The first snow fell in You Province. Liu Yu led his wives, concubines, children, and entire household northward into the wind and snow, presenting a profoundly lonely and desolate sight.
It made sense. Liu Yu was a Han imperial clansman and Governor of You Province, wealthy and exalted beyond measure. Yet in the end, he had been held hostage by his own subordinates, unable to control even himself. The devotion of the soldiers and civilians he had taken such pride in was also nothing but an illusion his subordinates had manufactured to please him. Defeated by Wang Yan of Liaodong, stripped of his family wealth, and with his servants dispersed, his entire family could only take a pile of splendid clothes and a jumble of household items. A few mules pulled several carts, while many of them had to travel on foot.
Such an immense fall from grace looked utterly bleak no matter how one saw it.
Yet the people standing at attention to see Liu Yu's party off were a group who, despite wearing coarse hemp clothes and being covered in grime, could be identified at a glance by their skin as people who had once lived in luxury. Shivering in the cold wind, they clutched tools as soldiers drove them toward the mountains.
They did not find Liu Yu pitiable. They even envied him somewhat. Who could have imagined that the fool they had privately mocked in the past had survived precisely because of his foolishness?
As for them, they would work until they died—or freeze and starve to death miserably. And after death, they would not even have graves, with no idea where they would be buried or alongside whom...
Having easily taken You Province, General Wang stationed himself in Ji County to direct affairs. Huang Zhong,