Chapter 100- Kongming Humiliates Sima Yi in Battle Who Retaliates with ...

Okay, so set the scene for us. We've got the Wei forces under Cao Zhen and Sima Yi retreating after some heavy rains hit them hard. Right. Their gear's ruined. Morale is likely low. The obvious move for Kongming, leading the Shu forces, is to chase them down, finish them off. Seems like a golden opportunity. That's not what happens. And before we even get to Kongming's decision, there's this incredible, almost absurd bet between the Wei commanders. Ah, yes. The wager. It's amazing. Sima Yi basically bets Cao Zhen that Kongming won't pursue. And the stakes were pretty intense. Totally. Sima Yi promises, if he's wrong, he'll wear women's clothes and red makeup in public. Cao Zhen puts up his imperial jade belt and prized horse. Wow. Okay, so that tells you Sima Yi was incredibly confident about something. What was he so sure Kongming would do instead of pursuing? He banked on Kongming being too clever for the obvious trap. Sima Yi knew a pursuit would likely run straight into an ambush he'd probably already prepared. He figured Kongming would see the predictable move as the biggest risk. So Kongming's own generals are pushing for the attack. They see the retreating Wei army. Yeah, they see weakness. They see waterlogged armor, bogged down supplies. They're basically yelling, charge! But Kongming holds back. His thinking is, Sima Yi's too good for this to be simple. Exactly. He says, essentially, Sima Yi expects us to chase. Chasing means walking right into whatever trap he's laid. It's classic Kongming thinking several steps ahead. So instead of the chase, he pivots, lets the Wei army get further away, which must have driven his generals crazy. Oh, I'm sure it did. But Kongming redirects his entire focus onto one critical spot on the map, Qishan. Qishan. It comes up so often. Why there? What was so special about Qishan? Kongming apparently called it the head of Chang'an. Chang'an being a major capital. Control Qishan, and you basically control the gateway from the resource-rich Longji region. Okay, strategic location. But more than that, look at the geography. It sits right between two key valleys, the Jigu Valley and the Shigu Valley. Perfect terrain for maneuvering troops, setting ambushes. It gave Kongming options. So by grabbing Qishan, he's trading the immediate gratification of pursuit for a much stronger long-term positional advantage. Precisely. He's playing the long game, forcing Sima Yi to react to him, not the other way around. And it's also a psychological game, right? He's letting the Wei commanders think, maybe he's hesitant, maybe he's unsure. And Sima Yi saw it coming. Back at the Wei camp, while Cao Zhen is probably thinking, good, they're not chasing, Sima Yi is focused entirely on those two valleys near Qishan. He tells Cao Zhen, Kongming isn't going to follow us. He's going to hit us through Jigu and Shigu. Which leads directly back to that wager we mentioned. Cao Zhen dismisses it, Sima Yi insists, and boom, the bet is on. Imperial belt versus public humiliation. Incredible. But Sima Yi wasn't just making a showy bet, was he? He immediately took steps to ensure his prediction could work. No, he was deadly serious. He knew his strategy relied on waiting, on anticipating Kongming precisely. And for that, you need absolute, rock-solid discipline in your own ranks. No second guessing. And he enforced that quite brutally. Extremely. The sources say he was inspecting his troops, maybe even in disguise, and overheard a junior officer complaining. Complaining about what? Delaying? Yeah, about the delay, the fact that the commanders seem to be gambling with their lives while the Shu army was somewhere else. And Sima Yi's reaction? Immediate execution. Had the officer's head displayed right there. Wow. Just for grumbling. It sent a chilling message. Sima Yi basically told everyone, this isn't a game. Discipline is absolute. We wait, we follow the plan, and we win. He understood that even a little bit of doubt or dissent could unravel the whole thing. He needed that iron fist. Okay, so Sima Yi is clamping down hard to maintain control for his waiting strategy. Meanwhile, Kongming's dealing with the opposite issue, right? Impatience and dissent causing problems for his action strategy. That's the perfect contrast. Kongming makes his first move towards Kishan, sending troops through the Jigu Valley. Generals like Weiyan and Chen Xi are involved. And Kongming gives them very clear orders. Advance cautiously. Don't push too hard. This is about securing position, maybe drawing out the enemy, not a full-on assault. He specifically warns about ambushes. But one general, Chen Xi, doesn't listen. Nope. Apparently others, including the notoriously aggressive Weiyan, were grumbling. Saying Kongming was being too timid, pointing to past setbacks, maybe mentioning that rejected Zihu Valley plan. Ah, so peer pressure and maybe some bruised ego. Chen Xi wants to prove Kongming wrong. Seems like it. He takes his 5,000 men and just charges ahead into Jigu Valley, ignoring the explicit warning. And runs straight into it. Exactly what Sima Yi had waiting. A well-prepared ambush. Chen Xi's force was decimated. Reports say over 4,000 casualties out of 5,000. Just a few hundred wounded stragglers made it back. Devastating. And Kongming's reaction when Chen Xi returns? Swift and absolute. Execution. Right there, in front of the camp. Head displayed. The message was brutal. Disobey strategic orders, ignore warnings about ambushes, and this is the price. Discipline is paramount, it's harsh, but you see the military logic. He needs his plans followed perfectly, but then there's the Weiyan factor. Right. This is where it gets really interesting from a leadership perspective. Kongming knows Weiyan encouraged Chen Xi's disastrous move. He even notes privately something like, Weiyan has a rebellious disposition he holds grudges. But he doesn't execute him? Why not? Because Weiyan, despite his attitude, was an incredibly effective, brave, and valuable general on the battlefield. Kongming decided, in that moment, that Weiyan's battlefield utility outweighed the risk of his rebellious nature. So it's a calculated risk. He punishes the immediate failure, Chen Xi, but keeps the useful, albeit dangerous, asset, Weiyan. Exactly. It's a cold calculation. Short-term gain versus long-term potential trouble. A choice leaders often face. And one that, well, often has consequences down the line. Definitely something to keep in mind. Okay, so the Jigu Valley attack failed due to disobedience. Kongming's dealt with that failure decisively. Now what? Now Kongming knows Kaozen, Sima Yi's rival commander, is probably feeling pretty secure, maybe even smug, especially after the failure at Jigu. He decides it's time for the real strike, targeting Kaozen's main camp near the Jigu Valley entrance. And this isn't just a simple attack. It's complex. Multi-layered. Oh yeah. This is Kongming, the master strategist at work. It involved deception, timing, using the terrain. Brilliant stuff. Okay, break it down for us. Phase one. Phase one involves hidden movement. He sends multiple forces, commanders like Ma Dai, Wang Ping on one side, Ma Zong, Zeng Yi on the other, along secret mountain paths. They move only at night. Totally bypassing Kaozen's main defenses. Completely. Their goal is to get into flanking positions around Kaozen's camp, undetected, and wait for the signal. The signal is coordinated fires to be lit near Qishan. Okay, flanking forces moving into position silently. Meanwhile, Kaozen, is he aware of any of this? Not a clue. His scouts are reporting maybe small, scattered shoe units. Nothing alarming. He's likely feeling complacent, maybe still fixated on his rivalry with Zeng Yi, thinking the main threat passed. So when reports of some shoe movement do come in near his camp. He underestimates it. He just sends out a deputy, a general named Qin Liang, with about 5,000 troops to check it out. Sort of a routine patrol. Big mistake. Huge mistake. Qin Liang marches out, and is immediately ambushed and wiped out by Kongming's advance units, led by guys like Guan Xing and Liao Hua. Okay, so that's phase two. Lure out and eliminate the investigating force. Now for phase three. This is the really clever part, right? This is the Trojan horse moment. Kongming takes the captured Wei uniforms and armor from Qin Liang's defeated troops. No way! Yes. He outfits 5,000 of his own shoe soldiers in this captured Wei gear. Puts Guan Xing, Liao Hua, and others in charge. And they just march towards Kaozen's camp, pretending to be? Pretending to be Qin Liang's troops returning victoriously. They carry Wei banners. Everything looks right? Unbelievable. And Kaozen buys it. Completely. He hears his troops are returning successful, and he actually walks out of the camp entrance to greet them, probably feeling pretty pleased with himself. And that's when the trap springs. Violently. The disguised shoe soldiers, now inside or right at the entrance, suddenly attack from the front. Simultaneously, those mountain forces, Murai, Huangping, Ma Zong, Zhang Yi, who've been waiting silently, launch their attack on the rear and flanks, triggered by the fire signals. Total chaos for the Wei army. Attacked from inside, front, rear, flanks. Complete rout. Kaozen's army collapses. It's an utter disaster for him. He barely escapes with his life. Saved only by Sima Yi showing up. Yeah, Sima Yi arrives with his contingent, probably having anticipated something was going down just in time to rescue the fleeing, terrified Kaozen. So Sima Yi wins his bet, in a way. Kongming did attack through the valleys, just not Zhigu initially. And Sima Yi's insight here is crucial. How did he know to move towards Zhigu, even as the main actions seemed to be elsewhere earlier? Right. Was it just luck? Or did you figure it out? He figured it out. Later, he apparently explained it. When Kaozen kept reporting seeing not a single shoe soldier in force near the main expected routes. Sima Yi realized Kongming wasn't playing by the normal rules. Exactly. He deduced that Kongming must be using hidden paths, covert movements, bypassing the obvious lines of attack to strike directly at the presumably complacent camp command. He anticipated the unconventional. Which Kaozen completely failed to do. The defeat was devastating for him personally, wasn't it? Totally broke him. The sources say he was so overcome with shame, maybe fear too, that he fell seriously ill. He effectively ceded all military command to Sima Yi after this. Kongming gets word that Kaozen is sick. He's already ill in his camp. Now, the obvious move might be a direct assault, but Wei's forces are dug in. Tough nut to crack. So Kongming thinks outside the box. Way outside. He opts for something riskier, but potentially much more impactful. He writes a letter. Not just any letter, though. He gives it to captured Wei soldiers. Uh-huh. Soldiers. He then releases, tells them to deliver it straight to Kaozen. Which in itself is a bit of a power play, right? Letting them go. Definitely sends a message. But the content of the letter, that's where it gets really nasty. Oh, it's a masterclass in targeted abuse. Strategic abuse, you could call it. Starts by calling Kaozen an unlearned junior. Basically questioning his experience right off the bat. Ouch. But it gets worse. Much worse. It pivots to a political attack. Accuses him of serving usurpers, the Kao family. Betraying the legitimate Han dynasty. That hits right at his loyalty, his sense of honor. So attacking his core beliefs. Exactly. And then Kongming twists the knife. He makes it personal, focusing on Kaozen's recent military failures. Mocks the Wei retreat as rat scampering. Rat scampering? That's brutal. Yeah. Describes him running away with remnant troops, throwing away armor, ditching weapons. Paints this picture of utter incompetence and cowardice. And then contrasts it with his own army. Right. Says the Shu army's like tigers pouncing and dragons soaring. Total dominance versus pathetic failure. It's designed to inflict maximum psychological damage. You know what's interesting is how specific it is. He's not just trash talking. He's hitting specific vulnerabilities. Precisely. Kaozen was a proud general. Kongming attacked his military reputation, his political standing, his personal honor all at once. And remember, he sent those released soldiers back. They can presumably confirm how bad the retreat looked from the Shu perspective. But hang on. If Kaozen was already sick, wasn't this a bit excessive? Like kicking a man when he's down? Did Kongming risk looking petty? That's a fair question. But I think Kongming had a bigger strategic goal here. Getting rid of Kaozen wasn't just about removing one general. Ah, it was about who replaced him. Exactly. It was about forcing the Wei emperor to call up Sima Yi. Kaozen, despite maybe being less brilliant, knew Kongming's tricks. Sima Yi, while incredibly smart, was also famously cautious. Almost paranoid sometimes. Easier to manipulate, maybe. Or at least paralyzed with doubt. That seems to be the calculation. Kongming often aimed for stalemate or strategic advantage, not necessarily total annihilation. And Sima Yi's caution could be exploited. And did the letter work? Like a charm, according to the sources. Kaozen reads it, feels this hatred filling his chest. Just pure rage and shame. And dies that very night in his camp. Wow. So, psychological warfare just took a major piece off the board. Cleared the way for the main event. The duel everyone was waiting for. Kongming versus Sima Yi. And Sima Yi steps up, takes command, and immediately wants to restore Wei's honor, right? Which leads us to the Plains of Wyvern. Yes. And this incredible set piece. The Duel of Rays. A contest of pure military science. They meet, exchange some formal insults first, you know, the usual stuff. Sima Yi calls Kongming an unlearned plowman. And Kongming hits back, calling Sima Yi a servant of usurpers. Standard pre-battle banter for the time. But then they agree to fight a raise. What exactly does that mean? Displaying formations. Yeah, but showing off your best tactical formations. Sima Yi goes first, shows his mixed primeval energy array fancy name. And Kongming's reaction? Total dismissal. Basically says, eh, even my junior officers could do that. Pure psychological gamesmanship again. Then Kongming unveils his own masterpiece. The big one. The legendary 8 Trigrams Array. The buckwa. And Sima Yi, he recognizes it. He seems confident. Oh yeah, he identifies the eight gates correctly. Rest, life, wound, stop, feud, death, shock, open. He thinks he's got the measure of it. So he decides to test it, sends in some troops. He orders three generals, Da Ling, Zhang Hu, Lu Zhen, each with 30 riders, tells them go in the life gate, come out the rest gate, loop around and re-enter via the open gate. He thinks he knows the path. And this is where Sima Yi's confidence completely evaporates, right? What happens to those generals? They ride in, and bam, it's like hitting a maze. The sources describe it as a continuous city. They're instantly lost. A continuous city. How does a formation do that? It's not just static lines of soldiers. Think shifting geometry, paths that seem open but lead nowhere, coordinated movements creating illusions. It messes with your sense of direction. East, west, north, south, gone. So it attacks the mind, not just the body. Absolutely. Those 90 riders and three generals. They were psychologically defeated, disoriented, long before they were physically captured. Which they were. All of them. And Kongming doesn't just capture them. He follows up with this, well, it's pure theater, isn't it? Utter humiliation. It's extraordinary. He strips them of weapons, horses gone, then he paints their faces with ink. Ink? Like branding them? It's a profound public shaming in that culture. Then he makes them walk back, on foot, to Sima Yi's camp, and sends a message. Tell your master to go re-read his military textbooks. Oof. That's not just an insult to Sima Yi, that's aimed at demoralizing his entire officer corps. Exactly. Look how easily I captured your best men. Look how little I regard them. And Sima Yi's reaction? Predictable, I guess? Pure rage. Humiliation turns into fury. He immediately orders an all-out attack, desperate to regain face. Which is exactly what Kongming wanted. Seems like it. Because Sima Yi charges right into a pre-planned ambush. Guan Xing on one side, John Wei on the other. A disaster for Wei. Catastrophic. Sources say he lost six or seven-tenths of his troops. A massive blow. He barely escapes back across the Wei River. And crucially, this teaches Sima Yi a lesson, right? A very hard lesson. After the array humiliation and the ambush, he completely changes tactics. No more pitched battles. He digs in on the South Bank, fortifications up. His strategy becomes, wait, starve Kongming out, don't engage him directly. So Kongming wins the military engagements, forces a stalemate. Sima Yi won't come out and fight. Seems like Kongming has the upper hand. Militarily, perhaps. But war, as we said, isn't just fought on the battlefield. And Kongming's biggest vulnerability wasn't his army. It was politics back home. Ah, the home front. Sima Yi realizes he can't win conventionally. So he shifts focus. He starts looking for ways to apply pressure indirectly. Information warfare, political manipulation. And he gets his chance thanks to a guy named Guan. Who is he? A logistics officer. A subordinate of Lian, who was in charge of supplies. And Guan messes up. He's ten days late delivering grain. Apparently he was drunk. A pretty serious offense when an army depends on reliable supplies. And Kongming being Kongming is not pleased. Not at all. Logistics were everything to his campaign's deep in enemy territory. He orders Guan's execution. Harsh. But understandable. Maybe. But his advisor, Yang Yi, steps in. Says, look, we rely heavily on supplies from western Sichuan. Executing this guy might scare off other suppliers. It could damage the whole supply chain. So Kongming backs down. He commutes the sentence. Yeah. But he orders 80 strokes instead. A brutal public flogging. Painful, humiliating career ending. And Guan doesn't take this well. Filled with resentment. Arguably justifies resentment. He immediately defects. Goes straight to Simi Yi. And Simi Yi sees his opportunity. Not for military intel, but for something else. Exactly. Simi Yi shows his own strategic brilliance here. He sees Guan not just as a defector. But as a political weapon. He sends him back. Yes. Tells Guan he can earn great merit. His mission. Go back to Chengdu, the Shu capital. And spread a rumor among the palace eunuchs. What rumor? The deadliest one possible. That Kongming, far away on campaign, is actually planning to usurp the throne. Consolidating power. Building his own base. Hitting Kongming where he's most vulnerable politically. The young emperor. Precisely. Simi Yi knew the court dynamics. The young emperor, Hu Zu, was known to be influenced by these eunuchs who naturally resented Kongming's immense power and authority. And the eunuchs buy it. They run straight to the emperor. Kongming's getting too powerful. He's not coming back. He's going to declare himself emperor. Fear takes over. Even though people like Jiang Wan protested? Tried to defend Kongming? Didn't matter. The fear of usurpation was too strong. The emperor issues an immediate recall order. Kongming is to relinquish command instantly and return to Chengdu. So Simi Yi wins. He forces Kongming off the field without lifting a sword. Just by using political intelligence and spreading a rumor. That's quite something. It's a different kind of genius, isn't it? Political strategy defeating military strategy. But Kongming isn't done yet. He's forced to retreat. But how he retreats is his final masterstroke. Right. He gets the recall order. He must be furious lamenting it. He knows Simi Yi will be watching like a hawk. He knows a retreating army is incredibly vulnerable. Simi Yi will pursue the moment he confirms Kongming is pulling back. That could mean the destruction of the entire Shu army. So he needs a way to withdraw safely under the emperor's orders. But without Simi Yi breathing down his neck. And this leads to probably the most famous anecdote of their entire rivalry. The trick with the cooking stoves. Ah, yes. The adding stove strategy. Explain this. He orders the army to retreat. But tells them to do something really counterintuitive with their campsites. Right. Normal practice, if you want it to fake strength while retreating, might be what Sun Bin did centuries earlier. Decrease the number of cooking stoves each day. Make it look like your army is deserting. Lure the enemy into a hasty, overconfident pursuit. Okay, so that's the historical precedent. Decrease stoves. Fake weakness. But Kongming flips it. He orders his retreating army to increase the number of cooking stoves each day. Increase? How does that work? Give us an example. So say you have a thousand soldiers in a camp section. Day one of the retreat, they dig 2,000 stove pits. Day two, maybe 3,000. Day three, 4,000. It looks like the army is growing, not shrinking. That seems incredibly risky. If Sima Yi scouts the empty camp and counts the stoves, won't he just realize it's a trick? He knows Kongming is retreating eventually. Ah, but this is where Kongming plays Sima Yi's own psychology against him. He knows Sima Yi is brilliant, yes, but also deeply cautious. Terrified of falling into one of Kongming's elaborate traps. So the increasing stoves aren't meant to suggest the army isn't retreating. They're meant to suggest why it might be retreating. Exactly. Sima Yi finds the first empty camp. He's suspicious. Kongming retreating could be a trick. He orders the stoves counted. And his scouts report back, there are more stoves than yesterday. What does the cautious Sima Yi conclude? He doesn't think, ah, they're just digging extra holes. He thinks, this retreat is a feint. Kongming is luring me forward while massive reinforcements are arriving. He's building up for a huge ambush. The increasing stoves look like proof of arriving reinforcements. Yes. The potential cost for Sima Yi of being wrong, of charging into a trap set by the master strategist, is immense. It could mean the end of his army, his career, everything. The risk is simply too high for his cautious nature. So Kongming isn't just trying to slip away unnoticed. He's actively trying to make Sima Yi afraid to pursue. He wants Sima Yi to retreat himself. That's the absolute genius of it. And it works perfectly. Sima Yi gets the stove counts. He tells his generals, basically, see, I knew he had a plan. He's adding soldiers, preparing a trap. We pursue, we die. And he orders his own army back. He pulls back. And Kongming gets his entire army back to Chengdu safely. Without losing a single soldier, the source says. He won the retreat by weaponizing his opponent's fear of his own intellect. He turned Sima Yi's caution, his respect for Kongming's mind, into the very thing that defeated him in that moment. But Sima Yi must have found out eventually. He did. Later on, apparently, some local Sichuanese people spilled the beans. Told Sima Yi's men, no, no, there were no reinforcements. Kongming was retreating the whole time. The stoves were a bluff. How did Sima Yi react to realizing he'd been so thoroughly outsmarted? The sources say he looked up at the sky, sighed, and realized he'd been fooled by Kongming's application of a classic strategy called Yuzhu. Yuzhu. What does that mean? Roughly, it translates to something like the strategy of appearing empty or feigned weakness concealing real strength, or in this case, kind of the reverse, feigned strength conceding the reality of withdrawal. It's about presenting a confusing picture, a double bluff. Sima Yi was so busy worrying about the trap Kongming might be setting, he missed the simpler reality. And he admits defeat, in a way. Looking at the sky, utterly deflated, he says, in strategy, I am inferior to him. Acknowledging Kongming's operational genius.