Chapter 120: One Kingdom Again
Upon hearing about the end of Shu and the creation of Jin, whoever the previous unimportant emperor of Wu was grows anxious and dies. He names his son as successor, but a couple members of the court tell the prime minister that the kid is too young, and he should get a cousin named Sun Hao to come in to be emperor instead.
The prime minister isn't too sure about this, so he goes to ask the old emperor's mom, who shrugs and says, beats me, pick who you want. Real riveting stuff, thanks for including that in the book.
Sun Hao is a pretty terrible emperor, spending all the money on himself and whittling away Wu's resources. One minister calls him out because Sun Quan had only a hundred royal concubines; Sun Mao, meanwhile, has thousands. I don't even know what you do with a thousand concubines. Hell, I barely know what you do with one.
Meanwhile, he's twice as mean and punishing as that one regent Sun Chen ever was, peeling skin off of faces and gouging out the eyes of anyone he doesn't happen to like. On top of that, he starts designating new epochs at a rate of one a year, calling them things like "Sweet Dew" and "Precious Tripod". Even if that second one is a bad translation we still have a real GOAT contender over here.
Pretty much nothing happens for some time. Things are so boring between Wu and Jin that at one point two generals, one on each side, meet up and become really cute friends for a while until Sun Hao catches wind of it and demotes his guy, thereby ruining the whole stupid rom-com.
You would think that this chapter would be action-packed considering it's the last one and we still haven't resolved the whole "three kingdoms" thing, but here's the bulk of the middle of this chapter:
- Yang Hu—the guy who made friends with that Wu officer that got demoted—writes to Sima Yan telling him since that guy's gone, now is the time to invade; but Sima Yan is talked out of it. Nothing happens.
- Yang Hu then goes to see Sima Yan asking him why he's not launching an invasion, so Sima Yan asks him to lead it. Yang Hu says he's too old now, get someone else. Nothing happens.
- Months later, Sima Yan goes to see Yang Hu on his deathbed. Yang Hu goes, so, you still haven't done the invasion. Sima Yan tells him, yeah, we just couldn't find the right person to pull it off. Yang Hu says, oh, I knew a guy the whole time, I'm just so humble I didn't want him to get famous and reward me for recommending him. Then he dies.
- Sima Yan appoints the guy he recommended, Du Yu. Nothing happens.
- A minister petitions Sima Yan to go attack Wu before Sun Hao dies and somebody competent steps in. Somebody else seems to think Sun Hao just deployed some soldiers in a preemptive defense, so they should wait a year for those troops to fatigue. Nothing happens.
- Du Yu writes to Sima Yan, and asks—
Well, eventually they get on with it. When Jin finally launches their invasion, Wu sends its army to counter. This army doesn't last too long, though, because when they meet the Jin troops and seemingly drive them away, they—say it with me, everybody—follow the retreating army into an ambush.
At this point, everything pretty much devolves into chaos as Wu officers are ducking every which way trying to escape the onrush of Jin soldiers, only to be cut down. Even the huge-ass chains Wu strung up across the river to stop the Jin navy from sailing in are easily dealt with, as the naval officer places some torches with burning oil on some rafts and sends them down to melt the iron.
Although we all know that hemp oil can't melt iron chains. I smell a conspiracy.
In no time at all, many of Wu's defensive positions along the border have been overrun, and Jin begins their invasion proper. Wu mounts one last token fight for all of the generals who prefer to go down swinging, but at this point, the writing's pretty much on the wall for Wu. As Jin approaches the capital, Sun Hao considers slitting his throat; but one of his advisors points out that Liu Shan made out okay, so perhaps he should just try surrendering?
He does, and at last, Wu is transferred over to Jin without any of those rebellious shenanigans that accompanied the fall of Shu. And with that, China is united once more. Finally.
Afterward, Sima Yan invites Sun Hao over for a feast. He gestures to an empty chair, saying, I've been saving this seat for you.
Sun Hao replies, that's funny, because I'd been saving a seat for you at my place, too. They both laugh.
Jia Chong decides he wants to ruin the mood and humiliate the fallen emperor. He asks, so, really, what kind of people deserved that whole face-peeling and eye-gouging stuff you liked to do?
Sun Hao replies, oh, I mostly just saved that for vassals who wanted to revolt and slay their rightful liege.
Jia Chong suddenly goes silent. Sima Yan asks what the matter is.
"Well," replies Jia Chong, "The story ends with me being really impacted by that comment, since I played a major role in helping your father kill off the emperor Cao Mao, but Skep kind of glossed over my involvement so now this ending doesn't make a lot of sense."
"Huh," says Sima Yan. "Well, it's already kind of a weird note to end this story on anyway, if you think about it."
"I guess so," Jia Chong remarks, but adds nothing else.
A moment passes in stilted silence. Then Sima Yan cheerfully beckons to Sun Hao. "Well, anyway, welcome to Jin! May it last for at least two hundred years."
It doesn't.
The end.