In 556, Yuwen Tai fell seriously ill and saw that he would not live long, but his appointed successor, Yuwen Jue, was still young (Yuwen Jue was only fifteen years old at the time), and Yuwen Tai needed to find a suitable person to assist his son.
Picking and choosing, he took a fancy to his nephew Yuwen Hu.
Yuwen Hu is Yuwen Tai's nephew, the relationship is close enough, and Yuwen Hu is rich and powerful, and his military achievements are outstanding, in Yu Wentai's eyes, he is the most suitable candidate.
As a result, Yuwen Tai appointed Yuwen Hu as an auxiliary chancellor before his death.
Yuwen Tai's choice had his reasons, but he forgot one thing: people can change
target
。
Soon after, Yuwen Tai died of illness, and his third son, Yuwen Jue, who was only fifteen years old at the time, relied on the elder Yuwen Jue to handle many important matters.
Yuwen Hu is a person with a lot of experience. From a young age, he followed his elders to join the Northern Wei Six Towns Rebel Army, which can be said to have grown up on the battlefield, and when he was a teenager, he went to Guanzhong to defect to Yuwen Tai.
At that time, Yuwentai's children were young, and Yuwentai often went out to lead soldiers to fight, and Yuwen Gou helped his uncle take care of the children, which made Yuwentai very grateful.
After Yuwen Tai became the commander-in-chief, Yuwen Hu followed him on his eastern expeditions and made many military achievements. Especially in the war in which the Western Wei army attacked Jiangling, Yuwen Hu performed well.
At that time, Yuwen Tai sent the general Jin and Yuwen Hu to lead the troops out together, and Yuwen Hu led the forward troops to break through quickly, cutting off the opponent's retreat at the first time, and then cooperating with the main force to defeat the opponent.
Since Yuwen Hu was both a relative and had many military achievements, Yuwen Tai asked him to assist the government before his death. At first, Yuwen Hu still tried his best to assist Yuwen Jue. In 557, under Yuwen Hu's arrangement, the Western Wei Emperor was forced to cede the throne to Yuwen Jue, who changed the name of the country to Zhou, and Northern Zhou was established.
However, with the passage of time, Yuwen Hu's influence in the imperial court grew larger and larger, and even overthrew the emperor Yuwen Jue, which caused some old ministers to be dissatisfied.
Among the old ministers, the most loyal to Yuwen Jue should be Zhao Gui and Du Guxin. Zhao Gui was an old courtier who had followed Yuwen Tai for many years, so when he saw that Yuwen Hu was increasingly authoritarian and overridden Yuwen Jue, Zhao Gui was very dissatisfied. So he found another veteran general, Du Guxin, and plotted to kill Yuwen Hu.
Unfortunately, they were not secret, and the news leaked, Yuwen Hu learned of it and preemptively attacked Zhao Gui, and then forced DuGu xin to commit suicide, and the two veteran generals died at the hands of the powerful minister Yuwen Hu.
But it wasn't over.
As Yuwen Jue grew older, he was also dissatisfied with the tyrannical Yuwen Jue and wanted to regain power. Although many of the veteran generals were eliminated by Yuwen Hu, Yu Wenjue soon found a new batch of supporters, mainly the ministers Li Zhi, Sun Heng, Gong Bo Yifufeng, Zhang Guangluo and others. They got together and discussed ways to kill Yuwen Go.
Since Yuwen Hu held military power, it was difficult to use the army to kill him, so they found another way, recruiting a group of strong soldiers in the name of martial arts training, so that they practiced their fists and feet every day, ready to find an opportunity to take Yuwen Hu.
Unfortunately, Yuwen Jue's use of people was overlooked, and there was a traitor zhang Guangluo in this gang. Zhang Guangluo secretly told Yuwen Hu about their plan.
Yuwen Hu's strategy was simple, directly transferring Li Zhi and Sun Heng out of the capital and driving out the two main forces of Yuwen Jue's camp.
As soon as Li Zhi and Sun Heng were transferred away, the remaining Gong Bo Yi Fu Feng and others were afraid, and they understood that this showed that Yuwen Hu had discovered his plan and was likely to attack him immediately.
In order to protect themselves, Gong Bo Yifufeng and others decided to launch an attack on Yuwen Hu as soon as possible.
However, as long as there was a spy Zhang Guangluo, any of their plans could not hide Yuwen Hu, and Zhang Guangluo quickly informed Yu Wenhu of the plan they wanted to do.
The bottom card was cleared by the opponent, and before he could do it, he was already downwind.
When Yuwen Hu learned that the other party wanted to kill him, he immediately found his close associates He Lanxiang, Wei Chigang and others to discuss countermeasures.
These few of Yuwen Hu's cronies were all military generals, and they were much tougher than Yuwen Jue's gang. He Lanxiang is from Wuchuan Town, has been fighting with Yuwen Tai for a long time, has made great achievements, and has worked with Yu Wenhu for a period of time, and the two have a good relationship.
Wei Chigang was good at riding and shooting, and his martial arts were excellent, and in the battle of the river bridge between Western Wei and Eastern Wei, Yuwen Tai's horse was shot by an arrow from the enemy and ran wildly, and it was Wei Chi gang who led his troops to fight the enemy to the death, which protected Yu Wentai from danger. During Yuwen Jue's reign, Wei Chigang served as the leader of the Forbidden Army, which was very crucial.
These were all masters who licked blood from the knife edge, and they were very decisive in their work, and when they learned that Yuwen Jue wanted to kill Yuwen Jue, He Lanxiang immediately proposed to abolish Yu Wenjue
throne.
Yuwen Hu then no longer hesitated and brought people into the palace, because Wei Chi Gang controlled the forbidden army, so Yu Wen Hu easily killed Gong Bo Yi Fu Feng, deposed Yu Wen Jue's throne, and established Yuwen Tai's eldest son Yuwen Yu as the new emperor, known as the Northern Zhou Ming Emperor.
A second puppet appeared.
Yuwen Yu (宇文毓), born in 534, was the second emperor of northern Zhou.
Although he ascended to the throne with the support of Yuwen Hu, Yuwen Yu was not an incompetent person, he had previously served in the local government with good political achievements, and after ascending to the throne, Yuwen Yu was more conscientious and conscientious, showing strong management ability.
Yuwen Hu did not expect Yuwen Yu to be so capable, which was not in his interest, and Yuwen Hu hoped to find an obedient puppet so that it would be convenient for him to gain power.
However, this is not a big problem for the fierce Yuwen Hu, since he chose the wrong person, then kill him and re-select him. So Yuwen Hu poisoned it again.
A man named Li An was in charge of Yuwen Yu's food, and he was actually Yuwen Yu's person, who secretly let Li An poison the food and poisoned Yu Wenyu.
One thing that went unforeseen by Yuwen Yu, yuwen Yu made a will before his death, allowing his younger brother Yuwen Yong to inherit the throne.
Since this was the emperor's last will, Yuwen Hu could not intervene, so he had to let the seventeen-year-old Yuwen Yong ascend to the throne.
Yuwen Yong was the fourth son of Yuwen Tai, with a calm personality and excellent knowledge, and usually did not talk a lot, but he could always talk about major events, and was deeply appreciated by Yuwen Yu, the Emperor of the Northern Zhou Dynasty.
In 560, after the Northern Zhou Ming Emperor Yuwen Yu was poisoned, Yuwen Yong ascended the throne according to his will and was known as Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou.
Although he became emperor, the situation facing Yuwen Yong was not much different from that of the previous two emperors, and the real power was still in the hands of Yuwen Hu.
When the enemy is too strong, taoguang is a good strategy.
Yuwen Yong learned the lessons of the previous two emperors, and did not clash with Yuwen Hu as soon as he came up, but tried his best to win him over.
At that time, the nominal emperor of Northern Zhou was Yuwen Yong, but the military power was in the hands of Yuwen Hu, and the dispatch of troops had to be approved by Yuwen Hu, and Yu Wen Hu's guard was even larger than the emperor's.
In this sinister situation, in order to curry favor with Yuwen Hu, Yuwen Yong specifically asked the hundred officials not to directly call Yuwen Hu's name in the documents to show their honor.
At the same time, Yuwen Yong also had great respect for Yuwen Hu's mother, and led the imperial family to visit him many times. Under Yuwen Yong's pull, Yuwen Hu's tense nerves relaxed, which did not kill the emperor.
At that time, Yuwen Hu was very powerful in Northern Zhou, and unless a major event occurred, it would be difficult to overthrow him. It was not until four years later that Yuwen Hu led a foreign war, and due to improper arrangement, it led to a major defeat, so Yuwen Hu's prestige was greatly damaged.
However, Yuwen Hu did not reflect, but continued to do a great job in the Northern Zhou, and his sons also used their father's power to do bad things, and more and more people resented Yuwen Hu.
After a long period of conspiracy and preparation, Yuwen Yong finally decided to take the opportunity to take care of Yuwen Hu. On this day, Yuwen Yong took Yuwen Hu to visit the Empress Dowager, and when he was about to arrive at the Empress Dowager's residence, Yuwen Yong said to Yu Wenhu: "Now that the Empress Dowager is old, she likes to drink, and she will not listen to any persuasion, please come and persuade her." "
Then Yuwen Yong naturally took out a prepared copy of the "Wine Curse" (written by the ancients
temperance
article), let Yuwen Hu read it to the Empress.
Yuwen Hu didn't think about it so much, and read it in front of the empress dowager with the "Sake Maker".
At this time, Yuwen Yong quietly walked behind him, and when he was not prepared, he suddenly smashed something on Yuwen Hu's head, knocking him to the ground. Yuwen Yong then quickly asked the eunuch on the side to take a knife and slash Yuwen Hu. As a result, the eunuch was so nervous that he didn't even hit it after cutting several times.
Fortunately, his accomplice Yuwen Zhi hid in the house and rushed out in time to kill Yuwen Hu. As soon as Yuwen Hu died, his forces were leaderless, and Yuwen Yong immediately ordered that Yuwen Hu's sons and cronies be quickly wiped out, at this time, twelve years had passed since Yuwen Yong ascended the throne.