In July of that year, King Chu Mu summoned Zheng Mugong and Chen Gonggong to Xixian County, asking the two countries to send troops to cooperate with the Chu army to attack the Song Dynasty, and then summoned the Luzi. The birthplace of the Kingdom of Lu is in present-day Baihe, Shaanxi, and it is a small viscount country. In August, the coalition army marched to the city of Shangqiu.

This year is the third year of Song Zhaogong, the Song State office is turbulent, and the monarch and ministers are not in harmony; Far from bringing the Song people together, Chu caused even greater chaos.

Faced with this situation, the Great Si Kouhua said: "Instead of waiting for the Chu State to weaken our country, it is better to take the initiative to show weakness to the Chu State, why wait for the enemy to persecute it?" If the public office is not strong, what is the crime of the people? ”

The people of the Song Dynasty opened the city gate and welcomed the people of Chu to the capital; Song Zhaogong stood beside King Chu Mu and listened to his orders.

At this time, it was already winter, and King Chu Mu said: "Bugu heard that Meng Zhu is a good hunting ground, and Chen Hou and Zheng Bo happen to be there, how about we go to Meng Zhu to hunt?" ”

Song Zhaogong did not dare to disobey, and he guided the monarchs of various countries to Meng Zhu. As a result, an incident that occurred during the hunting actually triggered the Great War of Chu and Song more than ten years later (the process of the incident of the Chu people humiliating Song Zhaogong will be described in detail in the chapter of King Chu Zhuang and Song Dynasty).

In the spring of the tenth year of King Chu Mu, the Chu division attacked the kingdom of Li. It turned out that at the meeting of the Song League convened by King Chumu last year, the deer was bewitched by the doctor and escaped with the army one night.

The Chu division defeated the Lu division at Fangzhu, and the Lu people immediately retreated into the city and did not come out, and the Chu army was not enough to attack the city, so they had to retreat. Seeing that he could not make the Lu people submit, the king of Chu Mu ordered Pan Chong's son Pan Dang to lead his army to attack the Lu again, and the Chu division conquered the Xixue this time, and the Lu people were forced to sue for peace.

In the eleventh year of King Chu Mu, the state of Chu sent troops to attack Qunshu.

In the vast area of Shucheng in Anhui Province as the center, north to the Huai River, south to the Yangtze River, and east to Sihong, there are several small countries with the surname Yan, and these small countries mostly take Shu as the name of the country, such as Shu Jiu, Shu Yong, Shu Li, Long Shu, etc., so they are called "Qunshu".

During the Yin Shang period, the ancestors of Qunshu lived in the Central Plains until the reign of King Wu of the Shang Dynasty, and then moved south to the place where they lived in the Spring and Autumn Period and became a branch of Huaiyi.

After history entered the Spring and Autumn Period, Qunshu gradually became the object of competition for Qi and Chu. In the early Spring and Autumn Period, the state of Xu (present-day south of Sihong, north of the Huai River) had been controlling Qunshu, and Duke Huan of Qi gained control of Qunshu by conquering Xu. Later, King Chumu successively destroyed the three Huaiyi countries of Jiang, Liu, and Tate, thus opening the door to Qunshu. The Qunshu states were small and scattered, unable to gather effective forces to fight against the Chu State, and finally had to bow down to the Chu State.

In the twelfth year of Duke Lu Wen, Cheng Daxin died, and King Chumu's physical condition also had problems. When Qunshu learned of this good news, he broke away from the Southern Alliance at the call of Shu (southwest of present-day Lujiang, Anhui) and Zong (northwestern of present-day Lujiang). King Chu Mu was furious and immediately ordered the new Ling Yin Chengjia to attack Qunshu.

In the summer, Cheng Jia led an army to the expedition, he obtained an army from the state of Cai, and the coalition army marched to Shu Jiu (now Shucheng, Anhui). The coalition army took advantage of the victory to encircle Zongguo in the south, and the friends of Qunshu retreated in the country and did not dare to show their heads; Only Shu Guo sent troops to the rescue, but the reinforcements were wiped out by the enemy's tactics of encircling and sending reinforcements.

There was no food in the country, so he had to open the city and surrender. The coalition army continued to attack the Shu State in the south, and the main force of the Shu army had been completely annihilated on the way to rescue the Zongguo, and the Shu people were forced to give up resistance and open the city gates. Shuzi disguised himself as a small trader and fled to the nest (present-day Anqingbei, Anhui), where Cheng Jia led an army to follow and surround the nest. The nest people didn't dare to provoke the fire, so they had to hand over the exiles to the Chu people.

Cheng Jia then lifted the siege of the nest and returned to Yingdu with the two kings of the dead country, and Zong and Shu perished. After the destruction of the two countries, Cheng Jia left behind his army and appointed an administrator in each of them. The administrators of these two places have resorted to brutal and high-handed tactics against the indigenous people, and naturally they have been strongly hostile to the locals.

King Chu Mu died in the twelfth year, and the crown prince Xiong Lu ascended the throne as the king of Chuzhuang. At that time, Yin was Chengjia and Da Sima was like a fight, and these two people were carefully selected by King Chu Mu to assist his son; The two important brothers of the king of Chuzhuang, the prince Ying Qi and the prince, only the elder brother Ma Shou Zhan; The right Yin Baojia and Taishi Pan Chong are also loyal to the royal family.

And it was precisely in this royal family, which seemed to have no unstable factors, that a serious civil strife broke out, so serious that it almost strangled King Chuzhuang, one of the five hegemons of the Spring and Autumn Period, in the cradle of the early days of his reign.

As mentioned earlier, King Chumu's most trusted brother is called Wang Zixie. Wang Zixie started as a low-level commander of the Yingdu garrison and worked his way up to the position of chief secretary.

Wang Zixie controlled the domestic intelligence system during his tenure as the chief secretary, and was an out-and-out secret agent; The order of the king of Chumu to get rid of those who dissided, openly or secretly, was to be done by him; And in addition to serving King Chu Mu with all his heart, that guy also killed many of his enemies by the way.

The people of Chu counted all their lives on the head of King Chu Mu. Although King Chu Mu needed a scavenger to do something unseemly, he was also increasingly dissatisfied with this brother. Wang Zixie's behavior became more and more rampant, and King Chumu's dissatisfaction became more and more intense. Wang Zixie eventually became a person hated by the government and the opposition in the Chu State.

Before Cheng Daxin's death, King Chu Mu asked him for a successor, and Cheng Daxin said: "Dou Pan (Ling Yin Ziwen's son) is okay, he is loyal to the royal family and has no selfishness, and he has the legacy of the first great master Ziwen." However, King Chu Mu thought that Dou Pan was too upright and incompatible with Wang Zixie and Dou Jiao and others, and was afraid that he would make a mess, so he did not take his opinion.

Wang Zixie has always coveted Ling Yin's position, and he took the initiative to recommend himself to King Mu. However, King Chu Mu has a principle in employing people, that is, he must not hand over the throne to any prince. For if a man has great power and at the same time is qualified to be king, he will threaten not only himself, but also his successor; Not to mention that Wang Zixie is an out-and-out villain.

After careful consideration, King Chu Mu finally handed over Ling Yin's power to Cheng Daxin's brother Cheng Jia. It is said that after the appointment was announced, Wang Zixie actually tortured and killed many slaves for a period of time to vent his anger.

After the death of King Chumu, Wang Zixie began to actively look for allies to overthrow the new king's rule; His goal was not to become Ling Yin, but to become the new king of Chu.

As mentioned earlier, after Shen Gong Douke was released by Qin Mugong, he was ordered by King Cheng of Chu to single-handedly promote the establishment of diplomatic relations between Qin and Chu; But after the deed was completed, he did not get the reuse of the king of Chu, but has been working as his small county prince in a remote county.

There are many reasons for this: first, he has been a prisoner of the enemy, and he has been doing it for more than ten years; This inglorious history not only affected his reputation, but also caused the Chu people to distrust him for a long time in an enemy country; second, the king of Chu intended to limit the power of the Ruo Ao clan; The third is that he really has no real skills except for being able to talk big.

Dou Ke decided to vent his anger on the king of Chu Zhuang, and as a result, he got together with Wang Zixie, preparing to turn the state of Chu upside down, and the two later contacted the equally unhappy Qu Yukou (former Xi Gongzibian).

After the death of King Chumu, the three began to look for opportunities. Soon, Qunshu in the east announced that it was out of the control of the Chu State, and the opportunity came.