When Liu Biao fell ill, he called Liu Bei to Jing Province and told him that when he died his younger brother should become master of Jing. Liu Bei declined. When Kongming asked why he had refused, Liu Bei answered that he could not seize the land of a man who had treated him with kindness and courtesy, just when that man was in danger. Kongming sighed that he was a truly humane lord.
Meanwhile Cao Cao gave Xiahou Dun a hundred thousand troops to probe Xinye. Kongming commanded troops for the first time and set fire to the narrow road at Bowang Slope. Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, who had grumbled that he was too young, got down from their horses and bowed before Kongming’s carriage as it came back. Around the time Cao Cao raised an army of five hundred thousand, Liu Biao died, and Lady Cai and Cai Mao forged his will to set up his fourteen-year-old second son, Liu Cong. Liu Cong gave Jing Province to Cao Cao without a fight.
Yi Ji urged Liu Bei to go to Xiangyang on the pretext of mourning and seize Liu Cong, and Kongming told him to do it. Liu Bei wept. If I seize the son my brother entrusted to me on his deathbed and take his land, with what face could I meet him below? Kongming posted notices at the four gates of Xinye telling any of the people who wished to follow to take refuge with them in Fancheng, and then drove off Cao Ren’s troops, who had moved into the empty town, with fire and water.