I wonder if it is because of his inferiority complex in appearance that Cao Cao was quite rebellious and stubborn when he was young. Peisongzhi’s annotation in the annals of the Three Kingdoms quoted the biography of Cao concealed the truth, which records that Cao Cao “liked flying eagles and running dogs and wandered freely” when he was young. According to the current words, he was an angry youth. Generally speaking, those who achieve great things are early. Naturally, the puberty of Cao Cao comes earlier than that of ordinary people. Just as Zheng Zhihua’s song “young age” sings, “a man should deliberately loosen a few buttons on his shirt and show his chest…”
Here, we use two things to restore Cao Cao’s life at that time:
The first thing is recorded in the annals of the Three Kingdoms – Emperor Wu Ji. It is said that Cao Cao’s uncle worried that Cao Cao would not become a talented person in the future, so he told Cao Cao Cao’s father Cao song about Cao Cao Cao’s indulgence in playing and asked for strict discipline. After being severely reprimanded by his father, Cao Cao did not mean to “turn back the prodigal son”. On the contrary, he blamed his uncle for being a bit nosy, so he came up with a clever idea to deal with his uncle. One day, Cao Cao’s uncle came to see him. Cao Cao pretended to have a stroke. Cao Cao’s uncle told Cao song that when Cao song came back to see Cao Cao, Cao Cao returned to his original state and said that his uncle said that I had a stroke because he didn’t like me. After that, Cao song did not listen to his uncle.
The second thing is that when Cao Cao was young, he played with Yuan Shao very hard, and specialized in some unreliable things. For a time, he became friends with many parties and ran through the streets. Once, when a family got married, Cao Cao and Yuan Shao went to see the excitement, but they wanted to steal their bride. First they hid in someone else’s garden. When it was dark, they suddenly shouted, “there is a thief!”! People attending the wedding rushed out of the house one after another, while Cao Cao took advantage of the chaos to get into the bridal chamber, held it with a knife and stole the bride. However, they were soon found and caught up. They left the bride and ran away in a hurry. In a panic, they rushed to a thorny bush. Cao Cao was quick and leaped by. Yuan Shao is a little fat man. He can’t pass the first jump, but he can’t pass the second jump. The cry of catching the thief came closer and closer. Yuanshao panicked and bowed his head to drill into the gap in the thorns. As a result, his clothes were caught and yuanshao dared not move. Seeing that the pursuer was in front of him, Cao Cao, quick witted, pointed to Yuan Shao and shouted, “here is the thief who stole the bride!” Yuan Shao panicked as soon as he heard this. He rushed forward with all his life and finally escaped. This event was recorded in Shishuoxinyu.
Of course, such a small fight is not very enjoyable for Cao Cao. Later, Dong Zhuo was in chaos, and Cao Cao finally had a chance to show his strength. In the romance of the Three Kingdoms, there is a description that after DongZhuo came to Beijing, he was domineering and did not pay attention to the emperor at all, so a group of literary ministers who played with pens would gather in Wang Yun’s “private club” to cry bitterly. Cao Cao happened to be “drinking tea” there once. Seeing this, he whispered to himself: “can you fools cry to death DongZhuo?” Later, he couldn’t help it, so he stood up and said, “although Cao Cao is not talented, I would like to break Dong Zhuo’s head and hang the capital gate to thank the world.” In fact, Cao Cao didn’t have any good ideas at that time. He just wanted to assassinate Dong Zhuo in some way. This was the later famous Meng Dexian Dao. Of course, this thing is so famous that many people think it is true. In fact, Cao Cao never assassinated DongZhuo in history. But DongZhuo valued Cao Cao’s talent and wanted to “incorporate” him to serve him. Cao Cao didn’t want to make trouble for the tiger, so he changed his name and ran away.
Although it is said that Meng De’s offering of knives is not true, there are two things that are proved to be true. First, Cao Cao did have assassination records on his file. Second, Cao Cao in exile really got involved with DongZhuo. Let’s talk about the first thing first. At that time, Cao Cao’s father, Cao song, was working as an official in Luoyang, the capital. Once, when Cao Cao went to Luoyang, he unexpectedly broke into the bedroom of serving officer Zhang rang and tried to assassinate him. This Zhang rang was one of the ten constant attendants who made the imperial government chaotic at that time, and he was a popular man around the emperor. This person has a very bad reputation in the society because he uses his power exclusively and destroys loyal and good people. Seeing that a courtier was in power, Cao Cao, an angry young man, suddenly became angry and decided to assassinate Zhang rang. At that time, the situation was very interesting. Zhang rang was in bed and closed his eyes. Suddenly, he found that a stranger had broken in. He immediately shouted and called for someone to catch him. In an instant, the guards closed the gate and swarmed in with swords and guns. But Cao Cao was not in a hurry. He took a halberd and fought from the bedroom to the hall and from the hall to the wall. None of the guards dared to approach. Finally, he watched him climb over the wall. As for Zhang rang, who has always been domineering, why didn’t he settle accounts after autumn? I think there may be two reasons. One is that Cao Cao made his first crime when he was young, which was an attempt to “kill with passion”; Second, Cao Teng, Cao Cao’s grandfather, was a systematic man (both eunuchs) and did not mean to make things too difficult.
The second thing is that when the 18th route princes were attacking DongZhuo, Hua Xiong was killed, and DongZhuo burned Luoyang and moved its capital to Chang’an. Seeing that the situation was very good, Cao Cao suggested that other princes should pursue the poor invaders. However, these princes all harbored evil intentions and wanted to preserve their strength and enjoy the fruits of victory. No one came forward. Seeing this, Cao Cao said angrily, “it’s nothing to do with the upright man!” So he led more than ten thousand elite soldiers of his headquarters to pursue DongZhuo. However, Cao Cao overestimated his army’s combat capability. After Dong Zhuo, a skinny camel, fought back, Cao Cao was wiped out, leaving only 500 of his 10000 men. At the critical moment, Cao Cao, the angry bird, would have been the target of the hunter if his younger brother Cao Hong hadn’t spared no effort to block him for several times.
Of course, things often have two sides. The “bile type” character brings risks as well as opportunities to Cao Cao. In the end, Cao Cao’s spirit of winning through hard work eventually became a great cause for the future.