The Jurchens went back home and found an error with their order. Excuse me, we ordered 32 princes, you gave us 31. Where is the missing one? Let me speak to your manager.
The missing prince was Zhao Gou. He happened to be elsewhere when the capital fell, and he became the next emperor. So the Jurchens went after him. They chased him from Hebei to Henan to Shandong to Jiangsu to Zhejiang. With nowhere else to run, Zhao Gou found a boat and stayed out at sea for several months. The Jurchen general looked out at the ocean and sighed, this guy is a real Running Man. Then they retreated. The Jurchens didn’t have a proper navy. Otherwise they could have made Zhao Gou into another Tom Hanks in Cast Away.
A few months later, Zhao Gou went back to the capital with Wilson. He assembled a few capable generals for revenge, the most famous being Yue Fei. Go fight, go fight. Wait, why do they keep winning? Will they take over my throne? No no, don’t fight, don’t fight. Oh no, the Jurchens are here again. Go fight, go fight. Wait, if the two emperors come back, I can’t be emperor anymore. No no, don’t fight, don’t fight.
He became like a paranoid clingy boyfriend. Then he gave Yue Fei twelve missed calls, ordered him back to the capital, and killed him. After that, he contacted the Jurchens. Hey look, I’ve killed my best general as a token of sincerity. I’m even willing to give you more money every year. Let it be peace between us. And peace he got. He lived to his eighties.
When Zhao Gou was running from the Jurchens, he had been so panicked that he became infertile, so he passed the throne to an adopted son. The son wanted to fight back, but all the capable generals had been killed by Zhao Gou. So he failed and paid even more money to the Jurchens. The next few emperors were similar. Fight. Lose. Pay more money.
Then the prime minister found a rando, Zhao Yun, by the roadside and made him the next emperor. Then, breaking news: the Mongols were beating the Jurchens left and right. So he secretly sent people to contact the Mongols. They formed an alliance to destroy the Jurchens together.
The war began. The Song army fought bravely like how the Italians fought bravely in World War Two… Wait, why am I saying this again? I thought I already said it when I was covering Zhao Ji. Anyway, the alliance destroyed the Jurchen empire. And then Zhao Yun did the unthinkable. He attacked the Mongols.
He fucking attacked the Mongols.
The weakest army of the time attacked the strongest. Unprepared. Unprovoked. It’s roughly the same scale of stupidity as Hitler declaring war on the US after Pearl Harbor.
The last three emperors were all little boys. The first was surrendered to the Mongols when he was five. The second nearly drowned while fleeing and died when he was nine. Finally, the prime minister carried the last and youngest one and jumped into the sea.