With so resolute a commander victory was almost assured. Changnan, vigorously assailed, quickly surrendered, and the captive prince of Chin was executed as a rebel taken in arms. Lieouyu, who had been winning victories elsewhere, now arrived, having marched in all haste to the aid of his valorous lieutenant. Praising Wangchinon for the brilliancy of his achievement, the commander was about putting his forces on the march for new victorious deeds, when peremptory orders recalled him to the capital, and his career of conquest was for the time checked. The absence of the strong hand was quickly felt. The rebels rose again in force, Changnan was lost and with it all the conquests Lieouyu had made, and the forces of the empire were everywhere driven back in defeat. Meanwhile Lieouyu, at the capital, found himself in the midst of political complications that called for decisive measures. The weakness of the emperor troubled him, while he felt a deep resentment at what he considered ill treatment on the part of the throne. He had, as Prince of Song, been raised to the third rank among the princes of the realm, but he thought his deeds entitled him to rank among the first; while the success of the rebels in the absence of his master had redoubled his reputation among the people. Ganti, the emperor, was destined to experience the dangerous consequences of raising a subject to such a height and yet leaving him below the rank to which he aspired. Lieouyu, now all-powerful in military circles, and virtually master of the realm, caused the emperor to be strangled, and named his brother Kongti as successor to the throne. But the ambition of the shoemaker's boy had not reached its summit. This was but a provisional step, and the throne itself lay before him as an alluring prize. Having skilfully laid his plans, Lieouyu, at the end of two years, gave the weak Kongti to understand that his reign was at an end, and that he must step down from the throne which a stronger than he proposed to ascend.