List of Fictitious Stories in Romance of The Three Kingdoms - Zhou Yu's Death

Zhou Yu's Death

Zhou Yu's death is mentioned in chapter 57 of Romance of the Three Kingdoms. In the previous chapter, Zhou Yu came up with a plan to help Sun Quan seize Jing Province from Liu Bei. He pretended that he wanted to help Liu Bei attack Yi Province (covering present-day Sichuan and Chongqing) in western China, and asked for passage through Jing Province. When Liu Bei agreed, Zhou Yu was overjoyed because his true intention was to conquer Jing Province when his army passed through. However, Zhuge Liang saw through Zhou Yu's ruse and set up a trap in Jing Province. Zhou Yu fell into the trap and was surrounded by Liu Bei's forces. He was overwhelmed by fury and fell off his horse. Zhuge Liang later wrote a letter to Zhou Yu, asking the latter to give up on attacking Yi Province and return to Wu instead because Cao Cao might take advantage of Zhou's absence to invade Wu. Zhou Yu then wrote to Sun Quan and told the other Wu generals to give their full support to their lord. He fainted afterwards, regained consciousness and sighed, "If (Zhou) Yu were to be born, why must (Zhuge) Liang exist as well?" He died after repeating that line several times.

This was the third time Zhou Yu had been infuriated by Zhuge Liang after sustaining an arrow wound at the Battle of Jiangling, a follow-up to the Battle of Red Cliffs. The first time was when Liu Bei, acting on the advice of Zhuge Liang, seized control of many territories in Jing Province when Zhou Yu and his men were busy fighting with Cao Cao's forces for control of the province. The second time was when Zhuge Liang foiled his "beauty scheme". (See #Liu Bei and Lady Sun's marriage.) Zhou Yu's condition worsened after each incident and he eventually died on the third time.