Fei Yi

Early career

Fei Yi was from Meng County (鄳縣), Jiangxia Commandery (江夏郡), which is present-day Luoshan County, Henan. His father died when he was still young so he was raised by his distant relative, Fei Boren (費伯仁), who was a cousin of Liu Zhang, the Governor of Yi Province (covering present-day Sichuan and Chongqing). Sometime around 211, Liu Zhang sent messengers to escort Fei Boren to his domain, and Fei Yi joined the former as a travelling student in Yi Province. Fei Yi remained in Yi Province after Liu Bei seized control of the province from Liu Zhang in 214. He was comparable with Xu Shulong (許叔龍) and Dong Yun, who were his close friends and scholars in Yi Province.

After Liu Bei declared himself emperor in 221 and designated Liu Shan as the crown prince, he appointed Fei Yi and Dong Yun as Liu Shan's attendants. When Liu Shan ascended the throne in 223, Fei Yi was appointed as a Gentleman of the Yellow Gate despite his intimate relation with the new emperor. When the regent Zhuge Liang returned from his southern campaign against rebellious tribes in southern Shu, many officials offered several tens of li to buy him off; however, Zhuge Liang asked Fei Yi, rather than any of those with higher posts, to take a ride with him. Zhuge Liang's action surprised many, and they changed their opinion of Fei Yi because of it.

During Zhuge Liang's regency

It is not clear how Zhuge Liang got to know Fei Yi's abilities, but by the time the former returned from the south and acquired military supremacy, he had arranged a series of reallocation of resources, and Fei Yi, who was among those Zhuge Liang repeatedly announced "most capable of the officials," was assigned important tasks.

As an ambassador

Following the reestablishment of the Wu-Shu alliance, Fei Yi served as an ambassador to Shu's ally state Wu. Fei Yi's biography in the Sanguozhi mentioned that during this time, Fei Yi did not back down when debating with the Wu scholar-officials. However, several other biographies in the Sanguozhi point out that Fei Yi faced much ridicule during his mission. According to Dong Yun's biography, the Wu emperor Sun Quan once asked a rude but critical question during a banquet. A drunk Sun Quan said," Yang Yi and Wei Yan, despite their contributions to Shu, were problematic. If Zhuge Liang dies, they will cause mischief! Are you guys fools not to prepare for the succession?" Fei Yi could not give an answer and he kept looking around for help. Dong Hui then told Fei Yi to answer that Yang Yi and Wei Yan fought against each other due to a personal feud and neither possessed great ambition; in light of the current situation, it would not be wise to not use them. Sun Quan laughed at Fei Yi. In an annotation in Zhuge Ke's biography, Sun Quan once made a joke on Fei Yi by telling his Wu officials to continue eating when Fei Yi entered the vestibule. Seeing that, Fei Yi said, "when a lion arrives, a cub will spit its food from its mouth. Now the donkeys are ignorant, so they keep on eating." Zhuge Ke promptly replied from his seat, "we planted mallows to wait for a phoenix to glide upon, but where comes a small bird instead? Why don't we spring him and send him back to where he belongs?" Fei Yi stopped eating the cake in his mouth, and requested a pen (brush), while Zhuge Ke also asked the same. They each wrote a poem, and admired each other's work. Nevertheless, Sun Quan apparently liked Fei Yi so much that he openly praised Fei Yi's talents on numerous occasions. When Fei Yi finally needed to go back to Shu, Sun Quan gave him his sword and said, "You are of good character and Zhuge Liang will put your talents to good use. I bet you will not be able to come visit me often in the future." Fei Yi sincerely accepted Sun Quan's gift and encouraged him to work closely together with Shu.

As a trusted aide of Zhuge Liang

After Fei Yi's return to Shu, he received a promotion and resumed his work in the palace agency. At the recommendation of Zhuge Liang, Fei Yi's power in the palace became influential, as Zhuge Liang asked Liu Shan to let the officials consult Fei Yi and his colleagues on all important issues. When Zhuge Liang went to Hanzhong Commandery and rearranged Wei Yan's area of responsibility, he asked Fei Yi to go to the frontline to serve as his Military Adviser to keep the conflict between Wei Yan and Yang Yi under control. Wei Yan often brandished his weapon in front of Yang Yi whenever they quarrelled and Yang Yi would cry in fear. Then, Fei Yi would step in to stop them from fighting. Zhuge Liang gave credit to Fei Yi for maintaining the peace between Wei Yan and Yang Yi.

In 234, when Zhuge Liang became critically ill during his final campaign against Wei at the Battle of Wuzhang Plains, Liu Shan sent messengers to inquire as to who should succeed him. Zhuge Liang recommended Jiang Wan as his successor and Fei Yi as Jiang Wan's successor. After Zhuge Liang's death later that year, a dispute on whether to abort the campaign followed. Wei Yan, who was assigned area responsibility over Liang Province, assumed his autonomous authority to urge continuing the battle, while the majority agreed with Yang Yi's view to retreat. Fei Yi picked Yang Yi's side and went to Wei Yan's tent to observe the latter. Wei Yan, arguing that the death of one individual should not interfere with their ultimate goal of restoring the Han dynasty, forced Fei Yi to help him reorganise the army for the expedition. Fei Yi tricked Wei Yan by saying "I'll go explain the issue to Yang Yi. He is just a civil officer inept at war, and will not defy your order." Wei Yan let Fei Yi go, but regretted on second thought; however, Fei Yi had already left. Both Wei Yan and Yang Yi sent letters to Liu Shan to accuse each other of treason. In the end, Ma Dai killed Wei Yan and ended the turmoil. After the commotion, Jiang Wan formally succeeded Zhuge Liang as the new head of government in Shu, while Fei Yi became his chief assistant.

During Jiang Wan's regency

As the chief assistant to Jiang Wan, Fei Yi handled mostly domestic matters. He was described as so quick in his comprehension and decisions that he only needed the mornings to carry out his duties, and he spent the afternoons entertaining guests. He was particularly skilful at playing weiqi. When Dong Yun succeeded him, he tried to follow Fei Yi's schedule, but after several days, the paperwork quickly backlogged, forcing him to work all day. Dong Yun was thus amazed at Fei Yi's abilities.

Jiang Wan was often in ill health so in 243 he moved the armies to Fu County from Hanzhong Commandery. He consequently transferred his military authority to Fei Yi and civil responsibilities to Dong Yun, while remaining as the head of government in name. In 244, when the Wei regent Cao Shuang attacked the less-guarded Hanzhong Commandery, Fei Yi was granted the staff of authority as a commander, and was urged to go the front-line. Lai Min (來敏) visited Fei Yi and invited him for a game of weiqi. Despite the urgency, Fei Yi played the game and was so engrossed in it that he showed no sign of concern with the military. Lai Min suddenly said, "I was just testing your reaction! You are indeed a trustworthy man and the one who can crush the invaders!" Since Cao Shuang made a serious strategic error, Wei suffered a major defeat, and retreated as soon as Fei Yi arrived on the field. The victory over Wei further increased Fei Yi's fame. After Jiang Wan died in 245, Fei Yi succeeded him as the new head of government in Shu.

Regency

One near-immediate task that Fei Yi faced was finding a chief assistant for himself, as Dong Yun, who had been serving in that role since 243, died soon after Jiang Wan's death. He decided on the general Jiang Wei. However, as both he and Jiang Wei were largely involved with military matters, the domestic matters soon apparently fell into the hands of Huang Hao, a eunuch described as treacherous and corrupt, but was trusted by the Shu emperor Liu Shan. The effective administration that Zhuge Liang had created and Jiang Wan had continued began to deteriorate, although the key effects would not be visible during Fei Yi's regency.

As Shu's head of government, Fei Yi adopted a somewhat more aggressive foreign policy against Shu's rival state Wei as compared to Jiang Wan, although his foreign policy fell short of the full-scale military confrontations in Zhuge Liang's time. He allowed Jiang Wei to lead Shu forces on periodic attacks at the Wei border but never authorised Jiang Wei to carry out an all-out assault against Wei. Jiang Wei persistently pushed for a revival of Zhuge Liang's foreign policy and requested more troops, but Fei Yi followed Zhuge Liang's treatment of Wei Yan and only assigned 10,000 men to Jiang Wei. During one intrusion into the territory of Wei in 250, Jiang Wei brought back Guo Xiu (郭脩), who had surrendered to Jiang Wei and now served the Shu government. According to an annotation in Jiang Wei's biography in the Sanguozhi, Jiang Wei had secretly recruited and formed a group of assassins, although it is not clear if Guo Xiu was one of those assassins.

One major characteristic that Fei Yi was known and admired for was his easy-going nature. One day in the year 253, he hosted a feast for key officials and invited the aforementioned Guo Xiu to attend. Guo Xiu assassinated Fei Yi during the banquet, but lost his life in the process as well. The historian Yu Xi (虞喜) commented, "Fei Yi was so open, honest and trusting of others that he eventually met his end at the hands of Guo Xiu, a surrendered enemy. Was his fault not due to the virtues he was famous for?" Liu Shan honoured Fei Yi with the posthumous title "Marquis Jing" (敬侯; literally "honourable marquis").