The Fall of Luocheng marks a decisive turn in Liu Bei's campaign in Yi Province: after an assault on the city is thrown back, Kong Ming draws its defender Zhang Ren into a trap, and Luocheng falls. The episode sets tactical deception against steadfast loyalty, ending with Liu Bei's entry into the city and the flight of Liu Zhang's son toward Chengdu.

Background and Stakes

Luocheng remains a center of resistance while Liu Bei's forces advance through Yi Province. Zhang Ren has not yielded with the other defenders, and the siege has become a contest of patience as much as force: Liu Bei has endured Zhang Ren's daily taunts without answering them. When word arrives that Kong Ming and Zhang Fei are approaching, Liu Bei chooses to launch an assault rather than continue waiting. The city matters not only as a military position but as a test of whether Liu Bei's campaign can turn a string of surrenders into control of the territory.

The defenders retain enough strength to exploit an opening. Liu Bei's assault focuses on some of the gates but leaves another unguarded; Zhang Ren leads a counterattack through that entrance and catches the besiegers by surprise. His men scatter Liu Bei's forces, and Zhang Ren rides directly toward Liu Bei, who turns and flees. The reversal makes clear that the siege has not yet settled the contest: a successful attack on the walls can still expose the besieging commander to capture.

Reversals in the Field

Zhang Ren pursues Liu Bei into the hills with only a few of his men. When capture seems close, Zhang Fei arrives with a troop and clashes with him. Zhang Ren soon withdraws when Yan Yan arrives with the main force; Zhang Fei pursues him as far as the city wall, but Zhang Ren reaches the gate in time. The encounter saves Liu Bei from immediate capture without resolving the siege, and Zhang Ren remains inside Luocheng to organize further resistance.

That resistance produces another near-disaster for Liu Bei's side. Zhang Ren and his officers devise a plan to lure Zhang Fei into an ambush: they challenge him to a duel, then pretend to retreat so that he will follow them into the trap. The ruse succeeds, and Zhang Fei is placed in great danger. Zhao Zilong arrives at the last moment and rescues him. The episode underlines how precarious the advance remains: Zhang Fei's boldness, useful in the earlier clash, now makes him vulnerable to a deliberately staged retreat.

Meanwhile, Huang Zhong and Wei Yan defeat another division of the defenders, whose troops surrender. The loss weighs on Zhang Ren, but it does not persuade him to submit. The narrative thus contrasts the widening pattern of capitulation with one commander's decision to keep fighting, even as the position of Luocheng grows more difficult to sustain.

Kong Ming's Stratagem and Zhang Ren's Fate

By the time Kong Ming arrives, Zhang Fei has already advanced and several cities have submitted. Kong Ming chooses to exploit Zhang Ren's readiness to fight. He rides toward one of Luocheng's main gates in his carriage, wearing Daoist robes and appearing unconcerned, while a deliberately poor-looking group of troops follows behind him. The display invites Zhang Ren to attack: the apparent carelessness is bait, not evidence that the defenders have caught Kong Ming unprepared.

Zhang Ren rides out and is drawn into the ambush Kong Ming has arranged. Captured and brought before Liu Bei, he is asked why he continued to hold out after the others had surrendered. Zhang Ren answers that a loyal servant cannot serve more than one master. Liu Bei points out that submission would let him live, but Zhang Ren rejects the possibility of a merely outward surrender: he says that if allowed to submit now, he would strike back later, and asks to be killed instead. Nothing Liu Bei says changes his resolve, and Zhang Ren is executed.

A poem after his death turns his refusal into the episode's moral counterpoint to the city's changing allegiance. It presents Zhang Ren's fidelity as the reason his death is not merely an ending and imagines his honor shining over Luocheng like the moon. The poem gives his choice a public and lasting meaning: the man who loses the city remains, in the narrative's judgment, unbent in loyalty.

The City Falls and the Campaign Moves On

After Zhang Ren's death, Liu Bei's army returns to Luocheng's walls and calls for the city to surrender. This time the gate opens. Liu Bei rides in and takes possession, bringing the siege to an end. The movement from a closed gate to an open one marks a sharp change in the balance of the campaign: with Zhang Ren gone, the resistance that had repelled Liu Bei and threatened Zhang Fei no longer holds the city.

As Liu Bei's forces enter through one gate, Liu Xun, Liu Zhang's son, escapes through the opposite gate and carries news of the fall to Chengdu. The capture therefore reaches beyond Luocheng itself: the report arrives at the seat of Liu Zhang's power while the victorious army takes control of the city. A letter from Fa Zheng, who suggests persuading Liu Zhang to submit, arrives as Liu Zhang consults with his son. Rather than accepting the proposal, Liu Zhang tears up the letter in anger and plans a counterattack; in his desperation, he is even persuaded to seek help from Zhang Lu, another enemy. The fall of Luocheng thus closes one stage of the campaign but does not end the conflict. It leaves Liu Bei in the captured city and Liu Zhang facing the news from Chengdu with resistance, rather than surrender, still in view.