willing to give up his grandiose designs on Liang and Yi Provinces, attacked Liu Song. Emperor Wen sent Pei Fangming and another general, Liu Zhendao (), to attack Chouchi, and in the only instance at which a southern dynasty army occupied Chouchi, took it over in 442, forcing Yang Nandang to flee to Northern Wei. However, by 443, Chouchi had fallen to Northern Wei forces, and Pei and Liu Zhendao were executed for having embezzled treasures and horses from Chouchi during the 441 to 442 campaign. Late reign In 445, in a famous incident, while waiting to send his brother Liu Yiji off to his new post as governor of Southern Yan Province (南兗州, modern central Jiangsu), Emperor Wen ordered his sons not to eat until dinner is served at the sendoff, but then intentionally had dinner served late, so that his sons would suffer from hunger, and then telling them, "You grew up in a rich household and do not see the people being poor. I intended that you understand the pain from hunger so that you would learn to be frugal and caring for the people." However, while this incident general drew praise from historians, some historians, including Pei Ziye (), a commentator to the Song Shu, found it hypocritical in that he was putting his sons in high offices at young ages without being properly trained. After that feast, an alleged plot involving the official (and compiler of Book of the Later Han) Fan Ye was exposed—as it was alleged that Fan had plotted with his nephew Xie Zong () and the deposed prime minister Li Yikang's associate Kong Xixian () to assassinate Emperor Wen at the feast for Liu Yiji and then making Liu Yikang emperor. One of the coconspirators, Emperor Wen's nephew Xu Danzhi (), after the assassination failed to occur at the feast, informed on his co-conspirators, and other than Xu, the conspirators were all executed. (The historian Wang Mingsheng () found the alleged plot far-fetched, and believed instead that Fan had been the victim of false accusations by Xu, Yu Bingzhi (), and He Shangzhi.) In the aftermaths of the plot, Liu Yikang, whose connection to the plot appeared tenuous at best, was stripped of his title, demoted to commoner rank, and put under house arrest. There would be repeated plots by others to put Liu Yikang on the throne, and by 451,