Looking up the list of Lanting gathering personnel, we can find that among the 42 participants, 22 are from the army and 3 are directly from the front. It is obviously impossible for a responsible soldier to leave his post without leave because of artiness. So, what did they come all this way for?
Since the establishment of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, it has been trying to restore the country through the Northern Expedition. In the eighth year of Yonghe, Yin (Y, N) led the Northern Expeditionary Army against the enemy on the front line of Huaihe River, and the national situation was urgent. Wang Xizhi's secret meeting is most likely to discuss the Northern Expedition with the generals.
In the first month of the tenth year of Yonghe, the war between the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the former Qin Dynasty broke out. Yin Hao, the general of the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the secretariat of Yangzhou, was abolished as Shu Ren due to the failure of the Northern Expedition, and the power in the DPRK fell to Huan Wen. In February, Huan Wen from Jiangling (now Hubei) arise and forty thousand cavalry north; The water army entered Junkou from Xiangyang (now Hubei) along Mianshui (now Xunxian West, Hubei) to Nanxiang (now Xichuan East, Henan); Infantry marched from Xichuan to Wuguan (now the north bank of Danjiang River in the southwest of Shangluo, Shaanxi); Sima Xun, the secretariat of Liangzhou, was ordered to send troops from Liangzhou (now northwest of Ankang City, Shaanxi Province) to the north along the Meridian Road (Ankang City, Shaanxi Province to Woods Town, Chang 'an County) to attack Qin Jun.