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Death and post-mortem events (234)

The stalemate at the Wuzhang Plains lasted for over 100 days. Sometime between 11 September and 10 October 234, Zhuge Liang became critically ill and died in camp. He was 54 (by East Asian age reckoning) at the time of his death.

Sun Sheng 's Jin Yangqiu (晉陽秋) recorded the following account:

A glowing red meteorite fell from the sky along the northeast-to-southwest direction towards (Zhuge) Liang's camp, bounced off the ground and landed again three times, expanding in size when it bounced off and shrinking in size as it landed. (Zhuge) Liang died shortly after.

The Book of Wei (魏書) and Han–Jin Chunqiu (漢晉春秋) gave different accounts of where Zhuge Liang died. The former recorded that Zhuge Liang vomited blood in frustration when his army ran out of supplies during the stalemate and he ordered his troops to burn down their camp and retreat into a valley, where he fell sick and died. The latter recorded that he died in the residence of a certain Guo family. In his annotations to Zhuge Liang's biography, Pei Songzhi pointed out that the Wei Shu and Han–Jin Chunqiu accounts were wrong, and that Zhuge Liang actually died in camp at the Wuzhang Plains. He also rebutted the Wei Shu account as follows:

"It was unclear from the situation (at the Battle of Wuzhang Plains) which side was winning and which side was losing. (The Wei Shu) was exaggerating when it said that (Zhuge) Liang vomited blood. Given Kongming's brilliance, was it likely for him to vomit blood because of Zhongda? This exaggeration originated from a note written by Emperor Yuan of Jin which said '(Zhuge) Liang lost the battle and vomited blood'. The reason why (the Wei Shu) said that Zhuge Liang died in a valley was because the Shu army only released news of Zhuge Liang's death after they entered the valley."

When Sima Yi heard from civilians that Zhuge Liang had died from illness and the Shu army had burnt down their camp and retreated, he led his troops in pursuit and caught up with them. The Shu forces, on Yang Yi and Jiang Wei 's command, turned around and readied themselves for battle. Sima Yi pulled back his troops and retreated. Some days later, while surveying the remains of the Shu camp, Sima Yi remarked, "What a genius he was!" Based on his observations that the Shu army made a hasty retreat, he concluded that Zhuge Liang had indeed died, so he led his troops in pursuit again. When Sima Yi reached Chi'an (赤岸), he asked the civilians living there about Zhuge Liang and heard that there was a recent popular saying: "A dead Zhuge (Liang) scares away a living Zhongda " He laughed and said, "I can predict the thoughts of the living but I can't predict the dead's."