Wang Pu
With Zhu preparing to seize the throne, Liu and another associate of Zhu's, Li Zhen, argued for a general purge of high-level imperial officials who were from aristocratic families. Zhu agreed, and initially a large number of them were demoted and exiled — in Pei's case, to be the prefect of Deng Prefecture (登州, in modern Penglai, Shandong), and then to be the census officer of Shuang Prefecture (瀧州, in modern Yunfu, Guangdong). Soon thereafter, some 30 of these officials — including Pei, Dugu, Cui, fellow former chancellors Lu Yi, Wang Pu, and other officials Zhao Chong (趙崇) and Wang Zan (王贊) — were rounded up at Baima Station (白馬驛, in modern Anyang, Henan) and ordered to commit suicide. At Li Zhen's request (as Li Zhen, who was unable to pass the imperial examinations, resented these traditional aristocrats for claiming to be free from taint), Zhu had their bodies thrown into the Yellow River (as Li Zhen put it, to taint them).