In the novel the chain stratagem is a managed double game. Wang Yun fears Dong Zhuo. The singer Diaochan agrees to enter the trap. Wang Yun lets Lü Bu see her and promises a marriage, then presents her to Dong Zhuo. She moves between them until, at the Phoenix Pavilion, Lü Bu and Dong Zhuo nearly come to blows. Lü Bu joins the murder.
The Records are arranged differently. Wang Yun, Shisun Rui, and other officials brought Lü Bu in. Dong Zhuo was stabbed as he entered court in 192. Lü Bu’s break with Dong Zhuo had private anger and fear: he was sleeping with one of Dong Zhuo’s maids. The maid is nameless. Wang Yun is not staged as a director using a woman as bait.
The chain plot supplies the motive the novel wants: why an adopted son kills his adoptive father, and how a woman enters the story. It does not replace the record of the Chang’an coup. Read the murder in the pages for Dong Zhuo and Lü Bu. Leave the pavilion here.