 Around the new year 535, Yuwen poisoned him to death and made his cousin Yuan Baoju the Prince of Nanyang (Yuan Mingyue's brother) emperor (as Emperor Wen).Western Wei was, initially, the smaller and the weaker of the two successor states of Northern Wei, and early in its existence, there were questions on whether it would survive at all.Yuwen Tai spent much of his effort on preserving existence of Western Wei against repeated attacks led by Gao Huan.