Jinting Han people

Having finally captured the entire territory of Hanzhong, the year's war officially came to an end, signifying the arrival of a period of peaceful tranquility. Liu Xian announced to the entire army that they could rest in place for half a month.

This was the long-awaited good news for the soldiers, and upon receiving the order, they erupted in cheers. After all, no one likes war, regardless of the era or time. Whether the war is truly just or merely a pretense of justice, war always means the restriction of freedom and dancing with death, which inevitably violates human nature. Therefore, people who are constantly in war will eventually become numb and weary, and then yearn for peace and tranquility.

The soldiers had already begun to rest, but Liu Xian could not rest yet; this was a crucial period for consolidating his rule in Hanzhong. Upon entering the Nanzheng Commandery, his first thought was to have his advisors gather their wisdom. Each was to submit a memorial of advice, not necessarily offering concrete suggestions, but at least posing a question that they considered most urgent to be addressed.

After all, there are limits to what one person can think, and the things one can see are also limited. As the saying goes, "Those involved are often confused, while bystanders see clearly." For example, if Yan Zuan hadn't reminded him, Liu Xian wouldn't have known that there were bandits in Yang Nan's army. Liu Xian also wanted to take this opportunity to reflect on how many oversights he had made and how much he could improve.

Since the lord was willing to accept advice, the subordinates responded enthusiastically. In just two or three days, Liu Xian received over a hundred memorials. After a cursory review, Liu Xian was quite relieved, because he had already considered most of the matters discussed, such as encouraging agriculture and sericulture, distributing relief to the people, rewarding military officers, and reorganizing the military... and so on.

However, there was a small portion that Liu Xian hadn't yet considered, and these were quite valuable. Among them, three documents stood out the most, attracting Liu Xian's attention.

The first memorial concerns civil affairs and was written by Fu Chang.

The reason was that after Fu Chang finished taking stock of the household registration and inventory of Hanzhong Commandery, he began to plan the expenses for next year. During the planning process, he suddenly realized that with the current household registration and tax revenue of Hanzhong, it was impossible to maintain Liu Xian's current army size.

Since Liu Xian led 6,000 cavalry into Guanzhong, he first mobilized 50,000 troops in Hedong, then accepted 20,000 elite soldiers from Yongzhou, plus more than 10,000 recruited in Weibei, nearly 10,000 troops from Qiuchi, and now more than 10,000 surrendered troops from Hanzhong. The total number of troops he has handled has reached a staggering 100,000.

Liu Xian's current army size is certainly not that large. After all, Liu Xian has also suffered some defeats, and some of his troops have deserted along the way. In addition, after deducting the 7,000 troops he sent to support Zhang Gui in Liangzhou, Liu Xian still has 70,000 troops at present.

This is undoubtedly an astonishing number. Looking across the country, even a governor of a prefecture would find it difficult to muster so many people, let alone a prefect of a commandery. Liu Xian only managed to do so by relying on his connections and reputation built up over many years, as well as the financial and logistical support from the Northern Expeditionary Army.

But now, the migration is over. The funds and provisions of the Northern Expeditionary Army have been mostly depleted, and continuing to maintain this size of army would undoubtedly be a waste of resources. Fu Chang then did the math for Liu Xian. According to the traditional ratio of soldiers to civilians, assuming a family of five has one hundred mu of land, and according to the imperial system, each mu yields three sheng of rice per year, and the annual rent is thirty hu, then that's enough to support one soldier.

Currently, the population of Hanzhong, Wudu, and Yinping prefectures, plus the migrants from Hedong, totals approximately 360,000. Based on this ratio, and assuming favorable weather next year and that all migrants and displaced people are allocated land, the grain and taxes collected by Liu Xian next year will be sufficient to supply approximately 70,000 soldiers.

The problem is that the government cannot invest all its grain and fodder in supporting the army, nor can it pre-plan for a bumper harvest next year. Moreover, there are many other things that require money and grain, such as cultivating farmland, building water conservancy projects, resettling displaced people, constructing city walls, storing grain and manufacturing tools, and rewarding meritorious officials.

Therefore, Fu Chang tactfully suggested to Liu Xian that before the start of spring plowing next year, it would be best to partially reduce the army to less than 40,000 troops.

Liu Xian drew a red circle on the top of Fu Chang's document to show his importance to it.

He felt this was indeed an extremely important matter. For the past few months, Liu Xian had been wreaking havoc in Guanzhong, which, while seemingly impressive, was ultimately destruction and slaughter. It could only ensure his own temporary safety, not withstand defeat, and could not truly solve the problem. Only by developing a place, building it up, making it a reliable home, and then continuously strengthening it, could it withstand the storms of life.

From this perspective, retaining too many soldiers is indeed short-sighted and detrimental to long-term development. However, Liu Xian also thought that in this chaotic world, it would be unreasonable to simply dismiss the soldiers.

After some deliberation, he concluded that the most suitable approach was to emulate Cao Cao's treatment of the Qingzhou army. He would weed out the old, weak, and disabled soldiers, find a piece of wasteland for military settlement, and let the harvest belong to the army. This self-sufficiency would save a significant amount of money and streamline the army's fighting strength. If the settlement location was chosen well, it could even enhance defenses. In case of an emergency and a shortage of manpower, drawing men from the military settlement would be far better than temporarily conscripting civilians.

However, this matter is of great importance and cannot be decided hastily. Liu Xian plans to wait until the rest period is over before having the entire army discuss the matter and produce a list of soldiers for the military farms. Afterward, it would be best to select several officers from the army to serve as military farm commanders, specifically responsible for managing the military farm affairs.

The second document, written by Wei Jun, also concerns the people's livelihood and mainly elaborates on the salt administration.

In his memorial, Wei Jun stated that since ancient times, food has been the most important thing for the people. With food comes the need for salt; without salt, there is no food, and without food, chaos ensues. Therefore, there is an old saying: "Without salt, there are no people." However, the critical problem is that Hanzhong has always been a salt-scarce region, unable to meet its own salt needs and relying on trade. Every year, merchants from various regions would transport hundreds of bushels of salt from outside Hanzhong to sell. But now, the problem is that with Hanzhong now divided, trade routes have been severed.

Although Liu Xian brought a large amount of coarse salt and fermented soybeans from Hedong, enough to supply the people of the prefecture for a period of time, Hanzhong would still face a salt shortage without a new salt supply route. Therefore, Wei Jun advised Liu Xian to plan for opening up a salt supply route.

Generally speaking, there are two trade routes for transporting salt from Hanzhong: one is the salt route from Xichuan to Hanzhong, and the other is the salt route from Guanzhong to Hanzhong. Both are currently difficult to traverse, so Wei Jun advised Liu Xian to prepare for both possibilities as soon as possible.

One strategy was to send merchants down the Han River into Jingzhou to smuggle and transport salt from Ba and the sea, temporarily alleviating the immediate crisis. The other strategy was to reach the border of Wudu Commandery and seize Shichang County.

After years of war, the imperial court's control over the borders weakened, forcing it to relinquish large tracts of land, including many salt lakes. The most famous of these was Shichang County, located between Wudu and Tianshui. Shichang County, also known as Lucheng (卤城), literally means "salty land in the west," indicating its abundance of salt lakes. Holding this county long-term would solve Hanzhong's salt shortage problem. However, its proximity to Tianshui could potentially provoke conflict with Tianshui Commandery. Liu Xian hadn't anticipated the salt shortage in Hanzhong. During his time governing Xiayang, he had never experienced a shortage of salt from Hedong, so he didn't need to worry about it. Later, Li Ju, as governor of Hedong, even secretly profited from smuggling salt to surrounding areas, which was enough to support the enormous expenses of Hedong Commandery.

However, since Wei Jun had raised this issue and proposed a solution, Liu Xian saw no need to delay further with lengthy explanations. Fortunately, he had a suitable candidate under his command. In recent years, Xue Xing had been in charge of smuggling salt from Hedong without any oversights. Now that someone was needed to rebuild the salt administration, he was naturally the most appropriate choice.

Considering that it was time to relieve Huangfu Chong's siege, Liu Xian decided to take Lucheng. He first appointed Xue Xing as the magistrate of Shichang and concurrently the salt official, and at the same time ordered Yang Nandi, who was familiar with the local terrain, to lead his 8,000 Qiuchi troops to attack Shichang County and escort Xue Xing to his post.

Currently, the Tianshui Prefect's attention is still focused on Huangfu Zhong, so Shichang County must be poorly defended and can likely be taken quickly. Once taken, it will inevitably attract the Tianshui Prefect's attention, creating an opportunity for Huangfu Zhong to break out. If he succeeds in breaking out, Liu Xian hopes he can stay in Shichang County, thus maintaining his influence over Qin Province as originally planned, while also controlling Qin Province's southward advance.

The third memorial, which Liu Xian paid special attention to, was unrelated to people's livelihood.

This is a memorial written by He Pan, in which he wrote to Liu Xian, hoping that Liu Xian would carefully consider the current issue of the banner.

After leaving Luoyang, Liu Xian successfully completed a massive migration, leading over 200,000 people three thousand li (approximately 1,500 kilometers) across the Qinling Mountains to Hanzhong—a remarkable achievement indeed. However, this was not enough to truly establish prestige among the people.

A true ruler not only needs the people's respect but also needs to make their intentions clear. True unity between ruler and subject doesn't mean that superiors should manipulate subordinates like puppets—that's impossible. Subordinates are human too; they want to know the purpose and meaning of their actions. If they are confused, they will often hesitate and waver in their actions.

Therefore, a ruler must learn to express his aspirations in a way that is understood by everyone, from top to bottom. In this way, loyal subjects will know what to do, while disloyal subjects will reveal their rebellious intentions.

Liu Xian now finds himself in this ambiguous situation. After his army entered Hanzhong, Liu Xian effectively became independent from the Xuchang court, yet he continued to use the titles of the Jin dynasty, giving the impression that he still wanted to be a subject of the Jin. In reality, however, Liu Xian repeatedly visited the Han imperial tombs and the Temple of Marquis Wu, demonstrating his determination to restore his kingdom.

He Pan pointed out that such wavering might not have a significant impact in the short term, but in the long run, it would inevitably give people the impression of indecisiveness and make subordinates waver.

Therefore, he suggested that Liu Xian should go all the way and completely break away from the Jin Dynasty, directly declaring himself king in Hanzhong. This was the simplest solution, and the entire government would surely unite as one to fight the enemy.

After reading the memorial, Liu Xian felt that He Pan's words made sense, but that declaring himself king was too radical.

He has just established himself in Hanzhong, and most of the surrounding forces still respect the Jin dynasty from afar. If he were to declare himself king in Hanzhong, it would inevitably arouse the vigilance and hostility of these forces. Many forces that could have eased tensions, such as Liu Hong and Zhang Gui, who might have been able to coexist peacefully, would eventually become hostile due to their political stances.

Of course, the main reason is that Liu Xian's current strength is not yet sufficient. Even including the two commanderies of Qiuchi, he only has three commanderies in total, not even a single province. To claim he wants to establish a state would inevitably invite ridicule as overestimating his abilities. Moreover, some of his relatives still serve the court, and Liu Xian must also consider their lives.

Considering all factors, the conditions for becoming king are ripe, but at the earliest, we can only discuss it after we have conquered Chengdu.

However, Liu Xian agreed with He Pan's idea of ​​adopting a more resounding slogan. The current slogan, "Supporting Peace and Protecting Joy," was a way to wash away the shame of national subjugation and also a personal motivation, holding great significance for Liu Xian personally. But for the entire Anle Duke's Mansion and the people under its rule, it might remain merely a literal expression and not easily understood.

But what banner should he raise? Liu Xian hoped that the banner would have two characteristics: it should express his ambition to inherit the glory of the Han Dynasty and his ideal of helping the world in distress. However, after thinking about it for several days, Liu Xian felt that neither was suitable. Either the banner was too simplistic and lacked appeal, or it was too long and pedantic, lacking the refreshing and enlightening feeling that people would have.

Fortunately, this matter was not urgent, so Liu Xian put it aside for the time being, intending to think about it while doing other things, and use it when he came up with a suitable one.

However, things are always like this; Liu Xian had countless matters to attend to and simply couldn't manage them all. He valued the idea of ​​a banner, but if he put it aside for even a moment, he didn't know when he would bring it up again.

As November drew to a close and the weather grew increasingly cold, news from both the north and south arrived one after another. Only then did Liu Xian realize that the situation in the world had undergone a dramatic change.

This doesn't just refer to the news of Zhang Fang's usurpation of the Western Expeditionary Army Command. The envoys Liu Xian had previously sent to various forces surrounding Hanzhong were now returning to Hanzhong one after another, informing Liu Xian of their attitudes and opinions. In the end, Liu Xian's general predictions about the movements of the six forces surrounding Hanzhong were correct, but the accompanying messages from the envoys were something he hadn't anticipated.

In short, it can be summarized in three sentences: Li Xiong formally established his state, internal strife broke out in the Xuchang court, and Zhang Fang led his army on an eastern expedition. (End of Chapter)