The Three Kingdoms: Hindsight is 20/20, and the Three Revivals of the Han Dynasty

Chapter 222 Zhang Fei's Schemes Are Too Deep, Jia Kui Embarks on a Pro-Liu Path of No Return (3 Updates)
Upon returning to his camp, Zhang Fei immediately dispatched numerous scouts to investigate the powerful clans and wealthy families of Jiangyi, to find out which family owned the most farmland, houses, workshops, and slaves, and which family was the most arrogant and lawless.
The residential structure of county-level administrative centers in this era was basically characterized by "small city walls and large surrounding areas, with blurred lines between urban and rural areas."

Cities were never purely residential areas, but rather military fortresses and administrative centers.

Inside the city walls were mainly government offices, such as government offices, clerks' residences, prisons, as well as the high walls and deep courtyards of local powerful families, dense rows of houses for merchants and commoners, simple mud-brick houses for soldiers and their families, and foundationless thatched huts for rogues and servants.

Outside the city walls lay the "autonomous kingdoms" of the families. The powerful families who truly controlled the resources would establish independent manors around the county town. For example, the powerful families in Jiangyi County would occupy the fertile land of the Fenhe River Valley and build fortified villages within five to ten miles of the city, so that they could be protected by the county town and avoid the tax supervision within the city.

A single powerful fortified village typically gathers three to five hundred people, including relatives, retainers, artisans, and servants. A stronger fortified village can even accommodate more than a thousand people.

Taking Jiangyi as an example, the county only had about 800 registered households in the city, while nearly 2,000 households from powerful families and fortified villages were listed as "attached households" and were exempt from paying taxes to the imperial court.

More than a thousand households were forced to live in the countryside because they were unwilling to pay taxes due to the pressure of making a living. This was the main reason why Jia Kui felt frustrated as the magistrate of Jiangyi.

In a small county with a few thousand households, Jia Kui could only collect taxes from about eight hundred households. He couldn't afford to offend the nearly two thousand powerful households, and he was unwilling to forcibly bring back the thousand or so households scattered in the countryside, just like Yuan Tan had done.

While the center of power seemed to be within Jiangyi City, the real foundation of wealth lay outside the city. What frustrated Jia Kui most was that the city was often the first to be attacked! Enemy generals who captured a city would usually rob the people and their money and grain within the city, and then send people to appease the powerful families outside the city and symbolically demand some benefits.

Some people directly robbed powerful clans and wealthy families, but such people usually ended up being retaliated against by these powerful clans and wealthy families. The most typical example is Cao Cao, who managed to rob so many powerful clans and wealthy families in the entire Yan Province that they united against him.

For powerful and wealthy families: Since you are not following the rules and are taking my money and grain, I will take the initiative to share my money and grain with others. There will always be someone willing to follow the old rule that "the money and grain of the powerful and wealthy will be returned to their original source, and the money and grain of the common people will be divided 50/50".

Especially in the Hedong and Guanzhong areas, there were dozens of powerful and independent armed forces. Although the generals in Guanzhong were led by Ma Teng and Han Sui, they were actually a group of dozens of powerful armed forces.

This has nothing to do with right or wrong, but rather with one's stance. "Are kings and generals born with a special destiny? The victor is king, and the loser is a bandit."

Throughout the Hedong and Guanzhong regions, county magistrates conscripted registered households within the city, while powerful local families outside the city turned a blind eye to this. Such urban-rural divide and grassroots collapse were commonplace.

Even Wang Yi, the governor of Hedong, often couldn't issue orders beyond Anyi.

This was also one of the reasons why Wang Yi dared not send troops to rescue Jiang Yi.

To put it nicely, he was the Prefect of Hedong; to put it bluntly, he was just a local tyrant who received an imperial edict appointing him as the Prefect of Hedong, but his prestige was not enough to make the powerful families in Hedong willingly contribute troops, money, and grain.

If they win, all will be well; if they lose, Wang Yi's entire fortune will be gone.

Zhang Fei's "Zhuge Liang-esque" rhetoric successfully fueled Jia Kui's resentment towards powerful clans: Look, someone is willing to play the villain, are you still going to tolerate it?
Although Jia Kui was somewhat inept at educating his children, and each generation of his descendants was worse than the last, Jia Kui himself was a brilliant governor whom Cao Cao praised as "If all the governors of the empire were like Jia Kui, what would I have to worry about?"

Chen Shou also included biographies of six governors: Liu Fu, governor of Yangzhou; Sima Lang, governor of Yanzhou; Wen Hui, governor of Yangzhou; Liang Xi, governor of Bingzhou; Jia Kui, governor of Yuzhou; and Zhang Ji, governor of Liangzhou. He praised them as exemplary governors of the time who were "skilled in handling affairs, and possessed both authority and benevolence, thus able to maintain order and discipline across vast distances."

He had no choice but to endure it before; now that he has the opportunity, Jia Kui is no longer willing to endure it.

So, Jia Kui, who had returned to Jiangyi City, sent his confidants to the major manors in Jiangyi to inform them that, as Zhang Fei had suggested, they should first pretend to be good people in front of the powerful families!

And the results were as Zhang Fei had predicted. After receiving a tip from Jia Kui, the powerful families of Jiangyi became increasingly uneasy when they discovered that Zhang Fei had sent out a large number of scouts to investigate whose family owned the most land, houses, workshops, and servants, and whose family was the most arrogant and lawless.

They all sent messengers to find Zhang Fei, trying to offer him some benefits as before so that everyone could live in peace.

However, Zhang Fei avoided meeting any messenger, regardless of whose they were. He even had the soldiers guarding the camp gate point to a banner that read, "By order of the Left General, anyone who harms the people shall be executed on the spot to uphold military law," and rebuked the messenger for believing rumors.

This directly threw the powerful clans of Jiangyi into a panic: under the guise of not harming the people, they sent scouts everywhere to investigate, clearly wanting both money and provisions and a legitimate reason for their attack.

Unable to meet Zhang Fei, the powerful clans could only send messengers to Jia Kui, claiming they were willing to elect Jia Kui as their representative to negotiate with Zhang Fei.

This result shocked Jia Kui once again.

It was thought that Zhang Fei would directly send troops to attack the powerful clans of Jiangyi, but unexpectedly, Zhang Fei only sent a large number of scouts and intimidated the powerful clans of Jiangyi.

The negotiation between Jia Kui and Zhang Fei took almost no time.

In just a moment, Jia Kui returned from Zhang Fei's camp, holding a blank delivery order in his hand.

It says:

On the seventh day of the tenth month of the sixth year of Jian'an (200 AD).

The magistrate of Jiangyi, Jia Kui, was entrusted by the people of Jiangyi to defend against the invading enemy army. The details of the entrusted wealth are as follows:
[Blank space]
Once the transaction is completed, the original owner may not claim the property again.

Recipient: Jia Kui, Magistrate of Jiangyi

Deliverer: [Blank space]
Witness: [Blank space]
Jia Kui was also a clever man.

I understood Zhang Fei's intentions as soon as I saw the delivery order.

In short: Zhang Fei never formally said he wanted to plunder the money and grain of powerful clans. It was the powerful clans who entrusted the money and grain to Jia Kui, the magistrate of Jiangyi, to defend against the invading enemy army. As for whether Jia Kui could defend against the invading enemy army, that depended on Jia Kui's ability.

So after Jia Kui returned to the city, he lied to the envoy of the powerful family, saying: "Before the seven-day truce is over, let's transport all our wealth to Jiangyi City and wait for Liu Bei to come before we negotiate."

As for how much wealth the powerful families were prepared to offer, Jia Kui let everyone discuss it amongst themselves, only offering a "kind" reminder: there are over six thousand soldiers outside the city, and if Liu Bei were to come, he would probably have over ten thousand. Ten thousand soldiers would have a big appetite, so we must act according to our means and not be too stingy.

At the same time, he also had each family's envoy make a copy of the handover order to take back. The reason was quite good: when the troops outside the city came to plunder, he could take out the handover orders from everyone and pretend that they were gifts from each family. Liu Bei was a self-proclaimed benevolent and righteous man, and after seeing the handover orders, he would certainly not send troops to forcibly seize the manors of powerful families. Not only that, Liu Bei would also thank everyone.
　Update 3 is here!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)