Liu Bei and Guan Yu both turned their heads at the same time.
Their gazes were sharp. Dangerous. The kind that made people reconsider their life choices.
Liu Bei: Could you please not mention the Battle of Yiling?
Guan Yu: If I don't die, where does the Battle of Yiling come from?
Zhang Fei instantly ducked his head—but he still muttered stubbornly under his breath.
"I wasn't wrong though… Big Brother only ever lost to the real monsters. Didn't that Cao Cao also get ambushed by Lü Bu?"
Laughter burst out all around.
As for Sun Quan's military résumé, no one felt the need to pile on further.
Was there anything more absurd than Xiaoyao Ford?
At the very least, "withdrawing without success" meant he managed to drag the entire army back in one piece. That alone already counted as a noteworthy achievement.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[ While Lord Guan busied himself building cities, he also kept one eye firmly on the north—on Cao Cao.
And then he waited.
Waited for another inevitable factor:
Rebellions.
Rebellions within Cao Cao's domain were not a surprise. They were a tradition.
An incomplete count shows that between 200 and 220 AD, there were fifty-one armed rebellions under Cao-Wei's rule:
Eleven in the core regions.
Seventeen in the eastern regions.
Twenty-three in the western regions.]
Liu Bei's eyes lit up.
"That Wei Feng rebellion should be among them, right?"
Anyone who nearly stabbed Cao Cao in his own backyard immediately earned Liu Bei's respect.
More importantly—
This man raised the banner of the Han.
Favorability +1.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[This brings us to an old and endlessly argued issue:
Cao-Wei's taxation system.
A popular modern narrative goes like this:
The Tang Dynasty's prosperity inherited its tax system from Wei and Jin.
Wei-Jin inherited it from Cao Cao's reforms.
Therefore—
Cao-Wei's taxation system was advanced.
Humane.
Progressive.
Unlike the cruel Qin and Han dynasties, which supposedly extracted fifty to sixty percent of the people's harvest.
All praise Tax Reformer Boss Cao, the man who laid the groundwork for the Great Tang's golden age!]
Even the Tang Dynasty referenced Cao Cao's system?
That impressive?
Zhuge Liang felt genuine admiration rise in his chest. Since personally taking charge of taxation under Liu Bei, he knew exactly how complex and punishing the system could be.
A golden age learning from Cao Cao?
This deserved careful listening.
Liu Bei, however, frowned.
"The 'one-thirtieth tax'—where does this 'fifty to sixty percent' come from?"
Zhang Fei snorted.
The three brothers had risen fighting the Yellow Turbans.
"If it really was a one-thirtieth tax, how did the Yellow Turbans sweep the whole land?"
Liu Bei fell silent.
The Han house was declining.
The people had no means to live.
And "no means to live" never meant poetry—it meant being crushed under taxes, levies, and endless demands.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[And here's the contradiction.
If Cao Cao's people truly had enough food and clothing, why did rebellions never stop?
Were all fifty-one rebellions just die-hard Han loyalists?
The answer lies in the fine print.
The so-called Qin-Han "fifty percent tax" appears clearly in Ban Gu's Book of Han, Wang Mang's edicts, and Xun Yue's memorials. The Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Governance summarizes it succinctly:
"The powerful and wealthy encroach and oppress, dividing the land and forcing tenants. Its name is 'one-thirtieth tax,' but in reality, it is 'one-half tax.'"
In other words—
On paper, the system was still one-thirtieth land rent.
In reality, once miscellaneous exactions were added, half the harvest was gone.]
Liu Bei's head drooped even lower.
Shameful.
And worse—the shame carried on to later generations, and their later generations.
"The powerful and wealthy encroach and oppress, dividing the land and forcing tenants."
Wasn't this the Han Dynasty's most chronic disease?
Kong Ming nodded gravely. Miscellaneous exactions were the root of all suffering. Turning one-thirtieth into fifteen-thirtieth—or even twenty-thirtieth—
How were people supposed to survive?
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[Cao Cao replaced this with a fixed-quota land rent system: four sheng per mu.
At the end of the Han, average yield per mu was only about a quarter of modern output—roughly 280 catties.
Four sheng equaled about 16 catties, which comes out to roughly one-eighteenth of the harvest.
Judging by numbers alone—
Cao Cao looked like a living Bodhisattva reincarnated.]
Mi Fang noticed the mood in the hall subtly shift.
Everyone's mouths were slightly open—just like when he first entered and saw the screen.
Even his elder brother beside him looked completely dazed.
"Impossible!" Guan Yu shot to his feet.
"How could future yields be four times ours?!"
"A yield of twelve dan per mu?" Kong Ming also frowned.
"Could the commentator be mistaken?"
"Or is this—again—the power of that 'technology'?!"
"Kong Ming!" Liu Bei's mind was racing. As someone who had worked the fields himself, numbers mattered.
"Since we can make Zuo Bo paper based on Cai Lun's work, can you use that Tiangong Kaiwu book to reach over ten dan per mu?"
Kong Ming opened his mouth.
Then closed it.
Then shook his head.
My Lord… you're thinking far too far ahead.
By his own estimates, if Jingzhou's rice yield reached three dan and three dou per mu this year, it would already be exceptional.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[But reality was harsher.
Only great families and large landowners truly benefited from this tax system.
For the common people, Cao Cao implemented the Tuntian—military agricultural colonies.
According to Feng Yu's memorial recorded in the Book of Jin:
If common households farmed using government oxen, the tax was six-tenths.
If using private oxen, the tax was five-tenths.]
"Kong Ming," Liu Bei asked quietly, "what is our rate, counting everything?"
Kong Ming fanned himself slowly.
"Combining all taxes and levies—between three-tenths and four-tenths."
Liu Bei nodded.
In times of chaos, a one-thirtieth tax was a fantasy. But knowing his burden was lighter than Cao Cao's brought some comfort.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[And where did the manpower for Tuntian come from?
Conscription.
The Records of the Three Kingdoms repeatedly records Cao Cao forcibly relocating populations to Xuchang and Ye.
After pacifying Ji Province in 205 AD—households were moved by force.
In 209 AD—people from Huainan were relocated, driving one hundred thousand to flee to Jiangdong.
And those who resisted conscription or fled?
The Biography of He Kui records it bluntly:
"Those who do not submit to instruction cannot but be executed."]
Liu Bei shook his head.
He understood Cao Cao's ruthlessness.
The people understood it too.
Hearing Cao's troops were coming was like hearing demons had arrived. They packed their families and fled—often following Liu Bei himself.
It was because he refused to abandon the people that his retreat slowed, allowing Cao Cao to catch up—leading to the defeat at Changban Slope and the death of Lady Mi.
He felt no regret.
Now, his only regret was not having enough soldiers to strike down the Cao traitor outright.
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[Still, it cannot be denied:
Cao Cao's tax reform was a systemic advancement—though it remained far from the post-liberation Household Responsibility System.
The Tang Dynasty did reference it, pushing the Great Tang into a world-famous golden age.
But who would've guessed—
Cao Cao's original reform was merely a compromise with the great families.
Because the great families paid less, those conscripted into Tuntian were squeezed even harder.]
Silence fell.
Liu Bei and Kong Ming exchanged a glance—unspoken understanding passing between them.
Kong Ming memorized yet another new term.
"Household Responsibility System."
Was this the secret behind twelve-dan yields?
The name alone gave no clues.
Liu Bei's thoughts went deeper.
The great families and powerful clans—this disease had plagued every dynasty.
How had later generations solved it?
[Wen Mang – Voiceover]
[And taxes were only part of it.
The people also faced corvée labor. Refusal or flight meant death.
Under such pressure, resentment boiled over.
By 219 AD, the entire realm was approaching a breaking point.
In the first month of the 23rd year of Jian'an, Court Physician Ji Ben, together with Shaofu Geng Ji and Sizhi Wei Huang, rebelled. They attacked Xu and burned the camp of Chancellor Chief Clerk Wang Bi.
In the same year, Zhang Gu, Chief of Luhun, was ordered to conscript laborers for Hanzhong. The people feared the distant labor and fell into chaos. A commoner named Sun Lang raised troops, killed the county Registrar, and rebelled.
In the tenth month of winter, Hou Yin, defending general of Wan, rebelled alongside others. They seized the Administrator of Nanyang, plundered officials and civilians, and occupied Wan.]