“Turmoil”: Battle for the Han Empire sample (Act I) -- T. P. M. Thorne
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The power of the ‘Ten’ persisted when the childless Emperor
Huan died and his child heir, a relative, became Emperor Ling: most reluctantly accepted the situation, and any who did not - including the
new Empress Dowager’s father, Dou Wu - were quickly defeated by the devious range of political and armed counterattacks
that the ‘Ten’ employed. The persecution of ‘Partisans’ - which had been relaxed by Emperor Huan
after his father-in-law Dou Wu’s remonstrations - resumed under Emperor Ling, who had been tricked into thinking that
his life was under threat from any who opposed the ‘Ten’: Cao Cao and his friend Yuan Shao were two of many
young men who chose to shelter the ‘Partisans’ and discuss ways to remove the ‘Ten’. To them,
a court ruled from the shadows by a band of greedy, murderous eunuchs that did not tolerate any form of criticism was
itself intolerable and could only lead to ruin.
And while the nation was not in ruins, it had certainly descended
into chaos: Emperor Ling’s aloof rule allowed the ‘Ten’ to tighten their grip, and even an uncle of the
emperor was not spared demands for tribute or the punishment that met the defiant. Corruption and incompetence were rife, and
still matters worsened: when crops failed, the ‘Ten’ failed to allocate relief funds to any but their friends;
when the Khan of the Xianbei Confederacy led an army into China, the ‘Ten’ appointed unqualified allies as commanders
and sent men into battle with such inadequate resources that some did not even have clothes or weapons; and when a Taoist cult
known as the ‘Way of Peace’ started to sway the minds of the desperate people, the ‘Ten’ and their allies
dismissed the threat and continued to behave in the same way. When a ‘Way of Peace’ coup within the capital failed,
their leader, Zhang Jue, had his acolytes - who numbered in the hundreds of thousands - adopt the treasonous symbol of a yellow
turban and attack every part of the Han infrastructure.
The ‘Yellow Turban Rebellion’ was quelled by private militias
led by men like Cao Cao, since the ‘Ten Attendants’ and their friends had embezzled the majority of the treasury monies:
that, combined with other rebellions and a poorly-made decision to promote many of the Provincial Inspectors to semi-autonomous
Governors created the right conditions for ambitious men to carve out their own territories.
When Emperor Ling died, his 13-year-old eldest son became Emperor Shao:
Shao’s mother, Empress Dowager Hè, and her brother Hè Jin then repeated the pattern of the past and seized control
of the court. The ‘Ten’ were able to blackmail Empress Dowager Hè, since she had murdered the mother of her
son’s half-brother, Prince Liu Xie: they were in turn opposed by Hè Jin, who was Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Army.
The political plotting culminated in the death of Hè Jin and the subsequent destruction of the ‘Ten’ by none other
than Yuan Shao: the power vacuum was filled by the corrupt and sociopathic warlord Dong Zhuo, whose sizeable army and collection of
formidable officers and cunning advisers made him powerful beyond expectation. Dong Zhuo tricked the prodigious and intimidating
warrior Lü Bu into joining his service and murdering his own loyalist lord and stepfather, Bing Province Governor Ding Yuan:
Dong Zhuo subsequently appointed himself as Chancellor of State, killed Empress Dowager Hè, deposed and then killed Emperor
Shao, appointed Liu Xie as Emperor Xian and slaughtered the clans of dissenting officials.