Chapter 1005: The Reason

"I can agree to your phased exchanges and will compensate you with fertile lands. There will also be other forms of compensation, but you will be responsible for developing those areas. Furthermore, when our government’s orders arrive, they must be executed without hesitation!" Chen Xi said, his gaze sweeping over the family heads.

"Must the orders be carried out without question?" Wei Ji furrowed his brow.

"Rest assured, as long as your actions remain within the rules, or even skirt the edges of them, I won’t interfere. Our orders are generally universal in nature and not custom-made to target anyone," Chen Xi explained calmly, understanding the aristocratic families’ concerns.

"Some of these so-called universal decrees could, in essence, harm our interests. This feels like playing with words," Xun Shuang countered logically. It was clear that the time had come to discuss the real, substantive issues.

"Very well. Since we still have time, you can select representatives to draft a set of guidelines with us, a constitution of sorts. Once everything is settled, we’ll proceed with the agreement. The deadline is five years. As for the reason..." Chen Xi nodded slowly as he responded to Xun Shuang.

It was unrealistic to expect the aristocratic families to immediately follow the path Chen Xi envisioned. What he needed now was to prod them along—whether with carrots or sticks, using soft or hard measures—until they reached their destination.

Chen Xi had to admit that, like it or not, the aristocratic families were still the elite class of the era. Most of the talent of the time had been cultivated within these families.

As for ideas like the imperial examination system, Chen Xi had indeed thought about them. However, such a system needed to be restrained. Left unchecked, it could eventually devolve into rigid doctrines like the eight-legged essays of the Ming dynasty or the stifling orthodoxy of later Confucian scholars.

Everything needed balance. Once anything exceeded a certain limit, there would be no good outcome. Since the aristocratic families had not yet fully entrenched themselves like in later dynasties, there was still value in saving them. This was the reasoning behind Chen Xi's approach.

After the Three Kingdoms era, the Nine-rank System abolished any checks on the aristocratic families, leaving them all-powerful. However, once papermaking became widespread and emperors sought to suppress the aristocrats, the sheer numbers of ordinary people eventually overwhelmed them.

But without the necessary checks in place, the massive class of scholars that arose afterward caused even greater damage than the aristocrats. The sheer scale of that class’s influence was undeniable. Given that neither group was ideal, should everything just be destroyed?

Chen Xi wasn’t that foolish. Besides, if the aristocrats were eliminated, what would replace them? To be honest, even now, 60% of the officials in Liu Bei's administration came from aristocratic families. While Chen Xi hoped to reduce this number to 50%, the aristocrats' superiority in governance was undeniable.

Chen Xi estimated that, without a generation of stability, most commoners wouldn’t be able to meet his standards of governance.

The ancient saying, "When the granaries are full, the people know propriety; when they have food and clothing, they understand honor and shame," rang true. The impoverished masses, much like Mi Fang, who served as a military supply officer, were far more likely to embezzle military provisions—it was an unspoken truth.

Just as Chen Xi had observed, the Yellow Turban soldiers fought fiercely to protect their livelihoods without hesitation, yet petty theft was also rampant among them.

You couldn’t assume that just because they shared their last bit of food with a comrade in the darkest of times, they were inherently good people. It was not uncommon for them to withhold some of the spoils of war for themselves.

This was why Chen Xi had repeatedly instructed Yu Jin to maintain strict military discipline. Yet even so, the discipline of the Qingzhou Army was far from ideal. Although they weren’t as lawless as some, they still caused more destruction during war.

These seemingly small issues, Chen Xi realized, would take at least a generation of education to fully resolve, which frustrated him the most. Despite having the most comprehensive knowledge, he was unable to use it effectively.

Still, this wasn’t the worst-case scenario. At least these problems could be solved within a generation, and for an empire, the investment of one generation was not an unbearable burden if it meant achieving long-term goals.

The more difficult challenges, however, were those that even Chen Xi, with his nearly 2,000 years of accumulated wisdom, experience, and knowledge, could not solve.

Everyone knew the aristocratic families were a deep-rooted problem, but eliminating them during the Three Kingdoms period was impossible. Even with Chen Xi’s current power, he couldn’t do it. A regime couldn’t function solely on its top ten leaders; the vast numbers of mid- and lower-level officials were even more crucial.

If you removed nearly all the upper, middle, and lower levels of governance that maintained a state’s stability, the collapse of any empire would be inevitable. Even if you replaced these officials, it couldn’t be done in such a sweeping manner. This was the reason Chen Xi had to proceed cautiously and gradually.

It was like the people of the Soviet Union cursing their government. When the Soviet government collapsed, the people didn’t get what they wanted. In fact, their lives became worse than before, and it took over two decades for them to recover.

And that was in an industrialized country with far more wealth and strength than China had in 1840. And even the Soviet Union didn’t face the collapse of 90% of its ruling class—only around 30%.

Of course, the idea of removing 90% of the governing class is an exaggeration. It's impossible. Even before reaching that point, all rules would have collapsed. If you wanted to destroy the aristocrats from the ground up, other than waiting for their natural decline, the only way would be to have an entirely separate, complete administrative system in place outside of the aristocratic families.

Unfortunately, during the Three Kingdoms era, no country had the luxury of such an alternative. If they had two Zhuge Liangs, two Pang Tongs, two Fa Zhengs, and two Jiang Wans...

That scenario was entirely unrealistic, so Chen Xi quickly abandoned the idea of wiping out the aristocrats through force and began exploring other options.

Pushing the aristocratic families into decline, as history did, would be easy. By popularizing papermaking and education, and by supporting the common people over a few generations, most of the aristocratic families would disappear within 100 to 150 years.

Of course, if some families continued to produce geniuses, there was nothing that could be done. True talent, when combined with the same level of effort, is nearly unstoppable. If the Zhuge family kept producing people like Zhuge Liang—or even just Zhuge Jin—that alone would be enough to cause despair. In such cases, there would be no solution.

It would be easy for Chen Xi to accelerate the decline of the aristocratic families, as history did. But would that truly be the best course of action?

When you stand high enough, your considerations should go beyond immediate interests. This was a lesson Chen Xi had learned long ago: always take the long view. That is what people like them were meant to do.

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