Chen Ke held a skeptical attitude towards the division of human social development stages in Marxist theory. Like many young people with the same skeptical attitude, Chen Ke believed that the stages of human development—slavery, feudalism, capitalism—did not suit China. The era of large-scale slavery in China was only the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, and even in that era, the slave class was never an independent class. Personal subordination has a long history in China, but slavery was never the dominant force in society. The Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties used "Shi" [scholars/gentlemen], "Guo Ren" [people of the state/capital], and "Ye Ren" [people of the wild/countryside] as the main political power hierarchy division. By the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, this division was merely superficial. Baili Xi was first a high official in the State of Yu; Yu was destroyed by Jin, and he became a slave in Jin; finally, he became a high official in Qin and was called "Five Sheepskins Officer" because Baili Xi ran from Jin to Chu, and the King of Qin redeemed Baili Xi with five black sheepskins.

If the upper class was like this, it could be considered a special case. once the State of Song lost a battle, and the general returned to the capital with the defeated soldiers; those with slave-like status repairing the city wall actually sang songs to mock this group of defeated generals. In Chinese history, there were slaves in status, but the kind of slavery Marx spoke of never existed in China.

As for the feudal system, China's true enfeoffment system was in the Xia, Shang, and Zhou eras. After Qin Shi Huang unified China, enfeoffment was never a norm in Chinese history. Moreover, the enfeoffment system was followed by cutting down vassal states time and again. The unified centralized system is China's tradition. And Marx never described this system.

Chen Ke originally thought so: Marx, a European white guy, having no deep understanding of China was the norm. Moreover, in Marx's era, European industrial countries were in their heyday; Chen Ke actually suspected that Marx himself might not have noticed, but in Marx's subconsciousness, he also thought white people were quite superior. But without investigation, there is no right to speak. In 1906, Marx was already dead, and Engels was also dead. It would be impolite to write a letter to ask Marx's family. Moreover, Chen Ke considered himself a believer of Grandpa Mao and a later learner of Confucius and Xunzi. Even if Marx really thought white people were quite superior, Chen Ke only wanted to use Marx's thoughts and didn't mean to whip his corpse.

However, after really investigating the Manchu Qing era, Chen Ke felt that a saying he encountered before might not be unreasonable. The Chinese bureaucratic system, in a sense, can be considered the feudalism of the bureaucratic system itself. The magistrate being called "Marquis of a Hundred Li" was not a new term created by Chen Ke. At least in the late Qing era, the bureaucratic system was roughly a feudal tax collection system. So the castle stronghold system similar to European feudalism had quite a bit of feudal flavor.

However, these were all Chen Ke's thoughts when his mind was wandering. Overthrowing a certain part of Marx's theoretical construction was not the work Chen Ke prepared to start now; it could be done calmly after the victory of the revolution. The imminent thing was military struggle. Chen Ke's discussion of military struggle at the Military Commission meeting was very simple: "Rural areas encircling the cities." based on the theory inherited from Grandpa Mao, targeting the stronghold political characteristics of the Manchu Qing, the People's Party let go to launch the revolution in the countryside, and the main force of the troops carried out devastating strikes against various strongholds of the Manchu Qing.

In Grandpa Mao's era, the militia organized by landlords had always been the most stubborn enemy. However, the so-called militia needed the cooperation of the enemy's regular army. If there was no cooperation from the enemy's regular army, the militia was equally vulnerable to the regular army of the revolutionary troops. Since it was a militia, the leaders were all landlords. After eliminating this group of people physically, there were no substantial enemies in the countryside.

When the Worker-Peasant Revolutionary Army of the People's Party set out for Fengyang Prefecture, they found Chen Ke's judgment quite correct. For some time now, the "Insurance Corps," the predecessor of the Worker-Peasant Revolutionary Army, had been breaking forts everywhere and starting to establish base areas. The landlords' forts had now become the territory of various new base areas. Even with such a big disturbance, there was still no movement from the Fengyang Prefecture side. Even Chen Ke, who had no illusions about the efficiency of the Manchu Qing, felt it was a bit excessive. But reality is always stranger than fiction. The newest base area developed by the People's Party was only more than fifty li away from Fengyang Prefecture, yet Fengyang Prefecture turned a blind eye.

The soldiers of the Worker-Peasant Revolutionary Army didn't have so many worries. Attacking Fengyang Prefecture mobilized all troops of the Water Detachment, totaling a brigade in strength. When the troops marched, they first took the Huai River water route, then entered Longzihu [Dragon Son Lake]. After landing on the east bank of Longzihu, they prepared to continue eastward straight to Fengyang Prefecture.

Fengyang Prefecture is on the *yang* [sunny/south] side of Fenghuang Mountain [Phoenix Mountain], hence the name. If not for Zhu Yuanzhang, this place wouldn't be very famous originally. Moreover, the famous part in the *Fengyang Flower Drum* is also "Since Zhu Yuanzhang came out, nine years out of ten are famine." Because floods are frequent here, Fengyang Prefecture is actually just a general name. Even the prefecture seat changes with frequent floods.

In this sense, it might be more appropriate to view the Manchu Qing's rule in Fengyang Prefecture as a feudal colonial authorized tax collection system. Backward productive forces made the common people exhausted just coping with floods, unable to engage in production. This was also a fact of Fengyang Prefecture.

As soon as the troops disembarked, a large number of common people were already waiting on the shore. Everyone had seen many ragged disaster victims, but these disaster victims were quite different; carrying various "weapons," they were quite spirited. Seeing the soldiers of the Worker-Peasant Revolutionary Army, there was no surprise common to people in other places on their faces. On the contrary, these common people all had radiance on their faces. The People's Party had not yet opened a base area in the Fengyang County area for the time being, but this did not mean the people of Fengyang County did not know the existence of the People's Party. A young man in a long gown stood in front of the common people; beside the young man was the liaison officer of the People's Party. Seeing the team of the Worker-Peasant Revolutionary Army dock, the two went up to welcome them first.

The young man looked gentle and refined. He cupped his hands at the people on the fleet and shouted loudly: "I am Zhu Sanshui, from Yaozhuang. May I ask which one is the leader of the People's Party?"

The commander of this military operation was still Zhang Yu, and the fleet commander was Yan Fu. The two were on the foremost boat. One reason for choosing to dock here for this operation was that Zhu Sanshui volunteered to lead the locals to participate in the battle to attack Fengyang Prefecture.

Zhu Sanshui's joining was completely unexpected. The new base areas didn't want to be too conspicuous; although the furthest base area had already reached Hongze Lake, they temporarily didn't press too close to Fengyang Prefecture. Zhu Sanshui ran to the Tianhe Base Area on his own initiative to ask to join. One selection point for the People's Party to develop base areas was to be by the water. Because of the flood, the common people by various lakes were the most miserable.

After the persons in charge of various base areas arrived at the base areas, they all found that the situation they faced was completely different from Fengtai County. One of the most important differences was that there was no longer time for rush planting and rush harvesting. Although forts were taken, there was no reason to immediately start gathering people for labor. Farming must start next year, but the people's stomachs were starting to get hungry now. The only coping method was to form "Reclamation Brigades" and adopt centralized living to save grain supply quantity.

For the secretaries of various districts of the People's Party, this was a last resort. For the common people, this was the only way to save their lives. So various rumors began to spread at great speed. The People's Party had countless grain; as long as one was willing to depend on the People's Party, everyone would have food and shelter. Previously in Fengtai County, the common people were already living centrally, so news didn't spread fast. Now that the base areas expanded, the range of contact with disaster victims expanded greatly.

Zhu Sanshui was a scholar, but failed to pass the examination for Xiucai [Shengyuan] before the court abolished the imperial examination. Fortunately, there was a little thin field at home; with no hope for official rank, farming should be okay. As a result, when the flood came, there was no hope for farming either. After hearing the rumors of the People's Party, Zhu Sanshui immediately felt that this newly rising force was by no means "good men and believing women" [devout believers/harmless people]. In these years when the government didn't even relieve disaster, for a non-governmental force to spontaneously organize so big, their heart was definitely not to serve the court.

Having studied for so many years without getting a degree, Zhu Sanshui had completely despaired of the court. After discovering the "suspicious" political force of the People's Party, Zhu Sanshui's choice was to defect immediately. He first went to the Tianhe Base Area to inspect on the spot, saw those blue-clad troops, and also tried to get food twice. He confirmed that this group of people and the court were not the same thing at all.

Zhu Sanshui had studied after all and knew that defecting empty-handed was useless. There was still some surplus grain at home, so he simply asked to see the leaders of the Tianhe Base Area. The secretary of the Tianhe Base Area was Qin Wuan. Qin Wuan, who came from Fudan Public School, was from Shaanxi and had the personality peculiar to people from Guanzhong: frankly speaking, refreshing; badly speaking, impetuous. He was very interested in Zhu Sanshui's proposal to "join the partnership." In the conversation, Zhu Sanshui didn't understand the people's revolution mentioned by Qin Wuan; Zhu Sanshui originally only cared about whether the People's Party wanted to rebel. Since the People's Party wanted "revolution," Zhu Sanshui simply proposed that he could use all his family property to organize the people of Longzihu to participate in the "revolution."

If not for the People's Party having already decided to attack Fengyang Prefecture, Zhu Sanshui's end would very likely be "supervised" for investigation. Now time was so tight, and Qin Wuan was also impatient, so he simply went with Zhu Sanshui to the Longzihu area for an on-the-spot investigation personally. The investigation result was that the local area completely had a revolutionary foundation.

At this time, the plan to attack Fengyang Prefecture had been formulated. The result of the Party Central Committee's research was that Zhu Sanshui's defection to the revolution should be sincere. Agree for the time being at this stage. But the premise lay in sending someone to see if Zhu Sanshui could obey orders and scatter the surplus grain in his home to organize local people. The result of observation was that Zhu Sanshui indeed obeyed orders and, under the command of the special commissioner, organized a team of hungry people.

Finally, Zhu Sanshui was temporarily allowed to join the revolutionary ranks.

Before departure, Yan Fu expressed he was not very assured about this team joining rashly. Zhang Yu didn't have so many worries. The common people couldn't survive; if rebelling could let them live, the common people didn't care about attacking the government. According to several contacts, the news brought back by the liaison officer was that quite a few local people chose to join the battle spontaneously. If Zhu Sanshui expressed defection alone, there was still some possibility of a scam. If local people chose to join in large numbers, the possibility of them being court running dogs was minimal.

Seeing Zhu Sanshui coming to welcome them, Zhang Yu shouted loudly: "I am the commander of the People's Party. Is this friend Zhu Sanshui?"

"I am Zhu Sanshui! Thank Heaven and Earth, I finally looked forward to the arrival of the King's army." Zhu Sanshui shouted loudly.

After the troops disembarked, according to the prior arrangement, the grain given to these "uprising common people" was also transported down. The base area didn't have much rice or wheat; the transported grain was all potatoes. Everyone didn't say anything else; for anyone volunteering to participate in the battle, distribute twenty jin of potatoes per person first.