Okay let me explain everything. First a bunch of tyrannical people started making children who have no idea how to run a country emperor, so they could grasp the emperor's trust and power. (becoz children r stoopid u know)
And due to the tyrannical-ness of these people in power, the people not in power started to get mad of all the taxes and stuff and so they bunched together forming a rebellion namely the Yellow Turban rebellion with a catchy slogan that I won't mention because when it translates into English it's downright weird.
The imperial government (that's the emperor and his fellas) freaked out and some 'clever' guy came up with this idea.
"Hey Emperor bro why don't we summon all the regional warlords and let them quell the rebellion in their respective territories?"
"Great idea!"
In the rebellion-quenching thingy, a lot of famous warlords joined including Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Sun Jian and Dong Zhuo. They're all important except for Sun Jian so keep an eye out for these dudes.
And good news for the Han, these warlords crushed the rebellion and hooray everyone is happy only that by doing this the Han didn't quite realize that they increased the warlords' power and their power was diminished to almost nothing. The warlords could act almost entirely independently now, which is never a good thing. Look at the poor Zhous and see how well they did.
The Emperor died and his son was crowned emperor who gave power to a dude named He Jin. This He Jin guy hated a bunch of people in the court and teamed up with warlord Yuan Shao (who also joined the rebellion quelling stuff). But the Emperor's mother firmly refused and thus they had to 'invite' a warlord from the south called Dong Zhuo (remember him?) to 'convince' the Emperor's mother. Dong Zhuo set out from his region with his army for the capital of China, Luo Yang.
The enemies of He Jin somehow got wind that He Jin was trying to kill them and so they lured him to the palace and lobbed his head off. Yuan Shao found out and he led the Imperial Forces to massacre all of He Jin's enemies. In the chaos the emperor and his brother were forced to flee due to the angry peasants starting to riot. Meanwhile, Dong Zhuo has just arrived. (perfect timing eh)
He found the emperor and his brother in the hills outside the city and was seriously confused. The emperor cowered in fear while his brother shouted at Dong Zhuo bravely if he was helping the emperor or trying to assassinate him. This made Dong Zhuo favor the emperor's brother over the emperor.
So anyway, Dong Zhuo scooped up the emperor and his brother and WAHEY just took over the country like that. His first act was to kill the emperor and make his little brother the emperor. So yeah. It's a bit the emperor's own fault ya know, but who can blame him?
Dong Zhuo was really really tyrannical and he ruled with an iron fist. He had people who disagreed with him killed and once he even killed an important dude to get a warrior.
Now all the other warlords saw what was going on. Perhaps out of jealousy, perhaps out of hate, perhaps just for expanding their own power or maybe just maybe for the good of the people, they ganged up against Dong Zhuo including all the warlords previously mentioned plus Yuan Shao's half brother Yuan Shu.
Remember the warrior Dong Zhuo killed an important guy for! His name was Lu Bu and he was an absolute beast of a warrior. He never lost a one to one fight and legend has it he even took on Liu Bei's two brothers (the fierest warriors in the country) and Liu Bei himself. All at once. Without losing.
So the rebellion is winning and Sun Jian's forces inflicted a heavy defeat on Lu Bu and Dong Zhuo's forces so they were forced to retreat to the city of Chang An. After that the war entered a stalemate. The warlords in the coalition saw this wasn't going anywhere and they all secretly hated each other so they dispersed. Dong Zhuo was safe. But what he didn't know was that there were people working for him who secretly hated him. Including a really famous guy called Wang Yun. He deviously used his 'daughter' to trick both Lu Bu and Dong Zhuo, making Lu Bu betray Dong Zhuo and hooray he's (Wang Yun) in control now.
Now everybody wants to rule over China so we enter into a crazy chaotic period that may possibly be mythical but is one of China's most exciting parts.
Okay are you ready? Here we go.
Cao Cao started swallowing nearby Yellow Turban remnants, increasing his own forces. Sun Jian was killed in an ambush staged by one of Liu Biao's men. Sun Jian was replaced by his son, Sun Ce.
Cao Cao's family was murdered by a group of bandits who wanted their wealth. (and they got it lmao) Cao Cao was devastated and held Tao Qian, the province's warlord responsible. He brutally started taking over. Tao Qian contacted Kong Rong who contacted a very likeable warlord called Liu Bei who rapidly came to his aid with his fierce warrior brothers Guan Yu and Zhang Fei. (Oh, and he also borrowed some men from his old classmate Gong Sun Zan and an even more calculating and fierce warrior named Zhao Yun.)
Tao Qian saw it was hopeless and gave his territory and forces to Liu Bei, who was the current emperor's distant relative. Lu Bu got annihilated by Cao Cao so he fled to the east to Liu Bei and in a misunderstanding where Zhang Fei stole 500 horses of Lu Bu, Lu Bu took over Liu Bei. Liu Bei fled to Cao Cao and they annihilated Lu Bu and Lu Bu was killed. (GG)
Inside Cao Cao's place, a bunch of people secretly ganged up with the help of the emperor to assassinate Cao Cao. There's Ma Teng and Liu Bei, and some other people. Then in a slip, their plots were uncovered by Cao Cao who killed everyone involved but Ma Teng and Liu Bei weren't reachable by the time. Cao Cao pretended to invite Ma Teng back then killed him but made Ma Teng's son or something, Ma Chao, very angry.
Meanwhile out of nowhere Yuan Shu declared himself as emperor which makes everybody very mad so he got killed. Sun Ce took over his territory and then got assassinated so his youngest brother, Sun Quan took over. (Watch out for this guy)
Yuan Shao defeated Gong Sun Zan to his north. (the classmate of Liu Bei) Liu Bei was very sad but he had more urgent matters on his hands. He fled south to his distant relative Liu Biao because Cao Cao was eyeing him up and down. Meanwhile Yuan Shao focused on Cao Cao but it backfired due to Cao Cao being more clever than Yuan Shao so Cao Cao obliterated Yuan Shao and took over his territory, just like that. Something that made the other warlords very afraid.
Liu Biao died and his stupid son Liu Cong immediately surrendered. Liu Bei was like HUH??? NOOO and then he fled everywhere with his trusty mates Guan Yu, Zhang Fei and Zhao Yun. From some bright guy's advice, they set off to invite a very very VERY clever and cunning strategist called Zhu Ge Liang. They failed on the first two tries but on the third try they finally found him. Legend has it that Zhu Ge Liang didn't want to leave but Liu Bei touched him by crying so he did come to Liu Bei's aid lmao
So you know about Liu Cong surrendering... he had an older brother who should have been in power. But he wasn't in power. So Liu Bei, being the sneaky guy he is, grabbed Liu Cong's brother, Liu Qi, and took control of the southern part of the Jing Province. (also Liu Biao's territory) Cao Cao prepared to attack both Liu Bei and his friend on the east, Sun Quan, and if he could succeed, he would rule over the whole of China, just like that.
Tune in to the next chapter for Three Kingdoms continued. Man, I thought I'd only need one chapter...
