In the first month of the first year of Shengping (AD 357), just as common-born boys bound up their hair and began military service, and aristocratic boys began engaging in pure conversation and socializing in preparation for official recruitment, the fifteen-year-old Jin emperor, Sima Dan, formally donned the adult cap and changed the era name to Shengping. His mother, Empress Dowager Chu Suanzi, moved to Chongde Palace.
Then the Prince of Kuaiji, Sima Yu, continued assisting in government as before.
That was right: the emperor had donned his adult cap and changed the era name, but everything outside remained unchanged. Only the empress dowager returned to her son the share of power she had wielded from behind the curtain. Not one scrap of what belonged to anyone else could possibly be "returned" to him.
And that was not all. After the great victory in the North, Huan Wen kept his troops assembled, and his generals put their names to a petition demanding that the court make him Grand Marshal.
What was a Grand Marshal?
The little... no, the emperor who had already donned his adult cap had not known at first and could only ask learned men.
According to those learned men at court, it was the highest military office. Under the Han system, it ranked above the various Great Generals, Generals of Agile Cavalry, and Generals of Chariots and Cavalry, replacing the Grand Commandant-in other words, a supercharged version of the Grand Commandant.
It commanded all military affairs.
By the Wei and Jin periods, the Grand Marshal often coexisted with the Grand Commandant instead, making its transcendent position above the Three Excellencies even clearer.
It still commanded all military affairs, and apparently even the staff it recruited ranked higher than those of the Three Excellencies.
Of course, this explanation