The Three Qins () refer to three of the Eighteen Kingdoms, the short-lived power-sharing arrangement formed in 206 BC after the collapse of the Qin Dynasty. The three kingdoms were located in Guanzhong Plain (in present-day central Shaanxi), the heartland of the Qin Empire. Background In late 208 BC the rebel king of Chu, King Huai II, promised that whoever invaded Guanzhong first would rule the region. In late 207 the Chu rebel Liu Bang became the first anti-Qin rebel to enter the Guanzhong region, capturing the Qin capital Xianyang and receiving the surrender of Ziying, the last king of Qin. He also won the support of the people of Guanzhong by abolishing the harsh Qin laws and by forbidding his troops from killing and robbing the locals. For these reasons, Liu Bang had a strong claim to Guanzhong, which was grain-rich, populous, easily defensible and ideal for expansion into China's Central Plain. However, the Chu rebel Xiang Yu, the most powerful rebel warlord at the time and Liu Bang's rival, ignored Huai's promise, and in January 206 he instead gave Liu the former Qin territories of Hanzhong, Ba and Shu in present-day Sichuan, which he would rule as the king of Han. Ba and Shu were grain-rich, but they were remote from the rest of China. Xiang Yu allowed Liu Bang to take only 30,000 soldiers to go with him to Hanzhong, although 10,000 further men from Chu and other states voluntarily joined his army. Liu Bang's army marched south across the Qinling Mountains, following the Ziwu Road to Hanzhong. After reaching the Han River Basin in Hanzhong, Liu Bang, on the advice of his advisor Zhang Liang, burned the wooden gallery road to prove his commitment to follow Xiang Yu's orders and remain within his own dominion. Xiang Yu wished to rule his Chu homeland rather than Guanzhong, and so he divided the region between three former Qin generals who had surrendered to Xiang Yu after the Battle of Yushui River back in July 207. The former General-in-Chief of Qin, Zhang Han, received the kingdom of Yong (), occupying present-day central Shaanxi. Xiang Yu's intention to use Zhang Han was partly influenced by the latter's exceptional successes as a general. In 209 Zhang Han had trained an army of convicts to fight the rebels, saved Xianyang and Xingyang and annihilated the rebel armies of Zhou Wen, Wu Guang