Chapter 600: - A Great Help

Where there was a town, there would inevitably be restaurants, wine shops, and inns. The more people there were, the larger those establishments became, and the more room there was to divide them into different grades.

Strictly speaking, people created everything.

Once there were enough people, restaurants appeared, wine shops appeared, and so did the countless distinctions of rank and class people applied to themselves.

And when there were enough refugees, food stalls naturally followed as well.

The refugees were moving east.

Their destination was very clear:

Snow Sea Pass.

For the past three years, a folk rhyme had circulated among the people:

Soldiers follow Count Pingye, earn great merit;
Common folk follow Count Pingye, eat their fill.

For the overwhelming majority of common people in this age, being able to eat until they were full was already the greatest blessing their ancestors could bestow.

From Shengle City all the way to Snow Sea Pass, the efforts Zheng Fan’s group had poured into civilian livelihood over these past few years were finally producing visible results.

The first reason was that the Demon Kings were extraordinarily capable at local development and governance.

The second was that every external war they had fought had, in the end, become an extremely profitable deal.

The third was that the upper structure centered on Count Pingye had little interest in extravagant personal enjoyment. In that sense, they led by example, allowing the cake to be divided somewhat more evenly.

Of course, the first point was still the most important. That was the foundation. Everything else was merely additional.

Even Yanjing had already received news of the great victory in the campaign against Chu. Naturally, the people of Jin had learned it earlier.

Ordinary people did not possess any especially clear understanding of war or the grand affairs of state. But as ants trapped within the game, they still had some sense of the currents carrying them up and down.

Once this war was over, the Chu probably would not be able to invade again.

The Savages had long since been beaten into submission by Count Pingye, so the threat from the snowfield should not return either.

Sixty years.

A hundred years.

Those spans were too distant for ordinary people.

If they could see ten or twenty years of peace ahead of them, that was already enough for them to vote with their feet.

The first to emerge were the Jin people who, ever since the Savage uprising, had spent the past two years hiding in mountains, ravines, and waterways. Some had defended fortified villages. Others had simply turned themselves into something resembling mountain strongholds, cutting themselves off from the outside world in order to survive.

For the past two years, the Yan had largely left eastern Jin to fend for itself. Western Jin still required time and energy to digest, much less eastern Jin, which had long since been judged certain to suffer through another round of war.

So the Yan army had never carried out any large-scale clearing operation in the region.

In other words, no serious bandit suppression.

These “mountain kings” had also known their place. Some among them were certainly ambitious, but not one had been stupid enough to raise some “royal banner” and declare himself Heaven’s chosen sovereign.

Prince of Jingnan’s princely banner had remained in Fengxin City.

Count Pingye’s Zheng banner had continued flying over Snow Sea Pass.

No one dared become the bird that stuck its head out first.

Once news arrived of the great victory over Chu, those most sensitive to changes in the weather reacted first.

The ducks knew when the spring river warmed.

For one thing, war was unlikely to return to eastern Jin any time soon. Naturally, the people began emerging from their hiding places. Everyone possessed the right to pursue a better life.

After all, only a minority of mountain kings truly ate meat by the mouthful and drank wine by the bowl. Most of the people under them lived in rags and suffered terribly. They had merely managed to stay alive.

Most of the leaders of those mountain strongholds chose to follow popular sentiment.

The rest simply understood the times.

They knew perfectly well that once the Yan finished dealing with Chu, the next thing they would do was free their hands to clean up eastern Jin.

If they emerged now and voluntarily led their people into submission, they could still preserve some dignity.

This became the first wave of refugees.

And their numbers were not small.

Then came the second wave.

The second wave consisted of the civilian laborers mobilized to support the campaign against Chu. The overwhelming majority would return home, but after seeing the treatment laborers received at Snow Sea Pass and talking among themselves, quite a few gritted their teeth, stamped their feet, and decided to slip away toward Snow Sea Pass instead.

This involved a great many complications.

But with the war visibly nearing its end, and with soldiers and officials from Snow Sea Pass standing there watching, the other regions of Yan had little ability to pursue deserters from the labor corps.

Even if they wanted to investigate, could some local official from the man’s home district really travel thousands of li to demand him back?

And even if he did come, would he dare make a scene at the gates of Count Pingye’s Residence?

The third wave consisted of refugees who had fled across the Wang River from eastern Jin during the Savage uprising several years earlier.

The homeland was difficult to abandon.

For them, this was simply returning home.

On that point, the officials of Yingdu, including the Prince Cheng Residence, all chose to turn a blind eye.

For one thing, they needed to give Count Pingye face. After all, that was a man who had dared lead troops into Yingdu itself to seize people.

For another, Yingdu had struggled with a refugee problem for years.

Too many people were a problem.

They were also a tremendous source of instability.

And with Jin suffering repeated floods this year, it was easy to imagine even more refugees pouring into Yingdu in the future.

Better to send some of the trouble away in advance and clear room now.

So, as the great campaign against Chu drew toward its end, an enormous wave of migration appeared across the lands of the Three Jin.

At the mouth of one ruined town, destroyed during the Savage uprising but still sitting on an important road, several stalls had appeared because so many refugees passed through.

Some sold food.

Some cut hair.

Some were run by itinerant physicians.

The food was naturally nothing refined.

The barbers did reasonably well. Their craft involved many tools, but all of them were portable.

As for the physicians, they did not carry many herbs. Mostly they looked people over and offered advice. There might not be enough medicine to boil into a proper decoction, but at least the sick could feel somewhat reassured.

Refugees were refugees, but not every one of them was utterly penniless.

There were still plenty who could afford to spend a little.

Yet the hurried atmosphere surrounding everything made it clear that this prosperity would be brief as fireworks.

Even so, it still matched an old saying:

In a famine year, a craftsman does not starve.

Xu Chuang sat down before one of the stalls.

In front of him stood a charcoal brazier with a pot resting on top. The broth within boiled red.

Winter had begun.

The weather was cold.

Hotpot drove away the chill.

Truthfully, hotpot had not been invented by Count Pingye. This world already possessed the dish.

But because Count Pingye loved it, hotpot had spread especially widely around Snow Sea Pass.

There were several large government-run hotpot restaurants there, all inexpensive and generous. Their winter business was always excellent.

Here, of course, the broth and the ingredients were simplified as much as possible.

No one was particular about flavor.

Being able to eat something hot and seasoned was already difficult enough.

After sitting down, Xu Chuang tossed out a piece of broken silver and pointed directly at the broth before him.

“Put the food in.”

The owner knew at once that he had encountered a generous customer, perhaps even someone with official status.

Ordinary households rarely paid with silver merely to eat at a roadside stall.

“Right away, sir. Just a moment.”

The ingredients went into the pot soon afterward.

Xu Chuang pressed his left hand against his chest and picked up his chopsticks with his right, beginning to eat.

As the steaming food entered his stomach, comfort first crossed his face.

Then pain.

Then gloom.

At that moment, a swordsman in ordinary cotton clothes sat down across from him.

The man placed his sword upright beside him, picked up a pair of chopsticks as though this were his own table, and began eating from the pot.

The owner glanced over.

Seeing that Xu Chuang remained calm and simply continued eating, he naturally assumed the two knew each other.

In truth, Xu Chuang had never met the swordsman before.

But even seriously wounded as he was, he could still sense the aura surrounding the man.

Everyone knew that among the cultivation grades, the lower the number, the stronger the practitioner.

Anyone who knew a little more understood that sorcerers, Qi Refiners, and similar paths fluctuated greatly in actual strength.

Only those who had truly entered the threshold understood that Fifth Grade and above already counted as having entered the hall.

Fourth Grade and above was a completely different realm.

As for Third Grade, that was already the summit.

The same rice fed a hundred kinds of people.

Cultivation was no different.

Nothing was ever perfectly rigid or absolute.

Take that man-not-man, ghost-not-ghost corpse puppet he had encountered earlier.

In terms of actual cultivation, neither Xu Chuang nor the old man had been afraid of him.

Yet after the fight, that one existence had nearly dealt with both of them alone.

Now, looking at the young swordsman before him, even the way the man moved his chopsticks through the broth to retrieve food carried its own rhythm.

It was a kind of temperament.

Like men judging whether a woman carried the air of the pleasure quarters, or women judging whether a man was hollow or truly substantial.

Swordsmen had their own ways of judging swordsmen too.

A piece of wild venison sat at the bottom of the pot.

Xu Chuang reached for it.

The swordsman did the same.

Their chopsticks collided.

In the next instant, they clashed more than ten times.

The pot remained the same pot.

The broth barely even rippled.

After that brief test, Xu Chuang withdrew his chopsticks.

He was injured.

In the end, that made him less confident.

But the exchange had already allowed him to roughly judge the other man’s level.

A swordsman who might already be Fourth Grade.

Even if his formal cultivation had not reached Fourth Grade, his actual strength certainly had.

He already carried that particular spirit.

Swordsmen and sorcerers were similar in certain respects.

Sorcerers pursued insight into the meeting between Heaven and man.

Swordsmen, at times, also pursued that sort of divine flash of inspiration in a single sword strike.

By comparison, Martial Artists, those “great blocks of wood,” sat at the very bottom of the cultivation world’s chain of contempt.

Had Xu Chuang not been wounded, he would have remained much calmer.

But he was wounded.

And he had just been beaten half to death by a bizarre corpse puppet.

So he now possessed the instinctive caution of a man bitten by a snake once and frightened of ropes for ten years.

Unknown “experts” made him wary.

“You’re injured,” the swordsman said while eating Xu Chuang’s food.

“Yes.”

Xu Chuang admitted it openly.

The wound was difficult to conceal.

Not only were there three holes in his chest, there was corpse poison inside them.

Fortunately, he had come down from Wenming Mountain.

Across its entire history, Wenming Mountain had produced only a handful of truly famous figures in the jianghu.

Xu Chuang himself already counted as one of its more impressive men.

As a result, after most of Wenming Mountain’s practitioners spent years studying saber and sword only to achieve “nothing on either path,” many became disheartened and turned toward various unconventional arts instead.

For example: medicine.

Everyone in the State of Liang knew that Wenming Mountain had never produced any astonishing saber or sword master.

But the physicians on that mountain were excellent, every one of them.

More than half the imperial physicians of Liang came from Wenming Mountain.

Every year, nobles and powerful families from nearby states, as well as people from Jin, Qian, and Chu, deliberately traveled to Wenming Mountain to seek treatment.

Even so, Xu Chuang felt he could no longer suppress the corpse poison much longer.

At the end, there would remain only one truly effective method.

Disperse his blood and qi.

In other words: disperse his cultivation.

Let the corpse poison leave together with his blood and qi, preserving his life.

After that, he would not merely lose seventy or eighty percent of his cultivation.

His entire body would be left terribly depleted.

He would become a sickly invalid.

Xu Chuang was no saint.

His cultivation had been painfully earned.

He still wanted to search for another method and drag matters out a little longer.

Until the final possible moment, he did not want to disperse his cultivation.

“You’ve also been poisoned,” the swordsman said.

Xu Chuang nodded.

“Yes.”

The swordsman continued eating.

Then casually called to the owner for two flatbreads.

Xu Chuang studied him.

Seeing the other man fall silent, he assumed the swordsman was deliberately keeping him in suspense.

“Brother, do you know medicine?”

The swordsman shook his head.

“Only how to treat ordinary jianghu wounds.”

Disappointment appeared on Xu Chuang’s face.

The swordsman added:

“But I know someone who is excellent with poisons. A man skilled at using poison is naturally skilled at curing it.”

Using poison and neutralizing poison looked like opposite extremes, but the underlying principle was the same.

Without understanding poison at its root, one could never truly master either.

“Oh? Where is this expert?”

The swordsman shook his head.

“I don’t know where he is right now. But before long, he should be coming back.”

“Coming back where?”

“Snow Sea Pass.”

At Snow Sea Pass there was a dwarf.

He excelled at stealth.

He traveled on three legs and moved like the wind.

He was skilled with poison.

Skilled at killing invisibly.

Xu Chuang’s mouth fell open.

Why was it that place again?

For a moment, Xu Chuang even suspected the man had been sent from Snow Sea Pass to hunt him.

But after thinking about it, that made no sense.

Snow Sea Pass would have no reason to take off its trousers just to fart.

If they wanted him dead, why had they released him earlier?

“What poison are you suffering from?” the swordsman asked.

Xu Chuang pressed his lips together and did not answer immediately.

He could sense that the swordsman before him was probably quite familiar with Snow Sea Pass.

The swordsman bit into one of the flatbreads.

While chewing, he examined Xu Chuang seriously.

“Pupils darkening... lips purple... complexion dusky green... veins standing out on the backs of the hands... aversion to cold... nails blackening...”

As he spoke, the swordsman slowly lowered the flatbread in his hand.

His expression went from suspicion, to surprise, to shock, then finally back to calm.

Xu Chuang could tell the man was not pretending.

People who used swords usually liked straightforwardness.

Once a swordsman truly entered the hall, there were not many left who still enjoyed deliberate performance.

The swordsman asked very seriously:

“You were poisoned by corpse venom?”

Xu Chuang froze.

After hesitating for a moment, he nodded.

Then, with sudden hope, he asked:

“You know corpse poison?”

“I was poisoned by it once too.”

“What!”

Xu Chuang nearly leaped for joy.

The swordsman continued:

“I was defeated by something that was neither man nor ghost, and then I was poisoned.”

“Yes! Yes! Exactly!”

The same one.

He was talking about the same one!

The swordsman nodded.

Then he picked up his sword and held it suspended before Xu Chuang.

“You were wounded by him, which proves you intended to harm someone extremely close to Count Pingye’s Residence. That existence only protects a few of the closest people there. Sorry. I can’t let you leave. I have to take you back to the Count’s Residence.”

The corner of Xu Chuang’s mouth twitched.

“They released me.”

“Heh.”

The swordsman laughed.

“You think I’m stupid?”

“...” Xu Chuang.

“Either die beneath my sword right now, or come back to Snow Sea Pass with me.”

“They really released me. It was a blind man. A blind man with fairly high status.”

“Mr. Bei?”

“Seems like it.”

“Then it’s even more impossible. Looks like you really do think I’m an idiot. Mr. Bei is always polite and easygoing on the surface, but when he handles matters, he is the most ruthless of all. He likes pulling weeds out by the roots. How could he possibly let you leave? You’re pretty good. You actually managed to escape. But you ran into me. Bad luck. As for the cost of this meal, once I bring you back to Snow Sea Pass, I’ll have the people at the Count’s Residence repay you.”

With that, the swordsman stood.

He drew his sword and laid the blade across Xu Chuang’s neck.

“You really have misunderstood. This really is a misunderstanding...”

“Heh.”

The swordsman smiled faintly.

“Don’t treat Hero Chen like a fool.”

...

“Are you certain? When will the Count return?” Xiong Liqing asked the Blind Man.

The Blind Man replied:

“Three days from now. Given Master’s temperament, he’ll probably leave the rest behind and ride back first with only two or three hundred personal guards.”

The entire mess there, prisoners of war, spoils, and so on, would probably be left to Fourth Lady to handle.

Then the matters here would be left to the Blind Man.

Earlier, the Blind Man had returned to Snow Sea Pass to relieve Fourth Lady.

Now, very soon, he would probably have to go back there and swap with Fourth Lady once more.

“Thank Heaven. He’s finally coming back.” Xiong Liqing was clearly delighted. “As for the preparations inside the pass...”

“Your Highness can rest assured. I’ll handle them.”

“Thank you for your hard work, Mr. Bei.”

“It’s only proper. Part of my duties. Your Highness and Miss Liu only need to prepare yourselves to put Master to bed. After this campaign, Master should be exhausted. Truthfully, the war is over and peace has been negotiated, yes, but what comes next may not be any easier than fighting. The real moment to establish our foundation and build our household is about to begin.”

The Princess nodded.

“I understand.”

“Then I’ll take my leave first.”

“Go ahead, Mr. Bei.”

The Blind Man walked out of the small hall.

At that moment, a messenger hurried over and reported:

“Mr. Bei, Hero Chen is back.”

“Oh? Where is he?”

“Drinking tea in the front hall.”

“All right. I understand.”

...

Hero Chen was a good man.

Their first meeting had involved a misunderstanding that ended with Sha Tuo Queshi nearly beating him into a cripple.

Later, the misunderstanding was resolved, and they successfully coaxed him into serving as hired muscle several times.

Before the war began, Hero Chen had been studying swordsmanship beside the Sword Saint.

After the fighting started, Hero Chen went to the battlefield once, then quietly disappeared again.

He was, after all, a man of Qian.

Becoming too deeply involved in a war between Yan and Chu did not feel quite right to him.

As for helping Master put on a performance last year to steal the Princess back, Hero Chen did not believe he had done anything wrong.

He had helped his good brother steal back his wife.

How did that violate the greater righteousness of the state?

In short, Hero Chen possessed his own standards of morality and patriotism.

Other people might find those standards rather difficult to understand.

But so long as he could make sense of them himself, that was enough.

The Blind Man entered the front hall and saw Hero Chen sitting there drinking tea.

Then he saw Xu Chuang tied up and laid horizontally across the floor.

Something had been stuffed into Xu Chuang’s mouth.

Restrictions had been placed on his shoulders, wrists, and dantian.

The instant he saw the Blind Man enter, Xu Chuang began making furious muffled noises.

Hero Chen sat comfortably where he was, still sipping tea.

A faint curve hung at the corner of his mouth.

He looked like a student waiting for praise.

The Blind Man immediately cried out in amazement:

“Oh my! Hero Chen, this... this... we exhausted ourselves trying to catch this bastard, spent every last bit of strength we had, and in the end he still escaped. But you’re the capable one. You actually caught him and brought him back for us. You truly did us a great help!”

“...” Xu Chuang.

[End of Chapter 600]