Chapter 1017: Ten Thousand Li of Rivers and Mountains, One Willow Branch

Mianzhou City.

Governor-General's Residence.

"Young Master, tea."

The old man handed a cup of tea to Zu Zhuming.

Zu Zhuming accepted it, but set it aside again. Raising a hand, he rubbed at the space between his brows.

"Young Master, you still haven't made up your mind?"

"They're forcing me."

Zu Zhuming's hair was already half white. At this moment, the deep "river" crease between his brows looked especially pronounced.

At the military council earlier, tempers had run high.

Some had shouted that they should turn the army around and march to Shangjing to rescue the sovereign.

Others had shouted that the great tide was already lost, so they might as well...

The problem was that those shouting about rescuing the sovereign were not necessarily pure and loyal ministers who truly intended to go, while those shouting that all was lost were not all cowards greedy for life and afraid of death.

More than ten years ago, before the Yan first launched their great invasion south, Great Qian's Three Frontiers had possessed a system of their own.

But after that campaign carried the Yan all the way to the walls of Shangjing, the Three Frontiers system had been filled out continuously with troops from every direction. For a time, the court, driven by fear, kept piling every "elite" force from across the country that could fight into the region.

That was what had created the extraordinarily complicated balance of power along the Three Frontiers today.

Each force had its own origins, its own home territory, its own web of connections, its own factional mountain...

Zu Zhuming remembered very clearly that during the first Yan-Chu national war, the court had originally intended to cooperate with Chu and launch a northern expedition. Old Chancellor Zhong had forcibly suppressed the plan. Then, with Old Chancellor Zhong's death from illness, that northern expedition ultimately vanished like smoke.

The reason was simple. The armies of the Three Frontiers were too mottled in color, too mixed in composition. It was extremely difficult to find a single man who could truly speak for everyone and preside over the whole situation.

Even the court itself understood that.

And in essence, that situation had never really changed.

Earlier, Zu Zhuming had managed, at least on the surface, to "straighten out" the Three Frontiers. But now Shangjing had fallen and the court's decree of surrender had gone out. Once he lost the legal authority behind him, how could a Jiangnan man possibly command complete obedience from the Three Frontiers?

Before Zu Zhuming rose to prominence, the Zu Clan had merely been an ordinary military household in Jiangnan. At best, it had stood somewhere in the middle ranks, perhaps even a little below them.

Back then, banditry had ravaged the southeast. Zu Zhuming rose rapidly by wiping out the pirate menace, and through those victories built the Zu Clan Army.

So, to put it plainly, when Zu Zhuming came to the Three Frontiers as Governor-General, he had come as an outside commander.

"Uncle Chen, the Three Frontiers cannot be held."

"Young Master, yours is a hard road."

Uncle Chen had been one of Zu Zhuming's father's personal guards. Utterly loyal, he had served two generations of the Zu Clan.

At that moment, a personal guard entered to report.

"Grand Commander, there is... an old acquaintance asking to see you."

Zu Zhuming frowned slightly. Looking at this veteran guard, he asked in confusion, "An old acquaintance?"

"Grand Commander should go and see him. He truly is... an old acquaintance."

...

The old acquaintance was in the signing chamber.

That made Zu Zhuming even more puzzled.

An ordinary guest, even an honored guest, would normally be settled in the front hall to wait for Zu Zhuming to receive him. A place like the signing chamber was somewhere the master of the residence had to invite or personally bring a guest.

Yet this group of subordinates, men who had always followed the rules, had taken it upon themselves to do otherwise this time.

A man stood inside the signing chamber, looking over the calligraphy and paintings hanging on the walls.

Yao Zizhan had once served as Governor-General of the Three Frontiers. This residence had been his headquarters as well, and he had left behind a great many works of calligraphy and painting. When Zu Zhuming succeeded him, he had kept them all in place. Partly that was to show respect for his predecessor.

And partly...

Ordinary nobles and dignitaries would spend a thousand pieces of gold trying to obtain a single painting or piece of calligraphy by Yao Zizhan. Only a man with something wrong in his head would take down genuine works that were already hanging on his walls.

The man inside seemed to hear Zu Zhuming's footsteps.

He turned.

Under Zu Zhuming's stunned gaze, the man dropped directly to both knees.

"Father!"

That one word struck Zu Zhuming like a thunderbolt.

"Father, your son has returned!"

Zu Zhuming stared at the man's face in disbelief.

"Dong... Dongcheng?"

"It is me, Father!"

"You... how are you... still alive?"

"Father, your son has been unfilial. The truth is, I've been alive all along."

"The Eldest Young Master is back!" Uncle Chen cried out in shock.

...

"You've been living in Yan all these years?"

"Yes, Father. After that battle, your son was captured by the Re... by Zheng... by Yan..."

Zu Dongcheng opened his mouth several times, yet could not bring himself to say that man's title.

Zu Zhuming supplied it for him.

"The Regent Prince."

"Yes. After that battle, your son was taken prisoner by the Regent Prince, though at the time the Regent Prince was not yet a Prince."

"So the news Yan released back then, saying that you were taken to Yanjing, refused to surrender even under threat of death, cursed the late Emperor of Yan to his face, and were then executed... all of that was false?"

"Yes, Father."

"You surrendered?" Zu Zhuming asked.

"Your son... your son..."

"Stop swallowing your words. Tell me exactly what happened."

"Your son did indeed meet the late Emperor of Yan, but His Late Majesty... never asked your son to surrender."

"Heh."

Zu Zhuming laughed and slapped his thigh.

"Of course. My legitimate eldest son being captured should have been an enormous humiliation. At the time, both your father and the Zu Clan Army might even have been suppressed by the court because of it. Executing you on paper and turning you into a loyal, courageous martyr who chose death over surrender not only erased the disgrace of your capture, it raised your father's standing instead. Otherwise, how could I ever have climbed into the position of Governor-General of the Three Frontiers? The Yan... that late Emperor of Yan... what a fine game of calculation he played!"

Zu Zhuming's knuckles cracked as he clenched his fists.

He was angry.

What angered him was that the late Emperor of Yan had kept his son as a chess piece and had apparently never worried in the slightest that Zu Zhuming might truly unite the Three Frontiers and become some great threat to Yan.

His fury came from being looked down upon.

But the anger arrived suddenly and left just as quickly.

After all, the man who had looked down on him was that late Emperor of Yan.

Being underestimated by a man like that... somehow did not feel especially humiliating.

"Did the Emperor of Yan send you?" Zu Zhuming asked.

"Yes, Father."

"To persuade me to surrender?"

"Yes."

Zu Zhuming looked at the legitimate eldest son who had once filled him with pride, the son he had regarded as his true successor.

"You may try."

Zu Dongcheng prostrated himself again.

"Father, you should already know that Shangjing has fallen. The Regent Prince's army has entered the city. The Emperor and all the civil and military officials have surrendered. What meaning is there in Father continuing to hold the Three Frontiers? More than that, without Shangjing, without Jiangnan's support, do the Three Frontiers even still possess the strength to hold?"

"I..." Zu Zhuming drew a deep breath. "Our Zu Clan has served as a military house of Great Qian for generations. How can we simply..."

"Even the Emperor has bowed his head. Even the Emperor has surrendered. Father, the Zhao family themselves have knelt before the Yan. What is the Zu Clan supposed to be beyond that?"

"Dongcheng, can the Emperor alone represent the State of Qian?"

"The Emperor... is he not Qian?"

"Great Qian is hardly something a single Zhao-family Emperor can represent."

"Father, your son understands what you mean."

"Oh? You understand?" Zu Zhuming was somewhat surprised.

"Before your son came here, His Majesty personally summoned me. He spoke to me about several things. About Father."

Zu Zhuming's gaze sharpened slightly.

"What did the Emperor of Yan say?"

"His Majesty said that Father is a loyal minister. A loyal minister of the State of Qian, and a man loyal to the people of Qian. He said Father's loyalty is vast enough to hold all the waves of the Eastern Sea."

"Heh... hehehe."

Even a man as imposing as Grand Commander Zu could not help feeling pleased after being praised like that by the Emperor of an enemy state.

The same flattery, spoken by different mouths, produced entirely different effects.

"His Majesty also said..."

"What else did His Majesty say?"

"He said the last man as loyal to Qian as Father... was the Tattooed-Face Chancellor."

"..." Zu Zhuming.

The Tattooed-Face Chancellor had been imprisoned and ultimately died in prison. Even now, the affair remained almost forbidden ground in Qian politics.

But there was nothing new beneath the sun. What seemed confused and mysterious to ordinary people was, in the eyes of those who truly stood at the top, usually no more than... exactly what it looked like.

As Qian's neighboring state, Yan had also paid close attention to the Tattooed-Face Chancellor's death. However incompetent the Secret Intelligence Department might have been, it was still capable of investigating a matter that important when ordered to focus on it.

Zu Zhuming remained silent for a long time.

When his father still did not speak, Zu Dongcheng broke the brief stillness.

"Father should have received... letters from home, shouldn't you?"

Zu Zhuming nodded.

Zhao Yuannian had established his puppet court in Jiangnan, and the old Zu Clan residence lay squarely within Zhao Yuannian's sphere of power.

Part of the chaos at the earlier military council came from the fact that everyone had already heard that the Zu Clan in Jiangnan had thrown itself behind Zhao Yuannian.

Grand Commandant, Supreme General, one first-class military office after another... look down the list and there were Zu surnames everywhere.

So although Zhao Yuannian's performance as Jiangnan's "Emperor" had the absurd flavor of his Mount Tai'er farce, it still produced genuine political effects.

At the very least, as a man who could claim half the relationship of an "adopted son" to the Regent Prince, Zhao Yuannian was not entirely without ability.

Now the armies of the Three Frontiers had split into multiple factions, each with different political goals and demands.

Some wanted to surrender to Yan. There was nothing more to say about them.

Some wanted to take their troops away from the Three Frontiers, return to their home regions, carve out territories of their own, then watch which way the wind blew.

Others intended to find some imperial prince, raise him up, and establish another court.

There were quite a few in that final group. A hundred years ago, Great Qian's founding Emperor Taizu had risen from precisely such an age of chaos and built a dynasty that endured for a century.

By contrast, Zu Zhuming possessed a moral fastidiousness that made him utterly incompatible with the surrender faction.

Yet because the Jiangnan Zu Clan had already defected, and had done so with such an ugly appetite for office, he could not fit among the resistance faction either.

And because the Zu Clan's roots lay in Jiangnan, any attempt to return home and establish an independent base would require marching from north to south across nearly the whole of Great Qian.

That was almost impossible.

Did they really think the Yan were blind?

Would the Yan simply watch while the Zu Clan Army strolled under their noses all the way home?

And so the dignified Governor-General of the Three Frontiers had somehow ended up holding a position and a will completely different from every faction beneath his own command.

"Dongcheng, have you lived well in Yan all these years?"

"Father... your son has lived quite well."

Zu Dongcheng clenched his teeth, then continued.

"Your son is married and has children."

"Children?"

"Yes. You have two grandsons and two granddaughters in Yan."

"Congratulations, Young Master," Uncle Chen immediately said.

Zu Zhuming, meanwhile, asked at once, "Who is your wife?"

"She is Commandery Princess Xianshu of Great Yan. The late Emperor... arranged the marriage."

Great Yan had once had one exceptionally famous Commandery Princess, the young lady of Marquis Zhenbei Residence.

But that did not mean Great Yan possessed only one Commandery Princess. There were plenty of imperial clan daughters entitled to that rank within the Ji imperial house.

"The Yan truly were willing... to put real capital into this," Zu Zhuming sighed.

His daughter-in-law was a daughter of one of the late Emperor's brothers.

Even within the imperial clan, she belonged to one of the more prestigious branches.

"Hehehe."

Zu Zhuming lowered his head and laughed.

"So I've spent all these years guarding the Three Frontiers against my own in-laws?"

"Father... His Majesty said he intends to govern the Qian lands with benevolence and righteousness. The people of Qian will be treated no differently from the people of Yan, all alike under the law."

"Spare your father that horseshit."

Zu Zhuming looked at his son.

"How old are the children?"

"Father, the eldest and second sons are twins. They are thirteen this year. The elder girl is eleven, and the younger girl is ten."

"Already thirteen? Son... were you really in that much of a hurry?"

Zu Dongcheng lowered his head in shame.

He knew exactly why his father was astonished. Count backward from the eldest sons' age, then add ten months of pregnancy, and the conclusion was obvious.

After Zu Dongcheng was captured, he had essentially not held out for long at all before going off to make children with a woman of the Ji imperial clan.

"Father, His Majesty gave your son something to pass to you."

"A letter?"

"No."

Zu Dongcheng took two pieces of yellow silk from inside his robes.

Uncle Chen carried them over and placed them in Zu Zhuming's hands.

"These are..." Zu Zhuming's eyes widened. "Marriage contracts?"

"Yes."

Great seals had been stamped upon them.

Zu Zhuming had never seen the names written there before, but one glance was enough to know that they belonged to his two granddaughters, the daughters of his eldest son.

The elder girl was bestowed in marriage upon the Crown Prince of Yan.

The younger girl was bestowed in marriage upon the Regent Prince's Heir Prince.

Zu Zhuming had spent his whole life in the army.

Yet faced with those two marriage contracts, even he had nothing to say.

Truly nothing.

He had assumed that since the Yan had sent his son to persuade him to surrender, they would simply cycle through the usual handful of methods.

Who could have imagined that the Emperor of Great Yan would be so... so... so...

Zu Zhuming could not even find a proper word to describe what the Emperor had done.

True, the contracts did not say Crown Princess or Heir Princess, so the girls would most likely enter as secondary consorts.

But no matter how one looked at it... across the entire State of Qian, it would probably be difficult to find a second Qian family whose ties to Yan were now more intimate than the Zu Clan's.

They were directly becoming in-laws with both the imperial house of Great Yan and the Regent Prince Residence.

By generation, Zu Zhuming would even stand one generation above both the Emperor and the Regent Prince.

And taking the argument ten thousand steps farther... even if Great Yan fell into civil war one day, whether the Emperor won or the Regent Prince won, the Zu Clan... would still be imperial kin.

"Dongcheng..."

"Father..."

"You little beast!"

...

A new military council was convened in Mianzhou City.

Since the Yan army had halted its offensive after breaking Liang Garrison, commanders from nearly every force could attend.

No matter what happened, everyone needed to decide his own future as early as possible.

This council, however, was different.

Halfway through the proceedings, armored soldiers suddenly stormed in and seized every commander present.

Immediately afterward, the various units of the Zu Clan Army began moving in concert.

In earlier years, to divide and control the Three Frontiers, Zu Zhuming's own forces had never represented a particularly large share of the whole. But his people had been planted everywhere.

Prepared men struck the unprepared.

Combined with Grand Commander Zu's decisiveness, strategic strongholds were opened from within one after another. Yan troops moved in to receive them.

And so the Three Frontiers defensive line, built and maintained by Great Qian for a century at the cost of immeasurable manpower, wealth, and blood, a line that had lodged like a fishbone in Yan's throat through countless sleepless nights... collapsed completely.

...

"This general, Zu Zhuming, pays respects to Your Majesty! Long live my Emperor! Long live, long, long live!"

"Marquis of Donghai, rise quickly."

Ji Chengjue personally stepped forward and helped Zu Zhuming to his feet.

Zu Zhuming's head swam as the Emperor raised him.

What had His Majesty just called him?

Then understanding struck.

Once it did, he could only kneel again.

"Your Majesty's grace is vast. This guilty general is ashamed and dares not accept it."

Great Yan's stinginess with noble titles was known throughout All Xia.

Once, that stinginess had applied mostly to men outside the imperial surname. But after two notoriously hard-fisted Emperors in succession, the late Emperor and the present one, even the titles of the imperial clan had shrunk several times over.

Just look at the present Emperor's brothers.

Not one of them held a princely title.

A Marquisate, especially a military-merit Marquisate granted to a man outside the imperial clan, carried extraordinary meaning in Great Yan.

The Emperor's own elder brother was still only a military-merit Marquis, yet the weight of that title far surpassed the old princely ranks once given to imperial clansmen.

At present, Great Yan had only three Princes outside the imperial surname: the Regent Prince, Prince Zhenbei, and Prince Jingnan.

All three had originally been military-merit Marquises.

So the instant the title "Marquis of Donghai" left the Emperor's mouth, Zu Zhuming's place in Great Yan's hierarchy of nobles became extremely easy to calculate.

Set aside the Son of Heaven himself.

Zu Zhuming was now, unmistakably, the fifth-ranking meritorious noble in Great Yan.

Ji Chengjue had started his career doing business. When it was time to haggle over every copper, he could haggle over every copper. But when generosity was called for, he could be more generous than anyone.

"Beloved minister, you deserve it."

The Emperor helped Zu Zhuming up a second time.

The Three Frontiers held enormous meaning for the people of Qian.

They held just as much meaning for the people of Yan.

True, after this defeat the State of Qian had almost ceased to be a state at all. But Zu Zhuming's "Feast at Hong Gate" had, in one stroke, cut away half the future chaos and trouble Great Yan would otherwise have faced in governing the Qian lands.

When the late Emperor had "exhausted the state through militarism," Ji Chengjue had been his chief logistical steward.

So he knew very well that the cost of defeating an enemy army and toppling an enemy court was often smaller than the cost of occupying and governing what came afterward.

The former was frequently a one-time expenditure.

The latter... was an endless bleeding wound.

Once Zu Zhuming had been properly placated, the Emperor threw back his head and laughed inside the imperial command tent.

"All right! At last We can go to Shangjing and meet that bastard Zheng!"

The words rang out with force.

But only Wei Zhonghe, standing beside the Emperor, knew that His Majesty had spoken them through somewhat clenched back teeth.

Not long ago, the Regent Prince had sent His Majesty a letter.

In it, the Prince said he had already sat upon the dragon throne in Great Qian's imperial palace.

He also said that when he sat down, he had deliberately left a little gap beside himself, enough for His Majesty to turn sideways, bend his knees, and squeeze in beside him.

After reading it, the Emperor cursed the Regent Prince three times in succession:

"Beast. Bitch. Bastard beast!"

Then the Emperor decided that he would personally travel to Shangjing.

He intended to sit on the dragon throne first, then leave a narrow gap for that Zheng bastard and win back the round.

Wei Zhonghe did not dare remind His Majesty that, according to reports, the Regent Prince had now entered Third Grade as a Martial Artist.

Your Majesty... can your backside really shove the Regent Prince aside?

...

Two blossoms bloom; let us speak of each branch in turn.

In the north, the Emperor of Great Yan had personally brought nearly the entire Three Frontiers under control and was leading his army south toward Shangjing without delay.

Shangjing itself, by contrast, was much quieter.

A cup of fruit drink was set down before Zheng Lin.

Zheng Lin laid aside his brush, picked up the cup, and took a sip.

"Godfather, this is too sour."

"That's what wakes you up."

The Blind Man reached out. A stool beside him slid over "on its own," and he sat down.

"I'm fine," Zheng Lin said. "It hasn't reached the point where 'official documents weary the body' yet."

"Your godfather is rather pleased. Back in Jinghai City, when your father pushed you out to take charge, you sat there and did the work, but I could still tell there was a restless fire in you. Now it's been nearly a month, and you can still keep your temper settled."

"Was there?" Zheng Lin asked.

The Blind Man nodded.

A man's temperament needed tempering.

Especially a young man's.

And the best whetstone was to give him something he truly revered.

The Blind Man had to admit that Master had succeeded in that regard.

"It's just that handling these matters is tedious, but still somewhat interesting."

"You're not saying that deliberately to make me happy?"

"No."

"Do you like the feeling?" the Blind Man asked. "Sitting here in the Imperial Study, reviewing memorial after memorial. You should know that behind every one of these memorials lie the lives of thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of people."

"I wouldn't say I like it," Zheng Lin replied. "I just treat it as another form of cultivation."

It was a perfectly orthodox answer.

The Blind Man could not say he was especially delighted.

But neither could he call himself disappointed.

The desire for power depended very much on the person.

Those who grew up suffering hardship and oppression often became ravenous for power and status the moment the opportunity appeared.

None of that had anything to do with his godson.

Zheng Lin had been born the Heir Prince. His position was almost that of Great Yan's second Crown Prince.

It was just like being born at Ninth Grade.

Both had simply been his from birth.

Things obtained too easily rarely became obsessions.

Fortunately, Lin'er was not like his biological father, who had lived two lives.

So at least he was not quite so Buddhist about everything.

In short... there was still hope for the future.

The great undertaking remained worth anticipating.

"These matters in front of you are still minor ones. At present, more than eighty percent of these government orders don't even leave the capital region."

"I know."

"But that will change soon." The Blind Man reached into his pocket and took out an orange.

Zheng Lin's expression changed at the sight of it.

Fortunately, his godfather did not peel it. He merely rolled it in his hand.

"The latest news is that the Emperor has subdued the Three Frontiers and is heading this way."

"Oh. Is Godfather worried?"

"Not yet. All Under Heaven isn't fully settled. We'll probably have to use commanderies and counties in some places while preserving enfeoffments in others. Suppressing rebellions, exterminating some groups and pacifying others, won't be finished in a short time either. The dishes have only just reached the table. They're still hot enough to burn your mouth. It isn't time to divide them up yet. For the next five years or so, the Yan homeland will still belong to the court, eastern Jin will still belong to the Residence, and everywhere else will be a case of you within me and me within you. So long as no one openly tears the face apart, the dividing lines will remain blurred."

"Oh." Zheng Lin nodded.

"Enough. I won't discuss this with you now. It's almost time. Go to the north side of the city."

"What ceremony is Father holding again?"

The Blind Man picked up the fruit drink Zheng Lin had taken only one sip from and tried a mouthful.

His entire expression trembled.

It really was that sour.

Only after conquering the sourness did he answer:

"Arbor Day."

...

North of Shangjing, a stretch of ground had been cleared.

Before a crowd of generals, guards, surrendered Qian ministers and nobles, and commoners, Great Yan's Regent Prince picked up a shovel.

In a tree pit that had already been dug, he symbolically turned over two more shovelfuls of earth.

Then he accepted a young willow tree that had been transplanted there and set it into place.

Finally, he picked up the shovel again and symbolically returned two shovelfuls of earth.

The Brocade-Clad personal guards beside him immediately stepped forward and filled in the rest.

A young willow took root.

The Prince clapped the dirt from his hands and took two steps back.

He looked at the willow.

Then at Shangjing's towering walls not far away.

A faint smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

More than a hundred years ago, the first Marquis of Zhenbei had crushed a five-hundred-thousand-man Qian northern expedition army and planted a willow branch at the border.

The meaning had been simple:

By the time that willow put forth green, he would already have led Great Yan's iron cavalry through Shangjing and avenged Qian's treacherous surprise attack.

Unfortunately, fate made sport of men.

The war in the north had become too urgent, and Yan could no longer divert additional troops away from the decisive front against the Barbarians to reinforce the first Marquis of Zhenbei.

The first Marquis could only smash through Qian's three northern commanderies, seize population and wealth, and return home.

Later, for reasons of political balance, that first Marquis of Zhenbei, a southerner by origin, was enfeoffed in the north.

For the rest of his life, he never fulfilled his old ambition of marching south and breaking Qian.

More than a century later...

Great Yan's Regent Prince planted a willow beside the walls of Shangjing.

He ordered a squad of soldiers to guard it in shifts day and night and allow no harm to come to it.

At the same time, a stone stele was erected beside the tree.

Upon it was carved a couplet:

Whips raised, steeds spurred, we chase the silver waves;
Along clear waters winding far, we gaze on peach blossoms.

The lines described the first Marquis of Zhenbei's great victory over the Qian army.

They were also the origin of the name Yinlang Commandery: Silver Waves.

What surprised everyone was the signature beneath the inscription.

It did not read Great Yan's Regent Prince.

Instead, it read:

Garrison Commander of Cuiliu Fort, Yinlang Commandery — Zheng Fan

[End of Chapter 1017]