On the fourth day of the second month, the Great Liang diplomatic mission entered Northern Wei’s Youzhou territory, and Emperor Wei dispatched Minister of Rites Ge Zhaofu to receive them.
Having controlled the Privy Council for many years, Qi Ying naturally understood much about the factional struggles in Gao Wei’s court. A few months ago, Northern Wei’s Minister of Rites had been someone else—if he remembered correctly, it should have been Jiang Changhong, who belonged to the Gu family faction. But after this defeat, the Gu family showed signs of losing power. The first to be purged would be their proteges and followers. Emperor Wei had dismissed Jiang Changhong and promoted Ge Zhaofu, a student of Zou Qian, to replace him. From this glimpse, one could see that the civil and military factional struggles in Northern Wei’s court had reached white heat.
This was naturally what Great Liang was pleased to see—the Gu family posed a far greater threat to Jiangzuo than the Zou clan. As long as the Gu family fell, ten years later the southern army would have the opportunity to cross the natural barrier and achieve great undertakings.
These thoughts circulated in Qi Ying’s mind, yet outsiders could not glimpse even a trace of them. The officials from Wei’s court who came to receive them only saw that the officials from the Southern Dynasty were all solemn and quiet, bowing their heads as they waited for one person to step down from his carriage. That man, held up like stars surrounding the moon, possessed extremely magnificent phoenix eyes with pupils dark as spilled ink, and a bearing noble and stable as vast mountains and rivers, making one feel ashamed and inferior upon first sight.
Great Liang’s Qi Jingchen.
This name was already well-known among Northern Wei’s officials, and after the Northern Expedition it had become household knowledge, becoming a nightmare for the people of the north. Though Wei envoy Ge Zhaofu deeply hated this man from Great Liang, he also felt profound awe, so he stepped forward and cupped his hands, saying: “Minister Qi.”
This form of address was rather interesting.
In Great Liang, officials mostly called the Privy Councilor “Young Master Qi,” because they valued the Qi family more, viewing Qi Ying as subordinate to the family. But the Wei people didn’t buy into aristocratic families and cared nothing for the so-called “Three Surnames of Jiangzuo.” In their eyes, the name Qi Jingchen was more worthy of respect than the so-called Qi clan, and his family had gained fame north of the river precisely because of him, so they directly addressed him as “Minister Qi.”
The Great Liang officials all caught this nuance, while Qi Ying showed no reaction, only exchanging greetings with Ge Zhaofu and other Wei officials, then inquiring about subsequent travel arrangements before following them into Youzhou City to await tomorrow’s journey to the capital.
Northern Wei’s capital Shangjing differed from the Southern Dynasty’s Jiankang. Though both were national capitals under the Son of Heaven’s feet, their atmospheres were vastly different. It lacked Jiankang’s brocaded splendor, replaced instead by a sense of majesty and solemnity, with the unique desolate grandeur of the northern lands. However, due to their recent defeat, the expressions of the common people on the streets also carried heaviness, with considerable criticism and complaints when they saw the Southern Dynasty’s diplomatic mission’s carriages entering the city.
This was Shen Xiling’s first time coming to Shangjing.
Sitting inside the carriage, she carefully peered through the gaps in the carriage window at the outside, truly seeing the appearance of a northern imperial city for the first time. From the buildings and architecture to the clothing of people on the streets, everything differed from Jiangzuo, making her feel very curious.
Qi Ying patted her shoulder, so she closed the carriage window and turned back to look at him, hearing him say: “I’ll need to go to the Wei palace shortly. Will you wait for me at the envoy’s guest quarters?”
He was asking for her opinion.
Shen Xiling looked at him and nodded, then asked with some worry: “…You won’t be in any danger, will you?”
He smiled faintly and shook his head.
Indeed, Gao Wei had just suffered defeat and was originally seeking peace talks—how would they dare harm Great Liang’s envoy?
Shen Xiling felt relieved and smiled sweetly at Qi Ying, saying obediently: “Then I’ll wait for you to return.”
From then on, Qi Ying became very busy.
During the day he frequently went in and out of the Wei palace to negotiate peace talks with Northern Wei court officials. At night, returning to the guest quarters, he had to meet again with officials from the Privy Council and Court of Imperial Hospitality to discuss matters. Occasionally he also had to write memorials to send back to Jiangzuo for presentation to the sovereign—truly overwhelmed with tasks.
Shen Xiling had known since childhood that this person was always very busy, but previously his busyness was usually at the main family home or government offices, rarely in front of her. Now at the envoy’s guest quarters they were together daily, so she finally witnessed his laborious appearance with her own eyes—day and night without rest.
It was truly exhausting; she felt tired just watching.
She had no way to help with his work, so she could only do her best to take care of his meals. When mealtime came, she would insist he take at least a quarter hour to eat properly, no matter what. Qi Ying felt quite helpless about this, while Qing Zhu was very satisfied and gradually warmed up to Shen Xiling because of it.
After just four or five days in Shangjing, Qi Ying had visibly lost weight. Shen Xiling naturally felt heartbroken about this, but he remained calm, coaxing her by saying: “This is the last time. It will never be like this again in the future.”
That day he seemed in good spirits, probably because the peace talks were progressing quite smoothly. He even planned their future life in seclusion with her, making Shen Xiling happy as well and temporarily forgetting her worries about his busyness, wholeheartedly beginning to long for their future days.
The next day, after Qi Ying left the guest quarters, Shen Xiling was also forced to go out.
This wasn’t really a big matter.
Besides Qi Ying, several other Great Liang officials also stayed at the envoy’s guest quarters. Everyone needed to eat, which inevitably required someone to go in and out purchasing grains and provisions. Though Shen Xiling was actually Young Master Qi’s legitimate future wife, she bore the outward identity of a servant. To avoid attracting attention and suspicion, she inevitably had to work more, and on this day she was assigned the task of going out to buy fruit.
Shen Xiling didn’t mind this. After all, staying at the envoy’s guest quarters left her with nothing to do, so going out was good—she could see the northern customs and culture while amusing herself, which was nice.
She wandered around the main streets, and besides buying fruit, she also paid attention to the prices of other goods—this was probably merchant instinct, automatically calculating back and forth whenever she saw money and goods, more precisely than anyone.
She discovered that many things in Shangjing sold for much more than in Jiankang. For example, the textiles she was most familiar with—mulberry, hemp, and silk were all significantly more expensive than in Jiangzuo. White cotton cloth was even more expensive, with much smaller quantities than in Jiankang, actually considered novel goods. As for medicinal materials, books, fruits and vegetables, all were more expensive than in the south.
Thinking carefully, this had origins—the north had always been less prosperous than Jiangzuo, and Wei didn’t value commerce like Great Liang did. In Jiangzuo, even among great aristocratic families there were those involved in trade, while Gao Wei still had the custom of viewing merchants as base, focusing solely on agriculture. Over time, this naturally obstructed monetary circulation and trade, making expensive goods inevitable.
Shen Xiling came from a merchant background after all, so seeing this situation made her quite restless. She thought that if someone could break through the north-south border limitations and establish trade routes, they could sell everything previously stockpiled completely, and even with a twenty percent markup it would still be cheaper than current market prices in Shangjing—wouldn’t this be mutually beneficial?
Moreover, the earned silver could be donated to those people collapsed by the roadside…
Shen Xiling sighed.
She wandered around some more and found that northern grains were somewhat cheaper than in Jiangzuo, with full grains of excellent quality, probably related to Gao Wei’s climate and agricultural traditions.
She was very interested and asked the shopkeeper about how this rice was sold.
The shopkeeper was a burly northern man with a very rough appearance and an even rougher temperper. Upon seeing Shen Xiling, he frowned tightly, looked her up and down, and asked in a muffled voice: “Little girl, are you from Great Liang?”
Shen Xiling was stunned upon hearing this, not immediately reacting, and instinctively nodded.
As soon as she nodded, the shopkeeper’s frown deepened even more. He waved his big hand and said in an even rougher voice: “Then go away! I won’t sell to you!”
Shen Xiling blinked, immediately feeling confused, only gradually understanding later.
Her speech carried the accent of the Jiankang area—soft Wu dialect that was easily recognizable, immediately revealing her origins. Now that Northern Wei had just suffered defeat, even common people deeply hated Jiangzuo and Great Liang, showing no good face to people from the south. She was being blamed by association.
Shen Xiling was somewhat speechless but didn’t want to argue with anyone, so she said nothing and avoided this shopkeeper, walking elsewhere. Even after walking far away, she could still hear the shopkeeper telling others it was “unlucky.”
She pressed her lips together.
Shen Xiling continued wandering the streets and gradually discovered more and more differences between Shangjing and Jiankang.
For example, the beggars on the streets.
On her journey north, though she had seen many scenes of human misery, Jiankang as Great Liang’s imperial capital was prosperous and peaceful, with very few beggars seen along the streets. But Shangjing clearly had many more, all in ragged clothes and emaciated.
There was a little girl, probably only five or six years old, sitting thin and weak by the roadside with a broken bowl, too timid to reach out and beg. Then she noticed Shen Xiling looking at her and saw her kind face, so she mustered courage to approach and ask if she could give her some food.
Shen Xiling’s heart melted.
She looked around and saw a steamed bun shop not far away, so she took the little girl’s hand and walked over, taking out money and saying to the shopkeeper: “Shopkeeper, please give us two meat buns.”
She didn’t know why she was so unlucky that day—both shopkeepers she encountered had bad tempers and loved taking out their anger on others. Hearing her accent, his face fell again, saying in an even worse tone than the previous one: “Go go go! Get away! I’d rather feed my meat buns to dogs than sell them to you Liang people—go away quickly!”
Shen Xiling was truly at a loss for words and didn’t want to argue with this shopkeeper either. She handed the silver to the little girl beside her and turned to the shopkeeper saying: “These buns are for her. She’s not from Liang, so surely you won’t still refuse to sell?”
But that shopkeeper wouldn’t look or listen, still insisting on driving them away. Shen Xiling had no choice but to take the child to the neighboring steamed bread shop, only to receive another cold face. Walking down the entire street, not a single person would sell anything to her.
Shen Xiling was truly somewhat angry, feeling these people were being quite unreasonable. Even if they blamed people from the Southern Dynasty, how could they be so indiscriminate? Moreover, what wrong had this beggar child beside her committed that they should make things so difficult?
Seeing Shen Xiling walk a full circuit empty-handed, the bun seller was quite smug, looking at her with mockery in his expression. Shen Xiling couldn’t suppress her temper and said to him: “The shopkeeper is quite fierce bullying women and children, but I wonder where you were when north and south were at war? If you truly care about the country and hate the Southern Dynasty, why not join the army instead? Wouldn’t killing with a blade be more satisfying? Cowering here and bullying people is too much of a waste.”
Shen Xiling didn’t easily lose her temper with people—the few times were always for others’ sake, like last time for Steward Feng, and now for this completely unknown little beggar. Even when angry she remained gentle and quiet, without a single dirty word in her speech, but her expression showed contempt and indifference, making one feel her disdain.
But that shopkeeper wasn’t a reasonable person. Hearing such mocking words was like having his tail stepped on. He immediately flew into a rage, not bothering to argue with Shen Xiling but turning red-faced. Probably humiliated into anger, he grabbed the rolling pin beside him and swung it at Shen Xiling!
Author’s Note:
I’ve decided to give General Gu, who hasn’t appeared for so long, a male lead experience card!
Whether he can win the pretty lady’s heart depends on this moment!
Go for it!