Baozhu hastily scooped a mouthful of coarse millet rice from the earthenware bowl, tears mixing with the rice as it entered her mouth. She chewed with all her strength, the millet scraping her gums painfully, the bitter taste of tears spreading through her mouth—it probably tasted no better than livestock feed.
Millet had always been one of the main grains that common people paid as taxes to the court. The palace often used it to make Imperial Yellow Queen Mother Rice, sweet millet porridge, and similar dishes, all fragrant, sweet, and tender. She couldn’t understand why this millet rice was so coarse and inferior.
Accompanied by the sounds of fighting and shouting in the courtyard, a short man burst through the window, struggled twice on the ground, then lay still. This was the owner of this black inn.
The bandits disguised as servants all rushed out to fight, leaving no one to serve. Yang Xingjian tremblingly searched the room and found a clay jar, digging out some fermented black bean sauce from inside—apparently the only dish available today. He poured the sauce into a small dish and respectfully placed it before Baozhu, saying shamefully, “Today’s fare is truly simple. Perhaps we’ll have proper food when we reach Luoyang.”
Baozhu didn’t respond, only focused on shoveling rice into her mouth.
“Senior Brother! Someone’s on the roof!”
Shisan Lang’s shout came from outside, followed by chaotic footsteps on the roof, then a scream as a heavy body crashed through a corner of the thatched roof and fell headfirst into the house, landing silently in a pile of firewood. The packed earth floor raised a cloud of dust.
Baozhu and Yang Xingjian quickly covered their bowls to prevent more “seasoning” from being added to their millet rice. Thinking back on how they ended up in such a black inn, it was simply because the crooked sign at the entrance advertising “Lodging and Bathing” had caught her eye.
Traveling dusty roads all the way, they couldn’t stay at official post stations without proper credentials. Rural private inns offering single rooms and bathing facilities were extremely rare—often they searched until dark without finding one. She couldn’t do as the senior brothers did, stripping off shoes and jumping into rivers and streams when they found them, even washing their clothes while bathing.
A nimble, agile figure jumped down through the hole in the roof, crouching cat-like with arched back on the collapsed bandit’s body. After carefully checking the neck pulse, he looked up at Baozhu. Seeing her tearful face, Wei Xun straightened up, walked over and asked, “Why are you eating tears with rice again? Is the sauce not salty enough?”
Yang Xingjian pointed at the bodies on the ground, saying resentfully, “The performing dancers’ skill level is too poor!”
Wei Xun laughed, “Then you dance for her entertainment while she eats. Registrar Yang is an unparalleled master of the dance world…” Before he could finish, Shisan Lang called from outside, “Reinforcements coming!” Wei Xun immediately darted out through the wide-open main door, leaving a blue afterimage.
More clanging fighting sounds came from outside. The remaining enemies were just enough for Shisan Lang to practice on, with Wei Xun standing guard beside him, only kicking away anyone who rushed toward the house. They fought vigorously and noisily, and even the donkey occasionally delivered cold kicks, braying proudly for credit when it connected.
After dealing with more than ten bandits with no more reinforcements coming, Wei Xun and his junior brother returned to the house. Shisan Lang’s monk robe was torn, but with no time to tidy up, he hurriedly scooped millet rice from the cold stove and sat on a mat to eat.
Wei Xun first threw the dead and half-dead out of the house, washed his hands, and pulled out the last piece of dried meat from their luggage, handing it to Baozhu: “It’s been seven or eight days, a bit stale. Will you settle for it?”
Baozhu shook her head in refusal. She wasn’t crying only because she had to make do with coarse millet and fermented beans.
The double spiral buns she’d styled this morning had already drooped into messy twin pigtails. This black inn advertising bathing facilities had no bathtub, not even proper beds and bedding—the back room for lodging only had a straw sleeping platform. The inn was a trap for robbery, so naturally the signboard couldn’t be trusted.
Entering Henan Prefecture territory, food had become mysteriously difficult to buy in recent days. Nine out of ten shops selling flatbread and steamed bread had closed, and the remaining one used moldy wheat flour. Drought in Guanzhong was one thing, but no natural disasters were reported near Henan Prefecture, yet market rice prices kept soaring from eighty coins per dou in Chang’an to six hundred coins per dou without being available for purchase.
From opening her eyes this morning until now, this was her first meal. Even Yang Xingjian, normally timid and afraid of trouble, dared to arrange meals amid flashing swords. The donkey had switched to eating grass and straw, and the bean cakes for feeding the donkey had become Shisan Lang’s snacks. Perhaps this was why Wei Xun had insisted on buying a donkey when they set out—donkeys could tolerate coarse feed, while horses eating only grass would lose weight dramatically.
Hungry, dirty, tired, simultaneously despairing yet forcing herself to shovel down rice—her character had become as inferior as her mount. Thinking of herself transformed from a noble thoroughbred to a pitiful thin donkey, Baozhu’s tears pattered into her bowl.
Shisan Lang asked strangely, “Has Jiu Niang never eaten millet rice, or did she find worms in it? Is it worth crying like this?”
Yang Xingjian explained, “She’s certainly eaten it before, but this coarse millet only has the outermost hard shell removed—it can’t compare to the fine grain she’s used to. And it’s not fully cooked either…”
Wei Xun said, “To us it’s fully cooked. After all, firewood isn’t cheap, so we wouldn’t waste it cooking until the grains burst.” Even as he said this, he relit the cooking fire and added half a ladle of cold water to the pot.
“Wait a bit before eating—it’ll be softer.”
He deliberately teased Baozhu: “You can tell someone’s background by looking at their teeth. You’ve eaten fine grain since childhood, so your teeth show no wear.”
Baozhu was too hungry to wait for the pot to boil again. She ate most of the bowl mixed with tears before stopping, choking back sobs as she said, “When I suggested staying at this place, your expression looked wrong. Did you already know it was a black inn? Why didn’t you stop me?”
Wei Xun sighed, “I wanted to stop you, but you’d already excitedly ridden the donkey inside. What could I do?”
Baozhu was extremely puzzled, asking, “Before discovering the drugged water, what exactly gave this inn away?”
Wei Xun pointed at the entrance: “It was written clearly on the sign. For people without money, having a roof overhead is an inn’s greatest function. Only those carrying wealth can’t stand filth and would specifically seek places offering baths.”
Shisan Lang laughed, “If Senior Brother and I had come to stay, it would probably just be an ordinary guesthouse. Only with Jiu Niang staying here would it definitely become a black inn.”
Baozhu said displeasedly, “Bandits couldn’t necessarily know you’ve practiced martial arts.”
Wei Xun and his junior brother exchanged smiles without saying anything. Black inns didn’t slaughter every passing guest—most of the time they operated normally, only striking when they spotted suitable fat sheep. Even without wearing a head full of pearls and emeralds, anyone could tell at a glance she came from wealth. Whether for kidnapping and ransom or direct sale, a beautiful young woman was the most valuable.
Yang Xingjian, when traveling alone, could use court-issued official vouchers to stay at post stations and had never experienced the dangers of rural black inns. He sighed, “Guanzhong is after all at the emperor’s feet, so security is still decent. Entering the metropolitan region, chaos abounds—the Eastern Capital Commissioner and Henan Prefecture Governor’s administration is truly inferior.”
Shisan Lang burst out laughing: “You really can’t blame those high officials. Jiu Niang hired the most formidable bandit within eight hundred li of Guanzhong to travel with her, so naturally she was safe in Guanzhong territory. Only after leaving our Sunset Court’s domain would short-sighted people come to rob his person.”
Yang Xingjian and Baozhu looked at each other in shock, then at that “most formidable bandit within eight hundred li of Guanzhong,” who was already doubled over with laughter.
Wei Xun hugged his arms and laughed for a long time before saying, “Outside Guanzhong, I’m just a blue-robed donkey-leading servant. Unfortunately, today’s bandits were rural vagrants banded together in rebellion who don’t recognize martial world nicknames. Otherwise, just your illustrious reputation as ‘Donkey-Riding Lady’ would be enough to intimidate martial world scoundrels.”
Hearing that infuriating nickname again, Baozhu was about to explode when she suddenly felt warm, fuzzy breath on the back of her neck. The donkey, hearing someone call it, had stretched its neck through the broken window frame and poked its head inside, sniffing its owner before opportunistically extending its white muzzle into her bowl to steal a big mouthful of millet rice.
“Ah! Annoying!”
Now she not only had an ugly nickname but was sharing a bowl with the source of that nickname. Once again driven to tears by Wei Xun and the donkey, Baozhu cried, “What martial world! They’re all unlettered country bumpkins! Even a bandit chief like Chen Shigu knew to use the elegant word ‘Sunset,’ so why give me the name of an inferior mount!”
Shisan Lang asked blankly, “Is ‘Sunset’ considered a good word? Everyone says morning sun is good—isn’t sunset rather unlucky?”
“‘The setting sun enters the western mountains, I visit a lone monk in his thatched hut; in this world of tiny dust, why should I love or hate?’ Of course it’s an elegant, refined word. As for whether it’s auspicious…”
Glancing at Wei Xun who was trembling with laughter, Baozhu said spitefully, “For a tomb-robbing thief, it’s perfectly fitting.” She thought again and asked, “All seven of your graduated disciples have martial world nicknames. What was Chen Shigu’s nickname? Was it nice?”
Wei Xun said, “For a while the martial world called him Colonel Who Unearths Mounds, but he refused to acknowledge it. Anyone who called him that to his face would be killed, so later no one dared use that title. Martial world people simply called him by name—Chen Shigu was both name and nickname.”
Baozhu was stunned, thinking that though this man was fierce and violent, he refused to accept unwanted titles. The strong had their own forceful, domineering methods—no need for tearful complaints like hers. She felt both awed and envious.
Yang Xingjian hissed, “Such an arrogant bandit chief hiding out without being captured by authorities, letting him die of old age—he was lucky.”
Wei Xun sneered, “We weren’t hiding. Sunset Court was in Chang’an’s western suburbs, at the emperor’s feet. He lived there forty years, always openly, and no official soldiers dared come calling.”
“Ah! This…”
Yang Xingjian and Baozhu were astonished. Shisan Lang suddenly said, “Actually, Master might have had a nickname. Once after he killed someone, I was standing nearby and heard him mutter to the corpse: ‘Someone called Rouge Mixed with Tripe.’ I still don’t know what this ‘rouge mixed with tripe’ good thing is—whether it’s a famous dish like rouge goose breast. Unfortunately, he looked mad and demonic then, so I didn’t dare ask.”
Wei Xun seemed to hear this for the first time too, mocking him: “You glutton have been spoiled on this journey. After just two or three days without fine rice and white flour, are you craving meat despite your vegetarian upbringing?”
Shisan Lang quickly shook his head in denial. Baozhu said, “That definitely wouldn’t be food—you must have misheard.”
Yang Xingjian, having no interest in learning about bandit backgrounds, interrupted to steer the conversation back on track: “Since Your Highness mentioned ‘visiting a lone monk in his thatched hut,’ calculating our travel speed, we still won’t reach Luoyang tomorrow. Why not stay at Great Toad Light Temple west of the city? My former superior, Vice Minister of Works Wang Sui, retired and became a monk, living in seclusion in the Eastern Capital. He now serves as abbot there under the dharma name Tanlin. A great monastery’s conditions are much better than this rural black inn, and safer too.”
Baozhu recalled but found the name Wang Sui completely unfamiliar, asking, “When did he serve in the Ministry of Works? Why don’t I remember such a person?”
Yang Xingjian respectfully replied, “Monk Tanlin is now over seventy, having served three dynasties. He retired more than ten years ago, so Your Highness naturally wouldn’t know him. When I was young, I served as Chief Clerk in the Ministry of Works’ Bureau of Forestry, and he was very caring toward junior subordinates during his tenure.”
Baozhu thought this old man was an official from previous reigns who had withdrawn long ago. He definitely wouldn’t recognize her appearance, and having left no famous reputation good or bad, he was probably mediocre. She asked, “What is his character and conduct like?”
Yang Xingjian said, “Cautious as an official, learned and talented, skilled in painting, fortune-telling, and ancient artifacts and inscriptions. He’d yearned for Buddhist learning since youth and always wanted to become a monk. The previous emperor also revered Buddhism and granted him the honorary rank of Gold-Ribboned Grandee of the Palace with Silver Seal upon retirement.”
Wei Xun laughed, “What, high officials also play those same fortune-telling tricks as street performers to deceive people?”
Yang Xingjian said seriously, “Though the Prince has become a monk, he still holds third-rank official status. You mustn’t speak disrespectfully, and certainly can’t slouch casually in his presence. At minimum you must perform the touching-head ceremony and sit properly on the ground.” He patted his own knees, demonstrating proper kneeling posture.
Wei Xun shook his head rebelliously, “Wei’s legs are naturally defective and can’t kneel to anyone.”
Hearing this, both Baozhu and Yang Xingjian rolled their eyes. To say someone who climbed walls and roofs as if on level ground had leg problems would make everyone in the world paralyzed. Old Yang had always disapproved of martial world people’s casual manners, and despite much persuasion throughout their journey, it remained futile.
Baozhu said coldly to Yang Xingjian, “Don’t mind him. When I died, I was still first rank, but when have you seen him properly perform ceremonies? He always just sits cross-legged like that.”
Yang Xingjian was a firm believer in mystical arts and wanted to visit his former superior partly to have his fortune told. He strongly recommended Baozhu stay at the Buddhist temple, talking for a long time. His final statement won her over: Toad Light Temple possessed Luoyang’s most famous hot springs.
*Author’s Note:
Baozhu’s mount is a Guanzhong donkey, a large donkey breed, roughly four-fifths the size of a horse, not a small donkey. With white eye rings and white muzzle, it has a wonderfully cute quality of seeming to mock everything.
Luoyang Eastern Capital
Retire from office
“In this world of tiny dust, why should I love or hate” – “Northern Green Vines” by Li Shangyin*