Li Chi smiled at Cao Lie’s retreating back. “You’re the one I came up with so many good things for, and you’re the one who won’t smile.”

Cao Lie: “You’re not inviting me to your wedding. I’m not inviting you to mine.”

Li Chi: “When you get married, even if you don’t invite me, I’ll show up on my own. And you’d dare turn me away?”

He patted Cao Lie on the shoulder. “By then I’ll already be Emperor. An Emperor coming to celebrate your wedding — you really think you’d have the gall to ask the Emperor for a wedding gift?”

Cao Lie: “That’s just shameless.”

Li Chi: “Indeed it is.”

Cao Lie: “…”

He saw Lu Chonglou arriving and made his exit. “You talk to your precious Shu Governor. Another moment with you and I’ll be bankrupt.”

Li Chi: “Go on, and tell me how much I have in the treasury.”

Cao Lie immediately quickened his pace.

Lu Chonglou arrived at the door just as Cao Lie stepped out. They exchanged a greeting, and then Lu Chonglou went in, hugging his policy essay to his chest.

“Set it down. You rushed over here — sit and have some tea first.”

Li Chi gestured for Lu Chonglou to sit across from him.

When Lu Chonglou sat down, he said, “My lord, regarding how to stabilize Shu swiftly, I have written a policy proposal—”

Li Chi gave a slight shake of his head, cutting him off. “Before we discuss your essay, let me ask you: if you had to put Shu at ease as quickly as possible, what is the very first thing to do?”

Lu Chonglou answered, “The people’s livelihood.”

“And within the people’s livelihood, what comes first?”

“Agriculture and sericulture.”

Li Chi shook his head. “No.”

That simple denial left Lu Chonglou momentarily lost. When it came to the people’s livelihood, agriculture had to be first. The people take food as their heaven — until the grain question was solved, nothing could be stable.

Li Chi smiled. “This is exactly why I had Yu Jiuling find you and tell you not to rush this.”

He pointed at the thick stack of papers.

“Part of the basis for what you’ve written comes from what you’ve seen and heard along the road, yes?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“And you’ve heard the people saying grain is scarce, that the fields have gone fallow?”

“Yes.”

“But have you considered — the route we’ve taken has been deliberately through the war zones?”

Lu Chonglou’s expression shifted slightly.

“When you talk about other matters, you can reason from the particular to the general,” Li Chi said. “But when it comes to the people’s livelihood, you cannot look through a narrow tube and then set policy for all of Shu.”

Li Chi stood and stretched as he spoke. “The war zones in Shu are actually not that extensive. With the horse guild’s help, with Tantai pressing forward on the western flank, and with the surrendered Zhou soldiers guiding us — only a handful of places saw real fighting. We entered Shu from the east. How many major battles did we fight before Mei City? When you count them up, Mei City was really the only one.”

He looked at Lu Chonglou. “Agriculture is certainly important. But what time of year is it right now?”

Lu Chonglou didn’t dare answer too quickly. He thought carefully — and then it clicked.

“The autumn harvest.”

Li Chi gave a quiet sound of affirmation. “I’ve already issued orders across the army: no grain is to be requisitioned from the local people. Every jin of this year’s harvest belongs to the people themselves.”

He looked at Lu Chonglou. “If agriculture isn’t the top priority right now, then what should come first?”

Lu Chonglou understood. He stood. “My lord — I had assumed road construction should be deferred until after the spring planting next year. I see now it must be moved up immediately.”

Li Chi smiled, sat back down, and gestured for Lu Chonglou to continue.

“We use the captured silver as wages,” Lu Chonglou said quickly. “If we begin preparations now, by the time everything is in place the autumn harvest will be done and the people will have a period of farm-idle months. That’s when we recruit laborers to build the roads. With good wages paid on time, every laborer we bring in is a family we’ve stabilized. Shu’s roads will need hundreds of thousands of workers — that’s hundreds of thousands of families with an income.”

He looked to Li Chi. “To attract as many workers as possible at the start — should we perhaps offer double wages for the first wave of recruits?”

Li Chi shook his head. “No.”

Lu Chonglou paused again.

“Pay at market rate,” Li Chi said. “No delays, no shortcuts. Make it daily pay — and if you’re short on the staffing to manage that, I’ll have Xiahou detail people to help you.”

Lu Chonglou fell into thought. Quick as he was, the meaning came to him in moments.

“Building roads across Shu — once started, it won’t finish in a year or two. It could take ten years…”

“If from the very beginning we attract workers with double wages, we can never scale back. It becomes impossible to continue.”

Li Chi nodded. “Eventually road construction will be contracted out to local governments by section. If you launch with double wages now and the local offices later can’t afford it, no one will take workers for standard pay anymore. Every local government will be in an impossible position — none of them will have money to spare.”

He looked at Lu Chonglou. “Remember this: when you do good for the people, when you do great things — don’t start by offering the best. Build up gradually. Sustain it over time.”

He paused. “You’re not only thinking about what you should do. You also have to think about what the people will come to expect.”

He let that settle, then continued. “I spent ten years walking the rivers and lakes with my shifu when I was young. In those ten years, I saw every kind of person and every kind of life… When you give people the best at the beginning, and then pull back even slightly, you get resentment.”

Lu Chonglou said, “I understand. Paying daily is to spare the people the worry that they might be cheated. And if something happens at home, they can leave at any time — long-term or short-term work, entirely their choice.”

“Market-rate wages are enough on their own. But the provisions and supplies must be managed without gaps — the workers must be fed, kept warm, and paid on time.”

Li Chi nodded. “Get started on this right away.”

Lu Chonglou bowed. “My lord, though I’ve read many books and absorbed many principles — books can broaden a person’s view — still, compared to you, my perspective has been narrow.”

Li Chi: “Don’t try to flatter me — leave that to Yu Jiuling and the others. But you’ve read more than I have, and I’ve walked more roads than you. Do you know the difference?”

Without waiting for Lu Chonglou to answer, Li Chi said quietly, “The difference is that nearly every person who reads widely and grasps the principles of the world is deeply useful. But people who’ve simply walked a great many roads…”

He looked at Lu Chonglou. “How many of them are me?”

“Now — beyond the roads, let’s talk about education.”

In the same calm tone: “Give men work. Give children schooling. Work comes with wages; school costs nothing. Accomplish those two things, and within a year at most — perhaps just one winter — the hearts of Shu’s people can be won.”

Lu Chonglou bowed. “If children can all attend school at no cost, then the local schools also help families with their children during the day. And it gives the scattered scholars in every town a proper occupation. Every household can settle in and concentrate on making a living.”

“I won’t be in Shu much longer,” Li Chi said. “I’ll probably be setting out for Ji Prefecture soon.”

He looked at Lu Chonglou. “Is there anything else you want to say to me?”

Lu Chonglou started to shake his head, was about to say nothing, then suddenly realized what the Prince of Ning was actually asking.

He had been so absorbed in discussing Shu’s affairs that he had instinctively assumed the question was still about Shu. But in a flash he understood: what Li Chi was asking about now was Yue Prefecture. Was Xu Ji.

Lu Chonglou knew that certain matters had been left unaddressed because the time wasn’t right. Now that Shu had fallen, with Li Chi’s enthronement likely not far off, the time for those postponed matters was approaching.

So Lu Chonglou stepped back two paces, dropped to his knees, and pressed his forehead to the floor. “My lord, I have something to say.”

Li Chi said, “No need for that — just speak.”

Lu Chonglou knelt there, head to the ground: “A subordinate official bringing formal accusation against a superior — this violates the law of the land…”

Li Chi smiled. “The land is not yet settled; what law? As for rank — as of this moment, you are the Military Governor of Shu.”

Lu Chonglou raised his head. His eyes were faintly red. His voice trembled slightly.

“Your subordinate… your subordinate believes that the Military Governor of Yue Prefecture, Xu Ji, is colluding with factions and engaging in private dealings. Your subordinate…”

Li Chi raised a hand. “Understood. We’ll discuss this another time.”

Lu Chonglou blinked.

Was he wrong? Was this not what the Prince of Ning wanted to hear? Had he overstepped?

If not — then why had he barely begun to speak before Li Chi cut him off?

In the span of a heartbeat, Lu Chonglou’s mind turned over a thousand possibilities.

Li Chi reached down and helped Lu Chonglou to his feet. “There are still many large matters ahead. I understand what you mean.”

Lu Chonglou gave a quiet sound of acknowledgment, but his thoughts were still churning.

He took his leave and walked back slowly, still turning it over. By the time he reached his own room, his head felt tangled.

He poured cold water over his face.

When it hit, something flashed clear in his mind.

I was right. I wasn’t wrong.

Lu Chonglou stood bolt upright, forgetting his face was still dripping, so that water soaked the collar of his robe.

He murmured to himself, eyes growing steadily brighter.

“Yes… it’s like this…”

He began pacing the room, speaking to himself, faster and faster.

“My lord didn’t refuse to raise the matter or refuse to deal with the man. What my lord needs is someone to raise it. Right now, he’s not watching for Xu Ji’s fate — he’s watching for my stance. What my lord was asking was: when the time comes, will you stand up?”

With that, Lu Chonglou let out a long breath and felt the knot in his chest dissolve.

At the same moment, in the study, Li Chi sat down and flipped through a few pages of the inventory reports his subordinates had sent. Gao Xining stepped in from outside, carrying a bowl of freshly prepared white fungus and lotus seed congee.

“Hungry?”

She smiled.

Li Chi smiled. “Think of something and there it is — I was hungry, and the congee arrived. I thought of something lovely, and a beautiful person arrived.”

Gao Xining: “Let me see what you’re reading, since apparently reading it was enough to inspire certain thoughts.”

Li Chi: “Looking at you is enough. What else could I need to look at?”

Gao Xining: “What if you needed a little something extra for inspiration?”

Li Chi: “You sound like you know quite a bit about this?”

Gao Xining immediately changed the subject. “Drink your congee first.”

Li Chi: “You didn’t put anything in it, did you?”

Gao Xining: “About seven jin of aphrodisiac. I want to see if I can make you lose your mind.”

Li Chi looked at the bowl. “Seven jin. How did you fit it into this little bowl?”

Gao Xining: “Like refining a pellet — took a long time. This is the pure essence. One sip and your love runs deep; two sips and your joy knows no end; three sips and you ascend to immortality—”

Just then, someone outside coughed quietly. The two of them looked toward the door.

And there — impossibly — was Dean Gao.

The three of them had stayed behind in Daxing; none of them had come to Shu. To suddenly materialize here was enough to make both Li Chi and Gao Xining do a double-take.

Li Chi rubbed his eyes. “Is this a demonic apparition?”

Gao Xining: “…”

Dean Gao stepped inside. Behind him, the Long-Brow Daoist hobbled in on his staff. Old Master Zhang was last, wearing an expression that was neither a smile nor not — but wasn’t quite sinister either.

“Oh my,” said Li Chi, patting Gao Xining’s shoulder. “Have you noticed — we’ve been missing our dear grandfather, our dear shifu, and our dear venerable elder so much that we’re both seeing visions of them?”

Gao Xining: “Yes — we’ve apparently fallen ill from longing. Can you believe it? We’re sharing the exact same hallucination.”

Li Chi: “We are, aren’t we.”

—