*There is no such thing as dirty silver in this world — only dirty people.* The words settled over Xiahou Zuo and silenced him.
After a moment, Xiahou Zuo said: “The way things are going, that Prefect Cui is probably already carrying out a search and seizure as we speak. Do you want to go and watch?”
Li Chi shook his head. “I may be capable of ordering it done. I can’t stand to watch it.”
He looked at Xiahou Zuo and asked: “Am I too prone to killing thoughts?”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “Then you should feel proud of yourself. For people like us, a few more killing thoughts is a blessing to this world.”
He said to Li Chi: “Generals on the frontier have taken countless lives — according to any doctrine of cause and effect, there ought to be punishment for that. Yet the people pray for such generals to live a hundred years. Tell me: which is greater — the workings of fate, or the will of the people? If I live to a hundred, it will be proof that the people are greater.”
Then he added: “For a man like you, every kill is the removal of an evil. The more you kill, the greater your merit.”
Li Chi said: “You have no gift for anything useful, but crooked reasoning — you’re unrivaled at that.”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “At most third place. Your master is first, you are second.”
“You’re too modest,” said Li Chi. “We three are, at most, tied.”
Xiahou Zuo’s teasing drew a real laugh out of Li Chi, and the phrase *for people like us, a few more killing thoughts is a blessing to this world* had cleared something open inside him.
“We wait and collect our earnings.”
“Feel like a game of chess?” Xiahou Zuo asked.
Li Chi shook his head. “No chess. Come with me and frighten someone instead.”
Xiahou Zuo grinned. “Frightening people sounds considerably more interesting than chess.”
“Who are we frightening?”
“An instructor at the Academy,” said Li Chi, “who has a long history of frightening his students. It’s high time someone frightened him back.”
Xiahou Zuo thought for a moment about which instructor at the Academy was notorious for that.
He asked: “Are we going to take care of Yan Qingzhi?”
Li Chi: “…”
—
Half a shichen later.
Instructor Yuan’s old residence in Xinzhou City. The gates had been shut for several days now. For those days, Yuan Jiabei’s father had not dared to go out. A demon had taken up residence in his heart, and day and night it lashed him with a whip.
Every time he recalled his own degraded spectacle in the gambling den, the demon would surface and strike again.
Yet he felt it was still not hard enough — because now he could no longer even respect himself. He had displayed that degradation fully and openly before his own daughter, and the thought made him feel he would be better off dead.
Yuan Jiabei and her mother took turns keeping watch every day, terrified that their father and husband might do something irreversible.
At that moment, a knock sounded at the gate.
Madam Yuan indicated to Yuan Jiabei not to go, and went herself to the inner gate to call out: “Who is it?”
“A student of the Academy — Li Chi. I’ve come to call on Instructor Yuan.”
Madam Yuan opened the gate at once. She already knew that had Li Chi not been present that day, her husband might have met with a terrible end — and the man had paid off fifty taels of gambling debt on her husband’s behalf. Such a kindness was not to be taken lightly.
Li Chi saw that the one who opened the door was a woman, and guessed this must be the instructor’s wife. He immediately bowed his head respectfully: “Teacher’s wife.”
Though Yuan was not technically his teacher, the man was an instructor at the Academy, so addressing her this way was appropriate.
Madam Yuan felt she could not accept such courtesy and returned the greeting hastily.
“Is the instructor at home?” Li Chi asked.
“He is — just lying in the room. He’s… he’s gone three days without eating or drinking.”
Li Chi said: “Three days without eating or drinking is nothing much. Has he lost his temper with you or with Jiabei?”
Madam Yuan shook her head repeatedly. “He simply doesn’t wish to see anyone.”
Good enough, Li Chi thought.
Li Chi looked at Xiahou Zuo. Xiahou Zuo stepped forward, thinking to himself: *Li Chi, you little schemer — you take the good, I take the bad. What kind of arrangement is that.*
He cleared his throat and said: “My name is Xiahou Zuo. I am a general of the garrison forces.”
Madam Yuan had never encountered an official of this stature and immediately began to prostrate herself. Xiahou Zuo said: “No need for ceremony, Madam. You and your daughter may step away for a moment — I have a few words to say to your husband. Please wait outside the courtyard.”
Madam Yuan hurried back inside to inform her husband and daughter. Yuan Jiabei, hearing that Li Chi had come, immediately dashed out — then braked hard just short of the door, hurriedly adjusted her clothing and hair, and stepped outside.
She had only just opened her mouth to say something when Xiahou Zuo said coldly: “You and your mother wait outside.”
Xiahou Zuo then jerked his chin, and an aide brought a man into the courtyard. The gate was shut behind them.
Yuan Shanshen came out, visibly trembling. The instructor who had always been so severe with his students stood now before a student in a state of trembling fear.
Those with guilt in their hearts and those without — they are never the same. Unless the guilty man has become so vicious that he is worse than whatever haunts him.
“Do you recognize this man?”
Xiahou Zuo gave no mind to whatever posture Yuan Shanshen struck. He had no particular warmth toward men of this sort. Compared to him, Yan Qingzhi was practically endearing.
He pointed at the man kneeling on the ground and posed the question.
Yuan Shanshen looked up and recognized him immediately — the old childhood friend who had sought him out, recalled old times, drawn him into drink until the familiarity was overwhelming and the cups kept flowing, and then pulled him into the gambling den.
“Yi Sheng!”
Yuan Shanshen lost all composure and lunged forward, grabbing the man by the collar, shaking him back and forth as he cried out: “Why did you do this to me?!”
The middle-aged man dared not answer. His eyes slid away.
“Why did he do it?”
Xiahou Zuo gave a cold snort and said: “Because you have a beautiful daughter. Because most of the women in the brothels of this city got there by exactly this route — every one of them with stories of suffering you would not want to hear. If Li Chi hadn’t stopped you that day, your daughter would be receiving guests in a brothel right now!”
These were the words Yuan Shanshen had already thought of — and refused to face. He had been hiding like a turtle pulling into its shell, refusing to acknowledge the things his mind had already worked out.
“I…”
Yuan Shanshen opened his mouth, then lowered his head again.
Xiahou Zuo stepped forward, raised his hand, and struck Yuan Shanshen hard across the face with an open palm. This was a man of extraordinary strength — the blow sent Yuan Shanshen spinning to the ground, and within moments the whole side of his face had swollen, shaped with remarkable precision to the outline of a hand.
“You made an error. This is your reckoning for it.”
Then Xiahou Zuo drew his blade and turned. In one stroke, he took the head from the man called Yi Sheng.
Blood fountained outward. Yuan Shanshen let out a scream of terror.
“He committed a crime. This is his reckoning.”
Yuan Shanshen was so frightened he lay prostrate on the ground, shaking uncontrollably. The headless body lying there — that sight would likely never leave him for the rest of his life.
Xiahou Zuo said: “Instructor Yuan, give it some thought yourself. Do this again, and you may one day find yourself dragging your own daughter by the hand and selling her to a brothel for money. I have seen that happen.”
He crouched down beside Yuan Shanshen and asked: “If you still feel the urge to gamble, come find me. You and I will gamble our lives.”
Yuan Shanshen shuddered.
Xiahou Zuo rose and said: “This ends here. When Li Chi and the others return, they will not mention a word about Xinzhou to anyone at the Academy — they will not mention having seen you here. Go back to being Instructor Yuan. We will protect your reputation. But your own conscience — that is yours to keep.”
He then gave the order: “Clean this up.”
His aides stepped forward, bagged the body, and scraped the bloodstained ground clean with a shovel.
Once everything had been attended to, Xiahou Zuo looked at Li Chi: “Ready to go?”
Li Chi gave a sound of assent. “Let’s go.”
Xiahou Zuo’s men pulled the gate open. Outside, Yuan Jiabei was immediately looking at Li Chi. Xiahou Zuo — knowing that Li Chi was more or less helpless when faced with young women he wasn’t familiar with (Gao Xining was a different case; with anyone else, his tongue simply failed him) — turned to Yuan Jiabei and said:
“Your father, being a man of principle, has — under our gentle persuasion — seen the error of his ways. He will never touch anything like this again. You may all set your minds at ease. Once the new year has passed, return to Jizhou. The Academy will never learn of any of this.”
Madam Yuan and Yuan Jiabei gave their thanks many times over.
When they looked again, Li Chi was already gone.
Yuan Jiabei glanced around, and when she spotted him, the figure was already dozens of yards away, feet slapping noisily against the ground in full flight.
Li Chi waited in the distance, and when Xiahou Zuo caught up, he received a withering glance. “You call that coming along to frighten someone? This was all you managed?”
“If she’d said she wanted to thank me,” Li Chi said, “I’d have had absolutely nothing to say back. That kind of thing is genuinely a bother — all that bowing and scraping, it wears you out…”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “You have no trouble at all trading teasing blows with Gao Xining.”
Li Chi’s face reddened. “Don’t slander people — she’s just a matchmaker.”
Xiahou Zuo nodded agreeably. “Fine, fine, a matchmaker. I must say, the sheer audacity of you — even matchmakers you don’t spare…”
He seemed to think of something then, and said: “Wait — I have this feeling you’re playing a very long game. Get the matchmaker on your side, and you’ll end up with endless…”
He trailed off and looked at Li Chi. Li Chi’s face had gone red as a monkey’s backside. This seemed to be his one genuine weak point — he’d argue with anyone about anything, but the moment Gao Xining came up, he went speechless.
Xiahou Zuo sighed. “Look at that burning blush of yours!”
Just at that moment, Yu Jiuling came running from a distance, flushed with excitement, panting as he said: “Just now a messenger from Prefect Cui arrived to report that all of Liu Wenju’s properties — including the gambling dens and brothels — have been sealed. Just those several establishments alone have yielded tens of thousands of taels in dirty silver. They are now conducting a full search of Liu Wenju’s home, and will transfer everything discovered to General Xiahou shortly.”
Xiahou Zuo smiled. “He’s efficient.”
“The sooner the better,” said Li Chi. “The day after tomorrow is New Year’s Eve. The sooner he gets it done — the sooner we can have a proper New Year’s Eve ourselves.”
Xiahou Zuo said: “Speaking of tomorrow, I suspect you’re planning something at my expense.”
“What are you saying?” said Li Chi. “Given the bond between us, how could I be scheming against you? Everything I’ve done from the beginning to now — it’s all been schemes against your father.”
Xiahou Zuo: “I… thank you so much.”
“Your banner is grand,” said Li Chi, “but not as grand as the Prince’s. Tomorrow at the prefectural office there’s still a scene to play out — and we may very well need to haul out Prince Yu’s name.”
Xiahou Zuo paused, then said: “It’s our own house — so be it, haul it out. As long as we can be rid of the two great sources of harm in Xinzhou and come away with enough silver to issue death compensation to the fallen, I’d haul out the banner ten times over.”
Li Chi let out a long breath and said: “By my reckoning, your father should reach Daizhou Pass in a few more days. Once the new year has passed — do you want to go see him?”
Xiahou Zuo shook his head. “I have no wish to.”
He smiled, reached out and hooked his arm around Li Chi’s neck, and they walked forward together side by side. As they went, he said: “Think it over — is following someone like Yu Chaozong really better than staying with me?”
“When have you ever let me feel at ease?” said Li Chi.
“Hey!”
“I spoke out of turn. Completely out of turn.”
“Yu Chaozong has some ability,” said Xiahou Zuo, “but a man who took your advice and went to guard Xinzhou Pass — that means he genuinely wants to be Emperor. It is his ultimate goal, and beneath that goal, everything else is expendable. Li Chi — be careful.”
Li Chi gave a sound of acknowledgment, but inwardly he still felt that men like Yu Chaozong, whatever else might be said of them, would not treat their sworn brothers wrongly. Zhuang Wudi had said once that Yu Chaozong had only one reversed scale — and that was his brothers.
Xiahou Zuo saw that Li Chi gave no answer and decided not to press further. He laughed and shifted the subject: “Once we’re back in Jizhou, I’ll be curious to see how you explain yourself to the matchmaker — you saved Yuan Jiabei, and saved Liu Yingyuan, and now both of them are headed back to Jizhou.”
He laughed. “Just thinking about it gives me a headache.”
“I,” said Li Chi, “am a man of unblemished honor!”
Xiahou Zuo said: “I’ve heard that’s exactly what the Daoist said before he went to drown his sorrows in wine.”
“No, no — that was Mister Yan, after he came back, who said it.”
He looked at Xiahou Zuo, smiled, and asked: “You’re always telling me to think things through carefully — but what about you? Are you really just going to stay at the frontier for the rest of your life?”
Xiahou Zuo was quiet for a moment, then nodded. “People are different from one another. I’m the kind of person who belongs on the frontier. That is what I actually want to be doing. What others find bitter — I find satisfying.”
He reached out and ruffled Li Chi’s hair, smiling. “If the work you do gives you satisfaction — what more could you ask for?”
Chapter 208: Let’s Talk About Dividing the Money First
The residence was spacious enough, but three courtyards housing over a hundred people would still be a squeeze — and the rear courtyard was where Liu Yingyuan’s family of three was lodging, which made things additionally inconvenient.
Fortunately, none of this was a problem that Xiahou Zuo and his men needed to concern themselves with. The as-yet-unaware Prefect Cui would handle all of it.
It wasn’t long before Prefect Cui Hansheng came hurrying over, dressed in a freshly pressed set of official robes — the fold-lines from their packaging still visible in the fabric.
Before leaving, he had glanced down at the two new rings on his fingers, hesitated for a moment, and tucked them into his pocket.
As he approached the residence, still some distance away, he caught sight of the general who had not yet removed his armor. The smile began building on Cui Hansheng’s face well in advance — an official’s smile was a discipline in itself, requiring genuine warmth over a foundation of mild anxiety, courteous deference threaded through with humility. The expression worn at court was a field of study all its own.
“Your subordinate, Cui Hansheng.”
At about ten feet away he was already prostrating himself on the ground. “I greet General Xiahou!”
Xiahou Zuo glanced at him and said in a cool, flat tone: “Please rise, Prefect Cui. Given your rank, such an elaborate greeting is unnecessary.”
“Your subordinate is… moved.”
Cui Hansheng genuinely looked it.
He had just drawn breath to say a few words in praise of General Xiahou’s valiant defense of the pass, when Xiahou Zuo spoke first.
“Where is the food?”
All the flattery Cui Hansheng had ready deflated back into him. He answered hastily: “Over twenty cooks have been summoned from the restaurants across Xinzhou City. Please allow a moment, General — all the ingredients are on their way. It won’t be long before a meal worthy of the general and his brave men is prepared.”
Xiahou Zuo frowned slightly. An operation of this scale would take at least an hour before anything appeared on the table.
He turned to look around and noticed that Li Chi had vanished — had been right there a moment ago, laughing and talking beside him, and had slipped away entirely without Xiahou Zuo noticing.
“Where’s Li Chi?”
He then noticed that Yu Jiuling was also gone.
“He was just here,” said Mister Yan. “I didn’t see when he left.”
Xiahou Zuo gave a brief sound of acknowledgment and walked back inside the compound. Cui Hansheng, still with a stomach full of undelivered praise, could find no opening to release any of it. He told himself it was fine — after all, this was the son of Prince Yu, a newly promoted Senior Fourth Grade general. Was this not entirely normal behavior?
He followed behind Xiahou Zuo toward the courtyard, and Xiahou Zuo turned to look at him: “Something else?”
“I thought I might stay close and attend to the General,” said Cui Hansheng quickly. “Whatever the General requires, your subordinate is here at hand.”
“Whatever I instruct, you can carry it out?” Xiahou Zuo asked.
“Yes, yes,” said Cui Hansheng. “The General’s arrival is an honor to all of Xinzhou and to this subordinate personally. Whatever you instruct, I will do everything in my power to fulfill it.”
“Then go home,” said Xiahou Zuo.
“Ah…”
Before Cui Hansheng could form a response, Xiahou Zuo had already stepped through the door into the main hall. To follow him in would be awkward; to not follow him in was unsatisfying.
In the end, fear of irritating the general won out, and Cui Hansheng retreated in embarrassment — only to step back outside and find Li Chi returning with a small crowd, each person carrying a load on their shoulder poles, easily a dozen people in all.
Li Chi looked at Cui Hansheng and asked: “Leaving already, Prefect Cui?”
Cui Hansheng immediately poured out his grievances, explaining why General Xiahou had treated him with such cool indifference.
Li Chi looked at him for a moment, then said with an expression of deep disappointment: “Because you’re foolish.”
Cui Hansheng hardly cared how bluntly Li Chi spoke to him anymore. He pulled Li Chi aside and pleaded with fawning intensity: “Please, Young Master Li — guide me.”
Li Chi glanced down at Cui Hansheng’s hands. All ten fingers were bare. Not a single ring. Li Chi’s expression shifted at once to something approaching mild dismay.
The moment he caught that look, Cui Hansheng understood. He immediately produced two rings from his pocket, slipped them onto his fingers in a single fluid motion, and extended his hand. The sequence had the gravity of ceremony and the fluency of long practice — a deeply pitiful sight.
Li Chi stripped one off and said: “First — I told you that General Xiahou dislikes being disturbed. Without a summons, don’t seek an audience. I told you this just now, and you’ve already forgotten. Then you wonder why the General was cold toward you? You should be grateful he didn’t have you thrown out.”
“I thought… that when General Xiahou mentioned the food, he meant he wanted to see me.”
“That brings us to the second point,” said Li Chi.
He took the second ring. “How can you be this obtuse? General Xiahou has ridden hard all day without eating. What does a man need most at that moment? Not to wait another hour or two while you assemble a brigade of cooks to build fires and start dishes from scratch.”
He turned and called back: “Bring everything to General Xiahou and the soldiers first.”
Yu Jiuling led the group forward.
Li Chi pointed at them and said: “Do you see? The moment I spotted those cooks of yours I knew things had gone wrong. You have spent years in official posts — how do you lack even this much judgment? Those are street vendors I just went out and found. I called over every stall selling steamed buns in the area. Soldiers need to be filled up, not presented with elaborate food that won’t satisfy a stomach.”
“And that brings us to the third—”
Cui Hansheng waved his hands hastily. “No more — there is no third.”
“I’ll put it on account,” said Li Chi. “You can make it up to me later.”
Cui Hansheng raised a hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead and asked in a tone of miserable anxiety: “Then what should I do to recover the situation?”
“General Xiahou was born to rank and distinction,” said Li Chi. “You’ve managed to irritate him, which means I’ll have to spend considerable effort finding ways to smooth things over. Quite a headache. Go home and wait for word — if there’s news, I’ll send someone to let you know.”
Cui Hansheng pleaded: “I beg Young Master Li to put in a good word with the General on my behalf. I have truly learned my lesson this time.”
Li Chi said, “Three days ago I called you a perceptive man, and now I find you aren’t all that perceptive after all… You’re still worse than Liu Wenju.”
He let out a long breath of resignation, hands clasped behind his back, and walked away.
Cui Hansheng wiped his brow again and thought: so this must be what people mean when they say attending on the powerful is like walking beside a tiger. He could see now why even those officials who seemed to have it all together must spend every day in exactly the same state of trembling vigilance as he felt right now.
But he was only a local official. He had no means, no connections, to continue climbing. To have reached the position of prefect of Xinzhou — barring some extraordinary event, this was likely the ceiling of his life.
Which was precisely why this was a rare opportunity.
He suddenly recalled that a few days ago, more heavy carts had departed from Liu Wenju’s estate, presumably heading toward Daizhou Pass with more silver. Liu Wenju had already sent twenty thousand taels, and this second shipment meant — evidently — that General Xiahou had asked for more. And an open request for funds meant that Liu Wenju had already established his connection.
He had already fallen behind Liu Wenju. If he didn’t find a way to compensate soon, Liu Wenju would be climbing over his head before long.
Then he thought back to that last thing Li Chi had said to him… *Three days ago I called you a perceptive man, but now I find you aren’t all that perceptive — you’re still worse than Liu Wenju.*
In that instant, a beam of light flooded through Cui Hansheng’s mind. In it, Li Chi seemed to be standing there — a halo of radiant saintly light around his head — looking down at him with benevolent serenity. He raised his hand, and pressed three fingers together — thumb, middle finger, and forefinger — and rubbed them.
*Money.*
The light burst inside Cui Hansheng’s head, and the realization detonated like a thunderclap.
He immediately snapped an order: “Quickly — where are my horses and carriage? Get me back to the office!”
Li Chi, for his part, had not anticipated that Cui Hansheng’s mind had gone through quite so many elaborate philosophical twists before arriving at the concept of money — nor that by the time it got there it had ascended to the level of sacred revelation.
He had simply meant to nudge the man. He had not expected it to require such a grand scenic detour.
Li Chi walked back inside the residence and stepped into the main hall to find Xiahou Zuo already working through a large steamed bun, cheeks puffed out on both sides. There was nothing remotely dignified or imposing about it.
“Such a waste,” Xiahou Zuo said, somewhat muffled.
“What is?”
“They’re all vegetable filling.”
Li Chi sighed. “The people of this city may not have seen meat for quite some time. That I managed to find this many vegetable buns at all was no small feat. Count your blessings.”
He held out his hand. “I spent fifteen taels of silver. Friendship price: twenty.”
“That Cui Hansheng seems to have money,” said Xiahou Zuo. “I’ll collect it from him for you tomorrow.”
“What for?” said Li Chi. “I already collected it just now.”
Xiahou Zuo: “…”
Li Chi grabbed a bun and began eating. Xiahou Zuo was still on his second bite when Li Chi finished his first.
Cabbage and glass noodle filling — modest enough ingredients — yet made into something that tasted genuinely satisfying. That clean vegetable fragrance, savory and warming. You ate one and felt a kind of ease settle through you.
“Slow down,” said Xiahou Zuo. “You’ll choke.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Li Chi said. “Don’t you know me by now?”
“Pfft — can you not hear that I’m complaining about how much you eat and how fast?”
“Mmm…”
Another one gone.
Li Chi had already eaten earlier, and so he stopped naturally after seven. Xiahou Zuo finished six and felt stuffed — those were not small buns, and in the northern style, steamed goods were made to be filling. Three or four would be plenty for most people.
But those vegetable and glass noodle buns were the finest thing the soldiers had eaten in the past ten days or more.
What Li Chi did not know was that the men outside ate until every single one of them could take no more — and still felt full of contentment. Full of happiness.
“So. How do we go about this?”
Xiahou Zuo set down his tea and asked.
Li Chi walked him through the situation with the brothels and gambling dens. Xiahou Zuo thought it through carefully and concluded that if the operation went smoothly, the sum that could be extracted would be staggering.
“Let’s start with how to divide it.”
“Brothers settle accounts clearly,” Xiahou Zuo said. “I need money. The funds to build the memorial garden and monument are sufficient, but the death compensation for the fallen soldiers has not yet been arranged.”
“You take what you need,” said Li Chi. “The rest is mine.”
Xiahou Zuo smiled. “Fine by me.”
He let out a long breath, then after a moment said: “What do you plan to do with your share?”
“All this trouble you cause your elders,” Li Chi said, “and the silver isn’t still being saved up for you to take a wife?”
Xiahou Zuo’s eyes narrowed slightly. Li Chi had already taken two steps back, carrying himself now in the manner of Xiahou Zuo to Li Chi, Li Chi to Yu Jiuling.
This was the food chain.
“Set it aside for later,” Li Chi said.
“I’ve been thinking,” he continued, “about whether it might be possible to acquire some horses from the steppe in the future.”
“Mares or stallions?” asked Xiahou Zuo.
“Hmm?”
“Tch,” said Xiahou Zuo. “You have no sense of humor whatsoever.”
Being good sworn brothers, it seemed, meant both being perfectly willing to sacrifice everything to be the other one’s father — and sustaining that effort indefinitely.
—
# Chapter 209: Dog Bites Dog, Ghost Devours Ghost
The following morning, Prefect Cui — having prepared a substantial quantity of ready silver — sent someone to request an audience with Li Chi. He did not dare seek out General Xiahou, but calling on Young Master Li should pose no problem, seeing as the Young Master had never said he disliked being disturbed.
Prefect Cui had concluded that Li Chi was a good man — the kind of good man who welcomed interruptions at any hour, so long as the interruption came with money.
The messenger said that Prefect Cui invited Li Chi to come to the prefectural office. Li Chi replied that he understood, and told the man to inform the Prefect he would be there shortly.
Then Li Chi strolled off in search of Xiahou Zuo.
Xiahou Zuo was in the courtyard practicing his exercises — mid-winter, stripped to the waist, lifting a stone lock in each hand.
Li Chi walked over and said as he approached: “Put those down for now — there’s something on.”
Xiahou Zuo nearly dropped both stone locks. He glared at Li Chi and said: “Can you please not use that particular phrasing? Use ‘set them aside,’ or anything else — is there a reason you have to say ‘put those down’?”
“Fine. Set those down for now.”
Xiahou Zuo picked up the stone locks and started chasing him. Li Chi circled the pillars.
“It looks like Prefect Cui has taken the bait,” said Li Chi as he moved. “He sent someone just now to invite me to the office. My guess is he’s figured it out.”
Xiahou Zuo set the locks down, accepted the towel his aide handed him, wiped his face and said: “How much silver do you think we can squeeze out of this?”
Li Chi counted on his fingers. “Liu Wenju’s operations in Xinzhou are, conservatively, taking in a fortune every day. Of that, no less than a third will have been flowing into Cui Hansheng’s pockets. Conservatively, Liu Wenju has ten thousand taels in silver. That puts what Cui Hansheng holds at no less than fifty thousand — and Liu Wenju isn’t the only one who’s been paying him.”
Xiahou Zuo did the arithmetic. Fifty thousand taels — at ten taels per man as death compensation, it wouldn’t cover all the fallen soldiers.
He looked at Li Chi. Li Chi read his expression and nodded: “I’ll make an effort.”
Xiahou Zuo raised a fist. “Believe in yourself!”
Li Chi: “…”
Before long, Li Chi arrived at the Xinzhou prefectural office. Prefect Cui had been pacing back and forth in a state of frantic agitation, and the moment he heard Li Chi had come, rushed out to receive him.
“Young Master Li, I’m truly sorry to trouble you to come all this way — I should have been the one to call upon you, but feared disturbing the General’s rest…”
Li Chi waved him off. His expression was dark — very dark — which caused Cui Hansheng’s heart to clench.
Li Chi’s face was terrible. Genuinely terrible. The look of a man who had just encountered a great many problems, multiple and none of them small.
“Young Master Li?”
Cui Hansheng didn’t dare raise his own concerns yet, and ventured carefully: “Has something happened to trouble you?”
Li Chi sat down and said nothing. He sat in silence for a long moment, and then — a crack — his palm came down hard on the table.
“That useless wretch Liu Wenju!”
The table immediately collapsed, the tea things on it scattering to the floor in pieces.
Li Chi turned to look at Cui Hansheng. “Is this the man you recommended to me?! This Liu Wenju — after arriving at Daizhou Pass, he first managed to infuriate General Xiahou. Xiahou let it go, given that he had brought military funds. Then Liu Wenju found out Prince Wu had arrived at Daizhou Pass and, bypassing General Xiahou entirely, went to seek an audience directly with Prince Wu!”
A shockwave went through Cui Hansheng. Even in those few words there was enough to turn a man pale with fright. Bypassing General Xiahou to seek out Prince Wu directly — even before considering whether he would be received, this was precisely the kind of violation that could end a man at court. How had Liu Wenju dared?
“I understand now,” said Li Chi, “why General Xiahou was so cold toward you. It all traces back to that Liu Wenju — a mere merchant, and he had the audacity to behave this way. Yet you told me he was capable and reliable?!”
Cui Hansheng raised a hand to wipe the cold sweat that had sprung up instantly on his brow and said hastily: “Liu Wenju was truly unconscionably bold.”
Li Chi said: “And that’s not all. You think it ends there? General Xiahou, upon hearing that Liu Wenju had gone to seek an audience with Prince Wu, killed him in a fury.”
“Ah!”
Cui Hansheng’s face went instantly white.
“I spent most of last night trying to calm the General,” Li Chi said. “He still hasn’t cooled off. You think he was merely being cold toward you? Last night as we drank, he asked three or four times: *What should I do about this Cui Hansheng?*”
With a thud, Cui Hansheng dropped to his knees.
He was a prefect, a full official rank, and he knelt — just like that.
He wiped his sweat and said, “Young Master Li, please save me.”
“Get up first,” said Li Chi. “I managed to keep Xiahou in check last night — for now — but his anger is still there. You must know this already: before General Xiahou arrived, Liu Wenju dispatched another train of carts from his household toward Daizhou Pass. That silver was not sent on behalf of the General — it was Liu Wenju’s offering to Prince Wu.”
He pointed straight at Cui Hansheng. “What sort of man did you put to use?! He tried to establish himself directly with Prince Wu, not knowing that he had no chance of being received — and those carts of silver were stopped by some minor aide in Prince Wu’s retinue without the Prince himself even being aware. He never reached Prince Wu. He only lost his life.”
“He couldn’t even attach himself to Prince Wu, and he died for it — which matters little enough; he was the sort of man who bites the hand that feeds him. But in failing to attach himself to Prince Wu, you and he managed to offend General Xiahou together. What do you propose to do about that?”
Cui Hansheng said: “I’ll do whatever you say. Young Master Li, please, you must save me.”
Li Chi let out a breath and his tone softened slightly.
“It’s not too late to recover.”
“While Prince Yu has yet to arrive,” Li Chi said, “you must move quickly to pacify General Xiahou and extinguish his anger. If you fail to do so, when the Prince reaches Xinzhou and General Xiahou tells him about you, your future will be over — your life along with it.”
Li Chi leaned forward, looking Cui Hansheng directly in the eyes. “If I didn’t think you were a man of some sense, if I didn’t give weight to the fact that you’ve shown yourself willing to learn — would I have come to tell you all this? General Xiahou is still furious. I should be keeping well away from you. The decent thing would be to avoid all association.”
Another crack — Cui Hansheng’s head struck the floor.
“Young Master Li. Save me, Young Master Li.”
Li Chi reached down and lifted him. “Look at you — frightened half out of your wits, not a single idea in your head. How have you managed to hold office all these years?”
He raised Cui Hansheng up and said: “Let me ask you something. The General’s anger — is it directed at you?”
Something lit up faintly in Cui Hansheng’s mind. He ventured carefully: “It… should be that Liu Wenju is the one who provoked him.”
“Exactly.”
Li Chi clapped him on the shoulder. “Liu Wenju has spent years in Xinzhou City deceiving his superiors and oppressing those beneath him, doing harm in the shadows — over all these years, how many families has he ruined? You are Xinzhou’s chief official, and long before this, you had heard rumors and quietly dispatched people to investigate. And now, at precisely this moment, you have gathered evidence of Liu Wenju’s many crimes…”
Li Chi gave Cui Hansheng a meaningful look. Cui Hansheng understood at once — if he failed to grasp Li Chi’s meaning now, he truly was past all help.
“I understand — I understand completely!”
Cui Hansheng’s expression brightened with excitement. “I’ll send people at once to seize and search Liu Wenju’s household. That damnable wretch — oppressing the people, murdering the innocent, that’s not even the worst of it — he’s been conspiring with rebel forces!”
Li Chi nodded. “How astute of you, Prefect Cui.”
“I will personally lead the men to seal all properties under Liu Wenju’s name,” Cui Hansheng continued, “and confiscate everything. Since General Xiahou is in Xinzhou, it would be appropriate to transfer the entire matter to the General for his handling — along with all confiscated assets.”
Li Chi dropped his voice and leaned close to Cui Hansheng’s ear. “Do you understand why I’ve been giving you all these hints?”
Cui Hansheng said: “Because Young Master Li is saving me — such generosity.”
Li Chi gave a short derisive sound. “Nonsense. Liu Wenju has been sending you silver for years. Your dealings with him are surely not clean. I’m handing you this case — you handle it yourself, and by the time you pass it to General Xiahou, you’ll have separated yourself from it completely. You walk away clean. And so do I.”
Cui Hansheng’s eyes actually lit up.
“Young Master Li,” he said, “you are nothing less than the one who gave me a second life.”
He bowed again deeply.
Li Chi smiled. “I’ve been worrying myself raw over your situation. Last night, once I understood where the General’s mind was, I immediately sent people out to find evidence — and as it happens, certain matters involving Liu Wenju have come to light…”
He paused, then looked at Cui Hansheng. “There is a man named Liu Shanshen imprisoned in Liu Wenju’s household — correct? This man once served as an official in Jizhou and later came to Xinzhou to join Liu Wenju. Liu Wenju coveted the beauty of his daughter and had him set up for disposal. I’ve already had Liu Shanshen and his family of three freed and brought to General Xiahou’s side.”
The cold sweat Cui Hansheng had only just dried broke out again all at once.
Li Chi said: “You had nothing to do with any of this, Prefect Cui?”
“Nothing — nothing whatsoever!”
Cui Hansheng waved his hands urgently. “I truly had no knowledge of it — none at all. That Liu Wenju really was unconscionably bold!”
“I’ve settled the matter of that witness for you,” said Li Chi. “What happens next is up to you.”
He rose and turned to leave. “General Xiahou was going to send men to arrest you this morning. I held him off. Get the Liu Wenju case closed within two days. If you don’t — when Xiahou decides to kill someone, no one can stop him. He killed Liu Wenju right in the middle of Prince Wu’s army. Do you think he’d hesitate over you? Don’t forget — whatever their differences may be, Prince Wu and General Xiahou are uncle and nephew by blood. What was Liu Wenju? Nothing.”
Li Chi walked away. Cui Hansheng bowed and escorted him out in person, and it was only after Li Chi had disappeared from view that the Prefect realized his clothes were nearly soaked through.
He walked back to the study and sat heavily in his chair. He felt cold all over. The damp clothes clung to his skin, unpleasant — though that was far less unpleasant than the feeling inside him.
“Summon everyone!”
After a moment’s thought, Cui Hansheng rose to his feet and called out: “Send word — assemble every constable in the prefecture. Requisition three hundred garrison soldiers. Tell Deputy Prefect Han to come here at once. We ride together and search Liu Wenju’s household!”
The order went out, and before long Deputy Prefect Han Tong and Chief Constable Qi Dian had both arrived.
Three officials led their men at a fierce march straight to Liu Wenju’s compound. On the way, Cui Hansheng laid out Liu Wenju’s crimes. He had long harbored resentment toward Liu Wenju, and feared him gaining the upper hand — now that the chance had come, he struck without mercy.
“Anyone with knowledge of the accounts between him and myself: kill them without exception.”
Cui Hansheng ordered: “You two divide the work — Deputy Han, take men to search the gambling dens and brothels. Seal all the silver.”
“Qi Dian, you come with me to Liu Wenju’s household directly. Anyone with knowledge of our dealings: not one left alive.”
He turned to look at Qi Dian. “The ledgers. You must find the ledgers.”
—
Meanwhile, at Li Chi’s residence.
Xiahou Zuo asked Li Chi: “You went to see Cui Hansheng — what do you think he’ll do?”
Li Chi gave a slight shrug. “Dog bites dog; ghost devours ghost. Let them kill each other.”
He was quiet for a moment, then seemed to speak almost to himself: “There is no such thing as dirty silver in this world. There are only dirty people.”
—
# Chapter 210: I Am Content
*There is no such thing as dirty silver in this world — only dirty people.* The words settled over Xiahou Zuo and silenced him.
After a moment, Xiahou Zuo said: “The way things are going, that Prefect Cui is probably already carrying out a search and seizure as we speak. Do you want to go and watch?”
Li Chi shook his head. “I may be capable of ordering it done. I can’t stand to watch it.”
He looked at Xiahou Zuo and asked: “Am I too prone to killing thoughts?”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “Then you should feel proud of yourself. For people like us, a few more killing thoughts is a blessing to this world.”
He said to Li Chi: “Generals on the frontier have taken countless lives — according to any doctrine of cause and effect, there ought to be punishment for that. Yet the people pray for such generals to live a hundred years. Tell me: which is greater — the workings of fate, or the will of the people? If I live to a hundred, it will be proof that the people are greater.”
Then he added: “For a man like you, every kill is the removal of an evil. The more you kill, the greater your merit.”
Li Chi said: “You have no gift for anything useful, but crooked reasoning — you’re unrivaled at that.”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “At most third place. Your master is first, you are second.”
“You’re too modest,” said Li Chi. “We three are, at most, tied.”
Xiahou Zuo’s teasing drew a real laugh out of Li Chi, and the phrase *for people like us, a few more killing thoughts is a blessing to this world* had cleared something open inside him.
“We wait and collect our earnings.”
“Feel like a game of chess?” Xiahou Zuo asked.
Li Chi shook his head. “No chess. Come with me and frighten someone instead.”
Xiahou Zuo grinned. “Frightening people sounds considerably more interesting than chess.”
“Who are we frightening?”
“An instructor at the Academy,” said Li Chi, “who has a long history of frightening his students. It’s high time someone frightened him back.”
Xiahou Zuo thought for a moment about which instructor at the Academy was notorious for that.
He asked: “Are we going to take care of Yan Qingzhi?”
Li Chi: “…”
—
Half a shichen later.
Instructor Yuan’s old residence in Xinzhou City. The gates had been shut for several days now. For those days, Yuan Jiabei’s father had not dared to go out. A demon had taken up residence in his heart, and day and night it lashed him with a whip.
Every time he recalled his own degraded spectacle in the gambling den, the demon would surface and strike again.
Yet he felt it was still not hard enough — because now he could no longer even respect himself. He had displayed that degradation fully and openly before his own daughter, and the thought made him feel he would be better off dead.
Yuan Jiabei and her mother took turns keeping watch every day, terrified that their father and husband might do something irreversible.
At that moment, a knock sounded at the gate.
Madam Yuan indicated to Yuan Jiabei not to go, and went herself to the inner gate to call out: “Who is it?”
“A student of the Academy — Li Chi. I’ve come to call on Instructor Yuan.”
Madam Yuan opened the gate at once. She already knew that had Li Chi not been present that day, her husband might have met with a terrible end — and the man had paid off fifty taels of gambling debt on her husband’s behalf. Such a kindness was not to be taken lightly.
Li Chi saw that the one who opened the door was a woman, and guessed this must be the instructor’s wife. He immediately bowed his head respectfully: “Teacher’s wife.”
Though Yuan was not technically his teacher, the man was an instructor at the Academy, so addressing her this way was appropriate.
Madam Yuan felt she could not accept such courtesy and returned the greeting hastily.
“Is the instructor at home?” Li Chi asked.
“He is — just lying in the room. He’s… he’s gone three days without eating or drinking.”
Li Chi said: “Three days without eating or drinking is nothing much. Has he lost his temper with you or with Jiabei?”
Madam Yuan shook her head repeatedly. “He simply doesn’t wish to see anyone.”
Good enough, Li Chi thought.
Li Chi looked at Xiahou Zuo. Xiahou Zuo stepped forward, thinking to himself: *Li Chi, you little schemer — you take the good, I take the bad. What kind of arrangement is that.*
He cleared his throat and said: “My name is Xiahou Zuo. I am a general of the garrison forces.”
Madam Yuan had never encountered an official of this stature and immediately began to prostrate herself. Xiahou Zuo said: “No need for ceremony, Madam. You and your daughter may step away for a moment — I have a few words to say to your husband. Please wait outside the courtyard.”
Madam Yuan hurried back inside to inform her husband and daughter. Yuan Jiabei, hearing that Li Chi had come, immediately dashed out — then braked hard just short of the door, hurriedly adjusted her clothing and hair, and stepped outside.
She had only just opened her mouth to say something when Xiahou Zuo said coldly: “You and your mother wait outside.”
Xiahou Zuo then jerked his chin, and an aide brought a man into the courtyard. The gate was shut behind them.
Yuan Shanshen came out, visibly trembling. The instructor who had always been so severe with his students stood now before a student in a state of trembling fear.
Those with guilt in their hearts and those without — they are never the same. Unless the guilty man has become so vicious that he is worse than whatever haunts him.
“Do you recognize this man?”
Xiahou Zuo gave no mind to whatever posture Yuan Shanshen struck. He had no particular warmth toward men of this sort. Compared to him, Yan Qingzhi was practically endearing.
He pointed at the man kneeling on the ground and posed the question.
Yuan Shanshen looked up and recognized him immediately — the old childhood friend who had sought him out, recalled old times, drawn him into drink until the familiarity was overwhelming and the cups kept flowing, and then pulled him into the gambling den.
“Yi Sheng!”
Yuan Shanshen lost all composure and lunged forward, grabbing the man by the collar, shaking him back and forth as he cried out: “Why did you do this to me?!”
The middle-aged man dared not answer. His eyes slid away.
“Why did he do it?”
Xiahou Zuo gave a cold snort and said: “Because you have a beautiful daughter. Because most of the women in the brothels of this city got there by exactly this route — every one of them with stories of suffering you would not want to hear. If Li Chi hadn’t stopped you that day, your daughter would be receiving guests in a brothel right now!”
These were the words Yuan Shanshen had already thought of — and refused to face. He had been hiding like a turtle pulling into its shell, refusing to acknowledge the things his mind had already worked out.
“I…”
Yuan Shanshen opened his mouth, then lowered his head again.
Xiahou Zuo stepped forward, raised his hand, and struck Yuan Shanshen hard across the face with an open palm. This was a man of extraordinary strength — the blow sent Yuan Shanshen spinning to the ground, and within moments the whole side of his face had swollen, shaped with remarkable precision to the outline of a hand.
“You made an error. This is your reckoning for it.”
Then Xiahou Zuo drew his blade and turned. In one stroke, he took the head from the man called Yi Sheng.
Blood fountained outward. Yuan Shanshen let out a scream of terror.
“He committed a crime. This is his reckoning.”
Yuan Shanshen was so frightened he lay prostrate on the ground, shaking uncontrollably. The headless body lying there — that sight would likely never leave him for the rest of his life.
Xiahou Zuo said: “Instructor Yuan, give it some thought yourself. Do this again, and you may one day find yourself dragging your own daughter by the hand and selling her to a brothel for money. I have seen that happen.”
He crouched down beside Yuan Shanshen and asked: “If you still feel the urge to gamble, come find me. You and I will gamble our lives.”
Yuan Shanshen shuddered.
Xiahou Zuo rose and said: “This ends here. When Li Chi and the others return, they will not mention a word about Xinzhou to anyone at the Academy — they will not mention having seen you here. Go back to being Instructor Yuan. We will protect your reputation. But your own conscience — that is yours to keep.”
He then gave the order: “Clean this up.”
His aides stepped forward, bagged the body, and scraped the bloodstained ground clean with a shovel.
Once everything had been attended to, Xiahou Zuo looked at Li Chi: “Ready to go?”
Li Chi gave a sound of assent. “Let’s go.”
Xiahou Zuo’s men pulled the gate open. Outside, Yuan Jiabei was immediately looking at Li Chi. Xiahou Zuo — knowing that Li Chi was more or less helpless when faced with young women he wasn’t familiar with (Gao Xining was a different case; with anyone else, his tongue simply failed him) — turned to Yuan Jiabei and said:
“Your father, being a man of principle, has — under our gentle persuasion — seen the error of his ways. He will never touch anything like this again. You may all set your minds at ease. Once the new year has passed, return to Jizhou. The Academy will never learn of any of this.”
Madam Yuan and Yuan Jiabei gave their thanks many times over.
When they looked again, Li Chi was already gone.
Yuan Jiabei glanced around, and when she spotted him, the figure was already dozens of yards away, feet slapping noisily against the ground in full flight.
Li Chi waited in the distance, and when Xiahou Zuo caught up, he received a withering glance. “You call that coming along to frighten someone? This was all you managed?”
“If she’d said she wanted to thank me,” Li Chi said, “I’d have had absolutely nothing to say back. That kind of thing is genuinely a bother — all that bowing and scraping, it wears you out…”
Xiahou Zuo laughed. “You have no trouble at all trading teasing blows with Gao Xining.”
Li Chi’s face reddened. “Don’t slander people — she’s just a matchmaker.”
Xiahou Zuo nodded agreeably. “Fine, fine, a matchmaker. I must say, the sheer audacity of you — even matchmakers you don’t spare…”
He seemed to think of something then, and said: “Wait — I have this feeling you’re playing a very long game. Get the matchmaker on your side, and you’ll end up with endless…”
He trailed off and looked at Li Chi. Li Chi’s face had gone red as a monkey’s backside. This seemed to be his one genuine weak point — he’d argue with anyone about anything, but the moment Gao Xining came up, he went speechless.
Xiahou Zuo sighed. “Look at that burning blush of yours!”
Just at that moment, Yu Jiuling came running from a distance, flushed with excitement, panting as he said: “Just now a messenger from Prefect Cui arrived to report that all of Liu Wenju’s properties — including the gambling dens and brothels — have been sealed. Just those several establishments alone have yielded tens of thousands of taels in dirty silver. They are now conducting a full search of Liu Wenju’s home, and will transfer everything discovered to General Xiahou shortly.”
Xiahou Zuo smiled. “He’s efficient.”
“The sooner the better,” said Li Chi. “The day after tomorrow is New Year’s Eve. The sooner he gets it done — the sooner we can have a proper New Year’s Eve ourselves.”
Xiahou Zuo said: “Speaking of tomorrow, I suspect you’re planning something at my expense.”
“What are you saying?” said Li Chi. “Given the bond between us, how could I be scheming against you? Everything I’ve done from the beginning to now — it’s all been schemes against your father.”
Xiahou Zuo: “I… thank you so much.”
“Your banner is grand,” said Li Chi, “but not as grand as the Prince’s. Tomorrow at the prefectural office there’s still a scene to play out — and we may very well need to haul out Prince Yu’s name.”
Xiahou Zuo paused, then said: “It’s our own house — so be it, haul it out. As long as we can be rid of the two great sources of harm in Xinzhou and come away with enough silver to issue death compensation to the fallen, I’d haul out the banner ten times over.”
Li Chi let out a long breath and said: “By my reckoning, your father should reach Daizhou Pass in a few more days. Once the new year has passed — do you want to go see him?”
Xiahou Zuo shook his head. “I have no wish to.”
He smiled, reached out and hooked his arm around Li Chi’s neck, and they walked forward together side by side. As they went, he said: “Think it over — is following someone like Yu Chaozong really better than staying with me?”
“When have you ever let me feel at ease?” said Li Chi.
“Hey!”
“I spoke out of turn. Completely out of turn.”
“Yu Chaozong has some ability,” said Xiahou Zuo, “but a man who took your advice and went to guard Xinzhou Pass — that means he genuinely wants to be Emperor. It is his ultimate goal, and beneath that goal, everything else is expendable. Li Chi — be careful.”
Li Chi gave a sound of acknowledgment, but inwardly he still felt that men like Yu Chaozong, whatever else might be said of them, would not treat their sworn brothers wrongly. Zhuang Wudi had said once that Yu Chaozong had only one reversed scale — and that was his brothers.
Xiahou Zuo saw that Li Chi gave no answer and decided not to press further. He laughed and shifted the subject: “Once we’re back in Jizhou, I’ll be curious to see how you explain yourself to the matchmaker — you saved Yuan Jiabei, and saved Liu Yingyuan, and now both of them are headed back to Jizhou.”
He laughed. “Just thinking about it gives me a headache.”
“I,” said Li Chi, “am a man of unblemished honor!”
Xiahou Zuo said: “I’ve heard that’s exactly what the Daoist said before he went to drown his sorrows in wine.”
“No, no — that was Mister Yan, after he came back, who said it.”
He looked at Xiahou Zuo, smiled, and asked: “You’re always telling me to think things through carefully — but what about you? Are you really just going to stay at the frontier for the rest of your life?”
Xiahou Zuo was quiet for a moment, then nodded. “People are different from one another. I’m the kind of person who belongs on the frontier. That is what I actually want to be doing. What others find bitter — I find satisfying.”
He reached out and ruffled Li Chi’s hair, smiling. “If the work you do gives you satisfaction — what more could you ask for?”