After Li Chi and the others returned to Jizhou, they had almost no interaction with Shen Rujian. The medical hall’s affairs were hers alone to manage, and besides, Shen Rujian seemed to dislike them coming by the medical hall too frequently.

But even if they had been given a role, Li Chi would not have gone poking his nose in. What impressed him was that Shen Rujian’s strength lay precisely in laying everything out plainly in advance. She was, it seemed, the sort of person who preferred everything settled beforehand — and once settled, it would not be mentioned a second time.

This meant her subordinates operated with exceptional efficiency. She stated things once; those who failed to remember or failed to follow through were immediately demoted. The greatest benefit of this was that it kindled a competitive spirit in everyone — no one within the same rank wanted to fall behind the others.

So as not to interfere with the medical hall’s business, Li Chi had simply relinquished the other half of the compound. He had originally planned to open a courier escort agency there, but even without the medical hall, there was no way to run such a business — the situation was so turbulent that an escort agency couldn’t even get out of Jizhou City. What business could be done?

With the escort agency unworkable, Li Chi had also considered opening a martial arts school, since they now had Jia Ruan and the others, and were not short of hands.

But the medical hall was doing well and needed not to be disturbed. So Li Chi sent word to Shen Rujian saying the other half of the compound could go to her for a dispensary to store medicinal supplies.

Shen Rujian’s reply came in the form of a banknote.

She had her people relay to Li Chi that she was taking the space, but since this was not part of the original agreement, she would treat it as a rental. The banknote was the rent.

Li Chi thought this seemed wrong.

He gave back the banknote.

Prince Yu had originally intended to reopen the Three Month River Pavilion, but recent events had left him with no heart for such things, so the place had been sitting empty all this while.

Li Chi had more than once contemplated ways to get his hands on that property — but there was no easy path to it.

The Carriage Agency.

Li Chi and his companions were in the middle of practicing when a staff member came running from the front courtyard to say that a strange visitor had come demanding to see the proprietor, but refusing to say who had sent him.

Li Chi, who at that moment had no immediate adversaries or enemies in Jizhou City, could not imagine who it might be.

When Li Chi entered the front reception hall, the person waiting for him was a stranger — a middle-aged man of about thirty, whom he had never seen before.

A very refined-looking man: fair and clean-featured, dressed in a pale white scholar’s long robe.

Autumn had arrived, and the robe seemed a touch thin for the season. His air was one of deep bookishness — the very picture of a civil scholar.

“This one is Feng Yunji. I greet the proprietor.”

The middle-aged man cupped his fists in salute when he saw Li Chi.

Li Chi returned the gesture and asked: “Has the gentleman come to discuss some business?”

Feng Yunji shook his head: “Not business.”

Li Chi smiled: “The Carriage Agency conducts business. If the gentleman has no business to discuss, other matters are not of great interest to me.”

“It is not business to speak of, but there is remuneration.”

Feng Yunji smiled and said: “If the proprietor is willing, please accompany me to the Yan Nian Pavilion to meet a person of importance.”

Li Chi asked: “Which person of importance?”

Feng Yunji said: “The proprietor will know upon arrival.”

Li Chi shook his head: “I will not go.”

Feng Yunji frowned slightly, but kept his tone courteous: “This person of importance — the proprietor would do well to meet them. It will benefit the proprietor, and benefit everyone at the Carriage Agency.”

Li Chi narrowed his eyes slightly and asked: “Do you mean that if I do not go, there will be no benefit for me, and no benefit for everyone at the Carriage Agency?”

Feng Yunji did not answer. His silence was perhaps answer enough.

Li Chi said: “Would the gentleman like some tea?”

Feng Yunji was startled, unsure why Li Chi was suddenly asking him about tea — it had nothing to do with what had just been said.

Li Chi continued: “If not, you may leave. I open my doors for business. The only thing that costs nothing is the tea to welcome guests. Everything else here has a price.”

Feng Yunji frowned: “Does the proprietor think money is the most important thing?”

Li Chi glanced at him, then turned and walked away.

The staff member stepped forward with a gesture indicating the way out. Feng Yunji was plainly unprepared for Li Chi’s attitude. Watching Li Chi’s retreating back, he called out: “Does the proprietor not wish to know which person of importance wants to see you?”

Without turning around, Li Chi replied: “If you wish to invite someone, first go and learn what it means to invite someone properly.”

Feng Yunji fell silent. Finding this somewhat embarrassing, he turned and left.

Half an hour later, Feng Yunji returned, this time with a formal invitation in hand, and requested to see Li Chi.

Li Chi came back out from the inner courtyard. When Feng Yunji saw him, he cupped his fists and said: “My manners earlier were lacking — I ask the proprietor to forgive me.”

Li Chi asked: “Has Mister Feng come to discuss business this time?”

Feng Yunji said: “It is indeed business — which is precisely why I have come especially to extend this invitation. Three days from now, at the Yan Nian Pavilion, an important person will be waiting for the proprietor.”

Li Chi did not take the invitation, and said with a smile: “Mister Feng — do you remember what I said earlier? That the tea to welcome guests is the only thing that costs nothing?”

Feng Yunji did not follow the meaning, but still nodded and replied: “I remember.”

Li Chi said: “Do you remember what came before that?”

Feng Yunji thought carefully. For a moment he could not quite recall.

Li Chi smiled: “See the guest out.”

This time Feng Yunji was genuinely irritated. He turned and left — and halfway out, he suddenly remembered: Li Chi’s preceding line had been… “I open my doors for business.”

The next day, a carriage pulled up outside the Carriage Agency. Feng Yunji stepped out first, then held back the carriage curtain and waited.

A man in a hooded cape climbed down. The hood was drawn low over his face, and he kept his head down — his features were not visible. He stepped down from the carriage and walked directly through the Carriage Agency’s front gate.

A short while later, in the front reception hall.

Li Chi entered to find the caped figure standing with his back to the door, apparently studying the calligraphy on the wall.

The words were something Li Chi had brushed for amusement. He had thought nothing of them once done, but Gao Xining had decided it was too much of a waste to throw away, so she had it mounted and hung it on the reception hall wall.

The writing was not any complete poem or classical verse, but three lines that, at first glance, seemed to have been dashed off at random.

The first: *In life’s glory, let joy be full.*

The second: *In life, a half-measure of glory is most fulfilled.*

The third: *In life, every damn one of these is right.*

The figure stood staring at the three lines. At the sound of footsteps, he turned — and when Li Chi saw his face, he could not suppress a moment of surprise.

“His Excellency the Military Governor?”

Li Chi truly had not anticipated this: the important person who wanted to meet him was none other than Jizhou Military Governor Zeng Ling.

“Young Master Li.”

Zeng Ling smiled and called out a greeting, then pointed to the writing on the wall: “Did Young Master Li write these?”

Li Chi gave a slightly abashed nod: “I did.”

Zeng Ling smiled: “The third line — exquisitely apt.”

He took a seat and said: “The man who lives letting joy be full — he speaks of one whose life has always gone well. The man who finds a half-measure the fullest point — he speaks of one who has perhaps never even had a half-measure. The one who lets joy be full has most likely always had joy; the one who claims a half-measure is most likely speaking from a life that never quite reached half.”

Li Chi smiled: “Both are right.”

Zeng Ling smiled: “The third one is missing the ‘damn.'”

Li Chi laughed again, with the same faint embarrassment. That smile of his — it was devastatingly disarming. There was an air of innocent harmlessness about it that consistently deceived.

Zeng Ling looked around, then asked with a smile: “And why is that complimentary tea not yet forthcoming?”

Li Chi smiled and told a staff member to go brew tea. When the tea was brought and the staff members had all been dismissed, Li Chi understood from Zeng Ling’s having come in person that there was clearly something of importance to be said.

Zeng Ling sipped his tea and gave a satisfied nod: “I would not have imagined that Young Master Li’s tea could be this fine.”

Li Chi thought to himself that he had no idea whether it was fine either — it had been picked by the staff during their stay at the mountain. They had nothing else to do, so they had picked and then roasted it themselves.

At the time he had asked Shen Rujun: “Sect Leader — is that hillside tea garden planted by the Immortal Crane Divine Palace?”

Shen Rujun had replied that it was, and added that if Li Chi was fond of tea, she would have someone bring some for him to take along. Li Chi had said that seemed too much of an imposition — he would just help himself to some.

In that one fleeting moment, Shen Rujun had found herself questioning whether life made sense.

Li Chi asked: “Has the Military Governor come on some matter of business?”

Zeng Ling smiled: “When Young Master Li said to my man that you open your doors for business — you meant that if someone wants to do business with you, they had better come to your door and say so plainly. Am I reading it correctly?”

Li Chi gave another of his endearingly abashed smiles, still wearing that expression of innocent harmlessness.

Zeng Ling said: “If I must call it business — then it is somewhat business.”

He suddenly grew grave and composed, and looked at Li Chi: “The business of killing — does Young Master Li take on such work?”

Li Chi’s brow furrowed slightly.

Zeng Ling glanced toward the door. The Carriage Agency staff were all at a distance; the nearest person was in fact his own man, Feng Yunji.

Zeng Ling waited for a while, and seeing that Li Chi said nothing, he asked: “Young Master Li does not ask whom I want killed?”

Li Chi answered: “If I ask, it means I am ready to accept.”

So he did not ask.

Zeng Ling sighed: “Xiahou often says that Li Chi is the most intelligent person he has ever met, and also the person with the most principles. Today I see for myself that what Xiahou said was no exaggeration.”

He looked at Li Chi and said: “The man I want killed is named Yang Zhuo.”

Li Chi frowned again.

Yang Zhuo — Prince Yu’s heir.

Zeng Ling asked: “Does Young Master Li not intend to ask for my reasons?”

Li Chi shook his head and said nothing.

Zeng Ling was silent for a moment, then nodded: “Of course. If you asked for reasons, you would already be interested.”

So he continued: “Jizhou right now is beset by troubles both within and without. Never mind the external dangers — speak only of the internal. His Highness’s displeasure with me is growing, and three or four parts of that displeasure can be attributed to his heir, Yang Zhuo.”

He looked at Li Chi; Li Chi still said nothing.

Zeng Ling said: “If I were to die at this juncture, Jizhou would collapse into chaos and inevitably be lost. So I cannot die. But Yang Zhuo has already, on multiple occasions, been urging His Highness to have me killed.”

Li Chi still said nothing.

Zeng Ling fell silent in thought again. Then after a moment he said: “You should have your own grievance against Yang Zhuo — after all, he tried to kill you and Xiahou, more than once.”

Li Chi still did not speak.

Zeng Ling’s gaze shifted to the doorway. This time the silence stretched even longer.

“Yang Zhuo has long deserved to die. The people of this city have suffered much at his hands — tyranny, cruelty, no shortage of outrages. It is only because his father is the Prince that no one dares say a word. I cannot use my own people for this. The only one I could think of was you.”

He finished and looked at Li Chi again.

Li Chi sat just as before, eyes lowered in apparent stillness, as though he had not heard a word.

So Zeng Ling fell silent once more.

After some indeterminate span of time, Zeng Ling looked at Li Chi. This time he said only three words.

“One hundred thousand taels.”

Li Chi smiled and nodded: “I will take it.”

Zeng Ling smiled as well. After a moment he asked: “Young Master Li — when did you start wanting to accept? My guess is that you had already decided the moment I mentioned that he had tried to kill Xiahou, not just once.”

Li Chi answered: “One hundred thousand taels.”

Zeng Ling was taken aback.

—