Several days in a row, thousands of people worked at full pace to bring in the summer grain. Watching the stores fill up again, Li Chi’s mind eased considerably.

With provisions settled, nothing else felt like a true problem. With grain, hearts were steady — and so were the hearts of the soldiers.

What gave him even more quiet satisfaction was the way the chaos of the times seemed to be working in Yanshan Camp’s favor with every passing season. More chaos would only help them further.

Luo Geng was dead. No one in the Youzhou Army would think of Li Chi anymore. From the day Luo Geng died, Luo Jing would be channeling every ounce of his energy into seeking vengeance against Pan Nuo.

And the Youzhou Army had no particular reason to attack Li Chi either — the expenditure of men and supplies would be enormous, and the gain marginal.

As for the Jizhou Army: Pan Nuo’s hands were full managing Luo Jing. He had gotten Luo Geng killed, and he knew Luo Jing would come for him with everything he had. The last thing he had time for was Li Chi’s Ning Army.

That said, Pan Nuo was a man of remarkable cleverness. No wonder the Emperor and Prince Wu both trusted him to hold Jizhou.

On the eve of Luo Geng’s birthday, a single set of women’s clothing had provoked the man into coughing blood and dying. Who could have predicted that?

Sometimes a small stratagem, one that seemed insignificant on the surface, accomplished more than an entire battle.

“Chief.”

Jia Ruan, the senior brother of the Hanging Blade Sect, came running in from outside, so pleased with himself he seemed about to burst into flower.

He was now the Ning Army’s head of logistics — Li Chi had handed the storehouse into his care. With a harvest like this, of course Jia Ruan was overjoyed.

“I just finished counting.”

Jia Ruan said happily: “Reckoned against our current strength, what we have brought in is enough for two or three years.”

Li Chi laughed: “Look how pleased you are.”

“Well, we’re flush!”

Jia Ruan laughed loudly: “Now that the coffers are full, Chief, have you noticed? My whole bearing has changed.”

Li Chi said: “There’s more to come.”

Jia Ruan heard those words and knew the chief was turning something big over in his mind. He was no fool, only appeared a little more straightforward than the others.

No one in the Ning Army was truly straightforward.

“Chief is thinking about…”

Jia Ruan leaned in: “What scheme?”

Li Chi smiled: “Only just the beginning of an idea. We will call everyone together later and talk it through.”

Li Chi turned and walked, talking as he went: “Now that provisions are no longer the worry, and no one should be coming to make trouble for us for a while — I thought: perhaps it is time for us to go and make trouble for someone else.”

Jia Ruan said: “Take me, take me, include me.”

Li Chi said: “Not even a shadow of a plan yet. No need to be in a hurry.”

Just then, Yu Jiuling came in from outside as well. Li Chi had handed over command of the scout teams to him, and for the past two or three months Yu Jiuling had been on the move constantly.

“Look at that face of yours.”

Jia Ruan took one look at Yu Jiuling’s grin and curled his lip: “You look like your mouth has sprouted flowers — a prim little monkey-rump bloom.”

Yu Jiuling shot back: “If my face sprouted flowers, yours would be one enormous sunflower, nodding at itself — just look at all those teeth, like sunflower seeds about to come flying out.”

Jia Ruan opened his mouth, could not immediately find a return volley.

Li Chi laughed: “What is the point of bickering with him?”

He asked Yu Jiuling: “Well then. What good news?”

Yu Jiuling said: “Before we get to that — you did ask me to go gather intelligence, so let me start with the situation in Jizhou…”

Li Chi kept walking and nodded. “Go ahead.”

Yu Jiuling said: “When Prince Wu left, he took the great bulk of the forces with him. Jizhou City now has fewer than twenty thousand garrison troops — and of those, the ones who are capable, battle-ready fighters are perhaps half. The rest are the old, the sick, and the barely functional.”

He glanced at Li Chi, then continued: “I also went to see Elder Shen. The Shen Medical Hall in Jizhou City is still open, and has already established a familiarity with Military Commissioner Pan Nuo.”

Li Chi gave a nod at that. He had not arranged for Shen Rulan to stay in Jizhou — yet she had made that choice herself.

Yu Jiuling said: “Elder Shen says that if anyone needs to go into Jizhou to conduct business, they need only go under the banner of the Shen Medical Hall and travel is unimpeded.”

Shen Rulan had stayed in Jizhou of her own will. For Jizhou, Li Chi had arranged a different person.

“Did you find Jiang Ran?”

Li Chi asked.

Yu Jiuling nodded. “I did. Just about to get to that — he is Commissioner Jiang now.”

When Li Chi had left Jiang Ran behind in Jizhou, he had seen clearly what Jiang Ran was capable of. At the time, Pan Nuo had no familiarity with Jizhou whatsoever.

Prince Yu was dead, Military Commissioner Zeng Ling was dead, and a great number of the major families had also suffered heavy losses. The city was in disorder, and no one could make sense of it.

On top of that, Pan Nuo’s forces were all men from the Yuzhou Army under Liu Li — making the gaps in Jizhou wide open enough to drive a cart through.

A seasoned operator like Jiang Ran had a thousand ways to get close to Pan Nuo. The most important thing was that he had once been persecuted by Prince Yu and Zeng Ling.

With that history, it would not be difficult for Jiang Ran to earn Pan Nuo’s trust.

So Jiang Ran had not troubled himself with any circuitous maneuvering. He went directly to Pan Nuo’s Military Commissioner’s residence.

Today Jiang Ran was already one of Pan Nuo’s generals — only a fifth-rank, but Pan Nuo trusted him considerably, bringing him into consultations on many matters.

Jiang Ran was a veteran of Jizhou’s inner workings, familiar with the various forces and families of the city — many of them he knew to some degree.

And he genuinely delivered results. Whatever Pan Nuo assigned him, he handled with exceptional competence.

Yu Jiuling laughed: “Jiang Ran is now clearly Pan Nuo’s most favored man. His rank is modest, but what he controls is military supplies and logistics…”

At that, Yu Jiuling blinked, then let out a slow, silly grin.

Li Chi laughed: “What are you grinning about?”

Yu Jiuling said: “I just recalled — back when we were lifting things from the patrol army’s storehouses in Jizhou, right at the very beginning, didn’t Jiang Ran hold some kind of post?”

Li Chi said: “You are confused. He had no post then. He was the one who led us in the stealing.”

Yu Jiuling said: “History… is uncannily consistent.”

Li Chi laughed out loud.

Yu Jiuling continued: “I have already worked it out with Jiang Ran — he will make contact with Shen Rulan. Same method as before.”

Li Chi nodded.

The method in question was the same: Jiang Ran would lead the way in taking things — though naturally Jiang Ran could not get his own hands dirty anymore, now that he held a post. In the past Li Chi’s people had done the actual work; now it would be the Shen Medical Hall’s people instead, using the cover of the medical supply business to carry the taken goods back to Li Chi.

“I should go to Youzhou.”

Li Chi stopped at the doorway and looked out at the lush greenery beyond. His mood had lifted considerably — it seemed as though everyone had begun to emerge from the shadow of what had come before.

“Go to Youzhou?”

Yu Jiuling was startled.

“Luo Jing’s position is still unclear, and this is the time when he is at his most volatile. If you go now and something goes wrong—”

“Nothing will go wrong.”

Li Chi said: “Because I am going to offer him a partnership.”

—

A little over ten days later. Outside the walls of Youzhou City.

Li Chi and his people had dressed themselves as a merchant caravan and were now waiting in the queue outside the Youzhou city gates, accepting inspection. It was plain to see that Youzhou was on extreme alert.

The gate soldiers were examining the people and vehicles coming and going with painstaking thoroughness — their manner harsh and domineering. Those who gave them any friction were hauled to one side and beaten.

Li Chi’s group had dressed as a medicine delivery caravan for the Shen Medical Hall, with the Shen Medical Hall banner flying from the cart.

The inspection was so thorough that the queue moved with agonizing slowness. By the time it was Li Chi’s turn, it was already midday.

The officer on duty was a Youzhou Army captain, sitting at ease some distance back. Whenever his men passed along the bribes they had collected, he dropped them into a wooden box beside him.

The day’s earnings were nothing to be dismissed. When the city gates closed at nightfall, the contents of the box would be divided: half to the men, half to the duty officer. A lucrative post like this — who wouldn’t want it?

Several soldiers stepped forward and stopped Li Chi’s group, glancing at the banner on the cart. The squad leader frowned slightly.

“A Shen Medical Hall convoy — how come we haven’t seen you before?”

The squad leader walked up to Li Chi and, when he saw Li Chi making no move to answer, his expression shifted and his tone turned sharp.

“I am asking you! Why haven’t we seen you people before!”

Li Chi looked at him, then answered with perfect sincerity: “Because we are impostors.”

The air went still.

The Youzhou Army squad leader blinked, as if not trusting what he had just heard, and looked at Li Chi with bewildered eyes.

He asked: “What did you say?”

Li Chi gave a small sigh and said it again: “We are impostors. By which I mean: we are not from the Shen Medical Hall. We only dressed as Shen Medical Hall people to get into the city.”

The squad leader was at something of a loss. He stared at Li Chi for a good long moment, and then, with some difficulty, managed: “You… are honestly very brazen.”

Having never in his life run into anyone quite like this, the squad leader had no idea how to handle it. He pointed at Li Chi. “You — stay right there and don’t move.”

Then he jogged over to the captain, bent low, and murmured something. Whatever he said, the captain also blinked.

“Someone that brazen?”

The captain muttered, snatched up the saber resting on the table, and walked over toward Li Chi.

When he got close, he looked Li Chi up and down — figuring that someone this outrageous must either have a powerful backer, or be someone of unusual origin, so for the moment he kept himself from going too far.

He asked Li Chi: “Why are you impersonating the Shen Medical Hall? You want into Youzhou City — are you here for something underhanded?”

Li Chi replied: “Do not worry. No need to probe. I have no distinguished backing, and my identity is nothing remarkable. Feel free to question me just as you would anyone else. You may be as harsh as you like.”

Yu Jiuling wanted to cover his face. He thought: Chief, I am still not quite as shameless as you — I am merely shameless. You are shameless beyond all reckoning.

“He really is brazen.”

The captain waved a hand. “Surround them all!”

The Youzhou Army soldiers around them immediately moved in, surrounding Li Chi’s entire caravan. The city gates became completely blocked.

The captain looked at Li Chi and said: “Since you dare to be brazen, I dare to deal with brazen people. Just don’t let me find anything on you or your carts that you should not have, or else you…”

Before he could finish the sentence, Li Chi immediately said: “There is. There definitely is.”

“What?”

The captain blinked again.

Li Chi took off his pack, opened it, and began producing things one by one: first a saber, then a crossbow, then a dagger, then a grappling hook…

The captain’s eyes grew larger with each item. He watched Li Chi pulling things out like a conjurer, thinking: this man is not just brazen — he is looking for death.

The captain glared at Li Chi and shouted: “Are you trying to get yourself killed? Men — confiscate all of it!”

Li Chi said: “Hold on.”

Those two words startled the captain, who instinctively grabbed his sword hilt, expecting resistance.

Li Chi said: “Do not rush. There is still more.”

He climbed down from the cart, opened the carriage door, and hauled out a bundle of spears, then dragged out several shields…

The captain swallowed, with some difficulty.

Li Chi said: “It is not just this one cart — the carts behind are carrying some as well. If you are going to confiscate everything, I would ask that you write me a receipt.”

He looked at the captain with great earnestness. “Because I will come back to collect. If the numbers do not add up, you may have to compensate me.”

“Compensate you in your dreams!”

The captain bellowed: “Take them all! Seize the lot!”

Li Chi sighed: “Really, the receipt would have been the wiser approach. Without it, you will truly be at a loss…”