Dragon’s Head Pass.

Zhuang Wudi looked at the man standing before him — and he had to admit, he was a little surprised.

Because he hadn’t expected this man to come walking directly into the Ning Army’s presence, and with such an air of perfect ease at that.

“My name is Cao Lie. Young Master of the Shanhe Seal. Your Prince Ning’s adversary.”

Even his introduction was blunt and direct.

Zhuang Wudi nodded. “I’ve heard of you.”

Cao Lie managed to smile and ask: “And how do I come across, in what you’ve heard?”

Zhuang Wudi said: “Steady inwardly, careful in disposition, clear-eyed in the long view, decisive in action — and naturally, ruthless when the moment demands it.”

Cao Lie nodded. “Not bad. More or less accurate.”

Zhuang Wudi said: “Why have you come?”

Cao Lie said: “The New Year is almost here. I came to bring your Prince Ning a gift. Do people not visit family for the New Year around here?”

Zhuang Wudi said: “We certainly have that tradition — but I don’t think we’re family.”

Cao Lie said: “Not with you.”

Zhuang Wudi thought: this man is really quite bad at conversation. Cao Lie thought the same thing about himself.

Cao Lie glanced back, and his men immediately passed the chest to Zhuang Wudi. Zhuang Wudi didn’t take it right away. He asked: “What is this?”

Cao Lie said, in all seriousness: “Your Prince Ning’s heart.”

Zhuang Wudi’s expression shifted, something sharp moving through his eyes.

This was clearly a provocation.

But Cao Lie maintained his unbothered air and continued: “Your Prince Ning’s heart has always been mired in the love of money and can’t find its way out. I’ve brought him his money-pit, so naturally this is his heart.”

Zhuang Wudi looked at the chest, momentarily at a loss for words.

Cao Lie said: “Inside that chest are the ledgers and records for the vast majority of the Shanhe Seal’s shadow banking operations, gambling houses, and various enterprises throughout the northern frontier. If I know your Prince Ning at all, his mouth will be splitting into a grin from ear to ear the moment he sees these.”

Zhuang Wudi wanted very much to say *how impudent* — but the words wouldn’t come out. Because he was a man who had standards. And the man wasn’t wrong, which meant he couldn’t be criticized.

What could you say? That he’s being too brazen — but our Prince Ning, while perhaps not being quite this brazen… well, even so, you can’t say it out loud.

“You are very fortunate.”

Cao Lie said to Zhuang Wudi. “You followed the right person.”

Zhuang Wudi said: “I knew that before you did.”

Cao Lie gave a quiet sound of acknowledgment. He didn’t know that Zhuang Wudi was essentially someone who didn’t talk much with people he didn’t know — and if he had known, he might have been a little more pleased, because Zhuang Wudi had already given him more than his fair share of courtesy.

“Your Prince Ning doesn’t need to look for me anymore. I won’t be looking for him either.”

Cao Lie turned to leave, raising one hand in a casual wave as he walked away.

“When he gets here, tell him: from here on, his days will be missing one very tiresome adversary, and that must be rather dull. His adversary… feels the same way.”

By the time he finished speaking, he was already gone.

A moment later, Zhuang Wudi realized he probably should have detained this man.

But then — after another moment’s thought — he decided that Li Diudiu probably wouldn’t feel he’d done wrong by letting him go.

In the carriage leaving through the pass, Chang Juding, handling the reins, smiled and asked: “Young Master — where are we headed?”

Inside the carriage, Cao Lie, resting with eyes closed, thought carefully before answering: “South. Back to Jiangnan.”

Chang Juding asked a follow-up: “Are we really going to spend the rest of our days like that… rich, leisured, doing nothing but spending money, completely useless to the world?”

Cao Lie said: “When you said ‘useless to the world,’ did you nearly break trying not to laugh?”

Chang Juding did laugh — genuinely, out loud.

Then he sighed: “Those days sound so dull. I’m not ready for them.”

Cao Lie said: “Then you don’t have to come.”

Chang Juding said: “No, no — days that difficult, I absolutely have to be by Young Master’s side to weather them.”

Cao Lie said: “Wipe that drool off your chin.”

Chang Juding burst out laughing, snapped the reins, and the horses seemed lighter somehow — their gait quickened, and the bells hanging from their necks rang out with a sound as bright and clean as you could ever want.

Several days later, still within the pass.

Cao Lie stood beside the road, relieving himself, looking like a man meditating on the great questions of existence — even that, he managed to make seem somehow extraordinary.

Chang Juding said: “Young Master, word just came that the Qingzhou bandits are nearly here. It sounds like Dragon’s Head Pass is in for another fight, and the New Year almost upon them — soldiers really do suffer.”

Cao Lie gave a quiet sound of acknowledgment.

Then he shook himself off.

He straightened his clothes, stretched, and said: “Nothing to worry about, really. The Qingzhou bandits showing up at Dragon’s Head Pass, with tens of thousands of Baishan Army soldiers there, the Ning Army there, and all those civilians there — the Qingzhou bandits won’t dare attack lightly. Besides — haven’t you noticed?”

Chang Juding didn’t follow: “Notice what?”

Cao Lie said: “We’ve been traveling through the pass for days, and it’s been this calm. That alone tells you the Black Martial forces never made it through. Li Chi won.”

Chang Juding went still — then quietly, involuntarily let out a long breath.

Whoever Li Chi was — the fact that he had turned back a Black Martial invasion army was cause for celebration. That was a man worthy of respect.

“The days ahead will be good ones.”

Cao Lie smiled suddenly. “I’ve never met anyone more formidable than him — and that, right there, is the most satisfying thing of all. If we’re lucky enough to live long enough, maybe one day we’ll see a Central Plains army riding out to give the Black Martial people a taste of their own medicine.”

Chang Juding found himself thinking back to when they had first come to Yanzhou — the Young Master’s intention had been to seize Yanzhou and use it to contest the realm with Li Chi. If he couldn’t contest it outright, at the very least he could make every step Li Chi took feel like walking through mud.

That had been the plan. And now, in however short a time it had been, the Young Master’s thinking had shifted completely.

But he didn’t dare ask. Anyone who asked was a fool.

“Let’s go. Li Chi will be rushing to Dragon’s Head Pass — he certainly won’t have time to swing back through Jizhou.”

Cao Lie smiled. “I’ve suddenly got a craving for the brazier-baked flatbreads from Jizhou City. That family that made them — they weren’t actually based in Jizhou, but I remember them being really quite good. Let’s go to Jizhou City first, eat and drink and indulge ourselves for a few days, then head south. And before we leave, I need to relieve myself on the wall of the Prince’s residence.”

Chang Juding said: “We’ll all go together.”

“You won’t do.”

Cao Lie shook his head. “Only I can do it. Because he owes me that.”

Then he climbed back into the carriage and said in a cheerful tone: “Let’s go — we’re going to Jizhou City to eat, drink, and have a fine time. Does anyone here know any songs? Give us a few lines.”

The driver Chang Juding thought hard for quite a while and couldn’t come up with a single thing he actually knew.

At that moment, a guard riding alongside the carriage suddenly opened his throat and began to sing at full volume, the sound enormous.

*”Hey little sister, she spotted her sweetheart oh, and her heart just bloomed wide open oh, your arm around my little waist, my hand in the crook of your elbow…”*

Inside the carriage: Cao Lie. “…”

They departed.

One day later, Li Chi’s contingent came thundering down the same road in a rush.

The two of them had been in the same place, separated by only a single day — neither one knowing how close they had come. Li Chi was racing to reach Dragon’s Head Pass, and Cao Lie was drifting leisurely toward Jizhou — and this might well have been the closest the two of them had been, in the physical sense, for quite a long time to come.

Two more months passed. Jizhou City.

Cao Lie’s carriage arrived outside the city gates. Perhaps because of how stuffy it had been inside the carriage, or simply because of the wait while the guards checked travelers through, he stepped down to stretch his legs.

In front of their carriage, another carriage was queued ahead of them, waiting for inspection. A young scholar inside, apparently likewise suffering from the stuffiness, had also stepped out to stretch.

When the handsome young scholar turned back and happened to catch sight of Cao Lie, he took one look at the man’s bearing and face and privately concluded: this fellow is probably quite wealthy.

And when Cao Lie looked at the young scholar, he privately concluded: this fellow is probably thinking about how to swindle my money.

So the two of them locked eyes for a moment — and both smiled.

The young, graceful gentleman cupped his hands in greeting. Cao Lie returned the gesture cheerfully.

And so both of them, as if by mutual unspoken agreement, drifted naturally over to each other and began to chat.

Cao Lie asked: “If I may — what is your distinguished name, sir?”

The young gentleman answered: “My surname is Li, given name Shangong. And you, sir?”

Cao Lie said: “My surname is Cao, and I go by Cao Fangzhou — *fang* as in to set free to all four seas, *zhou* as in a boat rowing against the current.”

He asked: “Is Li Gongzi making a special trip to Jizhou City? Your accent doesn’t sound like a local.”

Li Shangong said: “Just here out of curiosity. I’ve heard that Jizhou these days is a place where doors are left unlocked at night and no one picks up things dropped in the street — I find it hard to believe, so I wanted to see it with my own eyes.”

Cao Lie said: “Likewise. You seem like a good-natured person, Li Gongzi — we seem well-suited to be friends. How would you feel about exploring the city together?”

Li Shangong immediately said: “Precisely my own thought!”

A short while later, Cao Lie climbed back into his carriage; Li Shangong climbed back into his. His young attendant asked: “It looked like sir was getting on very well with that stranger?”

This Li Shangong, of course, was none other than the Jingya Scholar who had devised the stratagem that broke the siege of Jizhou on Xu Ji’s behalf.

“Of course I was getting on well,” Jingya Scholar said. “That man looks wealthy and generous with his hospitality — our meals, lodging, and entertainment in Jizhou City for the next few days are sorted.”

The young attendant smiled. “That’s wonderful.”

On Cao Lie’s side.

Chang Juding asked: “Young Master, who was that? You seemed very naturally in tune with him.”

Cao Lie smiled: “He wants to swindle me into paying for his food and entertainment. I want to use him to keep my identity hidden. Of course we were in tune — mutual swindling just means going along with whatever the other person says.”

Chang Juding laughed. “At least he only wants to trick us out of our silver.”

Cao Lie smiled: “It’s a willing transaction on my end, so it can’t be called swindling — it’s a gift.”

Then Cao Lie caught himself: “Why did you say ‘at least he only wants to trick us out of our silver’?”

Chang Juding said: “I just… meant that?”

And so these two individuals, each with their own small calculations, found themselves together — and over the next several days they wandered through every notable attraction Jizhou City had to offer.

All of these attractions offered more or less the same variety of sights, and yet the two men and their respective companions seemed to find inexhaustible enjoyment in each one.

In one of the scenic-spot dining rooms, Li Shangong smiled and said: “You and I have such natural rapport — if you’re free, why not come with me to find someone? We can take our time on the road, enjoy the scenery. And if we do find him, I promise you won’t be disappointed.”

Cao Lie asked: “Who are you looking for?”

Li Shangong smiled: “A god.”

Cao Lie asked: “A god? Are there actually gods in this world?”

Li Shangong said: “Oh, there are. If this world has only one god, it would have to be him. When you meet him, you’ll understand — whatever you think you know, in front of him, it amounts to nothing.”

Cao Lie found, to his own surprise, that he was genuinely intrigued.

“Where is this person you’re looking for?”

Cao Lie asked.

Li Shangong’s young attendant interjected: “We don’t know yet. We’ll just ask around — whoever raises the best pigs, wherever the pigs are fattest, that’s him.”

Cao Lie: “?????”

Cao Lie was reclining with his head in a young woman’s lap. She heard these words and immediately said: “Oh, I know! Everyone in Jizhou knows — the best pig farmer is definitely General Yu Jiuling!”