At the Rouge and Powder Cosmetics Shop, Wang Daxia was enthusiastically recommending rouge and face powder to a female customer. The customer was of noble birth and was currently preparing her dowry. Her skin was as white as milk, with a pair of large eyes that sparkled with autumn waves – truly a great beauty.

Wang Daxia praised her: “Miss, you have naturally beautiful skin. You don’t need rouge and powder to be beautiful. If everyone looked like you, my cosmetics shop would go out of business.”

The female customer was somewhat shy, her cheeks slightly red. “I want the lip rouge you have, and also the almond honey powder that Zhong Jin Khatun uses, the kind with mica flakes that looks sparkling and shimmering.”

Wang Daxia took out a pile of cosmetic powders from behind the counter. “Zhong Jin Khatun uses products from my shop. Honey powder, lip rouge, rouge, and perfume bottles – I have them all. There’s also the essential oil that An Da Khan uses to maintain his beard, also from our shop. Right now the store is giving back to customers – spend fifty taels of silver and get free essential oil and a beard comb.”

The female customer didn’t even ask about the price and said: “I want them all, wrap them up for me.”

What wealth indeed. As Wang Daxia was wrapping the rouge for the female customer, a commotion arose on the street outside. The female customer looked toward the street, then suddenly ran outside, calling loudly: “Bahan Naji!”

Bahan Naji was riding his horse, escorting Cult Leader Zhao Quan, followed by countless empty wagons, about to leave the city for Bancheng to transport (rob) grain. Hearing someone call him with a somewhat familiar voice, he turned to look and saw it was actually his fiancée, Hasi Tuya.

The wealthy female customer was called Hasi Tuya, meaning “beautiful jade” – one of the most common Mongol names, similar to “Suzhen” or “Cui’e” in the Central Plains. The female customer lived up to her name, being a famous beauty among Mongol nobility. She was about to become the second wife of An Da Khan’s most beloved grandson, Bahan Naji.

The grasslands practiced polygamy, where two wives had equal status, both called Biji. Bahan Naji had married at twelve to his first wife, Da Cheng Biji. Now at eighteen, still without children, An Da Khan selected the daughter of Mongol noble Tuche Jin, the beauty Hasi Tuya, to be his beloved grandson’s second wife to continue the lineage.

After the betrothal, Hasi Tuya entered the palace to meet Third Madam. Seeing Third Madam’s beauty and having a love for beauty that all people share, Hasi Tuya inquired about the Rouge and Powder Cosmetics Shop and came to purchase her dowry.

Bahan Naji was of noble birth, tall, handsome and young. Hasi Tuya was very satisfied with her fiancé. Grassland women were not so shy – seeing her beloved, she ran out to greet him.

Bahan Naji also very much liked this beautiful fiancée. Young people always like to show off their power and charm in front of their lovers, so he actually dismounted in the midst of his busy schedule to talk with his fiancée.

Bahan Naji said: “I’m going to Bancheng to transport grain for A’duo Si. Once they receive the grain, they’ll withdraw their troops, and we can hold our wedding ceremony as scheduled.”

Seeing such a beautiful fiancée, Bahan Naji wished he could have their wedding night tonight.

The two began sweet-talking on the street. Wang Daxia had wrapped up a pile of items, but Hasi Tuya hadn’t paid yet. Afraid the customer would change her mind, he hurriedly brought the large and small packages to the street: “Miss, that’s fifty-seven taels of silver in total, thank you.”

Although it was dowry, since he had encountered this situation, how could he let his fiancée pay? Bahan Naji waved his hand grandly and paid for his fiancée: “Put the items on the wagon, I’ll have them escort you back.”

Hasi Tuya, caught up in love, only wanted to spend more time with her fiancé and said: “You’re going to Bansheng to transport grain, I want to go with you.”

Bahan Naji was only eighteen after all. With his fiancée’s request, and since this wasn’t a military campaign with no danger, his head heated up and he agreed, leading over a gentle old mare as a mount for his fiancée.

Ding Wu took An Da Khan’s reply and left the city again to find A’duo Si to negotiate troop withdrawal: “…Twenty thousand shi of grain will be transported from Bansheng immediately. Once you receive the grain, you must withdraw immediately and may no longer disturb Fengcheng.”

“So quickly?” A’duo Si had burned his bridges this time. Unable to survive anyway, he had already prepared for war. He hadn’t expected the usually strong An Da Khan to make concessions, agreeing to A’duo Si’s demands with almost no bargaining.

Ding Wu said: “You should thank Zhong Jin Khatun. If it weren’t for her about to give birth, and with people in the khan’s court eyeing her covetously, An Da Khan would worry about what might happen to his delicate young wife if he went to war. So he killed the White Lotus Sect pig he’d been raising for many years to resolve the crisis. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have succeeded so easily this time.”

A’duo Si laughed wildly at the sky: “Heaven protects my Alduosi tribe! Our tribe is saved!”

Ding Wu thought to himself: Thanks to you raising troops to demand grain, otherwise the White Lotus Sect wouldn’t have fallen so quickly. It seems even heaven couldn’t stand Zhao Quan fooling the believers, treating them as less than human, forcing the cult leader to show his true colors.

Let’s see how you continue your divine pretense now.

At Bansheng.

Bahan Naji led his men to sweep through all the granaries, ignoring the believers’ pleas, not even sparing the seed grain, loading everything onto wagons.

The believers went to beg Cult Leader Zhao Quan to have Bahan Naji show mercy and give the believers a way to live, even if they only had one bowl of thin gruel each day!

But Zhao Quan, usually so eloquent, had an ashen face and remained silent. No matter how the believers knelt and begged, Zhao Quan remained expressionless, like a clay Buddha statue, unmoved.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to keep grain, but that he lacked the ability to keep it. If he resisted, the hot-headed young Bahan Naji might publicly chop off his head!

Zhao Quan was now in a state of rigor mortis, letting others manipulate him.

Seeing the granaries emptied, cattle and horses led away, and the cult leader saying nothing, the believers’ faith of many years collapsed in an instant.

Anger, disappointment, sadness – with passionate blood, they had followed the cult leader in betraying their homeland, coming to a foreign land to clear wasteland and farm, living new lives. They firmly believed their faith made them pure, cleansing their sins, allowing them to go to paradise after death.

Even when half the believers were lured away last winter by promises of “returning to the homeland, clearing wasteland, eating and drinking without worry with surplus grain, five years tax-free,” they persisted in staying at Bansheng, holding to their faith. They believed joining the sect would help them avoid calamity, and famine was also a type of disaster – they wouldn’t give up until the very end.

Cult Leader Zhao Quan indeed lived up to expectations, spending his entire fortune with a martyr’s determination to protect believers from suffering, helping them avoid the calamity of starvation.

But they never expected that after just three months, Cult Leader Zhao Quan would personally bring Bahan Naji to Bansheng and completely empty the believers’ remaining grain.

This time, Bahan Naji wouldn’t give anyone face, completely emptying even the granary of Li Zixin, the White Lotus Sect’s second-in-command.

Li Zixin naturally refused: “You can’t do this! I’ve guided you before. Half the wealth of the khan’s court came from me serving as your cavalry’s guide when you raided Daming! You can’t burn bridges!”

After speaking, Li Zixin went to the wagon to unload grain. Bahan Naji, embarrassed in front of his fiancée, became furious, grabbed Li Zixin bare-handed from the wagon, and threw him into the recently thawed farmland.

Li Zixin fell flat on his back and couldn’t get up for a long time, watching helplessly as the grain was requisitioned (stolen).

There was still a month until spring plowing and half a year until autumn harvest, while they could survive at most ten days without eating before starving to death.

Hunger defeated the White Lotus Sect. What the Embroidered Uniform Guard couldn’t accomplish, hunger did.

Seeing Cult Leader Zhao Quan’s coldness and Deputy Leader Li Zixin’s wretchedness, like homeless dogs, where was their usual divine presence from the altar?

The believers cried and begged until their tears ran dry, completely losing faith in the White Lotus Sect. They packed their valuable belongings, took their families, and headed for their homeland. Along the way, they even sang ballads composed by the Embroidered Uniform Guard:

“White Lotus Sect, lost conscience, work all year but starve, all grain goes to the Great Khan. Return to homeland, clear wasteland, eat and drink without worry with surplus grain, five years tax-free.”

Return to the homeland! The homeland welcomed the wayward children like an old mother, with hot meals, clothes to wear, and warm kangs to sleep on – fallen leaves returning to their roots.

One by one, believers passed by Cult Leader Zhao Quan, some even bumping into him, no longer showing their former respect – at the height of Zhao Quan’s prestige, believers would even kiss the dirt beneath his feet.

Zhao Quan stood in the road like a statue. Bahan Naji, having obtained the grain, couldn’t wait to find A’duo Si to deliver it, leaving him abandoned at Bansheng like oil dregs squeezed dry of their essence.

Li Zixin, thrown into the farmland, struggled to stand up, broke off a tree branch, and limped over to Zhao Quan’s side. After mumbling for a moment without saying anything, he returned home and had his family bring out gold and silver to go to Fengcheng to exchange for grain.

The White Lotus Sect had completely collapsed, existing only in name. Gold and silver were the eternal gods.

Cult Leader Zhao Quan painfully reflected on the gains and losses of these twenty-plus years. The White Lotus Sect he founded had risen and prospered by relying on An Da Khan, but was also destroyed by over-dependence on him. Truly a case of success and failure both due to the same cause.

An Da Khan and the White Lotus Sect were like a crocodile and an oxpecker bird – the crocodile ate big meat while the oxpecker cleaned meat from the crocodile’s teeth, mutually dependent. Who knew that when the crocodile got extremely hungry, it would simply eat the oxpecker too. Even mosquito legs were meat, and oxpecker meat was even more so.

Ordinary believers could return to their homeland and start anew. But Zhao Quan and Li Zixin, wanted criminals with heavy bounties from Daming, couldn’t return even if they wanted to.

Would he really suffer complete defeat? Zhao Quan fell into despair.

On the other side, A’duo Si, besieging the city, saw large numbers of refugees and didn’t understand what was happening. He quickly led his troops into formation, ready for battle.

Ding Wu hurried to stop him: “These are all White Lotus Sect people. The iron tools in their hands are farming implements, not weapons. All their grain was taken by Bahan Naji, and they’re returning to their homeland to find a way to survive. It’s not easy for anyone – don’t block their way, let everyone get by.”

They were also people trying to fill their bellies. A’duo Si ordered his men to make way, allowing the White Lotus Sect refugees to pass through.

Bahan Naji arrived with the grain, accompanied by a radiant beauty in red – his fiancée Hasi Tuya, wearing Wang Daxia’s flame-red lipstick on her lips. Her face was powdered with the same almond honey powder as Third Madam, mixed with ground mica flakes, making her entire person sparkle and impossible to look away from.

The saying goes: when fed and warm, one thinks of lust. Having grain and no longer needing to starve, A’duo Si immediately had higher pursuits – women. He fell in love at first sight with the red-clothed beauty beside Bahan Naji, wanting to take her back as his ninth wife to bear him children.

A’duo Si wrote a letter for An Da Khan and had Bahan Naji deliver it, saying: “Please be sure to give this to An Da Khan. The Ordos tribe will forever remember that the Great Khan gave us life-saving grain, and will forever remain loyal to An Da Khan.”

Bahan Naji, being young after all, didn’t understand middle-aged men’s greed and schemes, foolishly serving as messenger.

The other tribes took their allocated grain and immediately withdrew to their own territories, but only the Ordos tribe remained encamped outside the city.

At the khan’s court, An Da Khan opened A’duo Si’s letter. Besides thanking him and swearing continued loyalty, it also proposed marrying Tuche Jin’s daughter Hasi Tuya, rehashing old grievances about how Zhong Jin Khatun had originally been his fiancée and they were about to marry when she married An Da Khan instead.

The Great Khan owes me a wife. You need only exchange wives with me, marry Hasi Tuya to me, and I’ll never mention this again. Others won’t gossip behind your back about the Great Khan taking another’s wife either.

No wonder the Ordos tribe hadn’t withdrawn yet! They were waiting to take Hasi Tuya home.