Emperor Wu, Yang Zao, looked at his old vassal Chang Mianshen. This was not his beloved general — his beloved general had died long ago, turned to ash. Nor was he a favored minister exactly — not that he didn’t wish to trust and rely on him, but the man’s natural gifts were limited; take him off the battlefield and he was largely useless, even a liability.

And yet, even so, he trusted him, and understood clearly that if the former dynasty ever rose again, if his own reign ever collapsed, this was the man certain to die alongside him to the very end.

And so, both angry and helpless, he suppressed his fury and said: “You — how dare you call yourself a father?”

They were one family — what grudge, what hatred, could have driven them to the point of nearly taking up weapons to harm one another? If some ill-intentioned enemy pursued this to the end, how much effort would it take him to shield this pack of wretches!

The hall fell silent. After a long while, Chang Mianshen struggled to prop himself upright. Everyone had assumed he would behave as he always had — begging forgiveness, playing the shameless rogue, pleading, rolling about on the ground.

But this time, he did none of that.

Chang Lianqi and Chang Lianxu tried to support him, but he pushed them away.

The whip wounds on his back tugged at old injuries; Chang Mianshen drew breath for a long while before he found enough clarity of mind to say to His Majesty: “…Your Majesty, truth be told, I long ago stopped daring to be anyone’s father. They — they are the ones who ought to be my father instead…”

At these words, even Chang Lianfang, who had been nursing his own resentment all this while, did not dare claim that mantle of blame for himself.

However much anger he still carried in his heart, in this moment he too had no choice but to follow his two elder brothers in bowing his head to beg forgiveness of his father.

Heaven, earth, sovereign, kin — father as father, son as son.

And yet Chang Mianshen only waved a hand, drew a breath, and with an oddly liberated smile said to His Majesty: “Your Majesty, this trifling mess within my own household has stirred up everyone above and below you — I daresay I deserve to be cut to pieces for it.”

Emperor Wu, at a loss, said nothing for a long while, watching Chang Mianshen. He knew this old fellow’s temperament well, and today’s manner was anything but normal — he would simply wait and see how the man would explain himself.

After all, he was a veteran official of many years’ standing; some measure of dignity had to be preserved.

Without waiting for His Majesty’s order, She Qingling had Zhang Minwang bring over a robe to drape over him, along with half a wooden support to lean on.

To be told to rise was not something he dared presume upon.

Emperor Wu, satisfied, glanced toward the screen, then turned back to look at Chang Mianshen, now restored to some semblance of dignity.

Chang Mianshen thanked His Majesty, and then offered thanks toward the screen as well. Leaning on the wooden support, he steadied himself a moment longer before speaking: “I won’t hide it from Your Majesty — the truth is, eight or nine years ago, in my own heart, I already stopped daring to call myself a father.”

Emperor Wu’s eyebrows rose. “You wretched old fool, what are you talking about? Have you gone soft in the head again? At your age?”

Chang Mianshen laughed, glancing at his three sons lying prostrate to one side, his smile carrying a long-suppressed sense of release. “Your Majesty is wise indeed. I truly have reached the age for it. You see — in the old days on the battlefield, my very guts spilling out, it still took no more than a month before I was back on horseback, charging into battle just the same. And yet now, after this little bit, these three had to shoulder half the burden for me. A person’s bones grow older, and the more they come to rely on someone, the more they realize how many things went wrong from the very start, Your Majesty…”

Emperor Wu’s expression softened somewhat. He looked at his old vassal and asked, “What went wrong from the start?”

Chang Mianshen answered readily: “In my youth, reckless and proud, the first time I became a father, I simply didn’t do it well. There I was, living my life easily enough on my own, and then I married, became a father, and one by one these brats came marching into my days. Back then I too was a muddled fool, understanding nothing of how to be a father or a mother — young as I was, who is born already knowing how to be a father? I always assumed that once they themselves grew up and became parents, they would understand… but only once they themselves became mothers and fathers did I discover — what a fine hope that had been! Everyone understands the principle well enough, but the knot itself can’t be undone. This kind of knot isn’t the sort easily resolved as it is in the old operas — the knots lodged in a family member’s heart, as I see it, cannot be undone at all.”

Chang Lianqi and Chang Lianxu, prostrate on the ground, lifted their heads slightly in astonishment to look at their father.

Chang Mianshen looked at his two eldest sons, then at his youngest, who kept his head lowered, and finally, gritting his teeth, said to Emperor Wu: “I beg Your Majesty — command those around to withdraw. There are some matters I wish… wish to report to you alone.”

Emperor Wu said nothing, but She Qingling rose and, taking his grandsons with him, withdrew.

By the time he’d brought his two grandsons outside Dongming Hall, he could already see, in the distance, his own son limping toward them, hand pressed to his backside.

Seeing his father, Chen Dasheng gave an embarrassed little smile — a grown man, still getting his backside beaten, it really was rather absurd.

An’er, catching sight of his father, brightened at once and reached out his hands. “Papa!”

She Qingling smiled, watching the reunion of father and son with evident affection, though he still said with his usual biting sarcasm, “Quite the achievement — learning to meddle in other people’s family business, you.”

Years of father-and-son bond meant Chen Dasheng could speak without much shame: “What’s there to be embarrassed about? Losing face is his father’s business, his family’s business — I’m the one who got dragged into it. Besides, even a fourth-rank official down at Nanmen has been beaten before, more than once or twice. What’s a few strikes of the board to me?”

Having said this, he took his son with one hand and held him close, glanced toward Dongming Hall, and asked Prince She quietly, “Father, has Xiaohua not come out yet?”

She Qingling sighed inwardly, raised his face to Chen Dasheng and said, “Tell them to prepare the carriage — pad it well. Once Xiaohua comes out, we’ll take him back to Qinwei Lane to recover.”

Something in his tone was off, and Chen Dasheng tilted his head to ask quietly, “Has it — has it really come to that?”

She Qingling gave a smile, though it carried a note of grudging admiration and sighed: “Ah, just as that brother of yours wished — he’s played this game on a grand scale indeed, leaving no one any way back… He wanted too much. Well, if it can’t be won, then let it go. Once tonight is done, that family — I’m afraid they can never go back to what they were.”

A wisp of dark cloud draped a veil over the bright moon; heaven and earth dimmed.

Inside the hall, Chang Mianshen’s eyes had gone distant as he recounted his own faults: “…I was an only son. My father died young, so there was no one to teach me what it meant to be a father… In my youth I was known far and wide for my sense of righteousness, generous with my wealth for the sake of loyalty, and I believed I truly was such a man. Being generous with wealth would have been one thing, but I also loved to right injustices, filling my head with thoughts of how bitter the common people’s lives were, convinced that my being born into this world must have some purpose, that surely one day I would accomplish something… And so I spent my days scheming — scheming after righteousness and loyalty! Scheming after a reputation for generosity! Scheming after doing something for this world so that my life would not have been lived in vain…”

He looked at his eldest son, watched the boy’s dazed expression, and suddenly smiled with release. “How old was I then? Sixteen! Young and carefree, spouting righteousness every single day — and then he arrived!”

He looked up at the imperial desk and sighed. “I won’t hide it from Your Majesty — the first time I became a father, I understood nothing at all. Faced with this creature that cried endlessly day after day, truthfully, I felt no real affection for him.”

Seeing his two sons’ shock, Chang Mianshen laughed indifferently. “Don’t tell me it was any different for you? The moment you see a newborn, do you rush to cherish it as though it were your own heart and liver? Hypocrites!”

Seeing them stay silent, he laughed on regardless: “Men, for the most part, are heartless and thoughtless creatures — unless born with a naturally gentle, considerate temperament, most feel little for their children at first. Whatever affection exists is something cultivated gradually — the more you tend it, the closer it grows, the better it becomes. That is what makes father and son. But that requires spending your days together, side by side, to have the chance to cultivate it…”

The bronze censer trailed its wisps of smoke as Chang Mianshen looked up at the painted ceiling of the great hall and laughed bitterly. “When did I ever have the time to raise them properly? I became a father in utter confusion, and they were born in utter confusion, and muddled on in confusion right up until now. Falling into the hands of a father like me, what good days could they ever have had? Even when they were lucky enough to get a single garment from their own mother, if I saw the child of some old friend who’d come calling with nothing to keep warm, I’d strip the clothes right off my own son’s back in front of everyone…”

Chang Lianxu’s tears streamed down at once, his teeth grinding audibly.

“Don’t even speak of never having built up any father-son bond — resentment accumulates exactly this way. Someday, once enough of these knots pile up, the father stops being a father and the son stops being a son. They carry grievance in their hearts, and when the grievance grows large enough it becomes resentment, while I went on taking for granted that I was still that carefree, unencumbered man with nothing to tie him down. I followed Your Majesty in rebellion, ruined my family’s fortune to raise troops, made their mother live in terror, let their mother be thrown into prison, made the lot of them wander homeless and displaced… Is this what father and son should be? Is this what husband and wife should be? This is more like sworn enemies! This — this is all my own karmic debt, and debts must eventually be repaid!”

Emperor Wu’s brow twitched, feeling uneasy himself, and he said, “Is not a child’s filial duty simply natural and proper? Why call it karmic debt?”

But Chang Mianshen, so often muddled, replied: “Your Majesty, this is precisely why I asked to speak with you alone. Your Majesty, look at me — outwardly it seems as though I enjoy wealth and glory, but in truth, I have long since had nothing at all.”

Emperor Wu, at a loss, gestured toward his sons. “You wretched old fool, what nonsense is this? Aren’t they all kneeling right here before you? This is nothing more than a trifling family matter — at most it makes you a bit of a muddlehead. How does that amount to having nothing at all?”

Chang Mianshen only laughed. “Your Majesty — do you remember the battle at Zhuoning Pass…”

“Father!!!”

Kneeling to one side, Chang Lianxu and Chang Lianqi suddenly cried out together, a single anguished shout of “Father!”

Chang Mianshen, one hand pressed to his forehead, bowed his head and laughed.

Emperor Wu’s brow furrowed. In his life there had been few moments of true disgrace, but the battle at Zhuoning Pass was one of them — his own poor command had cost the three armies dearly. Afterward, it was Chang Mianshen who had led his forces in a desperate last stand, buying him the time to escape the danger.

But that battle had nearly broken the Chang family army’s very foundation — no, it had broken tens of thousands of soldiers; barely a thousand survived.

Once safe, everyone had assumed the Chang father and sons would never make it back. And yet three days later, this father and his two sons had staggered out of the ravine, alive. That year, Chang Mianshen had taken thirteen blade wounds, his very guts spilling out.

It was that year that Emperor Wu had begun to show this old vassal particular favor. However muddled he was in family matters, however often he made a fool of himself in official duties, on the strength of that single act of desperate rescue at Zhuoning Pass, he had sworn to guarantee three generations of prosperity for the Chang family.

Watching his two eldest sons’ pleading eyes, and Chang Mianshen’s own gaze utterly without hope, no longer carrying his old vigor, Emperor Wu felt something twist within him, felt a pang of reluctance, and finally, with a cough, said: “Minister Chang, this is merely a household matter, and you are no longer young. It’s grown late tonight — why not take your sons home, and whatever knots remain in your hearts, talk them through properly among yourselves, in private. Why should blood kin come to this? Even if bones must be broken, you all —”

Could not settle it yourselves?

Emperor Wu was no fool; he already had some answer forming in his mind — an answer he had no wish to hear, still less to have laid bare.

But Chang Mianshen had no intention of leaving himself any way back today. He smiled and said, “Your Majesty, for the sake of all these years I have followed you without fail, unto death, I beg you — let me speak today. If I do not speak of it today, the Chang family’s internal strife will sooner or later drag in innocent lives among our own kin, and by the time that happens I fear I will already be buried in the earth, my body long rotted, powerless to set it right.”

Emperor Wu’s head tilted back sharply, his gaze turning cold. “Then — speak.”

Paying no mind to his two eldest sons’ pleading or his youngest son’s utter bewilderment, Chang Mianshen let his mind sink back into that bitterly cold winter, back to when he’d been slashed open, his very guts spilling free, his life hanging by a thread in that ruined temple, and began to tell his tale:

“…That year, deep winter, our army was trapped at Zhuoning Pass. I led my men in a rearguard action, fighting a desperate last stand. People died until they no longer looked like people — like beasts, like withered plants. Coming was not up to us, and dying was even less so!

The snow was white, the blood was red, and in the end white and red mixed together into something like hell itself. One step forward, eighteen layers of hell; one step back, eighteen layers of hell all the same! Father and sons, we fled, and fled, and people kept dying, dying until we were utterly cut off from help, cornered in a ruined temple out in the wilds. By sheer fortune, heavy snow fell that year. I thought myself certain to die, and in that haze I heard something…”

It was over.

Chang Lianqi’s eyes snapped shut, tears spilling from them.

Chang Lianxu’s expression no longer held fear, but instead a fierce glare turned on his own father, his back teeth grinding as he said, “So it’s come to this — this is what it’s come to. How dare you — how dare you call yourself a father?”

His Majesty felt a chill spreading through his very temples as he looked at Chang Mianshen. “For them to fear this so — what happened, exactly?”

Chang Mianshen, without looking at his sons, said to His Majesty with a bitter smile: “At that time I was dying. The two of them thought I knew nothing at all — but I simply had no strength left, could not speak, could not move, yet my ears still worked and my mind was clear. I lay there on the ground; the ruined temple was full of holes on every side, and I could tell exactly where every gust of cold wind came from. I — I heard my second son say through his tears to my eldest, ‘Brother! Let’s run — did this man, just because he gave us life, ever once behave like a father to us?’

My eldest wept until his heart seemed to break, and when he was done weeping, he cursed at me too, saying, if you don’t even know how to be a father, why bother having children at all? Do people raise children just to torment them?

At the time I was utterly bewildered, and yet utterly clear-headed too. I thought — could it be that I really had done wrong? Just as I was thinking this through, in the end, they abandoned me… and ran.”

Chang Lianfang’s eyes went wide with shock, as he heard his father continue on in that same flat tone: “They dragged me to a spot sheltered from the wind, and in the end, they left… How had it all gone wrong? The wind and snow blew into the ruined temple — how cold it was! I lay there thinking, thinking of them at one year old — couldn’t remember it. Thinking of them at three — nothing there either! Thinking of them at eleven or twelve — even that was hazy and indistinct. I thought, and thought, and in the end, a great deal came back to me…

I loved a fight, brought debt collectors to our door, and they were the ones shoved to the ground for it. To raise soldiers, I sold the writing brushes and inkstones their uncle had given them, sold their little bows and their little ponies. To prove to my men that military discipline applied to all without exception, I deliberately had them called half an hour late, and before the whole army, had them struck twenty blows of the rod first.

To prove my own impartiality, whenever there was bad food in the camp, my own sons had to eat it first. Whenever there was a battle no one wanted to fight, my sons were always sent to the front. Once, when I went to visit the medical tent, my own son, badly wounded, was lying by the door near the fire for warmth, and without a thought for his injuries, I picked him up and — and threw him right outside the tent… What — what kind of father am I!”

So he had known. He had known everything all along.

Chang Lianxu and Chang Lianqi exchanged strange looks, even something close to laughter, as they turned to look at their father.

Chang Mianshen reached to touch his eldest son, who flinched away; he turned to his second son, who looked back at him as one might look at an enemy.

He sighed. “What kind of father am I, really — being left to die in that ruined temple was no more than what I deserved. These things, one by one, thoroughly destroyed whatever father-son bond might have existed in the first place, clean and complete. That day — how cold it truly was! Cold enough that I, at last, grew wise, came to understand clearly… I was no father at all — I was plainly an enemy, an enemy! Your Majesty!”

Chang Mianshen, fierce and unyielding his whole life, finally let his tears fall, and choked out to Emperor Wu: “Your Majesty, at that moment I thought — so be it! I was the one at fault in all of this. I am unfit to be a father, unfit even to be a husband! Better to die there in that ruined temple, and leave behind, for my sons, for my Chang family, at least a name of loyal sacrifice! But if I died just like that, tomorrow my sons would suffer for it — what then?”

Chang Mianshen wrenched himself half-upright and crawled forward on his knees to kneel between his two eldest sons. He spread his arms wide and pulled both sons into his embrace.

Chang Lianqi and Chang Lianxu, their old wounds stirred to life, struggled with hearts in utter turmoil, but their father, back still bleeding, held his sons tight and cried out fiercely: “But — my sons! My sons!! My son, Chang Mianshen’s own son! Came back — Your Majesty, my sons came back, came back to fetch this wretch of a father, unworthy as he is?”

The two eldest sons froze utterly still in that instant.

Chang Lianfang, entirely cast aside, suddenly laughed, tears streaming down his own face all at once. He wanted to ask — and me? What am I, then?

So it turned out he had been abandoned all along!

Chang Mianshen, looking at the dumbstruck Emperor Wu, said with a laugh: “Your Majesty, you don’t know this — at the time, I was afraid that if they lived on knowing this, their later years would be unbearable, so I took a broken spear tip and held it to my own throat, wanting to leave behind a name of dying rather than yielding. I thought, at the time, that if someone found my body and believed I had taken my own life, and word reached my sons, then they could be freed from it, could go on and live good lives from then on — this, too, would be the one worthwhile thing I, unworthy as a father, could still do for them…”

Emperor Wu, looking at Chang Lianfang left alone where he was, in the end could not help himself. He rose, walked over, sat cross-legged on the ground, and reaching out one arm, drew Chang Lianfang in, pulling the boy’s dazed head against his chest.

For more than twenty years now, everyone had called him an adopted son, and yet he had never once held him this way, never once shielded him…

His adopted sons had died off one after another — had they never wanted a father?

He had never asked. But tonight, it seemed, he wanted one.

He looked at Chang Mianshen with something like defiance.

Chang Mianshen only smiled, and said, quite unconcerned: “…Wind and snow filled the sky, enemies pursued from behind, and yet they came back — truly came back! Came back to carry this unworthy father of theirs, struggling through hundreds of li in the freezing cold, they thought I didn’t know! My sons, my sons!

Along that whole road, my two useless sons carried their wretched father on their backs, crying as they fled, cursing as they went! There was no water, so they warmed melted snow against their own bodies to feed me; there was nothing to eat…”

Chang Mianshen bared his teeth and let out a silent, skyward cry of anguish, then bowed his head to kiss Chang Lianxu’s hair and said with a laugh: “There was nothing to eat, so this — this foolish son of mine cut his own wrist and fed me his warm blood, drop by drop. Even after all that! I never — never once did a single thing, not even half a thing, that a father ought to do, and yet my son still refused to abandon this father of his, using his own flesh and blood to save this wretch, this man unfit to be a father… What am I to you, in your hearts?”

Chang Mianshen, face streaked with tears, looked at his third son, who had stopped crying and simply stared back at him in silence, and said with a smile: “I have already wronged them, wronged them so deeply! Next life, you be the father, and let me be your son — would that be all right?”

Chang Lianfang closed his eyes silently and turned to bury his face in His Majesty’s chest.

His Majesty drew a breath and waved a hand at Chang Mianshen, meaning for him to leave Chang Lianfang be.

Chang Mianshen took one last look at his youngest son, then held the ones in his arms even tighter and said: “Your Majesty, my son carried me on his back that whole way, fighting for our lives… but as Your Majesty knows, the battle at Zhuoning Pass broke the very foundation of our old family holdings in Shao Shang. Though along that entire road I feigned unconsciousness, in my heart I swore a thousand vows — that I would be good to my son, that I would cherish my son! That I would give my son everything I could… and yet, so that we might rise again, Your Majesty, to turn things around… I sold my son off again? Sold him, Your Majesty!”

How could His Majesty forget — if not for Chang Mianshen using his two eldest legitimate sons’ marriages that year to secure grain and warhorses in exchange, the Great Liang army would never have recovered its breath. It was Minister Chang, using his two legitimate sons’ marriages, who had secured a portion of the resources that let the Great Liang army fight on once more.

Ah, in this human world — in the end, who truly owed whom?

As though soothing children to sleep, the two old fathers each held tight to whatever they could still grasp, swaying without meaning to, murmuring on and on.

“Your Majesty, tell me — in some past life, what did these children of mine owe me?”

His Majesty licked his dry lips and looked at the two now-stunned wretches of the Chang family. “You’ve exposed all this today — are you not afraid of cutting off their future prospects?”

Chang Mianshen laughed softly. “That is precisely the point — to cut off their delusions, so that they might finally accept their place. You know how it is — these two treasures of mine, greedy, stingy, petty, never raised properly as children, calculating and small-minded to boot — how could they ever be a match for the one in your arms? Look at them — this is only the first time they’ve come to blows, and already it’s come to this!

If I don’t strip away this layer of skin here before you today, once I’m gone… the disaster awaiting them will be great indeed. Who else could shield them then, against that little troublemaker in your arms who’s always setting traps to take lives?”

His Majesty could only sigh helplessly. “There’s no need for that.”

Chang Mianshen’s heart ached fit to break, and yet he bared his teeth, drawing cool air through them with a laugh, and said: “Ah, ah, ah, there’s no need indeed. Just protecting these two of mine has already nearly killed me, Your Majesty. Being a father… is no easy thing either. Heh heh heh heh!”

His Majesty sighed. “And the next generation — will you not concern yourself with them either?”

Chang Mianshen, in the end, could not help but wipe away his tears and sigh. “Ah well, the dead are dead. Back on the battlefield, when men fell in droves like scattered duckweed, could any of them, in their final moments, spare a thought for their grandsons, their great-grandsons? For their sons’ sons down the line, and what might become of them? Better to look out for oneself first, don’t you think?”

Emperor Wu closed his eyes halfway, feeling only cold and solemn within, and no small measure of helplessness.

He thought, too, of his own children — those who, through the upheavals of war, had never lived to grow up.

What manner of misfortune was it, to be saddled with a father like himself, so consumed by great ambition?

Ah. What a joyless thing.

He waved a hand at Chang Mianshen. “Enough. Go.”

Chang Mianshen reached out to press down both his sons in a gesture of pleading forgiveness: “I am guilty! I beg Your Majesty’s mercy — whatever wrong was done, it is entirely mine, I deserve ten thousand deaths! I, as their father, failed to raise them properly, but my sons are innocent!”

“Go — go on! Get out!!!”

And so father and sons departed. His Majesty held Chang Lianfang and patted him for a long while, until at last someone outside came, trembling, to ask on Prince She’s behalf when the carriage — now prepared — should be sent to take Chang Lianfang out.

His Majesty looked down, only to find Chang Lianfang had fallen asleep.

The little wretch was not only asleep, but drooling, snoring softly.

His Majesty gave a helpless laugh, meaning to pat him a few more times, when he suddenly noticed his own palm was covered in blood. A wave of sorrow rose in him from nowhere, and not knowing quite whom to curse, he muttered:

“…Beasts!”