What the common people most loved to see was also what officials must do. In later generations, people had watched all kinds of shows until they wanted to vomit, but arriving in the Great Tang, how could such a good thing not be used?
Thus the common people working around the new city witnessed a scene they had never seen before. His Highness Li Chengqian, Crown Prince of the Great Tang, with his trouser legs rolled up, legs covered in mud spots, wearing hempen clothes and a Fanyang bamboo hat, accompanied by Marquis Yun whose entire body was immaculate with his purple-gold crown gleaming brilliantly, inspected the construction site everywhere.
The court had already allocated no less than four hundred thousand silver coins for the development of the new city, yet supposedly the city walls hadn’t even taken shape. Yun Ye’s memorials always said construction was ongoing, but there was never any major movement. Fang Xuanling could no longer sit still and prepared to personally go to the Two Lakes region to see what was really happening, but was stopped by the Emperor. Thus His Highness the Crown Prince of the Great Tang led his retinue in a grand procession into Yuezhou City.
His Highness the Crown Prince would ask the laborers whether they could eat their fill, then ask whether their lodgings leaked rain. He personally walked to the kitchen, scooped a small bowl of broomcorn millet rice, poured meat broth over it, and ate while chatting with several elderly people.
This eliminated all distance. His Highness the Crown Prince, sporting a small tuft of beard, sat on a small stool. With each bite of broomcorn millet rice, he would ask the common people about their hopes for the future. When they reached happy topics, the group would burst into hearty laughter, very pleasant indeed.
After eating, he went to where the laborers lived. Seeing the houses that leaked wind from all four sides, he sternly and sharply commanded the immaculately dressed Marquis Yun that he must quickly resolve the common people’s lodging problems. The weather would soon turn hot, and once mosquitoes bred and caused plague, it would be a great disaster. This matter must be addressed first. Even if the city’s construction schedule had to be delayed, human lives must be placed first.
The resplendent Marquis answered in great embarrassment, then turned and ordered his subordinate officials to immediately make preparations. Meanwhile, His Highness the Crown Prince was already holding a filthy little girl, wiping her nose. After cleaning her little face, he gave the little girl two milk candies. The little girl didn’t know how to eat them, so His Highness the Crown Prince peeled off the wrapper for her and put it in her small mouth.
The little girl’s eyes lit up immediately. She struggled down from the Crown Prince’s embrace, took the other candy, unwrapped it and stuffed it into the mouth of a toothless old woman, then reluctantly spit out the candy in her own mouth and fed it to an even dirtier little boy beside her, drooling as she watched her younger brother eat the candy.
This scene moved His Highness the Crown Prince of the Great Tang to tears. The attendants beside him also sobbed uncontrollably. Some common people leaning on their tools had already wailed aloud. Han Cheng and Qian Sheng even threw themselves to the ground crying loudly, claiming they would serve the Great Tang for five hundred years.
Good children would receive rewards. His Highness the Crown Prince distributed the milk candies he had brought one by one to the laborers’ children. Seeing that His Highness the Crown Prince had distributed all his candy, one child made a great decision, bit off half a piece of candy and handed it to Li Chengqian. Looking at those dirty little hands, with the candy still wet with the child’s saliva, Yun Ye watched Li Chengqian mockingly. This fellow never ate leftovers, much less a candy covered in saliva.
How strange! Li Chengqian didn’t hesitate for half a moment. Opening his mouth, he put that half piece of candy in and ate it with relish. He even reached out and ruffled the child’s bird’s nest-like hair twice. Feeling around and finding he hadn’t brought any gifts, he noticed the jade pendant on Yun Ye’s belt was nice, casually pulled it off and placed it in the child’s hand, smiling as he said to use it as a betrothal gift when he married a wife in the future.
“The Great Tang is now in a period of revival. As long as one is a subject of the Great Tang, one must consciously shoulder one’s responsibilities. Now that warfare across the realm has been settled and foreign enemies have all been driven to bitter, cold lands by Great Tang warriors, good days must be created by our own hands—they cannot be begged for or waited for. The court is establishing this new city here precisely to let this great city that connects north and south, links east and west, bring everyone more wealth. Think about it—once this great city is completed, the products of the Two Lakes can flow out in an endless stream. Countless large ships will anchor here. When there are more people, the land prospers, and everyone’s livelihood becomes easier. This is the court’s purpose in spending enormous sums to build a city here. If we suffer hardship for a few years and strive to build this city even more magnificent and prosperous.”
Li Chengqian’s plain and simple speech won everyone’s devotion. Regardless of official or commoner, they all knelt on one knee together and loudly proclaimed “Yes!” A Crown Prince in hempen clothes and cloth robes was far more beloved than the resplendently dressed Marquis.
After His Highness the Crown Prince finished speaking, he was the first to pick up a shovel and walk toward the construction site. Behind him followed a dense black mass of people—men, women, old and young all came. Seeing His Highness the Crown Prince begin digging earth, everyone rushed to their own posts—digging earth, carrying stones, chiseling rock, busy without a moment’s rest.
Having dug earth under the blazing sun all afternoon, His Highness the Crown Prince’s two hands were already covered with glistening blisters. Looking at his own hands, he said to Yun Ye who was leaning against a tree drinking fermented rice wine, “Ye, look at these hands of mine. After just two years without practicing martial arts, they’ve become so delicate. After digging earth for a while, they’ve become like this.”
“I’ve just discovered you were born suited to be Emperor. That half piece of candy—how did you manage to eat it? I remember you never eat other people’s saliva, but this time you ate it clean and neat.”
The blisters on his hands weren’t important. They would dry up in two or three days. But Li Chengqian’s behavior truly startled Yun Ye.
“My father said that seizing things from the common people’s hands is what fatuous rulers do. Getting the common people to consciously pay taxes and grain—that requires a good emperor to accomplish. As for getting the common people to willingly give their own things as gifts to you—such an emperor’s realm would be as solid as iron. I want to be the best emperor, but the days ahead are still long. Let me start with this half piece of candy. Besides, that half piece of candy, in my view, was sentiment and righteousness. This thing called sentiment and righteousness isn’t easy to price. Once I have it, I quickly accept it. Who has time to worry about whether that child’s hands were filthy?”
Yun Ye nodded. Being able to wholeheartedly perform required extremely high cultivation. It seemed Li Chengqian had been trained quite well by his father, though it wasn’t perfect.
“Chengqian, if you slept on the construction site with those laborers tonight, that would be doing it to the extreme.”
“Come off it. The construction site has heavy moisture. Sleep there one night and the next day you’d be like you’d taken a bath. Do you think I’m stupid? Hurry up, I can already smell the hot pot’s fragrance. Eat some chili peppers to drive away the cold air.”
Little Lingdang had already arranged the dining table. After serving Li Chengqian as he washed his hands, only then did she withdraw. Li Chengqian unceremoniously lifted the hot pot lid, took a long breath and said, “You have a beauty to accompany you—wherever you go, you have a blessed fate. Since you left, I haven’t felt comfortable going to your house to freeload meals. Qing Que also says the food at home doesn’t taste good. Speaking of which, why did you leave in such a hurry back then?”
Yun Ye slowly mixed his oil bowl and said helplessly, “No matter who has a great eagle constantly circling over their head, they can’t stay at home. In the eagle’s eyes, we’re just chickens playing a game of eagle catching chickens with it. I’m the mother hen at home protecting the little chicks. If we keep playing, the eagle will always snatch away one or two chicks. I don’t want my family to lose any little chicks, so this mother hen bravely ran out and led the eagle far away, lest the little chicks be snatched.”
“Yes, everyone has concerns. Generally, great men have three principles of conduct: first is righteously facing disaster, second is transmitting law to the sage, third is transforming the people. You don’t belong to any of these three. For you, it’s family first, old friends second, conscience third. Being a person like you—a watchdog—is truly rare.”
“Nonsense! As for righteously facing disaster, forget it. I’m not yet so great as to willingly sacrifice for justice. But as for the second principle of transmitting law to the sage, I’ve achieved that. I transmitted the great laws of governance to you, this future sage king. How can you say I haven’t done this? As for transforming the people, that’s my specialty. Every brick and tile of Yushan Academy embodies my blood and sweat. Spreading education to all the people—that’s precisely the essence of transforming the people. Look, what a great figure I am. Don’t casually slander me in the future.”
Dongyu walked in carrying two fresh fish, calling out indistinctly “great deeds, great deeds.” Yun Ye had long ago told him not to keep his mouth shut all day without speaking—make sounds whenever he could. Over time without speaking, even hearing would decline. Though indistinct, it was always better than gesturing with two paws. The effect was good. Everyone was now quite accustomed to what he said and could communicate with others without using hands. This attraction was quite strong for Dongyu.
In front of Yun Ye and the Crown Prince, using his small knife, he cleaned the two財fish in just a few moves, cut them into sections and arranged them on a plate woven from green grass—very rustic charm. Seeing Yun Ye had no other instructions, only then did he bow and withdraw.
“It seems you’re always opposing the immortals, aren’t you?” Li Chengqian pointed his chopsticks at the fat fish in the grass plate and said irritably, “I’ve heard this kind of fish is transformed from the Big Dipper stars—celestial lords who committed errors and were banished to the mortal realm. When the time comes they’ll return. Aren’t you afraid the immortals will blame you?”
“Your old man is a hundred times more terrifying than immortals. Didn’t I also not spare carp? Didn’t he eat them with endless praise? Where do all these immortals come from? In a couple days I’ll invite you to hear the mountain god beat drums. That commotion is truly divine majesty like a prison, with all beasts fleeing. We’ll hide at the valley’s edge to hunt. Randomly throw down a stone and you’ll hit prey. Wild beasts have already become a disaster. If we don’t kill some off, even after the city is built, it will just be a nest for wild beasts. People won’t be able to stay.”
Though Li Chengqian said this with his mouth, his hands weren’t ambiguous at all. Holding the grass plate, he put the fish in the pot. In the interval while cooking the fish, he asked, “I heard you let the eagles go? My father was quite disappointed for a while. If you’d sent those two primordial mutant great eagles to Chang’an, you might have gotten a reward.”
“I also wanted to exchange two eagles for money, but look—my eye corners still haven’t healed, there’s still a patch of bruising. That was from being swatted flying by an eagle’s wing. As a result, they just ran away. Wu She said once the kings of the sky reach the sky, no one has a way to deal with them.”