In November, the fog over the plain remained as ordinary as ever, and the winter sky still carried its bluish-grey gloom. A new wave of reform was rippling through the southwest.
Looking back from a later vantage point, the most pivotal historical turning point was emerging at this very moment, but the people living through it in the present had no idea how great an impact the moment they occupied would leave on posterity.
Because reality itself was undergoing intense change at every turn. From the thirteenth year of the Jinghan era, when the Jurchens first came south, up to now, this land had already seen several near-nation-ending catastrophes, countless massacres and slaughters, disasters that left the land strewn with the grieving — and most of these violent upheavals had, in the end, produced negative outcomes. In such an environment, people had grown weary of such upheavals, yet had also gradually grown used to them.
A change touching a hundred villages, involving over two hundred thousand people, was full of talk of a glorious future, but even the most optimistic found it hard to truly accept that the great harmony ideal of “land to the tiller” could really be achieved. But so what — even if it failed, this would be no more than one bump in the road for a warlord power amid this age of chaos. Even though, over the past two years, this warlord power had displayed an almost unfathomable strength, when it came to challenging so great an ideal as “land to the tiller,” what people, after all their heated arguing, likely felt deep down was nothing more than a low, quiet sigh.
And yet, as though taking one cross-section of the vast, surging tide of history and looking down upon it, the muddy currents of this chaotic age, churning around the sharp bends, threw off countless swirling eddies — some ran forward interwoven within the great tide, some broke into towering waves, some coiled into whirlpools, some were flung off course entirely, hurled skyward. Some would grasp the truth ahead of everyone else; others, uneasy at heart, hesitated and held back. Countless currents of thought were thrown into disorder.
This too was part of the fascination a great era could offer.
Among the hundred villages, ninety-three erupted in resistance, fierce or mild, but there were always the rare few that, for one reason or another, chose a different path.
Xigu Village, southeast of Chengdu, was one of the very few villages that both had a great landlord and yet reached a swift agreement on surrendering land. On November 2nd, the propaganda officer stationed there, Qin Weiwen, was being given a headache by certain matters.
“Mm, that makes sense, that makes sense…”
Night had just fallen. Back in his room at the temporary lodgings, this new-generation second young master of the Qin family heard a familiar set of footsteps outside, along with a voice that seemed to be chewing on some delicious morsel while talking. The pattering footsteps stopped outside the door, followed by a thoroughly ill-mannered kick against it.
“Young Master Qin — this makes sense! Young Master Qin, are you in there? This makes sense—”
He pulled the door open. Outside, various figures were still coming and going through the Huaxia Army’s temporary encampment, and standing there was a country young master roughly his own age. The reason for the kick soon became clear: the man was holding a newspaper in one hand and, in the other, an oil lamp apparently snatched straight off a desk, and in the dim night was pressing his eyes close to the paper, reading intently, smacking his lips as he read, then aiming another kick at Qin Weiwen with a cloth shoe he’d hastily slipped on.
“This makes sense, Brother Qin—”
Qin Weiwen, having taken the kick, laughed ruefully. “What is it, Brother Nie?”
“Today’s issue of Three Days’ Talk! This piece has resolved my great confusion! It makes sense! It really makes sense, Young Master Qin—”
The young man, seemingly unaware he had just kicked the other man, walked straight in, still gloating over the newspaper in his hand. Qin Weiwen closed the door; the other man set the oil lamp down on the desk to one side and wiped the oil from his hand a few times onto his own fine clothing. “Come look, come look!”
Xigu Village, comfortably well-off and possessed of considerable land, was the odd one out in this round of land redistribution, and the specific reason for that came down to the local Nie clan patriarch, Nie Shaotang. This man, past fifty, wielded enormous influence in the area — by the standards of ordinary folk, something of a local strongman who held sway over his own turf. During the Huaxia Army’s unification of the southwest, he had been forced into submission and pacified through the joint efforts of Xigua and Li Shishi, and had since aligned himself firmly with Li Shishi’s faction, tying his fate to hers.
Unlike ordinary political opportunists, Nie Shaotang had been extremely decisive in placing his bet on this alliance, and this same wild, instinctive resolve was on full display in this land-reform affair. After paying two visits to Li Shishi, he became one of the first great landlords to proactively settle terms on selling back his land to the Huaxia Army. The landholdings accumulated over several generations under the old dynastic order had, in exchange, brought him money that seemed generous enough, along with policy compensation set to benefit three generations to come — but at this particular moment, it was genuinely hard for any rational observer to figure out what could account for such remarkable clear-sightedness on his part.
Looking back from a later age, though, it turned out he hadn’t really held any especially “progressive” convictions after all.
Still, several rounds of generous and decisive betting on the Huaxia Army had naturally brought him no small reward. Setting aside the financial gains, several of Nie Shaotang’s sons had quickly become familiar faces in Chengdu’s inner circles. His third son, Nie Xinyuan, who now stood before Qin Weiwen, had struck up something of a friendship with the mild-mannered second Qin son on account of his love of reading. Of course, in the past there may have been an element of deliberate cultivation to it, but only now, with Qin Weiwen accompanying him to Xigu Village to oversee the lessons, did he discover that the bookish, refined Nie Xinyuan he’d known back in Chengdu in fact had such a wild streak.
From the first day the work group arrived, Nie Xinyuan had latched onto Qin Weiwen, peppering him with all sorts of detailed questions about the land redistribution, raising an endless stream of thorny questions. At first Qin Weiwen thought he was deliberately trying to trip him up, but he soon realized the man seemed to be some kind of “revolutionary” in the mold of Aunt Gua and her circle — a mind bursting with all manner of novel ideas, often leaving Qin Weiwen stammering, unable to answer.
Qin Weiwen was only eighteen this year, with unremarkable talent in both study and martial arts, and had been assigned here as a lecturer mainly for the experience — because he came across as honest and dependable, and, in Ning Yi’s own words, “You’re better suited to being a lecturer than Ning Xi, because you look approachable.” So after two months of training, he had come here — but as for the Huaxia Army’s most radical theories of equality, though he’d heard of them, he had never gone very deep.
For the past two days, whenever Nie Xinyuan managed to corner him, he would shake him like an eager, curious child, and Qin Weiwen had to rack his brains for answers. As a mere afterthought among the lecturers, he had no real grasp of the thornier theories of equality; at first, trying to keep up appearances, he had gone off now and then to ask the group’s more experienced instructors, and later he’d been prepared to fob Nie Xinyuan off on someone else. But Nie Xinyuan had turned bashful at that, staring wide-eyed for a moment before stammering, “N-not that close to them…” and had gone right back to pestering him.
Now here he was again, pointing eagerly at the article in Three Days’ Talk and pushing it on Qin Weiwen, who bent over the desk to look. It turned out that what had won Nie Xinyuan’s favor was a rather simplistic yet blunt political essay — perhaps it was precisely because its argument was so utterly unadorned and direct that it had caught his fancy.
“…Brother Qin, look, just look… now that this piece has come out, so many of the questions we’ve been going over these past few days finally make sense…”
“…From ancient times through every dynasty, from the very start, one interest bloc after another forms — your family has one, mine does too… So many interest blocs, all out to grab benefits for themselves, and over two or three hundred years, they grow too entrenched to dislodge, and popular resentment down below inevitably comes to a boil… So what’s to be done? That’s exactly why every two or three hundred years there has to be a change of dynasty — and the essence of a change of dynasty is, no matter what, smashing apart, breaking up, these interest blocs that have accumulated over two or three hundred years…”
“…To achieve that goal, it doesn’t matter what means are used, and it doesn’t matter what reasons the interest blocs claim for themselves, because the plain fact is: if you don’t break up, everyone else simply can’t go on living… So look at today’s Wu dynasty — after two or three hundred years and change after change of dynasty, all these interest blocs that have piled up over so many generations are bound to be smashed. You see the Huaxia Army being gentle about it today, unwilling to just take it by force — but someday, if not now, they’ll be forced to divide it up under threat of the blade, because it must be divided, or else no one gets to start fresh…”
“…What a simple, plain truth! Stated so bluntly! It’s like thunder in my ears — it’s shaken me awake—”
Nie Xinyuan’s own voice was thunder enough in the room. Qin Weiwen rubbed his forehead. “This Three Days’ Talk, it’s always publishing this kind of eye-catching stuff. This… this is a bit too much of a… a political conspiracy theory…”
“It makes so much sense, Brother Qin!” Nie Xinyuan sat down beside him. “No need to get into the details, no need to dress everything up as justice — a change of dynasty is obviously exactly like this! Look at all the great families of the Wu dynasty, accumulating for so many years — let them accumulate for another three hundred and how are ordinary people supposed to live? Ordinary people can’t go on, and the great families get slaughtered too. So this article makes it clear — the Huaxia Army’s approach to the land policy today is already showing them plenty of face; they’ve barely killed anyone, and they’re even giving them money, so much money. These landlords ought to understand: handing over the land, so everyone can start fresh — that’s the only way to protect themselves for five, ten generations to come… This reasoning should be laid out plainly to them. It takes a thunderbolt’s ruthlessness to reveal a bodhisattva’s compassionate heart.”
Qin Weiwen didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “You’re so worked up about it, why don’t you go negotiate with them yourself.”
“I’d like to, but… with a crowd I stammer…” Nie Xinyuan looked briefly glum, then raised his head again. “But listen — you all need to be careful about this! Look at the second half of the article — it says the Huaxia Army is tackling this in two directions. First, through land redistribution, breaking up part of the accumulated wealth to give ordinary people a floor to stand on for their livelihoods. Second, through science and commerce, expanding the overall pool of wealth, adding fresh water at the source, to buffer this… accumulation of interest-group wealth. Because of that second point, there’s room to go easy on the landlords, sparing everyone’s lives…”
“But then…” Nie Xinyuan paused. “Is this second point of yours actually correct? If… I mean, if it’s true that every dynasty needs a full three hundred years and a total cleansing before everyone can start over, before everyone gets another three hundred years… what if that second point isn’t quite right? Your soft-hearted approach — not killing people, even giving them money — might it shorten that three hundred years down to a hundred-something. Others kill; you don’t. So the time it takes before the accumulation becomes unbearable is bound to get shorter…”
Qin Weiwen looked at him. “We didn’t kill your side… and you’re still not happy about it…”
“I’m j-just discussing the issue…”
“…”
“…”
The two of them sat there staring at each other for a moment, Nie Xinyuan’s expression utterly sincere, Qin Weiwen at a loss for words. After a while longer, Qin Weiwen squinted, a bit troubled, then leaned in close.
“I’ll only tell you this privately: Uncle Ning — Master Ning’s side — is planning to establish a basic state policy, something called… an inheritance tax. Households like yours, say — when your father dies, whatever you inherit, you’d have to pay the state seventy, eighty, even eighty or ninety percent in tax — tax you nearly to death… And Master Ning has especially stressed that this tax, at any stage of the state, can’t be deducted or exempted for any reason… This is still under discussion, don’t spread it around, but if it’s decided, it’ll have to be set at the founding of the state.”
Nie Xinyuan’s mouth fell open, frozen for a moment. Then his fingers began drumming unconsciously on the desk, and his eyes lit up.
“Makes sense… makes sense… this makes sense… there’s something here… Brother Qin, now I really believe you’re aiming for peace across the ages… opening up an undertaking not seen in a thousand years…” he muttered to himself, and after a moment suddenly grabbed Qin Weiwen’s hand. Qin Weiwen’s brow furrowed at once, but the other man just patted it twice and let go. “No, wait, that doesn’t solve the problem either. This… Brother Qin, think about it — say my father has a million taels of silver. When he dies, we’d have to pay the tax. But before he dies, he could just give it to us! Once you issue this order, every great household in the world will inevitably rush to give everything away in advance, wouldn’t they? There’s no way to stop that, is there—”
Qin Weiwen’s whole face scrunched up like an ugly steamed bun. “…That would solve some of the problem, wouldn’t it. That’s still something.”
“That’s true enough…” Nie Xinyuan nodded. “That’s just how these things go — once there’s an idea, there’s a countermeasure for every move… This inheritance tax is a good idea, Brother Qin. Over the next couple of days I’ll think about how I’d get around it, and once I’ve figured something out I’ll come talk it through with you…”
“You… you—”
“Wait, I’ve thought of something else.” Nie Xinyuan went on. “You said before that science and commerce can open up new sources of wealth — but say my father has a million taels in family assets, and he was originally going to use that hundred taels to run a business. Now with this inheritance law, he figures he’s getting old, so he splits all the businesses among us wastrel sons — that won’t work, that won’t work at all, a lot of businesses just can’t be run that way! So this inheritance law… right, suppose my father doesn’t have cash, he has a factory worth a million taels — when he dies, you take away nine hundred thousand taels, then what happens to the business? The business is gone, Brother Qin—”
“I… I only heard about this secondhand from Master Ning’s side…”
“And another thing — the emperor’s far away and the mountains are high, how can anyone really keep track of exactly how much money each household has? And besides… ugh, this brings us right back to a big problem — once you’ve taken back the land, the government becomes the biggest landholder in the world. A cruel official is worse than a tiger, Brother Qin. Someday, once the Huaxia Army has unified all under heaven, and it comes to distributing land in these outlying regions, can the center really reach that far? I keep feeling this will be the real problem down the road… Brother Qin, what does Master Ning usually say about this? Tell me quickly—”
“Uh… this… hold more meetings?”
“…”
“…”
The lamplight in the room fell quiet for a moment, then the rapid-fire chatter started up again. Two hours went by like this, and Qin Weiwen was nearly wailing. “Go ask Group Leader Tang…”
“A little question like this… how… how could I bother him with it. Brother Qin, you grew up at Master Ning’s side, you must have some idea, must have heard him say something… just keep me company a while longer…”
They talked on late into the night, until many people had already gone to bed, before Nie Xinyuan finally headed back, holding his oil lamp and clutching his newspaper, pattering off, muttering and shaking his head as he walked…
After that, on the third and fourth of the month, morning, noon, and night, whenever Nie Xinyuan had a spare moment, he still came to find Qin Weiwen. His words were blunt, sometimes even startling. For instance, after sitting through a few of the lessons, he suddenly worked something out and went to Qin Weiwen. “I get it! It makes sense—! You lot don’t actually care whether everyone fully understands your lessons. What you mainly want is for everyone to learn to obey orders without question — so that from now on, when the Huaxia Army speaks, they all listen… That’s right, that’s right, that’s the real logic behind striking at the landlords. In the old days imperial authority never reached down to the county level — so how do you get imperial authority down to the county level? Once they’ve learned to obey your commands, hasn’t it reached the county level already? The core of the land redistribution isn’t even just the land itself… it makes sense, Brother Qin—”
Qin Weiwen sighed. “I’m starting to think it makes sense too…”
By November 5th, Nie Xinyuan came to fetch him again, and this time he was led into a classroom to sit. After a while, he saw Ning Yi walk in through the door. It wasn’t Nie Xinyuan’s first time seeing Ning Yi, but it was his first private audience with him. Ning Yi sat down beside him, smiling as he looked at him, and Nie Xinyuan sat frozen, dumbstruck, at a loss for words.
“Weiwen has told me about a lot of your ideas — very interesting. Look, whatever he couldn’t answer, he wrote all of it down. I’ve had a look…” Ning Yi held a notebook in his hand; it was Qin Weiwen’s, one Nie Xinyuan already recognized well, covered with scrawled, hurried jottings that seemed to reflect the writer’s own frustration. “This little Qin fellow wrote down a lot, but he doesn’t really have a sense of what matters most. How about this — Xinyuan, which few questions are you most eager to have answered? Let’s discuss them.”
Nie Xinyuan: “Ah… uh… I… that…”
“…”
Ning Yi studied him for a moment, then broke into a smile. “Let’s put it this way — though Qin Weiwen’s notes are a bit scattered, most of the questions actually already have a partial theoretical answer, if you think it through carefully. But I know there’s one question, or a few, that you haven’t been able to get answered so far — for instance, once we eventually reclaim the entire Wu dynasty’s territory, how will we manage the outlying regions? That question touches on the very reasons the feudal system came into being in the first place, and its implications run deep. Without a core strategy to resolve it, without a decisive change, then bringing imperial authority down to the county level, taking back the fields and land — we might say that’s nothing but a farce staged by opportunists and naive idealists… or even a crime…”
Nie Xinyuan nodded vigorously; by the time Ning Yi reached the end, he was shaking his head just as hard, out of sheer fright, without quite knowing what he meant to convey.
Ning Yi paused.
“Well then — talk is cheap without proof. I’d like to invite you to go see something. Once you’ve seen it, you might find some of these thoughts resolve themselves. Go home and pack a couple of changes of clothes; someone will make the arrangements for you shortly.”
Seeing how nervous the man had become, Ning Yi stood up, but gave him an approving nod all the same. “That you’ve thought this far, thought of all this — it isn’t just parroting other people’s opinions, it’s not nothing, it’s genuinely impressive. Keep thinking hard from now on too — we need a great many comrades who can think through problems and solve them.”
He reached out his hand, and after a moment, Nie Xinyuan shook it.
Nie Xinyuan felt as though he were dreaming.
Not long after, he found himself carrying a small chest, arranged by the staff, boarding a carriage bound for Leshan.
The carriage traveled half a day and stopped overnight partway, and by the second day he arrived at his destination, a small town on the outskirts that had undergone extensive Huaxia Army redevelopment — this was a research institution not far from the Huaxia Army’s Leshan armaments works. Since it was already midday, after he was given lunch, someone led him to a small reception room that seemed to be for visitors awaiting a tour. More than a dozen people were already there; looking around, Nie Xinyuan saw both old and young — some young scholars, some elderly Confucians in patched clothes — several of them deep in animated discussion of what seemed to be the land policy.
Someone came over to greet him — a young man slightly older than himself. “Xu Shiyao of Hanzhou, courtesy name Shiyao. And you are, brother?”
“N-Nie Hou, courtesy name Xinyuan…” Nie Xinyuan thought a moment. “The Xu family of Hanzhou — could this be the honorable Elder Xu—”
“Brother Nie must mean my grandfather.” The Xu family of Hanzhou were major merchants dealing in southern goods, and old patriarch Xu Rui was quite a figure in the southwest, so Nie Xinyuan knew the name. He heard the other man ask quietly, “May I ask, brother, what brings you here?”
Nie Xinyuan hesitated a moment. “And… and you, brother?”
“On account of this new land policy, I was bold enough to write a few essays and submit them, and afterward someone arranged for me to come here… Looking at the people gathered this time, rich and poor alike, I doubt we were summoned for our family backgrounds — more likely because we wrote something.”
Nie Xinyuan scratched his head too. “I’m… I’m the same… the same… wrote an essay…”
Xu Shiyao laughed. “One look at you, brother, and I can tell your writing must be excellent.”
The two chatted a bit further, and then a Huaxia Army lab member wearing spectacles came over, and after roughly confirming names, led them out of the room. After passing through several courtyards, they arrived at an open space in the hills, where in the distance a river could be seen flowing, and along its banks stood several buildings fitted with waterwheels. From one of those buildings a straight line extended, connecting to the back wall of a building on this side.
“They’ve told us to show everyone an experiment. Let’s head up front first.” The bespectacled lab member led the group toward the building by the water.
The building with the waterwheel turned out to be quite large, and inside was a mechanism of complex construction, turned by the waterwheel — something none of them had ever seen before. It seemed to have a great deal of wire wound around it, and after a moment they made out that it was copper wire; amid it there also appeared to be large pieces of iron. The bespectacled lab member tossed up a piece of iron sheet, which immediately stuck fast.
“This is a lodestone.”
Once they’d finished viewing this, the group left the building and followed the long line toward the other side. Xu Shiyao, from a merchant family, leaned in to examine the long line closely. “This seems to be lac resin.” He reached out to touch it, but was loudly stopped by the lab member. “This material is hard to produce, don’t touch it carelessly!”
Xu Shiyao smiled. “Is this indeed lac resin?”
The man replied, “It uses lac resin, plus some other things. Inside is copper wire.”
Xu Shiyao nodded, then said to Nie Xinyuan, “Lac resin is also called shellac. My family often trades in southern goods, so I know of it, though I’ve no idea what they want with wrapping copper wire in it.”
At this point everyone was still thoroughly confused. As they neared the building at the other end of the long line, they saw that where the cord came through, there were simply two plain pieces of iron. The lab member came over and said, “The two buildings are seventy-eight zhang apart. In a moment, the waterwheel will engage the machine and send a signal from that side to this one… Ah, this experiment’s still rather simple — copper wire and lodestone aren’t easy to produce, so this is just for you all to see for now. According to Master Ning’s plan, there’s also supposed to be a way to rebuild the generator here…”
Barely anyone understood a word of what he was saying.
The lab member signaled with a flag from this side, then explained to the group.
“The waterwheel engages the machine, the machine turns, and electricity is generated inside the copper wire. In just a moment, you’ll see the electricity carry a signal over to this side.”
“What is this thing?” Xu Shiyao and the others asked, frowning.
“Electricity.”
“…What?”
“Lightning! The same lightning that flashes during a thunderstorm!”
The room fell into confused chatter, everyone voicing their own doubts, but then, all at once, they heard a sharp “snap” from the two iron plates, and a flash of silvery light.
Then, snap, snap-snap, snap-snap-snap… the sounds began to come in rhythm, ringing out for only a brief moment.
“…By conducting lightning through copper wire, as long as the wire is long enough — a hundred zhang, a thousand zhang — lightning can reach it in an instant. Using the length and spacing of the flashes as a code, in the future, no matter how great the distance, a message can be sent this way… In future, paired with the rail carriages over in Chengdu, connecting any city, a message could be sent even a thousand li away in the blink of an eye…”
The bespectacled lab member explained the experiment to the group in a flat, matter-of-fact tone. Some of them were gradually beginning to follow along; others were still utterly lost — lightning? Sending messages? What was this… Seeing that the group’s grasp of it was limited, the lab member sighed and started over, explaining the principle simply from the beginning, touching on a number of other points as well…
“…It was only after we defeated the Jurchens that Master Ning brought us in to start work on this. Every idea, every theory, was built up single-handedly by Master Ning himself… Honestly, the copper wire, the lodestone, even the shellac coating — we’re still working all of this out bit by bit ourselves, and we’re still a good way off from the assembly-line mass production Master Ning talks about. But now that this prototype has been made, we feel that—”
Nie Xinyuan gradually began to understand what he was hearing.
Once he grasped the full meaning of it, everything before his eyes and around his ears seemed to grow gradually distant. His head buzzed and hummed, and it felt as if his soul had left his body, looking down on this land from somewhere up in the sky. Feudalism, great harmony, dynasties as private family holdings, bringing lasting peace to all future generations, the babbling recitations of countless children at their first lessons — all of it seemed to be echoing at once…
He had no idea when exactly he had followed the group out of that place. It was still winter, the weather cold and overcast, seeming to carry that particular grey unique to the area around the Chengdu plain. His feet carried him forward within the crowd, and at some point, he sank to his knees on the ground. When he came back to himself, tears were pouring from his eyes as if spilling over…
His own thoughts, his own confusion, the countless questions he’d been putting to Qin Weiwen these past few days — all of it welled up in him at that moment.
Land to the tiller…
Confucius the sage, countless sages, the ideals of those who sought the Way…
The possibility of breaking apart the feudal enfeoffment…
The possibility of great harmony under heaven…
At that moment, he crossed a threshold…
The great tide of the age came surging forward, and like a molten current, embraced him.
Those questions, in theory, had now come full circle.
……
A day later, he returned to Xigu Village.
A day after that, he rode in a carriage into a Chengdu as boisterous as ever, with countless public discussions still swirling around the new land policy. He found a guest room to stay in, and then, hands trembling, began writing down his own thoughts on paper: “My Views on the New Land Policy.”
His ideas were still unpolished, his prose far from refined, and he crossed out and rewrote what he put to paper again and again, and again… Two days later, Xu Shiyao arrived as well, and then more people came…
All this while, countless great scholars were still hurling out one grand essay after another declaring the land policy impossible to achieve.
He remembered the hand Ning Yi had extended toward him that day.
“…Keep thinking hard from now on too… We need a great many comrades who can think through problems and solve them.”
This was but one wave stirred up within the age — and at that very same moment, across the whole of this land, countless other waves were rising and churning as well, as the great tide of history surged forward with unstoppable force.