Firelight lit the night; a simple wooden platform was being built in the ravine to the west, torches of the search parties stretched off to the sides, soldiers trotted through the camp. At the edge of the small square at the camp’s center, Song Jiang, hands and feet bound, lay on his side on the ground, watching, along with his fellow prisoners, the scholar by the wooden table nearby, hands folded, having his final words before the platform was fully built.
“Actually, the whole thing began like this,” he said. “You’ll find it puzzling, wondering why your actions were guessed at, but it’s not because you thought too little — it’s because you thought too much.”
“After Liangshan fell, you cut off your own limb to survive, with nearly four thousand of you escaping, resetting my earlier arrangements to zero — that was a correct move. After that you took many steps: burning villages, fleeing through the mountains, dragging ten or twenty thousand people around in circles; when you realized burning villages wouldn’t work, you seized Fengping County, then intimidated Raoping, and then struck back with a counterattack, and on top of that used the situation in Yunzhou, spreading rumors to make everyone follow you… ah, Zhu Wu, it seems you’re the only one interested in what I’m saying…”
“You did extremely well — every step was admirable.” Standing by the wooden table, Ning Yi’s gaze swept across the group, his speech calm and a touch fast, and only now did he nod toward Zhu Wu in acknowledgment. “To be able to use the circumstances here to accomplish so much — just the fact that over three thousand of you ran around in the mountains for nearly a month without being caught is already no small feat. And you began enforcing military discipline, suppressing the effectiveness of spies to the greatest extent, holding it in until the very end before erupting. Honestly, I’ll tell you — no matter which step, tactically, I never managed to catch you… oh…”
Zhu Wu, in his cage, raised his head, the deepest confusion in his eyes. A soldier came to report to Ning Yi at his side; he listened, nodded, then picked up the water cup on the table.
“He says it’s gotten a bit unruly over in the ravine — never mind them. Back to what interested you, Zhu Wu — and perhaps also Brother Gongming, this topic. I never caught you — though honestly, I’d hoped they could have surrounded you sooner, so you wouldn’t have gotten to do so many messy things — but it must be admitted, circumstances hadn’t reached that point yet. I… only settled on one thing from beginning to end, and I settled on it the moment you left Liangshan.”
“You wanted to kill me!” The voice echoed across the small square. Ning Yi nodded. “You were bound to want to kill me! I was certain of this from the moment you came down from Liangshan — you just seem to have settled on it a bit late. The whole matter is really that simple.”
The words drifted on the wind; Ning Yi bowed his head to drink water, letting a bit of silence linger there. After a moment, he set the cup down and shook his head.
“When a man walks forward, there are many roads he can take… Most people think this way. When you came down from Liangshan, it’s not as though you never thought of killing me. But before you lay many things you could have done. You could have gone to join Tian Hu — though the road is a bit far, and once out of Yunzhou you wouldn’t know the terrain as well, but it wasn’t impossible. You could have kept drifting until Wurui Camp finally lost interest in hunting you, since they’d already earned the credit for wiping out Liangshan’s fifty thousand. You could have kept burning, killing, and plundering villages, forcing the officials of Yunzhou or elsewhere to offer you amnesty just to be rid of the trouble. You could also have killed me — but that seemed troublesome too, and looked like just one option among many… But I only settled on this last one. No matter how many hundreds of roads lay ahead of you, in the end, you could only walk to here…”
“You struck at Jiangning, suffered a small setback and retreated in defeat; on the canal I made you choke; after years of building up your strength, when you were at your peak, I brought you down at Dulong Ridge; I turned Liangshan’s own home ground against you, made you fall into internal strife. It was I who ran about everywhere, threatening the officials around you, forbidding them absolutely from accepting your surrender! It was I who pressed Wurui Camp, forbidding them absolutely from withdrawing their troops! Wherever you had a road, I sealed it off; when you burned villages, I used the men left over to fill the holes at Dulong Ridge. Every time you stumbled with each step forward, you would have seen me more and more clearly — but by then, unfortunately, it was already too late…”
“Did you think you’d suddenly seen the light? Think you’d suddenly found the crucial thread amid all the tangled clues? Think you’d finally made up your minds, burned your boats behind you? Think that after deciding, you painstakingly employed tactics, tricked the government troops, and then resolutely struck back with a counterattack? These past days you’ve thought too much, even deceiving yourselves, and got the order of things backward…”
“You only finally made up your minds these past few days, on the fifth and sixth — but back on the twenty-third and twenty-fourth of the sixth month, we had already spoken with Wurui Camp. If you were never caught, the only thing I needed to guard against was this final step. I don’t have much experience in tactics, so I could only see this far ahead — I told them as much, and then… reached an understanding with them…”
His voice paused. “After you stirred up the waters, I couldn’t keep up with all your movements. I’m no oracle, nor did I get word of your actions from any spy — you’d already prepared for that, the intelligence was bound to have errors, information is inevitably imperfect. After Liangshan fell, every spy’s duty was already complete; I had them all go silent — even what they volunteered to pass on, I chose to doubt. Yan Qing left a note at Fengping; to this day, I’ve never opened it. But the more violent your movements became, the more clearly you told me what you wanted to do… the direction of the greater trend kept narrowing — besides that, what else could you have done? Wurui Camp is a bit slow due to all sorts of red tape, but given a month to prepare, pulling off an ambush was no problem…”
A soldier came again, reported news; Ning Yi nodded once more.
“Of course, you also could have chosen not to attack. But if that had been the case, at most another half month or a month, and I guarantee the outside pressure would have made it impossible for your whole force to hold together. By then, the wilds of Yunzhou wouldn’t have let you run wherever you pleased, or flee whenever you wanted — when the final battle happened made no difference…” He gave a slight smile, his voice lowering. “Well, what needed saying… has mostly been said. Everyone, let’s go over there — the two thousand inside are probably getting impatient by now. Come, Song Jiang, let’s walk together…”
The soldiers closed in; someone untied the rope around Song Jiang’s feet and helped him up. Song Jiang struggled: “What are you going to do…” But the soldiers were already hauling up the captured heroes one by one. Zhu Wu, Wu Song, Dai Zong, Xi Junyu, Chai Jin, Zhang Qing, and so on, one after another, pushed forward. Wu Song struggled with all his might and kicked away a soldier — a gunshot rang out, blood blossoming on his chest; almost the same instant that Ning Yi fired his gun, a soldier beside him swung a blade at Wu Song, then flinched, startled by his own action. Ning Yi lowered his firearm, watched Wu Song’s corpse fall, then turned to the soldier with a smile and a nod: “Well done.”
He patted Song Jiang’s shoulder. “Even though this is our first meeting, I like you. No need to ask any more, let’s go.”
The group walked outward, Song Jiang stumbling along, visibly trembling. Then he clenched his jaw and drew a breath. “There are still two thousand men — they’re the finest brothers Liangshan has…”
“Hm?” Ning Yi, walking beside him, looked at him amiably.
“You can’t push people this far — when someone’s cornered to the point of death, they’ll fight to the last. I… I can surrender, I can accept amnesty, you don’t need to kill so many. You… spare these brothers of mine, no need to wipe them all out — as for me, Song Jiang, you can kill me whenever you like from now on…”
“Noble and righteous, a true brother.” Ning Yi smiled and nodded, listening carefully. They had passed through the ranks of soldiers, and could already see a small wooden platform in the distance. Ning Yi did not answer his words, thought a moment, then said with a smile, “Actually, I understand you. I understand what you’ve done.”
“Uh…” Song Jiang was momentarily stunned, but Ning Yi patted his shoulder and urged him to walk faster, his tone not raised, like two friends whispering side by side.
“No one is born wanting to become a bandit. Sometimes it’s fate, timing — we can’t hold it back no matter how hard we try. Just like a tiger crouching in a desolate stream, hiding its claws and fangs, enduring — see, I really like your line, hard times and ill fate forced you up the mountain to become an outlaw. There are many such people. Take Lin Chong, for example — framed by Gao Qiu, his wife defiled by that scum Gao Yanei, driven to her death; he was branded and exiled to a labor camp, and even there his superiors framed him, petty men plotted to assassinate him — in the end he had no choice but to go up the mountain. Every humiliation a man can suffer, he suffered.”
As they walked and talked, Ning Yi shook his head, his gaze wistful. “He had no way to avenge himself — what could a mere drill instructor do? With a brand on his face, even if he’d gone to the capital to make an assassination attempt, he couldn’t have killed Gao Qiu; and even if, by some stroke of luck, he had managed to kill Gao Qiu, he certainly wouldn’t have escaped alive. Some people talk cold words, blaming him for not having the will to fight to the death — I don’t see it that way. Fighting to the death, easy to say… holding others to that standard is simply immoral. So I understand him completely, don’t you agree… look, your brothers and friends…”
By this time the group had reached near the wooden platform; further off in the valley, the silhouettes of the trapped Liangshan men could already be seen — they too were looking this way, stirring up a small commotion, the chieftains and soldiers filled with righteous fury.
Song Jiang was brought up onto the wooden platform, lit by firelight so those in the ravine could see more clearly. Xi Junyu stood beside him; the rest were lined up below the platform. The soldiers first tried to make them kneel — some knelt, some struggled. Ning Yi waved a hand toward those below. “No need to trouble yourselves — kneel if you like, stand if you like, doesn’t matter.”
The wind blew at the torches, the light flickering, the sound howling; the two sides of soldiers stood facing each other across a distance of over a hundred meters. In the ravine over there, figures stood row upon row. Wu Yong, Li Kui, Song Qing, Hua Rong, Sun Erniang, Song Wan… Li Kui let out a great roar, nearly rushing forward, but in the end held himself back. Ning Yi glanced toward both sides, making sure they could roughly see each other’s faces, then turned back. Song Jiang had in fact been watching him the whole time, and he walked over to Song Jiang’s side.
“Actually, I understand you too — take, for example… acting on Heaven’s behalf and all that. Of course a rebellion needs a slogan! Why shouldn’t it? If it were me, I’d have one too — it has to be shouted loud and proud! And look beside you — Xi Junyu… it’s simple enough — a little brother caused trouble outside, or maybe he’s not such a good sort to begin with, and of course the elder brother has to shoulder it. To go up the mountain, of course you have to kill people and set fires — if he were so wonderful, the authorities wouldn’t have forced him up here. Sometimes, when a little brother has gone too far, an apology can also suffice — in the world of rivers and lakes, fighting and killing, accidental injuries are unavoidable…”
The night was silent, only the wind sounding; both sides watched Ning Yi on the platform speaking to Song Jiang as if they were old friends, occasionally pointing at Xi Junyu, yet not saying a single word to either side. No one knew what was about to happen. Even Song Jiang himself, at this point, found it somewhat eerie — he had hoped Ning Yi would discuss amnesty or surrender with him, but instead the man rambled on and on, and only a strange, icy feeling accumulated in his heart.
“And then there’s Qin Ming, Xu Ning, and the others — men so skilled, of course it’s better to use them than to kill them. If it were me, I’d probably also want to force them into rebellion. Once you’re driven to the mountain with no way out, the greater Liangshan’s momentum grows, the more bargaining chips I’d have to save my own life, right? When it grows big enough, negotiate amnesty with the authorities, become an official. Really, if it were me, that’s probably all I could do too. See, I understand you. I truly understand you.”
Ning Yi looked at him with a smile, repeating that sentence, and when Song Jiang, after a moment, nodded reflexively, Ning Yi seemed to recall something. “Hmm… back to the apology — this matter, though it was your little brother who started it, over a hundred people of the Su family died. Some of the children were only this tall, just this little — I saw them… cut in half. That wasn’t their fault. I’m certain it wasn’t their fault. Since it was you who did wrong, an apology should be fine, right? Such small children… what do you say? I really hope you can apologize to them, just say you’re sorry…”
Song Jiang looked at Ning Yi; Ning Yi looked back at him, his gaze gentle yet unwavering, smiling, with a touch of sorrow. Song Jiang’s jaw clenched. “I’m sorry.” The words came out as if squeezed from between his teeth; after saying it, perhaps feeling his voice had been too quiet, he wanted to say it again, louder — but Ning Yi had already nodded, reaching out to touch the top of his head and the back of his skull. “That’s enough, that’s enough. They’re already up in heaven now — whether said loudly or quietly, they should be able to hear it either way. That’s enough now…”
Song Jiang was over forty years old now, and though not the most imposing figure among the men of Liangshan, he was still built like an iron tower of a man — yet the way Ning Yi touched his head was as if patting a child. The back of his head still bore fresh blood, but Ning Yi paid it no mind at all. Having said all this, he raised his right hand and gave it a wave, then walked off to the side with a touch of excitement.
“I did say I understand you all — just like… Lin Chong, just like the one I just killed — was that Wu Song? Was that Wu Song? Killed a tiger with his bare hands — if I usually heard of someone that formidable, I’d have to say he’s a true hero. You all drink from big bowls and eat meat by the chunk, how gratifying, right? Sounds enviable — if it were written into a book, it would surely be popular. Over there, the Resourceful Star Wu Yong — sounds impressive too. Your brother Li Kui — kills whoever he wants, how wonderful. Not to mention Li Kui — take Lu Zhishen, for example — people say he has great wisdom. See, great wisdom, and always so free and unrestrained — everyone would envy that. Ordinary folk all love heroes like that, because they too wish they could live so freely…”
“What are you trying to do…” Amid Ning Yi’s endless talking, Song Jiang finally cut him off again. Because as Ning Yi spoke, he was rummaging through a box beside him, and pulled out a sharp, gleaming bone-cutting steel knife — the kind that looked used for butchering pigs. When Song Jiang asked this, Ning Yi, swinging the blade in hand, paused, glancing at the steel knife.
“Oh, this… a knife, of course. What was I saying? Um… free and unrestrained, living freely and easily, sounds enviable to everyone — but, but what happens when you come killing your way into my home?” Ning Yi held the knife, blowing on it at his side, shaking his head as he walked, gaze fixed on Song Jiang. Then he paused, looked down at the blade in his hand, touched the tip with a finger. “You… you’d come killing into our home. It’s not just something to hear in a storybook and let go. You’d come, and kill an entire family. What am I supposed to do at that point?”
Ning Yi stood there. “Am I supposed to keep saying I understand you had your hardships? Wu Song — I too wish I could kill a tiger, so formidable. Lin Chong — I too feel righteous indignation for him, truly righteous indignation. Lu Zhishen — everyone wants to be like him, free and unrestrained, possessed of great wisdom. Though he hasn’t accumulated good karma, killing and burning as he does, perhaps one day he’ll have a great awakening and attain Buddhahood — but before he becomes a Buddha, he’ll protect you, and what of those he kills, those you kill? What if he kills me before he becomes a Buddha? What good is such a Buddha to me? I too want to drink from big bowls and eat meat by the chunk like you — everyone wants that — but what if the wine you’re drinking is mine? See, you came into my home, and you killed…”
Ning Yi studied him, his gaze earnest, the blade turning in his hand. “So — what I’m saying, can you understand it?”
Song Jiang’s jaw trembled; he wanted to say something, his expression shifting rapidly. The wind blew past. In Ning Yi’s hand, the blade’s edge turned upward and held still. His gaze fixed in that instant.
“Thank you for understanding.”
With those flat words falling, Ning Yi stepped forward and plunged the blade straight into Song Jiang’s belly, then gripped the hilt and yanked it upward with sudden force. Before the eyes of all present, in the firelight, blood sprayed into the sky.
In the air, what seemed like a roar of shouting rose up. Right beside Song Jiang, Xi Junyu, who had listened to the entire exchange, screamed and staggered backward, urine already leaking from his trousers. Ning Yi shook his head, not minding the blood splattered on himself, glanced once at Xi Junyu, handed the steel blade to a companion nearby, and slashed once across Xi Junyu’s body — this was his final disposal of Xi Junyu. Then, amid the enormous uproar, Ning Yi turned around, and in the flickering firelight, raised one hand.
“Kill—”
A tremendous roar, driven by the force of the Broken Six Dao energy, spread out in all directions. Beside the wooden platform, the arrayed soldiers raised their blades and struck at the line of Liangshan heroes held before them — Zhu Wu, Dai Zong, Chai Jin, Zhang Qing… row after row of blood bloomed and burst forth. Killing intent surged, flames tore through the night sky. Song Jiang’s whole body was split open; he fell to his knees, then collapsed. Blood flowed, spreading across the wooden platform and beneath Ning Yi’s feet, spreading further and further…
After the rain of arrows, the clash of soldiers began — the true slaughter of this night had begun…