The boy was raised by the wind; his appearance remains unchanged, yet his heart is still afraid.” — Hu Xia, Let Go

Chapter 451: Fate’s Currents — Tangled Strings of Chaos

The Wu Dynasty, tenth year of the Jinghan era, Dongshan Circuit of Shandong, Yuying County.

Deep winter had set in, and heavy snow fell in swirling drifts, draping the small county town and its surroundings in a blanket of silver. But at this moment in Yuying, few had much interest in admiring such a snowy scene.

Aside from the wealthy households of the great cities, or carefree children who knew no better, days of heavy snow like this were always the hardest to endure for ordinary people. Especially south of the Qinling-Huai River line, come winter, people would stockpile firewood and often wrap themselves in bedding for a month or two, unwilling to leave their beds — nothing unusual about that. Partly this was because the cold was simply too bitter and there was little to do in winter anyway; partly it was because not every household could be counted on to have winter clothing, and in many rural areas, farming families might not even have basic warm garments. When winter arrived, whole families could only huddle together under quilts, shivering and enduring, and every trip out of bed became an ordeal.

Some poor households, having chopped and sold firewood in late autumn and early winter, found themselves without fuel to keep warm come winter. The old story of the charcoal seller worrying that charcoal was too cheap and hoping for colder weather was, even now in the Wu Dynasty, nothing out of the ordinary. And so, when winter came, if the areas around the major cities didn’t see mass deaths from freezing, that already counted as a peaceful year — as for the frail elderly who couldn’t make it through the depths of winter, that too was nothing unusual.

Of course, Yuying wasn’t a large county, but it did have a dock along the banks of the Yellow River, and some wealthy households had settled there, so even on a snowy day like this, there were still people willing to venture outside. In the county town, several of the best restaurants and teahouses had seen business slow due to the cold weather, but the pleasure houses, though somewhat affected, had held up rather well. Plenty of wealthy patrons and rich households were happy to enjoy the warmth of these establishments, a feeling almost like coming home, and some merchants stranded in Yuying by the snow, with nothing else to do, could only pass the time lingering in such places — turning what was meant to be brief business into something drawn out much longer.

The finest pleasure house in Yuying, Chunxiang Pavilion, kept its lights burning bright every night. Thick cotton curtains hung over the main gate and all around the building; inside, the best charcoal burned, the singing girls’ voices were sweet, the pastries delicious, and the accompanying courtesans warm and attentive. Hot water was available at all hours for anyone wishing to bathe. Though the cost wasn’t cheap, the wealthy households of the county and merchants stranded in Yuying were all willing to come here for entertainment.

Naturally, there was occasionally some excitement to be had as well.

Just such a scene was unfolding now at Chunxiang Pavilion. A woman in a padded cotton coat, leading several burly men, was dragging a drunken young man out of some woman’s room upstairs. The drunken young man refused to leave, and the two sides were nearly trading curses right there in the hall.

This sort of “catching someone in the act” drama wasn’t uncommon in pleasure houses. But to be honest, if it escalated to a real scene like this, it usually meant the woman had some backing of her own — and from the exchange between the two, onlookers could tell they weren’t husband and wife. Everyone in the main hall watched the show with great interest, murmuring amongst themselves.

The drunken young man clung to the stair railing, struggling fiercely. “I’m not your husband! I’m not your husband at all! You’re just my little sister! What right do you have to interfere in my business! What right do you have to care what I do! Let me go, I want to go back and drink!”

The man raved and thrashed about wildly, shouting without any coherence. The woman leading the way ahead, bundled in her padded coat so that her figure was hard to make out, still had a decent enough face — at the moment, her eyes trembled with fury. Without turning back, she simply said, “Drag him out!” The two men accompanying her hauled the struggling man down the stairs.

The man grabbed at anything within reach, or simply flopped onto the floor, struggling and shouting. “I’m not leaving! What right do you have to do this! I’m your brother! The eldest brother stands in for the father! I’m the head of the household now! You’re just a money-losing burden — sooner or later you won’t even be part of the Lou family anymore, so what business is it of yours! I’m going to marry you off! I’m going to marry you off — everyone, this is my little sister, and I’m marrying her off! Whoever pays my wine bill today, I’ll give her to him! Don’t drag me—”

These words drew a burst of laughter from the crowd in the hall, and some began chiming in with jeers, though it seemed this woman’s backing was no small matter. People in the hall whispered among themselves, saying she was a woman from out of town here on business, connected somehow to Chen Laohu, a man with a hand in both the legitimate and criminal sides of Yuying, and that she’d already been stranded here for several days. Shandong as a region had always been a tangle of both worlds, and it was precisely because of her connection to this Chen Laohu that the woman was able to make such a scene here at Chunxiang Pavilion.

“Brother here, if your sister wants to marry you off, that’s not really something we can help with…”

“Though it’s a bit much for a little sister to be minding her brother’s romantic affairs, ha ha…”

An ordinary woman subjected to this kind of mockery would surely have felt humiliated and furious. The woman before them, though she looked as though she’d seen plenty of difficult situations, still gritted her teeth, her eyes reddening slightly. She made her way down the stairs, pressed a banknote into the madam’s hand, and murmured an apology. Behind her, the man’s shouting only grew more frantic.

“I’m not going… did you hear me! Lou Shuwan! You’ve gone mad — I’m the smart one here! Let me go back and drink! I’m not going with you! You go your way, I’ll go mine! You lunatic! You think killing… makes you something impressive, huh! You still don’t understand…”

“Say that any louder and see what happens!” What the man was blurting out seemed to be something about “killing someone,” and the woman suddenly whipped around and snapped at him. Hearing this, the crowd was briefly taken aback, but not truly surprised — not to mention the man hadn’t spoken clearly, and even if he had, given how thoroughly the underworld and the law mixed in Shandong, anyone with connections to Chen Laohu was unlikely to be an innocent sort. It was only after hearing this remark that people stopped their teasing. This was a region where merchants came and went, where martial heroes and hardened greenwood fugitives alike passed through — people gathering and scattering, forgotten again within a few days.

Stepping out of Chunxiang Pavilion, wind and snow lashed at her face as the woman wiped tears from her cheeks, walking ahead. Behind her, the man kept struggling all the way, muttering that she wasn’t part of the Lou family. When they reached the roadside where two carriages waited, the woman suddenly turned back.

“That’s right! I’m not part of the Lou family! But you are! Look at yourself now, a member of the Lou family — what do you even look like! Lou Shuheng! You’re the last man of the Lou family, and look at the state you’re in!”

The two people here now were none other than the Lou siblings, scattered and adrift after the fall of Hangzhou.

“Me?” His sister’s rebuke was harsh; Lou Shuheng, swaying unsteadily, forced himself to stand straight, shoving off the man beside him who’d been holding him up, and laughed in a manic, unhinged way. “I’m the smart one! I’m exactly like this because I’m the smart one! You’ve got to… got to live well, seize the day! You’re… you’re the lunatic, Lou Shuwan, look at what you’re doing…”

Amid the wind and snow, Lou Shuwan stared at him, her words coming out slow and deliberate. “I’m making the Lou family stand back up! I’m… preparing to avenge Father and our elder brother…”

“Ha ha ha ha, revenge.” Lou Shuheng swayed as he laughed, then shook his head. “You want revenge, I don’t want any part of it! You lunatic… you still haven’t seen clearly, you can’t get revenge at all, even if you didn’t see it clearly back in Hangzhou, you should see it clearly here! What revenge! An entire Liangshan wiped out to the last man! What right do you have to seek revenge… You think killing your own husband makes you impressive, you… you only killed your own husband, and you didn’t even care about him, I saw it clear as day, why don’t you kill me too…”

Lou Shuheng’s voice trailed off lower and lower. Lou Shuwan stood there staring at him, her eyes filling with blood-red fury, and said through gritted teeth, “If you weren’t my brother, I’d have killed you long ago…”

“Ha ha, that’s right. I’ve wronged you, both he and I have wronged you. Back when we were fleeing, I lost my head, I was starving to death, I lost my head, I shouldn’t have traded you for food…”

“Shut your mouth!”

“Oh.” Lou Shuheng laughed in a manic, unhinged way. “You don’t like it, fine, I won’t say it. But… I see it clearly, Lou Shuwan, you can’t get this revenge, and I don’t want revenge either, because deep in your heart you don’t even…”

“Shut up!”

“Deep in your heart you don’t even…”

“Shut up—”

A slap rang out across Lou Shuheng’s face. He staggered sideways a couple of steps and sank down to sit by the carriage wheel, laughing loudly. He pulled a hidden wine flask from his sleeve and opened it to drink. Lou Shuwan rushed at him, kicked him square in the chest, then kicked the flask from his hand.

“No more drinking, brother—”

She charged at him, raining down punches and kicks. Bundled up as she was in her winter clothes, Lou Shuwan wasn’t especially strong to begin with, and after beating on him for a while, all she’d really managed was to kick the flask away and muss up his clothes and hat. Lou Shuheng, by this point, was like a dead pig unafraid of scalding water — he took the beating and sat there reeking of wine, sneering at her. Lou Shuwan stood there staring at him for a moment, then finally instructed the people nearby, “Take him back to the inn.”

Lou Shuheng was loaded into a carriage. As it began to move, Lou Shuwan tilted her face up and said, “Brother, we’ll talk again when we’re back.”

Lou Shuheng’s head lolled against the carriage window, and he murmured hazily, “I still want to go back to Chunxiang Pavilion…”

The carriage pulled away. Lou Shuwan stood there for a good while, then pressed her fingers to her forehead. Turning around, she saw the wine flask that had been knocked into the snow, and walked over to pick it up. A fair amount of the wine had spilled, but there was still some left. She stood there for a moment, then tipped the flask back and took several gulps, a faint flush of red spreading across her cheeks. She turned to the remaining attendants beside her. “Let’s go… we still need to handle the matter with the Tiger King properly… once that’s done, everything will be fine…”

The group walked toward the remaining carriage. As it set off, not far outside Yuying County, in a small village, a pair of eyes turned upward in a dim woodshed, gazing at the snowflakes drifting past the window. The eyes belonged to a broad-framed man, unkempt and startlingly thin, lying amid a jumble of firewood, half his face covered in scars, his features ruined beyond recognition on that side — because of this, no one could see anymore… the criminal’s brand once carved into that cheek.

Not far away by the stove, a farm woman in thin clothing hummed and bounced a two-year-old child in her arms while feeding wood into the fire, coaxing out a bit more warmth.

She muttered on and on as she worked: “…When I first took you in, oh, it was because you were big and strong — even if you weren’t some greenwood tough, once you got your health back you could help out with things. Who’d have thought, after all that effort nursing you back to health, you’d turn into an idiot instead, sigh… you good-for-nothing burden, if you keep this up I’ll throw you out come next spring… why do you always stare at the window, I know, you’re cold, aren’t you, I’ll get something to block it up for you in a bit…”

She was a widow in this village, with a bit of looks to her. When her husband had been alive, the household had been reasonably well-off, but ever since his death, everything had gone rapidly downhill.

A few months earlier, she’d rescued a man who’d washed up on the riverbank, covered in what looked like blade and spear wounds. She’d had her own little scheme in mind — rather than let the relatives divide up what her late husband had left behind, why not attach herself to a strong man instead? So she’d gone to great trouble and expense nursing him back to health. But once he recovered, the man remained silent all day long, never saying a word, not even resisting when scolded or beaten, which made her feel the whole venture had been a poor bargain after all. But with the weather turning colder, she couldn’t very well throw an idiot out into the cold, so she’d settled him in this woodshed — in a sense, leaving him to fend for himself.

Still, this arrangement had brought her plenty of trouble besides. What her late husband had left behind was, after all, family property, and in the past, relatives wanting to claim a share had at least had to go about it discreetly. Now that she’d taken in a man, those same relatives who came around gossiping grew bolder and more brazen about it, and she often found herself arguing with them.

During these arguments, the man would sit quietly in the woodshed, listening. After the widow finished quarreling and came back, she would invariably complain and grumble at him for a while: “If the weather weren’t so cold, I’d have thrown you out long ago…”

By the time spring came the following year, the village had gained a new resident — a silent farmer with half his face scarred. Because of his large frame and the many blade scars on his body, the villagers gradually came to realize he was easy to push around, yet no one truly took things too far with him; many suspected he might have some background — perhaps once the chief of some mountain stronghold or another. This sort of thing was of no great concern around here, and no one had any real inclination to report it to the authorities.

When he went out to work the fields, the widow, child in tow, would bring him things, sometimes watching him from the edge of the field. There was plenty of gossip in the village, but she wasn’t one to be ashamed, being of a sharp and fiery temperament, and would occasionally get into arguments with people over it. By the time what her late husband had left behind was finally divided up and gone, the two of them ended up sharing a bed — that was in the autumn of the following year…

The threads of fate are like countless tangled strings — sometimes they cross paths, and once parted, there’s no telling when, or even whether, they might ever cross again. In early December of the tenth year of Jinghan, Su Wenyu and Wang Shanyue left Shandong to return to Bianliang. Several months of managing that camp had put Su Wenyu through an ordeal difficult to put into words, and by now his whole bearing had changed. As for Wang Shanyue, he’d recently had some friction with the Zhu Family Manor, to the point that Zhu Biao had given him a thorough beating.

The reason being, he’d become the third party in the romantic affairs between Hu Sanniang and Zhu Biao…

And after beating him, Zhu Biao had asked him to pass a message to Ning Yi: “Once the New Year’s over, I’m heading for the capital.”

At this time, in the capital, with the New Year approaching, everything was alive with festivity…