Mid-October, the city of Bianliang.
The bleak north wind had already begun to blow, and the sudden drop in temperature was a matter of just these past few days. The people in the city had layered on thicker clothes, but in a great city where a million people gathered, even with the slight chill, the number of pedestrians on the streets showed no sign of thinning. Those out shopping continued to shop; the merchants kept up their calls and cries, eager to draw in more business before winter fully set in; children ran about outside, eagerly awaiting the first snowfall of winter.
To the left of the Imperial City was the district where high officials and great households gathered, and here, the number of pedestrians on the roads was somewhat sparser. On the relatively secluded Wenyuan Street, a peddler pulling a cart of sugar cakes called out a few times outside the residence of Censor Lord Zhang. He knew that this Censor Zhang had a three-year-old grandson, deeply doted upon by the family’s elderly matriarch, and that once his calls stirred the interest of the child or the old woman, there would usually be a sale to be had.
Most of the pedestrians passing along the street were servants and maids from the great and noble households, with carriages rolling quietly past. Before long, a few more people came walking this way from the other end of the road. The woman leading them was tall and slender, with a fresh, elegant appearance. Though it was already winter, her clothing was rather modest, yet it could not conceal her fine figure. The young woman walking beside her seemed to be her younger sister, chattering away at her about something, and whenever the conversation turned amusing, her feet would give a light little skip. Behind them followed four maidservants, two of whom had plainer looks but sharp eyes and tall frames. One of the maids carried a basket in her arms.
The group of six came to a stop at the rear gate of the Right Chancellor’s residence. After they knocked, someone came to receive them and led them inside.
The ones who had come were, naturally, Yun Zhu and Jin’er, who lived nearby. Ever since Ning Yi had been stationed at the Chancellor’s residence overseeing the relief efforts, he often found it difficult to get away at midday, so the two of them had taken to visiting frequently — sometimes bringing lunch, sometimes bringing sweet soup. It was still afternoon at this point. After entering the residence, the two bodyguards dressed as maidservants were left at the outer perimeter, while Yun Zhu and Jin’er made their way inward with the ease of familiar routine. Just as they neared the courtyard where the work was being done, they happened to cross paths with Qin Siyuan, who was walking toward them. The old man, dressed in plain clothes, appeared to be lost in thought, but upon seeing the two of them, he smiled all the same. “Ah, here you are.”
“Grandpa Qin.”
“Grandpa Qin.”
They offered their greetings, and Qin Siyuan said with a smile, “What have you brought? Is there a share for this old man?”
Jin’er said with a smile, “Silver ear fungus and lotus seed soup, still hot, and there’s plenty of it.”
“Oh, then serve me a bowl later too. Come along, I’m looking for Liheng as well.”
The group made their way toward the courtyard where Ning Yi and the others were. Although this relief effort involved a great deal of intelligence gathering and data analysis, and there were several people helping Ning Yi besides himself in the courtyard, the atmosphere was nothing like the bustling energy of later-era financial markets — everyone worked through their own portion, occasionally consulting with Ning Yi. Once Qin Siyuan arrived, Ning Yi also set aside his work for the moment and sat with the old man in the courtyard for a while. Yun Zhu and Jin’er ladled out the soup and delivered a bowl to each of the working aides. When they brought bowls to Qin Siyuan and Ning Yi, the two men were sitting there, seemingly chatting idly — but the topic was anything but idle.
“…Fighting has broken out over at Pingzhou.”
“Troops have been dispatched?”
“They moved days ago already. The one leading the army is Wanyan Shemu.”
“Aguda’s younger brother — though his abilities are only middling… What’s the court’s attitude?”
“Originally they were pleased, but now that it’s actually happening, His Majesty seems uncertain. As for Tong Guan’s side… they’re afraid.”
“Have Commander Guo cooperate — there has to be at least one engagement…”
“That’s exactly my thinking too. The Jurchen have few numbers and can’t easily push south, but north of Yanmen Pass, that’s a fight that absolutely must happen. It’s a shame… the court only wants to negotiate…”
“So what’s the situation now…”
“Wanyan Shemu’s forces are fewer than Zhang Jue’s men, so we can only hope Zhang Jue manages a victory.”
“I think… the court needn’t send troops itself, but it could have Commander Guo lend a hand from his side. Chancellor, perhaps we should have Commander Guo petition the court himself, requesting to join the fight?”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking too — I’ve already sent a letter north… How are the grain prices?”
“Both sides are fluctuating around thirty taels.”
“The weather’s turning colder — hasn’t it risen?”
“Our maneuvers are still having an effect, but for now, we can only hold steady. The biggest hurdle will come after the first snowfall — that’s when we’ll truly see whether the court can restore the people’s confidence.”
Though called a grain war, an economic war, what was truly being fought was the people’s confidence in the government’s relief efforts. The great households and wealthy gentry claimed that grain prices were bound to rise, that there simply wasn’t much grain to begin with — and if the people believed this, they would rush to buy grain at inflated prices. The government, in turn, declared that relief was coming, that they would crack down on unscrupulous grain merchants, that a steady stream of grain was on its way. The ultimate outcome of the relief effort hinged on how much the people trusted each side — and, of course, on just how hungry they were.
That was the basic principle of it; in the finer details, the matter grew a thousand times more complex. The process of suppressing grain prices in both the north and south had already been underway for a month, and the fact that prices in both regions had managed to hold steady around thirty taels was enough to genuinely surprise Qin Siyuan. But just as Ning Yi had said, what would truly decide the outcome would only become clear after the first snowfall — at that point, either the court’s relief measures would collapse, or the psychological limits of the great households would give way. Until then, both sides continued to employ every means available to strengthen their respective positions.
In the south, within just this half-month period, a grain transport ship had even been deliberately sunk, and the culprit had yet to be identified. And not long before that, a county magistrate whom Qin Siyuan had stationed in Huainan — a man of blunt, forthright character who pursued relief measures aggressively — had triggered a backlash. A grain-hoarding magnate, hoping to expand his holdings amid the famine, had recklessly bought up a large quantity of the incoming shipped grain. He believed it a sure profit and absorbed it at high prices, never expecting that the subsequent price fluctuations would defy his expectations, showing signs of an actual decline.
This was, in part, a consequence of just how aggressive Ning Yi’s suppression tactics had been in the first phase. Although the total volume of grain he could actually mobilize now looked smaller than originally hoped, his investment in that first phase had still been made with real boldness. He was far too experienced not to know that in this kind of all-or-nothing market gambit, win or lose, one had to be willing to take a bruising first. And on another front, the enemy this time also existed in a kind of tiered hierarchy — bursting the appetite of some of the lesser magnates first, piling pressure onto them, forcing them to break early and release their grain ahead of schedule, in order to then intimidate those higher up the chain. That, too, was precisely Ning Yi’s design.
At this level, the small and mid-sized rural gentry stood no chance against Ning Yi at all. Ning Yi controlled the inflow of grain, and that magistrate, having received orders from the Chancellor’s residence, threw himself enthusiastically into the task — using administrative measures alongside public opinion to drive prices down, while also pressuring these magnates to release their hoarded grain. He did his job too well. The psychological limit of that particular magnate finally broke, and one day, roaring, “If you won’t let me live, then I’ll make sure you die too,” he hired men to kill the magistrate who had been working tirelessly to save the disaster victims.
That magistrate had himself come from a poor family, an official of upright integrity and honesty. At the time of his murder, he had been distributing his own household’s food rations among the starving people outside — his own family, meanwhile, had been reduced to drinking porridge every day as well.
After the murder took place, that magnate secretly had word spread that the magistrate had been killed by bandits under the rebel Wang Qing operating nearby, but the constables quickly tracked down the true culprit. Overseeing relief efforts in the south at the time was the power of the Princess Chengguo’s household, and Zhou Pei happened to be nearby — in fact, she herself had personally relayed the relief strategy to that very magistrate. Upon learning the full circumstances, she was overcome with grief to the point of near-madness, and immediately dispatched people to seize the magnate’s entire household, sorting out those connected to the hoarding scheme along with the magnate’s direct family members, and throwing them all into prison. She and the furious Princess Chengguo, Zhou Xuan, then wrote a joint letter to Zhou Zhe.
After this incident, the Chancellor’s residence immediately issued orders for agents of the Secret Investigation Bureau to take over the affairs of the county government. After trial, the guilty were paraded through the streets for public display, and several other households were subsequently investigated with equally firm measures. Word spread swiftly among the rest, and under this kind of intense pressure, no one dared hoard grain any longer — which, in turn, opened up a crack in the local grain prices.
As for what happened to that magnate once he was thrown into prison — it was said that on the very first day, Zhou Pei stormed into the jail and seized all the food meant for the magnate’s family, even drinking a bowl of the prison’s thin gruel on the spot, declaring, “How can such fine porridge be given to beasts like these,” and “They must be left to starve to death,” and “Anyone who dares send them food again, I’ll beat them to death.” With a member of the imperial family involved, even if the family had been beaten to death on the spot, it’s likely no one would have dared say a word. It was only said that on the night Zhou Pei drank that gruel, she was violently sick back in her room, and nearly fell ill the next day.
By the time the trial and public sentencing finally took place, that family had already been starved for four days straight, and it was only after Kang Xian issued an order that Zhou Pei was kept away from the matter, and the family was given one bowl of porridge a day, just enough to barely keep them alive. But one could well imagine that a good end was unlikely to await them after this.
As Qin Siyuan recounted this, his tone grew somewhat somber, and Ning Yi’s expression turned cold as well.
“Magistrate Geng’s family has already been properly arranged for by the Secret Investigation Bureau… As for Zhou Pei, it’s best she’s sent back — that area is close to where Wang Qing’s rebellion is active, and although Xin Xingzong and the others have already set out to suppress it, it’s still far from settled there. And besides… even if one county’s grain prices come down a little, it does little to help the bigger picture. We can’t keep paying for it with the lives of good men — we need to make sure nothing like this happens anywhere else…”
Ning Yi’s tone remained cold, but as he dwelled on these matters, compassion still stirred within him nonetheless. Qin Siyuan, however, shook his head. “This is war — such things are unavoidable. A hard blade that doesn’t cut still wounds less than a soft one that lingers. Lately, the pressure from below has been considerable, but if we truly want to see this through properly, we must adopt the mindset of war. Otherwise, once you start thinking of self-preservation, once you compromise once, you’ll inevitably keep compromising after that. I intend to have Geng Qianzhi’s case published in the court gazette for the whole realm to see, to let everyone know the wickedness of these grain hoarders — we absolutely must bring them down!”
Ning Yi considered this, then nodded. “I suppose I’ve been a bit indecisive about it…”
Qin Siyuan laughed. “‘The gentleman, in his relation to animals, cannot bear to watch them die once he has seen them living; and cannot bear to eat their flesh once he has heard their cries. This is why the gentleman keeps his distance from the kitchen.’ Liheng, you are harsh with yourself and with others alike, and yet you always harbor compassion for those close to you — that is precisely the way of the gentleman.”
Ning Yi thought for a moment, then sighed. “Good men ought to receive good rewards. We so often say that so-and-so did good deeds, accumulated virtue, and yet in the end died for the sake of others, receiving no good reward at all. In the end, it tends to leave people with the impression that doing good must inevitably bring misfortune — and that if misfortune doesn’t follow, then the person’s good deeds must not have been done with a pure heart to begin with. That kind of narrative isn’t a good thing to spread.”
“There’s no such tendency as Liheng describes.” Qin Siyuan looked mildly surprised. “From what I’ve seen, in the stories and tales of the strange circulating in the world today, those about filial devotion or chastity almost always end with good fortune — if the protagonist is a man, he typically passes the imperial examinations with top honors and rises to high office; if a woman, she typically ends up united with a fine and worthy husband. Stories where good men meet misfortune are actually rather rare.”
“Er…” Ning Yi was taken aback for a moment, then couldn’t help but laugh. “Ha, seems I got that backwards. My apologies, Chancellor Qin.”
Qin Siyuan smiled as well, then turned serious. “As for the ‘soft blade’ I mentioned, Liheng, you mustn’t let your guard down.”
Ning Yi nodded. “I know. Right now, across both north and south, nearly every official we’ve sent out has come under pressure — either lured with money or coerced through power, all aimed at getting them to turn a blind eye here and there. I’ve already had the Secret Investigation Bureau step up its scrutiny in this regard. The other officials matter less, but the routes along the north-south trade corridors — those we cannot afford to be careless about.”
“Someone has already extended their reach into the capital, working through connections close to me.” Qin Siyuan’s expression darkened. “Sooner or later, they’ll find their way to people around you as well, Liheng. You mustn’t go unprepared.”
Hearing this, a faint smile touched the corner of Ning Yi’s mouth. “I’ve already prepared myself for that, Chancellor Qin. Rest assured.”
Qin Siyuan sighed. “It’s not you I worry about — as I just said, you’re harsh with yourself and with others alike. I only lament for this world of ours…” He paused, then broke into a smile. “Oh, that reminds me — Dexin and Zhouhai seem to be doing quite well up north.”
Ning Yi nodded. “Brother Cheng is truly formidable. With him and Dexin working together, those people won’t be able to stir up much trouble.”
“Mm, Zhouhai’s schemes run a little too ruthless, somewhat like my own in my younger years — but when it comes to actually getting things done, he really does account for every angle. I find myself… not worrying about him much at all…”
As the old man spoke, it was clear that he actually held deep expectations for this particularly cunning disciple of his, Cheng Zhouhai…
…
The reason Qin Siyuan and Ning Yi had brought up Cheng Zhouhai was that Cheng Zhouhai had originally been responsible for military grain supplies in the north. Once the relief effort began, he had temporarily taken over the Secret Investigation Bureau’s operations in the north, and after that, he had linked up with Li Pin, the two of them working in coordination.
Then, a few days earlier, in Hedong Circuit, the first fierce backlash from the great households had come from the Guo family of Xiaoyi County.
Ever since Li Pin had gone to the Guo family and pressured them into releasing grain, Guo Mingyi had gone to consult with Zuo Jilan, who in turn sought out Qi Fanghou of the Qi family. After the two sides conferred, their two aides, Wang Zhizhen and Xu Mai, gave Guo Mingyi his first scheme.
After that, on the second day after Guo Mingyi returned home, escorted by his household guards, he went out before the starving refugees and delivered a tearful speech: because the government believed the Guo family, having distributed porridge all along, must surely have grain in reserve, they were pressuring the Guo family to release even more — and so he had no choice but to make certain reluctant concessions. At the same time, he announced that this day would be the very last day the Guo family would serve porridge.
He intended… to incite the starving masses into riot, aimed squarely at the government!
No matter how high Li Pin’s official rank, no matter what backing stood behind him, if the very first measure he took after assuming his post triggered civil unrest, then combined with the influence the Zuo and Qi families wielded in the capital, his official career… would be finished no matter what.
That day, perhaps because it was the last day of the porridge distribution, the Guo family’s porridge was made unusually thick, which gave the continuously hungry crowd the strength to actually process this news. As the assembled refugees listened to Guo Mingyi’s words, they stared on in stunned silence.
Unrest looked set to erupt at any moment. Then, someone at the edge of the crowd suddenly shouted: “He’s lying!”