In the southwest, the busy autumn had passed, giving way to a winter that felt lively and abundant. During the winter of the tenth year of Wujian Shuo, on the Chengdu Plain, the people, having weathered a bountiful harvest, gradually settled into a sense of calm, growing accustomed — with a mixture of unease and curiosity — to the strange new peace the Huaxia Army had brought with it.

The massive relief effort undertaken during the summer-autumn transition, paired with well-judged publicity, had firmly established a concrete image of the Huaxia Army in people’s minds. A relatively strict and relatively incorruptible enforcement corps had smoothed over unrest in the marketplaces and streets; medical teams traveling from place to place had resolved ailments that impoverished families had once had no way of treating; veteran soldiers stationed in every town and village brought with them a certain measure of iron-fisted discipline, matched by the Huaxia Army’s swift and thorough suppression of local gangsters and bandit gangs throughout the region. Traveling opera troupes occasionally accompanied the medical teams as well, and wherever they went, they drew crowds from the entire surrounding village and countryside.

New workshops had sprung up in various places, providing work for those without homes or from impoverished families. Trade between the major cities, having recovered to its former pace over the summer, took on entirely new dimensions by winter.

As the Jurchens drew closer, the great clans and warlord factions of the Wu Dynasty had already begun to feel enormous pressure, and were secretly reaching out to the Huaxia Army to purchase more weapons — no small credit for this going to the Huaxia Army’s own tireless lobbying efforts on all sides. By summer, an unspoken understanding had already been established between the two sides, and by late summer, large quantities of iron ingots, ore, and saltpeter — goods that had previously been under embargo — were now openly flowing into Huaxia Army territory, in exchange for the newer, higher-quality iron cannons and land mines the Huaxia Army now produced.

Beyond this, luxury goods and everyday items produced by the Huaxia Army — perfumes, glassware, mirrors, books, clothing — had also begun, riding on the coattails of this deliberately overlooked arms trade, to open up large new external markets. Some of the merchants who, guided by the principle that great wealth demands great risk, had followed the Huaxia Army’s lead in establishing various new industries had by now already recouped their initial investments.

In November of that year, a party of over five hundred men set out from the distant Dayang tribe in Tibet, and after more than half a month’s journey, arrived in Chengdu. The commander leading them was built like an iron tower, blind in one eye — Qin Shaoqian, now commander of the Huaxia Seventh Army. At the same time, another company set out from the Miao territories in the southeast and likewise arrived in Chengdu — representatives of the Huaxia Twenty-Ninth Army, led by none other than Chen Fan, whom people hadn’t seen in quite some time.

The Huaxia Army’s own “Greatest Martial Arts Tournament Under Heaven” convened in Chengdu that December.

This marked the first large-scale athletic gathering ever held by the Huaxia Army. Similar martial contests had long been a regular occurrence within the army’s own ranks, but this particular gathering was open not only to Huaxia Army personnel but welcomed all comers — martial artists and greenwood heroes from the wider world, and even representatives from the great clans of the Wu Dynasty. Naturally, no official representatives of the Wu Dynasty itself dared to participate in such an event just yet.

Tales of the martial world and its greenwood heroes had, over a decade earlier, been material Ning Yi had “borrowed” for various novels, spread far and wide through the storytellers of the Bamboo Chronicle network. Listeners of such stories had always harbored a secret longing for the kind of grand “martial arts convention” that appeared in these tales — but of course, no one ever expected such a thing to actually happen. Only now, with Ning Yi expanding the Huaxia Army’s internal martial contests and promoting them openly to the general public, did a massive wave of enthusiasm sweep through the region around Chengdu.

Across the hundreds of li surrounding the Chengdu Plain — territory still nominally belonging to the Wu Dynasty — huge numbers of greenwood fighters flocked in to register, many claiming they wanted to knock the Huaxia Army down a peg, while others declared that by joining this tournament, they hoped to rally everyone to march north and resist the Jin. By the time the first heavy snow fell, the ancient city of Chengdu was already packed to bursting with visitors from every direction, its once-ample inns and taverns now overflowing.

Though the tournament itself was staged with tremendous fanfare, Qin Shaoqian and Chen Fan — who each commanded one end of the Huaxia Army’s territory — had clearly not come all this way merely for the entertainment. The great war in Jiangnan raged on; the Jurchens were resolutely determined to destroy the Wu Dynasty in a single decisive campaign. Whether the Wu Dynasty could exhaust the Jurchen southern army, or whether the Jurchens would drive straight through unchecked, the eleventh year of Jianshuo would prove the turning point for the entire realm. Meanwhile, Liangshan remained besieged by over two hundred thousand troops, and Jin territory continued its stubborn, brutal resistance. As the Huaxia Army’s central command and core power base, the time had also come for a new round of high-level strategic meetings to determine the direction ahead.

At the same time, Qin Shaoqian’s journey from Dayang also concerned another matter entirely.

In May of that year, Lu Mingfang had confirmed the whereabouts, in the north, of the concubine Wang Zhanmei and her posthumous child — the family of the late Qin Shaohe. He had traveled to Liaoyang, rescued the mother and child, and arranged for their journey south. By this time, the Central Plains had already fallen into overwhelming warfare, and Wang Zhanmei, her body weakened after more than a decade of suffering, found the long journey unbearably difficult. The trip south was arduous in the extreme, proceeding in fits and starts, sometimes requiring the pair to rest and recover for extended stretches along the way.

On their journey south, they passed through Liangshan, then embroiled in its ongoing resistance thanks to the natural defenses of its marshland, and later crossed paths with the forces of Liu Chengzong and Luo Ye, roaming the area southeast of Bianliang. Wang Zhanmei fell ill several times along the way; during these episodes, she asked her Huaxia Army escorts to leave her behind and send the child south first, to avoid complications along the route — but the boy refused to leave his mother’s side. And so, proceeding in stops and starts, it was not until the end of November of that year that they finally arrived in Chengdu.

Qin Shaoqian had come to see this mother and son.

Ever since the fall of Taiyuan and their forced captivity to the north, over ten years, no one had ever inquired after the fate of this mother and child. Lu Mingfang’s staff in the north had, of course, compiled a report on their circumstances; after reading it, Ning Yi had chosen to seal it away without further comment.

Wang Zhanmei, upon arriving in Chengdu, was only in her thirties, slightly younger than Ning Yi himself, yet her hair had already thinned to sparse strands of white. In places, her scalp bore clear signs of past injury; her left eye showed nothing but white, evidently blinded by some blow, and a scar cut across her face where a knife had once slashed her. Her back was slightly hunched, her breathing weak — she needed to stop and catch her breath every few steps.

As for the child accompanying her, he was gaunt and thin, his cheeks carrying faint traces of his late father Qin Shaohe’s refined features, though his emaciation left his facial bones sharply protruding, his eyes unusually large. His gaze often carried a flicker of timidity and wariness, and his right hand had only four fingers — his pinky had been hacked off by someone.

The moment he laid eyes on this mother and son, Qin Shaoqian — a man whose resolve had, over the years, hardened into something like iron and stone — nearly broke into tears on the spot. Wang Zhanmei herself, despite all she had endured, had not let her spirit grow dark; after weeping for a while, she even managed a joke: “Uncle’s eye and mine really do look like they belong to the same family.” She then pulled the boy forward and said, “I finally brought him home. The child only has a childhood name, Shitou — a proper name is still yours to give, uncle… I managed to bring him back safely — in this life, I feel I haven’t failed my husband…”

The boy, whose childhood name was Shitou, meaning “Stone,” was twelve years old that year. Perhaps from having witnessed the resistance at Liangshan and the great battles across the Central Plains along the way, and perhaps also because the Huaxia Army itself was full of people who had likewise emerged from harsh circumstances, by the time he arrived in Chengdu, there was already a faint hardness beginning to show in the boy’s eyes. Having grown up in Jurchen territory, whatever toughness lay within him had, in his early years, necessarily been suppressed deep beneath the surface — but now it was slowly beginning to reawaken. When children like Ning Xi and Ning Ji occasionally sought him out to play, he remained rather reserved and cautious around them, but whenever there was sparring or combat to watch, his eyes lit up with genuine interest. Within just a few days, he had already begun training in martial arts alongside the other children of the Huaxia Army. Given his frail constitution and complete lack of foundation, however, whatever he might achieve in the future — in either temperament or physical strength — would surely require a long and difficult journey.

For Ning Yi, amid all these many great matters, there was also one small thing that had arrived alongside Wang Zhanmei and her son.

Now that Liangshan had become the center of the great war, Li Shishi — who had been forcibly sent out of the marshes by Zhu Biao, Lu Junyi, and the others — had traveled south along with this same convoy carrying Wang Zhanmei and her son, and had likewise arrived in Chengdu this winter.

Given the perilous times of years past, Shishi and Ning Yi had a history between them, with a certain measure of mutual fondness that had never been entirely hidden. Gossips among the wider public had long taken to regarding the two of them as a pair, and as Shishi traveled about with Lu Junyi’s company, with Su Tan’er’s tacit permission, this rumor had only continued to spread ever wider.

This rumor, while it had served to protect Li Shishi’s safety, had also, in a certain sense, cut her off somewhat from contact with the outside world. Now that she had arrived in Chengdu, Ning Yi, amid the press of his official duties, found himself feeling a touch of awkwardness about the whole matter.

He pretended not to know she’d arrived, keeping himself busy with meetings, the tournament, and receiving various visitors, and simply had Juan’er arrange her accommodations “casually” alongside Wang Zhanmei’s group. It wasn’t until mid-December, at the martial arts tournament grounds in Chengdu, that Ning Yi saw her again — her expression calm and composed, following behind Wang Zhanmei’s group, watching him from a distance with something between a smile and no smile at all.

After exchanging greetings with Wang Zhanmei, there was no avoiding his old acquaintance any longer. Ning Yi smiled and cupped his hands in greeting. Li Shishi leaned forward and said, “I’d like to ask you for a job.”

“Hm?”

“These past years, traveling around with Brother Lu and Brother Yan and the others, I’ve had my hand in intelligence work and building connections. Brother Ning, if there’s somewhere I could be of use, please find a place for me.”

Her tone was calm, though that address — “Brother Ning” — left Ning Yi briefly lost in thought. It brought back, faintly, the memory of Bianliang more than a decade ago, when she too had carried that same eager warmth, always wanting to help wherever she could — including during that great relief effort, including that brutal siege defense. Looking now into her eyes, Ning Yi nodded. “Give me a few days to clear some time, and we’ll sit down and discuss it properly.”

“Good.” Shishi smiled and said nothing further.

On the eighteenth of December, with the Little New Year drawing near, urgent word arrived that the Jurchen general Wushu had crossed the Yangtze and was marching directly on Lin’an — the news exploded like a bombshell before Ning Yi, Chen Fan, Qin Shaoqian, and the others. A few days later, a steady stream of reports from Lin’an began arriving, pushing the entire situation into a state of crisis none of them had ever anticipated.

By the twenty-fifth of December, senior Huaxia Army leaders — Ning Yi, Qin Shaoqian, Chen Fan, Pang Liu’an, Li Yi, He Zhicheng, and others — gathered for a meeting before the morning briefing. Liu Xigua and several others joined shortly after, and as they all looked over the intelligence together, none of them could quite decide whether to feel pleased or troubled.

“No point in celebrating the New Year,” Chen Fan muttered. “At this rate, we won’t even get to celebrate the Lantern Festival either.”

“You talk like anyone’s ever had trouble affording you a bowl of tangyuan,” Xigua shot him a glance.

“I’m talking about not being able to go home to be with Qian’er. You two lovebirds, all cuddled up together, wouldn’t understand what it’s like being stuck out here.” Chen Fan looked between Ning Yi and Xigua.

Ning Yi, head bowed over the report, replied evenly, “You lovebirds carrying on with your cuddling wouldn’t understand what it’s like for a man who has to kneel when he gets home.”

His tone was flat and matter-of-fact, but once he finished speaking, everyone couldn’t help but burst out laughing. Qin Shaoqian, his expression composed, shifted his stool back a little. “Fight’s about to break out, fight’s about to break out.”

Amid the general uproar, no one, of course, actually came to blows. After the laughter died down, worry crept back onto everyone’s faces.

Because of the situation with the Wu Dynasty, the meeting had already dragged on for several days, and by now the situation was shifting by the hour, to the point where even the Huaxia Army could do little but watch it unfold.

Lin’an — indeed, the entire Wu Dynasty — was on the brink of massive upheaval, and no one could yet say with any certainty which direction it would go.

The whole affair had begun with the first court session following the Laba Festival.

On the tenth of December, snow fell over Lin’an. It was an ordinary day for court, seemingly routine and unremarkable. The fighting in the north remained locked in stalemate, the greatest concern being that Wanyan Zongfu had already cleared the canal routes and stationed his navy and heavy troops near Jiangning, apparently preparing to cross the river. But even with matters so urgent, the overall situation remained manageable — the crown prince’s side had contingency plans, the ministers had their talking points, and though some raised it as a matter of grave importance, it was, for the most part, handled through routine deliberation, one item after another.

Among all the court factions — Zhao Ding, Lü Yihao, Qin Hui, Zhang Jun, and so on — none, at this point, had any intention of stirring up conflict. The war was, of course, a matter of the utmost importance, but with the Wu Dynasty’s vast territories and the approach of the New Year, there were countless other matters demanding attention as well, and the calm, routine deliberations proceeded steadily, like grinding stone. As the Hour of the Snake was drawing to a close, the final item on the agenda was the matter of pacifying unrest in the southeast. Officials from the Ministry of Rites and the Ministry of War delivered their reports in turn, and once the matter concluded, Zhou Yong, seated above, asked, “Is there anything further?”

At that moment, someone stepped forward.

This was not a good sign. Zhao Ding’s nerves tightened at once. Ordinarily, court deliberations followed strict procedure — nearly everything meant to be raised before the throne had to pass through the chancellor first. Sudden interventions at court did happen from time to time, but they were usually signs of factional infighting, political struggle, or a desperate, all-or-nothing gambit — and were, moreover, a serious breach of etiquette. No superior ever appreciated a subordinate recklessly raising matters above his head without warning. Zhao Ding glanced behind him — it was a newly appointed censor.

But He Yong, head of the Censorate, hadn’t given any advance notice either. Zhao Ding shot He Yong a glance; the man’s face was likewise full of stern bewilderment.

This newly appointed censor was named Chen Songxian, forty-five years old, having spent half his life pursuing the imperial examinations before finally placing second this year, and afterward securing, through various connections, a position at court. Zhao Ding didn’t know him well. He sighed inwardly — men like this, who had spent half a lifetime scheming their way up through the examination system, were usually cautious types content to keep their heads down. For him to take such a reckless gamble now suggested either some matter of real gravity, or, more likely, that he had simply lost his senses.

Listening closely, Zhao Ding heard Chen Songxian launch into a stream of hollow, formulaic rhetoric on the matter of the southeastern pacification — nothing the least bit original, the usual talk of how, given the current crisis, leniency might be shown to the rebellious commoners, that if they proved loyal to the state their grievances that drove them to rebellion might be reconsidered, that the court itself ought to engage in some self-reflection — the sort of grand, sweeping rhetoric anyone could produce. Chen Songxian rambled on at length, his arguments growing ever grander and more insubstantial, until others in the hall were beginning to stifle yawns. But Zhao Ding suddenly snapped to alert — something troubling had flickered through, faint but unmistakable, in the man’s words.

“…Now that the Jurchens hold such overwhelming power, having destroyed Liao and swallowed the Central Plains, truly at the height of their strength — to resist them, we must certainly hold to a resolve unto death, but we cannot afford to close our eyes to the gap between our strength and theirs; we must look at it clearly… At such a time as this, every last resource we can muster ought to be united together…”

The moment he reached the phrase “united together,” Zhao Ding’s eyes flew open. Beside him, Qin Hui likewise jerked his head up; the two exchanged a glance, then both turned toward Chen Songxian. This oddly familiar phrasing was, unmistakably, straight out of the Huaxia Army’s own proclamations. They listened further, and heard Chen Songxian continue.

“…And now, there exists a power in the southwest — though we have had our old grievances with them, in the face of the Jurchens’ fearsome advance, they have in fact shown some willingness to step back, to cooperate… My lords, the state of the battlefield is plain for all to see. The Jin state holds the stronger position, the Wu Dynasty the weaker — yet in these recent years, our own national strength has been steadily catching up. Given only a few years to recover, our Wu Dynasty’s power will flourish, and reclaiming the Central Plains will no longer be an idle dream. However… how we are to endure these next few years is not something we can afford to approach with naive idealism, my lords—”

“Silence, you! Traitorous wretch—”

Just as Chen Songxian was crying out these last words, Zhao Ding spun around, seized the ceremonial tablet in his hand, and struck him squarely across the head with it!

In an instant, the entire court erupted into chaos. Amid Zhao Ding’s furious shouting, another official rushed forward as well — Vice Censor-in-Chief He Yong, his face flushed crimson with fury, dropped to his knees mid-tirade. “This ignorant fool — you’ve lost your mind! Your Majesty, Your Majesty! I never dreamed the Censorate harbored such a deranged and unruly lunatic! I failed to notice it — I am at fault! I beg that his office be stripped from him immediately, and that he be thrown into prison for thorough investigation…”

Another voice bellowed: “Your Majesty, this wretch must surely be some agent of the southwestern bandits — he must be investigated! He is surely in league with the rebels, and yet dares come here to disrupt the very order of our court…”

Voices of every kind rose together in a deafening roar. Zhou Yong rose from his seat, stamping his foot to try to stop it. “Stop this! Stop this at once! What manner of conduct is this! Everyone, stop—” He called out several times, but seeing the chaos continue unabated, he snatched up a jade scepter beside him and hurled it down, shattering it with a crack against the golden steps. “All of you, stop this at once!”

Only then did the assembled officials fall silent. Chen Songxian, his forehead bleeding profusely from Zhao Ding’s blow, staggered back to his place. Zhao Ding wiped his mouth and began to offer his apology for the outburst. In all his years navigating the treacherous currents of court politics, he had seen no shortage of men driven half-mad by ambition for glory and rank; this Chen Songxian was, quite plainly, simply another of that same breed — never having held office in half a lifetime, and now that he finally had, spouting nonsense he no doubt believed brilliant but was in truth utterly foolish, hoping to leap to prominence in a single stroke… this wretch’s career had reached its end right here.

From above, Zhou Yong began scolding the assembled ministers. “You so-called officials of the court — where is your dignity as men of state? Alarmist talk is alarmist talk — We wish to hear it! We do not wish to watch brawling!… Let him finish speaking. You are ministers of the court, and he is a censor — even if he has lost his mind, let him finish—”

Blood still streaming from the wound on his forehead, Chen Songxian dropped abruptly to his knees and began laying out his proposal for reconciliation with the Black Banner, declaring things like “extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures,” and “my own life matters little beside the survival of the Wu Dynasty itself,” and “all you distinguished ministers here are men who feign deafness and blindness.” Having already earned the wrath of everyone present, he grew, if anything, only more blunt in his words. Zhou Yong watched from above without interruption until Chen Songxian had finished speaking, his expression still simmering with anger.

“He’s finished! We said to let him finish! Brawling? What manner of conduct is that! Is this how Our ministers, Our chancellors, are meant to behave? The Jurchens are coming! Discuss it properly!” With that, he rose abruptly to his feet. “Court is adjourned! All of you, go home and reflect on yourselves!”

The matter of reconciling with the Black Banner was thus set aside for the moment, and Zhou Yong stormed off in anger. The other court officials glared furiously at Chen Songxian as they filed out of the throne hall. Once outside, He Yong seized hold of him. “You will remain confined at home tomorrow, awaiting judgment!” Chen Songxian struck a righteous, unyielding pose. “The dynasty stands on the brink of ruin — my own death means nothing, but how lamentable that all of you remain so shortsighted.” And with that, he walked off, striking the posture of a martyr going nobly to his doom.

Chen Songxian’s words were hardly worth further deliberation on their own merits. Zhao Ding and the others had already begun considering whether the man had some connection to the rebels behind the Black Banner, weighing whether to have him imprisoned. What no one expected was what happened the very next day. That day, Zhou Yong unexpectedly called an emergency court session on his own initiative, summoning everyone from their homes. “About yesterday’s affair… We have given it some thought…”

Zhou Yong looked out over the assembled officials and announced that he intended to seriously consider Chen Songxian’s proposal.

At once, the entire court erupted in objection. Zhao Ding, Qin Hui, and the others all knew perfectly well how shallow Zhou Yong’s judgment could be — that fear had driven him, in his desperation, to grasp at reckless solutions was, in a sense, understandable. Some ministers began invoking principles of legitimate succession; others tried to reason with Zhou Yong by putting themselves in his position. If Ning Yi’s regicide could simply be forgiven, they argued, then the one person who ought to fear the consequences most going forward was the emperor himself — who would ever respect the throne again? Anyone else might propose reconciling with the Black Banner, but the emperor, of all people, could not afford to entertain such a notion.

Zhou Yong wavered, indecisive as ever, but simply would not let go of the idea.

It was only at this point that Zhao Ding and the others began to sense that something was genuinely off. They had dealt with Zhou Yong for a full decade now, and reflecting carefully on it, they began to recognize a certain terrifying possibility.

There was no court session on the twelfth; instead, everyone began quietly probing and cautioning within the palace itself. Qin Hui, Zhao Ding, and others each paid separate visits to Princess Zhou Pei, who then went into the palace herself to urge caution upon her father. By now, public sentiment within Lin’an had already begun to stir restlessly, with various factions and great clans beginning to apply pressure on the palace as well.

There was no court session on the thirteenth either. By the time court convened again on the fourteenth, Zhou Yong seemed, at last, to have grasped the magnitude of the backlash, and swallowed the matter for the time being.

Then, on the afternoon of the sixteenth, urgent word arrived from scouts that Wushu’s cavalry had crossed the Yangtze. Zhou Yong summoned Zhao Ding and the others and launched into a new, far more resolute round of demands, insisting that everyone begin seriously considering reconciliation with the Black Banner.

This time, the emperor dug in his heels completely. The furious debate raged on for four or five days; ministers, great scholars, and the gentry of every noble house gradually began declaring their positions, with some military officers even submitting memorials of protest. On the twentieth of December, students of the Imperial Academy submitted a joint petition opposing what they saw as a betrayal of the very foundations of their people. By this time, Wushu’s army was already well on its way south, and Jun Wu urgently ordered a hundred and seventy thousand troops in the south to intercept him.

By the twenty-second, Zhou Yong had already been locked in confrontation with his ministers at court for seven or eight days straight. He himself possessed little real resolve, and by now had already begun to feel dread and regret creeping in — yet after more than a decade on the throne, having rarely if ever been openly defied, a stubborn flare of anger still burned in his chest. The ministers’ pleading continued unabated. Zhou Yong sat slouched upon the throne, head tilted, saying nothing. In the golden hall, the Minister of Rites, Hou Shao, straightened his robes and cap, then bowed low and long. “I beg Your Majesty to consider this deeply!”

The moment he finished speaking, he suddenly surged forward with tremendous force. The guards before the throne instantly drew their weapons — ever since Ning Yi’s regicide, court security had been substantially reinforced — and in the next instant, a sickening thud rang out as Hou Shao slammed headlong into a pillar beside the throne, red and white matter splattering across the floor.

Everyone froze in horror. Zhou Yong rose unsteadily to his feet, swayed for a moment, then let out a strangled cry and vomited on the spot.

It’s over…

…