Chapter Forty-Two: Grain Rent, Money, and Taxes

A bitter wind swept across Mount Sanwen, stirring dry leaves into the air and filling heaven and earth with a bleak, murderous chill.

Li Yifeng turned his back on Xu You, his sharp voice threaded with helpless frustration. “Wenzhi, your wounds—I cannot heal them.”

Xu You collapsed onto the ground. After resting for a while, he finally caught his breath. Lifting his sweat-soaked face, he smiled. “The worst that can happen is that I lose my martial arts. That is nothing worth troubling over, Brother Dao. Please do not take it to heart.”

Li Yifeng’s lips moved. He seemed about to speak, yet the words would not come. After a moment he said, “My medical skill is far from refined; it does not compare even one ten-thousandth to my master’s. Wenzhi, if there is any chance at all, I hope you will go once more to Crane Cry Mountain. Perhaps my master may have a remedy.”

Xu You gave a wry smile. “Brother Dao, though I appear free, in truth I am already a prisoner sentenced to die within this narrow stretch of rivers and mountains in Qiantang. Within the Three Wus, if I put in some effort and borrow strength where I can, I may still barely manage to protect myself. But if I were to travel a thousand li to Crane Cry Mountain, I fear I would not even make it halfway before my head and body were separated.”

The emperor had placed Xu You under protection in Qiantang. From an emperor’s perspective, that was already a kindness beyond measure. If Xu You himself insisted on courting death, leaving this place against all sense to seek Li Changfeng’s treatment at Crane Cry Mountain, then one could imagine the outcome: once the Shen family learned of it and sent assassins to strike him down on the road, he would truly die in vain.

Li Yifeng said, “How could I not know that? It is only that half a year ago, my master took a vow before the Heavenly Master not to descend from Crane Cry Mountain for ten years. Otherwise, considering our friendship, no matter how difficult it might be, I would have begged my master to come personally to Qiantang and treat your injuries. But at present, we can only settle for the next best course: you must make the climb yourself.”

Li Changfeng had sworn not to come down the mountain? And in front of Heavenly Master Sun Guan himself?

Was it forced? Or voluntary?

Xu You immediately caught the faint stench of corruption from the power struggle within the Heavenly Master Sect. That was only natural. Any organization, any body, any party, any state institution—once it grows to a certain point and begins to generate interests, conflict over the distribution of those interests inevitably follows. The war between those already entrenched and those lurking in wait has never ceased.

Xu You was not foolish enough to press for details. He treated it as something he had heard and promptly forgotten, and said with a frown, “From the way you speak, it sounds as though even if there is danger along the way, I must still make a trip to Crane Cry Mountain? Does that mean my injuries are already at the brink?”

Li Yifeng shook his head. “Not at the brink. They are hanging by a thread.”

Xu You was startled inwardly, though his face remained calm. “How can that be? Wen Riquan clearly said that with some time to recuperate, my injuries would heal. The price would be nothing more than the loss of my martial arts, leaving me a cripple.”

“Wen Riquan is indeed a divine healer, but he has one fatal flaw: he cannot fight. Being able to pull you back from the edge of life and death is already a blessing granted by heaven, yet he cannot truly see the root of your injury.”

Xu You recalled that strange, unfathomable chill of true energy that surfaced whenever he circulated his power, and his breath tightened. “Brother Dao, have you discovered something else?”

Li Yifeng considered for a long while before sighing. “I cannot say for certain. Your injuries are exceedingly strange, faintly familiar, and yet not at all the same. They are wholly unlike any illness or lesion I have ever seen before.”

Xu You stared at him, dumbfounded. Was this some kind of joke? So he had not actually diagnosed anything clearly, and yet he made it sound so terrifying.

Li Yifeng naturally guessed what Xu You was thinking. “That is the intuition of a physician. It is like how some people feel ill at ease when danger is approaching. I have treated countless believers within the Heavenly Master Sect. Many times, the diagnosis of bizarre ailments depends not on the pulse, but on intuition.”

If anyone dared say that in a modern hospital, they would surely be beaten to death by enraged patients, and even after death it would make the news, adding fuel to the already strained relations between doctors and patients.

Xu You did not reply, because he did not know what to say. Since leaving Yixing, his body had been weak, yet his spirit had improved day by day, and his conduct and movements were no different from those of a healthy man. So long as he did not circulate his inner power, he could even take a move from Mountain Sect without injury, and strike Dou Qi with a staff without tiring, as though he had swallowed some miraculous tonic. How could it be as exaggerated as Li Yifeng’s intuition suggested?

Li Yifeng did his best to persuade him. “If you grow careless, and it worsens, your life may be in danger. So the best course is to seek my master’s treatment now, before it acts up. There may still be a sliver of hope.”

Xu You said helplessly, “Brother Dao, if going up Crane Cry Mountain means I will certainly die on the road, then I would rather remain in Qiantang and live leisurely in peace. Besides, you yourself said it was only a possibility. What if it does not worsen?”

“Wenzhi, do you truly wish to place your life and death in the hands of a choice that comes down to ‘perhaps it will, perhaps it will not’?” Li Yifeng said in a low voice. “You worry about unexpected changes along the way, but those can be overcome. The Crown Prince and the Shen family may not actually be so omnipotent. If necessary, I can even draw on the strength of the Heavenly Master Sect to shield your movements all the way.”

Xu You suddenly fell silent. Supporting himself on the pavilion pillar, he stood and gazed toward the city of Qiantang below the mountain.

“Brother Dao, thank you. But I cannot leave Qiantang, much less leave under the protection of the Heavenly Master Sect. If this is truly the fate allotted to me, then there is nothing to be done.”

Whether you truly did this for my injuries, or wished to use this chance to pull me out of Qiantang’s muddy waters, I must still thank you.

Li Yifeng sighed. “Your temperament has not changed in all these years. Very well, have it your way. Only be careful about everything. If you feel even the slightest discomfort, you must seek treatment at once.”

Xu You smiled. “I am grateful for Brother Dao’s understanding.”

Li Yifeng sighed again. “Since you refuse to go, then you will not stand by while handling the matter of the Zhan family either?”

As the Ghost-Subduing Constable, he was cold-faced and cold-hearted, feared by all in Yangzhou’s administration. Yet before Xu You, he seemed to have spent all the sighs of a decade.

“Of course not! If one is to save a life, one must see it through. How can I leave things half done?”

Li Yifeng said, “If you want to save someone, you must know how to save them. I am, after all, the Ghost-Subduing Constable of Yangzhou, and my contact with Zhan Ting has always been handled by me. Do you have no questions you wish to ask?”

Xu You had come to see Li Yifeng this time for two reasons: first, to catch up; second, to use the opportunity to probe the truth of Du Jingzhi. To know oneself and know the enemy is to win a hundred battles. Though he had a way to help the Zhan family escape the dead end of the deer jerky matter, the final outcome would depend on how determined Du Jingzhi truly was.

“If Brother Dao were to reveal any secrets of the Way, would that displease Priest Du?”

“That is my concern; you need not worry.”

Li Yifeng’s master was Grand Priest Li Changfeng, ranked above Du Jingzhi, so he may not have feared his direct superior all that much. Xu You knew he was cautious and would not let Du Jingzhi catch him by the handle, so he asked, “What exactly does Du Jingzhi want with Zhan Wenjun?”

“That reason is known only to the priest himself. But by my guess, it should be related to a kind of Daoist art he is currently cultivating.”

Daoist art?

Xu You seemed to have caught hold of something. Whether in the Heavenly Master Sect of his former world or the Heavenly Master Sect of this world, the foundation that allowed it to stand in Jiangdong and become the foremost religion was precisely those strange, even miraculous Daoist arts. From emperors and nobles to merchants and laborers, all hoped to obtain from the sect whatever they desired: longevity, extended life, curing illness, blessings, and so on. If Du Jingzhi truly needed Zhan Wenjun because of some Daoist art he was practicing, then while it sounded incredible, it was not entirely incomprehensible.

For within the Heavenly Master Sect’s arts there was one especially famous and especially powerful technique called the Harmonizing Breath Art.

Xu You said again, “Then Du Jingzhi’s main purpose in targeting the Zhan family is Zhan Wenjun, correct?”

“No.” Li Yifeng shook his head unexpectedly. “Whether it is Zhan Wenjun or Guo Mian, they are in fact secondary. The primary purpose is money.”

“Money?”

Xu You’s eyes widened. “Money?”

He had never imagined that wealth would be Du Jingzhi’s true aim in such a large-scale campaign. It was true that many within the Heavenly Master Sect acted disgracefully, using talisman water and talisman charms to cure illness and dispel disaster, cheating believers out of who knew how much of their fortune. But they still would not go so far as to disregard all face and openly seize what they wanted by force.

“Du Jingzhi is the priest of Yangzhou, stationed in the most prosperous place under heaven. Would he really be short of money?”

“It is not Yangzhou that is short of money, but Crane Cry Mountain! The Heavenly Master has issued a divine decree requiring each district to contribute varying amounts of rent, grain, money, and tax according to its circumstances, and the amount is three times higher than in previous years. Yangzhou is one of the top three districts among the twenty-four, and it has been assessed a levy of five hundred million in rent, grain, money, and tax.”

The so-called rent, grain, money, and tax referred to the early requirement that those entering the sect must pay five dou of rice. Later, considering economic development, inflation, grain shortages, and other factors, equivalent cloth, grain, silk, and the like could be used in its place; this too was called rent, grain, money, and tax.

Five hundred million in cash...

After the Han dynasty, the government almost never issued currency. During the Cao Wei era, even the Five-zhu coin was abolished, and the people traded using grain and silk. By the time of the Eastern and Western Jin, no new coinage was issued at all, only ancient coins continued to circulate. Later, in the Northern and Southern dynasties, there was some improvement and over forty types of currency were minted, but the volume was small; what sustained circulation was still the old money left behind by earlier dynasties.

In the more than one hundred years after Emperor Wu of Han, a total of twenty-eight billion coins had been issued, averaging two hundred and fifty thousand strings per year. Extend that proportion onward, and by the Cao Wei period the total ancient currency in circulation would still be only about one trillion.

In other words, the total ancient money circulating among the kingdoms of Chu, Wei, and the north and south amounted to only about one trillion coins. Though Sun Guan was the Heavenly Master of the age, in the end he was merely the leader of a folk sect, and yet with a single sentence he demanded that a mere Yangzhou district pay five hundred million in tax. What appetite was this? What terrifying audacity?

Of course, those five hundred million could not all be coin; a large portion would still be paid in grain, silk, and other ordinary equivalents.

Xu You was stunned. “How could the Zhan family possibly have that much money?”

Li Yifeng said softly, “A single Zhan family naturally would not. But do not forget: the deer jerky of the divine deer came in seven pieces.”