Because they had set off late, the ox cart carrying He Jie and his companions reached Chongzi Village at the hottest part of the day. He Yi lived in a secluded spot, so the cart had to travel for quite a while longer.
Before them, on the eastern side, stood a house with white walls and gray tiles, understated yet cleverly designed. He Jie, already irritated by the jolting cart and the oppressive heat, snapped, “Did we take a wrong turn? This can’t be where He Yi lives.”
The house looked far too good for He Yi to afford. He Jie had heard his cousin built it himself. What could a fellow who only knew how to farm construct beyond a miserable thatched hut? A house of this quality could not possibly be his work.
The driver replied timidly, “This is the place. I’m certain.”
All three men stared in shock. Even after climbing down, they stood rooted to the spot for a while.
Fine though the house was, it still lacked its boundary wall and gate. That made things convenient for visitors who came with malicious intentions.
He Jie and his two subordinates did not linger. Their expressions darkened as they went inside looking for him.
He Yi, meanwhile, was napping on a mat laid on the floor. A sudden clamor of footsteps, and the sound of light objects being swept down, forced him to open his eyes. He listened for a moment before rising to investigate.
As the intruders advanced, they kicked anything that happened to lie in their path as though venting their anger. Carefully stored building earth spilled everywhere, leaving disorder behind them.
They entered the main hall, where they promptly saw He Yi walking straight toward them of his own accord.
He Jie had not seen He Yi in a long time. His strongest memory was of the young man beating people in a frenzy. When He Yi recognized his unwelcome guests, the faintly sleepy but otherwise mild expression on his face turned icy. The pressure of his presence was even greater than before, and He Jie swallowed several times without meaning to.
How dare a mere dirt farmer stare at him like that? He Jie swallowed again and ground his back teeth. After circling the hall, he said, “Nice house you have here. Spent all the money you took when the family split up, did you?”
He Yi watched in silence, waiting to see what he intended.
He Jie continued, “Who gave you permission to spend it? That money is mine.”
With perfect calm, He Yi replied, “I still have the signed agreement dividing the household property. Since when has the money allocated to me had anything to do with you?”
He Jie nearly bit his own tongue. What nerve! Before, while they still lived in the same family, He Yi had disliked him, but surely he could see the official runner’s uniform now. Did He Yi not know he had become head of the yamen runners? How could he remain so indifferent, as if He Jie were beneath his notice?
He Jie tightened his fist and reached for his saber, intending to see whether He Yi would still dare stare at him once he drew it. His hand met empty air. Only then did he remember giving the weapon to Zhang Wu.
He shot Zhang Wu a look. Zhang Wu understood: at last it was his turn.
“I am the town patrol inspector. I have come to uphold justice. He Jie reports that you illegally occupied silver and grain fields belonging to his household. Is this true?” Zhang Wu swept aside the hem of his robe, sat astride a long bench, and questioned He Yi in a stern voice.
Any ordinary villager would have been frightened senseless, dropping to his knees and begging for mercy. That was what the three men had expected. Yet He Yi made no move to kneel.
For an instant his stern expression cracked, but it quickly settled again. He kept meeting their eyes levelly. To the intruders, the stance looked like naked contempt.
Why wasn’t he afraid? Could he genuinely not know what a patrol inspector was? Surely not. He Jie and Zhang Wu were both baffled.
Zhang Wu pressed on with his rehearsed lines, demanding that He Yi hand over the money or face arrest and imprisonment.
He Jie chimed in. “You never should have received that money in the division. You colluded with your own grandfather to deceive the village head and swindle it away. Inspector, I beg you to investigate!”
Still He Yi stared coldly at them, without so much as knitting his brow.
What was happening? He had not even asked who his real grandfather was. Could he already know? He Jie grew anxious. The two others shot him furtive questioning glances, but received no answer.
Perhaps ashamed of how foolish they were beginning to look, He Jie joined the other cloth-clad runner in attempting to seize He Yi and intimidate him by force.
He Yi glanced at the saber hanging from Zhang Wu’s waist, then at the waists of the two men advancing on him. After a few breaths of consideration, he kicked He Jie viciously in the kneecap. With a sharp crack, the man collapsed to his knees. Without even looking down, He Yi struck backward with his right fist, catching Ning Fuwen across the bridge of the nose, then snapped his arm upward and drove his elbow toward the man’s temple.
Ning Fuwen fell backward but managed to retreat and brace himself against a wall before he crashed to the ground.
Still on his knees, He Jie felt pain surge through his leg. He had no strength to stand; even the tendons around his knee were twitching.
“You damned bastard! What insolence! You dare attack an official of the imperial court!” He Jie roared.
You had better really be someone the court appointed, He Yi thought, looking down at his cousin’s clenched teeth and hissing breaths without a flicker of emotion.
“Zhang Wu, do something! Are you dead or what?” Humiliated beyond endurance, He Jie no longer cared about maintaining the charade. All he wanted was He Yi dead.
Deep down he still feared his cousin. He had witnessed that reckless, almost insane ferocity of a man with nothing to lose. That was why he had recruited someone to impersonate the patrol inspector, hoping to use official authority to force He Yi to surrender his money. Instead He Yi would not listen, would not recognize his supposed betters, and showed no fear whatsoever. He was truly mad!
He Jie was becoming frantic too. His eyes were bloodshot and hatred boiled within him. When Zhang Wu charged with the saber and drew He Yi’s attention, He Jie tried to rise and attack from behind. He Yi did not even turn. He kicked the man’s right knee again, this time with even greater force. He Jie dropped to his knees once more, then toppled heavily sideways in a cloud of dust because both knees hurt too badly to keep his balance.
The other two men traded blows with He Yi. After several exchanges, He Yi became wary. These men were not empty showmen like He Jie, with strength but no skill. They knew how to fight and had probably obtained their positions through genuine ability.
Fighting two opponents at once was difficult, especially with the saber flashing between them. Its blade was thin and wobbled when swung, perhaps better suited to intimidation than actual cutting. Even so, it restricted He Yi’s movements. One misjudgment cost him a lock of hair and opened a cut across his shoulder. Blood poured from the slash.
He Yi immediately turned his head, found the wound, and pressed hard against it to stop the bleeding.
Zhang Wu froze. He had not expected to land a real blow, much less such a serious one. He had not intended to injure He Yi so badly, but a blade was difficult to control once swung.
He stood motionless in panic. Ning Fuwen stopped attacking too. He genuinely admired He Yi’s fighting ability. Two against one was dishonorable enough; he could not bring himself to attack a wounded man and take his life.
But although those two held back, someone else would not miss such a splendid opportunity.
He Yi felt a rush of air past his ear and, still holding his shoulder, dodged in the opposite direction. But He Jie had deliberately thrown a memorial tablet from the household shrine to distract him. Immediately afterward, he raised a long bench and smashed it down toward He Yi’s head.
With two sickening cracks, the bench held firm. Its legs and protruding seat struck He Yi squarely across his forehead and temple.
Ning Fuwen, standing to the right, would have been struck too had he not jumped aside. He Jie had not spared him a thought. Ning was about to curse, but the sight of He Jie’s crazed expression frightened the words back into his throat.
“Hahahaha! Aren’t you such a great fighter? Didn’t you love beating me in front of everyone? Why don’t you get up? Come on, hit me! Why aren’t you moving? I thought you were so capable, you useless bastard!”
He Jie kicked He Yi several times as he lay unconscious on the ground. Blood streamed from He Yi’s forehead, past his brows and behind his ear, pooling in a glaring red stain on the floor. The sight only sent He Jie into wilder laughter.
Zhang Wu crouched to stop the bleeding, but before he could touch the injured man, He Jie kicked him aside and ordered him to search for He Yi’s money and take anything valuable.
That had been their purpose all along. Yet He Yi’s life now hung in the balance because of them, and He Jie seemed wholly indifferent. Zhang Wu felt a chill of fear.
“He’ll die if we don’t stop the bleeding, won’t he? That’ll cause problems. We’ll get into trouble.” In his panic, Zhang Wu forgot that He Yi was merely He Jie’s cousin, not some powerful person with connections. All he could think was that they might offend someone important and lose their prestigious jobs as runners.
Ning Fuwen tried to reason with He Jie too, but got nowhere. He Jie searched the rooms himself, kicking at everything within reach.
In the end he found nothing. A few shabby books seemed worthless, and there were not even several decent changes of clothing. Enraged, He Jie smashed a cabinet in He Yi’s bedroom.
He then went around the back and discovered the neat, beautiful vegetable garden. A vicious impulse took hold. He trampled every plant, snapping what would break and kicking over what would not. Before long the whole garden was ruined, its former vitality erased.
The yao herb was crushed into the mud as well, its leaves and stems twisted together beneath a snapped chili plant, showing no sign of life.
He Jie returned to the hall, his face black with anger, and shouted, “I saw chickens in the coop. You two catch as many as you can. Consider them your payment.”
He had promised before the trip to pay them out of his own pocket if they found no money. Now he was reneging. Ning Fuwen and Zhang Wu exchanged a look, hid their bloodstained hands, and went outside.
He Yi’s bleeding had stopped, but he still looked terribly ill. His face had turned deathly pale.
The sight pleased He Jie. He clicked his tongue and waited for the other two to return.
Without warning, a chorus of loud honking and two men’s screams swept from east to west. Two human figures and a goose hurtled past in a blur.
He Jie stared. Zhang Wu and Ning Fuwen were being chased toward the village by an unbelievably fat goose. He almost thought his eyes were deceiving him.
A little later the two returned, but now the goose was followed by more than ten villagers carrying hoes and axes.
“What’s going on?” The villagers had seen strangers pursued by the goose and suspected thieves, so they had come to investigate. Instead they found He Jie in He Yi’s home, wearing an official runner’s uniform. Cold sweat broke out on them. A closer look showed that the other two men appeared to be runners too.
Then they saw He Yi lying in a pool of blood. The villagers were stunned into silence, their boldness in pursuing suspected thieves vanishing at once.
Zheng Yuanfeng and Uncle Zheng had been working farther away in the fields and arrived a little later, alerted by the goose. They too saw what had happened.
Zheng Yuanfeng felt as though someone had struck his skull with a club. For a long moment he could hear nothing clearly. Then he recovered himself and tried to rush to He Yi.
But Uncle Zheng seized his arm.
“Father!” Zheng Yuanfeng turned in disbelief.
Uncle Zheng held him tightly. He desperately did not want his son to approach men dressed as officials. Yet when he met his son’s gaze and glanced at He Yi lying on the ground, pity overcame fear. With trembling, wrinkled hands, he finally let go.
Zheng Yuanfeng stepped forward. “He Jie, you’ve gone too far! It was bad enough when you used to take things from every household you passed if you liked the look of them. Now you’d even hurt your own cousin! Are you human?”
“He committed a crime. I’m simply carrying out my duties impartially. What’s wrong with that?” He Jie lied without blinking, looking down on the crowd.
“What crime could He Yi have committed? Everyone in this village knows what sort of man he is. Tell us what he did that warranted such a brutal beating!”
The villagers, previously cowed, realized Zheng Yuanfeng was right. What crime justified this treatment? He Yi had not even appeared in court. This was outright extrajudicial punishment.
Seeing these farmers glaring at him rather than cowering, He Jie exploded. “What do you mean by that? He Yi resisted lawful arrest, and this is what happens. Do you want the same treatment? Are you obstructing officers of the court?”
The villagers dared do nothing more. They could barely meet his eyes. He Jie had no patience left for them and ordered Zhang Wu and Ning Fuwen to drag He Yi to the ox cart waiting outside.
The men hesitated but complied. Originally they had intended to take the money and flee. Now that the villagers had gathered and He Jie had publicly claimed an official arrest, withdrawing would amount to admitting their wrongdoing. They had little choice but to continue the deception.
As the men moved He Yi, the villagers crowded around, helplessly watching his still-unconscious body tossed into the back of the cart.
Zheng Yuanfeng glared at He Jie, red-eyed with anger. He received only a mocking smile.
The ox cart gradually vanished from sight.
Uncle Zheng felt sick at heart and had no idea what to do. Then his son showed how much he had grown. Looking at his father with sudden determination, Zheng Yuanfeng said, “Father, let’s go find Madman Tang!”
At that same moment, far away at the Northwestern Main Camp, Xue Ci suddenly sat up from his mat, startling Commander Qin, who was preparing salted milk tea nearby.
“Are you feeling better? Have you got the strength to sit up now?” Qin asked.
Xue Ci stared blankly at him without replying.
“What is it?” Qin was puzzled. Xue Ci did not seem to be looking at him at all, but at something beyond him.
Qin turned around. There was nothing unusual behind him.
When he looked back, something utterly unexpected happened. A thin trickle of blood slowly ran from the corner of Xue Ci’s mouth.
Xue Ci was startled too. He wiped away the moisture and stared at the bright red on his hand. Beneath his sweat-soaked fringe, his gray-blue pupils suddenly contracted.
Commander Qin was even more alarmed. “Why are you spitting blood too?!”
He was just about to summon the army physician when he saw Xue Ci clutch the left side of his chest. His fingers tightened, crumpling the fabric of his tunic. Then his lips parted, and he whispered a name:
“He Yi.”