[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty":3,"chapter-a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-chapter-32":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","A Literary Genius in the Song Dynasty",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2336415,4568,"Chapter 32: Station Observations","a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-chapter-32",32,"\u003Cp>When they resumed their journey, the sky suddenly changed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The contours of the northern mountains of Luzhou were blurred into bluish-gray by mist and rain, yet farmers by the roadside still bent over planting rice seedlings.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Their brown straw capes merged into a single expanse beneath the rain, and an old man wearing a conical hat stood on the field ridge, pouring fish fry from a bamboo basket into a pond beside the muddy paddy—silver tails flashed once in the turbid water and vanished.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The sudden downpour eased; as dusk fell, the carriage climbed a mountain pass, and the setting sun painted the entire hillside orange-red.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Terraced fields of rapeseed on the slope had already gone to seed; several village women carried bamboo baskets, harvesting the last tender shoots.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Farther off, in the valley, evening smoke curled from thatched roofs, mingling with mountain mist as it drifted toward Jinguancheng.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After spending one night beyond Luzhou and heading north, they entered the Sichuan Basin entirely, with mountains vanished without a trace.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Across the boundless flatland, the number of farmland plots along the imperial road sharply decreased, replaced instead by vast stretches of mulberry groves—now nearing early summer, the leaves were thick and glossy, gleaming with an oily sheen in the sunlight.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lu Beigu noticed that roughly every hundred paces stood a stone-well, its platform fitted with a windlass, where women often dipped silk baskets on bamboo poles to rinse them beside the well.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Never seen this before?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Never,” Lu Beigu replied, equally curious. “In Anle Creek, people mostly grow sorghum, brew liquor, and gather mountain goods—never raised silkworms.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“This is ‘bathing the silkworms.’”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Li Pan explained: “Sichuan silkworm farmers follow ‘three baths, three molts.’ Well water is cold—it halts silkworm disease—or rather, silkworms that can’t endure such chill won’t survive.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Survival of the fittest.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Li Pan paused, pondered, then smiled: “That’s an interesting saying—sharp.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After traveling most of the day, Lu Beigu finally reached halfway through his reference book, *The Essentials of the Book of Rites*, and arrived at a station where they could rest.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Along Song imperial roads, relay posts were placed every twenty li, and stations every forty li.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But relay posts weren’t for them—they were military, under the Ministry of War.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The Song had a famous rapid military postal system called “Emergency Foot Relay,” capable of covering four hundred li per day, established solely for urgent military intelligence.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In *Water Margin*, the Star of Swift Movement, Dai Zong, nicknamed the Divine Traveler, was said to wield a Daoist technique called Divine Travel, attaching divine horse-armor to his legs to cover eight hundred li per day—this ability was likely derived from the “Emergency Foot Relay.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>What they actually used were the stations.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Song stations primarily provided lodging, meals, and horse changes for passing officials and couriers, akin to modern guesthouses.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>When their carriage entered the station courtyard, Lu Beigu followed Li Pan down.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He stretched his aching back and looked around.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Within the brick walls, two ancient locust trees cast dappled shadows; the stable echoed with snorting horses.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The station master, wearing a round-collar robe, directed laborers hauling hay; seeing their arrival, he brushed his sleeves and hurried forward.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After verifying Li Pan’s credentials, the station master’s tone grew threefold more respectful: “Several superior rooms remain in the back courtyard—this way!”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He led them through the front hall, where wooden plaques nailed to pillars listed, in dense script, the officials who had passed through this month.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Sixth day: Wang Moumou , Clerk of the Zizhou Circuit Transport Office, accompanied by three attendants, two horses.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Eighth day: Zheng Moumou , Inspector of the Yizhou Circuit Judicial Office, one sealed dispatch.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lu Beigu glanced at the row of vermilion-painted dispatch boxes beneath the corridor; each compartment bore labels for different circuits. Boxes bound for Lizhou and Kuizhou were packed full—likely because the long distance made transport arduous, so they waited until full before sending. Boxes for nearby Yizhou and Zizhou circuits, by contrast, appeared half-empty.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>No sooner had they unloaded their luggage and stepped out for dinner than the sound of carriage bells echoed again from the imperial road.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This time, it was a guard detail escorting prisoners; their captain, drunk, handed over the station voucher while shouting for food.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The station master grimaced as he accepted the voucher and opened his ledger to record it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lu Beigu’s sharp eyes caught the station master casually writing “Ten” after “consumed hay,” then hesitating before adding “Five,” making it “Fifteen” bundles.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Taking public advantage—true in every age,” he muttered to himself.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Soon, the meal arrived: three dishes and one soup—pickles, vegetables, and meat.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The pickles were a dish of fermented melon shreds, chopped and tossed with garlic paste, vinegar, and a touch of sesame oil—salty, fresh, crisp, and perfect with rice.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The vegetable was boiled cabbage, simply boiled in water, sprinkled with salt, and served in a clay bowl—seemed tasteless.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But the meat dish looked appetizing: fried fish paste. The carp was cut into chunks, marinated in salt and fermented rice lees, then fried golden—the skin crisp, the flesh salty, chewy, reminiscent of the fried hairtail Lu Beigu had eaten before.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The soup was a bowl of scallion-white broth, faintly spicy, warm enough to dispel chill, but far from tasty.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The station master bowed apologetically: “Station meals on the imperial road are crude, far from the taverns of prefectural cities—please forgive us.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Li Pan waved dismissively: “Better than other stations we’ve passed.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He broke off a steamed bun and dipped it in the oily juice of the fish paste.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lu Beigu ladled soup, ate it with millet rice, and picked up a few pieces of fermented melon—comfortable enough.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The guard detail at the next table ate worse—no meat at all. Stations served according to rank: Li Pan was County Magistrate; their captain was merely a Captain.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>One of their own escorting guards glanced at the prisoners and asked:\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Huh, square neck-shackle, five-pound leg irons—what crime did he commit?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Hearing this, Lu Beigu turned his head.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The prisoner was a sturdy middle-aged man, tall and broad, his face sallow, head drooping.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He wore a square wooden neck-shackle made of paulownia wood, wrapped in ragged cotton to prevent chafing—weighing at least twenty catties. And that wasn’t all: his leg irons had a five-pound iron ball attached; every slight movement made a copper bell inside jingle.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Honestly, even Wu Song in *Water Margin* didn’t get this treatment.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Since both sides were officials, conversation came easily; the drunken captain merely said: “He killed the entire household that lent seed money.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This was the gravest crime under the *Song Criminal Code*’s General Provisions—classified among the “Ten Unforgivable Offenses,” exempt from amnesty even during general pardons. The likely sentence was death by heavy beating; the remote possibility was lingchi—though the latter had occurred only once in recent decades, during the Tian Sheng era.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In short, to both guards, the man was already dead.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Why?” Lu Beigu asked.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The guards replied vaguely: “Probably couldn’t repay.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The sallow-faced man silently ate the rice ball kneaded fresh for him, eyes lowered; Lu Beigu didn’t press further, and returned to his meal.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After dinner, Li Pan, likely stiff from the carriage, suggested they take a walk.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Though Lu Beigu refused to admit his youthful body was less resilient than Li Pan’s forty-year-old frame, truthfully, he longed to lie down—but how could he say, “I’ll rest first,” when the County Magistrate wanted to stroll?\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>So he followed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This station, situated on the direct road to Chengdu, enjoyed convenient traffic and had gradually become a settlement.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The group wandered aimlessly, passing behind a low wall choked with kudzu vines, and suddenly found dozens of neatly arranged silk looms.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This was a Shu brocade weaving yard.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>——————\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>① Silkworm basket: a common Sichuan tool for rearing silkworms, woven from bamboo or reed, used to hold mulberry leaves and silkworms.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>② “Jiao” was a common term in Song postal systems, meaning a parcel; “di jiao” referred to mailed parcels. “Fengpi” denoted the seal: official documents were either “tong feng” (open, non-confidential) or “shi feng” (sealed, confidential). “Tong feng” bore a summary on the seal, while “shi feng” required additional paper folding, re-sealing, and a numbered label without revealing content.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>③ A paper voucher granting access to station horses, carriages, and laborers. Wu Chuhou’s *Qingxiang Miscellaneous Notes: Station Vouchers* recorded its origin: “Before the Tang, inns and relay stations provided transport; during Kaiyuan, simplicity prevailed, and paper vouchers began.” The Song inherited this Tang system, as noted in the *History of Song: Officialdom, Volume Twelve*.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>(End of Chapter)\u003C\u002Fp>",1430,"2026-06-20T21:44:14.864Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","ffe9f8ba0ebc4916a1f210ea44ba1d8b94d10c20347aabf41b38e7f687b259bf","a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-chapter-33","a-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-chapter-31",56,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fa-literary-genius-in-the-song-dynasty-cover.jpg"]