Chapter 262: 260 Clan Forces

The most beautiful *shayaomei* of the Eight Rows Yao is still in the middle of the selection.

The event was quite lively: first elections within each "Dragon," then the winners of each "Chong" and "Row" competed, and finally all twenty-four Chongs of the Eight Rows held a grand contest.

Zhao Han could not possibly wait around; he continued south by boat all the way.

After passing Qingyuan, the fleet stopped at the Southwest Water Post Station in Sanshui County. The station was simply called Southwest Water Post, and the small town was called Southwest Town.

They rested for the night and set out the next day, switching to the overland route.

Zhao Han sat in the carriage. They had only gone two *li* when the driver suddenly pulled the brake: "Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!"

"What is it?" Zhao Han lifted the carriage curtain and asked.

"People ahead!"

"Protect the Regional Commander!"

"Form ranks! Form ranks!"

The personal guards moved swiftly, surrounding Zhao Han's carriage in a tight ring.

Zhao Han stepped out of the carriage and stood beside the driver to look into the distance. He saw several hundred peasants kneeling ahead.

"No need to panic. Everyone move aside."

Though Zhao Han said this, the moment he stepped past his guards, he could not help reaching to press down on his saber hilt.

Those peasants had been kneeling and waiting for a long time. Seeing that Zhao Han was reluctant to approach, they got up, ran a stretch, and knelt down again.

"Heavenly King Zhao, we have been wronged!"

"We beg Heavenly King Zhao to give justice to the common folk!"

"..."

That they could wait by the road to cry out their grievances, and gather several hundred people, showed at least two things: first, the couriers at Southwest Water Post had secretly tipped off these peasants; second, behind these peasants blocking the road to appeal, there was certainly coordination by clan forces.

Zhao Han had arrived at Southwest Water Post yesterday afternoon. Half an afternoon plus one night was enough time to organize several hundred peasants to come block his path. These peasants were themselves a force to be reckoned with; Zhao Han could not possibly take their one-sided story at face value!

Yet Zhao Han kept a kindly expression and smiled: "If you have grievances, send a spokesman forward to speak."

A man around thirty stood up, ran a few steps, and knelt before Zhao Han: "Heavenly King Zhao, this commoner is Chen Fushun of Shitang Village..."

A few words of Cantonese Zhao Han could roughly guess, but a long speech left him completely at a loss.

The accompanying interpreter came to Zhao Han's side and barked: "Speak one sentence at a time!"

The man stated his case at length and finally made the whole story clear. It was an old case from the year before.

The two villages, for ease of understanding, shall be called Upper River Village and Lower River Village.

The drought last year was severe. Upper River Village cut off the river to irrigate their paddy fields. Lower River Village, furious, went to contest the water and had over twenty people beaten and injured.

The matter was brought to the authorities, but the County Magistrate refused to file the case.

Because according to Zhu Yuanzhang's *Placard of Instructions for the People*, such disputes in the countryside could not be casually reported to the authorities; they had to be handed to the village elders for judgment. Anyone who bypassed the village elders to bring a lawsuit would be punished with sixty strokes of the heavy rod and sent back to the elders for judgment.

Thus, the people of Lower River Village, who had their water source seized and over twenty of their own beaten and injured, also ate a round of beatings at the County Magistrate's office. The elder faction of Upper River Village was stronger; Lower River Village lost its water source, had its people beaten, and in the end still had to scrape together money to pay the medical expenses.

The matter did not end there!

At the autumn harvest, Lower River Village's rice yield dropped by over seventy percent, while Upper River Village was not much affected. So the villagers of Lower River Village mobilized en masse and ran straight to the threshing ground to seize the grain.

This unexpected move caught Upper River Village completely off guard.

Several days later, Upper River Village gathered men for revenge, and Lower River Village suffered a heavy loss, so Lower River Village in turn gathered men. Over several rounds, more and more people joined the armed brawls, until finally a great battle involving over three thousand people broke out between the two sides, dragging in four villages in total.

Over fifty people died!

The County Magistrate finally stepped in. Without distinguishing right from wrong, he arrested ten people from each side of the brawl and had them executed after autumn.

Neither side accepted the verdict. They went to the Regional Inspector Censor to appeal their grievances. The Regional Inspector Censor kicked the case up to the Court of Judicial Review. However, the Regional Inspector Censor was also biased. For a brawl with over fifty dead, he reported only six deaths, and he also spoke in favor of Upper River Village.

All because Upper River Village had someone serving as a high official in the imperial court.

In the end, the Court of Judicial Review ordered the County Magistrate to retry the case. Upper River Village had only one man beheaded; the remaining nine were acquitted and released. Lower River Village had ten men executed.

"Heavenly King Zhao, you be the judge," Chen Fushun said. "Our village first had its water seized, then our people were beaten. Even if seizing the grain was wrong, we were driven to it by starvation. Even if both sides got fifty strokes, we would accept it. Why did they only execute one, while our village had ten killed! The Ming court is rotten to the core. From now on, our village recognizes only Heavenly King Zhao. We beg Heavenly King Zhao to give us justice!"

"We beg Heavenly King Zhao to give us justice!" Several hundred peasants knelt and cried out.

Zhao Han said expressionlessly, "Whoever taught you to say what you just said, tell him to come plead his case himself. These gentry can forget about hiding behind the scenes. I am returning to Southwest Water Post right now to wait. Let those village elders and gentry come on their own."

Chen Fushun froze for a moment, then kowtowed and cried out, "We beg Heavenly King Zhao to give us justice!"

Zhao Han could not be bothered to respond. He turned and left, riding the carriage back to the post station.

He waited at the post station for half a day. A few village elders arrived one after another. They wanted to speak but were ordered to shut their mouths and wait together at the post station.

By the next day, over a dozen gentry from the villages on both sides of the brawl had all arrived.

"Interrogate them separately!" Zhao Han ordered.

Because officials, propagandists, and peasant association cadres were in short supply, Sanshui County had only an acting County Magistrate appointed by Fei Ruhe. This was a wartime appointment, mainly to take over documents and storehouses.

As for land distribution, it would probably take another month or two before it reached the villages around Sanshui County.

The dozen-plus gentry were interrogated separately for a full day.

Where their testimonies did not match, the interrogation was repeated, continuing until well past midnight of the second day. During this time, they were allowed only water — no food, and no sleep.

Chen Maosheng held the final interrogation results and gave a wry smile: "A century of accumulated grudges; it cannot be clearly explained. Whichever side had the higher official bullied the other with that power. This time you took the loss, that time I took the loss. On the whole, the downstream villages took more losses."

"Those kneeling and crying out their grievances — are they freeholding peasants or tenant farmers?" Zhao Han asked.

"Most are tenant farmers," Chen Maosheng said. "A small number of tenants have an extremely complex status, something we never encountered during the Jiangxi land distribution."

Zhao Han grew interested and asked, "Complex how?"

Chen Maosheng explained: "The clan forces here are extremely strong. Every clan has set up communal fields. Some clansmen of closer blood ties can tenant-farm the clan's communal fields, and the rent collected is relatively low. Because they do not have to pay land taxes or perform corvée labor, their standard of living even rivals that of small landlords in Jiangxi. If a disaster year comes, they can receive relief within the clan. Even if they want to do business, they can borrow money from the ancestral hall."

Zhao Han said, "The clans use communal fields to control clansmen of closer blood ties, thus forming the cohesion of a great clan. And they each use private fields to control other tenant farmers. Therefore, whenever a brawl breaks out, they can summon a thousand men with a single call?"

"Exactly so!" Chen Maosheng nodded.

One could liken a clan to an immortal cultivation sect: the inner clan population are the core disciples, those of closer blood ties are inner-sect disciples, and those of more distant blood ties are outer-sect disciples.

They have clan property and clan fields, using these as a means of control. They also run private schools, build bridges, and pave roads — gathering loyalty while controlling everything. Ordinary tenant farmers are exploited, yet must weep tears of gratitude to the landlords. Class contradictions are directly shifted outward. When the people's hearts are unsettled, they just pick a fight with the neighboring village. The contradictions are all shifted to the neighboring village, thus creating a blood feud between the two villages.

Holding a public trial or anything of the sort was impossible to pull off here.

Because no matter how brutally the tenant farmers were exploited, they did not resent the landlords — they resented the villagers of the neighboring village. It was as if their own miserable existence was entirely the fault of that neighboring village.

"This is going to be hard to push forward," Chen Maosheng sighed.

Zhao Han said, "If the soft approach doesn't work, then use the hard one. Of the members of each main lineage, kill half outright, and drag the other half off to the mines."

Chen Maosheng gave a bitter smile. "These gentry all have reputations for virtue. Building bridges and paving roads, relieving their neighbors in famine, spreading culture and moral instruction — they've been doing good works like these all along."

"Doing good deeds cancels out their crimes? The charges are ready-made: inciting the common people to armed feuds, causing dozens of deaths and injuries." This time Zhao Han meant to be ruthless. "After dealing with the main lineages, distribute the land to the common people at once. Take all the main lineage houses, properties, and shops and divide them up too. And from now on, if the feuds continue, it won't just be the ringleaders who are executed — not a single participant will get away. For every feud, confiscate one mu of land from each of them!"

Dealing with the main lineages was about decapitating the leadership.

Distributing land and property would inevitably throw the lineage sons, the closer blood relations, and the more distant blood relations into psychological imbalance, and internal contradictions would arise. Meanwhile, the ordinary tenant farmers would be completely won over. If the lineages tried to rally and make trouble in the future, they would probably start fighting among themselves before they could ever unite against outsiders.

Sanshui County was not far from Guangzhou. Zhao Han directly mobilized troops and began "settling" the disputes in the feuding villages.

That Chen Fushun who had led the kneeling and crying of grievances was a tenant farmer of the closer blood relations.

He watched helplessly as the family of his own great-grandfather was dragged away by Heavenly King Zhao's soldiers. At first he burned with resentment, thinking that Heavenly King Zhao was also siding with the neighboring village — but that very same day, someone came to announce the distribution of land and property.

Dividing up great-grandfather's land and giving it to him?

Chen Fushun stood stunned for a long while, then suddenly felt that great-grandfather's arrest was a fine thing — and that it would be best if the whole family never came back for the rest of their lives.

During the land distribution, Chen Fushun grew furious again.

Why did ordinary tenant farmers get the same amount of land as him? This was clearly his own lineage land; his blood ties were far closer.

Very quickly, Chen Fushun's anger subsided again. Because he discovered that the land the lineage sons received was actually the same as his own. Didn't that put his mind at ease?

Not only was his mind at ease — he was secretly gloating.

Soon he was green with envy again, because the lineage sons were actually allotted shops. There were very few shops in the town, certainly not enough to go around, but even the lineage sons who didn't get a shop still received a share of movable property.

The entire land-distribution process seemed utterly bizarre.

Except for the tenants outside the lineage, who were simply overjoyed, everyone else was a mix of delight and resentment. Because they had all gained something, they did not hate Zhao Han — they hated each other.

These two villages had purely walked right into the muzzle of the gun; Zhao Han killed to make an example of them.

He could not go around Guangdong killing and redistributing land like this everywhere. For the remaining great clans, Zhao Han planned to forcibly relocate them to Huguang. Some of the great clans in Huguang would also be broken up and moved to other departments and counties — after all, parts of Huguang were desperately short of population.

Zhao Han tossed the land-distribution work for the two "demonstration villages" to Chen Maosheng to handle, while he himself went to Guangzhou for a friendly exchange with the merchants.

(End of chapter)