Chapter 256: Resignation

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The middle-aged man nicknamed "Oar Monkey" was also from Chengwei Village. Outgoing by nature, he was unwilling to spend his days scraping a living from fishing. Once he came of age, he was often away earning a living elsewhere, leaving his old mother to suffer alone in the village.

Fortunately, Chengwei Village had only about ten households in all. Though a mix of different surnames lived together, the grinding hardship day after day had long since twisted these villagers into a single rope: if they didn't support one another, none of them would survive the various disasters and **.

And so Monkey became the village's "man in the know."

Working on the move for merchants all year round, he would always bring back a little silver at year's end to see his old mother, then spin a load of tall tales for the isolated villagers, giving them a taste of the dazzling world outside.

Unlike previous years, however, Monkey had recently broken his routine and suddenly returned… and it was still far from year's end. The first moment he got back to the village, he sought out the man who called the shots, Yu Chengde.

Normally, the one who dealt with the various Official Runners and grain levies on Chengwei Village's behalf was the white-bearded old man, Village Chief Ba Grandpa; yet in truth, Yu Chengde, who held sway over all the able-bodied men in the village, was the real backbone.

The moment Monkey saw Yu Chengde, he launched into an animated account of his recent trip selling goods at Dayuan Port in Yizhou. With his glib tongue, he then proceeded to lecture Yu Chengde on the settlement policies across the sea. In short, apart from shaving one's head, going to Dayuan meant enough food and warm clothes, escape from a sea of bitterness, and a sure path to the pinnacle of life.

…Yu Chengde, of course, did not believe these fine-sounding stories. Crows everywhere were equally black. Even if the Great King across the sea was short of hands to till the land right now, he was likely up to no good behind the scenes. The poor wretches would suffer wherever they went — this was a truth Yu Chengde understood well.

Yet Monkey, who had always regarded Yu Chengde as an authority since childhood, was not buying it this time. Not only did he scoff at someone's outdated notions, he also tried to keep brainwashing his boss. In between, he scurried wildly all over the village, clamoring about taking his old mother to Dayuan to live a life fit for immortals…

Quite a few of the young men were swayed by his sweet talk.

Seeing this situation, Yu Chengde had a bit of a headache, so in the end he compromised. The two sides agreed that once everyone returned from this fishing trip, the village would send someone to escort Monkey and his old mother to Dayuan first; then, after the "observer" came back to report on conditions, the rest would make their decision.

Yet the world is unpredictable. What Yu Chengde hadn't expected was that today, after returning from fishing, he himself would bring up the matter on his own initiative, without any urging from Monkey.

Monkey was no fool. First Yu Chengde had thrown every last pig and chicken in the village into one pot, and the very next moment he was secretly calling Monkey over to ask about Dayuan — this was clearly planning to escape!

Having figured out the cause and effect, Monkey said gravely to Yu Chengde, "Uncle, every word your nephew has spoken these past days is absolutely true. If there's a single lie, may I die a wretched death! My old mother's life and the lives of everyone in the village rest on this — how would your nephew dare talk nonsense?"

Yu Chengde nodded slowly. In this moment, he was determined.

In truth, he had no choice. The immense joy brought by the 1,000 silver pieces and the sudden, shocking news of disaster, like ice and fire striking at once, had already completely shattered this old man's moral bottom line. 【*! @#

As the saying goes, liquor emboldens the coward. Yu Chengde was never a coward to begin with, and now he had something far more potent than fine wine — 1,000 taels of silver and a utopia. With all the conditions now in place, he very naturally went berserk — he was now going to resign from the Great Ming, no longer playing the obedient subject for the lords and masters.

After discussing the details thoroughly with Monkey, they returned to the village to find the pork and chicken already cooked, just waiting for the feast to begin. After joining everyone for a hearty meal with feigned cheer, Yu Chengde opened the village's only jar of homebrew and poured a bowl for every able-bodied man.

After they all drank together, Yu Chengde let out a great roar: "I'm done with this!" With that, he smashed his coarse ceramic bowl onto the muddy ground at his feet.

Amid everyone's stunned stares, Yu Chengde said loudly, "Brothers, we rise before dawn and work till dark, risking our lives at sea, all just to feed our families. And now the officials squeeze us harder by the day — we were barely holding on as it was."

At this point, Yu Chengde slammed a fist hard onto the table: "And then that cur Wang Fuqi stabs us brothers in the back! Tell me, everyone — even if I paid silver today to ransom Third Sister back, with that dog around, can we still go to sea with any peace of mind?"

At Yu Chengde's furious words, the people in the courtyard all felt the same, their faces filling with rage.

"Uncle, we can't let that cur Wang Fuqi off easy! I say we just snatch Third Sister back!" At Monkey's next loud shout, the already furious crowd instantly found an outlet and began roaring in agreement.

After sweeping his gaze across the courtyard, Yu Chengde spoke slowly: "When one place won't keep a man, another will. Since we can't go on living here, we might as well go to Yizhou and throw in our lot with that damn King Cao! Whatever it's like over there, it's probably better than this Ming Dynasty!"

Seeing the able-bodied men's spirits roused as they all cheered him on, Yu Chengde nodded with satisfaction, then suddenly drew that Military Spike from behind his waist and stabbed it into the tabletop: "When a man leaves, he settles his accounts. The years of pent-up rage we brothers have suffered — someone has to pay it back! Whoever's got the guts, come with me and slaughter that dog Wang Fuqi!"

"We'll go together!"

"Together!"

In this era, once all the able-bodied men had decided on something, the women and children had no right whatsoever to voice any opposition. They could only drift with the current, entrusting their fates entirely to the men.

Once their thinking was unified, Yu Chengde immediately began issuing orders.

First was sorting out their belongings. The women would turn the village's remaining coarse rice and mixed grains into dry rations, then each household would pack a bundle or two, and that would be that. Yes, the impoverished fishing village was that pitiful — apart from a couple of bundles holding dry rations and tattered clothes, these people possessed no wealth at all.

At the same time, Yu Chengde picked out six of the village's able-bodied men. These were all seasoned hands who had worked his boat for years; they had fought and killed bandits before and were not afraid to draw blood.

Now those blades and axes salvaged from the seabed came in handy. The weapons used by the Zheng family's direct troops were naturally top-grade — once sharpened, they could be used to kill.

The village had two broken-down Fishing Ships, one large and one small. After making his arrangements, Yu Chengde sent the remaining few men and a crippled carpenter to the boats to do temporary reinforcement and repairs. In the midst of this, he also gave his own son, who was itching to join the action, a kick and sent him back to the boat.

While everyone was busy with preparations, Yu Chengde called for his nephew Yu Chushui. The two of them, one after the other, went to a graveyard outside the village. The owner of this plot was Yu Chengde's elder brother, Yu Chushui's father — the grave of Yu Cheng'en.

In truth, Yu Chengde had also gone out to do "business" in his youth. Back then, he and his elder brother Yu Cheng'en had joined a band of Pirates together, taking up the trade of looting and plundering. Who would have thought that before long, his elder brother would be wounded in a gang fight? Not long after the two returned to Chengwei Village, Yu Cheng'en died from festering wounds.

Before his elder brother died, Yu Chengde had sworn in his presence that he would raise his nephew to adulthood and never again engage in such heaven-defying deeds — this was the fundamental reason why Yu Chengde had toed the line all these years.

"Kowtow to your father. When times are better in the future, we'll come back to move the grave." …Yu Chushui knelt as bidden and knocked his head nine times against the tombstone.

Yu Chengde also kowtowed three times to his own elder brother, then he explained before the grave: the world forced men's hands — honest folk truly could not survive. Yu Chushui was long grown now, yet he couldn't even take a wife. They had no choice but to take up the blade.

After paying respects at the grave, the two returned to the village, their faces filled with Killing Intent.

In this era, even the most law-abiding fishermen did not lack the courage to kill — without such courage, one could forget about going to sea.

The reason people endured injustice was their fear of the authority the officials had built up over centuries. And once that accumulated authority diminished due to the officials' weakness, then the former upholders of the system would have to bear the backlash.

Wang Fuqi was a case in point.

Wang Fuqi was no mighty hero capable of lifting bronze tripods; he was merely a Fish Overlord. Relying on the fact that his elder brother was the Patrol Inspector in the county, he had bought himself a post in the Fish Column at the County Yamen.

The Fish Column was a fish broker, no different from the human brokers in the slave markets — all of them fed off the monopoly rights granted by the system. Wang Fuqi kept seven or eight ruffians and idle thugs under him, who spent their days bullying the market, making loans, and taking cuts. Any fisherman from the area who wanted to sell fish in town had to first let this scoundrel skin a layer off them.

And Yu Chengde's village, being weak, had naturally suffered no small amount of bullying from Wang Fuqi. In fact, the so-called debt used to seize Third Sister had been bought by Wang Fuqi from someone else, then ballooned through compound interest from a few maces of silver to 13 taels.

Setting out from Chengwei Village, seven or eight li north was Chengtou Village, and another five-odd li north was the largest trading market in the area: Shuixiu Town.

Yu Chengde and his group of seven began their preparations just after noon and did not set out for Chengtou Village until three in the afternoon. This timing had been calculated: Wang Fuqi was from Chengtou Village, and usually by this hour the market at Shuixiu Town had dispersed and Wang Fuqi would have returned from town.

Seven fishermen wearing Bamboo Hats and carrying loads of Salted Fish, under the villagers' watchful eyes, formed a single line and silently stepped onto the Dirt Road at the village entrance.

In under an hour, the seven arrived at the entrance of Chengtou Village. After resting a while at the village entrance, the seven once again hoisted their "brimming" fish loads, filed along in order, and headed straight for a tile-roofed house at the far end of Chengtou Village.

Chengtou Village had over a hundred households, far larger in scale than Chengwei Village. And Wang Fuqi's two-courtyard residence sat all alone at the village's end, a stark contrast to the ramshackle huts in the distance.

Seeing the line of men carrying fish loads approach the gate, the several ruffians squatting before the Green Brick gatehouse sent someone inside to report, as was their habit — they had seen this scene of fish loads delivered to the door far too many times; it was always some poor wretches coming to pay rent or settle debts.

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