Chapter 166: The Son of Heaven's Far-Reaching Plans; A Common Man's Resolve

On the great parade ground of the Valiant Guard Camp outside Di'an Gate, banners and pennons stood thick as a forest, snapping and cracking in the wind.

Several thousand soldiers, helmed and armored, gripping halberds and pressing hands to saber hilts, stood upon the parade ground like pines and cypresses — not a breath of sound among them.

Every gaze converged on the tall command platform ahead.

Upon the platform, Zhu Youjian, Emperor of the Great Ming, stood erect in the Son of Heaven's everyday robes, yet for a long while he uttered not a single word.

Behind him were Xu Yingyuan, seal-holding eunuch of the Directorate of the Imperial Horses, and Cao Bianjiao along with the other five newly appointed Company Commanders.

They, like the soldiers below the platform, held their breath and stilled their minds, waiting in silence.

No one knew what His Majesty was thinking, and no one dared to hurry him.

Yet the thoughts of this sovereign — unfathomable in the eyes of his ministers — had long since drifted beyond the highest heavens.

His gaze seemed to be inspecting the martial array before him, but his mind had followed the spinach he had seen that morning and wandered off into boundless reverie.

It had snowed in the capital yesterday.

A short, fierce, bone-dry snow.

The flakes swirled and fluttered, putting on a grand show, yet the whole affair was over in barely half a shichen.

After it touched the ground, not a trace accumulated; the moment the sun rose this morning, it vanished without a sign.

Before coming to the parade ground this morning, he had made a point of going by Rabbit Hill and drawing several old farmers aside to ask.

They said the snow was a bit odd, but such things had happened in years past. So long as a few more snowfalls followed, it could hardly be called a disaster.

Just an ordinary thing…

Ordinary?

Zhu Youjian, who carried the answers in his head, certainly did not think so.

In his later age he had been a humanities student, not a science student.

That left him with only a smattering of knowledge about large-scale steelmaking or hand-cranking a telegraph; he could only work alongside the people of the Great Ming to rebuild the tech tree from scratch.

But a humanities student's knowledge was not entirely useless.

For instance, he knew with perfect clarity how that specter called the "Little Ice Age" had destroyed this old and vast empire.

Why would a mere one- or two-degree drop in temperature be so catastrophic?

Was it simply that crops failed from insufficient warmth?

It was nowhere near that simple!

In a land dominated by a subtropical monsoon climate, the vast majority of rainfall across the realm of Huaxia depends on the abundant moisture that the southeast monsoon carries in from the ocean.

And the strength and advance of the southeast monsoon are, in turn, precisely controlled by the subtropical high-pressure belt.

In a normal year, the subtropical high acts like a loyal general, marching steadily northward through the summer and pushing the rain belt all the way from South China to North China, bathing the entire empire in ample rain.

But… the temperature dropped.

A global cooling meant the continental landmass warmed more slowly in summer, weakening the thermal low-pressure systems that formed.

Once the temperature differential shrank, the force driving moisture from the oceanic high toward the continental low naturally weakened as well.

This is the first truth of the Little Ice Age calamity: the summer monsoon as a whole was enfeebled, and the total moisture supply diminished.

And what was more terrifying, the impetus that drove the subtropical high northward likewise weakened because the continent had grown "quiescent."

It would begin to falter, even lingering and loitering for long periods over the Yangtze-Huai region.

The result was catastrophic flooding in the south, with unbroken torrential rains, while the vast north waited in vain for life-saving sweet rain — not a drop falling.

By the time the subtropical high finally mustered enough strength to drag itself north, the crops in the fields had long since been scorched and parched to death beneath the fierce sun.

This is the second truth of the Little Ice Age calamity — and the killing stroke that truly destroyed the Great Ming!

— Floods in the south, drought in the north!

Compared to the chain reaction set off by the temperature drop, what did that paltry one- or two-degree loss of warmth and its crop reductions even amount to?

Zhu Youjian's brow furrowed slightly.

Personnel, military affairs, fiscal and tax matters were gradually unfolding now.

The officials' personnel dossiers he had to leaf through and review each day were growing fewer and fewer.

It was time to set aside some hours and begin preparations for climbing the tech tree.

That included the steam engine, military industry, and naturally this branch of the humanities tech tree he was so familiar with — meteorological theory.

Otherwise, once the new policies in Northern Zhili were fully rolled out, the injured landlords and the suppressed civil officials would surely converge with these natural disasters into a single torrent.

When that happened, his desk would be piled high with memorials declaring that "the new policies lack virtue" and "Heaven-sent calamities serve as warning"; by then, even if it were not shit in his crotch, it would be shit all the same.

So, how to begin…

And thus Zhu Youjian the humanities student, atop this lecture platform and beneath the eyes of several thousand men, stared blankly into space and let his imagination roam the future.

In the end, he roused himself.

He swept his gaze across the rows of solemn faces below the platform, swiftly snapping out of his "early-morning class" daze and switching back into the working mode of the Great Ming Emperor.

"Xu Yingyuan." His voice was calm and even. "Distribute the rewards."

"This slave obeys the decree."

Xu Yingyuan, seal-holding eunuch of the Directorate of the Imperial Horses, bowed deeply, then stepped forward, drew a scroll of yellow silk from his sleeve, unfurled it, and in a ringing voice proclaimed:

"By the Mandate of Heaven, the Emperor decrees:"

"Since the founding of the Valiant Guard Camp, you have eagerly enlisted and trained with diligence, and Our heart is greatly comforted. In this assessment of over two thousand men, though you have not been selected, your sinews, bones, blood, and valor already surpass those of ordinary soldiers. Were you posted elsewhere, you would still be accounted crack troops."

"However, the Valiant Guard Camp is the Son of Heaven's own personal army, the keen blade of the realm. None but the one man chosen from a hundred may enter its ranks. We now distribute you, over two thousand strong, among the various units of the Capital Camps. We hope you will remain as diligent as before, strive valiantly, and then perhaps the day will yet come when you return to the Valiant Guard Camp!"

"His Sacred Majesty is merciful. The season has entered autumn and the weather grows daily colder; mindful of the hardships of your training, He specially bestows upon every officer and soldier of the Valiant Guard Camp one padded cotton jacket, one bowl of imperial wine, and ten gold-backed great coins, to fortify your resolve."

"Those who have been eliminated shall receive the same reward, to manifest Our grace!"

Xu Yingyuan's voice reverberated across the high platform, every word carrying clearly into the ears of the thousands of soldiers below.

After a brief silence, a roaring cry like a mountain toppling and a sea surging burst forth toward the heavens.

"Long live His Majesty! Ten thousand years! Ten thousand, ten thousand years!"

Every soldier, whether staying or being dismissed, dropped to one knee — the clash of armored plates merged into a single mighty symphony.

Zhu Youjian nodded with satisfaction, raised his hand in a gesture of support: "Distribute the rewards."

"Distribute the rewards —!"

The shrill, drawn-out chant, starting from the command platform, was relayed by a line of eunuchs and carried to every corner of the entire parade ground.

The ceremony began.

Platoon by platoon, file by file.

The camp eunuchs, holding rosters, began calling out names in loud voices.

Every file and platoon that had been dismissed walked out of the ranks under a silent, collective gaze.

The roll-call voices drew near from afar; one after another, the squads that only yesterday had been competing for ranking gradually vanished in the direction of the parade ground's exit.

The soldiers who remained were silent, only watching all of this quietly.

In one corner of the parade ground, within the formation where Zhang Fu stood, the atmosphere was complicated to the extreme.

Sun the Fat looked left and right, forced a smile, and said: "At least we'll earn a bowl of wine on our way out, and we won't have to suffer this winter drilling — not such a bad thing after all."

No one answered him.

The smile on Sun the Fat's face slowly froze, and finally dissolved into a sigh so faint it was barely audible.

He knew just how insincere his own words were.

Who wouldn't want to stay in the Valiant Guard Camp? Who wouldn't want to be a soldier of the Son of Heaven's personal army?

But now that things had come to this, it was nothing more than self-consolation.

File Leader Zhang Fu pressed his hand on his saber hilt, the veins on the back of his hand bulging, staring fixedly ahead.

His lips were pressed into a resolute straight line, like a fierce tiger about to be driven from its mountain forest, his eyes filled with unwillingness and suppressed fury.

The Valiant Guard Camp's dismissals were conducted by platoon.

As a vanguard warrior chosen from Datong, no matter how hard he fought, he could not overcome the utter uselessness of the Platoon Officer above him!

A pity! A lament!

That dog-fucking Platoon Officer! That dog-fucking Liu Ruoxian! Don't let me run into you in the capital!

Li the Pockmarked drooped his triangular eyes, expressionless, only plucking the bowstring with his fingers over and over, producing soft twanging sounds — weng, weng.

The vibrating hum of that bowstring seemed to be the very portrait of his heart's tangled turmoil at this moment, grating on everyone's nerves.

Broken sinews and shattered bones can still be mended; but once the fighting spirit drains away, it can never be gathered again.

Their file, as it happened, was made up entirely of fierce veterans from the border garrisons — hard men who had crawled out from piles of the dead.

That Chen the Stutterer, clumsy with words, had taken three heads from the western barbarians.

He had simply traded them all for money to buy medicine for his old mother, which was why he remained a common rank-and-file soldier.

Chen the Skinny and Sun the Fat, though they came from guard stations in the capital region, had both served their rotational troop duty and fought beyond the passes — true men!

But at this very moment, every one of them could feel that chill called "loss" slowly eating into their very marrow.

That dog-fucking Platoon Officer!

At last, a Camp Officer holding a roster came before them.

"Zhang Fu's file, step forward!"

Here it came.

Zhang Fu drew a deep breath, released his grip on the saber hilt, and led his four men out of the ranks, striding toward the camp gate.

Every step felt like treading on red-hot iron plates, searing his heart with pain.

At the camp gate, a long passage had already been cleared.

In the middle of the passage, over a dozen tables had been set up; behind the tables sat a row of junior eunuchs, and behind them were mountains of brand-new padded jackets.

The five men silently turned in their waist sabers and bows and arrows — they felt lighter on their bodies, but darker in their hearts.

They were led before one of the tables.

A eunuch in charge of registration glanced up at them and, without turning his head, called out behind him: "Two large size, three medium size."

Several hired laborers immediately fished out five jackets from the mountain of padded clothing and tossed them casually onto the table.

The eunuch pointed with his chin at the padded jackets and said in a businesslike tone: "Take them. Wearing these padded jackets, when you go to the Capital Camps, don't disgrace the name of our Valiant Guard Camp."

The five men silently picked up the padded jackets — they were thick and solid in the hand, the material fine cotton cloth, nothing like the shoddy goods in the guard stations and border garrisons.

Passing this row of tables, ahead was another row of long tables.

Behind the tables were several large chests, gleaming gold within — all gold-backed coins, each worth five qian.

On the tables lay strings of coins, already threaded and tied.

The eunuch in charge of disbursing money saw them, counted out five strings of copper coins and handed them over, his face bearing a trace of a smile, and spoke almost the exact same words as the one before:

"Take them. Taking these gold-backed coins, you've received His Majesty's blessing. When you go to the Capital Camps, don't disgrace the name of our Valiant Guard Camp."

Zhang Fu took the money without a word and distributed it to the four men behind him.

A string of gold-backed coins worth five qian each could fetch nearly a hundred standard cash on the market — no small reward.

Yet every one of them would rather have done without this reward.

They continued a few more steps along the passage and were already out of the main camp; the view opened wide before them.

On the last great long table, bowl after bowl of clear wine had been filled, the fragrance of liquor wafting everywhere.

The eunuch tending the long table pointed with a beaming smile and said: "Drink up — fine imperial wine from the palace. After finishing this bowl of wine, when you go to the Capital Camps, don't disgrace the name of our Valiant Guard Camp."

Those same words again.

One sentence after another, like a curse, and more like a whip, lashing at every man's heart.

But this time, Zhang Fu and his four men all stopped in their tracks, looking at one another, hesitating instead.

Li Mazi stared at that bowl of wine, his eyes complicated.

The eunuch did not hurry them, only watched them with a beaming smile.

Zhang Fu was silent for a moment.

Suddenly, he stepped forward, pressed his right thumb firmly against the rim of the large celadon bowl, lifted it, tilted his head back, and drained it in one gulp — glug, glug, glug!

A line of fire burned from his throat down to his stomach, instantly igniting the towering pride and stifled resentment in his chest.

He flung his arm back forcefully, ready to smash the great bowl hard against the ground!

"Don't smash it!"

That eunuch shouted, "This is an imperially bestowed wine bowl — if you smash it, you'll have to pay the full string of gold-backed coins!"

Zhang Fu's raised arm paused slightly in midair.

He saw the eunuch's smiling face, and he also saw the smooth celadon bowl in his own hand.

A true man's ambition reaches far — how can he be bound by a single bowl and a single coin?

Crack!

A crisp, thunderous crash!

The great celadon bowl was hurled viciously to the ground by him, smashed to smithereens!

He pulled the heavy string of gold-backed coins from his bosom and tossed it carelessly onto the wine table.

"This bowl of wine — I, Zhang Fu, am buying it!"

His voice boomed like a great bell, every word weighing a thousand jun!

With that, he spun around abruptly, no longer looking at the mess, nor paying any heed to the cries of alarm and commotion behind him.

He strode off in great strides toward the assembly point outside the camp, his spine ramrod straight, like a javelin that would break before it bent!

Fatty Sun and the other three looked at one another in dismay, watching Zhang Fu's resolute back, then looking at the scattered coins and porcelain shards on the ground — and the fire long suppressed in their own chests ignited with a whoosh!

"His mother's!" Fatty Sun stamped his foot fiercely and threw his string of coins onto the table too. "The File Leader's right! This bowl of wine — Old Sun here is buying it too!"

Li Mazi was even more direct: he raised his bowl, drained it in one go, and smashed it just as hard on the ground with a sharp crash!

"Count me in!"

Skinny Zhang followed suit — smashed the bowl, threw the coins!

"And me!"

Four men, four sharp crashes, four strings of copper coins!

Only Stutterer Chen clutched his coins, squeezing them again and again, until finally he sighed, set his bowl down carefully, and only then ran after them.

The eunuch behind the table folded his hands, watching this scene without a word, only narrowing his eyes slightly.

The assembly point was noisy and chaotic; some men were already being led off to report to the Capital Camps.

The five paid no attention to any of this, only turning their gazes together toward that tall muster platform.

High upon the platform, His Majesty's yellow informal robe blazed dazzlingly bright under the sunlight.

The wind set the great banner behind His Majesty snapping and flapping — that great flag bearing the character "Ming" was like a mass of burning flame.

Zhang Fu's hand moved by instinct to the hilt at his waist again, but touched only empty air.

Right — blades and bows had all been turned in when they left camp.

Yet in Zhang Fu's heart, another blade was, at this very moment, being drawn from its sheath.

"In this Son of Heaven's own guard, how can there be no place for me, Zhang Fu of Datong!"

Behind the wine table, that young eunuch watched them go with a beaming smile and showed no anger.

He simply turned and called for the servants to bring a dustpan and sweep up.

A few servants swept halfheartedly a couple of times and quickly pushed the broken porcelain behind the piled-up wine vats.

As it turned out, that spot was already heaped with a floor full of shattered bowls.