Chapter 329: Untitled

By nightfall, when Diwu Lun had finished his official duties and returned to Orchid Pond Palace, he found Diwu Ming being passed from one nursemaid to the next, gleefully romping on the cradle-bed his father had designed for him.

An eight-month-old child, a boy at that — the hem of a robe, a finger, a toy, a nursemaid's earlobe, he wanted to put everything in his mouth and taste it. The human whelp was gradually entering the age of exceedingly vigorous energy.

His wife, wrapped in a white fox-fur cloak, reclined by the couch warming herself at the brazier; the stove fire flushed her cheeks crimson, and she looked to be in excellent spirits. She rose to greet Diwu Lun and exchange pleasantries, swaying slightly as she shyly confessed that she had drunk a little rice wine today and was somewhat tipsy.

Diwu Lun smiled and took her hand. "My lady, with whom did you drink?"

Ma Yuan was fond of wine, and the daughters of the Ma clan would drink a little on festive occasions — but today there was no particular cause for celebration…

"I met a maidservant in Orchid Pond Palace, and we talked quite delightfully," Ma Chanchan said.

Diwu Lun found this strange. Although Ma Yuan outwardly seemed a rough military man, the Ma clan was a family of poetry and letters; his wife was a learned and refined lady, well-versed in the classics and adept at citing them. She treated maidservants with courtesy, but the ingrained arrogance of the gentry class remained — she would not idly chat with them. "Oh? What sort of maidservant could hold a conversation with my lady?"

"Not only is she of noble birth, she is also thoroughly versed in the Five Classics and the Six Arts."

Ma Chanchan poured Diwu Lun a cup of water. "The Junior Guardian Shi Chen not only repaired the palace halls for Your Majesty, but even sent his own legitimate daughter into the palace to serve as a lowly maid. Such devotion — truly, it moves one deeply. Was it not worth a toast from me?"

In a single fleeting moment, Diwu Lun's expression passed through four stages: astonishment, shame-tinged fury, a flicker of murderous intent, and finally an unruffled calm. In the end, it all condensed into an emotionless "Oh…" as he lifted the cup to drink water and took a light sip.

Shi Chen had indeed proposed to him that more maidservants should be assigned to Orchid Pond Palace to look after the heir, and Diwu Lun had not refused.

Within the palace precincts, he had mainly appointed old maidservants of the Diwu clan whose backgrounds were thoroughly known from their village days. Though they were ignorant of court etiquette, they could be trusted.

Nor was a large staff necessary. Diwu Lun had always felt that any elegant palace institution ultimately boiled down to the baser functions of defecation, urination, flatulence, and sex. For instance, the attendants required to stand by and wait outside while one used the privy — those could be cut.

He had heard that Emperor Wu of Han liked to receive his ministers while on the toilet. For convenience, he had an attendant hold the chamber pot, ready at any moment. Many a famous minister had begun his career holding the chamber pot.

Diwu Lun was the opposite. With others present, or even watching, he felt not the slightest urge to relieve himself and had to drive everyone away first. A minister had once tried to remonstrate: "Has Your Majesty not heard the tale of Duke Jing of Jin drowning in the latrine?"

After hearing this jest, Diwu Lun was briefly stunned, then merely said, "When I am old, my legs stiff, and I can no longer squat, we shall speak of it again."

As for the menial laborers on the periphery, he let Shi Chen handle it as he saw fit.

He had never imagined that Shi Chen, without reporting to him, would slip his own daughter in. What was the meaning of this? If he could slip a daughter in today, he could send an assassin in tomorrow!

It seemed the rules of the rear palace needed to be properly managed and firmly established by the Queen.

Wait — it was not quite true that it had gone unreported. His expression unchanged, Diwu Lun stole a moment to glance at the memorials brought in today. Sure enough, at the very bottom, he found Shi Chen's request for his daughter to serve the Queen.

What a coincidence, was it not? Why, exactly, had this memorial ended up at the very bottom?

Diwu Lun said nothing more of the matter. Only when the nursemaids had taken the child to the next room and the couple was about to retire for the night did he ask again, "My lady, what did you and that daughter of the Shi clan talk about?"

"We spoke of quite a few things."

Ma Chanchan chattered on, recounting everything from the Shi daughter's appearance to her artless naivety. At the end, she added with a smile, "She was somewhat reserved at first, and only gradually opened up after I urged some wine on her. She spoke of her trepidation when Wang Mang first selected her as Empress. After all, Wang Mang was an old man past sixty, cold-blooded and heartless even to his own family. None of his four sons and one grandson met a good end, and his old wife wept herself blind. Who knew what would have become of her once she entered the Xin household? Truly pitiable."

"Fortunately, on the very day of the wedding procession, Your Majesty raised the righteous army at Hongmen and drove out Wang Mang, while her father defected at Ba Bridge. The marriage was thus left unresolved."

"Only, hindered by her status, no one dared to come propose marriage thereafter. After all, she had nearly become the mother of a nation, the Empress of the Xin Dynasty — who would still dare to marry her? The Junior Guardian Shi was truly driven to distraction over this, worrying until his hair turned white. It took a certain gentleman to enlighten the Shi family with a few words."

Ma Chanchan took Diwu Lun's arm and rested her head on his shoulder, still in the gossiping tone of a wife. "According to the Shi daughter, when Your Majesty's Director of Guests, Feng Yan, first persuaded Shi Chen to surrender, he made a point of mentioning that Your Majesty's reason for rising in arms on the day of Wang Mang's grand wedding was not solely to eliminate tyranny and pacify the people — there was another purpose as well."

"That may have been merely a stratagem of Master Feng's, a bit of feigned courtesy, but the Junior Guardian Shi took it to heart…"

The information Ma Chanchan provided was significant. No wonder, then, that over the past few months, Shi Chen had urgently admonished the King of Wei to expand his rear palace and raise more heirs — only to be rebuked by Diwu Lun. Having learned his lesson, he had used the Queen and the prince as pretexts to urge the repair of the palace halls, and had sent his daughter to Ma Chanchan's side, attempting to offer his daughter by a roundabout route.

Diwu Lun understood. He asked, "My lady, are you fond of this Shi daughter?"

Ma Chanchan nodded. "Regret at not having met her sooner. Hers is a bitter fate, yet her looks are fine and her bearing beyond compare. Seeing her, I felt considerable pity."

What sort of bitter fate was that? She was lucky, if anything.

Diwu Lun sighed. "The Junior Guardian Shi is so loyal and earnest, and his daughter cannot be married off. How can I not help share his burden?"

"Share his burden?" Ma Chanchan froze, thinking she had spoken in vain and only made things worse. She then brought up an old story.

"When Emperor Xuan of Han, Liu Xun, was still a commoner, he often played at cockfighting with Wang Fengguang and they became old friends. Wang Fengguang's daughter had the fate of a husband-killer — every time she was about to marry, the groom would suddenly die. After this happened several times, no one dared marry her. When Emperor Xuan of Han ascended the throne, he took the Wang daughter into his palace and later promoted her to Jieyu…"

She smiled. "Is Your Majesty perhaps planning to emulate this fine example?"

Yes, and later, because Empresses Xu and Huo either died or were deposed, the Wang daughter in turn became Empress — this was the Empress Dowager Qiongcheng, and the origin of the rise of Wang Yuan's and Wang Long's families.

Seeing that Ma Chanchan was growing anxious, cramming a single story with elements of husband-killing and palace intrigue, Diwu Lun merely smiled at how inexperienced she still was at playing hard-to-get with him. "My lady misunderstands."

He had raised his army under the banner of "punishing tyranny." But if the script were to unfold as Feng Yan had said and Shi Chen had hoped, once it spread among the common folk and was passed down to later ages, it would surely be transformed into "Diwu Lun's righteous fury for the sake of a beautiful woman."

It would be like King Wu of Zhou attacking the Shang, marching into Zhaoge, and then taking Daji into his bed. The entire nature of the war would plummet from "comforting the people and punishing the wicked" straight to the level of a melodramatic historical soap opera…

Diwu Lun was wronged — more wronged than Dou Rong!

No matter how innocent, how beautiful, how "pitiable" that Shi daughter was, Diwu Lun had to keep her at a respectful distance!

Looking back, the only love he had ever truly thrown himself into heart and soul dated back to his previous life… As for this life, even his formal, properly arranged marriage had involved heavy political calculations, let alone taking a concubine.

Diwu Lun shook his head. "Her age, my position — for us to reside in the same palace, the rumors that would spread would not be pleasant. I have already had her sent out of the palace under cover of night!"

"Thus, from now on, whether my lady is here at Orchid Pond Palace or later goes to Chang'an, you will not see Shi Luo again."

Ma Chanchan grasped Diwu Lun's meaning. "What does Your Majesty intend?"

Diwu Lun's eyes suppressed his fury toward a certain dog-headed schemer. "Let the Junior Guardian Shi petition on his own to have his daughter sent to Wannian Palace, to keep company with the Empress Dowager Xiaoping — the one who so nearly became her daughter!"

…

During his half-month and more in the Brocade Official City of Shu's capital, Feng Yan had been received with the highest courtesy. Li Xiong, the Chancellor of Shu, regarded him as a scholar of national stature. Gongsun Shu, the King of Shu, had granted him several audiences and even sent men to escort him to Pi County to pay homage at Yang Xiong's tomb. As expected, Gongsun Shu had protected it extremely well — a hut had been built and a dedicated caretaker assigned.

It was not in vain that Diwu Lun, for his part, had also seen to the proper care of Gongsun Shu's ancestral graves at Maoling — a case of repaying a kindness with a kindness.

And Diwu Lun's senior fellow apprentice, Hou Ba, had become Gongsun Shu's Grand Master of Letters, marrying a local wife and having children there. This time, he was to serve as an envoy and accompany Feng Yan north.

When Feng Yan returned to Chengdu, Li Xiong happily informed him that the King of Shu had decided to formally conclude an anti-Han alliance with the King of Wei!

"For the forging of this Wei-Shu alliance, Master Feng, you deserve the highest merit!"

"In ancient times, Zhang Qian opened the way to the Western Regions. Today, Master Feng has likewise traversed the lands of the Greenwood bandits, braving a thousand perils and ten thousand hardships to enter Shu — this too is a pioneering feat!"

Gongsun Shu personally offered a toast. Feng Yan grew somewhat light-headed, and though he was plied with wine until thoroughly drunk, he still squinted and read over Gongsun's state letter again and again.

Apart from bureaucratic boilerplate and appeals to old friendship, the state letter did contain some substantive points.

First, the King of Wei recognized the King of Shu, and the King of Shu recognized the King of Wei. The two stood independent of all the Han claimants, denying the legitimacy of every Son of Heaven of the Han lines. They denounced Liu Ying as an imbecile, Liu Xuan as a usurper of titles, Lu Fang as barbarian spawn, and Liu Ziyu as an impostor.

Second, the two houses would jointly attack the Western Han and the Greenwood Han. Diwu Lun would strike within the Guanzhong region, while the Shu state would send a punitive expedition via the White Water Road — the Yinping Main Road — against Wudu Commandery, which belonged to the Western Han, and then strike the Greenwood Han's Hanzhong Commandery.

It must be understood that there were three traditional routes from Shu to the outside world: the Stone Ox Road led from Shu Commandery and Guanghan to Hanzhong; the Micang Road and the Yangba Road connected Ba Commandery with Hanzhong.

But there was one more, little known to others: the White Water Pass northwest of Jiange, where the White Water River connected to Wudu Commandery. There was a road called the "Yinping Road" — this was the main road, to be distinguished from the remote, seven-hundred-li Yinping byway through the desolate mountains to the west, where few travelers ever trod.

Within this single month, the Shu kingdom also received the surrender of Yuesui Commandery, leaving the south essentially free of future trouble. The great clans of Jiangzhou in Ba Commandery likewise accepted Gongsun Shu's regime, so he could now concentrate his strength northward. He accordingly dispatched a general to open the Boshui Pass, making preparations for a campaign after spring.

Gongsun Shu considered that Hanzhong was held by the Greenwood, who had also received the remnants of Liu Bosheng's forces, giving them abundant troops. Advancing north by the three traditional routes would be difficult.

It would be better to first seize Wudu Commandery — wedged between the Western Han and the Greenwood Han, beyond the reach of either side's forces, a place they were content to "subdue by proclamation" — and then follow the Han River downstream to strike Hanzhong. That would be far simpler.

Only after the banquet, when Feng Yan had just been drinking and laughing with him, did Gongsun Shu say to Li Xiong: "Though the covenant pledges a joint campaign after spring, when the time comes, I shall still use heavy rain as a pretext to have Diwu Lun attack first."

"Once the Wei army has drawn the Western Han's main strength entirely to Right Fufeng, we shall seize the moment to march north. Only thus can we take Wudu with ease!"

Gongsun Shu remembered his meeting with Diwu Lun. Yang Xiong had just died then, and Diwu Lun was only eighteen or nineteen — a mere whelp. His friend Huan Tan had been quite impertinent.

By now, the King of Wei was only twenty-three or twenty-four. Treating such a man as an equal — in his heart, Gongsun Shu did not think much of it.

"Diwu Lun's ambition is no small thing. If he is allowed to unify Guanzhong early, sooner or later he too will crave the imperial title."

"Let the King of Wei tangle with the Western Han and the Greenwood Han, while Shu seizes the moment to advance and gain the full power of Yi Province."

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Gongsun Shu stroked the Imperial Heirloom Seal, which he treasured above all else. The five coiling chi-dragons on its knob would sooner or later be worn smooth by his handling.

"One day I fell asleep with the jade seal in my arms and had a dream."

"In the dream, a divine being said to me: 'Eight si, son tied — twelve is the term.'"

"'Eight si, son tied' — that is Gongsun."

"Chancellor, you are widely learned. Tell me: does this mean I have twelve years of life remaining…"

Gongsun Shu raised his eyes. "Or does it mean that within twelve years, I shall unify all under heaven?"

…

Leaving the city of Chengdu and setting out on the return journey with Hou Ba, Feng Yan leaned on his envoy's staff, thoroughly satisfied with himself.

"In former days, Emperor Gao of Han sent the scholar Sui He with twenty men as an envoy to Huainan. He arrived, conveyed Han's intent, and persuaded the King of Huainan, Ying Bu, to betray Chu, relieving Liu Bang's plight. Sui He's achievement surpassed that of fifty thousand infantry and five thousand cavalry."

"And my journey into Shu today is the equivalent of capturing a general within his own chambers, taking a city between wine-cup and table, routing the foe at the banquet mat — my merit surpasses Sui He's! It is worth at least a hundred thousand infantry and ten thousand cavalry!"

Feng Yan thought with rising excitement:

"When I return this time, what reward for merit will the King grant me?"

…

PS: Bonus chapter tomorrow.