Chapter 14: A Small Deed Earns a Modest Name

The feud between Hei Fu's family and the village chief began seven years ago, when his eldest brother Zhong married a girl from the neighboring village whom the chief's son had set his sights on…

But this was no time to worry about home. The two had eaten nothing since morning and had been hungry for most of the day; their bellies were growling with hunger. After passing through a crossroads, Ji Ying's eyes lit up and he pointed ahead. "The eating house is here!"

An eating house was a place where passing travelers could eat and rest their feet. Anlu County lay on a major north-south thoroughfare, with carts and boats coming and going constantly. Although there were post stations and guest lodges outside the city walls, eating houses within the city were indispensable.

This particular eating house, however, was rather crude — a thatched roof and whitewashed walls, with only a cloth banner bearing the character "Eat" drooping listlessly from its pole. Inside stood a few wooden tables, not even lacquered, with rough straw mats beside them. The place was cold and cheerless, with only five or six diners.

"It's New Year's — everyone's gone home to reunite with their families. Only those conscript laborers and traveling merchants with no other choice would make do here…"

Ji Ying was still huffing with indignation. He had been to Anlu County twice on labor service and knew the area fairly well, so he invited Hei Fu to duck into the eating house. They knelt on the straw mats beside a table near the door. Ji Ying slapped the wooden table and called out, "Shopkeeper! Do you have millet stew?"

The eating-house keeper was a sallow-faced middle-aged man who only shuffled over sluggishly when he heard the shout.

Because of Qin's unique national circumstances, both the lodging and food industries — whether traveler's inns or eating houses — were government-run. So the shopkeeper had little enthusiasm for serving customers, much like a state-run canteen — have you ever seen a server there beam with smiles to earn money for the public purse?

Seeing that Ji Ying was merely a common soldier and Hei Fu was only a lowly Gongshi, the shopkeeper's face immediately showed disdain. He said coldly, "Millet stew we do have, but as for the price…"

He looked the two up and down, his meaning clear: dressed in coarse brown clothes and straw sandals, they did not look like people with money. They might be here to swindle food and drink.

Ji Ying had been waiting for exactly this question! He laughed at once. "What, afraid we'll eat and not pay?" As he spoke, he opened the cloth sack in his hand and slapped a great handful of strung half-tael coins onto the table — clatter, clatter!

The shopkeeper saw that the coins amounted to well over a thousand wen and was slightly taken aback, but his face showed even more suspicion. "Where did you get this money?" If Ji Ying stammered, he was already prepared to report them to the authorities for banditry!

"Rest assured, shopkeeper, this money was come by honestly!"

Ji Ying rose to his feet and declared loudly, "We captured bandits and have just received our reward at the official compound!"

He deliberately shouted it out, as if he wanted every diner in the shop to hear.

Sure enough, the handful of patrons in the shop all turned to look at them and began pointing and murmuring.

The shopkeeper looked mildly surprised and sized up the scrawny, monkey-like Ji Ying from head to toe. "Could you be that Hei Fu who fought three men alone and captured the bandits by force?"

The story had already spread outside?

Ji Ying hastily shook his head and pointed at Hei Fu. "How would I have that kind of skill? Hei Fu is this Gongshi here!"

The shopkeeper clicked his tongue in wonder and bowed to Hei Fu with clasped hands. "These past few days, the story has been circulating all through Anlu County and beyond. They say you are eight chi tall, with the back of a tiger and the waist of a bear, that you subdued the bandits barehanded as easily as catching a three-year-old child. I never thought I would meet the valiant man himself today — truly, your physique is mighty and your bearing is extraordinary!"

"What a fine warrior!"

The several diners in the eating house also clapped their hands and cheered. Hei Fu could only force an awkward smile and bow to them in thanks.

"I merely did what I ought to do. It's not worth mentioning, not worth mentioning."

"You can't say that." The shopkeeper suddenly became warm and animated. Smiling, he said, "We Qin people revere meritorious deeds above all. Please wait a moment, you two — I shall go to the kitchen myself and prepare the millet stew, with extra meat, to feast our brave men!"

This shift from arrogance to deference caught Hei Fu completely off guard, and from the look of it, it was absolutely not because of his newly acquired Gongshi rank, but genuine admiration from the heart.

But thinking it over, it made sense. People of this era held warriors in the highest esteem. Setting aside the chivalrous assassins the world revered, like Yu Rang and Nie Zheng, even here in Anlu County, the person young men admired most was a "Tiger-Slaying Hero" from Yunmeng Township, famous throughout the county for shooting a tiger dead in the mountain forests.

In that light, his feat of capturing three bandits alone and seizing a blade with his bare hands was also something remarkable, and indeed enough to keep the county folk talking for quite some time.

Ji Ying gave Hei Fu a cheeky grin, the meaning of which was unmistakable: Well, brother, how about that? I helped make you famous…

Hei Fu shook his head helplessly. In truth, he understood. For people of this era, regardless of their station, life's pursuits boiled down to two things: wealth and rank, and honor and renown. To a country farmer like Ji Ying, once you had earned some renown, you had to let it be known and savor the feeling of being looked up to and praised.

But for the current Hei Fu, he had only achieved a small merit and gained a modest name. In this little county town, it was something to boast about, but set against the grand backdrop of the era — "Six kings done, all under heaven one" — what did it amount to? Nothing.

His perspective was different from Ji Ying's and the others', so naturally his thoughts were different too.

While waiting for the food, Hei Fu kept wondering what "millet stew" was. He was too embarrassed to ask, afraid of making another blunder like not knowing that the first day of the tenth month was New Year's, so he could only guess based on the characters.

After hulling, millet was called yellow rice or soft rice by northerners; stew meant a meat broth. Millet stew, then, should be a meat porridge made by cooking yellow rice mixed with meat.

When the dish was brought out, it was indeed just that. The shopkeeper had kept his word: the steaming hot meat porridge had plenty of thick, fatty chunks of meat added, which greatly whetted Ji Ying's appetite. But Hei Fu took one taste and shook his head.

Accustomed to all manner of delicious dishes from later ages, he found the crudely made food of this era bland and tasteless. What's more, the dubious chunks of meat in the porridge — he couldn't tell if it was pork or dog — had a rank odor that nearly made him retch. Only to fill his stomach, and to avoid embarrassing the shopkeeper who was watching them so earnestly, did he force himself to swallow small mouthfuls, and even had to praise it as delicious…

Since returning to this era, aside from language and writing, there were three things Hei Fu had found hardest to adapt to.

The first was having no underwear beneath his clothes — the wind blowing cool on his backside, not to mention how awkward it was. Otherwise, why do you think people of this era knelt and sat with their legs pressed together?

The second was having only one or two sets of clothes all year round, with no way to change and wash them often. Over time, both others and oneself carried an unpleasant stench of stale sweat. You have to realize, productivity was low in these times, and clothes were not cheap. When people died, they would even list their better garments as property in their wills…

The third, well, was the food.

"If only I could have a bowl of rice noodles, or a steamed bun."

So thought Hei Fu, licking his lips.

But he knew this was just a fool's daydream. Although the mill had already appeared in the north during this era, it seemed not to have reached Nan Commandery yet, which was awkward. At present, the main method of husking grain in Qin was pounding, and there was even a harsh punishment specifically for convicted women, also called pounding — pounding rice from dawn to dusk, so you can imagine how grueling the labor was.

"Once I finish my labor service and go home, when I have both money and leisure, I'll have to try to put together something that can satisfy the palate." Hei Fu wanted this for no other reason than his own stomach, the temple of the five organs.

Ji Ying, by contrast, was thoroughly satisfied. He wolfed down his food, holding the pottery bowl and gulping the millet stew in great mouthfuls, chewing those greasy fatty chunks of meat. In this era, poverty limited everyone's imagination. In the eyes of ordinary people, a prosperous life meant being able to eat fatty meat and polished rice.

Thinking of it this way, Hei Fu looked back at his twenty-odd years of life in his previous existence. Though he had been a loser, placed in the Warring States Qin era, he would already count as a "son of fat and grain."

Of course, with meat, how could wine be left out?

As Ji Ying ate, he sighed, "If only there were millet wine. Normally we're forbidden to gather and drink. Every year I'd look forward only to New Year's Day and the La Sacrifice, when I could drink a little with the village folk, but now…"

The wine Qin people drank at New Year's was also brewed from millet, called millet wine. But as far as Hei Fu knew, commoners normally had no chance to drink it at all, because Qin's prohibition on alcohol was so strict it was truly unprecedented and never to be repeated!

From the time of Shang Yang onward, because brewing wasted grain and people were prone to get bold and cause trouble after drinking, Qin deliberately raised the price of wine tenfold — the equivalent of later ages imposing heavy taxes on tobacco and alcohol. As a result, in Anlu County town, the only people who could afford to drink were officials or wealthy households.

Even eating houses were not permitted to sell wine. Otherwise, why do you think the wine shops and wine houses of other states became "eating houses" once they were in Qin? Simple — these places didn't sell wine!

You might say, isn't it just rice wine? What's so hard about farmers brewing it themselves?

However, Shang Yang had long since considered this point. Qin's Field Statutes explicitly stipulated: "Commoners dwelling in field cottages dare not sell wine; field overseers and deputy officers shall strictly prohibit and prevent it. Those who disobey shall be deemed guilty!"

Thus, if commoners wanted a sip of wine, they could only do so in secret, constantly afraid of being reported. As for drinking openly in public gatherings, only the first day of the tenth month and the La Sacrifice were permitted — it was New Year's, after all; people had to be allowed a little merriment.

Hei Fu, for his part, had little interest in the watery, beverage-like millet wine and smiled, unconcerned.

Just then, he suddenly overheard what seemed to be a pair of merchants behind him discussing something.

"People coming from Guanzhong say the King has issued a proclamation and is sending troops to attack Yan!"

At these key words, Hei Fu's ears could not help but prick up!

…

PS: The correct answer to the last chapter was A. According to the laws of Great Qin, there is no reward for answering correctly; those who answered wrong are fined by leaving a comment in the comment section.

(End of chapter)