Chapter 86: The Majesty of Qin Law

Heifu watched the scene outside the courtyard; it looked exactly like a police child-trafficking raid being mobbed in later ages.

To the hamlet folk outside, the people inside that house were the ones who had taken their own wives, or their neighbors' wives, and the ones who would bring calamity upon this hamlet. They had been waiting outside for a long time, and under the loud rallying cries of that hamlet gate warden, they were growing more and more agitated, more and more restless…

At that moment, Li Xian also came into the house, wiping sweat from his forehead, and said with a slight tremor, "Sheriff, this looks bad. The people outside could rush in at any moment! Who knows when Xiao Tao will bring reinforcements!"

Before Heifu came, he had left Xiao Tao outside and told him to act according to circumstances. As Heifu figured it, upon hearing the whistle from within the hamlet, Xiao Tao should have immediately sprinted down the mountain to seek help from the various station posts, township settlements, and even the county seat. He must have already run several li by now, right?

"We can't wait until dark."

Heifu looked at everyone in the room and made up his mind: "We must get out before nightfall, or there will be no way out alive!"

Darkness stirs up people's ferocity and evil thoughts. The night is long; one torch tossed inside and the few of us would die violent deaths. Heifu did not want to gamble on waiting for rescue that might arrive who knows when.

Ji Ying found it hard to believe: "Brother Heifu, we're just going out like that?"

"We have a crossbow; we can intimidate the hamlet folk into keeping their distance."

Heifu then handed the two-foot sword to Ji Ying and took the hand crossbow himself. This hand crossbow had been seized in that tomb robbery case. Truly worthy of being a fine item forbidden from civilian circulation, its draw strength was great. Within ten paces, it could even shoot through a human body; hit in a vital spot at twenty paces, there was absolutely no chance of survival. It was the deadliest weapon in this kind of alley-and-hamlet mobbing.

"But though the hand crossbow is sharp, we only have one…" Ji Ying murmured.

Outside were a dense mass of two hundred people. Though they had no proper weapons, stones alone could smash them to pulp. One man can hardly fight four hands; even if Heifu and Dongmen Bao were the greatest of warriors, even if the hand crossbow could intimidate the crowd into not acting rashly, it would be useless…

"As things stand, we can only take a gamble."

Heifu stood up and had Ji Ying and Li Xian each hold the hamlet chief and the field clerk. Right, they also had to gag these two men to stop them from spouting nonsense.

"We still have two hostages in hand; that might make them wary of harming us for fear of harming them."

"That's not guaranteed."

Li Xian muttered, "The people in these Mang Mountains are used to being fierce. If they feel their whole clan is in danger of being wiped out, they might not care about the lives of the hamlet officials and clan elder, and still make sure we don't get out."

Heifu nodded: "In that case, besides weapons and hostages, we still have a third thing."

"What is it?" Everyone in the room looked at Heifu in unison, wondering what other trump card he had yet to reveal.

Heifu pulled out the two-foot bamboo slip bundle tucked at his waist, densely packed with clauses of Qin law.

"And the majesty of Qin law!"

Everyone was stunned by these words.

"The majesty… of Qin law?"

Heifu knew that this line of his would be utterly ridiculous in later ages, sure to make criminals holding bare blades laugh their teeth out.

Law — law has no immediate effect, doesn't it? In front of thugs and villains, doesn't it often become a mere scrap of paper? The weapon of the law is usually only useful in the trial after the crime.

But in Qin, a state governed by Legalism, it was different.

Qin law was not the tender, sentimental civil code for everyone of later ages, but cold, brutal axes and cudgels; anyone had to weigh the consequences.

Heifu and his men were not anti-trafficking police who could be arbitrarily cursed and mobbed by villains and scoundrels; they were the hawks and hounds of the court, the heaven-hounds of Anlu County who hated evil as their foe. Whoever dared pluck a single hair from their tails would have their neck severed by the statutes!

"Though I'm loath to admit it, this is our final reliance!"

…

Outside, the hamlet folk had been discussing whether to rush in all at once or to set a fire and smoke them out, but they had not expected Heifu to walk out on his own initiative, and were momentarily startled.

Seeing Heifu stride forward, crossbow in his left hand and the two-foot bamboo slips held high in his right, they subconsciously retreated a few steps.

In the eyes of hamlet folk who rarely left their village even once, a sheriff was already the biggest official they knew of; that bit of awe in their hearts was still there…

Heifu also saw the crowd's fear of him. Looking at these two hundred dark, gaunt faces, he shouted:

"I am the Sheriff of Huyang, a Qin official appointed by the Qin government! You all know the matter by now. I came to Mangshan Hamlet precisely to recover the women who were abducted and sold… This matter has already violated the statutes. If you remain obstinate and block and mob this sheriff in the execution of his duties, your crime will be increased by one degree and deemed the crime of group banditry! When that time comes, I fear you will hardly escape death!"

Some people were whispering among themselves. In truth, they had long understood that this sort of thing was against the law, but the whole hamlet kept it covered up and said nothing — who would know? Until today, when Heifu and his men poked a hole in the matter. What was to be done now?

Although most of the hamlet folk were illiterate and lived in a remote place, at least a few of them went to the township or county seat to perform corvée labor every year, and had more or less experienced the harshness of Qin law that made people turn pale at its mention. It was also unlike later ages, where even if you beat up a policeman or mobbed case officers, in the end you'd be treated leniently because "the law cannot punish the multitude," and nothing much would come of it.

At that moment, they heard Heifu say further: "If you open the way and let us out, I may plead for leniency on your behalf! So that your crime does not warrant death!"

Heifu was deceiving the hamlet folk. When the reckoning came afterward, those who deserved to die would still die, and those who deserved to be wall-builders would still be wall-builders. He would not plead for the slightest mercy for the guilty.

In Qin, unless it was a pardon personally issued by the King of Qin, there was no such thing as clemency beyond the law!

As expected, at these words the crowd burst into an uproar. When they learned their crime might not warrant death, their will to resist stubbornly lessened somewhat.

One step, two steps, Heifu was slowly moving forward.

Three steps, four steps, the hamlet folk at the outermost perimeter were also retreating without realizing it.

It was only a short fifty paces from here to the hamlet gate; Heifu needed only a moment to leave…

At that moment, the hamlet chief and the field clerk were successively brought out, their mouths gagged, under the escort of Ji Ying and Li Xian. Behind them followed Ju and the four abducted women. Though Ju was timid, he still steeled himself to shield his daughter. And Dongmen Bao, clad in armor and holding a halberd in both hands, brought up the rear; no one dared meet his fierce, glaring eyes.

Seeing the hamlet's leaders captured, the hamlet folk were even more alarmed, but when they saw that the women their own families had bought were among them, those several households started clamoring again.

"That woman — my brothers and I pooled over two thousand coins to buy her!"

"If the person leaves, what about the money!"

"Right, she hasn't even borne my family a child yet."

In the eyes of these ignorant men, handing over money and receiving a person was perfectly fair and reasonable — what was the problem? How could they be allowed to take away the women they had spent money to buy?

Thereupon a swarthy man tried to walk over and forcibly drag away that crazed woman named "Yun." Seeing that man approach, the woman's face filled with terror, and she began crying out, babbling.

Without hesitation, Heifu raised the hand crossbow and shot at that man!

"Ah!"

The man fell to the ground at the sound. The crossbow bolt was seen deeply embedded in his flesh, fresh blood gushing out. Clutching the root of his thigh, he began howling loudly.

Can't open fire? Not a chance.

In this era, with Qin law backing him, Heifu could smash a bowl of chicken blood over the hamlet chief's head with satisfaction, and he could also pull the trigger on thugs and scoundrels without hesitation, without having to be timid, cower, or die a wretched "death in the line of duty."

But with this turn of events, the atmosphere grew tense again. A group of hamlet folk surged forward with a roar, only to be forced back by Heifu, who had re-cocked the crossbow.

"Whoever dares come closer will become a ghost under my crossbow!" Heifu raised the crossbow, aiming it at anyone who tried to accost them.

Behind him, Ji Ying and Li Xian also pressed their weapons against the necks of the hamlet chief and the field clerk, shouting threats.

"Make another reckless move, and these two will taste blood!"

Under the dual deterrence of the crossbows and the hostage, the villagers retreated once more. They slowly parted to open a path, and Heifu and his dozen or so men walked through the middle as if treading on thin ice.

At this very moment, the village gate was only ten paces away from them…

Yet before that gate, one person still stood blocking the way! It was the very Village Gatekeeper who had just organized the villagers to surround them, named Zhong Sheng.

Zhong Sheng was the third-ranking figure in Blind Mountain Village, after the Village Chief and the Field Clerk, but in terms of age and seniority, he was even greater than those two. Moreover, having once served as a garrison conscript and traveled to far, far distant lands, he had broader experience and more practice in dealing with Qin officials.

Just now he had come to fetch weapons, intending to distribute them to the villagers, but he had not expected Heifu and his men to be so bold as to walk straight out. Zhong Sheng could not help but be momentarily stunned.

Seeing that the villagers, intimidated by Heifu, had parted to open the way and were about to reach the village gate, Zhong Sheng hurried over and shouted to stop them:

"Gentlemen, do not be fooled!"

Zhong Sheng pointed at Heifu and said: "This Constable is deceiving you! The Village Chief told me long ago — anyone who buys a woman abducted and sold into trafficking faces certain death! As for the rest, they will also be implicated under collective punishment; at the very least, they will be made wall-building convicts! You absolutely must not let them leave!"

……

PS: I posted the afternoon chapter together with the morning one, so you can't call me a cliffhanger dog. Hmph!

(End of chapter)