Chapter 414: I'm Lying Flat, Do as You Please

Fan Zhi never imagined that three years later, he would still have to make a trip to Hexi.

When the Tokyo underworld figures controlled by Zhang Liecheng found him, Fan Zhi hesitated only briefly before agreeing to go to Hexi.

After all, in Tokyo there was no longer any path of advancement for Fan Zhi. Who would dare place a man so deeply entangled with Great King Zhang in a high position?

The route to Liangzhou this time was the same as the last.

But last time, the Xiongwu Army of Qinzhou had escorted him to Weizhou as an imperial court army, whereas this time, the Xiongwu Army of Qinzhou had already become the armed force of the Liang state.

Moreover, Yan Jin, who was now stationed in Qinzhou, had no intention of sending the Xiongwu Army to escort Fan Zhi and the others to Liangzhou.

As one of only two special figures in the Liang state, Yan Jin held four posts simultaneously: Vice Commissioner of the Longyou Circuit, Prefect of Qinzhou, Commander-in-Chief of the Xiongwu Garrison, and Defense Commissioner of Qinzhou.

Of these posts, the first two governed the people, and the latter two governed the army.

Although the Liang state's officials had not yet deliberately separated civil and military officials, an established convention had already formed.

That was, those serving as Circuit Commissioner and Vice Commissioner, the senior civil administration posts, could not concurrently hold military posts such as Commander-in-Chief or Defense Commissioner.

The only two exceptions were Yan Jin and Fan Quan, Prefect of Shanzhou, Vice Commander-in-Chief of the Hanhai Garrison, and Inspector of the Huang River.

Of these two, one had to face Li Congyan, the Prince of Qin at Fengxiang, and thereby spy on Guanzhong, while the other was responsible for overawing the various Tibetan tribes on the plateau, so they were special figures who held both civil and military authority in one hand.

Yan Jin, apart from being brave and fierce on the battlefield with the talent of a commander, had another great virtue: caution.

He knew that Zhang Zhao intended to put an end to the current habit of military men running rampant and subordinates overthrowing their superiors at every turn, so he paid particular attention to this aspect.

He was especially careful about deploying the Xiongwu Army, and naturally would not send men to escort Fan Zhi.

After hosting a banquet for Fan Zhi, he arranged for them to travel to Liangzhou together with the merchants of the Hexi Chamber of Commerce.

The Hexi Chamber of Commerce was now a semi-official institution under the Commerce Department of the Liang state in Hexi.

Its president, Cao Wantong, held the post of Adjutant in the Commerce Department. The heads of the great merchant houses along the Silk Road, as long as they joined the Hexi Chamber of Commerce, could basically all hold official posts under the Commerce Department.

The benefit was that they could appear before officials without kneeling and were exempt from ordinary official inspections. Moreover, this post did not require one to be a subject of the Liang state; traveling merchants of any origin could hold it.

Of course, these benefits of joining the chamber did not come without a price. The price was that they had to assist the Liang state's Commerce Department in collecting commercial taxes.

Specifically, it was tax farming. Every year, each great merchant had to commit to a commercial tax amount, and only those who could fulfill it were qualified to hold a post under the Commerce Department.

The second major aspect was the circulation and supervision of silver notes, especially the identification and suppression of forged silver notes.

Last month there was a case of a Khotanese merchant forging silver notes. The Commerce Department immediately notified the great Khotanese merchants and had them dispatch their caravan guard cavalry.

In only ten days the man was caught, and in twenty days he was delivered to Liangzhou, where he was tried with maximum severity: he lost his head, and his wife and children were enslaved.

Of course, the Commerce Department actually also had a secret organization—the Brocade Robe Envoys. This organization was directly subordinate to Zhang Zhao but was attached to the Commerce Department's Guard Bureau as a special-service organization.

Anyone who joined the Brocade Robe Envoys received a brocade robe as a reward, hence the name.

At present it was controlled by Zhang Liecheng. Its members were mainly Sogdian merchants great and small, with other ethnicities as well, spread across the region from Dunhuang to Tokyo Kaifeng, and it had even begun expanding into the Later Shu and Southern Tang states.

Apart from gathering intelligence and buying bribes, the greatest mission of the Brocade Robe Envoys was to keep the Silk Road functioning normally.

Fan Zhi had just come out of the Qinzhou Prefect's office when he saw that the market street outside was extremely lively.

A dazzling array of goods, cries of hawkers rising one after another. They had arrived too late yesterday and had not noticed that Qinzhou had already become this bustling.

Fan Zhi's wife also came from a minor official family and was a native of Tokyo Kaifeng Prefecture. She had always loved lively scenes, and now, seeing the crowds coming and going outside, she urged Fan Zhi to take their four-year-old son out for a stroll.

The bustling market quickly soothed the uneasy hearts of the group that had rushed all the way from Tokyo.

As for her husband's trip to Hexi this time, Fan Zhi's wife, though mentally prepared long ago, was still rather fearful.

These were hardly peaceful times. Even in Tokyo Kaifeng Prefecture, robberies were not uncommon.

Many were even just penniless soldiers who changed into civilian clothes and directly set about looting homes.

If the capital of the Son of Heaven was like this, then places outside Tokyo Kaifeng Prefecture went without saying.

In the Western Capital Luoyang, the father and son Yang Guangyuan would extort any wealthy merchant they saw. At the slightest resistance, the mildest response was a beating, and at worst they would throw the man into the Yin River to drown.

They had even dared to kill someone like Fan Yanguang, who held an iron writ of immunity, so they showed not the slightest mercy to merchants and common folk.

Fortunately, the Brocade Robe Envoys escorting them were very experienced and usually traveled together with several caravans, so they were considerably safer.

But once they passed Chang'an, their impression changed completely.

The order in Chang'an was actually better than in Tokyo Kaifeng Prefecture and the Western Capital Luoyang. When entering Chang'an, although the soldiers of the Jinchang Army collected taxes harshly, they still did not dare beat people at will or skim goods.

And after reaching Fengxiang Prefecture, Fan Zhi and his wife, along with the family of the accompanying Liu Tao, had a strange feeling, as if they had arrived in a different place altogether.

However, although the Fengxiang Army of Fengxiang Prefecture collected taxes somewhat more lightly than the Jinchang Army of Chang'an, its overall bearing was very poor, seeming somewhat too lax.

Fengxiang Prefecture exuded a kind of—uh! How to put it? If Fan Zhi had known the term "lying flat," he would certainly have found it very apt.

From Prince of Qin Li Congyan at the top down to the Fengxiang Prefecture soldiers below, all exuded this strange air of lying flat.

"Thud! Thud! Thud!" A burst of hurried footsteps came, and Fan Zhi looked over in surprise.

He saw a group of soldiers running over from the distance. They were still wearing military uniforms stamped with the phoenix emblem of the Fengxiang Army. Twenty-some men with swords and blades came clattering toward the Qinzhou Prefect's office.

At this sight, Fan Zhi's wife and Liu Tao's elderly mother let out a shriek of alarm.

Fan Zhi was so frightened his legs trembled. He quickly gathered his son into his arms and bolted for the sides of the street.

"Hahahaha!" Laughter erupted at once. The pedestrians and vendors along the whole street doubled over laughing, and only then did Fan Zhi realize that the only ones fleeing in panic were their group; no one else had moved.

"This gentleman must have come from the Jin state, right? You surely thought it was a mutiny! Do not be alarmed. The Great King is benevolent and kind, and sent Commissioner Yan to govern Qinzhou well. Our Qinzhou has not had yabing guards making trouble for several years now."

An old man selling cotton cloth, grinning with a mouth that had few teeth left, said cheerfully to Fan Zhi.

"Old Zhang is right. The Xiongwu Garrison men are all fine lads. When the Great King went to the Hun River, even the Khitan Emperor feared them and insisted on swearing brotherhood with the Great King.

I hear they all received enormous rewards and are quite content. No one starts mutinies. These men coming are soldiers from Fengxiang Prefecture, probably here to join up."

A Sogdian selling flatbread chimed in from the side.

Only then did Fan Zhi, his wife, and Liu Tao's parents set their minds at ease. At the same time, Fan Zhi was secretly alarmed.

Qinzhou had originally belonged to the imperial court and had been ceded to the Liang state only two years ago, yet now it had already pledged allegiance to Great King Zhang.

Sure enough, when those twenty-some sturdy Fengxiang Army soldiers arrived, they caused no trouble at all. Instead, led by one man, they squatted down outside the Qinzhou Prefect's office and rested.

Only then did Fan Zhi also notice that when they came over, a junior officer of the Xiongwu Garrison had followed along with a few soldiers.

After the junior officer brought these Fengxiang Army soldiers in, he immediately went inside to announce them.

Before long, the Administrative Assistant of Qinzhou came out in person and invited both Fan Zhi and the sturdy Fengxiang Army man inside.

As soon as they entered, Yan Jin was already waiting in the main hall. When the sturdy Fengxiang Army man saw Yan Jin in the seat of honor, he immediately prostrated himself.

"I am Xu Jiu, Captain of the Left Camp of the Fengxiang Army. I pay my respects to Prefect Yan!"

"Rise and speak. Just a few days ago a yabing officer Wang of the Fengxiang Army came by, and now you arrive as well. Does the Prince of Qin treat his men so shabbily?"

Yan Jin gestured for Fan Zhi to take a seat, and only then allowed the sturdy man called Xu Jiu to rise. Then he asked with a frown.

Hearing Yan Jin's question, Xu Jiu was greatly indignant and spoke out loudly.

"Since the last mutiny, the Prince of Qin has grown ever more miserly. Every day he does nothing but drink and make merry, or summon the entertainers around him for song and dance. The brave men of the various camps have their pay and provisions delayed time and again.

We men of martial skill cannot let our abilities rot away in the hands of such a man, so we crossed the border to offer our service. We beg Prefect Yan to take us in."

Yan Jin's frown deepened. He gave Fan Zhi a bitter smile and said,

"Brother Wensu, you see how carefree this Prince of Qin is. He attends to nothing but his pleasures, and it has come to the point that I, the Prefect of Qinzhou, seem to be his subordinate."

Having said this, Yan Jin looked at Xu Jiu again and said, "Xu Jiu, I have heard that you are skilled with spear and staff, and especially fine at archery. But the rules of our Great Liang are not the same as those of your Prince of Qin's household.

The Great King has lately been minded to gather brave men. So if you truly come to offer your service, then go to Liangzhou. If you do not wish to go to Liangzhou, I will have someone give you ten strings of cash, and you may return home and live in peace."

Fan Zhi's brow stirred. He had finally found the source of that air of utter resignation hanging over the Prince of Qin, Li Congyan, and the entire Fengxiang Army.

It turned out that Li Congyan was a second-generation man of power. From childhood he had loved drinking and feasting, loved song, dance, and poetry, and had never been much interested in military affairs, nor had he any talent for them.

Four years ago he had finally bestirred himself and instigated the mutiny of the Zhangyi Army, only for Zhang Zhao to appear and snatch away the fruits of his victory.

Then, unable to swallow his anger, he went to settle accounts with Zhang Zhao, and was badly defeated beneath Mawei Slope. Only through the mediation of An Shenqi, and after paying 350,000 strings of cash, did he manage to extricate himself.

But after paying Zhang Zhao those 350,000 strings, Li Congyan returned to Fengxiang to find his treasury nearly empty. He could not bear to spend money on comforting the officers and men or honoring the promised rewards.

Before long a mutiny broke out, and it was only suppressed after Yan Jin and An Shenqi, the Military Governor of the Jinchang Army, sent troops.

From then on, Li Congyan simply gave up entirely. He kept only a few hundred yabing guards to protect him, and completely abandoned the rest of the Fengxiang Army.

Seeing that no real trouble could be stirred up, the officers and men below who were unwilling to endure poverty mostly came over to Qinzhou. Those who remained in Fengxiang Prefecture were mostly just drifting along for their rations.

Xu Jiu thought for a while and felt there was nowhere better to go.

He had already fled Fengxiang Prefecture; he could hardly go back to Fengxiang now. At present, the only thing to do was make the trip to Liangzhou.

"Then many thanks to Prefect Yan for pointing the way. We shall go to Liangzhou!"

"Excellent!" Yan Jin nodded with satisfaction, then cupped his hands toward Fan Zhi.

"I have just received the Great King's instruction. In the third month of next year, a grand civil examination will be opened in Liangzhou, with three branches: civil, military, and agricultural.

The civil branch includes the Classics, Mathematics, and Policy Essays; the military branch includes spear and staff, horsemanship, archery, and commanding troops; the agricultural branch includes cultivation, seed breeding, and waterworks.

The instruction orders the able men of Qinzhou, regardless of status, to go to Liangzhou to prepare for the examinations so long as they have a skill.

It is fortunate that Brother Wensu has come here. Please come with us to Liangzhou. I have heard that you once presided over the civil examinations in the former dynasty, so I beg you to give my Qinzhou lads some guidance along the way."

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