Chapter 149: A Live One

Source of *The Stubborn Bandit*:

Du Qiao'er, led by Liu Chengzong, found the murderer among the captives.

The girl who had seemed so clever and brave in Liu Chengzong's eyes now walked timidly through the ragged ranks of prisoners, her body suddenly freezing as if struck by an immobilizing spell.

"Found him?"

Du Qiao'er seemed jolted alert by his voice; her body stirred, and she raised a hand to point at a banner soldier at the front of the formation.

Liu Chengzong looked over. It was an old banner soldier past forty, his weathered face deeply lined, with an utterly honest-looking face. He had lost an arm, his back was hunched, and he sat cross-legged at the very front of the ranks.

Being singled out, a puzzled look surfaced on the old banner soldier's face. He glanced at Fan Sanlang, then lifted his eyes to Liu Chengzong. "You bandit scum, if you want to kill someone just draw your blade — don't go slinging filth. I don't even know this person."

Truth be told, Liu Chengzong had been quite suspicious that Fan Sanlang might have identified the wrong man.

But hearing this banner soldier call him bandit scum, he tilted his head and rubbed the back of his scalp, his tongue sliding across his teeth.

Since entering Shanxi, the Lion Camp had wiped out eight bands of bandits including those at Yatou Mountain, surrounded Huo Family Fort where only Gao Xian's unit had loosed a few arrows, and apart from that had only fought the banner troops of the Fenzhou Guard.

And this very banner unit had, right under the scouts' noses, plundered and burned the two villages of Zaowang Mountain and Fanjia Valley, slaughtering at least two hundred households of common folk.

And now he had the gall to call him a bandit.

Then there was absolutely no mistake.

Before he could say anything, Fan Sanlang tore off her hair-wrap. "You killed my brother-in-law, killed my little brother, and dragged away my eldest sister — now see if you recognize me!"

"It was you! What gave you the right to kill my brother-in-law, kill my little brother, kill my eldest sister!"

Du Qiao'er had only looked at the old banner soldier's face once. She could never forget that face.

Even after spending two whole days in her head imagining ways to take revenge, she had only dared to look once.

The moment she saw that face, terror seized her heart in an iron grip.

These banner troops were all man-eating demons who didn't even spit out the bones; half her family had died at this man's hands.

Yet now this man was a prisoner in chains, and no one feared him in the slightest. These bandits from Shaanxi couldn't even be bothered to waste rope tying him up.

"So it's you, little girl."

The old banner soldier's face flickered with some emotion. He turned his head away, refusing to look at her, and merely said, "I've killed so many people, how would I remember which one was your brother-in-law or your little brother?"

That was enough.

Liu Chengzong watched as the old banner soldier used his remaining arm to push himself upright. The other banner soldiers around him unconsciously edged away, but the man's face showed no fear of death.

His gaze settled on Liu Chengzong's face. No longer calling him a bandit, he put on an ingratiating smile. "General, even with just one hand, I can still kill for you... You said it yourself — the Lion Camp spares those who identify others. You can't kill me."

The old banner soldier pressed his lips together, glanced at the girl and bared his teeth in a grin, then turned his head back. "I want to identify someone."

Liu Chengzong let out a laugh through his nose. "Quick-thinking, aren't you. To live to this age and still be just a banner soldier — what a waste. Does this even mean anything?"

The old banner soldier was not using the rules to fight the man who made them.

He looked left, then right, before nodding at Liu Chengzong again.

The meaning was clear: he was at death's door anyway. Either don't kill me, or the rule you made is worthless dogshit, no one else will identify anyone, and the prisoners won't just sit and wait to die anymore.

In this world, few people will truly sit and wait to die.

Those who do sit and wait to die all believe that what they are sitting and waiting for is not death, but life.

If what they were waiting for was death, then what was there left to wait for?

Liu Chengzong could only raise a hand. "Go ahead and identify. I won't kill you."

The old banner soldier wore a triumphant smile as he turned around and began pointing people out.

Liu Chengzong glanced down at Fan Sanlang. She had been weeping the whole time.

He turned around and beckoned to someone not far away.

The old banner soldier was acting as if it were a game, a grin plastered on his face as he swept his outstretched arm across the crowd. His finger seemed to carry immense power — wherever it swept, the banner soldiers' faces twisted in terror.

In that moment, the old banner soldier suddenly wanted to ask: what does "innocent" even mean?

In a place like a guard post, where the same few families had taken turns serving as commander for two hundred years, and the same multitudes had been military households for two hundred years — could people here even still be called people?

The commander was the sun in the sky; the banner soldiers were chives on the ground.

They were upright livestock, human-shaped tools, replaced by surplus conscripts when they died. What the commander wanted done, they had to do even if they didn't want to; what the commander forbade, they could not do even if they wanted to.

Morality, ritual, law — justice, right and wrong — whatever the commander said, that was what counted.

Guard posts — weren't guard posts just for fighting the emperor's wars? As long as they could fight, that was enough.

One thousand men against the Lion Camp's fifteen hundred — swap the terrain, and even the Xuan–Da border troops wouldn't necessarily have fought much better than they did.

Suddenly, the expressions of others shattered the old banner soldier's fantasy.

The banner soldiers he was pointing at no longer feared his finger; instead, they looked behind him with expectant faces.

He turned his head. Liu Chengzong was holding a Frankish hand cannon, explaining something to the little girl.

Chengyun had thought his second brother had called him over for something important and had jogged all the way there — only for his brother to say not a single word to him, simply reaching over and pulling the cannon from his waist.

Outrageous!

"With a blade it's hard for you to kill him. This — don't let your hands shake. One hand grips, the other supports. Shove it right up to him and pull the trigger."

The old banner soldier roared, "You can't kill me!"

"Dawdling around with the identifications. I won't kill you — every grievance has its debtor, every debt its debtor. Why can't she kill you? She's not going to point out anyone else."

With that, he fitted the match cord and handed it to Fan Sanlang.

The hand cannon in the girl's hands, front hand steadying, rear hand gripping — she held it as if it were a long-barreled bird gun, walking step by step toward the old banner soldier.

Bang!

Acrid smoke sprayed in front of Fan Sanlang. In the instant before the muzzle flash erupted, Liu Chengzong saw the old banner soldier sigh.

Then he was on the ground, shot through the chest, stretching his one remaining arm toward the sky as if trying to grasp something.

Fan Sanlang turned and ran back, placing the bird gun into Liu Chengzong's hands.

She wiped the tear streaks from her face, then turned back around and drew her blade. She had misjudged the length; the motion was clumsy, her arm fully extended, yet the tip of the blade was still caught in the scabbard.

He had no choice but to tug the scabbard further back before he could grip the waist saber in his hand.

The girl no longer feared the old banner soldier. She walked over, raised the saber above her head, and hacked — once, twice, again and again.

Over nine hundred banner soldiers sat there. No one stood up; they just watched with expressionless faces.

Strange to say, when the old banner soldier demanded the identification, with that look of having him dead to rights, Liu Chengzong felt no stir within.

Yet the old banner soldier's dying sigh carried an immense sense of power that made him grieve.

He raised his head and glanced at the deep blue sky, then stepped forward, grabbed Fan Sanlang by the back of her collar, and lifted her out like a tiny, flailing creature.

This one was simply not soldier material.

In truth, Liu Chengzong placed great importance on having a female soldier come to join him.

Tremendously excited — a female soldier.

Everything is hardest at the start. With a female soldier, he could take the next step and use them as models to rally the common folk, increasing the potential recruiting pool by at least thirty percent.

But the female soldier he wanted was the Qin Liangyu type — one meter eighty tall and one hundred eighty jin — not this little thing he could lift with one arm, barely over a hundred jin.

Compare the ideal to reality, and reality was a clucking, cackling quail.

The identifications ended that afternoon. Four hundred twenty-two banner soldiers of Fenzhou Guard, steeped in unforgivable crimes, were executed.

One hundred thirty convict soldiers were organized into a Left and Right squad. At dusk, they drank a meal of millet gruel, were issued round shields, swords, and sabers outside the fort, and began scaling the walls.

The remaining six hundred-odd banner soldiers, according to the severity of their crimes, were sent to dig pits or haul cargo.

Among them, over two hundred men, after extensive testimony was gathered from within the banner troops, were confirmed to have merely been swept along, never enthusiastic about the late Commander's orders, and were ultimately released.

Liu Chengzong even gave each of them two jin of dry rations for the journey.

This left them profoundly grateful. These men had never expected to leave alive in the first place.

They were the ones who least believed in the saying "no killing those who surrender," and besides, they were captives, not surrendering troops.

In this world, there is only cause and effect; there is absolutely no such thing as karmic retribution.

If retribution truly existed, then Liu Chengzong was their retribution.

For the battle of the two convict squads storming the fort, Fu Renxi also hurried over from Yonghe Pass to observe.

Liu Chengzong's murderous intensity frightened Squad Commander Fu, but this man also considered matters from a very practical standpoint: "Things have already come to this. Why let those two hundred go back? Just kill them all in the valley."

"Among those two hundred-odd I released, there may still be some who did inhuman things, but I believe more of them never acted like beasts."

Fu Renxi was momentarily speechless. His hand, not daring to rise too high, pointed at Liu Chengzong from the waist. "You're a strange one. Let two hundred go back, and the Fenzhou Guard lot, when they fight you again, will refuse to surrender at all costs."

"If they won't surrender to me, they'll surrender to someone else. Anyway, they'll always have to find someone to surrender to. A cat sticking its head into a rat hole gets its head stuck; a rat burrowing into a cat's den will die."

Liu Chengzong viewed the matter with indifference. "We're not the same kind of people. They don't want to surrender to me, and I don't want to accept their surrender either."

A volley of gunfire crackled atop the fort wall. The two convict squads entered the range of Huo Family Fort, hoisting scaling ladders and raising shields as they quickened their pace.

Fu Renxi pointed toward Huo Family Fort. "Then, are your humble subordinate and the General the same kind of people?"

"You want to go to Liaodong. I can see you off for a stretch, but once you're there, I won't be able to help. The world has already come to this."

Liu Chengzong watched as two scaling ladders were set against the fort wall and slowly shook his head. "Everyone in this world seeks mere survival; that is what makes ambition so rare and precious."

He felt deeply gratified that, during the battle with Zhang Zhan at Lion Camp, Fu Renxi had not led his troops to stab him in the back.

Fu Renxi gave a bitter laugh and spat. "This world... I have only four hundred men under me. The General can help me. If I ever became a Regional Commander or Vice Regional Commander, the moment I opened my eyes each day, tens of thousands of mouths would be demanding grain from me. What fucking ambition could I possibly have left?"

Liu Chengzong turned his face and glanced at Fu Renxi. "Vice Regional Commander... let me mull it over. How many times would wiping me out earn you a Vice Regional Commander post? By the time you've made Vice Regional Commander, I reckon that anywhere I go in Shaanxi or Shanxi, I'll be able to support you."

"Ha!"

Fu Renxi clearly did not believe it, taking it only as a joke from Liu Chengzong. He clasped his fists with a grin. "Then your humble subordinate shall borrow the General's auspicious words. If the day ever comes that I go to Liaodong, I'll have my child recognize you as his godfather."

Liu Chengzong was not joking.

A rough route was already taking shape in his mind.

Barren regions like Shaanxi and Shanxi were not without grain; it was simply that the best land was all in the hands of princely estates. Many commoners had been displaced, and the number of those who remained was far smaller than before.

If more and more officers commanding troops, like Fu Renxi, entered a symbiotic state with him,

he could further ease the military pressure and gain the time to accomplish the water conservancy projects the Great Ming could not complete, restoring at least a trace of vitality to this land.

Even if that still could not solve the grain problem, it would be enough to radiate influence to Northern Zhili, the Central Plains, and even the doorstep of the Land of Abundance.

But plans always look beautiful on paper. Last winter, he had still been thinking that this year the harvest along the Apricot River would be bountiful. Then a frost came after the Spring Festival, and the princely estate's yield was not even enough to cover their military rations for a year.

The two convict squads fought with desperate effort, scaling the fort wall under bows, crossbows, and arquebus fire, entering the white-knife battle to seize the ramparts.

The young men of the Huo family had no shortage of capable fighters, but defending the fort wall was difficult to win.

This battle had essentially decided the outcome.

Soon, the defenders atop the earthen fort dwindled. The fort gate was seized and forced open, and Gao Xian's infantry filed in and stormed the fort.

Not long after, the commoners, the old, the weak, and the women and children who had earlier taken refuge in the fort slowly emerged. The young men of the Huo family withdrew into the residential compound to make their stand.

Those who surrendered had already surrendered; those who fought were still fighting.

But now that the fort gate was open, the remaining fight was merely a matter of mopping up those holding out to the death. The issue was no longer significant.

This allowed both Liu Chengzong and Fu Renxi to breathe a sigh of relief.

It seemed to be only at this moment that Fu Renxi noticed a young woman was actually following behind Liu Chengzong. He laughed. "Is the General newly recruiting a household retainer?"

He meant it as a joke. Who would believe that a woman beside such a great bandit chief was a soldier?

And yet, Liu Chengzong disappointed him once again, nodding with utter seriousness. "I am also quite troubled."

He glanced back at Fan Sanlang and said, "She came to join me. I originally wanted to put her somewhere away from the fighting, cooking and washing clothes for the soldiers, or even learning some medical skill. But she insists on fighting. Look how thin she is — I was sturdier than her when I was twelve or thirteen."

It was just as well that Master Gao wasn't here, or he'd have died of rage.

Wasn't it only natural that you were sturdier than her? That autumn diet — no decent person could compare.

How many heroes and bold spirits eat that one final beheading meal in their entire lives, and you went and wolfed it all down, spending the whole autumn packing on fat and training martial arts.

Put a rock there, feed it that much heaven-and-earth spiritual energy and let it gnaw on the essence of the sun and moon every day, and even it could wreak havoc in the Heavenly Palace.

"Assign her to another squad, and she'll die in the next battle — might even drag them down. Of those two villages, she's the only one who survived. Her life should be cherished."

Du Qiao'er was truly not easy to persuade.

She had thought long and hard down in the well. Sanlang had long since dug a hole in the well, and the old lady had already passed away — there was no need to go out and fight others to the death.

Fan Sanlang had traded her everything of his — his weapons, his clothes, his soldier's pay, his spoils of war, even his very life.

All so she could live on, and live well.

That was why she had set up a door plank as a grave marker on Sanlang's burial mound, and written upon it: Grave of Du Qiao'er.

That night had been wrong.

The Banner troops should not have killed anyone. Eldest Brother should not have left the village. Second Brother should not have jumped the wall. Eldest Sister should not have tripped. Second Sister should not have run wild... Everything about it was wrong.

The one lying on the ground should have been Du Qiao'er. The one walking with hand on saber should have been Fan Sanlang.

She had to learn Sanlang's skills as quickly as possible, and set things back to the way they should have been.

To live on under the name Fan Sanlang, wielding his saber and bearing his bow upon her back.

Liu Chengzong turned his head. The little quail, who had been eavesdropping with both ears pricked, hurriedly averted her eyes. He let out a long breath through his nose. "Survivors are neither special nor rare. Here, every single person you see — we are all survivors left behind by heaven's disasters and man's cruelties."