Chapter 202: White Willow Creek, Cloud-Touched Moon

Bai Liuxi rode along the road toward Heshui County.

The vast procession threaded single-file along several goat paths over the mountain ridges, ragged bandits leading horses and mules with heads down.

As one of the many bandit chiefs in Qingyang Prefecture, Bai Liuxi was no different from the other leaders — her following swelled and shrank, her fighting strength waxed and waned, and her renown flared up and died down just as quickly.

The only difference was that she was a woman.

Bai Liuxi was from Huan County in the north of Qingyang Prefecture, born into a musician household, but she could neither compose nor play the zither; from childhood she had trained in sword and spear, excelled at performing Yang Paifeng, and only the year before last began learning unarmed combat, preparing to play Sun Erniang once she turned twenty.

But she never got the chance — with bandits rising up everywhere, the old troupe mistress who often played She Taijun saw their livelihood crumbling and decided to arrange a stable marriage for her, so as not to wrong the leading dan actress under her care.

She actually found someone — an official household planning to buy her as a concubine.

This family had a member who had risen as high as the rank of Vice Fourth-Rank Salt Transport Associate Prefect — they had official rank, they had status, they had wealth.

Only, that Vice Fourth-Rank Salt Transport Associate Prefect was the buyer's son.

The Associate Prefect himself looked down on the matter and refused to pay; meanwhile, his father kept pressuring the troupe mistress to send the girl over.

And so things got messy.

Later, when the old master sent household servants to fetch her, they beat up everyone in the opera troupe — the troupe members were unwilling to let the servants drag Bai Liuxi away, yet dared not fight back, so the men stood outside and stiffly endured the beating.

Every one of them was battered until noses were bruised, faces swollen, heads cracked and bleeding.

Finally the old troupe mistress stepped in to stop them, but a single kick to the pit of her stomach struck her down, and in the blink of an eye she was dead.

Bai Liuxi and the martial actors and actresses drew blades, brandished spears… truth be told, they weren't much good.

Though they had handled weapons all their lives, most of them had never once in their lives fought a real person.

And while their martial skills were polished, the martial arts they practiced were not quite the same as what Liu Chengzong trained in.

Liu Chengzong's kind of martial skill — the goal of long training was to strike true and kill.

The martial skill of Bai Liuxi and her people — the goal of long training was to evade and to deliberately miss.

One would drop into a split on the ground, swaying and ducking continuously; another would jab with a flowery spear, thrust after thrust, fast and fierce — but the aim was not to land the hit, but to make the near-miss look spectacular.

So when the fight broke out, it was rather awkward: others aimed for vital spots, while they aimed to just barely miss as the opponent dodged.

Those wielding blades and spears proved largely useless; instead it was Bai Liuxi who grabbed a staff and battered four or five men until they howled like ghosts and wailed like wolves.

In the heat of the moment her hand was too heavy, and she beat a man to death.

After that, she led the troupe to bury the old mistress and took to the hills in Huan County as an outlaw.

Bai Liuxi was able to become a leader not because she could fight, nor because she was young and beautiful, but because she could find grain.

In their line of work, especially here in Shaanxi, the most frequently requested repertoire was the Yang Family Generals, and as a young dan actress, she easily won the favor of dignitaries and nobles, often accompanying the old troupe mistress as an honored guest after performances.

Over time, she came to know the hidden grain caches of many wealthy households, and every so often she would sneak out and dig one up — with plenty of hands, even if discovered, those isolated estates couldn't stop them, and she would split the grain and flee.

She had always been clever, never telling anyone the locations of the grain caches; even when scouting, she only brought a few martial actors and actresses to verify the situation, letting others get involved only when it was time to act.

Yet even so, by this year, grain was growing scarcer and scarcer.

It wasn't just that all the caches she knew had been emptied — with drought year after year, the wealthy households they could rob had little grain left, and the remaining fortified stockades were beyond the reach of petty bandits like them.

When order first collapsed, no one knew which way to turn; whoever could point out a direction could ride the momentum and become a leader.

But now that order had been broken for so long, merely pointing out a direction was no longer enough to keep the people below steady.

This was hard for anyone, and for a woman in this age, it was even harder.

Her followers drifted away and scattered; those who stayed wanted to do something more drastic.

In the year and more since becoming an outlaw, Bai Liuxi had been diligently trying to learn to read, relying mainly on the storyteller in her band.

The old storyteller knew some characters and could teach her the basics, but his own craft depended on a prodigious memory — tell a story enough times and he'd commit the whole book to heart.

The trouble was, the old man had only ever memorized one book.

Water Margin.

This made Bai Liuxi afraid to set up camp on any mountain. She had once commanded over a thousand people; even after the scattering, she still had seven or eight hundred.

In the story, Wang Lun of Liangshan had three champions and seven or eight hundred small-fry; she had twelve martial actors and actresses and seven or eight hundred starving folk.

Bai Liuxi thought to herself, she was far too clever for that — counting the days, Lin Chong would soon be climbing the mountain, and Chao Gai wouldn't be far behind.

She couldn't stay on a mountain. Stay on a mountain, and she, the female version of the White-Clad Scholar Wang Lun, would be cut down by Lin Chong in a fiery coup.

She was brooding over exactly this when the Liu brothers arrived.

Not the Liu brothers of Yan'an Prefecture — the Liu brothers of Qingyang Prefecture: Liu the Fifth, Liu Daojiang, and Liu the Sixth, Liu Daohai.

These two brothers were local tyrants of Qingyang Prefecture; the year before, they had joined forces with Han Chaozai, who had risen in arms even earlier, mustering over ten thousand troops to fight the government forces in Huan County, leaving the land strewn with corpses.

Now they were marching their troops north again, frightening Bai Liuxi into hastily leading her band deep into the mountains, steering clear of those chieftains.

Had a male leader been in command, it wouldn't have come to this — they might have happily merged forces — but as it happened, her band was half men and half women, and she had taken in many renowned dan actresses from Huan County and Qingyang.

Just as earlier, when she had considered merging with Han Chaozai, his general, the Gorge-Leaping Tiger, had opened his mouth and demanded to take every last one of them as his women.

The matter was complicated. First of all, Bai Liuxi didn't like it.

But after discussing it with her sisters, she had to admit there was a certain logic to it.

A group of women with no one to rely on — though they were all familiar with weapons and possessed some martial strength, merely feeding themselves left them utterly exhausted in body and mind, let alone having to guard against soldiers and bandits alike.

Enemies on every side.

How long could they hold out like this?

They would inevitably have to find someone to depend on.

Finding someone to depend on — easy to say, yet terribly hard to do.

If hearts aligned, wandering to the ends of the earth together was no hardship; if both were willing, they could simply pair up and make a life; if no one caught the eye, they could aim for power — even stumbling upon a Short-Legged Tiger would count as good luck.

After all, in their profession, the troupe mistress had always said: sooner or later, marry a high official, far better than drifting through the dusty world.

But if they were only after power, why settle for some local bandit under Han Chaozai? Why not clean themselves up and deliver themselves straight to Han Chaozai? Or flee north of Yan'an Prefecture and throw in their lot with the mightiest of them all, Wang Jiayin?

And just at this moment, word was spreading like wildfire among the bandit bands of Qingyang Prefecture: Liu the Lion of Yan'an Prefecture had marched his army into Qingyang, and his great general Yang Yao was summoning the leaders of Qingyang's four counties to come pay their respects.

Bai Liuxi saw this as a fine opportunity, so she mustered her people and began moving toward Heshui County.

On the road, her senior general asked, "Sister Bai, what sort of man is that Liu Lion?"

Liu Lion — a man of the very highest caliber.

Bai Liuxi also had a senior general, a martial performer by the stage name Cloud Brushes the Moon.

She was a woman too. The two of them, taken in as children by the old troupe master for their fine features and trained in martial female roles — Bai Liuxi grew up fair-skinned and tall, and so was given this stage name.

Cloud Brushes the Moon, however, had a slight deviation in the course of her growth.

Bai Liuxi — just hearing the name feels like bathing in spring, white tinged with emerald.

Cloud Brushes the Moon — what sort of scene is that? Black tinged with brightness.

The two ate the exact same food and trained the exact same skills, yet Cloud Brushes the Moon grew ever taller, ever broader, ever sturdier.

How to describe it?

Before the troupe collapsed, Cloud Brushes the Moon's signature piece was "Meeting at the Ancient City," learned from a southern Anhui troupe.

In it she played Zhang Fei; the martial performer playing Guan Yu, wearing a green headwrap, stood half a head shorter than her.

A perfectly good sword-and-horse female role, with a lovely face — only because her build was too brawny and her complexion somewhat dark did she end up a martial performer instead.

Hearing Cloud Brushes the Moon's question, Bai Liuxi shook her head.

Though it was called paying respects to Liu Lion, everyone in the column knew they had reached the moment of decision — they had to find a reliable leader to attach themselves to.

At times like this, when they could not control their own fate, every heart was heavy.

Bai Liuxi had long hidden in the mountains; even the news of Yang Yao summoning the bandit bands had only reached her through others rushing to tell her — how could she know what sort of man Liu Lion was?

Still, as if consoling herself, she smiled and said, "I hear he is battle-hardened and seasoned in war. He must be a male version of Cloud Brushes the Moon."

Cloud Brushes the Moon paused, then laughed. "If he truly is a male version of me, then his looks must be among the finest men under heaven. If my sister were matched with a general's noble frame, it would be no loss."

But at this jest, Bai Liuxi's face showed worry. "Never mind matching or not. Look at the Water Margin — the men of this world come in two kinds. The greedy and lecherous mostly have no real mettle, while those who accomplish great deeds all shun women. I fear he might dig out my heart and liver to go with his wine!"

"That does seem true. I hear that Wang Jiayin of Yulin has also never taken a wife." Cloud Brushes the Moon sighed. "Every petty chief has wives and concubines in droves, yet the great leaders all stand alone. How strange."

Bai Liuxi's column moved south along the Huan River. The river was extremely broad, also called the Malian River, but the common folk preferred to call it the Horse Fool River.

Because the river was very long, winding and twisting southward from the Great Wall. Its water was poor — neither drinkable nor fit for irrigation — and no one cared for it. Only when it reached Ningzhou did it run somewhat cleaner, barely usable for irrigation.

Moreover, this river had an abnormal temperament. Normally one could wade across, but come the summer and autumn rains, it would swell a thousandfold, washing away bridges and drowning people, livestock, and fields.

The greatest use of this river for the people living north of Ningzhou was that it washed firewood down from the mountains onto the downstream shoals; once the waters receded, they could gather the wood.

Following the Huan River, past the desolate fields on both banks ravaged by bandit disasters and war, they reached the confluence with the Gourd River, twenty-some li from Heshui, and the surroundings grew lively.

Cloud Brushes the Moon climbed a ridge to scout. Before long she came rushing down the hill, spear in hand. "Sister, this is it! On the eastern hills, camps stretch ten li, banners covering the ground! Quick, climb up and see!"

Cloud Brushes the Moon simply had no idea how to describe the sight she had witnessed.

She had never in her life seen such a sight. Still at least twenty li away, she could see, stretching eastward along the ridges into the hill country, a dense mass of encampments unfolding layer upon layer across the dry terraced fields, stretching beyond the eye's reach.

In a daze, it was as though she were looking at a town from afar — and even calling it a town was no longer fitting.

The entire Qingyang Prefecture, even during the Wanli years, had only a hundred fifty or sixty thousand people. Now, after years of famine and two years of war, the surviving populace was scattered across four counties, one subprefecture, and the vast mountain regions.

Cloud Brushes the Moon was absolutely certain that this army encamped in the distant mountains outnumbered the population of any county beyond the prefectural seat.

As Bai Liuxi and Cloud Brushes the Moon stood on the ridge gazing at Lion Camp, Lion Camp was also watching them.

On the reverse slope of the ridge, hidden from Bai Liuxi's sight, Dai Daozi — former Ningxia Garrison Hengcheng Fort Unit Commander, now Lion Camp Reconnaissance Cavalry Unit Commander — led ten reconnaissance riders swiftly through the terrain.

These soldiers, still wearing border-army uniforms, ran through the hills with hands on their blades. On the winding road below the mountain, a single reconnaissance rider led over twenty warhorses at a gallop, kicking up a dragon of dust.

And on a ridge five li to the east, another squad of reconnaissance riders had already received their flag signal and knew that a column of several hundred had entered within twenty-five li of Lion Camp.

Lion Camp now had thirty-six reconnaissance squads, each squad twelve riders, with each squad manned by eight Ningxia soldiers and four post-station runners.

The Ningxia veteran Dai Daozi commanded four squads.

But in truth, the work of Lion Camp's reconnaissance riders was very difficult — the force was simply too large.

Under normal circumstances, they were accustomed to screening the force from twenty li out. At that distance, a standard battalion of three thousand, divided into sentry posts, could conceal itself completely within the mountains.

But their force was too large. Nominally two battalions, in reality it had more troops than three battalions, and the number of mules and horses they brought far exceeded that of any government army.

In a river valley with wide-open views and a terrain riddled with knolls, ridges, and plateaus, twenty li was nowhere near enough to screen them.

Dai Daozi's post-runner subordinate asked as they hurried along, "Unit Commander, can't we just keep an eye on them? That's seven or eight hundred people."

"Mm."

Dai Daozi merely kept his hand on his blade and ran with head down, answering with a grunt and saying nothing more.

He did not know what these people had come for. These past few days, every manner of chief from Qingyang Prefecture had been coming here to see his commander-in-chief — an unending stream.

The brothers Liu Daojiang and Liu Daohai had sent their subordinate officers over.

Han Chaozai, along with local chiefs like Tian Jin'an of Heshui County, and Hu Sanzha, He Zijie, Wang Mancai, and other such bandits from the Ningzhou area, had all come in person.

But these chiefs, answering Yang Yao's invitation, all came with at most three or five riders, at most a dozen or so — merely bringing a few bodyguards.

Who had ever come like Bai Liuxi, seven or eight hundred people surging forward in a dark mass, and traveling by the official road at that?

Dai Daozi was still far off and could only make out that this group's armor and weapons were in disarray; he could not tell whether their leader was man or woman.

Having weighed the military strength of both sides, Dai Daozi finally reached a conclusion: with the ten riders under his command, if it truly came to a fight against this column of seven or eight hundred by the riverbank, his odds of winning were not great.

But he certainly would not come out at a loss.

These people did not even have a single piece of decent armor, and all they carried were civilian weapons. Dai Daozi could imagine a tiny chance of victory — but the chance of losing was equally tiny. For example... if the enemy fought to the death and simply exhausted his ten riders to death?

Dai Daozi was burning with pent-up drive. Ever since he had been the first in the prisoner camp to join Lion Camp, he had yet to achieve a single merit and was desperate for a battle to show his abilities.

These seven or eight hundred would do very nicely.

Racing to the mountain path, Dai Daozi's men took the shortcut while the horses ran fast but took the longer route — both arrived almost at the same time. The twelve reconnaissance riders vaulted into their saddles, formed up in three ranks of cavalry into a small square formation, and closed rapidly on Bai Liuxi's column.

Four hundred paces was but a moment's gallop. The closer Dai Daozi got, the more something felt off.

At first he had assumed these were civilian militia from Heshui County, but only when he drew within bowshot did he make out that the column was mixed with many young women.

Many of the vigorous young women in that column were around the same age as the daughter the Qing vassal prince's lieutenant had murdered.

Dai Daozi's eager heart for winning merit cooled. He wheeled his horse in a half-circle and pulled his squad back to a safe distance. "Send someone to ask — what have they come here for?"

Source of *The Stubborn Bandit*: