Chapter 205: Yuan Sanmen

Ever since he was transferred to guard the city gate, Yuan Sanmen had been deeply unhappy.

His original surname was Feng; in his youth, he was a village good-for-nothing.

At nineteen, he gambled away his wife to someone else and became a beggar himself, unable to go on living.

He barged into the gambling den run by Squire Yuan and got a beating for his trouble; barged in again and had a leg broken; after the leg healed, he went back to stir up more trouble and had his left pinky chopped off — from start to finish, he never made a sound.

From that day on, Squire Yuan's gambling den paid him two taels of silver every month.

In truth, ever since the dynasty was founded in the early Ming, the people of Ming trembled inwardly at the mere sound of the word "gambling," because the Hongwu Emperor decreed that commoners who gambled would have their hands chopped off and officials who gambled would be stripped of their posts.

After the Hongwu Emperor died, the practice could not be stamped out entirely, but at least no one dared gamble openly and brazenly.

Yet the year Feng Sanmen barged into that gambling den was already the thirty-seventh year of the Wanli reign.

By then, the emperor had grown indolent in governance, local officials were in short supply, and none of the laws and decrees worked very well anymore; moreover, the emperor himself was gambling in the palace with the eunuchs of the Directorate of Ceremonial until the sky turned dark — every single person who came out of the palace was a professional croupier — and as they accompanied the tax eunuchs out in all directions, the gambling craze reignited across the realm, north and south, within two or three years.

Squire Yuan was no official; he had merely purchased an honorary cap and sash. He had started out as an old scoundrel, and during the Wanli years, he became the nominal grandson of a eunuch.

A nominal grandson is the nominal son of a nominal son.

Through this connection, he secured two mining sites in Heshui County and became a mine boss; however, because the surveying was slipshod and the commoners forced to mine lacked any motivation, the ore extracted not only failed to make Squire Yuan any money, it didn't even earn back the sum he had agreed to split evenly with the government and his nominal grandfather.

Fortunately, Squire Yuan was clever; before anyone found out, he joined forces with his nominal father to sell the mine boss rights to Master Qi of Heshui County's West Gate, who was known as "Half the Town."

Master Qi's family had for generations combined farming and scholarship, and he himself was a retired official who looked down on everyone; he saw the venture as a chance to make silver, never imagining he would lose his entire fortune. He could not twist the arm of a eunuch; his fields, houses, and land deeds were all divided up by Squire Yuan, and to make matters worse, his youngest daughter was also seized through trickery and force — he dropped dead of fury on the spot.

But Miss Qi was a woman of fierce temperament, her heart always brimming with hatred. The first time she was with child, she got rid of it herself; the second time, she simply maimed Squire Yuan's manhood, and later threw herself into a well.

Squire Yuan used this money to open three gambling dens inside the city and outside the two gates, and only then did he make a great fortune.

Originally, a reckless, pig-headed thug like Feng Sanmen would have been quietly done away with without anyone knowing, but when the matter reached Squire Yuan's ears, he recalled that he himself had been a ruthless man in his youth, so he gave him a little money each month and even brought him into his household as an enforcer for dirty work.

Feng Sanmen — "Sanmen" — was the name he got at the gambling den.

Within a few years, he had even changed his surname and was called Yuan Sanmen.

Some time ago, when Li Laochai and Tian Jin'an besieged the city, Magistrate Jiang summoned the city's gentry to provide men; Squire Yuan organized his gambling den hangers-on into a militia on the spot, and Yuan Sanmen was sent to the city wall to guard it as the militia leader.

After He Huchen drove off the bandits, the county seat had naturally withdrawn its defenses, but who could have known that a few days later He Huchen would come fleeing back in defeat, throwing the county seat into a great panic, and County Magistrate Jiang once again summoned the gentry.

And you really couldn't fault them — though the county could barely collect the Liao frontier tax, and the county magistrate himself, going door to door for local levies, could only get half of what was owed.

Yet when this sort of thing happened, whether it was men or money that was needed, everyone was exceptionally eager.

And they insisted over and over: "Oh, Magistrate Jiang, our father and mother, whatever you do, don't let the troops of Qingyang Garrison defend the city! Defending the city — we, the sons of Heshui, will shoulder it entirely on our own!"

Thinking of the nauseating sight of Squire Yuan leaning on his cane and saying those words in front of County Magistrate Jiang, Yuan Sanmen, who was sprawled on a reclining chair in the city gate tunnel, waving a palm-leaf fan and airing out his bare feet, tilted his head back, worked his throat hard, and hawked up a wad of thick phlegm; he cocked his head to the side and spat it onto the ground with a splat.

"Nothing but his mother's farting nonsense!"

That rotten old bastard says he wants to try out his equipment with his newly bought sixth concubine to see if it still works, and sends his crippled, forty-year-old, broken-legged, fingerless wreck of a father here to guard the city, under his mother's blazing sun, no less.

You old mother-violating thief, why don't you come try it out at the city gate instead, so Third Master here can at least get an eyeful.

What fun was there in guarding a city gate these days?

Yuan Sanmen thought to himself: the only people who come are refugees or famine victims, every one of them a filthy, stinking beggar — dealing with these bugs all day long, how disgusting.

Just then, a militiaman, drenched in sweat from the sun, came running over the drawbridge: "Third Master, a soldier from Qingyang Garrison is here and won't be turned away!"

He paused his palm-leaf fan. "How many men?"

"Just one!"

Yuan Sanmen scrambled up from the reclining chair, his face twisting into a complicated expression of furrowed brows and a hooked smirk; he stretched hard, then lurched forward with quick, hopping strides.

Here comes the fun, doesn't it!

A long line had formed on the drawbridge; several dozen refugees and famine victims in tattered clothes were waiting on the North Stream Bridge, many of them familiar faces.

These people were all beggars who had come out of the mountains; every few days they'd run over to East Gate to try their luck, as if there were a mouthful of food waiting for them inside the city.

Yuan Sanmen glanced at the line, then looked east toward the mountains — those mountains were truly hateful.

If it weren't for those mountains, all these filthy, stinking bugs would have starved to death and left the world in peace.

Once the city gate was shut, no matter if heaven crumbled and earth split outside, Heshui City would be as solid as a golden fortress!

At the very front of the line, a gaunt banner soldier in a patched uniform, mounted on a big-bellied horse even scrawnier than he was, waved a letter urgently and cried, "I must enter the city! This is a letter for your county magistrate — a major disaster has occurred!"

"Whose letter are you delivering?"

Yuan Sanmen frowned and came lurching up from behind; he reached out and took the letter, and heard the banner soldier say, "The Qingyang Garrison Commander..."

"Your granddaddy thought it was some hairy-faced monkey from who-knows-where." The moment he heard the words "Qingyang Garrison," Yuan Sanmen relaxed completely. He raised a hand and cursed, "Ha, you plague-ridden old baboon, riding a horse and pretending to be a man — I didn't even recognize you for a moment. Someone help me move that prick-face out of the way. The county magistrate has ordered that not a single bandit or dog be allowed into the city."

Having been held up for ages, the banner soldier was already beside himself with impatience, and now, being humiliated for no reason, he was simply dumbfounded by the cursing — he couldn't even think to retort. His eyes bulged wider than his cheekbones; he reached out a hand but couldn't get a word out, and cried in desperation, "I am a banner soldier of Qingyang Garrison, not a bandit!"

"The county magistrate also said: half a dog may be let in, but a banner soldier may not."

Before the banner soldier could retort, Yuan Sanmen had already raised one hand above his head.

That hand made an opening-and-closing motion; Yuan Sanmen waved it with a face full of disgust, cleared his throat with a rasp, and worked up another wad of thick phlegm. He stretched out his arm and pointed west: "Clamp that bird beak shut, quick! Fly back to your bird's nest and go screw your mother — the city is closed to you!"

Having thoroughly enjoyed his tirade, Yuan Sanmen turned to his men on either side and waved. "A commander so small his balls are smaller than a hair — if he doesn't piss off by the count of three, beat him to death on the spot and feed him to the famine victims."

The banner soldier's face flushed red and paled white by turns from the humiliation; five times he was on the verge of drawing his blade and cutting the man down, but he simply didn't dare. Nor did he dare linger any longer, and had no choice but to turn his horse and leave the drawbridge.

Before he left, he still shouted, "You dog-cripple, that letter must reach Magistrate Jiang!"

In Qingyang, no one feared the Qingyang Garrison.

Even the great households did not fear the Qingyang Garrison — not even before its rebellion.

Qingyang Prefecture had a Huan County Independent Defense Battalion; the Qingyang Garrison had stationed one battalion in Qingyang itself, while the rest of its main force was garrisoned in Ningzhou.

Some time ago, some men had deserted from that one battalion, and the remaining men had fought three battles against Han Chaozai — they won one, and now there weren't many men left.

The main force garrisoned in Ningzhou had deserted entirely.

Ningzhou was a place with a great deal of farmland, over a million mu, but because Li Siqi had made a desperate, last-ditch stand there at the end of the Yuan dynasty, the Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang had doubled the tax levy on it.

Where other places collected 1.2%, this place collected 2.5%; during the Wanli years, a few more hundredths of a percent were mysteriously tacked on, and no one knew why — in any case, the annual quota was nearly seventy thousand dan of grain.

From the fourth year of the Hongwu reign to the present, there had never been a single year in which the summer tax and autumn grain could be collected in full.

When drought or flood struck elsewhere, refugees all fled to Ningzhou, because there was so much land.

The common folk of Ningzhou had been fleeing elsewhere ever since the early Ming, and they were still fleeing now — because the taxes were too high.

The drought was already deadly enough, but then the Wanli Emperor and the Chongzhen Emperor each piled on extra levies in turn, and everything blew up at once.

The men the Qingyang Guard Commander could actually command were still fewer than what Yuan Sanmen had.

They had not gone far when a boom rang out from the riverbank — a warhorse screamed in agony, and no one knew if it had twisted its leg or was simply too starved to stand, but it crashed heavily to the ground and slid a long way.

Everyone on the bridge froze. The first to react was still Yuan Sanmen. He clenched his fists, hopping and jumping as he bellowed, "You maggots — the horse is dead, eat the horse!"

No one knew which starving man started it, but everyone charged stampeding toward where the banner soldier had fallen. For a moment, the banner soldiers around the warhorse were so alarmed they drew their blades and made as if to slash, yet they could not scare the starving people back.

Seeing they were about to be surrounded, the banner soldiers could only flee in disarray, watching as the starving mob behind them, like a pack of wild dogs, tore with their hands and bit with their teeth, devouring the still-dying warhorse alive.

Watching this, Yuan Sanmen stood at the far end of the drawbridge, arms akimbo, laughing uproariously.

It was not that he did not fear the Qingyang Guard Commander — truth be told, he would be afraid even if only a squad commander showed up — so it would be even better if the starving folk could kill these banner soldiers.

He was simply secure in his confidence, certain that this city would not let any government troops inside.

But then again, it would not matter even if they did. If government troops mad with hunger entered the city, he might die first, but there would certainly be those lords buried alongside him.

Yuan Sanmen... found himself very strange.

Being alive was not so bad — eating his fill and drinking his drink — but every day, all he saw were these things.

It was not about wanting to help others, or pity or sympathy. He did not think of others. It was just that what he saw every day made him realize that he himself would never get better either.

All his life, Yuan Sanmen had wished for others to call him Master Feng, but even if he became Master Feng, what then?

Yuan Sanmen would be killed by government troops or roving bandits driven mad by hunger.

Master Feng would likewise be killed by government troops or roving bandits driven mad by hunger.

He had even thought about scraping together one last sum of money, a big sum, and taking his band of Shaanxi lads under his command to flee somewhere else — but he had asked everywhere, and as vast as heaven and earth were, there was not a single place free of war and chaos.

It was vexing, like living inside Water Margin — not a life of avenging grievances or reveling in wickedness.

Rather, being born into a strange era, where saving a person earned not a shred of hidden virtue, and harming a person added not a sliver of karmic hindrance.

Great men, small men, great geniuses, great fools — the ending was all the same.

Furious, yet not knowing against whom to seek vengeance. Utterly pointless.

He was simply sick of living.

"Third Master, look over there."

Yuan Sanmen followed the militiaman's pointing arm and saw that there were still quite a few people on the drawbridge. These were not the starving ones — they might be refugees, at any rate none of them had yet reached the point of eating raw flesh.

Among them were four people: a toothless old servant, a hunched old woman, and two young women — one slender and graceful like a white lotus, the other tall and poised like a dark beauty.

But as for exactly how beautiful, Yuan Sanmen's gaze only traveled from the ground up to their shoes and went no higher.

In times like these, traveling out to such a poor and remote place, a woman whose shoes bore little dust and whose skirt remained clean was not someone he could afford to look at.

He walked straight toward the toothless old servant, a smile spreading across his face. "Old sir, you have a very fine physiognomy. May I ask what brings you to this small county?"

The old man handed over a travel permit, which left Yuan Sanmen dumbfounded. Guarding the city gate for over ten days, he had yet to see anyone carrying a travel permit.

"Xiucai — Xiucai, get over here!"

From beneath the city gate arch, a blue-robed scholar wearing spectacles sauntered out lazily. When he caught sight of the women on the drawbridge, his steps quickened a few paces.

In truth, at this moment, Bai Liuxi and Yun Jiaoyue still had not recovered from Yuan Sanmen's earlier string of obscenities, much less reacted to this abrupt shift to "Old sir, you have a very fine physiognomy."

Then they saw a bespectacled scholar step forward, clasp his hands, and grin foolishly. "My greetings to you two young ladies. This young student..."

"Aiyo, you dumb prick — 'young student' my ass, you simpering fop." Yuan Sanmen raised his hand and slapped the travel permit into the scholar's chest. "Hurry up and check this old sir's travel permit!"

The scholar dared not defy him. With a look of irritation, he unfolded the permit. "Huan County, musician household, four persons. Clerk Liu Er — the seal is fine. Qingyang Prefecture seal is also fine, Clerk Yang Ding... Where is Clerk Chen of Qingyang Prefecture?"

Hearing they were a musician household, Yuan Sanmen's eyes traveled upward a little, sizing up their figures. Not bad.

"Old man, keep your mouth shut." He dropped the honorific, merely raising a hand. "I need to inspect your luggage."

Clang! He drew out a soft blade, the sword steel flapping noisily.

A small serpent spear, four chi and five cun long — with a blade that long, it had decent heft in the hand, but the material felt rather poor, and it hardly qualified as any kind of real weapon.

A huge pile of theatrical costumes and props. Yuan Sanmen fished out a dozen or so Tongbao coins, then tossed them back. He held Zhang Fei's fake beard up to his own face to compare — not as luxuriant as his own.

The only item that could remotely be called a weapon was a thick staff, four chi and five cun long. He asked about it and was told it was Yang Paifeng's stage prop.

No crossbows, no firearms. Two young girls, carrying a heap of toys — nothing whatsoever to be wary of.

Yuan Sanmen asked, "Whose invitation did you accept, coming to this small county to perform Zhang Fei?"

"Shopkeeper Hong of the Moon-Reaching Tavern."

"Hong Laosi? Xiucai, escort these two young ladies to the big compound north of the city. The city is in chaos these days — don't let the young ladies get lost in the streets."

At these words, Bai Liuxi and Yun Jiaoyue exchanged a glance — fear on their faces, but delight in their eyes.

The old servant and the old woman, however, turned pale with shock. The old servant fished out a few qian of broken silver and pressed it into Yuan Sanmen's hand, saying hurriedly, "My lord, please show mercy. We are all honest folk of a musician household..."

"You old codger — I praised your physiognomy, and you try to fob your grandpa off with four qian of silver? You really think I can't tell that your wild-ass father stood at least four chi at the shoulder?"

Yuan Sanmen's face changed in an instant. He lunged forward, seized the old servant by the belt and collar and hoisted him up, then hurled him against the bridge railing — splash! — tossing the man into the river. He turned, a savage grin on his face, and looked at the old woman with a smile. "Old crone, you want to go down and cool off too?"

The old woman was so terrified she stumbled backward several steps and tripped over her own feet.

Almost simultaneously, the hangers-on behind him each pounced and seized Bai Liuxi and Yun Jiaoyue. Then, two of them grabbed the luggage, pushing and shoving the two women as they followed the scholar into the county seat.

They entered Heshui through the barbican of the east gate, headed north along the base of the city wall, and climbed a stone path through the hills. On the way, the scholar walked ahead, strutting and preening as if he imagined someone behind him was watching.

Little did he know that both girls were busy studying the city wall and the surrounding courtyard walls, paying him no mind whatsoever.

The scholar could be heard saying, "Do not be afraid, young ladies. The hills north of the city have always been desolate. Scream and no one will hear; even if they hear, no one will care. Let us not make trouble for one another. This young student is not a crude vulgarian like Yuan Sanmen. Serve the brothers for a few days in comfort, and if we are pleased, we might just let you go."

Bai Liuxi looked at the surrounding courtyards and asked curiously, "Truly no one can hear? There are so many households around here."

"All fled the famine. Looks like many courtyards, but in truth, no one is here. If you don't believe me, watch." The scholar raised his voice and shouted, "Help!"

Indeed, there was no response.

Bai Liuxi and Yun Jiaoyue exchanged a glance, both reassured. She stopped walking and let out a long breath. "Good that no one can hear. You shouted too soon."

The scholar had just turned forward again. Puzzled by her words, he was turning his head back when he saw Bai Liuxi flying at him, a fist growing larger and larger before his face.

Clang! His spectacles were sent flying, and the face he had just turned was slammed straight back — he saw stars.

The hired hand behind carrying the luggage hadn't even reacted before Yun Jiaoyue reached out and snatched the four-foot-five serpent spear. The crude spear with its foot-long iron head was as light as a wooden pole in her hands. She swung it in a full arc and simply smashed — one blow each, and both men were laid out flat.

They didn't even get a chance to wail for their mothers.

The scholar was dazed from the beating and only heard the girl say one line: "Yunniang, Sister always said this scholar was no good man either — a good man can't afford spectacles."

Then something tightened around his waist, binding him from behind, and his whole body was lifted into the air. He saw the sky first, then the ground, as his head was slammed heavily down onto the earth.

Yun Jiaoyue dragged one man by the leg in each hand, pulling them along the flagstone path and leaving two trails of blood.

Reaching the courtyard wall, she stood on tiptoe to peer inside. It was indeed deserted, cobwebs already forming. She and Bai Liuxi then put their strength together and, one after another, tossed the three corpses over the wall into the yard.

The two of them then swiftly and carefully used the opera costumes to wipe the bloodstains from the ground, scattered yellow earth over it, and threw the soiled clothes and weapons into the yard as well. They picked up the hired hand's short blade, vaulted over the wall one after the other, and stabbed the corpses a few more times.

That done, the two girls clapped their hands. "Entering the city went smoother than expected. Earning these five hundred dan of grain — now we just wait for nightfall!"

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