Chapter 31: Ansai Fortress

Crossing the Peony River and heading west along the winding valley, Ansai Fortress, built into the hillside, drew near.

Approaching the county seat did nothing to enliven Liu Chengzong's brief journey; the broken walls and ruins along the way constantly reminded the three of them that danger was closing in.

That morning, he had still wanted to carry on the fine, austere tradition from Yuhe Fort by poking through two more cave-dwelling ruins, trying to scavenge anything usable from inside.

Liu Chengzong felt that this habit of wanting to go in and loot any rundown house he saw might be an illness, making him look like a scoundrel, utterly devoid of dignity.

Unlike the meaning it would carry centuries later, in this era "scoundrel" was meant literally: a displaced, wandering person.

Looting houses was something only such people did, but Liu Chengzong liked it very much, like a trash-picker.

When he saw an unfamiliar house that looked ownerless and still had things inside — he never knew what he might find.

But this experience on the outskirts of Ansai Fortress might forever kill his curiosity for abandoned dwellings.

Not every place in northern Shaanxi was like the area around Yuhe Fort, where the common folk's only enemies were the harvest cuts brought by drought and the tax-collecting clerks of the imperial court.

Around Yuhe Fort, most of the houses were empty, their owners gone to evade taxation. Though they would never return, most still harbored a faint hope before leaving that the seasons might improve and they could go home, so those houses were all tidied up quite cleanly.

Around Ansai, it was different.

Inside a cave dwelling, he found half a skeleton and swarms of insects; the other half of the skeleton lay beneath the stove, mingled with the door planks, burned to ash.

On the doorframe, deep grooves left by a hanging rope were still visible, though the rope itself had vanished to who knows where.

It made it impossible to imagine what the owner had endured here before and after death.

To preserve his mental and physical well-being, Liu Chengzong emerged from the cave dwelling with pursed lips and resolved not to go looting houses for no good reason anymore.

Little did he know, a far greater shock still lay ahead.

As they emerged from the valley, the sun was high overhead. Riding at the front, Liu Chengzong gazed west from the mountain pass. The broad, twisting Yan River flowed southward, and a massive walled city stood within the landscape, like a colossal beast with its back against the hills.

He finally saw living people again.

Two yamen runners were pushing a handcart along the official road. When Liu Chengzong spotted them, the pair had just stopped the cart by the roadside and were using a straw mat to cover a corpse beside the road, laboriously lifting it onto the cart.

The sudden sight of a fully armed cavalryman appearing on the official road terrified the two runners; their faces, pale and bluish from cold and hunger, froze in shock.

One of them reacted faster, grabbing his companion who was about to turn and flee, and tightly clutched the short cudgel on the cart. "You— who are you?"

Liu Chengzong, expressionless on horseback, drew a waist token from his belt and dangled it in his hand. "From the prefect's yamen. I've come from the prefectural city to escort Magistrate Yang's family."

The token he had gotten from Yang Dingrui flashed once in his hand before he put it away. Liu Chengzong reined in his horse and circled once in place, then frowned and asked, "You two are runners from the county yamen?"

Not far away, the gates of Ansai Fortress were tightly shut, banners fluttering, and even the drawbridge over the moat had been raised. It looked nothing like a county seat, but rather, true to its name, like a fortress.

Beneath the city walls was a dense, dark mass of people. Hundreds of crude shacks spread outward along the moat on both sides. The barely clothed crowd sat in silence, the atmosphere as heavy as a pool of stagnant water.

Even Liu Chengzong had not expected the name of the prefect's yamen to be so useful. Upon hearing it, the two runners did not even bother to distinguish truth from falsehood. With a clang, the cudgel hit the ground. "General, sir, has the Prefect decided to send reinforcements?"

"Reinforcements?"

Liu Chengzong's head throbbed. Where would any reinforcements come from? Noting the raised drawbridge and the jittery, high-alert state of Ansai County, he asked, "Has the county seat been attacked by bandits?"

The runner who had first picked up the cudgel spoke again, nodding his head like a pestle pounding garlic. "Six days ago, the great bandit Gao of this county led several hundred foot soldiers and cavalry to plunder outside the city, demanding that the county seat open its granaries and distribute grain.

He called it opening the granaries to distribute grain, but everyone knew he intended to relieve those bandits, not sharing a single bit with the elders of our county."

The runner looked up. "Fortunately, our county magistrate is well-versed in military affairs and led the people to defend the city and resist the bandits. That bandit Gao dared not launch a direct assault and led his men away."

"The county sent two waves of fast riders to the prefectural city to sound the alarm, request troops, and ask for grain for disaster relief, but there has been no word at all. Now, the common people from thirty li around the county have come to seek refuge beneath the walls, and the gruel kitchen's grain stores have long since hit bottom."

Liu Chengzong thought to himself that the "Bandit Gao" the runner spoke of must be Gao Yingxiang. A force of several hundred foot and horse sounded formidable indeed. Hearing that the county's grain was already exhausted, he nodded. "Mm, I can see that."

The social status of yamen runners was low — compared to officials.

In reality, how many officials could there be in a small county of twenty to thirty thousand people? Compared to ordinary commoners, runners still held a relatively higher social standing, and their income was generally somewhat secure.

Even in the worst-case scenario, the task of distributing gruel fell to the runners, which meant they at least got a couple more mouthfuls to eat than the average commoner.

If even these two runners were so famished their faces were pale and blue, one could well imagine how dire the county's grain situation had become.

"Where are you taking these corpses?"

As he spoke, Liu Chengzong's hand on horseback made a subtle gesture, signaling Gao Xian, still back at the mountain pass, not to drive the carriage out — regardless of whether Gao Xian could see it or not.

Their carriage carried eight people's worth of rations and water stored in leather sacks, meant for Yang Dingrui's family on the return journey. The people here looked half-mad with hunger; if their water and grain were snatched away, they would all go hungry on the way back.

Liu Chengzong's eyes shifted, and he made up his mind — Yang Dingrui and the carriage absolutely must not get anywhere near Ansai Fortress.

If the starving people beneath the walls saw grain, even this small amount of grain, it would cause a huge disaster. With hundreds upon thousands of starving people gathered there, it was absolutely not a situation he and Gao Xian could control with just two blades.

"We've dug several large pits outside the city. Those who starve, freeze, or eat themselves to death all have to be buried. The county magistrate says leaving corpses around will breed pestilence."

The runner spoke as if this were utterly ordinary, even pointing to the large pits not far outside the city. Several pits were piled high like small hills with corpses — who knew how many bodies were buried there. Even now, people were still hauling corpses from the starving refugees' shacks and tossing them into the pits.

At this point, Liu Chengzong even decided he himself would not approach the city gate. He feared that where starving people gathered, pestilence might break out.

Besides, entering the city required calling for the drawbridge to be lowered, and he was unwilling to let anyone scrutinize his identity.

He simply took the bag of dry rations from his horse's pack, pulled out a flatbread, and tore it in two. "You haven't eaten properly in days, I reckon. I can't help anyone else, but you two take this bread and eat."

The two runners' eyes practically glowed green at the sight of the bread. Rubbing their hands, they glanced at each other, then looked tentatively at Liu Chengzong, trying to figure out if this "general" on horseback really meant to give them food.

After confirming several times, the lead runner stepped forward, swiftly took the bread, and pulled the other man down to kowtow before the horse. On the yellow earth, they banged out two resounding thuds with their heads, then wolfed the bread down ravenously.

They stuffed the bread into their mouths in a few bites, but when it came to the last two mouthfuls, they truly could not bear to swallow, so they chewed a few more times. Instinctively, they glanced at Liu Chengzong again, then fearfully withdrew their gazes and swallowed with difficulty.

Liu Chengzong, however, was in no hurry. He had been hungry himself and knew that half a flatbread could not fill a belly — what a person fears is not enduring hunger, but being unable to eat their fill when they are starving to the extreme.

He spoke, pointing to the bag in his hand. "I still have a few more flatbreads here. One of you two goes into the city and brings three people out for me, and these flatbreads are yours. How about it?"