Chapter 321

News traveled slowly these days, but by the time the refugees besieged Xuzhou, Wang Youshan had already passed Qingjiangpu. After Colonel Zhou Baolu pacified Pizhou, Wang Youshan also made his way there. A father's heart is tied to his son — Wang Youshan was deeply worried about Wang Zhaojing's safety and hurried back without stopping, arriving only a few days later than Colonel Zhou.

Zhao Jin smiled and nodded. He smiled because he noticed that when Chen Sheng said this, there was no trace of his usual sarcasm — a rare thing indeed.

As they were talking, a rider came galloping from the city gate. Drawing closer, they saw it was none other than Wang Zhaojing.

"My father won't arrive until dusk. Big Brother's business is more urgent — deal with this first."

They were all brothers here, so Zhao Jin did not stand on ceremony. They assembled the ranks and called everyone to keep moving. After just a couple of steps, Wang Zhaojing hurried to the front and said, "Big Brother, with so many refugees and the Xu family there, isn't bringing only the Zhao Character Camp too few? Why not call up all the local militias?"

The militia and volunteer camp was utterly silent — not even a single sentry was posted. Looking from a distance, a few figures could be seen slumped against carts and baggage, sprawled every which way. It seemed the knockout power of unlimited Han Well Famous Liquor was indeed considerable.

Zhao Jin pondered briefly, then said, "You can't give a favor and immediately demand repayment. This is the time to win hearts — don't lose the greater prize for a petty gain."

With the matter put that way, no one raised any objection, and they set out toward the Yellow River.

"... This refugee siege has left far too many loose ends to tie up. The civil and military officials in the city, the prominent elders and gentry — they'll likely all gather to deliberate. My father will have to attend as well..." Wang Zhaojing spoke as they traveled.

"Young Master Wang's father is a man of pure eminence, a figure of the first rank in Xuzhou City, and he has connections with the central authorities in the capital. In this aftermath, I fear they'll all look to Master Wangshan to make the decisions!" Among the whole group, only Ruhui could pick up this thread — he understood these intricacies very well.

As a former Investigating Censor of the capital who had retired to his hometown, Wang Youshan undoubtedly maintained countless ties with the Chief Surveillance Bureau and every other government office in the capital — correspondence was a given. The court would inevitably learn of this refugee siege of Xuzhou, and how to handle it would naturally depend on the maneuvering of various factions. Tong Huaizu had been stuck in Xuzhou for nine years, unable even to secure a promotion — his backing and connections were clearly limited. That meant the only person in Xuzhou with influence and personal ties in the capital was Wang Youshan alone.

The accounts set forth in Wang Youshan's letters would certainly be accepted as truth by the capital's censors and pure-stream officials. If he spoke well of someone, their path would be smoother; if he spoke ill, someone was sure to suffer for it.

Zhao Jin nodded and walked on in silence for a while, then suddenly spoke: "Are you all still worried the yamen won't cough up the silver?"

Everyone paused, then burst into laughter. Wang Zhaojing smiled and said, "Big Brother, in this joint deliberation on the aftermath, we brothers must take part as well."

"Without us taking part, who would dare make a decision!" Chen Sheng said flatly, and everyone nodded again.

Traveling from Xuzhou's prefectural seat along the official road toward the river, the area within ten li of the city was still passable. But further out, fallen corpses began to appear by the roadside, and a stench was already rising.

"Aftermath, aftermath — these need to be burned as quickly as possible too, or there'll be trouble." Zhao Jin pointed as he spoke.

"Big Brother already treats Xuzhou as his own now," someone teased. The group laughed, and Zhao Jin laughed too — not a mocking laugh, but one that took it as a matter of course.

By the time they reached the refugee gathering point by the Yellow River, the sun was already high in the sky. The refugee encampment bustled with activity. From a distance, they could see several large tents already set up by the riverbank, with crowds of refugees jostling around them.

The refugees by the river showed no alarm at the arrival of Zhao Jin's mounted troop. For them, having already fallen to such a state, what worse could possibly happen?

"We can't use force at a time like this. The moment blades are drawn, we'd only be driving the refugees into someone else's hands." Zhao Jin set the tone.

The main force of the Zhao Character Camp halted to rest on the spot, while the relief contingent from Cloud Mountain Monastery advanced, setting up tents and beginning to cook porridge right at the edge of the refugee gathering. Monks also walked toward the refugees, ceaselessly chanting the Buddha's name.

The Buddha is compassionate and merciful — whether that compassion is actually practiced is one thing, but the concept had long since taken deep root in people's hearts. The moment they saw the monks approaching, the refugees gathered around them, and the monks led them toward the large tents.

These things all followed a set routine. The monks sent out to chant the Buddha's name and lead people in were always those with kindly faces and exceptional eloquence — the sort who inspired trust at a glance.

By the time they reached the tents, some refugees were already kneeling on the ground, weeping bitterly — whether from grief or repentance, it was hard to tell.

Perhaps it was the reassuring image of the monks, or perhaps because they had been deceived into coming here by the Smelling Incense Sect, where they had chanted the name of Maitreya day after day — a heretical offshoot of Buddhism, but close enough — that as soon as Cloud Mountain Monastery set up its operation, wave after wave of refugees came surging over.

This bustle had barely lasted long before over a hundred sturdy men, armed to the teeth, came striding over with menacing intent. Among ordinary village militias and braves, only the elite carried bladed weapons; the rest made do with wooden clubs or spears — the reason being simple: cheap and saving on iron. Yet every single one of these hundred-plus men carried a podao, and they cut an imposing sight.

As it happened, one monk had not managed to get out of the way in time and stood blocking their path. The man at their head shoved him to the ground with one push, sending him sprawling.

By this time, they had reached the front of the porridge tents. These sturdy men looked at the young, able-bodied monks holding staves, contempt written all over their faces. The leader raised his hand as if about to give an order. Whatever the command was, though they could not hear it, everyone could guess — it was nothing other than to smash the place up.

But the burly man stopped his motion halfway. A few hundred paces behind the tents lay the Zhao Character Camp. With the tents blocking the view, it might have been hard to see clearly from a distance, but up close, it was plainly visible.

"Master Jin, they're asking over there who we are. Should we give them your name?" A young monk came back to inquire.

The entire Cloud Mountain Monastery, from top to bottom, feared Zhao Jin to the extreme. Without Zhao Jin's permission, they dared not even announce their own name — even though at a moment like this, invoking Zhao Jin could protect them.

"Tell them the Zhao Character Camp is here!" Zhao Jin said. The monk hastily acknowledged the order, turned, and ran back.

Perhaps the name "Zhao Character Camp" had its effect. The big man cast a few glances in Zhao Jin's direction, then turned and left. The hundred-plus menacing toughs all followed him away.

"They know when to quit. I thought we'd have a fight on our hands," Dong Bingfeng said, puzzled.

The Jingshan Xu family's sphere of activity had always been on the northern bank of the Yellow River. They had never crossed paths with Zhao Jin's Zhao Character Camp and naturally had no idea how formidable it was. As the most powerful local magnates in Xuzhou, the Jingshan Xu family would, under such circumstances, certainly want to test the waters with a fight. No one had expected the other side to know when to advance and when to retreat.

Not long after, the scouts who had been circling inside and outside the refugee encampment all came back to report. They said the Xu family's people were dismantling their own tents and loading all their equipment onto boats — they were actually leaving, just like that. Now, large numbers of refugees were surging toward Cloud Mountain Monastery's operation.

Zhao Jin and his companions looked at one another. Did their own prestige really run so deep? To scare the other side off so easily? Ruhui, who had been sitting on a camp stool, stood up and gazed ahead. Turning back, he said gravely, "Master, your subordinate believes we should persuade a batch to leave and then take them back — settle them first in the various estates of Cloud Mountain Monastery. If the refugees linger too long, I fear other troubles may arise. I will go ahead and inform Cloud Mountain Monastery."

Seeing Zhao Jin nod, Ruhui added offhandedly, "The Xu family's people came at a clever time and left just as quickly. Very suspicious."

"Infantry, stand by. If order needs to be maintained, follow Mister Cao's orders and assist. Everyone else who can ride, mount up — we're going to the riverbank for a look." Zhao Jin gave the order. Rather than keep guessing, better to see with their own eyes.

Everyone answered in assent. The companions, plus the household troops who could ride, made up some thirty-odd horsemen. They skirted around the pressing crowds of refugees and galloped toward the site of the other side's porridge tents.

The refugees now showed none of the frenzy they had displayed beneath the city walls that day. They simply crowded in front of the porridge-distribution tents, waiting for the monks to arrange them. When Zhao Jin and his men rode past, the refugees all shrank back in awe, clearing the way, not even daring to raise their heads to look.

"Xiaoyong, assign some sharp-eyed men to look around everywhere. See if that last group that charged the city might be mixed in among these refugees. These here are sheep — those were wolves." Zhao Jin spoke from horseback. Liu Yong acknowledged the order, and everyone looked with grave expressions at the surging tide of people around them.

They had to take a roundabout route to reach their destination. The tents there were already nearly dismantled; stoves, pots, and everything else were being loaded onto carts and transported toward the Yellow River ferry crossing.

The original reports said that after the refugees fled in defeat to the riverbank, they discovered that the boats that had ferried them across had all been burned, and every other vessel had vanished without a trace. Yet now, at the ferry crossing, over a dozen large boats were moored, several of them already packed full of refugees.

When Zhao Jin and his men approached, someone initially came over and barked a challenge, demanding to know who they were. Zhao Jin and his group simply announced their identity, and those people immediately went back to their own business, ignoring them.

"You're here to round up people, and we're here to round up people. You came first, we came later — and you're just going to watch us take them?" Zhao Jin directly called out to a man, stopping him to ask.

The man naturally had no friendly attitude toward Zhao Jin and his group. He had intended to lower his head and ignore them, but seeing Zhao Jin and his men armored and mounted, exuding an oppressive authority, he hesitated, then said, "Our family's Eldest Miss gave the order: if the Zhao Character Camp doesn't come, we don't leave. If the Zhao Character Camp comes, we leave immediately!"

"Your family's Eldest Miss?" Zhao Jin was taken aback. From the sound of it, the one calling the shots was a woman — and some "Eldest Miss" at that. In this age, men were honored and women held low; men handled external affairs, women the domestic. For a major clan's important business to be decided by an Eldest Miss was truly strange.

Seeing his companions standing before their horses, and a dozen or so men gathering on the other side with more running over, many on Zhao Jin's side reached for their weapons. Zhao Jin, however, paid this no mind and asked with a smile, "This Eldest Miss of your family — is she the Eldest Miss of the Jingshan Xu family?"

"Besides her, who else could be called Eldest Miss!" someone in front of the horses retorted rudely.

This was indeed a curious tale. Zhao Jin grew even more intrigued, but before he could ask further, Liu Yong behind him interjected, "Xu Dajiao?"

"Is that a name for you to speak!" The moment that name was uttered, someone immediately shouted.

Zhao Jin's thirty-odd riders were fully armed and looked down from on high, while the Xu family men gathered here were mostly unarmed. Yet at this moment, they showed no fear whatsoever, their faces flushed with anger, the crowd seething with indignation.

"Xu Dajiao?" Zhao Jin glanced back in surprise. The name seemed vaguely familiar, but he had never paid it much attention.

Seeing his interest, Liu Yong quickly explained, "The Eldest Miss of the Jingshan Xu family's main branch, Xu Zhenzhen. Because she never bound her feet and has always been out managing the Xu family's affairs, she earned this... 'nickname.'"

Zhao Jin smiled and shook his head. It still rang no bells. He had heard of Xu Benrong, the patriarch and head of the Jingshan Xu family, and knew the man was measured in his actions and never flaunted his power. When people mentioned the Jingshan Xu family, they had probably mentioned Xu Zhenzhen too, but he had never taken note.

In this era, those who ran households and made decisions were all men. Besides, the other party was a young girl, and he himself was not old — showing too much interest could easily lead to misunderstandings.

"... What are you still dawdling for? Get on the boats, quickly..." Someone in the distance was shouting.

Hearing this shout, the burly men who had been glaring angrily at Zhao Jin and his group finally turned and walked away. Even then, they weren't done — as they left, they kept glancing back with resentful looks, as if trying to memorize Zhao Jin's appearance.

"A bunch of northern savages — what have they got to be so cocky about?" Shi Manqiang behind Zhao Jin said in a gruff voice.

In the Xuzhou region, the lands south of the Yellow River were considerably wealthier than those to the north, so the southerners had always looked down on the northerners. This kind of bad custom existed everywhere under heaven, not just in Xuzhou alone.

"It's nothing more than being separated by a single river — what high or low could there be? I don't want to hear talk like this again." Zhao Jin spoke with a stern expression. Shi Manqiang hadn't expected Zhao Jin to take it so seriously; he flinched in fright, and for a moment didn't even know what to say.

Zhao Jin swept his gaze over the people around him, softened his tone, and said, "We brothers of Zhao Camp come from all over Xuzhou. If one place looks down on another, if those inside the city look down on those outside, and conflicts arise in peacetime, then how can we advance and retreat side by side on the battlefield? How can we trust our backs to our comrades? We are all one family, one body — do you understand?"

By this point, Shi Manqiang had come to his senses. His face full of shame, he said solemnly, "Big Brother, I was being foolish. It won't happen again."

Zhao Jin nodded and turned back around. The men of the Xu family of Jingshan had already reached the ferry crossing and were boarding the boats one after another.

These men of the Xu family looked as though they hadn't suffered much hunger — all of them had fairly healthy complexions. Though the clothes on their bodies were all the most common, cheapest coarse cloth, and even had patches, they were still neat and tidy. Their organization wasn't bad either: some gave orders, others obeyed, and on the whole they managed to be orderly and well-arranged.

Zhao Jin let out a long breath from horseback and pointed at the boats on the river. "The Xu family is no simple matter. Setting aside what they've done since the refugees entered Xuzhou, just look at the performance of these able-bodied men under them — they're practically not much inferior to our Zhao Camp. Truly extraordinary..."

"These are probably all they can send out. Most of their people still have to work," Chen Sheng said from the side.

Zhao Jin nodded slowly. There were still some things he didn't say aloud. The strength of the Jingshan Xu family wasn't reflected only in these able-bodied men recruited from the refugees.

A powerful clan whose main occupation was farming was nothing to fear. If they wanted to run a militia, they had to draw strong laborers from the farming households. For every extra militia man, there was one less able-bodied farmer — and that militiaman's equipment and daily expenses required even more farmers' labor to supply. So such powerful clans couldn't maintain too large a standing armed force, and the combat strength of temporarily organized village braves was also very mediocre.

But the Xu family was different. The Xu family's business was coal and iron, and the profits from coal and iron far exceeded those from farming. They could support a much larger standing force. And there was an even more important reason: mining coal and smelting iron required able-bodied men. In the course of mining and smelting work, these strong laborers had to cooperate and coordinate. Over time, they naturally developed organization and discipline. Not to mention that since they produced their own iron and forged their own weapons, arming them was also very easy. With men of such quality, when the need arose, a little training was all it took for them to take the field — and their combat strength would certainly not be poor.

Still, Zhao Jin could also see that having this foundation didn't necessarily mean possessing such strength. Not everyone would consider problems the way he did.

"Big Brother, though the Xu family is large, they conduct themselves with restraint. Despite having a Vice Minister in the court as their backer, I've never heard of them engaging in any arrogant or overbearing misdeeds. They just quietly go about their coal and iron business," Wang Zhaojing spoke up.

After Zhao Jin had finished assessing Xuzhou, his expression had turned grave. Everyone thought he was worried about the Xu family, so Wang Zhaojing spoke first to offer a few words of reassurance.

"Oh, there's a Vice Minister too. That really is..." Zhao Jin had heard people mention the Vice Minister before, but it hadn't left much of an impression. Hearing it brought up again today, his estimation of the Xu family immediately rose another notch.

But halfway through his words, Zhao Jin's eyes suddenly widened. He stared fixedly ahead. The people beside him all jumped in fright, thinking something had happened.

"What is that?" Zhao Jin said, pointing at a person ahead. Over at the ferry crossing where they were boarding boats, a dozen or so Xu family men stood guard holding weapons. The one Zhao Jin was pointing at was the person furthest to the outside.

Everyone was a bit confused. Zhao Jin, very urgently, spoke again: "What is that man holding in his hand?"

As soon as he said this, Zhao Jin kicked his stirrups against his mount, shook the reins, and rode directly toward that spot. His companions were all taken aback. After a moment of stunned surprise, they hurriedly spurred their horses to follow.

The Xu family people at the ferry crossing saw several dozen riders charging toward them and immediately tensed up in alert. Loud shouts rang out from the shore and the boats. A boat that had just left the bank turned back around. Quite a few people jumped straight off the boats and waded ashore through the water.

Halfway there, Zhao Jin realized something was wrong. He waved his hand from horseback and shouted, "I'm Zhao Jin! Don't misunderstand — I mean no harm! I mean no harm!"

Zhao Jin's voice was plenty loud, and he was waving his empty hands. When the Xu family people heard the name "Zhao Jin" and saw him waving empty-handed, they remained on guard, but the tension of being ready to start fighting at any moment faded.

When he was still a dozen or so paces from the edge of the Xu family group, Zhao Jin stopped. From horseback, he came straight to the point: "What is it that this brother is holding? Could you let Zhao have a look?"

After saying this, Zhao Jin turned and waved his hand, signaling his companions and the riders to stop. Being too close would indeed make people nervous and uneasy.

Everyone's gaze focused on the person Zhao Jin had pointed at. That person was somewhat thinner and weaker than the average man, and at that moment was completely at a loss, still not understanding what was happening.

Several Xu family men who looked like headmen had already come down from the boats. After finding out what was going on, a middle-aged man in his forties walked up to the person Zhao Jin had pointed at, reached out his hand in a gesture, and, seeing Zhao Jin nod, the middle-aged man — his face full of bewilderment — took the implement from that man's hands, held it with the handle facing toward Zhao Jin, and walked over.