Translator’s note: There’s just whole bucketfuls of place names that could be made up, or could be historical, or could be abbreviations, or could be the names of two places just stuck together….
In the twenty-ninth year of Great Qian, the former emperor passed away; the new emperor ascended to the throne.
In the history books of future generations, that year would mark the beginning of a long, twelve-year, period of chaos.
Ever since the twentieth year of Great Qian, uprisings had been springing up all across the land. The number of rebels was too many to count. When one place decided to rebel, its neighbors would follow suit it like it was a trendy fad. Anyone who hadn’t revolted at least a couple times would be too ashamed to show their face.
Plus, they’d been plagued non-stop by natural disasters and man-made catastrophes. Every day, the court was frantically tearing down the eastern wall to patch the western wall, driven to exhaustion as they did their utmost to save their failing country.
In the twenty-ninth year of Great Qian, war erupted in fourteen provinces in the region of Zhouyue. In places like Penglai and Dongyue, the refugees banded together into an army and took advantage of the chaos to loot, steal, and plunder. Their leader declared himself emperor and established his “Great Country of Dongyue” along the eastern coast. Then they put on a pompous show of writing a national charter and announcing to the world that they were openly rebelling.
The new emperor ordered his armies to vanquish them. The court’s armies got halfway there, right on time to experience the largest earthquake that’d ever shaken the land.
Before the antiinsurgency army could even find the rebel troops, thousands of their number had already been squashed to death by crumbling mountains. The earthquake’s effects were felt in multiple provinces: Penglai, Dongyue, Qinhe, Huaixi, and Wuchu. The earthquake had even caused Dazhou Mountain to sink a few hundred meters; half its western face had completely collapsed.
The pitiful new emperor of the “Great Country of Dongyue” was in the middle of touring his imperial palace, which was only half-built when it collapsed and nearly crushed him to death. Scared witless and nearly pissing his pants, he didn’t bother dismissing his courtly officials before he gathered all the beauties in his harem, collected his riches, and fled. And so, the antiinsurgency army, a few thousand people short and missing all of their provisions, returned to the court…. in victory.
That farce was only the beginning.
No one knew yet that the violent earthquake was the aftereffect of breaking the three great sects’ secret treaty.
At the same time, the bandits in the fourteen provinces in Zhouyue, who were no match for the imperial court’s armies, took the opportunity to relocate their forces to the place where the “Great Country of Dongyue” had once been, shameless as the dove living in the magpie's nest.
The “civil and military officials” of Dongyue who’d barely worn their official uniforms long enough to warm them up, deeply agreed with the idea that “whoever has milk was their mother,” threw all their qualms out the window, and merged with the bandits that’d arrived from Zhouyue.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
The top boss of the bandit army, “Black Qilin,” was draped in gaudy reds and greens with dregs of food still stuck in his teeth, when he seated himself on the throne like a monkey wearing a hat and became Dongyue’s second emperor.
Later on, in the span of the country’s grand one and a half years of history, the title of Emperor would change hands nearly a dozen times. For that reason, the “Great Country of Dongyue” would also be known as the “Carousel Country by future generations.
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They also had a very fresh take on warfare. These hillbilly emperors might’ve blinged themselves up with silver and gold every day, but were very decisive when the bandit-clearing armies came knocking on their door. They rallied their troops and met them in battle; they lost every single battle. Then they’d toss their helmets and strip off their armor and burrow into the woods. They’d hide in the mountains for a couple of days, pretending that, like the emperor in Pingyang City, they were just taking an outing in their summer villa.
Once the bandit-clearing armies swept through and moved into the city, these self-proclaimed “nobles,” “ministers,” and “generals” would harass them day and night, committing murder, arson, theft, you name it. Those ministers, who pursued robbery as a side gig, would rob to their heart’s content then book it. If they were captured, they’d surrender. It wouldn’t take them long to break out and go right back to burglary.
Both soldiers and civilians were extremely vexed by the problem.
However, luck was still on their side. The bandit-clearing armies were usually stationed there for less than a year before they were sent to put out fires somewhere else. Thus, the bandit-clearing army, like an oiled-up all-purpose brick, would be slapped together with some other regiment so they could wipe out some other bandits in some other place.
As soon as the eastern wall was torn down to patch the western wall, those “civil and military officials” of the “Great Country of Dongyue,” who’d been roughing it in the mountains, would switch faces overnight and immediately take over again. They were just like a piece of dogskin plaster, they had no skin and no face and were impossible to shake off.
When one “emperor” died, thousands of “emperors” would be climbing over each other to seize the throne. They even came up with a system: everyone had a serial number; when the person at the front of the queue died, the guy with the number after theirs would take their place. Then they’d record their fingerprint, kowtow, and light some incense as a vow. Somehow that system was very orderly. For years, no one cut the line or jumped ahead; it was a right miracle.
The second year, the new emperor changed the reign name, ushering in the first year of the Puqing era. But during that year, because the “carousel” had been spinning up a storm, the national coffers were all empty. The three great sects were all researching their ancient texts in hopes of repairing the treaty and had no time to worry about others’ problems. The whole continent was embroiled in chaos.
The court levied heavier and heavier taxes. The commoner’s woes became deeper and deeper. It was a vicious cycle. Once it got to the point where the commoners had no other choice, they’d rebel, dragging the teetering nation even closer to the edge of the cliff.
The new emperor issued edicts of self-recrimination, then had a fit of temper in front of the entire court and blew up at Yan Zhen and similarly important officials. Then, he castigated Yan Zhen, saying that his conduct was unbecoming of his status as the head of all officials, accusing him of neglecting his duty, ruining the country, and defrauding the people. He immediately had Yan Zhen imprisoned.
Yan Zhen kneeled there, placidly exclaimed “long live the emperor” three times, and was carted off to prison amidst the wails and protests of numerous senior officials.
The new emperor was playing by the “ruler’s handbook,” fiddling about with the art of balance. On one hand, he lashed out against Yan Zhen, and on the other, he placed great importance on Zou Yanlai, who was also from the Mi Sect. Thus he could appease the sects while reconsolidating imperial power.
Then, the emperor himself did something that was even more “ruining the country and defrauding the people.”
He’d rebuked Yan Zhen for oppressing the commoners under the weight of heavy taxes; heavy taxes meant that the government’s tyranny was fiercer than a tiger. Still, the country had wars to fight and disasters to relive. They had expenses. They needed money. The benevolent policies that the new emperor was pushing meant that he couldn’t increase taxes, meaning that ever since he’d ascended the throne, he’d had to cut back wherever he could. He decreased the number of servants in the palace and the cost of daily living. The serving size of meals from the imperial kitchen was decreased by half. He didn’t even think of doing any refurbishing or construction.
Rumor had it that in the northwestern corner of the imperial complex, there was the Yuhe Palace, which was the residence of the emperor’s favored consort. One day, the wind had blown off two of the palace’s glazed roof tiles and the favored consort went over to the emperor, crying and begging to have it renovated. The emperor, whose poverty was driving him mad, was provoked into a fit of rage. He thought for a fact that the woman was a squandering vixen and had her locked up in the “cold palace.” It seemed that a poor couple was a quarrelous couple.
Still, it wasn’t enough. Money was obtained by earning it, not saving it. The most pressing issue was how to find new sources of revenue. Cutting costs was only a stop-gap measure, it was meager as a drop in the bucket.
Thus, the Puqing Emperor racked his brains for three days and nights before he came up with a lousy idea — minting coins.
Normally, coins were made out of gold or silver. Though if they actually had any gold or silver, the lady of Yuhe Palace probably wouldn’t be sobbing in the cold palace all day. So, the Puqing Emperor decided to make money out of cloth banknotes. The cloth would be specially stamped and bordered with a special pattern by specially designated craftsmen. The words “Puqing Banknote” were written on the banknotes, meaning that they could be used all throughout the country in place of gold; their equivalent value in gold was printed on as well.
The Puqing Emperor thought he’d come up with a brilliant idea and proudly started issuing the cloth banknotes everywhere. However, he’d underestimated exactly just how poor the court was. One batch wasn’t enough, so they made another. In the end, the craftsmen who were furiously churning out banknotes day and night weren’t able to keep up with the workload anymore, so they had to simplify the process as much as they could. They did away with the border and the embroidered picture, making it so that valid banknotes only needed the words “Puqing Banknote” and the special stamp.
Instantly, the number of banknotes soared. Officials of every rank were requesting larger and larger amounts. Furthermore, one could almost just carry a bag full of toilet paper and scrap cloth into the capital, plop their butts down, bewail their poverty, then casually write some random number on the “banknotes” and have the court stamp and validate it.
Before the emperor was done being pleased with himself about his ingenious scheme, there was a little tune circulating among the populace: “In Pingyang there’s a brush extolled, Puqing can turn paper to gold. Amazing! Yesterday he was pauper poor, now his hoard shines with gold grandeur. Astounding! Pingyang paper’s cheaper than rice, half a bowl for a thousand price. How’s that? All I know’s that everything’s fine, may the emperor live for a long long time.
The genius Puqing Emperor couldn’t have imagined that his banknotes would become a huge laughingstock. Every household with a pigpen would toss a handful in as animal feed. And since its use had been prevalent for a while, even the market price of gold and silver was thrown into utter disarray. Some places decided they might as well go back to bartering.
That disaster quickly snowballed out of control and had the emperor running off his feet to fix it. Zou Yanlai took the opportunity to present a joint memorial, suggesting that the court abolish the cloth and paper banknotes and restore Yan Zhen to his former position.
All the courtiers kneeled and voiced their agreement. The Puqing Emperor then felt that he was alone as if he was on an island. The hatred he held towards Yan Zhen increased twofold, yet he had no choice but to sign off on the proposal.
That mess no doubt gave Gu Huaiyang and his compatriots opportunities to take advantage of. They’d always been doing things here and there in the shadows, especially Shi Wuduan and his network of scattered Daoists, who came together like many streams merging into a mighty river and used all manner of dirty tricks and vicious schemes to ruin the three sect’s secret treaty. Still, none of those were things that could see the light of day. Sometimes they’d even send disguised forces to help the court clear the bandits off a mountain. They’d originally wanted to wait until things got more chaotic and their wealth got larger before going any further, but who could’ve known that Puqing Banknotes would pop up out of nowhere.
As soon as the edict announcing the banknotes was issued, Shi Wuduan had already predicted the outcome of that laughingstock. Although Haining Commandery was remote, it was one of the first to carry basketfuls of toilet paper into the capital and cry about how poor they were. At the same time, they mobilized the Merchant’s Association, collecting all the banknotes they could get their hands on. After using the banknotes in numerous business transactions, they’d go through various channels to stealthily exchange, with the court, all the banknotes they’d amassed for their value in gold. Thus, it wasn’t until the banknotes had become utterly worthless and abolished by the court that clever people realized in dismay that there was even less gold in the market, and no one knew where it’d all gone to.
An utter mess — other than “an utter mess” there was hardly any other way to describe the rotten country.
The first thing that Yan Zhen did after he was reinstated was to investigate where all the gold and silver had gone. Then, he simultaneously sent secret missives to all three great sects, calling them to a meeting on Dazhou Mountain. With how tumultuous the current state affairs were, and how pressing their problems were, the destruction of the three sect’s treaty was enough to make one tremble with fear.
Zou Yanlai and his people also subtly leaked the information that there’d be a meeting taking place on Dazhou Mountain. If things were as Bai Li expected, then Shi Wuduan and his people who’d originally been cautiously watching from the sidelines, because of Haining’s sudden wealth, and their many years of military preparation, would be sharpening their knives, itching to make a move. The Redscarf Army that’d been biding its time for years was like a wild beast with it’s jaws wide open, ready to chomp at any second.
Shi Wuduan’s first target would be the conference on Dazhou Mountain.
At the end of the second year of Puqing, the leaders of the three all arrived at Dazhou Mountain, while Shi Wuduan secretly arranged his armies and laid down a trap.
Bai Li didn’t appear openly at the meeting. Ever since he’d come out of seclusion, Zou Yanlai was pretty much the only person he interacted with. Even in Pingyang city, he was withdrawn from the world. He’d been watching all those people rushing across the stage, singing their lines, like he was an audience to a play. It was about time for him to take action as well.
From the beginning to the end, he’d never even thought about the imperial family or the court. There was only one person on his mind, only one task.
One person, who’d hurt him most deeply, who he loved and hated so absolutely.
One task, which was to excise all the weaknesses from his person, to become strong no matter what the cost, and then become even stronger.
One day, nothing in the world could bind him anymore. One day, nothing in the world could ever get in his way.
It was enough that he’d been fettered by his blood, in that tiny courtyard, held at the mercy of others one time. Wuduan, it’s been many years. It’s about time the two of us met face to face.
That era had already come upon them and all the players had entered the field.
However, whether they were heroes or beauties or well-raised men of talent, they were all powerless before the changing of the times. Even if one was an unrivaled hero or a peerless beauty, their lives would amount to nothing more than a few faint strokes of ink. If one went with the flow, they could walk a bit farther. If they went against the current, then they’d merely be subsumed beneath the roiling tides.
No matter how much one was unwilling to accept it, in the end, it could all be summed up by a single phrase — woe that in this life I was human, powerless before the ancient earth.
How could the shattering of a rock… be enough to shake the heavens?
Wow what an intense chapter 😳🧨
Thank you so much for your wonderful translation work. Your dedication is commendable 👏🙏💐❤️
💙💙💙
You know, I’ve said this before, Priest is a really good writer. And I’m seriously impressed at the translations here because you’ve conveyed the intensity and meticulously thought through plot so well. Absolutely impressive.