Chapter 245: Corrosion On Da Yao’s Remains
After this battle, the Zhen State was like a war chariot suddenly roaring to life with a diesel engine; from top to bottom, from nobles to commoners, the dividends of war permeated every social stratum, lubricating all operations.
After Ji Prefecture was controlled by the great army, it produced several hundred thousand male slaves; these male slaves were quickly absorbed by the various prefectures of the Zhen State.
As for rebellion? The noble families of Ji Prefecture had no chance of turning the tables at all. Although several hundred thousand male slaves seemed like a lot, spread across the eight prefectures in the southwest, it was just a drop in the bucket. Each prefecture sent over fifty thousand people just to transport the slaves.
Terraced fields in the Lingnan mountains needed to be developed, and in Xingzhou, all the irrigation canals were waiting for these male slaves to labor on them.
The Chong Army also acquired a large number of women from the noble families being crushed.
The beautiful ones were assigned to the military; those who were not beautiful were assigned to the servant camps. Compared to the male slaves who worked themselves to death, these women were to form “shared households” with three to five men.
There were no shortage of women who disguised themselves as ugly and were mistakenly assigned.
…Way of Man…
It is worth mentioning that “shared households” were a very common phenomenon in the process of noble families and clans of Da Yao extensively accumulating servants.
It was just that those scholars always used the attitude of “a gentleman stays away from the kitchen” to deny it, and it was they who created the emergence of “shared households”.
Meanwhile, the new faction under Xuan Chong investigated eastward into “the living conditions of the lowly slave stratum under the rule of traditional local strongmen and great clans”.
This investigation was not because Xuan Chong was particularly benevolent, but out of importance on the issue of “population growth”. After all, Xuan Chong was very curious about how the noble families sustainably exploited the local populace.
In the late years of many dynasties, in fact, many farmers willingly went under the noble families that could conceal population in order to avoid heavy corvée labor, becoming slaves. The growth rate of servants in noble families and clans was much higher than that of self-cultivating farmers.
This meant there was a system that allowed servants to reproduce population on their own.
Now “exploitation” had not disappeared, but it had changed from the noble families whose virtue did not match their position exploiting the local populace to military groups wielding arms exploiting the defeated areas.
Some noble family disciples also fell to become servants. Xuan Chong believed that the servants needed a bit of hope, giving these people with huge disparities a reason to keep living.
Xuan Chong acknowledged the social stratum system but rejected the caste system: for individuals in the strata, being at the bottom was acceptable; but cutting off upward mobility channels, generation after generation at the bottom, would accumulate contradictions.
Zhen State edict: Sons of male slaves receive literacy education and can escape slave status through the imperial examination; they can also escape slave status through military merit. Of course, military merit can be accumulated without limit, while literacy can only advance one generation.
Twenty years later, workshops in the Zhen State would prosper, needing a large number of workers. The Zhen State needed desperate brave soldiers, and also needed cattle and horses.
…Scars and Suffering…
In the 7th year of the Tong Zheng Calendar, Chong Ling Sect began sending disciples into the human world because a great tribulation in the mountains could not accommodate too many cultivators. A disciple named Sima Ziyang descended the mountain.
At this time, the human world had changed appearance. In Ji Prefecture, vehicles coming and going were very numerous. And today, there was a new thing: rock tracks that could carry trains of wooden oxen and flowing horses.
These bluestones mined from the mountains were laid on the road surface.
Of course, bluestone was not laid over the entire road surface. That kind of bluestone road was too costly. Liangtian Pavilion chose instead to directly cover the old ruts, forming bluestone tracks similar to railway steel rails.
To prevent such stone rails from developing uneven gaps during settlement, they first dug a two-meter pit under the stone rails, installed strip stones like bridge piers, ensuring the bluestones forming the tracks were just fitted into these bridge piers embedded in the rammed earth. This made the stone tracks stable and unmoving when joined.
The vehicles traveling on such stone rails were locomotives belching black smoke one after another. The locomotive wheels were not wooden wheels, but rubber wheels with thick airbags.
One locomotive could handle the thousand-li transport task of two thousand shi of grain. Of course, more importantly, trains saved transshipment time. This allowed high-water-content, high-transport-loss food and grass like taro and potatoes to substitute for millet.
This rail line to Ji Prefecture was a key project of the Zhen State, especially in a newly occupied area like Ji Prefecture where order was being reshuffled; military strength had to quickly reach to maintain deterrence for long-term stability.
However, Sima Ziyang looked at all this and said coldly: “Gimmicks and clever tricks rampant, a nation of deviant paths.”
He thus passed through the city roaring with machinery, arriving at his familiar yet strange hometown. However, his family’s residence had people he did not recognize coming and going, turned into a large courtyard of dormitories and a school.
He looked at all this in bewilderment. His family no longer existed? Sima Ziyang bewilderedly carried his sword toward the residence gate, but the security guard nearby had already been staring at him. With a loud shout, Sima Ziyang’s magic power was shouted away. He saw that this one-legged security personnel had scarlet killing intent on his body.
This elder security guard was actually the nominal head of this residence. The price of one leg gave him enough merit to find a good place to retire.
Due to the elder’s own insufficient clerical ability, he could not handle office work. The specific maintenance of this courtyard was handed over to the assistant he selected.
But after all, he came from the military, unyielding, considering himself a real man, not a cripple.
(Men with broken legs and disabilities are often the least willing to admit they are disabled, striving mentally to prove they are still good men.) So he came to guard the gate.
With his mind seized, Sima Ziyang’s magic power seemed twisted into a steel knife, stammering under interrogation.
Sima Ziyang: “I, I just came down the mountain, this, this is my home!”
The head sneered with a crooked mouth: “Your home?” — This old military leader clearly knew this guy’s situation, thus without any politeness: “Your home has been leveled.”
Then, under the scolding of this killing intent-filled old military leader, Sima Ziyang finally learned that the Sima family, for resisting the Zhen State, had their three clans relocated.
He wanted to roar madly, but was slapped awake by a rough big hand; the head: “Young man, a word of advice, don’t mess around. You have dao cultivation, but probably no jade tablet, if caught now you’d just serve hard labor.”
This squad leader-turned head was still kind-hearted and let him go.
Sima Ziyang left in a daze, but when passing the distant public slave camp, he sensed something; he saw a sturdy woman washing yarn. He recognized this woman as his childhood sweetheart before going up the mountain. He took a deep breath wanting to go recognize her, but paused, because he calculated that this woman’s marriage star was off.
At dusk, in the slave camp, in a shared household of one phoenix and three owls.
Rough and thick: “Comfortable?”
Soft and tender: “Mm~ Faster.”
Impatient: “Turn over.”
Soft and glutinous: “Mm-hmm!”
Fierce: “Continue.”
At that moment, a melodious flute sound rose, the woman’s originally dazed expression instantly struck like thunder. Woman: “No no, no no!” She crawled up like mad, grabbed clothes to cover herself, then dressed and went out; but the flute sound had already faded.
In the distant clouds, Sima Ziyang had an evil charming smile on his lips, looked up at the sky, a crescent evil moon hung in the north, he rode the cloud over, and purple power was permeating his body.
…Perspective to the northern war-torn area…
At this time in the north, Wu Hengyu was leading troops striking out from the Jishan mountain path, attacking over; Zhao Cheng had no choice but to bring his defeated remnants into the north to meet the battle.
On December 3rd of the 5th year of the Tong Zheng Calendar, Zhao Cheng arrived at the frontline and saw the assembled officers and soldiers with incomplete armor, some faces youthful and immature, some with loose teeth, mostly conscripted new recruits. One must know, half a year ago those he left in the north were still the elite troops sweeping under heaven, he could not help sighing at the ups and downs of this half year.
Zhao Cheng: “For that man, the overall situation is set, but for me, it’s not over yet.”
The force Zhao Cheng now took over was a newly defeated army. And even worse, he currently had no legitimate status; Hao State had been extinguished by Su Ming, but “Da Yao” still existed.
At this time Zhao Cheng had no obsession facing Xuan Chong. Amid the world’s heroes vying for supremacy, Xuan Chong could still openly develop internal affairs. This forced Zhao Cheng to admit it was a wise ruler with worthy ministers.
Before this, Zhao Cheng believed: only by constantly seizing heaven’s timing, snowballing to sweep under heaven, was the model of a generation’s founding.
In the end, his great knife that could cleave the chaos bumped into Xuan Chong this rock; the original snowball momentum abruptly stopped. This forced Zhao Cheng to admit, lacking an “internal affairs” partner (that “both success and failure” partner), his path was too bumpy.
But facing Wu Hengyu, Zhao Cheng had not conceded. Zhao Cheng with graying hair looked at the similarly aged veterans, spurred his jade lion mount and said to the officers and soldiers: “Everyone, this is the final battle!”
Four days later, upon hearing Zhao Cheng bringing troops, Wu Hengyu immediately wanted to break camp for decisive battle. For Wu Hengyu, the “achievements” from this one battle were so close.
Then Wu Hengyu’s great army charged and killed all the way, defeating three routes of Zhao Army along the way.
However, after the fourth wave of attack, Wu Hengyu unwittingly led his troops too far, encountering an ambush.
In the end, under the ambush of thirty thousand troops, Wu Hengyu lost twelve hundred men, but his rear key grain depot was seized by Zhao Cheng, and Zhao Cheng implemented scorched earth policy, forcing Wu Hengyu to withdraw the remainder.
This great battle successfully allowed Zhao Cheng to establish footing. Of course, the evil moon in the sky was also getting brighter.
…Moonlight…
In Yacheng, Zhen Hao was hosting guests at a banquet. Under him now there were cultivators like Sima Ziyang, and also warriors wielding cleavers.
“Come come come, I invite everyone to eat!”
At this time high in the sky, after a puppet frame was set up, a veiled woman hung full of thin lines, dancing like a marionette, her expression full of panic, but pulled to dance continuously.
Now it was chaotic times, all sorts of demons emerging; and in chaotic times, men often died clean, while women did not die so easily, living in great pain.
This woman was not young, yet the playful guys in the venue all felt this woman had a different temperament.
After Zhen Hao announced this woman’s identity as Princess Xiasheng, daughter of Emperor Shu, pairs of eyes flashed with purple light.
Amid Xiasheng’s terrified gaze, the taotie feast for her began. — Back then, having received blessing from the purple evil moon to fulfill her wish, how could there be no cost?
After one incense stick, her hair bun came off along with the snow-white human skin peeled away.
…Corrosion Advances Further…
In the 5th month of the 7th year of the Tong Zheng Calendar, three months after Wu Hengyu’s battle west of Jishan, an envoy from Bo Kingdom arrived.
From the envoy group’s situation, Xuan Chong knew this was not congratulations. This envoy group included Hong Qiang of the Eastern Market Army, and also that Xian Daoren.
Sure enough, after meeting, the Bo Kingdom envoy sang a ballad: “The flowers of the changdi plant, how bright they glow. Of all people now, none match brothers. In death and mourning’s threat, brothers are deeply cherished. From hills and lowlands gathered, brothers are sought…”
Xuan Chong had long been in the military with little culture; but he still understood the nobles’ “elegant music”. This was like gaokao questions on ancient poetry appreciation, asking examinees to describe the poem’s mood.
And now with Bo Kingdom sending envoys to perform this song, Wu Fei quickly understood Wu Hengyu’s meaning. It meant “we two brothers should team up to finish off Zhao Cheng first.”
However, Xuan Chong clearly responded by singing along: “United against foreign foes, brothers fight within walls”.
The lyrics Xuan Chong sang were inverted from the original. The meaning was also obvious: brothers are brothers, states are states. Brothers also have the helplessness of dividing the family, once brother and brother established different states, then they must divide.
Xuan Chong teared up, said to the envoy: “I also miss Prince Bo very much. But now the two houses have separated, and I have just arranged a marriage for my son.”
Hong Qiang looked at this old superior, quite helpless. Regarding Wu Xiao Que’s play-acting, he had personally witnessed this former lord arranging Emperor Cheng’s funeral back then, that scene of cursing by pointing at mulberry trees.
Back then Xuan Chong cried much harder than today, if he did not understand it would be improper.
Hong Qiang opened his mouth, swallowed all words. He knew, half a year ago during the hegemony struggle, Bo Kingdom watched from the sidelines; this former lord, said to have even smaller mind than Sparrow, remembered it, so could only drop it.
Little did he know, Xuan Chong was not resenting Wu Hengyu for not coming to rescue, but really now they had “divided the family”.
Wu Yuanchang and Wu Hengyu could no longer return to the time when Wu Hanluan was still around; in Bo Kingdom’s succession, it followed “son inherits father’s business” not “brother succeeds brother”.
Here at Xuan Chong, with the citizens of seven prefectures up and down the Zhen State and complex interest groups, he could not ignore his side’s interest groups’ priority demands to cater to his brother.
Stepping back ten thousand steps, if the two states merged, who would be head of the next generation?
Beside Wu Yuanchang and Wu Hengyu there were ministers, would they engage in “court struggle”, killing off one line to solve this “state with two lords” problem?
After Hong Qiang no longer mentioned the two states jointly striking Zhao Cheng, Xuan Chong treated him well, then let him take some Lingnan herbs and jade back to visit big brother.
Though the states cut ties, the two brothers were brothers for life.
…Parting in Sorrow…
Twenty days later, Wu Hengyu sighed upon seeing the jade bi and agarwood items sent from his hometown.
Then he also began withdrawing from Jishan, enfeoffing three generals in the army as dukes of the state to establish a country here.
As for the Tong Zheng Emperor originally to “unexpectedly” die, he was also allocated a piece of land here, and all the remnants of the Yao Capital City were migrated here.
One must know, during Wu Hengyu’s frontline conquests, these remnants cooperated with conspiracies of the old merchants of Yao Capital City, seizing power in the rear, attempting to be “loyal ministers” of restoration.
Wu Hengyu originally planned to return and massacre them. But now, he packaged these guys collectively to his nephew, letting this bargain nephew emperor establish “Eastern Yao” here.
See, Zhao Cheng, wasn’t he wanting legitimate status? Then he must enshrine Tong Zheng Emperor. And if Zhao Army wanted to attack Bo Prefecture in the future, they must pass over Eastern Yao.
…Lingering Ties…
In the earth city of Eastern Yao, in a small temple. God tablets of successive Da Yao emperors were placed here; and Tong Zheng Emperor, that is Jia Ying, looked at this temple, then raised his head to look at heaven’s mandate, slowly saying: “Could it be, I really am not the late emperor’s heir?”
Over these years, spring and autumn sacrifices under his hosting could also invoke celestial phenomena, but different from Da Yao ancestors’ celestial phenomena. Da Yao ancestors’ were a sharp metal qi from the east, while his was fire qi; ministers described it as heaven’s mandate turning, in fact Jia Ying had felt his fate line connected to the west.
Tong Zheng Emperor looked toward his mother’s direction, over these years this empress dowager became increasingly improper, after leaving Bo Prefecture she recruited pretty faces.
Tong Zheng Emperor pondered, must find opportunity to “admonish” mother, and take personal rule by the way.
However, Tong Zheng Emperor did not know that in the palace where Empress Dowager Li was, those pretty faces were now fearfully looking at the green tentacles from the empress dowager’s chest, probing into their bodies.
