Chapter One

  It rained at night, and the weather was very cold in the morning. The yellow mud of Shiliang River was frozen solid, and it turned white. It was as quiet and still as the calm surface of Shiliang River. A few black crows perched on the sparse branches, calling out loudly. Occasionally, one or two yellow leaves floated by.

  The sound of horse bells came, and the pedestrians turned their heads to look back. First, they saw a official boat coming from the Shiliang River, with two gold-painted black plaques erected on the bow, each bearing the golden characters "Jiangdong Ancha Deputy Envoy" and "Left Du Qian Yu Shi Gu". Each plaque had three characters in a row. Those who could read asked: "What is the Left Du Qian official? What is the Yu Shi Gu official?"

  The willow branches on the riverbank drooped, and the official boat pulled out a long white water mark. On the yellow mud road on the left bank of the river, a team of cavalry came galloping, and the crisp sound of horse bells came from among them. Among those men with swords and armor, there was also a young Confucian scholar wearing a green shirt with a long skirt tied around his waist, holding the reins and walking, chatting and laughing with the military officer next to him who wore fish-scale armor, black clothes, and an iron helmet.

  The young man in the green shirt riding a horse is Lin Xie. The officer beside him is Yun Qiwei, deputy captain of the Dongyang Fu Army, who was sent to escort Vice Censor-in-Chief Gu Wu Chen and his family to Jiangning for their new appointment. Gu Wu Chens family, servants, and entourage all traveled by boat, while Zhou Pu, Zhao Hu, and Chen Enze rode horses at the back of the cavalry troops.

  They left Shiliang County yesterday, and although its only 200 miles to Jiangning by water, the Shiliang River has a stable flow in winter and little wind, so the boats move very slowly. The cavalry can only follow the official boat at a snails pace, moving slowly along the riverbank, thinking about where they will stop for food and rest ahead.

  It seems that Gu Wu Chen is not anxious to take up his post in Jiangning, and the assassination attempt in Shiliang County has not been mentioned again by Lin Fu. It appears that in his opinion, its a trivial matter. Lin Fu also wouldnt dare to speak out of turn, knowing that as a mere juren, he holds a very low position in front of Gu Wu Chen, who is a zhengsi langzhong, and even if Gu had other plans in mind, he wouldnt discuss them with him.

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  On a bitterly cold day, the cavalry rode against the wind, and their ears still stung from the biting gusts blowing from behind. After noon, when the frozen earth began to thaw, the yellow mud road on the river embankment, which had hardly been trodden by anyone, looked smooth and glistening with water, as if it had been oiled. As the horses hooves stepped onto it, they sank into deep muddy holes one after another, making a "plop" sound when pulled out. The horses hooves also kept slipping from time to time, and Lin Xie, riding on horseback, had to be constantly on guard against being thrown off.

  Liu Xilin looked at Lin Juren riding his horse with great difficulty and said, "Lin Juren, why do you follow us to suffer like this? We who eat military rations can barely endure these cold days and muddy roads. Youre doing well, yet you voluntarily come ashore to look for suffering. This road is slippery all the way, if you were thrown into the river, what would be good about that!"

  "General Liu, dont curse me, I really want to jump into the water and youll have to come down to the river to fish me out," Lin Xie said with a smile. "Im a restless person, feeling suffocated on the boat, besides, Mr. Gu and young master Gu are reciting poems, its annoying, why not ride horses with General Liu and boast wildly..."

  "Lin Juren, youre joking! Only 13 or 14 people in Dongyang Prefecture can pass the Imperial Examination to become a Juren scholar every three years. Even if youre not as talented as Lord Gu, you should be better than that Gu Gongzi...” Lin Xilin was delighted to hear two generals calling him by his name, one on each side. As a seventh-rank Yunqi deputy officer, he knew that in this dynasty, civil officials were valued over military officers, and even Juren scholars outranked seventh-rank military officers. This had created a culture where Confucian scholars looked down on military generals. Lin Xilin was clumsy at horseback riding but wasnt afraid of hard work. He enjoyed chatting with these soldiers who ate army rations, speaking casually without using flowery language, and listening to their boasts about life in the barracks. Lin Xilin and his two junior officers thought he was quite to their taste. Jokingly, they said, "I think Lin Juren wants to learn horseback riding well so he can deceive those young women in Jiangning City..." Everyone around them burst out laughing.

  “...Girls and daughters-in-law also need to cheat,” Lin Xie laughed and said, “In these troubled times, learning a few more skills can be useful for self-protection...Besides, a gentleman has six arts: rites, music, archery, charioteering, writing, and arithmetic, archery and horse riding are also part of the six arts. When I went to Jiangning, it was an unfamiliar place, if others knew how to ride horses and shoot arrows, but I didnt, wouldnt that be humiliating?”

  "With Master Gu present, who would dare look down on you, Lin Jun...?" said Liu Xilin, with a hint of envy in his tone.

  Lin Xuan smiled and changed the subject. As the left supervising censor of the imperial inspector, he could be said to have a high position and great power. The situation in Jiangdong Prefecture was somewhat special, and regardless of whether he had real power, in the southern capital of Jiangning Prefecture, there were many officials with higher ranks than Gu Wu Chen. Moreover, Lin Xuan didnt care what others thought of him; he wanted to thoroughly integrate into this world and learn from it. There were still many things he needed to try. People say that traveling thousands of miles and reading thousands of books is the way to go, but in this era, there were all sorts of ways to travel, none of which were as convenient and fast as riding a horse. Sitting on a boat was comfortable, but the speed was always too slow. In later generations, people got used to that high-paced life and felt that even if they took a carriage, it would take half a day to cover 30 or 40 miles, which was unbearable. How could one not know how to ride a horse? Moreover, if one day the secret of helping Liu Maozi in Changshan Island were to be exposed, and he had to flee, riding a horse would allow him to escape quickly and hide his tracks.

  Its easy to talk about riding a horse, the muddy road is messy, but Lin Xie can still chat with Liu Xi Lin and other generals from Dongyang Prefecture while riding on horseback. However, when the horses hooves are galloping like flying, its not easy to keep ones footing on the horses back. When facing the enemy, one has to rely on the horses momentum to slash and charge in order to crush them, which is no easy task. Moreover, Yang Pu, Yang Shi, father and son, as well as Gu Jia Gongzi Gu Siyuan all regard Lin Xie as a person who takes advantage of kindness and seeks revenge, and are very cold towards him. Lin Xie staying on the boat is also uncomfortable, its better to get familiar with the horses temperament by going ashore.

  Wu Qi and others temporarily stayed in Shiliang County to help the Seventh Lady, while Zhou Pu, Zhao Hu, and Chen Enze were nominally Lin Xies servants and attendants, so they naturally couldnt slack off and stay on the boat.

  At noon, there was no sign of a village or a store in front, and from the cabin emerged a woman wearing a blue printed blouse, who shouted from across the river to the shore: "Commander Liu, Mr. Gu said to stop the boat for an hour, please ask Mr. Lin and General Liu to come on board for lunch..." This woman was Xiao Jias daughter, the female owner of the tea hotel in Shiliang County, and her voice was very pleasant to listen to. When Lin Xie saw the beautiful young widow Xiao Jias daughter going to Jiangning with the Gu family at the Upper Lin Ferry, he was startled, but later learned that Xiao Jias daughter had been recommended by Magistrate Liang Zuo to follow the Gu family to Jiangning as a cook, with a monthly salary of three taels of silver, which was roughly equal to the official salary of Magistrate Liang Zuo himself.

  Throughout the ages, subordinates have always had the same idea of currying favor with their superiors. Lin Xian thought that some time ago, Liang Zuoren invited Gu Wuduan to eat at Xiao Jia Tea House, probably with this intention in mind.

  Liu Xilin reined in his horse, and the cavalrymen behind him also stopped without being summoned. It was unclear how long Mr. Gu wanted to rest, so Liu Xilin ordered his men to lead their horses away from the muddy yellow earth road and take a break on the grassy plain.

  Lin Xuan looked ahead and thought that this section of the waterway was one he had taken with Zhou Pu when they returned to Lin Du, so if they didnt take a break, they should be able to see Jiangning City before dusk. Even if they did take a break, it wouldnt need to be for more than an hour or two. He wondered what Gu Wu Chen was thinking, and dismounted his horse, tying it to a willow tree on the riverbank. Liu Xi Lin had some complaints in her heart and said to Lin Xuan: "This walking and stopping is really slow...its going to take three or four days to cover two hundred li of waterway...stopping here to rest isnt as good as enduring hunger for a bit, waiting until we encounter an inn ahead to stop and eat some hot soup."

  The cavalry and knife bowmen under the jurisdiction of the prefectural and county military commanders were all local troops, with a status and treatment far inferior to those of the garrison troops viewed as regular armies by the imperial court. Except for capturing thieves and bandits, they were mostly sent on labor service by officials, and their combat effectiveness naturally grew weaker day by day, becoming what is commonly known as miscellaneous troops, responsible only for maintaining law and order in prefectural and county cities.

  The rising rural soldiers just filled the gap left by the villages capture of thieves and bandits. It can be said that the team of cavalry led by Liu Xilin to escort Gu Wudun to Jiangning was still quite elite, but after Gu Wudun was assassinated in Shiliang County, the prefectural governor of Dongyang did not dare to take Gu Wuduns safety lightly, but in the eyes of Gu Wudun and his family, this team of cavalry was no different from ordinary miscellaneous soldiers. They only spoke politely to Liu Xilin, the leader, and even Liu Xilins two junior captains were not qualified to board the ship and dine with them at this time.

  "In front of the store, I asked the adults to stop for a while, so that my brothers could eat hot soup and meat dishes," Lin said. "Ill go on board first and see if we can cook some hot soup to send ashore."

  "Thank you, Lin Juren," said Liu Xilin, "Ill go over a bit later." He found Lin Juren more pleasant to get along with than those other arrogant scholars.

  After a while, the boatmen rowed the official boat to the shore, and Lin Xie and Zhao Hu helped tie the rope to the willow tree on the shore. The boatman at the bow of the boat said busily that he didnt dare, Lin Xie smiled and said: "Whats not daring?" He jumped onto the boat and went straight to the stern to ask Xiao Jias daughter for help to heat a bucket of vegetable soup for the cavalry on the shore. Just then, a young man came out of the cabin and asked Lin Xie: "Why are you lingering on the shore? Are you waiting for dinner?" There was some reproach in his tone.

  Lin Bing didnt respond to him, thinking to herself that he must have seen that the boat hadnt even stabilized yet.

  This young man was Gu Yunshous distant cousin, Gu Shiming, and also the nephew of Gu Wudust closest in kinship to the Gu family. Gu Shiming had studied for a few years but failed to pass any imperial examinations, so Gu Wudu decided to take him under his wing to see if he could be cultivated. Apart from Gu Shiming, another younger relative of the Gu family, Gu Tianqiao, also went to Jiangning to gain experience. The Gu family had declined for ten years, and there were no outstanding figures among the older generation, while the younger generation was also neglected, so it would not be difficult for the Gu family to rise again.

  Lin Xie saw Xiao Jias daughter poking her head out of the cabin and asked her, "Xiao Jias daughter, have you cooked some hot dishes and soup? On such a cold day, its not good for the soldiers to eat cold dry cakes on the shore."

  "No need for Mr. Lin to instruct you again, its already cooked, Ill bring it over for you!" Xiao Jias wife replied crisply and turned into the cabin.

  "Ill go help you." Gu Si Ming followed in with great enthusiasm.

  Lin Xian smiled to himself, this guy really thought that Liang Zuoren would recommend Xiaos daughter to the Gu family as a kitchen maid, truly having no idea how to read people, it was just that the Gu family was watching closely, so Gu Wudu didnt dare to rush into bringing up the matter of taking a concubine.

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  P.S: I have a traffic rules exam tomorrow afternoon, so I might be absent for one lesson tomorrow!

  Bodhisattva protect! Red ticket protect!