Where Immortals Once Walked

Before he even stepped through the gate, He Lingchuan heard the clanging of tools.

The He Residence was swarming with workers. There were people unloading furniture, taking down courtyard walls, and hauling materials. The place was as busy as a beehive.

Madame Ying was in the thick of her renovation plan. Funds were tight, so she oversaw every step herself. He Yue had suggested waiting until late spring, about two months later, to save quite a bit of money, but his mother’s answer was decisive: she could not bear to live in a house this ugly for even one more day.

Their residence in Dunyu was not as large as their old home in Heishui City. If work were happening to the west, the east would hear every hammer blow. With no peace and quiet to be found, He Chunhua and He Yue spent their days at the yamen, and even He Lingchuan could not train at home. He had no choice but to go out carousing until even the keen-eared rock wolf, Lu Xin, had suggested, “Why don’t we rent a room at an inn?”

Luckily, after a full day of loafing, the sun was already dipping when he came back for a bath. By the time he emerged, the construction had stopped.

Workers, like their employers, had to go home for dinner.

He Lingchuan’s father and younger brother had also returned, and after washing up and changing, the family gathered around the table.

He Lingchuan glanced at the spread and blinked. “Huh, hotpot tonight?”

“Hotpot?” Madame Ying smiled. “This is called antique stew[1]. It’s a local favorite.”

In the center sat a thin iron pot divided into inner and outer rings, both broths bubbling away. Around it lay plates of raw foods: marinated meat and sliced meat, a few kinds of pickled vegetables, and a small array of greens.

Vegetables were hard to come by this time of year, even plain cabbage.

To He Lingchuan, though, this was basically hotpot.

He sat, swished a slice of meat through the broth, dipped it in a sauce, and took a bite. It was spicy and tasty—surprisingly good.

He Yue had been watching him. Seeing his older brother keep dunking slice after slice, he looked somewhat disappointed. “So, how is it?”

“Delicious.” He Lingchuan ate another mouthful of meat. “Eat up, or there won’t be any left.”

“Not too spicy?” The two broths looked the same, but the inner ring was loaded with pepper pods. He Yue had tried a sip earlier and nearly spat it back out.

The broth was numbing and hot!

He Lingchuan had already spotted the peppers and Sichuan peppercorns floating on top.

Please, this is just a super-simplified red broth, minus the signature layer of chili oil.

Back in his old life, at the end of the month when money was tight, he could eat plain rice with yellow lantern chili sauce[2] straight from the jar.

Since coming to this world, real spice had been hard to come by. He had not gotten used to it in the first half-year he was here.

Truth be told, he still had not gotten used to it.

One bite of that familiar burn, and he almost wanted to throw back his head and howl.

Outwardly, though, he kept it cool. “It’s fine. Don’t you think it’s got a kick in all the right ways?”

“It does.” His tongue stung, but the after-rush felt great. Aside from He Lingchuan, the other three family members stuck to the outer ring’s white broth, only sometimes daring the inner ring for a dip. If they went for any more than a dip, they found themselves having trouble enjoying the food. “Shame we can’t have too much.”

He Lingchuan tossed down his chopsticks, ducked outside, and returned carrying a large bowl. He set it on the table with a thump.

“Here. If it’s too spicy, stuff this in your mouth.”

They looked over and saw a heaping bowl of fresh snow.

Madame Ying frowned. “Where did you scrape that from?” If he so much as said “off the ground,” she would thrash him until even he would not recognize himself.

“From the tree in my courtyard,” He Lingchuan said blandly. “My yard hasn’t been torn up yet, so there’s no dust that’s blown in that way. It’s clean as can be.”

Relieved, the three took turns spooning mouthfuls of snow. The burn faded almost at once.

Only then did He Chunhua ask, “Any movement from the Li Family today?”

“Yup.” While swishing meat in the red broth, He Lingchuan told them about Li Shuang’s attempted bribe.

“I’ve been to the Li Family’s Xiangpu House in Dunyu,” said Madame Ying, the resident expert in such matters. “The goods are decent. The clerks said business peaks around the festivals, so the end of the year, the Lantern Festival, the Shangsi Festival, and so on. Otherwise, revenue just about balances out.”

“Offering that kind of money to buy us off?” He Lingchuan scowled. “Who do they think they’re insulting?”

“Li Shuang wants us to delay taking his father into custody,” said He Chunhua, sipping glutinous rice wine. “He’s angling for time to send word to the capital. Once Minister Li starts applying pressure, they think Li Rong might avoid detention altogether.”

“He’s making calculations based on wishful thinking, counting us as fools,” said He Yue with a laugh. “We must never take that money.” Otherwise, the Li Family would report the bribe to the Minister of War, accusing the freshly appointed Governor-General of Xia Province of corruption.

He Lingchuan scooped a bite of snow into his mouth. The cold and clean snow brought him instant relief. “Li Rong’s time locked up is set. Should we put Li Zhi in, too? It’d be easy to pin something on him, and we could seize that hundred and fifty thousand taels of bail while we’re at it.”

Since arriving in Dunyu, even a second-generation wastrel like him could feel the pain of empty coffers.

“No rush,” said He Chunhua, unhurried as ever. “Let him hang and sweat, sleepless night after night. Only then will the Li Family cooperate wholeheartedly. The front lines need money and grain, and we need manpower. All of it has to come from the four great families. They’re the snakeheads. If they don’t step forward and make concessions, all the other families won’t truly commit.”

Madame Ying asked, “What about the front lines? Xun Province’s troops have gotten past Baiche Ridge and are pushing south. Will they reach Dunyu?”

“Not anytime soon. Dunyu lies closer to Xia Province’s southern border than its north,” He Yue answered. “From Baiche Ridge, cavalry would need to ride hard for a full day and night to reach us, and that assumes zero resistance. That’s one reason the four great families are still clutching their purse strings.”

Madame Ying snapped, “Death at their doorstep, and they’re still counting coins!”

“If Nian Zanli’s army really threatens Dunyu, they’ll withdraw south early. Even then, the disaster won’t fall directly on their heads.” He Yue sighed and said, “At worst, they’ll lose some property.”

“The Zhan Family was originally already leaving,” He Chunhua said evenly. “When they saw me take office, they held back. They want to see if I can hold the line. These gentry do their sums carefully. To their minds, war is the treasury’s business, not theirs. They won’t open their wallets until the last possible moment. That was how it was in Qiansong Commandery, and the same holds in Xia Province. The old spirit of ‘one heart, soldiers and citizens as one’ from the days of Baiche Ridge is long gone.”

If that were not the case, he would not need to squeeze the Li Family so hard.

When the servants drifted farther back, Madame Ying lowered her voice. “This isn’t quite the right thing to say, but I’m rather grateful that Old Master Li passed when he did.”

“If the old man were still alive, the four great families would be a tortoise shell,” He Yue said with a grin. “But now? We can crack them one by one.”

Li Rong was about to be sent to jail.

The jail—tch. It only detains suspects, yet the conditions there are worse than those in a proper prison. The filth and dampness go without saying. Some people got a single flea bite and ended up shaking with fever until they died. Even with bribes to the jailers, could a pampered lord like Second Master Li stomach a place like that?

As for Li Zhi, he was merely out on bail. In two months, when the case opened, he would go to jail alongside his brother. To win leniency, he would cooperate with Governor-General He. He could not bet everything on Minister Li; who knew what kind of man the new governor-general was? What if he did not budge to a carrot or a stick?

And then there was Li Shuang. He was too young. If both elders went behind bars and he wanted to get his hands on the Li Family’s reins, he might need to borrow the power of the state. And before his own trial, Li Zhi would certainly appoint a successor, and that successor absolutely would not be a son of Li Rong.

The vast Li Family was going to get very lively in the next two or three months.

What He Chunhua feared most was them uniting against him. Days like today, when they were split and scrambling, were ideal.

The old man, Li Zhao, must have been thinking about how to spar with He Chunhua up to his dying breath. He must have been thinking about how to lock wrists and test the other party’s strength.

Heh, how naive.

Why would He Chunhua ever give him the chance to fight head-on?

“The enemy in the north is the enemy of all Xia Province,” He Chunhua mused. “That is something we can make use of.”

Xun Province’s troops had already crossed into Xia. This was not just a geographic fact; it also punched a hole in the province’s psychological defenses.

The four great families felt the danger as keenly as anyone.

Crisis, crisis, manage the danger well, and it becomes an opportunity.

He Yue’s expression grew grave. “Father, what do you have in mind?”

He Chunhua said, each word filled with iron resolve, “My first battle must be a victory.”

However fiercely he cleaned house—shaping civil affairs, drilling troops, bringing the great families to heel—that would still be victory only on home turf.

At the moment, he was merely a bully in his own yard.

At best, it would make the gentry fear him without truly respecting him.

Only by facing an external foe and winning could a new governor-general like him properly plant his feet in Xia Province and raise his banner of authority.

Only then could the rest of the plan unfold in full.

This battle—this victory—mattered too much. It had to be prepared with care.

“Xia Province’s troops are mediocre,” He Chunhua said, shaking his head. “Nian Zanli’s men are veterans who’ve long held the north against the demon armies. If we meet head-on, our odds are poor.”

A war was to be fought one bite at a time, just like you ate a meal one mouthful at a time. He was not discouraged.

If the troops of Xia Province were easy to command, would the job have fallen to him?

He Yue could not help adding, “The enlistment order has gone out, but the response is weak.”

“It’s no surprise that no one wants to enlist, but conscription isn’t optional,” said He Chunhua, his eyebrows lifting slightly. “What bothers me is that the registered population on the census is very different from the actual number of residents. This was particularly prominent in Ru County. I specifically went to the county to have a look for myself, and there were only a thousand and five hundred registered households, but the old folks told me there are at least thirteen thousand people living there. And last summer, during Fire-Leaping Festival[3], at the natural riverbank square in Gua Township, the place was packed wall to wall, even though it should have been able to comfortably hold three thousand people. Despite that, Gua Township has only two hundred and thirty households on the books.”

“A thousand threads to untangle, all to be worked through one by one.” Too much spice had reddened his nose. He Chunhua dabbed it with a towel. “Slowly, then. Let’s hope Heaven gives me a little more time.”

He Lingchuan blurted, “Father, what can I do to help?”

He had been idle for days, with nothing to occupy his hands.

“Good boy, you’re learning to be thoughtful,” said He Chunhua, patting his shoulder. “Don’t worry. Your chance will come soon.”

1. This should just be a stew of rare delicacies. ☜

2. This is from Hainan. ☜

3. This should be the same or similar to Chaharshanbe Suri. ☜