The hundred or so bandits from Jiuqi Mountain who had joined the Nansi Prefectural Troops were still on tenterhooks even though they had been added into the official army register. Lou Jing put Lin Dahu in charge of the lot of them, and the bandits felt much more at ease on seeing that their old boss would also be the one managing them in the army. Lin Dahu was also very grateful for Lou Jing’s magnanimity, and he slowly integrated himself into the army camp, becoming a competent junior officer.
Lou Jing’s arm was more or less healed now. His troops had been twiddling their thumbs mindlessly for some days, so he decided to lead them forth to start catching the mountain bandits who were terrorising the four southern counties. The geography of this area was complex, and after some discussion, they decided to start from nearby Jiuchang.
Jiangzhou’s mountain bandits were able to run rampant because they were quite united. Once the Imperial soldiers attacked the mountain they were hiding in, they ran as one to another bandit group’s hideout if it looked like they were about to be defeated, then returned to their own hideout when the soldiers left. This cycle repeated again and again.
As such, Lou Jing’s strategy was to block off all roads leading to the mountain hideouts before attacking the bandits. It was much like a fisherman casting his nets skilfully and simply waiting for the fish to swim in. There were some hideouts that had too many roads leading in and out to use this method, and for such hideouts, they attacked the mountain head on and laid waste to the empty hideout so that the bandits could not return there. The bandits would flee to other mountains to hide, and Lou Jing and his men would capture them when they attacked those mountains.
Ordinarily, when Imperial officials and soldiers made battle, they did so by the book. Lou Jing, however, had no regard for any rules and regulations; he used all sorts of underhanded tactics to achieve his goal of catching the bandits. He poisoned the water, burned the mountain, stole the bandits’ food supplies, and even bribed the bandit cooks to put laxatives in their meals. The mountain bandits were overwhelmed by these unconventional means of attack and were soon screaming blue murder.
Before a month was up, the Jiuchang mountain bandits were practically on the verge of collapse. A few of the larger bandit group heads got together to discuss strategies to counter Lou Jing.
“This General Zhennan plays too dirty. We’re not his match at all,” a few of the bandit heads said, their brows furrowed deeply. They all wore pained expressions on their faces. This was the first time they had encountered a Protector-General who behaved this way. He didn’t care to maintain the “honour” of the Imperial Court at all, and was incredibly shameless – more shameless even than the mountain bandits themselves!
“The day before yesterday, he captured the family of the Xiaoyin Mountain’s head, including the little children. He tied them to wooden stakes, set fires around them, then threatened to burn all of them if the Xiaoyin Mountain Bandits didn’t surrender,” one of them said, sighing morosely. All of them had various reasons for becoming bandits, but their families were usually innocent. Many of their family members lived safely in Jiangzhou under the protection of the mountain bandits.
“We cannot use hard tactics to counter his hard tactics,” one of the men said, slapping his hand down on the table. “We should just surrender and join his army!” He had surrendered and joined the army before. It wasn’t a big deal – in the worst case scenario, he’d just steal some of the army food and supplies before running off.
As such, on that very day, the few remaining heads of the large mountain bandit groups swaggered into the army camp.
Two rows of soldiers stood to attention in the central tent. All of them held large swords in their hands and had cold, forbidding expressions on their faces. A few of the mountain bandit heads felt their hearts quail at this sight, but they still knelt and indicated that they were willing to accept amnesty and enlistment.
Lou Jing’s eyes swept over these bandit heads. They all had vastly different appearances. Some were built like bears, broad-shouldered and muscular. Others looked more like agile monkeys, with sharp mouths, slender bodies and long sideburns. He couldn’t tell whether they were sincere or not just by observing them, so he didn’t bother looking at them after that first glance. “This General is always pleased to hear that you are willing to accept amnesty and enlistment,” he said.
A few of the bandits’ faces immediately brightened. It seemed that their gamble had paid off. This young second-ranked General seemed to be quite an easygoing person!
“However…” Lou Jing tapped a single finger on the table, and the bandits kneeling on their floor felt their hearts trip in their chests again.
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 Wuwei General, Hua Xicheng, offered a record book to Lou Jing with both hands.
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“Drag them out and behead them,” Lou Jing said, closing the record book and leaning back on his tiger-skin chair.
“What?!” the three people exclaimed. Before they could try to escape, the two rows of soldiers had circled them, grabbed hold of them and tied them up.
“These men had previously accepted amnesty and enlistment, then escaped and went back to banditry,” Lou Jing said, smiling coldly. “Amnesty and enlistment is but a means to make things easier for this General. If your acceptance of this causes more problems for me than it solves, then I will deal with you harshly.”
“Spare us! Ah! General, general – we are sincere this time, ah…” the three of them were dragged out and executed before their very eyes.
The few bandit heads who were still kneeling on the ground were so frightened that their arms and legs turned into jelly. They didn’t dare to even think about misbehaving or deserting any more.
Lou Jing continued to use similar tactics in all the surrounding counties, and he succeeded in eliminating the mountain bandits in Jiuchang and its six subordinate counties. Nearly 2,000 bandits were recruited into the military after this exercise.
After settling the bandits who had accepted amnesty and enlistment, Lou Jing heaved a quiet sigh of relief. This army’s food and supplies were running low, and they consumed a lot more of these items when they were out fighting battles. The military budget was disbursed to the Jiangzhou Prefectural Governor to manage, and because the latter was awash in refugees at the present time, all his energies were focused on settling the refugees properly. He had to open the Imperial warehouse to give food and supplies to the refugees for their resettlement, and for this reason, he had applied some of the military budget toward the relief efforts. Lou Jing’s troops were not given their full budget as such. In truth, even if these bandits hadn’t come to surrender, he wouldn’t have gone out to attack any more mountains during this time.
The commoners were all in disbelief. The mountain bandits had plagued them for so long that they really couldn’t fathom a life free from fear of being robbed. A whole half-month passed before they dared to tread on the Imperial roads again. After that, Jiuchang became lively again, and some of the shops, which had closed during the conflict, reopened again.
The final returns from the salt trade that Lou Jing asked the Zhao family to do for him also arrived during this time, together with a letter from Zhao Xi.
“The Hanlin Academy is full of nerds, and I am bored. to. TEARS. I’ve been sorting history books recently, and I’m quite enamoured of the Taizu Emperor’s battle campaigns in the North and South. I only regret that I was not born in the right era. How about I resign and head to Jiangzhou to be your Military Strategist? I can fulfill a long-cherished dream at the same time…”
Lou Jing smiled with amusement as he kept the letter away. This Zhao No. 9 said that he wanted to be a Military Strategist to supposedly fulfill a “long-cherished dream”, but the truth was probably that he found his career progression in the Hanlin Academy too slow and was up to something or other with this suggestion of his.
“Gongzi, what sweets would you like?” the sweet shop owner asked, smiling gaily at Lou Jing.
Lou Jing looked at the sweets displayed in the shop. Other than plain white sugar, the shop sold sweet treats that were either malted candy or sweets that were sold by weight. One of Jiangzhou’s major products was sugarcane, and there were many sweet shops here as a result. Now that the mountain bandits weren’t plaguing the people any more, the shops in Jiuchang had prospered, and the sweet shop owners also started making more fanciful candy.
“Gongzi, if you would like some better quality candy, I have some hupo candy that’s freshly made today. You can try some if you’d like,” the shop owner said, pulling open a wooden drawer. It was lined with rice paper, and the beautiful, crystalline hupo candy sat in neat rows on it, sparkling prettily in the light.
Lou Jing accepted a piece and put it into his mouth. It was fragrant and sweet – probably made from a mixture of honey and malted candy. “Give me two jin of this, and put them in a bottle,” he said.
“Coming right up!” the sweet shop owner said, his smile even wider than before. Hupo candy was expensive, and only the rich people in town bought this sweet. He’d managed to sell a whole two jin at one go – that was considered a large sale, and he’d make quite a tidy sum from it.
“Mister, do you make honey-milk candy?” Lou Jing asked, giving the bottle of sweets to Yun Yi to hold. He’d gone to a few shops in Jiuchang’s main street and small alleys, but he hadn’t seen a single shop that sold any kind of milk candy. The shop he was currently in was the largest shop in town, but it also didn’t have the candy he was looking for.
“I’ve heard of it before, but I haven’t made it myself,” the shop owner said, thinking hard. “If you want, I can have a go at it.”
“That would be great,” Lou Jing said, finally smiling as he paid the deposit for the milk candy without hesitation.
When he got back to the camp, a subordinate reported that the Prefectural Magistrate Lord Yang was here.
“How have you been, General?” Yang Xin said, rising to greet Lou Jing.
“Your Lordship came at a most opportune time. I have something I need to trouble you with,” Lou Jing said, smiling as he gestured to Yang Xin to sit down.
“Shizi, please give me your instructions, whatever they are. There’s no need to be so courteous with me,” Yang Xin said, smiling. The commoners had been so happy about the successful suppression of the mountain bandits that they wanted to give presents to the Protector General who was responsible for this happy change, but because they didn’t know how to get the gifts to him, they had sent them to the local government offices near them and asked their Prefectural Magistrate to pass them on to Lou Jing.
Lou Jing looked at the list of gifts. They were all things like eggs, grain and bolts of cloth. There were even mantou, meat buns, and dried Chinese sausages in the list. Lou Jing couldn’t help chuckling. “Lord Yang, you are really deserving of the people’s trust,” he said.
Yang Xin smiled, slightly embarrassed by this compliment. He had always treated the people under his care with warmth and affection, and the Jiuchang residents often seemed to think of him as a warm-hearted old neighbour of theirs instead of an important Lord Prefectural Magistrate. “My daughter has arrived in the Capital safely thanks to Shizi ye,” he said in return.
Madam Wei had returned to the Anguo Gong residence. She treated the young Miss Yang with disdain, looking down her nose at her and tripping her up at every opportunity. Initially, Miss Yang didn’t dare to disobey Madam Wei and waited on her carefully and diffidently. Lou Jianyu didn’t step in at all; he found his new Side Consort fresh and interesting, but he didn’t want to deal with the affairs of women. Miss Yang also was not a talkative person, so she simply suffered this way for a few days.
That is, until a maid from Zhuque Hall found an opportunity to speak to her. “The Guogong ye is someone who doesn’t meddle with women’s internal affairs,” the maid said.
Miss Yang thought about this carefully and understood the implications of this statement. The next morning, she deliberately failed to turn up on time to greet Madam Wei. The latter immediately threw a tantrum and started scolding her. Lou Jianyu happened to be resting in the next room at the time, and this commotion disturbed his peace. “This is such a small matter!” he had said irritably to Madam Wei. Miss Yang relaxed on hearing this. Madam Wei acted tough, but she didn’t have her husband’s support even though she was the primary Consort. This gave Miss Yang quite a bit of wriggle room, and she felt her world brighten considerably.
Lou Jing waved his hand, indicating that he wished to change the topic. He didn’t want to waste time talking about this, and he was even more well-informed of the happenings in the Anguo Gong residence than Yang Xin was anyway. “There are two things I need your Lordship’s help with. One is to obtain some farmland in Jiuchang, and the second is to help me build a General Zhennan residence,” Lou Jing said, pushing a stack of silver notes to Yang Xin as he spoke.
“Since it is the Shizi’s request, I will certainly accede. However, I absolutely will not accept the silver notes in advance. When a good piece of farmland has been found, we can calculate how much it costs then. It won’t be too late to pass me the silver notes at that time,” Yang Xin said, hurriedly refusing the silver notes. This was the Lou family’s money, and he didn’t dare to take a single cent of it right now.
“That works too,” Lou Jing said. He didn’t insist on making Yang Xin take the silver notes. “I’ll be away for a few days, and my personal guards will hold on to the silver notes in the meantime. If you need any of it during my absence, you can discuss it with him,” he said, pointing at Yun Ba.
After tying up all the loose ends at the army camp, Lou Jing picked up two bottles of sweets and headed to Minzhou.
There were many affairs to deal with in Minzhou. It was far more complicated to administer a whole prefecture than it was to deal with the Nansi Prefectural Troops. Xiao Chengjun had been very busy the whole month, so much so that they both hadn’t seen each other at all even though they were only three days’ journey away from each other.
Construction of the Min Wang residence had begun before the New Year. It was nearly the sixth lunar month now, and it was almost fully built. Lou Jing galloped hard towards the Min Wang residence with a few Youyun guards, but found that Min Wang himself was absent upon his arrival.
The entire residence was eerily quiet and felt very cold and empty. The subordinates all wore very plain clothing, and even the tablecloths and window curtains were all done up in neutral colours. This gave Lou Jing a very bad feeling.
“What’s going on? Where’s Wang ye?” Lou Jing asked Le Xian urgently. Le Xian had come forward to take off his outer robes.
“Wang ye has gone to the seaside,” Le Xian said, looking around to make sure no one was nearby before whispering the next sentence. “Yesterday, some news came from the Capital. The prince is dead.”
“Who?” Lou Jing’s heart nearly stopped; he was so shocked. A prince? Dead?
“It’s the Fourth Prince,” Le Xian said in a low voice. His face was serious and bore no trace of his usual merry smile. “Last month, he was ambushed by the Tartars in a battle, and he was shot dead by their arrow.”