Chapter 59: The Whip of the Great Song

Li Changan felt a cool breeze blowing beneath his crotch.
Well, you old codger, you’ve reached the final threshold of your own life, so now you want to drag someone else into a shared funeral, do you?
In his haste, the words tumbled out: "Reporting to Your Majesty, and Her Majesty the Grand Empress Dowager, this whip of mine is still useful!"
The eunuchs, both great and small, all turned their gazes toward Li Changan in unison.
This is a formal audience before the throne, what kind of dirty talk are you spouting, you brat?
Besides, aren't you being a bit too sarcastic and weird? What, are you saying we became eunuchs because that thing of ours was useless?
This remark also gave Fu Bi a tremendous fright. Whose reckless lunatic is this, playing the hooligan and talking nonsense right on the imperial street?
Just as he wanted to salvage the situation, Li Changan added another sentence.
"Your subject wishes to become the Whip of the Great Song!"
Fu Bi's heart hung suspended in mid-air, his breathing stopped, and he prepared himself to faint at any moment. How utterly disgraceful! Did he really vouch for such a coarse, unrefined scoundrel?
Isn't this just a vulgar hoodlum? There wasn't a shred of decorum left, and sitting right above them was the Grand Empress Dowager, a widow well past fifty.
I am going to lose my moral integrity in my old age. If I had known, I wouldn't have believed this brat's nonsense.
"Cough... Um... Uh..."
A variety of sounds intended to mask the awkwardness echoed through the grand hall. Everyone regretted bringing their ears out today.
The grand eunuch in charge of audience etiquette glared with wide eyes, waved his hand, and was about to order the Imperial Guards to have this rebellious, arrogant, and shameless wretch beaten to a bloody pulp right on the spot.
At the very least, they should give him nine hundred slaps across the face, and then drag him off to the castration room to be snipped a thousand times over.
"Your subject is founding the *Financial Weekly* precisely to spur the court's twenty-seven thousand officials, four hundred thousand minor clerks, and countless powerful nobles and wealthy gentry. I do it for Your Majesty, for the Grand Empress Dowager, and for the Great Song, to keep watch on the direction in which the nation's chariot is galloping.
"Since ancient times, Censors-in-Chief have only concerned themselves with the capital. But since the Spring and Autumn period, the Nine Provinces have been unified, and the world is hundreds of times larger. Relying solely on the Censorate, even if you were to expand it by hundreds or thousands of censors, it would still be like a cup of water trying to put out a cartload of burning firewood, scattering salt in a lake, or a grasshopper trying to pull a carriage. Therefore, your subject wishes to run a public gazette, using the duties of a censor, the heart of serving the public good, and a brush as a weapon, to whip this team of galloping horses on behalf of the world, the common people, and Your Majesty!"
Fu Bi gnashed his teeth in bitter hatred. You little bastard, I treated you as a friend, but you treat me like an ox or a horse.
You even want to whip me?
Before we even leave the palace, I'll have you charged with the crime of showing disrespect before the emperor and have your bottom beaten to a pulp first!
Li Changan secretly raised a hand to wipe his forehead. That was close!
He had gotten too used to playing with the kids lately, bickering every day without filtering his words, almost costing himself his little life.
Silence is golden. No wonder officials of the past have always loved gerontocracy; young people are truly frivolous after all.
Stealing a glance at the situation, it seemed he had managed to talk his way out of it.
The emperor was about to speak, but after uttering just a single syllable, he was cut off by the Grand Empress Dowager.
"His ambition is commendable, his passion is forgivable, but his crime is hard to pardon!
"For anonymously writing essays to attack state affairs and hurling insults at the prime minister, he is sentenced to exile three li outside the city walls, along with a three-year forfeiture of salary.
"Begone!"

He still wanted to speak, but the quick-handed eunuchs were well prepared. A folded handkerchief covered Li Changan's nose and mouth, a kick to his heels sent him stumbling, and a glare summoned two Imperial Guards.
Dragging Li Changan up as if he were a corpse, they threw him out of the grand hall with lightning speed.
Good heavens, hurry and get this heartless wretch far away. Every single day he caused trouble for the men in the palace; if he kept talking, heaven knows what kind of catastrophe he might provoke.
Once outside, Li Changan gritted his teeth and rubbed his rear end, muttering the dirtiest curses under his breath.
That must have been the eunuchs playing dirty; that pinch was so fierce he was probably bruised all over.
After waiting outside for another half-hour, Fu Bi finally emerged slowly, supported by someone.
As soon as they met, Fu Bi immediately made a motion to hit him.
"You little monkey, if you're tired of living, don't drag me into it. Without you, I'd be back in my ancestral home in Luoyang, dandling my grandchildren and playing with hawks and hounds."
"I..."
"Shut your mouth! Get lost immediately! You are not allowed to set foot inside the city gates for three years, or else you'll be exiled three thousand li and given a hundred strokes of the paddle!"
Li Changan didn't care about not entering the city; the area outside the South Gate and the Bianjing East Wharf were even more prosperous than the inner city. But what was this about three years' salary? Wasn't he going to end up working on credit now?
Such a massive imperial court, owing salary to a lonely, helpless young man—was that any way to behave!
I have a grandfather waiting to be fed up above, a widowed and unemployed mother in the middle, and a younger sister waiting to be married off down below. You can't just bully an honest man like this!
"Money! Where is my salary?"
The two of them got into the carriage, and all the way through the South Fragrance Gate, Fu Bi refused to speak a single word to him.
Further out was the moat, and Fu Bi dropped him off right there.
Once the escorting Imperial Guards and the young eunuch had retreated, the old man finally put on an expression that was barely considered amiable.
"Wang Anshi is narrow-minded, and that young lord of his holds grudges like nobody else. This is only the first wave; you just wait for their countermoves.
"If I were you, I'd pack up my things immediately and run as far away as heaven and earth reach, instead of stirring up any gazettes or schools.
"Write books, establish doctrines, lecture and take in disciples—perhaps if you go build up your reputation in some remote place for twenty or thirty years, you might still have a chance to match wits with the Wang faction."
Was this sincere advice, or was it a test?
If he were afraid of trouble, would he still be a man? Young master made his name precisely by being good at stirring things up.
Wang Anshi's wings were not yet fully grown, and the New Faction had not yet solidified. To let him off the hook at this juncture—was he supposed to wait for Wang's disciples and followers to scour the mountains and seas, and spin him around like a top?
If you're going to fight, you have to strike now!
A true man is never cowardly because of the enemy's strength.
"What, are you scared, Lord Fu?
"If so, it wouldn't be impossible for me to go along with Young Master Wang, or wander the four seas and see the scenery of Shangjing."
Trying to scare me? Your lord here didn't graduate from Nanqiang Academy for nothing!
You old fogies, whichever one of you dares to mess with me, I'll turn sides and mess with you right back. As the saying goes, building things is hard, but destroying them is easy. Who doesn't have a basketful of methods to hurt others while benefiting themselves?

Fu Bi casually threw his prayer beads right at him. Was this brat's head made of the foulest stone in the outhouse? He couldn't understand a single word of well-intentioned advice.
"Get lost!"
The old man retreated back into the carriage and whipped the horses away.
In this scorching summer heat, the area outside the city gate was bustling with activity, filled with nearby farmers coming to sell melons, fruits, pears, and peaches.
He happened to be thirsty, so he found a melon stall run by a middle-aged man with a dark complexion.
"How much are your melons?"
"Ten cash per catty!"
"Hey...! Are the rinds of your melons made of gold, or is the flesh made of gold?"
"Are you buying or not? Where else in Bianjing can you find melons right now? These are all shipped from Huainan."
"Are your melons ripe?"
"I've been selling melons for years, do you think I'd sell you raw ones?"
"I'm asking you, are these melons ripe?"
"Are you fucking looking for trouble?"
"Hey, my temper flares up! Your lord here is a dignified Academician of the Hall of Government Affairs, a Censorate official appointed by imperial brush, Li Changan. Today, I'm just going to look for your trouble!"
Upon hearing this, far from acting arrogant, the melon vendor immediately stepped away from his seat and dropped to his knees. "Is it Immortal Li? The God of Wealth has arrived! This lowly one was blind and deserved to die! I deserve to die!"
With that, he raised his hand and began slapping his own face.
"Stop! Stop... Stop! You know me? I was just joking around with you, what act are you putting on here!"
"Little one is Yang Er, single name Zhi. I have an eighty-year-old mother at home and an infant waiting to be fed, and I've always made a living carrying baskets and selling fruit in the city. But a while ago, the officials insisted on forcing a loan of fifty strings of cash on me, with an interest of twenty strings for three months. Now I can't even survive. Great mercy and great virtue, God of Wealth, please save me!"
This kneeling of the melon vendor reminded him of the incident with Zhang the Lantern Maker half a month ago.
Had the harm of the New Laws already spread down to petty vendors who didn't even own a storefront?
"By your reckoning, selling melons for ten cash is justified? When the East City Public Welfare Money Bank collected the Green Sprouts loans, didn't you go deposit your money?"
"Reporting to the God of Wealth, the officials gave out nine and took back thirteen—I only got thirty strings of cash in hand! Two months have already passed, and I'm still short forty strings. Now I have no choice but to mortgage my house and land, and I'll likely have to sell my wife and children too. I just can't scrape enough money together!"
Li Changan went around asking the people on the edge, and sure enough, prices had skyrocketed; ordinary pears were selling for four cash each.
Hearing that this person was none other than Immortal Li, the God of Wealth of Bianjing, the peddlers all stopped doing business and knelt in a row, kowtowing endlessly.
"God of Wealth! Immortal Li! Please show us a way to survive!"