Chapter 60: Keep Going After Him (Please Give Some Monthly Tickets)

When Confucius was passing by Mount Tai, he heard a woman weeping bitterly at a graveside. The Master leaned forward against the crossbar of his carriage to listen, and sent Zilu to ask her, saying, "Your wailing is such that it truly sounds as if you have suffered sorrow upon sorrow." She replied, "It is so. Long ago, my father-in-law was killed by a tiger; then my husband was killed by one too; and now my son has also been killed by a tiger." The Master asked, "Why do you not leave this place?" She answered, "There is no oppressive government here." The Master then said, "Remember this, my little ones: oppressive government is fiercer than a tiger." — The Book of Rites: Liji, Fang Ji.

The Green Sprouts Loan, which grandly claimed to rescue the imperiled and relieve the common people from monetary distress, had actually turned out looking like this.

And this was right at the feet of the Son of Heaven, in the premier city of Bianjing.

If one were to travel merely thirty li outside the imperial capital, heaven only knows what grotesque monstrosities those local magistrates, who specialized in ruining families and destroying households, would have made of it.

Wang Anshi, your crimes are too numerous to record on all the bamboo in the world!

Previously, Li Changan had cultivated his reputation merely to elevate his social standing, ensuring that even if he parted ways with Su Shi—that peerless Pokémon—he could still face Bianjing with a proud smile.

Yet now, the neat rows of kowtowing elder brothers, older sisters, uncles, and aunties thoroughly enraged the soul that had traveled here from later generations.

By what right? All living beings are nurtured by heaven and earth; by what right must the common folk be so mercilessly plundered, serving as mere flesh and blood sacrifices for your grandiose grand designs?

You wish to become a sage, yet others must be reduced to beasts of burden—subjected to exorbitant taxes, extortion, violent plunder, and finally stripped to the bone and sucked dry.

Truly: "As long as the sages do not perish, the grand robbers will never cease!"

Today, even if I am skinned alive, my tendons pulled, and my legs broken, I will help these impoverished souls and demand justice from you, Sage Wang.

Li Changan’s eyes were bloodshot, his chest heaving violently, as he struggled to calm himself for a long moment.

"Go, follow me to the newspaper office! We shall expose their crimes to the entire world, and then I will lead you to strike the Dengwen Drum and present a petition directly to the Emperor!

"I simply refuse to believe that under this bright and clear sky, he alone can cover the heavens with a single hand!"

As the commotion rose, the imperial guards stationed at the gates instantly went on high alert, removing the leather covers from their lances, drawing their sabers, and stringing their bows, ready to suppress a riot at a moment's notice.

Yet once Li Changan finished shouting, the crowd below fell utterly silent.

Presenting a petition to the Emperor—these people who survived at the very bottom of society had long since been broken and numbed by a lifetime of strict subjugation.

Judge Bao was already dead; from where could an imperial petition possibly be brought? As mere ant-like subjects, accusing the current Chief Councilor—was that not simply being in too much of a hurry to die?

The more timid ones wiped away their tears and began to back away.

The slightly bolder ones merely opened their turbid eyes, gazing blankly at the immortal-like Li, their mouths opening without a single word coming forth.

They were afraid—afraid of the village head, afraid of the patrolling bailiffs, afraid of the six prefectural boards and five administrative departments, afraid of anyone wearing official uniform and holding blade or spear.

The common people were meant to eat grass; the superiors were meant to devour men.

They dared not. Even though Li Changan was willing to lead them, Li Changan was not Judge Bao; he possessed neither Zhang Long nor Zhao Hu, nor did he have a sharp executioner's blade.

In the blink of an eye, the crowd dispersed, leaving only three or four people who were too preoccupied with weeping to notice the shifting situation.

"Go, follow me! Your Green Sprouts Loans, I will help you pay them off!

"This is your last chance: come with me to petition the throne. If you yourselves do not dare to fight for your own survival, no one in this world can save you!"

Hearing this, Yang Er thought of his blind old mother, his wife with her face covered in sunspots, and his two children who were so starved their skin clung to their bones.

With a hard bite of his lip and a heavy stamp of his foot, he suddenly stood up from the ground.

"Immortal Li, I will go with you!"

At first, there were only three or four. But as Li Changan and the others actually began to move, others slowly began to follow behind, soon forming a long, winding line.

From the South City to the Cao Family Estate at the East Guo, the distance was at least seven or eight li.

Along the way, Li Changan walked and asked questions.

There were fruit vendors, sellers of small fish and shrimp, snack peddlers, furniture repairmen, house builders, boatmen on the river, breakfast stall owners...

They were all wretched souls living from hand to mouth, barely scraping by.

Over the course of an entire year, they might not even save two or three strings of coins. Yet despite this, they had been classified as merchants, each household forced to shoulder a fifty-string Green Sprouts Loan.

Was this a loan? It was a noose around the neck, a razor slicing away their flesh.

After walking for half an hour, they finally arrived at their destination. The procession trailing behind them had grown so long that its beginning and end were out of sight.

When Qian Weiming heard the gatekeeper's report, he was already so frightened that all the color had drained from his face.

Thinking he had encountered a popular uprising and that these rebellious rioters had set their sights on the estate where he resided, he had been on the verge of ordering the newspaper staff to bar the gates and escape through the back wall.

Seeing Li Changan's wrath-filled visage, he cried out, "Brother, you're going to scare me to death!"

"Weiming, call out all the staff from the newspaper office! Bring paper and brushes; today we are going to issue a special extra edition and write a grand, sweeping petition!"

How could Qian Weiming possibly know what was going on? Wasn't Li Changan dragged away by the Dali Temple? Who on earth had set him free?

What on earth were you trying to do—rely on a mob of rioters to bolster your position and openly defy the imperial court?

My good brother, if you truly harbor such an intention, let's just return to Songjiang, Suzhou, and Hangzhou, raise a banner of rebellion, and the success rate would be far higher than this!

The city walls of Bianjing are five zhang thick and nine zhang high; unless you know how to fly, we won't even catch a glimpse of the imperial palace. Besides, we don't even have any weapons!

Pulling Li Changan aside, the two men conversed for a good long while before the situation finally became clear.

Qian Weiming slapped his thigh in exasperation and said, "Brother, stop making trouble! You've just finished cursing the Chief Councilor into a rage, and now you want to petition the Emperor? If he drops dead from fury, won't all of us have to pay with our lives?"

Li Changan angrily retorted, "Impossible! Good people die young while turtles live for a thousand years. If I could actually curse him to death, I'd accept the consequences—at least I'd make it into the history books!

"Besides, this time I am petitioning through the Censorate, properly exercising my official duties. I am definitely not going to curse anyone!"

Qian Weiming refused to believe him: "I must review the manuscript myself!"

Li Changan agreed: "Fine! Furthermore, since I cannot enter the city, go invite Sima Kang and Su Zhan over. We need to recruit some real regular troops!"

Soon, the great gates of the Cao residence swung open, and thirty tables were lined up in the courtyard. People began to line up, stepping forward one by one to recount their harrowing experiences.

Some of the researchers and editors from the newspaper office hailed from Jiangnan, belonging to families with centuries-old literary traditions, yet they too had lived under the man-eating system of everyday life.

However, upon hearing that the Chief Councilor of the imperial court was playing such a foul game, their teeth were bared in rage, and their hearts burned with indignation.

The imperial scholars from the north were slightly more composed; over the years, they had been immersed in it and had witnessed countless absurd farces. As long as there was no proper supervision, this stratum of lower-level officials would always manage to commit atrocities that angered both gods and men, shattering all conventional bounds of human morality.

Everyone felt a sense of heroic grandeur. By pleading on behalf of the common people and following in the footsteps of Li Changan, Su Shi, and the renowned scholar Qian, they felt they were truly standing tall for once.

Though historians might not record their individual names, upon returning to their home villages, they would certainly instruct the clan elders to add a few thick, heavy strokes of ink to chronicle this glorious deed.

Writing furiously, the speed of grinding ink could not keep up with its consumption. In less than an hour, a pile of petitions a foot high had accumulated.

By this time, Su Shi and Sima Kang had also arrived.

As soon as they met, the two men anxiously asked how Li Changan had managed to escape danger, as they had been completely unaware of the circumstances and were frantically pulling strings everywhere to rescue him.

After briefly recounting Fu Bi's rescue effort, Li Changan immediately steered the conversation back to the present crisis.

"I intend to completely refute the Green Sprouts Law. Gongxiu, you are the chief executive of the tens of thousands of impoverished souls in Bianjing—though not their prefect, you are more to them than their own parents. Su Zhan, though you are only acting Prefect of Kaifeng, think of your predecessors: Kou Zhun, Bao Zheng, and Lord Fan Wenzheng! Now is the time for us to fulfill our mission!"

The two men had been busy all day and were already utterly exhausted from their hasty journey hither.

Yet upon hearing Li Changan's words, they suddenly felt a wellspring of immensely mighty strength surge upward from the earth beneath their feet, instantly filling their nearly drained bodies.

To conquer the strong with the weak, to plead for the lives of the common people—was this not the very work of sages!

As for our generation, we shall not shirk from this noble duty!