Chapter Eighty-Six: Aftermath

Chapter Eighty-Six: Aftermath

For some reason, whenever Iron Heart and Little Clever saw Yang the Eldest being thrashed with cracking slaps and heavy blows, they felt an endless delight in their hearts.

Today Yang the Eldest proved remarkably tough. Six burly men from the Tiger Wing Battalion circled him like a spinning lantern, fighting him one after another, yet he held his own against them all without the slightest disadvantage. The well-honed muscles of his sweat-damp body gleamed in the sunlight, slick and glossy as silk.

For that reason, Iron Heart and Little Clever agreed that the most pleasing sight would be if those old hands from the Tiger Wing Battalion could beat those satin-smooth muscles of his into a riot of colors.

But the two of them were destined for disappointment. The battalion’s instructor could not come every day; today it was the instructor’s disciple who had come. Though the six men were all skilled, they still were no match for Yang the Eldest, who had already found his way into the arts of combat.

Watching Yang the Eldest knock the six strong men down one by one, Iron Heart and Little Clever let out a long sigh together.

In the bitter cold, Yang the Eldest shook himself with triumphant vigor, all his muscles taut. He lifted a foot and kicked the warmed yellow wine jar toward one of the men, then winked at Iron Heart and the others before saying smugly to the man, "Brother Huang, you fellows seem short on spirit today."

The burly man caught the wine jar, took a swig, and handed it to his brother. "If we had spirit, we still wouldn’t waste it on you. There’s a half-open girl beside the Phoenix Spring Tower waiting for me to go and spoil her."

Another of the men laughed. "Now that the Eldest has glimpsed the path, Master Yan and Master Tiger both say that if nothing unforeseen happens this year, it won’t be hard for you to take first place. Why are you still pounding your bones every day like this?"

Yang Huaiyu smiled. "I am bound to go to the battlefield someday. The more effort I put in now, the more means I will have to keep myself alive later. How could I dare be careless?"

The leader among the men frowned. "Eldest, with your family background, you ought not to be suffering on the battlefield. Even if you win the title of Champion Martial Scholar in the future, it would be easy enough to secure a well-paid post in the Imperial Guard. Why go endure the wind and mud in the frontier army?"

Yang Huaiyu drew the mace-spear from the rack and flourished it into a spear flower as large as a bowl, smiling. "Before, I thought the same. But after spending two years sitting in the post of assistant palace envoy and doing nothing, I suddenly found it all terribly dull.

"My Yang family is a military house, yes, but if only my father goes to the battlefield with a few retainers, what sort of thing is that? Sons inheriting their fathers' calling is only natural, so I too want to go see the frontier."

The man surnamed Huang suddenly said, "If the Eldest truly intends to earn fame and fortune at the border with spear and blade, remember to take us brothers with you when you go. There’s not much point staying in the capital."

Yang Huaiyu set down the mace-spear and said solemnly, "A promise is a promise?"

The other five men all laughed. "A horse with four legs cannot outrun a word once spoken!"

Yang Huaiyu threw back his head and laughed, then resumed his practice with the mace-spear, whose rolling shadow had already begun to carry the sound of wind and thunder.

The Tiger Wing Battalion men laughed as they drained the wine in the jar, then casually tossed the empty vessel toward Iron Heart. If Little Clever had not reached out and caught it, he would have been struck by it; the men themselves just went off chuckling.

"So it really is true," Little Clever said enviously, looking at Yang Huaiyu in the courtyard. "As soon as a person becomes strong, he immediately has followers."

"Followers my foot," Iron Heart said. "They're just a bunch of paupers hoping to borrow the Yang family's power to make a name at the border, then come back to the capital as officials."

Little Clever nodded. "True enough. Even so, Yang the Eldest is truly remarkable. The men of the Tiger Wing Battalion are famously proud."

"All of them are poor ghosts! Anyone with even a little family connection would never place their bet on Yang the Eldest."

Somehow, Yang Huaiyu had stopped training and was sitting on a long bench, smiling. "If they have use, that is already good. What’s truly frightening is when they have none.

"My Yang family has seen plenty like them. The first time, you can indeed trust your life to them. But once such a man has won himself official rank, he is no longer someone you can believe in.

"The first time, they help me take root at the frontier, and I help them obtain the lowest military rank. After that, neither owes the other anything. That is the custom in the army."

Iron Heart looked at Yang Huaiyu. "I notice that ever since your future wife arrived, you seem like a different person."

Yang Huaiyu's handsome face reddened slightly, but he quickly regained his composure. "And if I am? But Brother Yuan, haven't your methods been a little underhanded?"

Iron Heart glanced at Little Clever. "I knew it would be bad to do a good deed. Her family kept her locked up at home until she grew foolish. If I hadn’t brought her out for some fresh air, who knows how long she’d have stayed that way? A woman like that would ruin three generations."

Yang Huaiyu did not want to keep discussing Su Mei with the sharp-tongued Iron Heart, so he soon changed the subject. "The tower collapsed last night. Do you know why?"

Iron Heart and Little Water exchanged a glance and both shook their heads to show they did not.

Yang Huaiyu dragged them both into the carpentry room with a look of triumph. After throwing his clothes over himself again, he squatted before the stove and said mysteriously, "It was brought down by a demon man who led a pack of pigs and cast some sorcery."

Iron Heart and Little Clever both drew in a sharp breath and stared at Yang Huaiyu in amazement, which greatly satisfied his vanity.

Leaning closer to them, he said, "Last night, the Deputy Superintendent of the Astronomical Office reported that Luo Hou had arrived half an hour early while Ji Du was half an hour late. This is a sign that a demon man has been meddling. And then, as you can imagine..."

Iron Heart and Little Clever exchanged another look. "What are we supposed to know?"

"Ignorant fools!" a clear voice came from outside.

Yang Huaiyu's face turned tender at once. Little Clever looked indignant. Iron Heart, meanwhile, piled on a smile and waited for the learned lady's arrival.

"The descending node of the ecliptic and the moon's path is called Luo Hou; the ascending node is called Ji Du. Together with the sun, moon, and the five planets of water, fire, wood, metal, and earth, they are the Nine Luminaries. In a man's life, when the year falls under Luo Hou, misfortune is at its sharpest: unrest in the household, lawsuits, and loss of wealth. And now with the yin and yang conjunction delayed by half an hour, it is certain that a demon man has been at work.

"Deputy Superintendent Master Wen of the Astronomical Office is one of the rare great masters of celestial signs in this age. How could his words be wrong?"

Su Mei pushed the door open and came in, followed by her little shadow, Water Pearl. The moment she entered, Water Pearl fetched a stool for Sister Su to sit on, carefully wiping the seat first with her sleeve.

As for Yang Huaiyu, he again displayed that disgusting expression of wanting to draw near yet not daring to do so. Rubbing his hands for a long while, he finally snatched the clean teacup from Iron Heart and poured tea for Su Mei. "Young lady, have some tea. Don't let these two coarse fellows anger you."

Su Mei calmly enjoyed the flattery from Water Pearl and Yang Huaiyu. She took the tea with satisfaction, sipped it, and then looked sidelong at Iron Heart and Little Clever on their low stools. "Scholars care about fate, destiny, and feng shui. If one does not understand the heavens or the earth, how can one stand in this world?

"Hmph. This year, Prince Ru Yang has encountered petty villains in his fate, and calamities of all sorts will be many. The Astronomical Office has long reached its conclusion. If his destiny cannot be changed after tomorrow, I fear there will be bloodshed.

"Look at this: what sensible person, when building a tower, would build such an ominous one? Yet this tower leans to the west, and the flying eaves at its top stab straight into the heart of the White Tiger in the west. The tiger is the king of beasts; in its pain and injury, it had no choice but to send the pig demon nearest the tower to work its mischief.

"I heard one of those pigs weighed a full thousand jin. That was the pig demon. But it miscalculated, and in the end the tower crushed it to death...

"My cousin was at the tower that night and saw with her own eyes that pig demon's eyes blazing red with scarlet light. It used sorcery to stupefy the Sixth Prince, forced the prince to open his mouth, and even stuffed its pig tongue into the prince's mouth, circling it around to suck away his vital breath. Oh, how disgusting.

"From that time on, the Sixth Prince turned into an idiot..."

Iron Heart shivered and looked at Little Clever. "Will you still believe in this sort of thing in the future?"

Little Clever glanced at Yang Huaiyu and Water Pearl, both of whom were listening to Su Mei's tale as though entranced, then leaned close to Iron Heart's ear. "From now on, I'd rather die than believe this superstitious nonsense. And I swear I will never marry a woman like that. If Heaven insists on giving me such a woman, I'd rather have no woman at all..."

After hearing Little Clever's words, Iron Heart found himself in complete agreement.

He had originally thought that, being born of the Su family, Su Mei must be a dignified and lovely daughter of a great house. But seeing the way she spun gossip into something intoxicating, he knew his earlier judgment of people had been mistaken.

More and more people came into the carpentry room to listen to Su Mei tell her story, and before long everyone in the courtyard had gathered around her.

Little Clever quietly pointed toward the gate, and Iron Heart was the first to slip out of the carpentry room. Not long after, Little Clever also crept out, and the two of them made their way through the courtyard into the blacksmith's room at the back.

Sure enough, there was an exceptionally large millstone here. Little Clever patted it and said, "What a pity. I couldn't find a larger one. If I had a millstone big enough, I could simply heat the iron red-hot, place it on the stone, and turn the rollers to press out materials of whatever thickness I needed. Trying to achieve large quantities of steel by hammering it would be impossible."

Iron Heart sprang up onto the millstone and smiled at Little Clever. "You’re a clever man, so how did you become muddled at a moment like this?"

"Why do you need such a huge millstone? Think about it: what sort of millstone could crush a red-hot iron block into thin cake-like sheets? How heavy would the rollers have to be?"

Little Clever laughed. "Just make it as large as possible. The larger, the better."

Iron Heart took up two wooden sticks and夹 them between the three fingers of both hands, then said to Little Clever, "Suppose you now want an iron plate as thick as my middle finger. These two sticks would then need to be two extremely thick iron bars. If you put a red-hot iron block between them and find a way to make the two bars rotate against each other, do you think you could produce a plate as thick as my middle finger?"

Little Clever stared at him expressionlessly. "Must you always humiliate my intelligence like this? Couldn't you have told me your brilliant idea before I had the chance to be foolish?"

Iron Heart smiled. "The master said that only through hardship can one gain wisdom. You really do need to read more books in the future.

"See? I read a great deal, which is why you can’t compare with me."

Little Clever nodded. "You're right. If one day I manage to build that iron-pressing mechanism you described, the very first person I'll stuff inside it and press will be you."