Clink, clank.
Stacks of copper coins were piled together and dropped into waiting palms.
"Twenty copper coins per person. Take them and move forward. Those behind, line up properly—no pushing! There's sweet mung bean soup up ahead."
"Children? Children count too. As long as they're a person, they count—those who can't walk and are carried in arms count too." After speaking, Old Cui the gatekeeper moved a stool over, stood atop the table, and shouted at the people behind, "Children count too! If they're a person, they count!"
His words were clear and his voice resounding, nothing like an aged, decrepit old gatekeeper.
The vast sea of people erupted.
"Thank you, Old Master Xu! Thank you, Old Master Xu!"
"May Old Master Xu's blessings be as vast as the Eastern Sea, his longevity as enduring as the Southern Mountain!"
On the top floor of the Confucian Temple Kui Pavilion in Huang Province, Old Master Xu of the Xu Family, Xu Rongguang, nearly a hundred years old, stood with his graying temples meticulously groomed. Watching the tide of people gather toward the Confucian Temple, his face glowed red with health.
As a scholar, Xu Rongguang had always preferred peace and quiet. Bamboo grew behind his house, pines stood before its gate. Yet today, he preferred bustle—the livelier, the better.
The crowd pressed onward, surged up the hill, and sheltered beneath the shade of the trees.
When an imperial decree reached local offices at every level, prefects, prefectural governors, and county magistrates had to select an auspicious day and hold a grand "public reading" ceremony. All officials and local gentry were required to attend, while the common people would also be encouraged to come watch and listen, displaying "universal celebration beneath Heaven."
No one knew what major event the court would announce