Shattering the Body (Part One)
Beneath the night sky, Clear Bamboo Residence was ablaze with lights, and the pleasing sounds of strings and bamboo instruments mingled with the singing of women.
In the Great Blue Dynasty, gambling houses and brothels were both legal. The brothels were further divided into four grades and placed under the exclusive management of the Overseeing Bureau.
Fourth-grade brothels were the notorious pleasure houses—pure flesh-and-blood businesses with high turnover and wildly uneven quality.
Third-grade brothels were called "lower establishments." They had fixed premises and, though they were likewise flesh-and-blood businesses, their quality was relatively higher.
Second-grade brothels were called "teahouses." They were high-end establishments that were half performance and half prostitution. Some middle-class folk with a little money in their pockets loved to invite two or three friends to "sample tea" there in their spare time.
The highest grade of brothel was the "Pure Singing Class." These were truly high-end establishments, and the women inside generally sold only their talents, never their bodies. If someone truly craved a woman's body, they would have to throw down a vast sum of real gold and silver and become the "number-one patron" before they might have a chance to taste her sweetness.
Places like the Pure Singing Class were the favorite pleasure grounds of high officials and nobles. Clear Bamboo Residence, meanwhile, was the most famous Pure Singing Class in all of Xingcheng, publicly recognized as the finest.
Clear Bamboo Residence was run by the Tiger Sabre Gang. Today, Master Zhang of the Tiger Sabre Gang was personally hosting an important guest here.
"Come, Chief Liu, let me toast you."
Zhang Mingze, bespectacled and brimming with scholarly refinement, raised his wine cup with a broad smile and toasted a somewhat portly middle-aged man.
Five people sat in the private