The Imperial Ceremonial Class Sword

Du Chengfeng took the bloodstained longsword, his face expressionless.

Right in front of him, the man had run a sword through one of his own subordinates. Was this meant to give him a show of force? Or had the man simply suffered some kind of mental breakdown?

Du Chengfeng did not know, nor did he particularly care. Though he was a peace-loving man who only wanted a quiet life, and was not especially fond of witnessing such killing, compared to when he had cut down those two hundred-odd Hu men, this scene was somewhat too small to stir him.

"Get someone to clean this up. The smell is too strong."

After casually giving Yang Xuan the order, Du Chengfeng set the sword upon the whetstone and began sharpening it.

Clear water splashed across the blade. What flowed down its edge was not only blood, but also distant memories.

Though this sword had killed only one person, Du Chengfeng still keenly sensed its history.

Unlike other weapons, this sword had been born in luxury. A highly skilled smith had used the finest hundredfold-forged steel to create a blade that looked slender yet possessed tremendous strength. Its gold-and-silver-decorated hilt had been engraved day and night by several master craftsmen. Once its brass throat piece had been fitted into its sharkskin scabbard, anyone would have called it an extraordinary sword.

And yet, more than a hundred of such fine swords had been forged at once.

It was hard to imagine such exquisite sharp swords being made as mass-produced goods, but Du Chengfeng soon learned why—this batch of treasured swords had been made by the Great Chen court to reward newly appointed officials. Since the civil and military officials stood in two separate ranks at court, they were also called Ceremonial Class Swords.

Put bluntly, they were ceremonial swords, chiefly used as decoration.

Although Great Chen had been founded through martial might, and men traditionally wore swords at their waists, these noble sword-bearers rarely had any occasion to draw them. After all, even if danger truly arose, their soldiers would fight for them. How could it ever come to the nobles themselves drawing swords and taking action? Thus, many nobles simply replaced their steel blades with wooden strips. They were lighter that way, while still preserving the martial splendor of carrying a sword.

But this sharpening artisan surnamed Wang had been an exception.

Because he had received a transfer order: he was to be sent to Jizhou.

The sharpening artisan surnamed Wang was called Wang Gaocheng. A disciple of the great Yanzhou scholar Ruan Shantao, he had been recommended to the court by a single letter from Ruan Shantao while still young. At such a splendid age, with an official salary soon to be his, Wang Gaocheng had been riding high on the spring breeze. Who could have expected that, when the court's official document arrived, it would assign him to accompany the army at the Jizhou border?

Only then did Wang Gaocheng learn that his benefactor had secluded himself in Yanzhou because he had offended far too many people at court in his younger days.

But by then, it was too late for words. Military orders were as immovable as mountains; defying them meant certain death. Wang Gaocheng could only return to Yanzhou and see whether the mentor who had sent him into a pit of fire could find some way to help.

What greeted Wang Gaocheng, however, was a furious scolding from the old man.

"As a scholar, rather than striving with all your might to repay the nation's grace, you dare come here asking me this?"

Two slaps across the face made Wang Gaocheng realize that his revered teacher had perhaps studied himself mad. The old man actually believed that studying was not for gaining high office and living as a dashing, elegant gentleman, but for serving the nation wherever danger lay. And the Jizhou border was undoubtedly the most dangerous place of all. So this damned transfer order had been personally arranged by his revered teacher.

Faced with such an excellent teacher, what could he say?

Thus, Wang Gaocheng could only pack his bags and head for the northern frontier.

Though Wang Gaocheng, being a scholar, still wore broad robes and long sleeves and carried himself like a renowned gentleman, he no longer dared replace his blade with wood for safety's sake. After all, besides being a sharpening artisan, that military order had given him another identity.

He was to serve as a military inspector, secretly watching Commander Liu of Northern Ji in all his movements.

The court had no easy answer when it came to frontier armies. If the border forces were too weak, the steppe people would come pouring in, and no one at court would sleep soundly. But if the border forces were too strong... perhaps no one at court would sleep soundly either. Thus, the court had always maintained the practice of sending sharpening artisans to the frontiers, creating a second layer of control over the border armies in addition to the supply system for provisions and fodder.

In a sense, this position was even as important as the chief quartermaster's. To soldiers on the front lines, the weapons in their hands were as important as the food in their bowls. Without food, they had no strength; without weapons, even with strength, they could not kill. Placing sharpening artisans loyal to the court at the border gave both the civil and military ranks in the capital a calming pill.

But Wang Gaocheng himself could not remain calm.

The border was perilous, the north bitterly cold. Wang Gaocheng felt he was little different from criminals sent into penal exile. Fortunately, Commander Liu was easy to speak with, and had even studied the classics of the sages for several years. In daily life, he conducted himself like a celebrated gentleman, with endless elegance and romantic flair. This was precisely the sort of thing Wang Gaocheng liked. The two quickly found common ground, going out and returning together, sleeping foot to foot, and becoming close friends who could speak of anything.

Of course, Wang Gaocheng still remembered his assignment. Yet no matter how he looked at it, Commander Liu was just as lacking in ambition as he was. What he needed to worry about now was not whether Commander Liu might threaten the court, but whether Jizhou, with its lax military preparedness, could withstand the steppe people's attacks at all.

Fortunately, just like Commander Liu, who loved to discourse on abstruse matters without lifting a finger, the steppe people to the north were also a pack of layabouts. Though conflicts broke out from time to time, they never amounted to more than bandit raids. Such things were utterly commonplace. Forget the frontier—even in the heartland of Great Chen, did mountain bandits and road robbers not plunder people?

So all he had to do was wait. Commander Liu had already said that if Wang Gaocheng was willing to endure a few years in Northern Ji, he would certainly petition the court to find him a prestigious, leisurely post where he could devote himself to studying the sages' classics.

One repays a peach with a plum. Since Commander Liu treated him so well, he naturally had to leave something behind for the other man.

For example, Liu Qingyun's Broken Horse saber.

With Wang Gaocheng's eye, he could tell at once that this long saber, forged in imitation of the ancient Broken Horse sword, must have come from the hands of some former palace craftsman. After all, only craftsmen there could grasp the true dimensions required for military weapons. Moreover, he had heard that this saber had once been sharpened by his damned revered teacher, Ruan Shantao of Yanzhou. That meant this saber had studied the classics of the sages.

A saber that had studied the classics of the sages was a perfect match for a refined gentleman like Commander Liu.

So this time, Wang Gaocheng was determined to have it.

Though the saber was said to have been bought by a folk sharpening artisan, Wang Gaocheng did not care. Strictly speaking, all sharpening artisans in Jizhou fell under his authority. Coming to take a saber was no trouble at all.

Only that refugee named Du Chengfeng had been truly irritating. Commander Liu and he had already condescended to come all the way to a place like Yang Family Fort, yet the man still did not know to present the saber to them. He had even claimed that he had seen Hu men invading the border through sharpening a blade... How could that be possible? Was sharpening not about using the sages' classics to suppress Sha Qi? Could this refugee truly sharpen blades?

"Since you claim to have such skill, then tell me what this sword has experienced."

As he spoke, Wang Gaocheng drew the sword at his waist and tossed it directly to the other man.

Only then did Wang Gaocheng feel fortunate that he had not replaced the steel blade with wood merely because the sword was too heavy. Otherwise, this refugee would truly have had an excuse to wriggle out of it.

He wanted to see how this refugee dared spin such a monstrous lie right in front of two distinguished scholars like himself and Commander Liu.

"So, Commander Liu, I was clearly doing this for your own good."

Looking at the longsword nailed through his neck, all the words filling Wang Gaocheng's heart were choked back into his throat by bloody froth.

"I did all this for your own good. Why did you kill me?"

After finishing the sword, Du Chengfeng was speechless for a long while.

Why kill him? Had this Wang fellow not understood even now? From the moment Wang Gaocheng entered Jizhou, Commander Liu had probably been putting on an act for him. Even Du Chengfeng, merely an observer, had realized that Commander Liu had likely wanted this fool dead from the start.

As an army-attached sharpening artisan, Wang Gaocheng spent every day discoursing on empty abstractions. In the end, he even decided that Jizhou's lax military preparedness was due to Commander Liu's lack of ambition. Did Wang Gaocheng never stop to consider how many days he had actually spent sharpening weapons since arriving in Jizhou?

Commander Liu had feigned flattery to avoid being constrained, only to end up with a living master who did no work at all. Putting himself in the man's place, Du Chengfeng felt he would have wanted to give Wang Gaocheng a few cuts as well.

Still, this experience of sharpening the sword had given Du Chengfeng another important piece of information.

The Commander Liu before him was not as useless as Du Chengfeng had first thought.

"It is a pity about your friend. Even at death's door, he was still thinking of giving you that saber."

Turning the hilt around, Du Chengfeng handed the sharpened sword back.

The Ceremonial Class Sword was fine, but something made only to decorate one's martial splendor was of no use to him.

"That was what he was thinking of before he died? Then it truly is a pity."

Taking the longsword, Commander Liu gently shook his head.

"I had thought he had been sent by some noble at court to make trouble for me. They have always believed that frontier warriors like us are crude and uncouth, incapable of understanding the teachings of the sages... Forget it. Say later that he died fighting the Hu men valiantly. That way, his family can receive some honor as well."

With that, Commander Liu turned toward Du Chengfeng.

"But now that Wang Gaocheng is dead, someone still needs to take charge of the army's equipment. What do you think...?"

"No."

Du Chengfeng immediately refused.

If, before sharpening the Ceremonial Class Sword, he had merely vaguely felt that he and Commander Liu were not of the same kind, then now he was even less willing to accept the man's recruitment. He had faintly sensed that Commander Liu carried something deeply familiar about him.

Yes, it was familiar. He had felt something similar from the swordsman Cui Yuan, and even faintly from Yang Sanlang.

So no matter what, he would never serve under this man.

Even if it meant splitting Commander Liu alive on the spot.

"No, no, I am not asking you to come to the army camp. You have already refused once, after all."

Commander Liu did not mind Du Chengfeng's immediate refusal, and instead continued.

"I mean, would you be willing to assist the Commander's Office in maintaining military equipment, as a private artisan?"

"This..."

This time, Du Chengfeng understood.

Assisting the Commander's Office with military equipment in a private capacity—in other words, outsourcing.

This time, Du Chengfeng no longer had any reason to refuse.

After all, Commander Liu was offering far too much.