Days slipped by like flowing water, silently and without a trace.
In the blink of an eye, it was the first day of November.
Late autumn had passed, and early winter was near.
The wind in Tianjin already carried a knife-like chill.
The old crooked tree outside Xu Jin's Shanty had long since shed its leaves. Its bare branches shivered in the wind.
It was noon.
Qin Geng had finished his morning fares and returned to the shanty to rest.
The passenger boats at Xun River Wharf ran on a schedule. No boats docked around noon, and there were few stray customers, so everyone took the chance to come back, rest their feet, and eat a hot meal.
For the past half month, Qin Geng had followed a routine as strict as an ascetic monk's.
Every day, he rose before dawn and ran all the way to Hundred Herb Hall.
Beside the little stove in the rear courtyard, he practiced his stance in the steam rising from the medicine, then drank a bowl of bitter Bone-Strengthening Powder while it was still hot.
Once he had taken his medicine and finished training, he went to pull his rickshaw.
After half a month, the results were as plain as a pole casting its shadow.
[Profession: Martial Artist (Level 7)]
He had yet to reach the threshold at level ten, where a qualitative change awaited, but every level brought real physical strengthening.
Even in a coarse cloth tunic, Qin Geng's muscles stood out beneath it like ridges of rock.
His arms were especially formidable. The slightest flex pulled his sleeves taut, as though they might burst at any moment.
He had grown taller, too, reaching a full meter seventy-five. His back was straight, and nothing remained of the sallow, scrawny, timid wretch he had once been.
His eyes shone almost frighteningly bright, alive with a commanding Essence, Qi, and Spirit.
But while he had built up his strength, he had also spent his money.
Those fourteen doses of Bone-Strengthening Powder were a gold-devouring beast.
Add in the fearsome amount he ate every day, and despite earning plenty over the past half month, he now had only one silver dollar left.
"If no more money comes in, I'll have to stop taking the medicine tomorrow."
Qin Geng sat on a stone stool, working through his accounts.
"At least I kept up with the Carriage Driver profession."
He glanced at the panel.
[Profession: Carriage Driver (Level 29)]
"Just one last step."
"At this rate, a few more fares this afternoon will definitely get me to level thirty."
"Once I hit thirty, I'll see Shopkeeper Lu and take that job in the mountains."
"Thirty silver dollars will keep me supplied with medicine for another month."
With a plan in mind, Qin Geng stopped worrying.
He was about to lie down on his straw mat and close his eyes for a while.
Just then, a jumble of footsteps and voices sounded outside the shanty.
"Brother Xiao Wu?"
"Careful now. The ground's uneven here."
Qin Geng frowned slightly at the voice.
It was Boss Lin.
Since the incident at Xun River Wharf half a month ago, the old bastard had not openly caused trouble, but he had kept out of sight.
Why had he suddenly come to this poor shanty today?
And why was he calling out so warmly?
Qin Geng signaled to Xu Chun and Uncle Jin. They rose from their straw mats with the others.
"I'm here."
Qin Geng answered without getting up, sitting broad-legged on the stone stool in the open air.
The doorway curtain lifted.
Boss Lin came in beaming.
He was dressed as respectably as ever, in a brand-new gray squirrel-fur jacket, and carried two boxes of pastries.
Behind him came a middle-aged man in a dark brown robe and a skullcap.
The man was thin, with prominent cheekbones and a pair of ratlike whiskers. He held a long tobacco pipe, and his little eyes darted about with a shrewd, mercenary gleam.
Seeing this, Xu Chun, Uncle Jin, and the others did not dare take the visit lightly. They stood behind Qin Geng to lend him support.
"Well now, Brother Xiao Wu, enjoying yourself out here in the sun?"
Boss Lin chuckled as he came in and set the pastries on the stone table.
He acted as though he and Qin Geng had been old friends for years.
"A rare visitor."
Qin Geng gave him a smile that did not reach his eyes. "What wind blew you here? Hope this backwater didn't dirty your shoes."
"Now, don't say that. We're all brothers. What's a little dirt between us?"
Boss Lin laughed it off, then stepped aside to present the middle-aged man behind him.
"Brother Xiao Wu, I'll get straight to it. I've come to introduce you to an opportunity beyond your wildest dreams."
Pointing to the man, Boss Lin said, "This is Master Jiang of Ten Thousand Treasures Brokerage in South City."
"A brokerage? Master Jiang?"
At those words, Qin Geng's face darkened at once.
Behind him, Uncle Xu, Uncle Jin, and the others frowned, their eyes filling with wariness and disgust.
There was an old saying in Tianjin: "Cart, boat, inn, porter, broker—even innocent, they deserve the knife."
Those five trades were notorious for their darkness.
Ricksaws and boats were Qin Geng's line of work now. He knew better than most how deep those waters ran.
In out-of-the-way places, drivers and boatmen often joined bandits to rob travelers and kill merchants.
Crooked inns and human-meat buns were staples of storytelling, but they existed in the real world, too.
Porter outfits controlled the loading and unloading at the wharves. Stealing goods in their care and swapping cargo were everyday affairs.
And "broker" meant brokerages: middlemen, fixers, busybodies, and matchmakers.
They were the sort who would not loose an arrow until they saw the rabbit. They took a cut from both sides and had the blackest hearts of all.
Their business ranged from finding someone a job or arranging a marriage to brokering land and houses or guaranteeing bulk shipments.
More often, though, they dealt in things that could not bear the light of day.
Human trafficking, for instance.
They sold respectable women into brothels, poor families' children into wealthy households as servants, and even people to the South Seas as indentured laborers.
There were two kinds of people Qin Geng hated most in this life.
The first were rotten gamblers like his father.
The second were brokers.
Years ago, after his gambling-addicted father had lost his head, a broker at the gambling house talked him into selling Qin Geng's own aunt, Qin Xiu, to the Su Family as a maid.
A young woman in the flower of her youth: one signed indenture, and she was worth twenty silver dollars.
The blackhearted broker took his cut and gave Qin Geng's father only five silver dollars.
The remaining fifteen went straight into the broker's pocket.
And those five silver dollars had not saved the family. His father had turned around and gambled away every last one.
At the thought, Qin Geng's gaze on "Master Jiang" turned cold.
"Ten Thousand Treasures Brokerage?"
Qin Geng snorted. "Boss Lin, I'm a poor rickshaw puller. I can't afford a house or land, and I'm in no hurry to find a wife. Bringing such an exalted guest here—sure you haven't come to the wrong door?"
Master Jiang, who had yet to speak, did not take offense at Qin Geng's tone.
He took a draw on his pipe, blew a smoke ring, and spoke at his leisure.
"Fifth Master, you've got us wrong."
Master Jiang's voice was thin and high, with a eunuch-like softness. "We didn't come today for a few paltry coins."
"We've come to bring you a fortune vast enough to blot out the sky."
"A fortune, is it?"
Qin Geng scoffed.
"That's right."
Master Jiang narrowed his small eyes and looked Qin Geng up and down as though appraising merchandise.
"Fifth Master, you've made a name for yourself in South City, but at the end of the day, you're still pulling a rickshaw."
"Out in wind and rain, earning every coin the hard way."
"But if this deal goes through, you could hold court at Xun River Wharf for ten years without anyone daring to touch you! Why, the next Dragon Head's seat could be yours for certain!"
"Oh?"
Qin Geng raised an eyebrow, motioning for Master Jiang to go on. "Let's hear what sort of deal warrants talk that big."
Master Jiang edged closer and lowered his voice.
"Fifth Master, you know Xun River Wharf belongs to the Dragon King Society, don't you?"
"I do."
Qin Geng nodded.
Xun River Wharf counted as a major crossing and a major wharf in Ping'an City, though it was nothing special by Tianjin's standards.
Tianjin Caobang had no interest in the place and could not spare the people to manage it, so they let smaller gangs control it and collect tribute for them each year.
The gang that controlled Xun River Wharf was the Dragon King Society.
To the Grain Transport Gang, the Dragon King Society was a small outfit. But to Ping'an County's Three Teachings and Nine Schools, it was unquestionably a major power. The thousands of porters on the wharf and the countless fishing boats nearby were all under its control.
The wharf's commissions and the offerings at Dragon King Temple alone brought in an astronomical sum each year.
"Jiang Hailong, the Dragon Head of the Dragon King Society, had a tragedy in his family a while back."
Master Jiang spoke mysteriously. "His only daughter, Miss Jiang, fell victim to a Water Ghost and drowned in the Xun River."
"I heard about that, too."
Xu Chun cut in from the side.
It had caused quite a stir. Jiang Hailong had reportedly searched for her body like a madman and even invited ritual masters to perform rites.
"Jiang Hailong loved his daughter dearly. He's afraid she'll be lonely down below, with no one to care for her."
Master Jiang continued, "So he wants to arrange a ghost marriage for her."
"He consulted a master about the match."
"The groom must be a young, strong rickshaw puller, full of yang energy and steady on his feet, with a birth chart that matches hers. Only then can he balance out someone who died by drowning."
At this, Master Jiang fixed his little eyes on Qin Geng.
"I've spent more than half a month going around South City, checking the birth charts of every rickshaw puller."
"Fifth Master, you and Miss Jiang are a match made in heaven!"
"And with your build and bearing, you're one in ten thousand!"
"Just give the word, and once the ghost marriage is arranged, you'll be Jiang Hailong's adopted son! The Jiang Family's Son-in-Law, too!"
Master Jiang raised a finger and wagged it before Qin Geng.
"Jiang Hailong said that once it's done, he'll pay you one thousand silver dollars in cash!"
"From then on, you'll be the young master of the Dragon King Society. You'll rise straight to the clouds, with the whole world open before you!"
One thousand silver dollars!
Everyone present drew a sharp breath at the number.
Xu Chun, Uncle Jin, and Ma Laifu stared wide-eyed.
They could pull rickshaws their entire lives and never earn a thousand silver dollars!
With that much money, they could buy a house and land, even take several concubines, and still have plenty left. In an instant, a poor wretch could become a rich man.
But after the shock, their faces turned grim.
Qin Geng felt the same. An unstoppable surge of rage shot from the bottom of his heart to the crown of his head.
A ghost marriage?
What did they take him for?
Breeding livestock?
An object to be buried with the dead?
He had never seen a ghost marriage himself, but Master Zhu Xin and other old hands had told him how it worked.
This was no way to take a wife. It was a way to drive a living man to his death!
The first step of a ghost marriage was called "consummation."
It was far more than bowing before a memorial tablet.
To let the deceased "rest in peace" and keep her spirit from wandering, the so-called groom had to perform the duties of a husband with a corpse that had soaked in the river and might already be rotting...
Just imagining the corpse's stench and its maggot-covered face made Qin Geng's stomach churn like an overturned river.
And that was not the end of it.
After the consummation, but before the burial, the family would hire a Paper Effigy Maker to fashion a life-sized paper figure in the dead woman's likeness.
A ritual master would then perform rites to draw the deceased's soul into it.
From then on, as her "husband," he would have to spend the rest of his life with that eerie Paper Person.
At meals, he would have to set out a bowl and chopsticks for it. At night, he would still have to place it beside his bed.
He would even have to offer it incense and speak to it every day.
If he ever failed to care for it properly, the family would punish him. Worse, the spirit might haunt him until he went mad and his family was ruined.
This was a tomb for the living dead!
It used the years and dignity of the living to fill a dead person's grave!
"Master Jiang, you've got quite the scheme worked out."
Qin Geng laughed. "A thousand silver dollars to buy the rest of my life? And I'd have to sleep beside a dead woman? Spend my days with a paper effigy?"
Master Jiang was still trying to persuade him, spittle flying:
"Oh, Fifth Master, don't put it like that."
"She's Jiang Hailong's daughter! She may be gone, but her standing hasn't changed."
"Besides, it's a ghost marriage. No one's asking you to go down and be buried with her."
"You'd just go through the motions. Bear with it, and it'll be over."
"With those thousand silver dollars and a connection to Master Jiang, what kind of living wife couldn't you find in Tianjin?"
"Put up with it for a while and the wind and waves will die down. Take one step back and the sea and sky will open wide!"
"Step back, my ass!"
Qin Geng suddenly roared.
Smack!
His right hand slammed onto the Bluestone Table before him.
He struck in fury, holding nothing back.
Boom!
A dull thud rang out.
The tabletop, a full three inches thick, was instantly covered in spiderweb cracks beneath Qin Geng's palm.
Then came a sharp crack.
The entire stone table broke apart, and chunks of stone clattered across the ground.
"Ah!"
Master Jiang shrieked in fright. His tobacco pipe fell from his hand, and he stumbled backward before landing on his backside, his face deathly pale.
Boss Lin shuddered too, nearly dropping to his knees.
He'd known Qin Geng was formidable, but not this formidable.
If that palm had struck a person, wouldn't it have turned them to pulp?
"Get out!"
"I may pull a rickshaw, but I'm still a man who stands on his own two feet!"
"If you want someone for a ghost marriage, go do it yourself!"
"Don't you fucking set your sights on me!"
"And you, Boss Lin."
Qin Geng turned. His icy gaze made Boss Lin's scalp prickle.
"If you ever bring this filth to my place again, I'll smash your head just like that table!"
"Get out!"
"Yes, yes! I'm going! Right now!"
Boss Lin didn't dare say another word. He hauled the terrified Master Jiang to his feet, and the two fled the shack, stumbling over each other.
They ran faster than rabbits.
Only after they had gone did the air inside the shack ease.
Xu Chun, Uncle Jin, and the others stared at the shattered stone table, clicking their tongues. The sight was satisfying, but it left them shaken too.
"Xiao Wu, you've offended the Dragon King Society, Boss Lin, and the Ten Thousand Treasures Brokerage..."
Uncle Jin sounded worried.
"Then I've offended them."
Qin Geng brushed the dust from his hands. "If I agreed to something that revolting, I'd break my own backbone. What would be the point of practicing martial arts then?"
"But..."
Qin Geng cut Uncle Jin off, his gaze firm. "If soldiers come, I'll send a general; if floods come, I'll dam them with earth. If Jiang Hailong tries to force me, I've got nothing to lose! Besides, I'm not the only rickshaw puller in Tianjin whose birth chart matches. Jiang Hailong can keep looking."
"If I really became some ghost's son-in-law, my life would be over."
Everyone nodded at that.
It was true.
If Qin Geng went through with the ghost marriage, he'd become the Jiang family's dog, and people would talk about it for the rest of his life.
"Get some sleep. We've still got fares to catch this afternoon."
Qin Geng waved a hand.
He could turn down the temptation of a thousand silver dollars, but he truly was short of money.
Still, he was about to reach level 30.
That thirty-silver-dollar task was the proper way!
He would earn money by his own ability!
He, Qin Geng, would rather do without this kind of money!
Qin Geng stood, his back straight as a great spear piercing the heavens.
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