Opening Up Wasteland

On an unnamed continent, one day, beneath a cloudless, windless sky stretching ten thousand miles, a blazing sun in the heavens cast down boundless light.

Suddenly, something like a ring flashed into existence in the sky. No one knew where it had come from. It appeared so abruptly, as though it had just crossed through time and space, then shot at tremendous speed toward the mountain peak below, accompanied by a strange "whooo-whoo" sound.

Ordinarily, anything flying in from beyond the heavens would trail thick smoke behind it, arrive with a howl, and make enough noise for the whole world to see.

Yet this object made sound for only a brief instant. Then, with a long pfft, it bored deeply into the rocks of the mountain and vanished without a trace.

It happened so quickly that it did not stir any living creature. Even the mountain birds nearby had no time to take flight.

Only afterward did those startled birds circle the air a few times before fluttering back down and going about their own business, unaware that a mysterious thing had appeared upon this continent.

And who knew how many years later, when mulberry fields had become seas and seas had become mulberry fields, when things remained but people had changed, that mountain peak had sunk and become a hillside. Much of the land had turned into flat ground, and human habitation gradually appeared. Some people even settled around the hillside. What splendid tale would this mysterious ring bring? Zhang Xiaohua was very happy, his face full of happiness.

His burning gaze fixed on the patch of wasteland before him as though it were a fragrant slab of pork belly.

Rather than wasteland, it would have been more accurate to call it mountain land, for it lay halfway up a hillside. The slope was relatively gentle, but it could only be cleared into roughly four fen of farmland. Even so, Zhang Xiaohua's father had painstakingly pestered the clan chief for nearly two months before obtaining it. Zhang Xiaohua also knew that while there were many barren hills around the village, land capable of growing crops was scarce. Everyone wanted to find somewhere beyond their existing fields that could produce food.

Most of the other villagers sought wasteland near the river. His family, however, had no money to grease the clan chief's palm, so they cast their eyes farther afield, searching east and west for land no one else wanted, until they found this patch.

The village where Zhang Xiaohua lived was called Guo Village. It covered only some four li or so, with mountains on two sides. The mountains were not particularly high; calling them hills would have been more fitting. A great river flowed past the village entrance, and a small bridge over it connected the road to the neighboring village. Some forty-odd households lived in Guo Village. Half of them bore the surname Guo and formed a small Lineage, residing in the center of the village, while the others lived scattered around its outskirts. Agriculturalists were simple and honest, but they could also be worldly and calculating. Most affairs in Guo Village were handled by the Guo Lineage's clan chief. Though they lived in the same village, their surnames differed, and when the clan chief dealt with matters, he could not help favoring those within his own Lineage. The best house sites in the village and the best farmland outside it were mostly held by villagers surnamed Guo. Still, they were neighbors after all. Though petty disputes as numerous as chicken feathers arose without end, no major conflict had ever appeared in tiny Guo Village. Its people all felt they lived the tranquil life of a Peach Blossom Spring.

Zhang Xiaohua's mother, Guo Sufi, was from Guo Village and belonged to a collateral branch of the Guo Lineage. Her family had once been "glorious," but by her generation, aside from Guo Sufi herself, there were no male descendants left. Moreover, Zhang Xiaohua's maternal grandfather, Guo Shan, had had his daughter late in life. By the time he raised her to marriageable age, he and his wife were already in their twilight years. To support the elderly couple, Zhang Xiaohua's father, Zhang Cai, married into the Guo family.

For Agriculturalists, a family's wealth was mostly tied to the number of able-bodied workers it had. Since Guo Shan had no son, he had always wanted to adopt a boy from among his relatives before Guo Sufi was born, but various obstacles prevented it. Guo Shan alone had to hold up the household, so its poverty was plain to see. Zhang Cai, however, proved capable. After entering the Guo household, he was skilled at farming, and in increasing the family's labor force, he far surpassed his father-in-law Guo Shan. One year after their marriage, Guo Sufi became pregnant and gave birth, adding a grandson to Guo Shan's family. They named him Zhang Xiaolong. The elderly Guo couple took great comfort in the birth of their grandson. Just as the whole family looked forward to a bright future, Guo Shan collapsed from illness brought on by years of overwork...

For a poor family, illness was undoubtedly a calamity that blotted out the sky and covered the earth. To treat his father-in-law, Zhang Cai sold every valuable thing they owned. Even so, he could not save Guo Shan's life, which was like a candle flame battered by the wind. When Zhang Xiaolong was a little over two years old, Guo Shan passed away suddenly. What allowed him to close his eyes in peace was that his second grandson or granddaughter would soon enter the world. Before his death, Guo Shan named the child: Zhang Xiaohu if it was a boy, Zhang Xiaohua if it was a girl. After Guo Shan died, Zhang Cai's mother-in-law's health also worsened day by day. Fortunately, Zhang Xiaohu's birth slightly eased the old woman's grief, preserving the family's quiet days.

The life of Agriculturalists was nothing more than working in the fields and returning home to eat. Land was their lifeline. Back when the old Guo family had few members, their land had been enough to work. As Zhang Xiaolong and Zhang Xiaohu grew up, Zhang Cai constantly worried over farmland. At first, he and his wife Guo Sufi brought Zhang Xiaolong by the hand and carried Zhang Xiaohu in their arms to kowtow and pay respects at the clan chief's house. Perhaps out of consideration for Guo Shan's sake, the chief gave them a small patch of cultivated land by the river, resolving Zhang Cai's "urgent need with fire at his eyebrows."

Zhang Xiaohua was born when his eldest brother was seven. By then, the household already had two and a half laborers, and its poverty had eased somewhat. Zhang Xiaohua's birth was also rather miraculous. The weather had been dry for more than two months, but on the night Xiaohua was born, a torrential downpour suddenly fell. Rainwater surged through the mountains, and the small river outside the village overflowed the bridge, a terrifying sight indeed. While giving birth to Xiaohua, Guo Sufi even saw flowers filling the sky. Thus, Zhang Cai's expectations for Xiaohua were extremely high. When naming him, he even consulted the teacher from the neighboring village and came up with names such as Zhang Zhen, Zhang Yu, and Zhang Xueyou. Yet after picking and choosing, his eyes grew dazzled, and he did not know which was best. In the end, thinking of the rain of flowers that had filled the sky and her departed father, Guo Sufi overrode all objections and gave Zhang Xiaohua this widely celebrated name, though Zhang Xiaohua was a thoroughly ordinary boy.

Xiaohua was already twelve years old. Children of Agriculturalists always matured early, and several years ago, Xiaohua had begun following his father and two elder brothers in tending the fields. Zhang Cai had not failed to consider sending his children to a school, so they could learn to read and write, seek fame and advancement when grown, and perhaps earn scholarly honors. But Guo Village was small, with no educated people in the Lineage and no means to support even a tiny school. The school in the neighboring village belonged to another large Lineage and charged Guo Village's children high fees. Xiaolong and Xiaohu had no chance of attending. The family had been poor then, and though Zhang Cai had the desire, he lacked the means. Xiaohua had been sent for a few days when he was small, but according to the teacher, Xiaohua's aptitude was middling among the students. Even if he gave it his all, he would only reach the level of being able to read and write. To pursue literary pursuits and seek scholarly honors would be like the moon reflected in water. Zhang Cai weighed his purse, then looked at Xiaohua's thick brows and bright eyes, and gave up his expectations, which were like a dream of yellow millet. He took the boy back to Guo Village to keep faithfully to the main work of Agriculturalists. Xiaohua's mother, however, seemed to remember the auspicious sign at his birth. From time to time, she asked literate young men in the village to teach Xiaohua a few things. Though Xiaohua liked following his brothers around to handle farmwork, his mother's insistence still made him learn quite a few characters. He could read some things and counted as the literate one in the household. Whenever anything involving writing arose, Zhang Xiaohua handled it.

Today was Zhang Xiaohua's first day farming independently. His father had told him yesterday that this land was his, a rice bowl that belonged to him. Though it was still a patch of ground with no sign whatsoever of becoming farmland, Xiaohua remembered something a scholar in the village had said: with a goal, one could begin; with a beginning, one had already succeeded halfway! With success, one's hope was not far away. And Xiaohua's hope was to eat a delicious piece of pork belly~

November marked the beginning of winter. The sun cast bleak light and heat from overhead, while mountain winds swept between the slopes, making the treetops howl. Everything spoke of a silent desolation.

But Zhang Xiaohua had no time to notice any of it. With his hoe in hand, he worked single-mindedly to reclaim the four fen of land. According to his plan, he would first dig an oval or quadrilateral boundary around the plot in the middle of the hillside, then move away the rocks, clear out the smaller stones, deal with the weeds, and once it had gradually taken shape, carefully till the entire field to lay a foundation for planting seeds. Farmwork always consumed time. By the time Xiaohua had cleared the perimeter and was preparing to move the large rocks from the field, it was already noon. Xiaohua stopped working, wiped the sweat from his forehead, walked to the edge of the field, picked up the earthenware jar of water his mother had prepared, and gulped down half a jar. He stretched deeply, then pounded his waist, which had not straightened all morning, and felt a burst of comfort. In the past, although he had worked alongside his father and brothers, he was the youngest, so no one let him do too much. He had never felt particularly tired. Now that he bore the burden alone, he finally understood the hardship involved. Still, when he thought of his grandmother, his mother, his family, and his own future, he felt it was all worthwhile.

Xiaohua had learned characters from young scholars. Though he had not been diligent, he often heard them speak in lofty language about the future, life, love, and such things, so he retained some impression of it. While working on ordinary days, when he had nothing to do, he would occasionally think about his own life, only for reality to quickly smash those thoughts to pieces and force him to lower his head to face the land. Remembering such things now was probably just daydreaming, a stolen moment of leisure amid busyness.

Just as Zhang Xiaohua's thoughts ran wild, his stomach kept rumbling. It seemed it was time to eat. He had always gone home with his mother for meals before, but now that he had set up his own household and opened land to farm, his mother had said that morning that she would bring his meal to the field at noon. Looking at the time, she should have arrived soon.

Sure enough, a voice drifted up from below the slope. "Xiaohua~ Come help Mother for a moment." The path up from the foot of the slope was steep and slippery. When they had come to inspect the land last time, Zhang Cai had fallen there. Zhang Xiaohua quickly answered, "Mother, wait a moment. I'll come down right away. Don't come up by yourself first." When Zhang Xiaohua walked down the hillside, he saw his mother standing by the road with a bamboo basket in hand, waiting for him. Zhang Xiaohua took the basket, carefully helped his mother up the slope, and let her sit on a rock at the edge of the field. Only then did he lift the cloth covering the basket. Inside was a bowl of pork belly and several coarse-flour steamed buns. Xiaohua considerately asked whether his mother had eaten. Her answer did not surprise him: she had already eaten. Seeing Xiaohua wolfing down his food like a ravenous tiger, Guo Sufi felt a little distressed and said to him,

"Eat slowly. Don't choke. Drink some water."

"Mother, why did you suddenly make pork belly?" Xiaohua asked.

"Today is your first day working by yourself. Your father told me yesterday to make pork belly and reward you." Xiaohua's mother looked lovingly at her youngest son. "You've had it hard too, Xiaohua. You're only twelve this year. Children your age in the neighboring village are all still studying at school, yet you are already working alone in the fields."

"Mother, listen to yourself. Didn't my eldest brother start working separately from Father when he was ten? What does this amount to? Besides, this land is mine. My second brother is still working the same plot as Eldest Brother. I'm happy before I can even get the chance." Seeing his mother begin to nag, Xiaohua hurriedly added, "Where is Grandmother? Did she eat pork belly?"

"Your grandmother is over eighty. How could she eat this? I cooked her millet porridge." Xiaohua's mother said, "Only now do you remember your grandmother. Your grandmother spent the entire morning worrying about you."

Xiaohua scratched his head awkwardly. It seemed he truly had not thought that far.

At the mention of Xiaohua's grandmother, Guo Sufi's face clouded with sorrow. As the children had grown, the family's life had gradually improved, but Xiaohua's grandmother's health had worsened more and more. Though living past eighty was already a rare longevity among Agriculturalists, who would not wish for their elders to accompany them for a little longer? Recently, Xiaohua's grandmother had even lost her sight. Guo Sufi and Zhang Cai had discussed asking a doctor to examine her, but Xiaohua's grandmother adamantly refused. She said that at such an advanced age, blindness was normal and she did not want them spending money on it. The couple could not prevail against the old woman, so they agreed. Now, every day, the old woman still busied herself around the house, feeling her way through the darkness to feed the chickens, feed the pigs, and do whatever work she could.

After watching Xiaohua finish eating and drink water, Guo Sufi said, "Xiaohua, work less this afternoon and come home early. Your grandmother misses you. I still need to take food to your father and brothers." Xiaohua froze. "Mother, then... then I ate all the pork belly. What will Father and my brothers eat?" "It's all right. There are other dishes. Remember to work less this afternoon. Don't catch a chill." Guo Sufi lovingly stroked Xiaohua's head. Looking at her youngest son's anxious, reddened face, she seemed to see the little child who had once acted spoiled at her knees.

When Zhang Xiaohua helped his mother down the slope path and watched her retreating figure, he felt deeply guilty. Sigh, how did I eat all the pork belly?

An extremely important postscript: Impatient readers may directly read Volume One, then return to read the prologue when they have spare time. The prologue describes Zhang Xiaohua's rural life before he learned martial arts and also lays the groundwork for the entire book. You may begin directly from Chapter Sixty-Five. An extremely important postscript: Impatient readers may directly read Volume One, then return to read the prologue when they have spare time. The prologue describes Zhang Xiaohua's rural life before he learned martial arts and also lays the groundwork for the entire book. You may begin directly from Chapter Sixty-Five.