In early March, peach blossoms glowed pink and willows greened in Shouchun. Liu Cheng, accompanied by Fan Ning, Fu Jian, and other old and new staff members, joined the Shouchun generals in seeing Xie Shang south to recuperate-or, rather, to die and return to his native soil. Xie Shang could no longer speak in complete sentences. They went ten li beyond the city before turning back.
That seemed rather impolite.
For on that very same day in Jixian, someone likewise dealing with a senior regional official's retirement had gone thirty li outside the city to welcome him.
Of course, it was different. The man being welcomed there was his own father.
The man going out to greet him was Yi Zhang, the director of the Central Secretariat, barely thirty years old. The man he was welcoming was his father, Yi Yi.
Yes, a very pleasing name.
And it was not only his name that was pleasing. Yi Yi was no nobody. One office and one temporary assignment alone could show his standing within the Great Yan regime: he had been inspector of Youzhou, and when Great Yan established its state at Jixian, he had served as caretaker of Longcheng.
In fact, this was also why Yi Zhang had become director of the Central Secretariat at such an age.
His father already held such standing, and now, advanced in years, had requested retirement. How could they not promote Yi Zhang? These had been the rules of politics for centuries. It was the same in the southern court.
He waited a long time, but the four or five groups of Mounted Slaves and attendants coming and going ahead all reported that they had not seen the old master. Yi Zhang remained bewildered for quite some time. His father had always been famous