Along Heaven Street (10)

"Brocade-Clad dogs! We of the Great Righteousness Gang will fight you to the death!"

After a night of bloodshed, a similar cry at noon the next day sent an involuntary shudder through Zhang Xing. He nearly threw up.

This time, it was not at the brick kilns but in a small alley. The man cornered here was Zhang Dacheng, the leader of yet another gang in Jiajing Ward. His Great Righteousness Gang was still small. It relied chiefly on Zhang Dacheng's exceptional martial prowess and outstanding loyalty, which had allowed its dozen or so members to establish themselves quickly in the ward and enter the fiercely competitive carting trade.

Now, perhaps because yesterday morning's and afternoon's massacres remained all too vivid, especially the bloody fighting that afternoon, Zhang Dacheng knew this could not end peacefully. Cornered in the alley, he instead turned savage. White light shone around both his hands, and he whirled his two broad axes so fiercely that even the rain could not all get through, charging straight toward one end of the alley.

And he shouted the same words as his predecessor yesterday.

What made it even more like yesterday was that, with their leader so courageous and usually so loyal to his men, his followers naturally turned savage too. Howling and yelling, brandishing blades and clubs, they splashed through the pooled water after him.

That was the end Zhang Xing and Qin Bao were guarding... There was no helping it. Hu Yan led the men blocking the other end, and his Black Sash was too conspicuous. Even an idiot would not run that way.

Considering that Bai Yousi might not be able to intervene immediately this time, Zhang Xing felt rather unsure of himself. He drew his saber first, turned to shelter behind a large shield, then thrust out his chin and ordered:

"Fire crossbows!"

Yes, despite all the elaborate ideas beforehand, just two engagements had rendered those extra preparations useless.

Two classic surprise attacks-one a targeted, sequential elimination from above, the other a large-scale open battle followed by pursuit through alleys-had both proved that, faced with superior weaponry, military organization, and Bai Yousi's almost cheating tactic of descending like an immortal from beyond the heavens to behead their leaders, these supposedly fearless Southern City gangs had become a joke.

In fact, after yesterday afternoon's battle at the kilns, although three or four smaller gangs remained in Jiajing Ward, there was nothing left but pursuit and arrests.

At a time like this, shields, steel crossbows, and polearms became the favorites.

Shields blocked everything, polearms stabbed everything, and as for steel crossbows, in these narrow alleys there was no need even to aim or worry about damaging the strings. Just draw and fire. Whatever hero you were, however willing to fight, a few bloody holes scattered across your body made it all worthless.

That was precisely why Bai Yousi had written an order first thing that morning and opened the City Defense Army's reserve armory directly. Every properly enlisted man, whether a Street-Cleaning Tiger or a bailiff, received a steel crossbow.

Those steel crossbows, combined with teams sweeping through like the teeth of a zipper and increasingly cooperative ward residents, made even scattering and fleeing a distant dream for the seven remaining gangs of various sizes entrenched in Jiaqing and Jiajing Wards.

Returning to the present, when Zhang Xing gave the order, Great Righteousness Gang leader Zhang Dacheng did not retreat. Instead, he roared even louder. The white radiance around his hands suddenly flared, almost enveloping both broad axes, even lending their edges a faint golden hue... River-cutting true qi again, the same as yesterday's expert, except he could not force out anything substantial like a blade of sword light.

Seeing this, both Qin Bao and Zhang Xing grew nervous. Whatever Qin Bao was thinking, Zhang Xing's heart immediately lurched. All he could think was whether the shields could stop those things long enough for Hu Yan to attack from behind.

But the next moment, as the crossbow mechanisms snapped in succession, the Great Righteousness Gang leader abruptly turned. Swinging his golden broad axes like a pair of professional demolition sledgehammers, he smashed them into a wall beside him. A breach thundered open, and with a nimble roll, he vanished from the alley.

Meanwhile, the twenty bolts fired together struck, in a ragged scatter, the followers closest behind him. Two probably died on the spot. The others lay howling on the ground, crying for their fathers and mothers, while also cursing both the Brocade-Clad dogs and their own gang leader as turtle-spawn bastards.

Zhang Xing stared dumbfounded, then flew into a rage. With a wave, he had Qin Bao lead the men in continuing to suppress the gang head-on, while he took two shields and four or five crossbowmen through the breach in pursuit.

This Great Righteousness Gang leader truly was a talent. His river-cutting true qi, an orthodox transmission of Lord White Emperor's mystic tradition, had already reached unfathomable depths. Seeing the Brocade-Clad dogs hot on his heels, he summoned his remaining courage, swung his two golden broad axes again, and chopped down the wall on the other side of the household's courtyard as well.

The fright sent several children hiding inside the house straight into tears.

Zhang Xing was panting from the chase, but his anger only rose, and he kept pursuing relentlessly.

Finally, after chopping down five courtyard walls in one stretch, the gang leader failed to catch his next breath. Before the sixth wall, he dropped his broad axes in exhaustion, then turned to face his pursuers with both legs trembling nonstop.

"Are you the Brocade-Clad hero Third Brother Zhang of the Jing'an Directorate?"

Having thrown down his axes, the gang leader dropped to his knees with a thump, raised both hands, and prostrated himself in the pooled water, speaking earnestly. "When you blocked me earlier, I heard someone call you that. If it's true, we even share a surname..."

"It's true."

Still panting, Zhang Xing nodded, squatted down across the courtyard, and asked earnestly from a distance, "Namesake... how far have you cultivated that river-cutting true qi? It's really formidable."

"I've opened eleven of the twelve orthodox meridians," Gang Leader Zhang hurriedly answered. "Namesake, let's make a deal. You see, I still have a little strength... spare my life, would you? I'll sell myself to you, work like an ox or a horse for the rest of my life, and never harbor a disloyal thought."

Zhang Xing paused, expressionless, then shook his head. "I've only opened five orthodox meridians. How would I dare employ a hard case who's opened eleven?"

Helpless, Gang Leader Zhang could only force himself upright, seemingly looking for his broad axes.

At this point, Zhang Xing could only weakly lift his head toward the crossbowmen beside him. They had long since grown impatient with the chase. Seeing their supervisor's assent, they fired four or five bolts together.

But Gang Leader Zhang was no pushover either. Seeing no way out alive, he snatched an axe off the ground and savagely hurled it at them.

Moments later, the dust settled. One could only say that this Great Righteousness Gang leader truly was somebody. Three steel bolts had struck him-one squarely in the knee, one in the abdomen, and one between the ribs-yet he still dragged himself along, trying to escape. Debris on the ground tugged the steel bolts aside, and his blood spilled into the rain, instantly reddening the whole courtyard.

The axe he had thrown, meanwhile, had grazed past Zhang Xing's shoulder and struck a wall to one side.

Zhang Xing was thoroughly enraged. Besides, he had certain thoughts of his own just then. Gritting his teeth, he stood, advanced with his saber, and stabbed this great expert who had opened eleven orthodox meridians hard in the back twice. But halfway through the third thrust, he hastily pulled back as though scorched by fire.

Then this Brocade-Clad dog abruptly froze, as if choking on his food. He hurriedly drew back his saber to lean on it and took a long while to recover before weakly calling toward the house as usual, "People inside, come out and wash the ground. No stripping clothes. Exchange intact bodies for grain, dry firewood, and salt... the credit for this Great Righteousness Gang leader belongs to everyone around here, not just one household, understand? We've been killing for two days. You ought to know the rules by now, shouldn't you?"

He repeated this twice, but there was still no sound from inside. Zhang Xing could not be bothered to pursue it. Carefully carrying his saber, he led his men away, swaying... Only a good while after they had gone did a resident poke his head out. Yet he dared not touch the corpse, instead turning to look back inside.

Inside, a young man with a tattoo on his arm hugged himself, shivering as he stared outside. After a stunned moment, he dropped to his knees again, covered his face, and burst into tears, only for a woman to rush out and clamp her hand tightly over his mouth.

Of course, Zhang Xing did not know that a purge which had already left him numb had saved a young soul. Even if he had known, he would not have cared. In this world, wanting to be a good person might mark the beginning of another tragedy.

In fact, he had barely returned to the alley entrance before his superior urged him to work overtime.

"Zhang Sanlang!"

Perhaps because Zhang Xing had supplied the idea, Hu Yan, previously under heavy pressure from political vetting, was considerably warmer this time. But warmth did not stop him from urging the man back to work. "What's wrong with you? You used to serve in the vanguard, yet after just two days of killing, you're staggering with exhaustion? Look at Qin Bao. You have the same cultivation, and he's still lively as a dragon and tiger..."

Leaning against the foot of a wall, Zhang Xing weakly tried to explain, but the moment he opened his mouth, he finally vomited with a retch. Fortunately, the ground was covered in bloody water, so no one could tell what he had eaten that morning.

Seeing this, Hu Yan immediately grew somewhat embarrassed. "If the rain's made you ill, you should say so... how about this? Stop coming to the front to kill people. Let Qin Bao lead the squad. Go count the bodies on the street and put something in writing for our superiors."

Barely managing to listen to the end, Zhang Xing simply nodded at once.

Yes, Zhang Xing was not ill, nor had Bai Yousi frightened him into vomiting a day later. He was overstuffed, and had been since yesterday... For the first time, he discovered that absorbing too much true qi in a short time could actually leave him overstuffed.

In fact, ever since discovering this effect, rather like gaining experience from killing monsters, during the mountain village clash, Zhang Xing had never dared use it recklessly.

First, naturally, he felt human lives were precious. Second, he was wary of it, even more seriously so than of the Compass.

After all, the Compass was a catalyst guiding how things developed, something external. True qi could directly affect his own body. Never mind conspiracy theories-what if absorbing too much paralyzed him, or made him explode?

He did not even want a second taste of the rheumatic legs he had suffered when he first transmigrated.

But returning to this operation, wasn't this a rare opportunity to crack down on gangs and eliminate evil? Wasn't it a large-scale, concentrated special operation? So Zhang Xing had gone on a killing spree with almost no psychological burden... He had neither deliberately avoided nor deliberately competed to kill cultivators. Yet yesterday's targeted elimination, large-scale melee, and subsequent fighting and pursuit had still left him overstuffed before he knew it.

The Azure Emperor's longevity true qi, the Red Emperor's Li Fire true qi, Lord White Emperor's sharp-arms true qi, and the orthodox Three Luminaries path's radiant light true qi-he had tasted all these most common varieties. Never much at once, but truly many times.

At first, when that hot current rushed toward him, he could still feel clear benefits: warmth and comfort in his body, a sudden lift in his spirits, or an abrupt sharpening of his sight and hearing.

Yet by the time he had been cutting people down into the evening, before his limbs had even grown sore or numb, the area of his so-called dantian and sea of qi had begun distinctly sloshing.

It was difficult to describe, genuinely very much like getting carsick after eating too much.

Standing still, he had no problem at all. But the moment he moved, even just swinging an arm, it felt as if he were meditating to force open a meridian, an uncontrollable sensation of true qi wanting to rush there on its own with a whoosh.

As for the man who had stuffed him to the point of vomiting, Zhang Xing had killed him with complicated feelings... There might indeed have been greed for his true qi; he was a rare expert, after all. But there was also anger at almost being sliced by an axe. More importantly, he had wanted to test a conjecture prompted by yesterday's large-scale battle.

This expert, who had almost exhausted his true qi, was a natural sample for comparative observation. Through him, Zhang Xing reached a crucial conclusion: cultivators seemed to possess a baseline reserve of true qi within them. That reserve increased with their cultivation and was generally difficult to use, but after he killed them, he could still take it easily.

Indeed, the true qi he seized after killing someone might well be only this reserve, rather than the little bit martial practitioners ordinarily stored in their dantian and then used to chill sour plum soup...

In other words, Zhang Xing keenly realized that what he seized might be something related to true qi akin to "rank" or "standing," rather than true qi itself.

Of course, these were merely thoughts tucked away in his heart. To speak only of what followed his killing of that namesake, for the sake of his own safety, Zhang Xing truly could not keep cutting people down indiscriminately.

He needed to digest.

"You're Zhang Xing?"

About an afternoon after he switched careers to recording corpses, once the true qi inside him had settled somewhat, the inspection team dispatched by the Jing'an Directorate arrived. Slightly surprisingly, the Vermilion Sash who came was someone he knew-none other than Xue Liang, who had called Cao Lin his adoptive father that day.

"Yes, that's me, your subordinate." Working beneath a covered walkway beside Heaven Street, Zhang Xing hurriedly put down his brush and paper, rose, and saluted with cupped hands. His manner could only be called enthusiastic. "What are your instructions, Vermilion Sash Xue? Would you like to sit out of the rain and have some tea?"

"Well... where's your Inspector Bai? Or Deputy Patrol Inspector Hu?"

Xue Liang's gaze swept toward another stretch of Heaven Street beside Zhang Xing. His voice carried obvious bewilderment and unease, for at least a hundred corpses lay neatly arranged there, head to foot, a truly horrifying sight. "Right, have you caught any... fugitives?"

Having spent an hour beside the zebra crossing formed by the corpses, Zhang Xing fully understood Xue Liang's hesitation. He immediately answered earnestly:

"Reporting to Vermilion Sash Xue, Inspector Bai is on the northern wall's tower, ready to fly down at any moment to help us kill people in the two wards. Deputy Patrol Inspector Hu is leading men killing people inside the wards. He assigned me to clerical work here in case the Directorate sent someone to ask... As for fugitives, we haven't caught any from this prison break. We have only caught Ma Kui, the 'Soaring Cloud Sword,' who was on the Directorate's wanted list, but he was shattered too. There was also some gang leader who secretly kept armor, and he was beheaded."

"Never mind Ma Kui for now... just tell me what's going on with these?" Xue Liang seemed unwilling to ask why he had said "shattered." He merely pointed impatiently at that "corpse zebra crossing" and asked, his voice almost trembling. Whether it was an illusion or not, even the chestnut horse beneath him seemed uneasy.

"Reporting to Vermilion Sash Xue, it's like this. The imperial edict, the Southern Office's orders, and our Intendant's military orders all required us to search our assigned wards thoroughly and ensure we found the fugitives." Zhang Xing answered with his hands clasped, his explanation still detailed and his attitude earnest. "That's what we did, but the local gangs wouldn't let us search. Then we offered rewards, and the residents all said that if anyone was harboring fugitives, it would definitely be those gangs... You know, Vermilion Sash Xue, our Inspector Bai has a fierce temper and is loyal in serving the throne. Besides, her elder male cousin was responsible for this incident, so she also felt the shame of misfortune in the family. She said, what if these gangs really were harboring the fugitives? What could we do, then? So she led us in to kill them. And what could we do after killing them? We couldn't very well leave them in the wards frightening people, so we laid them outside..."

Xue Liang listened in a daze, finally let out a long breath, then lowered his voice and leaned down from his horse. "Do you have a count?"

"What count?"

Zhang Xing paused, but when the other man frowned, he immediately understood. Turning, he took seven or eight forms he had just completed from the table and handed them up. "Yes, yes... two wards, just under forty thousand residents. So far, we've killed a total of a hundred and twenty-seven. All vicious criminals who dared openly resist the law with weapons. They're all laid out on Heaven Street. We pieced together the shattered ones as best we could, too. Everyone's name, crimes, gang affiliation, how they violently resisted the law, which colleague risked his life to kill them, and how they were killed are all written here... It's just that there are another three hundred or so wounded, all chained up on Crossroads Street inside the wards. Some are badly hurt, and every so often one doesn't make it. We also estimate another day or so of killing before things are clean, so the list may still change. More will need adding."

Xue Liang was silent for a while, looked again at the neatly arranged corpse zebra crossing, and took seven or eight breaths before reaching out to accept the stack of papers. Then, without going to see Bai Yousi or seeking out Hu Yan, he simply spurred his horse north through the rain and flew back to the Jing'an Directorate.

PS: Happy New Year, everyone.

And while I'm at it, here's a book to offer up in sacrifice:

"Reviving Shu Han: Beginning with Tianshui's Young Qilin." It's reached a million characters, so dig in without worry.