What Kind of Fate Was This?

A "tally" was an extremely important form of identification.

Zhang Xuezhou had pulled plenty of little tricks involving tallies in the past, so he knew exactly what was at stake.

If he let someone through whose tally had a problem, he could not escape responsibility for anything that happened afterward.

Grave robbers could not come or go, and neither could anyone whose tally had a problem.

"It's their business that they didn't check your tallies at the gates of Chang'an City. Here, you need a tally to pass through!"

When Zhang Xuezhou was passing through gates himself, he naturally wanted the journey to be as convenient as possible. But now that he was doing this job, he too had become the most troublesome and difficult gate official in travelers' eyes.

Never mind grave robbers-even more than half the craftsmen who had come to work normally were turned away.

These craftsmen had traveled in carriages belonging to the Privy Treasury and the Court of the Imperial Clan. The carriages had carried them through without trouble, right up until they were stopped at the East Sima Gate.

The craftsmen kicked up a great clamor, but Zhang Xuezhou paid it no mind.

"What's this about me being unable to bear the blame for delaying construction of the imperial mausoleum? I'm afraid you've got it wrong. If construction is delayed, you're the ones who'll lose your heads. What does that have to do with us gatekeepers?"

"Forcing your way through a city gate is a serious crime. When the consequences are severe, it's not uncommon for the whole family to be implicated. Come on through if you have the guts!"

Though the East Sima Gate had only a handful of men, and the soldiers were not even as sturdy as some of the