Sparse, scattered applause sounded from the banquet by the water.
The seated officials wore smiles uglier than tears. How had they ended up encountering this baleful star?
Huaiyang Marquis Xiao Chengyan was indeed just as the rumors said—a bloodthirsty, murderous madman whose actions defied all reason!
The applause came in fits and starts, like intermittent bouts of diarrhea. As long as the host of the banquet did not call for it to stop, the guests dared not cease their clapping.
Amid the hall full of applause and forced smiles, only one person neither clapped nor smiled.
Magistrate Yang’s face was as foul as a stone from a latrine pit, and he said stiffly:
“Huaiyang Marquis disregards national law and abuses private punishment. Instantly killing three people in such a ghastly manner—what is there to applaud? This official fails to see it!”
From behind the bamboo curtain, a left hand marked with several fresh scars reached out, and the banquet host leisurely sipped a mouthful of wine.
“Well said. Magistrate Yang, this Marquis quite admires you.”
Magistrate Yang took a deep breath, sensing that his life was about to come to an abrupt end tonight.
He rose as calmly as he could and, amidst the sparse applause that no one dared to stop, opened his mouth to leave behind a few final words that might be passed down through the ages: “I, Yang Shenzhi, fear neither life nor death—”
A personal soldier ran up, knelt, and reported: “The rebel who fell into the water is dead!”
From behind the bamboo curtain, Xiao Chengyan waved a disinterested hand, cutting off Magistrate Yang’s just-begun last words: “The banquet has been enjoyable enough. Let us disperse.”
The hall full of officials heard this as if it were heavenly music, instantly springing to their feet!
Fearing that Huaiyang Marquis might change his mind at the last moment, each one ran faster than the last, leaving only a dazed Magistrate Yang behind at the waterside banquet.
The bamboo curtain was lifted.
Huaiyang Marquis, who had only been heard and not seen, finally revealed his true appearance under the Glazed Lamp.
This newly enfeoffed Marquis of the court was younger than anyone could have imagined.
His nose was high-bridged, his expression indifferent. His thin lips curved upward in what seemed like a smile, but upon closer inspection, appeared more like a sneer.
Hidden behind the bamboo curtain, he had actually been sitting there half-naked while hosting the grand banquet. His right shoulder blade, upper arm, and entire forehead, like his right hand, were all thickly wrapped in layers of bandages.
Blood still seeped from the bandage on his forehead.
Xiao Chengyan had patiently sat through half an hour tonight, his temples throbbing incessantly.
A headache.
That day, after falling from a height, he had relied on sharp instincts to use his horse’s body to cushion the impact, narrowly escaping death. But his skull had been badly shaken; it felt as if wind were leaking through, and his vision remained blurry to this day, preventing him from riding a horse.
That blockhead Magistrate Yang—even after the banquet had ended, he remained standing stiffly in place, waiting to die.
Growing impatient, Xiao Chengyan pulled his open outer robe over his shoulders and walked through the now-empty banquet hall.
“Tonight’s song and dance were enjoyable, but it’s a pity Prefect Lu could not attend. This Marquis will invite him another day.”
“Magistrate Yang, Ping An Town is under your jurisdiction. This Marquis has a task to entrust to you.”
“Find a young woman.”
“…What?!” Magistrate Yang initially thought he must have misheard.
Only after Huaiyang Marquis had walked away surrounded by numerous elite personal soldiers, and the soldiers began washing away the bloodstains on the riverbank, did Magistrate Yang—left alone on the shore—finally snap back to reality and exclaim in shock:
“Marquis Xiao wants to find a woman, and he intends to round up all the young women aged fifteen to twenty-five in the entire Ping An Town for inspection?”
“Outrageous!… Absurd!”
“Have you all heard?”
“What a sin.”
The two gatekeeper women were whispering again. Grandma went over to listen for a while, and her expression turned extremely grim.
“Second Miss, have you heard?” Grandma hurried into the room. “We truly can’t stay in this town any longer.”
Nan Yang was having her morning meal.
Lotus seed and lotus leaf millet porridge, fragrant with a hint of sweetness.
She looked up from her bowl with a trace of bewilderment, listening to Grandma’s hurried recount.
“All the young women aged fifteen to twenty-five in Ping An Town have caught the eye of the Marquis of Huaiyang. That ill-omened star intends to search house by house, summoning them before him for personal inspection.”
Grandma’s voice trembled with anger: “Girls of this age are either awaiting marriage or newly wedded. Is the Marquis of Huaiyang trying to emulate the emperor by selecting concubines for himself? How preposterous! Though Ping An Town is a small rural place, the law of the land must still be upheld!”
Nan Yang rose to ladle a bowl of steaming sweet porridge from the pot, urging Grandma to sit and eat as well.
“Don’t be angry, Grandma. These are just the neighbors’ speculations, not necessarily true.”
How could Grandma have any appetite for porridge?
She recalled an even more terrifying conjecture.
Perhaps the Marquis of Huaiyang wasn’t selecting concubines, but choosing something to eat—young women aged fifteen to twenty-five with tender flesh?!
Grandma shuddered, unable to resist glancing at Nan Yang.
The sixteen-year-old maiden, with bright eyes and pearly teeth, her skin smooth and soft. Like a flower in full bloom, both youthful and fresh…
Grandma felt nearly crushed by the images in her mind.
She cried out in despair: “We really can’t stay in this town any longer. We must find a way to leave, immediately!”
Nan Yang lowered her head and took a mouthful of porridge.
“Wasn’t the thirteen-year-old maid from next door offered up that night? Yet she was returned alive and remains well to this day.”
According to that little maid, she never even saw the Marquis of Huaiyang. She only encountered a General Di with a scar on his browbone, and a scholarly gentleman dressed in wide sleeves—Mr. Ming.
Mr. Ming asked a few questions kindly, to which the little maid tearfully replied: The Mistress of the House had offered her up for the Marquis of Huaiyang to consume, begging only that he spare the family’s five-year-old boy.
General Di cursed angrily with a dark expression, then sent the little maid back home.
“These past few days, gongs and drums have been sounding throughout the town. Several loud-voiced soldiers have been going around shouting that the rumor about the Marquis of Huaiyang eating people is deliberately fabricated slander, telling us not to believe it.”
Grandma spat in contempt. “A thief crying innocence—does that make him any less a thief? Look around town—who believes their shouts?”
Nan Yang: “But the thirteen-year-old maid next door…”
Grandma: “She’s small and skinny, not three ounces of meat on her. Perhaps the Marquis of Huaiyang didn’t fancy her. Isn’t that why he’s now seeking young women aged fifteen to twenty-five?”
Nan Yang looked at Grandma, and Grandma looked back at her.
The town was sealed off; talk of escape was merely empty words.
Both fell silent.
Grandma stood up and added half a bowl of porridge for Nan Yang.
“Never mind, overthinking won’t help. Eat a bit more, and keep an ear out for news in town.”
The rumors in town were like the unpredictable weather of a June day, changing three times before sunset.
At first it was said: All young maidens aged fifteen to twenty-five in town had caught the Marquis of Huaiyang’s eye; all must go out to await selection.
Those not chosen would return home; those selected would follow the Marquis of Huaiyang away, their fates left to heaven!
Every household was filled with weeping, the entire Ping An Town drowned in cries.
The commotion reached the Marquis of Huaiyang’s two key advisors—one civil, one military—General Di and Mr. Ming.
That evening, the two personally appeared, walking along the dirt roads and calling out house by house:
Fellow elders and folks, do not spread rumors, do not believe rumors! The young maidens will come to no harm. Marquis Xiao is merely searching for a certain young lady in town whom he once had the fortune to meet!”
A bold and sharp-tongued woman shouted through the door:
“The young lady in town who has seen the Huaiyang Marquis—isn’t she Doctor Huang’s daughter from the clinic? She was sent to the capital back in March! Did the Huaiyang Marquis devour her? One wasn’t enough, so he’s come back to town looking for other young ladies!”
Many women and men chimed in from behind their door cracks: “Exactly!” “That’s right!”
“Only Doctor Huang’s daughter from the clinic—no other young lady in our town has ever seen the Huaiyang Marquis!”
Mr. Ming murmured darkly, “Three people spreading rumors make a tiger; many mouths can melt metal. Who knows if Marquis Xiao doesn’t eat people?” Shaking his head, he turned and left first.
General Di reined in his horse by the dirt road and raised his voice to explain:
“No, there’s another one! Marquis Xiao mentioned her—a young lady carrying a basket to pick mulberries, who also rowed a boat to gather lotus in the summer—”
A woman retorted, “What does this young lady look like? Square face or round face? Tall or short? Loud or soft-spoken? Does she laugh often or not?”
Di Rong replied bluntly, “My lord didn’t get a clear look at her face. Her appearance is unknown, and her voice isn’t clearly remembered either. But my lord believes she should be a young woman between fifteen and twenty-five years old…”
“Pah!” “Pah, pah, pah!” “Without knowing her looks or remembering her voice, who’d believe it?”
Before Di Rong could finish, angry curses erupted from the surrounding households. Under the cover of dusk, someone threw rotten vegetable leaves out their door.
Di Rong grabbed them and flung them to the ground, shouting, “Stop throwing!”
The next moment, rotten vegetable leaves came flying from all directions.
By the time Nan Yang heard the commotion and rushed out to the courtyard, peering through the gap in the main gate of the estate, she saw General Di, covered in rotten leaves on his armor, expressionlessly riding his horse past the front gate.
Nan Yang stood behind the door, blinking in surprise.
Perhaps her breathing was a bit too loud, for General Di suddenly turned his head, facing the large gap in the Wei Family’s gate: “Stop staring!”
“…” Nan Yang held her breath and crouched back down.
These soldiers under the Huaiyang Marquis were truly terrifying.
As the sound of the soldiers’ hoofbeats faded into the distance, the curses from the neighbors grew louder. Nan Yang let out a soft sigh, patted the dust from her skirt, and stood up.
Come to think of it, it had already been three full days since the Huaiyang Marquis led his troops to seal off the town.
Over these three days and nights, the young maidservants offered to him had been returned, and the children found during house searches hadn’t been taken away either. Among the five hundred or so households in town, no one had heard of anyone being devoured.
The only ones killed on the spot by the soldiers were three rebels hiding in the cellar next door.
Nan Yang walked back into the house, puzzled.
What the Huaiyang Marquis had done in Ping An Town seemed, somewhat, not quite worthy of his reputation for extreme cruelty?
But if the rumor of him eating people was fabricated and slanderous, why was he suddenly searching all over town for young women between fifteen and twenty-five?
She wondered to herself, what was he trying to do?
That night, before the Wei Family’s gaping gate could be repaired, someone began pounding on it loudly.