On To The Next Plan

The office of the leader of the Great Saber Gang.

Black Leopard sat up on the table with his legs crossed, taking his drink at his leisure. The lieutenant stood in front of him, back from the medicine raid with the job done and a triumphant look on his face. Black Leopard filled a cup to the brim, handed it across, and asked,

“Is the medicine safely in the storehouse?”
“Yes, Boss! I had it stored there exactly as you instructed. More than ten crates of it, and every one packed full of medicine. Sell it off and we ought to come away with a tidy sum of gold.”

The report set Black Leopard grinning almost from ear to ear. Money had been tight of late, and thanks to that greenhorn from House Yang he could breathe again. He poured himself a cup, drank it off, and said,

“That fellow from the Red Headband Hall does clean work. You watched them at it. What did you make of them?”
“I watched them in secret as you told me, Boss, and their preparation was thorough. Masks on, and they had the Yang boy’s column surrounded in perfect order. That was no common skill.”
“Is that so? I had a good feeling about him, and it turns out he’s got the skill to match. Did the Yang boy give the medicine up quietly?”
“Yes. The boy must have taken fright — he handed it over without any resistance to speak of.”
“Heh heh heh. Maybe I came down a little heavy on a greenhorn who isn’t even twenty. I’d feel bad if he wet the bed over it.”
“Haha, how could that be any fault of yours, Boss? He brought the whole thing on himself. Today he’ll have learned just how fearsome the gangho can be.”
“Right?”

Black Leopard and his lieutenant filled the office with their ugly laughter.

Don’t go thinking this is the end of it, greenhorn. This business is only the beginning.

He meant to make the boy pay in full for laying hands on his money and his men. Today’s work was no more than a word of welcome. From here on he would put him through worse than this, again and again, for a long time to come.

What sort of face would the greenhorn make when he learned House Yang had been ruined on his account? The thought alone sent a thrill through his whole body.

Black Leopard refilled his cup and spoke.

“That Duho of the Red Headband Hall — I like him a lot. He does a job properly.”
“I feel the same. If more work of that sort comes up, I think we could hand it to him.”
“Do that. And the medicine — keep a crate or two and sell off the rest.”
“Understood.”
“Good work.”

Black Leopard, a satisfied smile on his face, was about to throw back his drink when it happened.

— Slam!

The office door flew open hard enough to break it, and one of his men came tearing in, gasping.

“Boss! There’s trouble!”

The lieutenant scowled hard and shouted.

“Have you lost your mind! Charging in on the Boss like that! Don’t you know I’m having a private word with him!”
“The treasure storehouse is on fire!”

The man ignored the lieutenant and shouted it out.

“What did you say!”

Black Leopard shot to his feet. The wine jar and the cup hit the floor and smashed to pieces. The drink went out of him in an instant, and his head snapped clear as though someone had thrown ice water over him.

“Tell me what’s happened, quickly!”

Black Leopard pressed him, his face twisted into a fiend’s and flushed red with rage.

The man took one look at him and swallowed hard, then spoke through trembling lips.

“Th-they, they’re trying to put it out, but they s-say they can’t get it under control.”
“And? Is it out or isn’t it?”
“They say they’re still at it, but the blaze is so fierce they haven’t been able to hold it.”

At that, Black Leopard’s face set like stone. The man looked up, met Black Leopard’s gaze, and sucked in a sharp breath.

“The goods in the storehouse?”

Black Leopard’s voice dropped low. That storehouse held the vast hoard the Great Saber Gang had scraped together over the years, and the man in front of him knew it better than anyone. He could not bring himself to speak; his lips only shook.

“The goods. What became of them?”

The bellow made the man flinch, and he answered in a voice barely above a whisper.

“We think the fire will have gone through the whole storehouse and left nothing but ash.”
“…”

Silence. A suffocating stillness hung over the office while the lieutenant and the man watched Black Leopard for a sign. His face went red, then purple, and thick veins rose along his neck.

— BANG!

Black Leopard brought his fist down on the table. The thick wood burst apart and splinters flew in every direction.

“Uwaaaaargh!”

The roar shook the building. Everything he had amassed in running the Great Saber Gang was gone. His gut heaved until he thought he would cough up blood, and he tore the office apart, smashing whatever came to hand.

In a single moment, Black Leopard had been left with nothing.

At the same hour, the Shandong Escort Bureau in Jinan.

I was sitting face to face with Bureau Head Jo Mansik, drinking tea. He set down his cup and spoke.

“I have heard the story. You ran into a band of bandits, I understand?”
“Yes.”
“They tell me the medicine was taken from you. How is it, then, that you have still brought what you promised?”

The bureau head asked with the look of a man who could make nothing of it.

Because the medicine was never taken from me in the first place.

I had handed the Great Saber Gang’s men only part of the consignment. Its top layer was dressed to pass for medicine, but beneath it the crates were packed with straw soaked through with oil. The real medicine I had set aside. After luring the Great Saber Gang into robbing the medicine, I had gone home, collected the stock I’d kept there, and brought it on to the Shandong Escort Bureau.

I had lost part of the consignment, true enough, but I meant to have Duho collect its full price. I could say none of this aloud, so I made up something suitable.

“I had heard that bandits were appearing all over the Central Plains of late, so I had extra medicine made. I never expected it to come to this myself, but I am glad I prepared beforehand.”
“Hah.”

Jo Mansik let out a sound of amazement.

“You leave nothing to chance. I knew it from the first time I saw you, but young hero Yang’s discerning eye truly is a remarkable thing.”
“I was simply lucky.”
“Hoho — modest into the bargain. I only wish that son of mine would learn a little of that.”
“Is your son well now?”
“Thanks to young hero Yang’s medicine he has recovered, and he has gone out on an escort run somewhere close by. He says he will stop at the Yang manor on the way back to pay his respects, so I hope you will receive him kindly. It should take about six days, I expect.”

Jo Mansik smiled and went on.

“The goods have been received in good order. I will settle the payment as soon as the medicine sells.”
“Thank you.”

The talk with Jo Mansik came to a warm close. He seemed genuinely moved that I’d kept faith even after being hit by bandits, and the business had deepened the trust between the bureau head and me.

Should I be thanking Black Leopard for this?

I rose from my seat and made the cupped-fist salute.

“I will take my leave here.”
“Have a safe journey home.”

The bureau head saw me off, and I set out.

By about now Duho will have made his move.

If things had gone to plan, they’d have paid the price in full. My steps quickened on their own. I wanted to know what that medicine had cost the leader of the Great Saber Gang.

Jo Mansik, the head of the Shandong Escort Bureau, went to find his steward. The steward, who was checking the medicine inside the crates, caught sight of him and greeted him.

“Bureau Head. You’re here.”
“I am. How does the medicine look?”
“It looks good. The packing was done with care and the contents are excellent. For goods said to have met a band of bandits, there is not a fault to be found in the crates or in what is inside them.”

Still marvelling, the steward showed Jo Mansik the crate of medicine. The crate was clean, without so much as a scratch, and the medicine bottles stood ranged in neat order. Jo Mansik nodded, pleased.

“To have that kind of nerve and that discerning eye at once, at his age. I was not wrong about him after all.”
“Indeed. When you first said you would hand over as much as seven parts in ten of the profit, I confess I was worried, Bureau Head, but now I can only marvel at your eye for people.”
“You see? Making extra stock in case bandits took the goods shows how dearly he holds his credit. For a man not yet twenty to handle his business this well is nothing short of astonishing. Mark my words — before long the name Yang Mujin will be known throughout the Central Plains.”
“I am of the same mind. Tying ourselves to a talent like that so early may well prove the Shandong Escort Bureau’s greatest asset.”
“From now on, take greater care in our dealings with the Yang manor. Leave nothing undone, so that whatever happens they are never put out on our account.”
“I will bear it in mind, Bureau Head.”

Instead of going back to the house, I turned in at an inn near Qingzhou. When I stepped inside, Duho was already seated in the corner, so I went over and sat down across from him. His face was smeared all over with soot, and he was giggling away at something or other.

“Wipe your face.”
“Have I got something on it?”

Duho wiped his face with the hem of his robe. The soot came away black on the cloth, and he gave a snort of laughter at the sight.

“I was so taken up watching the fire I never noticed a thing on my face.”
“Enjoyed yourself, did you?”
“It was glorious.”

His voice rose with excitement.

“Just as you said, I put a light to the oiled straw bundles and the whole thing was blazing away in no time. Something to see.”
“Was there much treasure inside?”
“Oh, the storehouse was huge, and they had it stacked high and neat besides. Shifting the crates was hard work.”
“They won’t have put the fire out, will they?”
“Of course not. I placed the crates of oiled straw just so, to make sure they couldn’t. And I watched with my own two eyes till it had properly caught. The Great Saber Gang’s men threw water and dirt on it, and the blaze only got fiercer.”

I nodded and asked him,

“And Black Leopard?”
“He’s completely lost it and he’s throwing a fit. A lifetime’s hoard burned clean away — there’s no way he’s in his right mind. They say he’s smashing whatever comes to hand and screaming, and the whole place is in an uproar.”

Duho snickered and knocked my shoulder.

“How did you ever come up with burning the storehouse down? You really are a vicious bastard.”
“I told you. I’d get the full price of the medicine out of them.”

Rather more than I’d reckoned on, as it turned out… Less than my due would have been a problem, but more is always welcome. The more the better, and the more it overflowed, the better still.

“So what now? The way I see it, Black Leopard’s going to be out for blood. Shouldn’t we keep our heads down for a while? If it comes to all-out war, we’ll get pushed back.”

I shook my head.

“No. If we’re going to move, now’s the time.”

To have a hand in an incident set to unfold near Qingzhou later on, the Great Saber Gang would need a lot of money, and given time they would scrape it together one way or another. I had to press them hard and leave them no room to do it.

“…Hey. Hey. What’s that look in your eye? What lunatic thing are you about to do this time.”

Duho recoiled and pulled back in his seat.

“Lunatic, he says. This time we’ll do it in a thoroughly wholesome, gentlemanly way.”
“Why is it that when you say that, I don’t trust it one bit? Go on, let’s hear it.”
“I’m going to cut off one of the Great Saber Gang’s sources of funds.”
“One of their sources of funds? Which one?”
“A gambling house.”
“Ah — Tugeum Hall?”
“That’s it.”
“And what are you going to do with it?”

I answered him.

“Do with it? You go to a gambling house to gamble.”
“What?”
“Let’s go gambling.”

Let’s go and pull off a proper haul.