The Carrot And The Stick

The Red Headband Gang’s training ground was so crowded there was no room to plant a foot. Duho had raked together every trader of any name in Qingzhou, and not one had been spared: pleasure houses, wine houses, inns, apothecaries, anyone at all doing business inside the Red Headband Gang’s territory.

Nobody knew what the sudden summons meant, so they sought out familiar faces and muttered among themselves.

“They say the Great Saber Gang vanished overnight and some lot calling themselves the Red Headband Gang have moved in and settled. Do you know anything about it?”
“How would I know? I went to sleep and woke up with a different gang over us.”
“Dear me, what a business. I bent my back double keeping that Black Leopard sweet, and now I’m already worrying how much the new one will squeeze out of us.”

The traders’ faces were full of worry. Whether it was the Great Saber Gang or the Red Headband Gang made no difference to them; either way they were bled in the name of protection money. All they hoped was that the new lot would not lean on them too hard.

“Still, they can hardly be worse than the Great Saber Gang’s men, can they? I hear there are a lot fewer drunks throwing their weight around lately.”
“You never know. I caught a bit of talk — you know Musam? Black Leopard’s right hand.”
“I know him. Vicious piece of work.”
“They say the new gang leader took his head off with one stroke, without so much as blinking.”
“So he’s a merciless butcher, is he?”
“Shh! Keep your voice down, man, they’ll hear you.”

Unease spread among the Qingzhou traders gathered on the training ground, and the further it spread, the louder the murmuring grew, until one of the Red Headband Gang’s men called out.

“The Boss is coming in!”

In an instant the murmuring cut off. Hundreds of eyes swung as one toward the voice.

A man was walking in from the entrance, a boyishness still hanging about him as though he had not yet turned twenty.

It was Yang Mujin, the new leader of the Red Headband Gang.

He crossed the training ground with the spear slung across his back, and the crowd parted to either side of its own accord, opening a path for him.

That boy is the gang leader?
He looks younger than my own son.

Bewilderment flickered in the eyes of people who had been picturing some fierce chief of the black path. A few among them, though, knew that face.

Wait. That face… isn’t that the eldest of the Yang manor?
Great Hero Iron Lion Yang Taejun’s son, leader of the Red Headband Gang? Wasn’t the Yang manor supposed to stand among the orthodox sects?
Is the Yang manor meaning to eat up Qingzhou?

Every one of them eyed him with surprise and doubt. Yang Mujin paid the stares no mind at all and stepped up onto a wooden crate set at the front of the training ground.

“Good day to you. I am Yang Mujin, leader of the Red Headband Gang.”

I finished my brief greeting and looked slowly over the crowd.

They all look fairly startled.

Their faces showed quite an assortment of expressions. My mere existence was probably a considerable shock to them; the Young Master of the Yang manor had become the leader of an unorthodox sect, after all.

I looked at them a while without speaking, then broke the silence.

“You must be wondering why I called you here.”
“…”

Nobody answered, but every one of them was watching me, their eyes telling me to go on.

“The reason I called you here is simple. I mean to inform you of how the monthly dues and the protection money will stand from now on.”

The moment the words were out, the mood of the crowd shifted subtly. Money is a sensitive matter to a trader, and it would be the one thing everybody here cared about most. I felt every eye fix on my mouth.

Without drawing it out, I went straight to the point.

“The monthly dues you are to pay the Red Headband Gang are three parts in ten.”

For a moment a silence ran through the training ground, as though cold water had been thrown over it. Some shut their mouths; others knotted their brows and scowled. They seemed to need a moment to work out whether they had heard it right.

I understood. Even I thought I had pitched it steep. Then, just as I had expected, the shouting broke out.

“Three parts in ten? How can that make any sense!”
“Hand over three parts in ten of our takings and what are we supposed to live on! Do you think we dig our stock out of the ground!”
“Even the Great Saber Gang’s men never squeezed more than one part in ten out of us! This is going too far, isn’t it!”

Complaints burst out from every side, so violently that they seemed to have forgotten I was the gang leader. By my own reckoning it was barefaced robbery, not that I had any intention of taking it back.

A paunchy man in the front row came forward with a snort. He must have been furious, because his face had gone red to the roots of his hair.

“I’ve worked over twenty years in Qingzhou alone, and nowhere has ever put the monthly dues above one part in ten. And now three? Are you telling us all to lie down and die, or what!”
“He’s right! Pay three parts in ten and we’ll starve to death!”
“This isn’t tribute, it’s plunder!”

The merchants around him took up the man’s shout and raised their own. The mood turned so ugly that one wrong step looked likely to set the whole yard rioting.

I looked at the man. I knew who he was.

He was trash. I had already made sure of that.

“Baek Uimin.”
“Huh? How do you know my n—”

— Whish.

Before the words were out, I was at his back. I drew the spear and swung it.

Baek Uimin’s voice cut off, and in the same instant his head came away from his shoulders, dropped, and rolled along the ground. The body seemed to stand a moment longer before it folded limply down, blood shooting up from the cut neck like a fountain.

“Uwaaaagh!”
“He’s dead! Somebody’s—!”
“Move! Get out of the way!”

People stumbled backward as the training ground filled with screaming. Some went flat on their faces as they fled; others, frozen with terror, only stood and shook. It was nothing short of bedlam.

I drove the spear point down into the ground.

— Thud.

Once.

— Thud.

Twice.

— Thud.

Three times.

At the sound of the point striking earth, the bedlam in the yard settled little by little, though the faces turned toward me stayed stiff with tension and fear.

“Baek Uimin. This man took money under the table from Black Leopard, the leader of the Great Saber Gang, and helped him traffic in human beings.”

— Clap, clap.

When I finished, Duho clapped his hands, and a group of people came onto the training ground. Pointing at Baek Uimin’s corpse with shaking hands, they cried out.

“That son of a bitch said he’d get me work and sold me on!”
“I had a drink with him and woke up to find myself dragged off with my hands and feet tied! That man is human trash!”
“That creature, lower than an animal, sold us to the Great Saber Gang!”

As the testimony went on, the feeling in the yard turned. People gave small nods, as though to say Baek Uimin had had it coming.

I waved the abducted people out, then spoke again.

“I have no use for trash who buy and sell people in my territory. From now on, anyone who does what decency forbids will end up like that.”
“…”

No answer came, but I took it they had all understood. If they hadn’t, it made no difference. I would simply show them instead of telling them.

I went on.

“As I said a moment ago, the monthly dues are three parts in ten. In exchange, the Red Headband Gang will not squeeze money out of you at random or throw its weight around. Once at the end of the month, and only then, you pay three parts in ten of your takings. Beyond that we will not interfere or ask for anything at all.”
“…”

The merchants said nothing. It went without saying that they didn’t like it; who would be glad to be asked for half their takings? With half cut away, there would be nothing left for them.

Yet not one of them raised an objection, which would be down to the spear in my hand and Baek Uimin’s corpse rolling on the ground.

The stick had been laid on hard enough; this was where the carrot came out.

“I am not demanding three parts in ten of you out of thin air.”

I put force into my voice.

“If you trust me and follow, I will guarantee you several times the profit you make now.”

At the boldness of the promise the crowd began to murmur, far louder than when I had named the three parts in ten, and the eyes stealing glances at me were full of suspicion.

Then an old man over in a corner cautiously raised his hand.

“Er… Boss. Might I ask how you mean to produce profits several times over?”
“A good question.”

I said it with a smile.

“I intend to make our Red Headband Gang’s territory the greatest pleasure district in Qingzhou — no, in all Shandong.”
“A pleasure district?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. Gambling, drink, food, courtesans, lodging — everything to do with amusement, gathered into one place. I mean to keep people there longer and have them throw their money around while they stay. In a word, I am going to build one enormous entertainment quarter.”

Mouths fell open as they heard the plan.

“Would that be as easy as it sounds? With the shops as they stand now it would be nowhere near enough.”
“Quite right. As things stand it is nowhere near enough.”

I agreed flatly.

“So I am going to plow the whole lot under.”
“What do you mean, plow it under?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. I mean to pull down every building on the street and put up new ones.”
“Then are you telling us to shut up shop?”
“Yes. You will have to close for a while.”

People cried out in horror.

“Close our shops? How can that make any sense!”
“We earn in a day what we eat in a day. If we shut the shop, are you telling us to starve?”
“Putting up new buildings isn’t a matter of a coin or two. Where is that money supposed to come from!”

The pushback was fierce, and there was no helping that when I had as good as told them their meal ticket was being cut. In their place I would have been up in arms without a second thought.

I watched the clamor a while, then spoke.

“Everyone calm down. I know what you are worried about. That you have no way to live in the meantime, and no way to raise the cost of the building work.”
“You know that, and you say it anyway?”
“If that is all, there is no need to worry.”

I let a beat pass before going on.

“Every cost the work takes, and the living expenses to keep you fed while the buildings go up — I will cover all of it myself.”

For a moment the yard went dead still. The look on their faces said they could not believe what they had just heard.

“Do you mean what you just said?”
“I promise it on the name of the Yang manor.”

I drove the point home.

“The Red Headband Gang bears every cost. I will hand the new buildings over to you as well. All you have to do is trade in the shops I put up. And if your profits come out lower than they are now, I will take only five parts in a hundred in dues.”

The merchants’ eyes began to waver.

“If it goes well your profits will grow several times over. Even if the result falls short of expectation, the new buildings remain. What do you say to my offer?”
“…”
“…”

Nobody found it easy to speak, and I had a rough idea what they were thinking. They would be flicking the abacus beads busily in their heads, working out which way paid better.

But there was only ever one choice open to them.

“I’m in favor. I’ll follow the Boss!”
“I’ll do it too!”
“I’ll put my trust in the Boss as well!”

Once one man had spoken, the rest declared themselves in favor as though they had been waiting for it. The complaints of a moment ago were gone; every one of them was behind me.

I smiled, satisfied.

“I will see to it that you never regret today’s choice. The detailed schedule for the work will be sent to you in due course. You may go home now.”

The merchants bowed from the waist and left the training ground wearing smiles they had not had on the way in. They ebbed away like a tide until only Duho and I were left in the yard.

Then Duho, standing beside me, spoke up.

“Shall I call the boys in?”
“Yeah. Tell them to be here by the hour of the Rabbit tomorrow.”¹

I had succeeded in bringing the territory’s merchants around. What remained now was discipline at home.

It was time to make the Red Headband Gang solid from the inside.