Plowing The Street Under

Three weeks had passed since we began the training. In all that time we had thrown ourselves at the drills without missing a single day.

There were results. The eyes of the Red Headband Gang’s men had changed, and so had the air they gave off. There was a hard venom in their stares now, and firm muscle on their bodies. Above all, the discipline had set deep enough that they carried out my orders without a word of complaint. The bastards who had been nothing but a rabble were finally starting to be of some use.

“That’s it for today.”

The words were barely out of my mouth before the men dropped where they stood.

“Hah, hah…”
“I’m dying…”

Ragged breathing echoed across the mountainside. Duho, his face soaked with sweat, spoke up.

“Young Master, our boys aren’t half bad now, are they? Every one of them can hold out two quarters of an hour.”
“Yes. They’re doing well.”

It was not empty flattery.

They were punks off the very bottom, and I had worried their heads would be rotten through, but they kept up better than I expected. None of them would ever have trained this hard before, and simply enduring it earned a word of praise. Set against three weeks ago, the improvement was enormous.

“Heh. Good thing all that suffering was worth something.”

Duho sprawled out flat where he sat. I wiped the sweat off with a towel and looked at him.

This one has come a long way too.

The first time we sparred, he had struggled just to close the distance; now there were a fair few moments when I thought I could lose if I let my guard slip. His instinct for a fight was good, so sparring alone had lifted his skill visibly. If his internal energy could only catch up, reaching first-rate would be no great trouble. There was a way to solve that, so it was nothing to worry much about. Until then he only had to push his body and his senses to their limit.

“I’m thinking of raising the intensity a little more from tomorrow. What do you say?”
“Huh? More than this?”
“What, you don’t want to?”
“You’ll raise it whether I want it or not, won’t you?”
“You know me well.”
“…Ruthless. Just ruthless.”

I was trading jokes with Duho, letting the sweat cool, when a familiar face came climbing up the mountain path from below.

It was Elder Kang. The climb seemed to have left him short of breath, and he let out a great puff before he spoke.

“Hooo— young master, the Shandong Escort Bureau has sent the materials. The yard’s packed full of carts.”

They had come at last: the materials I had asked for the last time I met Bureau Head Jo. Rebuilding a city takes a staggering quantity of material, and I had asked him to supply every last piece of it.

I turned to the men sprawled on the ground and spoke.

“There is no night training today.”

At that, the dying bastards snapped their eyes open and shot upright.

“Do you mean it?”
“Boss, you’re serious, right? Don’t go changing your story later.”

The men fired questions back at me one after another, as though they could not believe it. Did they trust me as little as that? I had kept every promise I ever made them.

“Yes. Rest well today.”
“Hurrah!”
“We’re saved!”

They cheered and shouted, every one of them. If they were this delighted, I must have been working them fairly hard.

Duho was celebrating right along with them at my side, so I turned to him.

“You’re coming down with me.”
“Aw, why.”
“Because you’re the deputy boss. We have to go and check the materials.”

I took Duho and Elder Kang down to the house.

Carts stood packed so tightly they spilled out past the gate, timber and stone and every other building material stacked on them without a gap. Among them I caught sight of a face I knew.

What was his name again…

“Escort Yi Sungwon.”

He was the man I had let go on purpose when we abducted the Shandong Escort Bureau’s young bureau head. He had been checking over the carts, and when he saw me he came across and gave a cupped-fist salute.

“It has been a long while, young hero Yang. Have you been well?”
“I have been well. Are you fully recovered, Escort Yi?”
“Yes, I recovered without any great trouble. It is all thanks to you, young hero Yang. You have my gratitude.”

Yi Sungwon thanked me again and again. I answered with a smile.

“Not at all. It must have been hard work, coming all this way.”
“Not in the least. It was the Bureau Head’s order, and when I heard young hero Yang had asked for it, I volunteered. Do have a look at the materials. The Bureau Head took care over what he sent.”
“Please give the Bureau Head my thanks.”
“I will. Then, by your leave, I shall be starting back.”
“Have a safe journey.”

Once I had seen Escort Yi Sungwon off, Duho looked the carts over.

“Wow, that’s a hell of a lot. What did all this cost? Young Master, were you this rich?”
“Rich, my foot. It’s all debt. I have to pay every bit of it back later.”
“What? All of this?”
“Yeah. The materials still to come, the silver for the Red Headband Gang’s lads, the merchants’ living costs — I borrowed the lot.”
“…We’d better make this work, then.”

That’s right. We had to succeed, no matter what. When I asked the Shandong Escort Bureau for help, the security I put up was myself, and saving Bureau Head Jo’s son was no reason for him to hand over materials and funds on this scale for nothing.

Bureau Head Jo is already making a large allowance for my circumstances just by advancing me the materials and the money.

Settling for nothing more than me as security amounted to a kindness on his part. That was why we had to succeed without fail. If I plowed the territory under and still failed to turn a profit, my life would be tied to the Shandong Escort Bureau from that moment on.

I gave Duho his orders.

“Take the boys and tell the merchants inside the territory that the work starts in three days. Give word to the carpenters and stonemasons ahead of time as well.”
“Where do I tell the merchants to stay?”
“I’ve arranged inns in the east of Qingzhou. Tell them to give my name and stay until the work is done. I’ve agreed to cover the whole cost.”
“When did you go and book that many inns? Honestly, our Young Master is thorough as anything.”
“Never mind that. Go and pass it on to the merchants.”
“Yes, yes— understood, Young Master.”

Duho gave his brazen answer and went. I looked out over the manor, full of carts.

There was a great deal to do ahead.

The three days went by in the blink of an eye, and the Red Headband Gang’s territory stayed busy through every one of them.

The merchants packed up and moved into the inns I had arranged, and the street emptied until there was not a soul on it. A street that had always bustled now lay as quiet as the grave, and standing in it felt strange.

In the dawn street there was no one but me and the Red Headband Gang’s men. They took in the sledgehammers, pickaxes and carts piled up to one side and turned baffled faces on me.

“From today there is no morning or afternoon training.”

The men’s faces lit up with delight, until what came next wiped those blossoming faces blank.

“Instead, we rebuild the street.”
“Sorry?”
“Huh?”

I went on.

“We demolish every building on the street. Break the buildings, clear the rubble, haul the materials. Questions.”

One of the men raised a hand.

“Speak.”
“Are we not swordsmen? Ah, more of the lads use spears, so spearmen would be the right word, I suppose…”
“Meaning you want to know why you have to do it. Is that it?”
“Yes.”
“Do the rest of you think the same?”

The rest of the Red Headband Gang’s men nodded in agreement.

“We’re supposed to be martial artists. Common labor is a bit much.”
“It’s embarrassing, isn’t it.”

Complaints burst out here and there. Men who had made their living by the blade were being told to pick up a hammer and a pickaxe; it was only natural their pride smarted.

But pride does not put food on the table. What they had to do was follow my orders.

Without a word I picked up a pickaxe and swung it into the wall of a building.

— BANG!

The sound roared out, and a hole opened clean through the wall. I hung the pickaxe over my shoulder and spoke.

“A martial artist needs a strong body. This is all part of the training. Break buildings, haul rubble and materials, and the body trains itself.”
“…”
“There is nobody here who does not want to train, I take it?”
“…”
“I thought not, from men of mine. Everyone picks up a tool.”

The men each took hold of a sledgehammer or a pickaxe.

“Each squad of ten takes one building and levels it. Once it’s down, load the rubble on the carts and dump it. Execute.”
“Execute!”

The men shouted the order back and scattered.

— BANG! BANG! BOOM!

The sound of buildings coming apart rose from every direction, and down they came, fast. Whatever else they were, men who had made their living by the blade handled a tool well without being taught.

“Roof’s coming down — move!”
“Split the pillar first!”
“This is more fun than I expected! Hammer coming through!”

Their faces were bright with excitement. Fair enough. There was a strange pleasure in breaking things, and the training these past weeks must have been hard on them in all sorts of ways. I hoped this would let them work off some of the strain.

I picked up a pickaxe myself.

— BANG!

The outer wall broke apart where the pickaxe struck. Mm, the feel of it through my hands was good. I raised the pickaxe again and drove it down.

— BANG!

As the building’s pillar came crashing down, it felt as though something inside me had come loose all at once. The corners of my mouth lifted before I knew it.

I must have had a fair amount piled up in me too, one way and another.

The demolition went on all morning. Around the time the sun climbed to the middle of the sky, the craftsmen I had engaged arrived at the site.

But there was a problem. The craftsmen were hanging back, unable to bring themselves onto the site.

What are they doing over there?

I walked over to where they hovered outside.

“Are you not coming in?”
“Ah, Boss. The thing is… the men working down there are so frightening. We’re not sure they’ll listen to a word we say.”

Ah. The moment I heard it, I understood why they could not come in; the lads down there were a savage-looking lot.

I looked around. Bastards stripped to the waist swinging sledgehammers with the sweat running off them, bastards with pictures inked all over their bodies, bastards with long scars down them. They were threatening enough standing still; with sledgehammers and pickaxes in their hands on top of that, it made perfect sense to be frightened of them.

“Do not worry, and do not judge by appearances alone. The lads are good sorts.”

To put the craftsmen at ease, I called out to my men.

“Everyone, attention!”

Every man stopped what he was doing and looked at me before the last word was out.

“These are the people who will build our territory anew. You do not argue with their instructions; you do as you are told. Understood.”
“Understood!”

The answer came back with the discipline drilled right into it, and I turned to the craftsmen.

“You saw? Give your orders freely. If there is anyone who will not listen, you have only to tell me.”
“Ah, yes… Thank you.”
“We have nearly all the buildings down, so please wait just a little longer.”
“Understood.”

The craftsmen gathered in twos and threes and went in along the street.

The lads have energy to spare, no question.

All that climbing the mountain and sparring had been worth it. At breaking things, at least, every one of them was twice as fast as an ordinary laborer, and because we had started at dawn, the demolition was running far ahead of what I had expected.

Another twenty-odd buildings to bring down and the street would be clear.

I was not idle either. While the lads broke things, I loaded the rubble onto carts and hauled it away. Moving it while I kept my internal energy circulating turned the labor itself into excellent internal-energy training.

The voice came as I repeated the work, and each time it did, my qi ran freer.

An unexpected harvest.

The corners of my mouth lifted before I knew it.

I was pushing a cart loaded with rubble past an old storehouse when it happened.

— Grrk. Creeeeak.

I stopped where I stood.

One of the men was taking a pillar apart, and above it, where it stood half broken, the structure was swaying dangerously. The bastard had eyes only for the pillar and never looked up.

— Krrak-krak-krak! Creeeeeak!

The sound swelled all at once. The pillar gave way, and the structure resting on top of it came pouring down on my man.

“Get clear!”

I drew the energy up out of my dantian and threw myself at him.