Nirvana In Fire

The second month of this year happened to coincide with the civil service examinations, which were held every three years. According to the system, the Ministry of Rites presided over the examinations. The Emperor would appoint a chief examiner and 18 deputy chief examiners to select the best scholars in the realm. During this time in previous years, the Crown Prince and Prince Yu would attempt to support their own people into the new civil service positions by whatever means possible, creating trouble both overtly and secretly. Furthermore, the examiners who took advantage of these faction fights for personal rank and power naturally had to in turn look after the interests of their respective masters, and so these private corrupt practices continued to prevail. There were some loyal imperial court officials who would admonish them countless times, but not only was it ineffective, they also came to a bad end. This corruption in selecting scholars had become the imperial government’s most chronic disease, with few who had the experience or knowledge to understand it.

But everyone understood that this year, the circumstances would definitely change. As for how, many were keeping watch.

Apart from being the eldest son who inherited the nobility and merits of his family, the civil service examination was the only way for the majority of people to begin an official career in the civil service. The various aspects involved were very complicated. Geography, origin, in-laws, old friends and acquaintances, teachers….many factors could affect the final result. It’s not just about faction politics. To avoid taking that path and put an end to any rumour, one must endure pressure from all parties in one’s network, while simultaneously safeguarding one’s integrity and fairness in order to avoid others nitpicking on one’s mistakes and so meet with failure.

This time, the crown prince was out of the game and Prince Yu was under house arrest. It seemed that Prince Jing was the only one who could influence the Emperor’s choice of examiners this year. If he wanted to exercise such influence, no one would dare to argue with him.

At the end of the first month, the Ministry of Rites announced the year’s auspicious date for the civil service examinations after reading the heavenly bodies. Presiding over the selection of examiners in court, the Liang Emperor asked Prince Jing for his opinion on the matter, to which he replied, “This is a serious matter. I dare not respond arbitrarily. Please give your son several days to carefully consider this,” even though there was no clear answer. However, it was very clear that he had no intention of staying out of it. But reversing such long-standing abuse within the system was no easy matter, and if not handled carefully it may have the opposite effect, so everyone waited in great anticipation for the time when the final list of names would be revealed. In fact, they were actually waiting to see this prince’s final decision, whether he would strive to recommend the kind of upright and outstanding scholars whose worth he recognized without worrying about offending people, or capitulate to the previous years’ usual practice of appointing an accommodating examiner who would leave a gap for some special people to enter (the system).

On the fourth day of the second month, the Imperial edict was finally issued, and it was read aloud to the public by a ceremonial officer. If their chins could drop off, one would have seen many chins scattered all over the court that day. The deputy chief examiners were the youngest and most energetic officials from the six ministries, but the chief examiner was the elderly 73 year old Cheng Zhiji from the Phoenix Pavilion. Although Cheng lao da ren* had the grace of remaining at home for many years without having to be at court, although being the Master of the Pavillion was well-known to be an honorary official position, but in the system, he was still a first-grade court official, and qualified to be selected as the Chief Examiner.

*old lord – form of respect

It’s just that no one like him had been appointed to such a position before, and no one thought of him when speculating about potential candidates.

But everyone soon understood what Prince Jing was trying to achieve by proposing such a mix of young and old. Cheng Zhiji was not a particularly tough and unyielding old court official. He was kind and gentle, never rejected anyone nor caused anyone to lose face. He was well-informed about the current state of affairs, even though it seemed to have forgotten about him because he had simply been away from court too many years. Because he had no clear connections at court, his conversations with others centred around matters that were public knowledge and everything had to be explained in detail. The crucial point was that if an ironclad relationship didn’t exist, who would dare to play the martyr and say something for personal gain without careful thinking? Especially so before someone who had been forgotten for so many years and whose limits one was unclear of. After all, one must first consider the risk when doing something. One can’t simply insist on bringing along a chest full of gold, silver, pearls and jewelry to ask for help when the path is no longer the same old familiar one. After all, his predecessors weren’t vegetarians.

But between the selection of the examiners to the start of the examinations, there were only ten days. Before anyone had the time to discover the path to win Cheng Zhiji over, he was already in the examination room with his bags. Without any outside influence or personal selfish motives, even arguments and objections became simple. Actually, the biggest flaw in mixing the old and the young was that the elder tended to stick to their conservative views, unwilling to accept new ideas, while the young were arrogant and impetuous, not respecting the experience of their elders. This was what Prince Jing was contemplating when deciding on the candidate during the “several days” he requested. Although the final list of names weren’t completely those he had selected, and the Liang Emperor had made a few changes, it retained the original plan and ultimately achieved Prince Jing’s desired outcome.This is mainly because Cheng Zhiji was a suitable choice. Even though he was old, he wasn’t stubborn and was willing to listen to other points of view. At the same time, he was a former scholar, and the Master of the Phoenix Pavilion. With such weight behind him, all eighteen deputy chief examiners had high regard for the old master, and not one of them dared to show him any disrespect when the time came for grading on the first day of the examinations. When the Chief Examiner does not react badly to the varied views and impulsiveness of the young and the Deputy Chief Examiners recognize the authority of the Chief Examiner, mutual restraint can naturally become mutual benefit, avoiding the likelihood of major contradictions.

Actually, this year’s civil service examinations was still far from being able to avoid missing any talents, because that was simply not possible, but at the very least, this was the fairest and cleanest preliminary examination round for the past many years. Prince Jing’s goal was “no pass with no achievement”. He did not expect to completely clean up such long standing corruption all at once, nor did he adopt a hard stance to enforce integrity that could have easily led to resentment and opposition. What he first wanted to change was the old notion of “no disadvantages for not passing the examinations”, stopping the so-called “usual practice” that had lasted for so many years, thereby taking the first step in cleaning up the election of government officials.

The civil service examinations ended smoothly without any major disturbance, which made the Liang Emperor very happy. What he was most worried about was that Prince Jing would be unaware of the current situation and cause a political upheaval by blindly imposing his own way of thinking, so the Emperor was glad to notice that he was becoming increasingly moderate and amiable.

In the blink of an eye, the third month arrived. The court began to busy itself with preparations for the imperial family’s Spring Hunt which would be held away from the palace at Jiu’an Mountain. Apart from Prince Yu who was under house arrest, all the rest of the princes were expected to go. Including the rest of the imperial clan and the retinue of high officials, there were close to two hundred people, each of them bringing their own entourage, making this the largest group in history. Those ordered to stay behind to take care of things were the same as previous years, but the imperial concubine who joined the hunt wasn’t the previously favoured Concubine Yue from Guanliu Palace but Concubine Jing.

Two days before they departed for the hunt, Mu Qing made his way once again to the Su Residence on his palanquin, heading directly to the rear garden before alighting. Besides the young prince, there alighted from the palanquin another young man who seemed to be recovering from a serious illness.

Li Gang came forward silently to make his salutations before turning around to guide them into Mei Changsu’s quarters in the main building. As soon as he entered the room, Mu Qing headed exuberantly towards the host, his hands cupped in greeting, saying, “I have brought him here safe and sound. Nothing happened along the way.” Saying this, he turned to the side, revealing the young man behind him.

“Many thanks, Prince Mu,” Mei Changsu smiled politely in return. At the same time, he glanced at the young man. “Mei Changsu has the pleasure of meeting General Wei Zheng. Is your injury healing well?”

Wei Zheng suppressed his turbulent emotions and replied in a trembling voice, “For Mister Su’s grace in coming to my rescue, I will never forget……” After saying this, he looked like he was going to fall on his knees but he was stopped by the other’s soft gaze, and so forced himself into a deep bow with his hands clasped.

Feeling that his mission had been accomplished, Mu Qing swung his arms and asked, “Where’s Fei Liu?” ‘He’s not here”. Mei Changsu understood the young prince’s intention, but at the moment there was somebody waiting in the secret chamber, so of course he had to think of a way to make him leave. “I will bring him to your mansion another day. I’m afraid I can’t keep you company today as I now need to make arrangements for General Wei Zheng.”

“You must remember to come.” Mu Qing was a frank and straightforward person and didn’t feel that anything was amiss. After this reminder, he immediately turned around and strode directly away. As soon as his silhouette disappeared, Wei Zheng fell heavily to his knees, saying tearfully, “Young Commander…..please blame Wei Zheng for not being careful…..”

“That’s enough. Do such words need to be said between us?” Mei Changsu didn’t help him up. Instead, he, too, knelt down, and clutching Wei Zheng’s shoulders, said, “Calm down. Don’t get too excited. I am going to bring you to meet Prince Jing. Be careful not to let slip who I am in front of him.”

“Yes…..”

“Come, get up.”

Wei Zheng took a few breaths before stretching out his hand to Mei Changsu for support, and they stood up together. Both of them approached the bedroom side by side, and opening the secret door, they entered, one after the other.

“Your Highness Prince Jing, General Wei is here.” Following this simple announcement, Mei Changsu got out of the way like Mu Qing earlier and quietly retreated into the corner.

“Wei Zheng….greets Your Highness Prince Jing…..”

Seeing this person from his past that he had never thought to ever meet again, Xiao Jingyan found it more difficult than expected to control his emotions and he quickly steadied himself as he stepped forward to support Wei Zheng up. Standing behind him, Lie Zhanying also couldn’t resist taking a step forward, carefully looking Wei Zheng up and down several times, after which the rims of his eyes were red.

“Your Highness, let’s all sit down and talk. I think tonight’s conversation won’t be a short one.” Meng Zhi, who was the most calm as he had met with Wei Zheng many times, came forward to arrange the seats. Lie Zhanying insisted on standing to the side, according to military decorum, while Wei Zheng cast a covert glance at Mei Changsu, evidently wanting to stand behind him too, but the latter merely leaned against a table, fiddling with the heating stove, not looking up.

“Wei Zheng, since we are in a secret room, you don’t have to stand on ceremony. There are many things I would like to ask you, so please sit.” Prince Jing pointed to the seat closest to him. “So many doubts I have kept hidden in my heart all these years, that I didn’t think I would ever find any answers to. The Heavens have blessed me now, to be able to once again meet someone from the past. I hope you will allow me to clear them up one by one.”

“Yes.” Wei Zheng bowed deeply and slowly moved to take the seat. “Your Highness, please ask your questions. I will answer them without reservation.”

Prince Jing looked straight into his eyes and asked his first question. “Were there any other survivors?”

Wei Zheng was prepared for this question, and immediately replied, “Yes, but not many, and even less of those with rank. Because they were declared as rebels and would have been sentenced to hard labour, even low rank soldiers dared not return home, and could only live in exile.”

“What about those I know?”

“I’m afraid Your Highness does not know these lower ranking officers. Of the higher ranks, only Nie Duo…….”

Prince Jing’s gaze wavered. “Nie Duo is still alive?”

“Yes, but I have no idea where he is now, which means he is well hidden.”

“Nie Duo was also one of the key ranking officers…. Then what about the Northern Valley? Were there truly no survivors from there?”

Wei Zheng lowered his head. It was hard to tell if he couldn’t bear to reply, or if he was unwilling to.

“How could this be……” Prince Jing tried to keep his trembling voice steady. “Others may not be aware, but I know fully well that the Chiyu Battalion was the toughest army to face in any battle. Xie Yu and Xia Jiang brought in 100,000 cavalry from the western border. How did they end up in such defeat?”

Wei Zheng suddenly raised his head, his eyes blazing. “Did Your Highness really think that we would engage Xie Yu in battle? Was our Chiyan army really a rebel army, to engage in such a terrible battle with an army the court appointed?”

Prince Jing grabbed Wei Zheng’s arm, squeezing it as if he would shatter it. “Did you mean to say that Xie Yu continued to attack even though you all didn’t resist? But knowing Xiao Shu, even if he hadn’t anticipated this at first, once the butcher’s knife was raised, he wouldn’t just sit back and wait for death!”

“Your Highness is right, but……” Wei Zheng’s cheeks were stretched taut like strands of iron, “At the time the butcher’s knife was raised, we had just gone through a fierce battle and no longer had the strength…….”

Afterthought: When I first started translating this chapter, I had not anticipated its upcoming change in direction. The first half was very tedious to translate, being so wordy, but ultimately, I enjoyed reading this insight into XJY’s brain. He wasn’t just all brawn and in MCS’s shadow as the show seemed to have made him out to be – because MCS’s bosom friend would have had to provide him with some mental stimulation at least! But ah, the turn in the chapter just crept up on me and happened very suddenly, and here we are, having to stop our hearts from lurching as we begin an emotional roller coaster ride with the next couple of chapters.