The Longest Day in Chang’an: A Race Against Time

Chapter 37: Shen Chu (15:00-15:59) P6
Translator: DragonRider
Time was ticking away, but those Turks on the run were nowhere to be found, as if they had disappeared into the ocean. These guys had extremely dangerous Fierceflame Bombs at their disposal, and they might also have abducted Wang Yunxiu, which meant that they were a big trouble no matter where they went.

At this moment, Yao Runeng pointed at the ground and said, “Commandant Zhang! Look!” Zhang Xiaojing lowered his head and saw a couple of black stains on the loess ground, which looked like ink. Yao Runeng dismounted from his horse, crouched down and scrutinized those spots for a while before raising his head, saying, “These black spots are not perfectly round, which means the drops didn’t fall vertically. The curved ends of these spots face the west and the pointed ends the east. The wagons were probably driving fast towards the west against the wind when these drops fell. That was why these stains are in this shape.”

Those Turks retreated in haste, so they didn’t get the time to reseal those pots. These stains caused by drops of fossil oil were a perfect indication of the direction they had gone.

Zhang Xiaojing gave him a gesture of compliment. These days, there were not many youths who were willing to carry out intensive observation. Yao Runeng’s cheeks slightly flushed when he saw Zhang Xiaojing’s gesture, but his excitement soon abated considerably on the thought of the previous disagreement between them.

“Let’s go!”

Uninterested in what kind of petty things Yao Runeng was thinking about, Zhang Xiaojing turned his horse around and galloped away. Yao Runeng also hastily mounted his horse and followed closely after. Currently, the first priority was to catch those Turks, and all other issues should be left aside for the moment.

They reached another intersection and Yao Runeng checked the stains of fossil oil on the ground again. He found that those Turks had turned northwards at this intersection between Yongan Fang and Tonggui Fang. Having identified the direction, Zhang Xiaojing and Yao Runeng gasped in horror at the same time.

The road that the Turks had taken was the third street to the west of the Rosefinch Street. It was a south-north street. Northward up this intersection, all the fangs on the sides of this street were affluent and prosperous ones. And at the north end of it was the Yanshou Fang which was the most luxurious place in western Chang’an. And to the west of Yanshou Fang, right on the other side of the street, was the West Market which was said to be “the place where all treasures under the sun were gathered”.

This area was crowded with people even on normal days, not to mention that today was the first day of the lantern show held in honor of the Lantern Festival. Now it was already Shen (15:00-16:59), and the sun had moved to the western half of the sky. Numerous wheels, trees and shelves, decorated with lanterns, were being moved to the street, and countless residents and merchants were converging.

Mere two vats of fossil oil had caused the Lubi Army heavy casualties. If those wolf guards managed to intrude into this area with more Fierceflame Bombs, it was very likely that the prosperity of the whole western Chang’an would be destroyed.

This was the most critical juncture, and they couldn’t afford to hesitate a single instant.

Zhang Xiaojing reined in and turned his head aside, saying to Yao Runeng, “Listen. I want you to be absolutely obedient to me from this moment on. You must follow my order without any hesitation, even if it is women or children that I ask you to kill. Follow me if you can do this, and get lost if you can’t!” After saying this, he spurred the horse and galloped northwards. Knowing how bad things were, Yao Runeng clenched his teeth, fished out a smoke bomb and tossed it to the ground before following Zhang Xiaojing.

Seeing the smoke signal giving off by the smoke bomb, people on nearby watchtowers started beating drums constantly, sending the message to the Jing’an Department. At the same time, Cui Qi also had his report delivered. In the hall, stacks of documents were everywhere and the atmosphere was so tense that people felt suffocating.

“What the hell were Zhang Xiaojing and Cui Qi doing?! We were only a step away to catch the wolves!” Li Bi tossed the horsetail whisk aside and quickly walked up to the sand table. The curators of all the divisions of the Jing’an Department also gathered around. Over ten pairs of eyes were fixed on the sand table. Tanqi moved the black pottery figurine representing Wolf Guards to Yongan Tonggui, its head facing the north. The situation was crystal clear.

Li Bi snatched the moon stick from Tanqi, carved a deep line in the exquisite clay sand table and said in a resolute and decisive tone, “We must intercept them before they reach Guangde Huaiyuan intersection. This is the bottom line! By no means will we let them cross!”

All the areas to the north of this intersection were of great importance to the capital. Guangde Fang in the north was the place where the Jing’an Department’s headquarter was located, and it was also where the Jingzhao Office was. Further north, there was the West Market, Yanshou Fang and other prosperous places as well as the imperial city. If anybody managed to make a scene in any area to the north of this intersection, Li Bi would no doubt be dismissed from his post.

A curator said, “The distance between Yongan Tonggui and Guangde Huaiyuan is merely two kilometers. We need to put up barricades and stop them as soon as possible.” Another curator contradicted, “This is the spot with the most lantern show audiences. Putting up barricades now will only cause chaos — you forgot Supervisor He’s order?” The former curator argued, “Do you think there will be no chaos after those Fierceflame Bombs blast dozens of fangs?” A third curator reminded them, “Don’t forget that they still have Jiedu Wang’s daughter in their hands!”

Hearing these incessant arguments, Li Bi felt annoyed and perplexed. He silently repeated the Taoist Seclusion Sutra, collected himself and then waved his hand, “Dispatch all the guard teams to nearby intersections but don’t put up any barricades yet.”

This order was ambiguous, since Li Bi himself also didn’t know how he should deal with this situation. All he could do was play it by ear. A messenger wrote the order down and walked towards the exit only to hear Li Bi’s sudden, angry yell from behind, “Start running!” He was nearly scared into a tumble and immediately ran out of the hall, stumbling.

Under huge pressure, Li Bi forgot his usual principle of always staying relaxed and composed. At this moment, Xu Bin came to him, as timid as usual, “Sicheng Li… Er…”

“Say it!” After shouting this, when he saw that it was Xu Bin, Li Bi became a little milder. This curator had just made a great contribution by seeing through the Turks’ means of transporting fossil oil.

As if having just made a great resolution, Xu Bin took a deep breath and then said, “The current situation is extremely precarious. Why doesn’t Sicheng Li considering Jiajie (Jiajie means temporarily delegating the power to someone) watchtowers to Commandant Zhang?” A piercing look appeared in Li Bi’s eyes when he heard these words. Xu Bin felt a cold shiver of fear run through him, but he steeled himself and didn’t lower his head.

Jia meant lending; jie meant power. “Jiajie” was originally a term used in the Han Dynasty and the Jin Dynasty meaning the Emperor delegating power to his subordinates, but in the Jing’an Department, this word had a different meaning. “Jiajie watchtowers” meant that all watchtowers followed the order of the one who was delegated the authority, and that they no longer had to report to the headquarter of the Jing’an Department.

Xu Bin’s proposal was synonymous with letting Zhang Xiaojing take over the whole Jing’an Department establishing a second hub.

“Do you know what you’ve just said?” Li Bi said coldly. This guy had just made a small contribution, yet he already dared to be so arrogant.

Xu Bin emboldened himself and said, “It takes too long for the message to be delivered from watchtowers to the headquarter, and then from the headquarter to Commandant Zhang. We can wait, but those Turks won’t. In an emergency, we need to be more flexible in our decision making!”

“You have quite some confidence in Zhang Xiaojing.”

Xu Bin said urgently, “This guy is the most persistent and trustworthy man I’ve ever met. If you put him in charge of watchtowers, it would be like adding wings… ur… to a tiger.” The first half of his remarks were full of power and grandeur, but then his stammer ruined the momentum.

Though preoccupied with a lot of his own thoughts, Li Bi still couldn’t help letting out a laugh, “I wouldn’t have had him work for me if I don’t have faith in his competence. But Jiajie is a serious issue. He’s still a convict condemned to death.”

“This is not what you said to Supervisor He!” The moment he finished this sentence, Xu Bin realized that he had been too impetuous, and sweat beads began seeping from his forehead. He hurriedly adjusted his tone, “Er… er… The point I’ve been trying to make is that Commandant Zhang is right on the spot, which means his judgement is more accurate than ours, since we are here in this hall reading documents.”

Li Bi thought, ‘No wonder this guy never got promoted. He offends people so easily.’ He waved his hand and had Xu Bin leave. Then he turned his head back and stared at the sand table, “Where are Zhang Xiaojing and Cui Qi?”

Tanqi hastily took the moon stick, moved the scarlet pottery figurine representing Cui Qi to the Changming Fang in the south, and pushed the gray pottery figurine representing Zhang Xiaojing to Yongan Tonggui. It could be seen that the Jing’an Department’s main force were dispersed on the north and south ends. Zhang Xiaojing was the only one who was following those Turkish Wolf Guards. Standing in the sand table, that gray pottery figurine looked extremely important yet also extremely lonely.

Li Bi remained silent for only three Xi (A unit of time used in ancient China. A Xi equals about 6.4 seconds) before issuing the first order, “All watchtowers on the third street keep a close watch on nearby wagons and report every thirty Xi!” He briefly hesitated and then added, “Report to Zhang Xiaojing first. Make sure he’s the first one to receive the newest message from now on.”

Stunned, all curators around looked at Li Bi, but Li Bi had no intention to explain at all.

Xu Bin might be a terrible talker, but one of his remarks was absolutely right, “We can wait, but those Turks won’t.”

Following Zhang Xiaojing, Yao Runeng was galloping northwards all along. Suddenly, he heard drumbeats come from a watchtower not far away. It was Fixed-Signal message passing! This Fixed Signal was very rare, and he had to try very hard to recall the corresponding code in the pamphlet.

“Jiajie watchtowers?” Yao Runeng could barely believe what he had just heard. This would make this convict, who had been condemned to death, instantly become one of the most powerful men in the whole Chang’an city.

But he didn’t dare delay telling him. He hurriedly spurred the horse to ride side by side with Zhang Xiaojing and told him his new appointment. There was no excitement on Zhang Xiaojing’s face at all. He merely made a simple comment, “Sicheng Li is a smart guy after all. Send a message to the watchtowers right now — ask them to keep an eye out for wagons with wide tails!”

The wagons that these Turks had taken belonged to Su’s Wagons and were for long-distance transportation of goods. The wooden cross board at the rear of this kind of wagon was wide, thick and durable, while rear cross boards of carriages for short-distance trips within Chang’an city were narrow, pointed and shaped like the tail of a swallow, which made them more maneuverable and thus more suitable for traveling in streets and alleys. The difference between the two was rarely known among people who were not staff members of cart companies.

It was fairly unreasonable to have those scouts on watchtowers tell the nuance, but currently this was the only way to quickly identify the wagons of those Wolf Guards.

Yao Runeng straightened himself on the horseback and started waving a red flag and a yellow one to send signals, looking a little funny. When he finished delivering the order, they had already passed the intersection between Yanfu Fang and Yongping Fang.