Chapter 3:

Chapter 3

‘It’s strange how easy an introduction can change one’s reception.’ I mused. as I walked.

When I started traveling into the nameless villages near the Seventh Yellow Hill Town, I hoped to find a market that nobody thought to explore and discover, an untapped market as my new student called it.

What I found was barren and hostile land that refused to tolerate me any more than the law demanded of them and the worst part is that I can’t even claim that it is because of my parentage.

The people in the villages don’t care for foxes as long as they behave, but they are always one mistake away from stoning merchants to death.

I came here in the central square and saw a blood woman on the ground trying to beg but failing due to no longer having teeth and her head being bloody.

The Village Head said something but all my mind could process was the woman in front of me.

I've never seen someone die despite hearing the stories and It’s frightening to see it happen before me, but the horror feels numbed now. It's the smiles and cheers of the villagers that did it.

They are not horrified but happy to see it as if it's a celebration.

The day started well enough, I woke up, dressed and washed myself and my student’s family told me that the Village Chief had an announcement to make, and then they started stoning a woman to death. A human woman at that.

It’s only been a few minutes since they started, or it could have been hours, but I am not sure I can tell the difference now.

“What did she do?” I asked my student Tai Su.

The Village Head said it before the stoning began, but I did not hear it, my mind was too preoccupied with her screams for mercy.

The young man is tall, tanned, often times shirtless and his eyes posses a shine to them that nobody would trust him when he says he is a citizen and not a barbarian. That opinion lasts only until you hear him speak as he does not speak in the broken speech of barbarians.

“She tried to sell water, teacher Hao Wen.” My student replied promptly.

The man speaks the same a military officer does, curt and respectfully with not even the lightest possible accent. His father used to be in Lord Xi’s guards and is still in good standing with them and his son seems to be just as martially minded as his father.

“I didn’t know it was crime.” I replied numbly.

I researched the laws passed by Lord Xi to make sure this doesn’t happen, but I only asked if any of my writings and writing utensils were banned, I never thought to ask if selling water is banned.

Who does that? Why would you ban the sale of water, everyone needs it!

“The Village Head passes it two years ago. Selling drinking water to people is banned.” He explained.

We were on the outside of the group of villagers stoning a lifeless corpse with the viciousness I’ve seen reserved for Rapists back home.

“Seems harsh.” I observed.

The villagers are brutal as not even in death is the poor woman spared the stones.

“The fool should have turned it into juice or something else, everyone needs water and only the clouds and ground produce it. Now she’ll feed the pigs” He continued.

The villagers finished abusing a corpse and some elders dressed in black took the corpse with them to feed it to the Village Head’s swine.

“Why?” I asked simply.

What could possibly make someone kill someone else so viciously for selling water?

“A merchant poisoned the well by shitting in it during the night. We only found out because he fell into it and begged to be let out. We got him out, proceeded to beat him as he was covered in feces and found out he filled many barrels with water before he fell into it. We put the two together and realized he shit in the well to sell us clean water. The Village Head asked for an alchemist to come from the town to purify it and made it illegal to sell water to prevent it from happening again. Lord Xi did not pass such a law, but all Village Heads nearby did to ensure this doesn’t happen to them.” He explained.

My jaw was opened wider and wider the more I heard and I looked at the tanned man incredulously.

“Sounds unthinkable.” I mumbled numbly.

If this is what happened, and so little time ago then I can understand the reaction at least, but what did the idiot think to achieve with that? You need repeat business if you want to make any money!

I can’t imagine paying for an alchemist was cheap either.

“Treat people long enough like a demon and they’ll start acting like one. People like you come trying to look for profit, they get rejected and beaten enough and they get spiteful and desperate. That man was beaten multiple times in multiple villages before he did that. Be glad I managed to enter into an agreement with you so and taught you how to act so that you didn’t end up like that woman.” My student said.

I numbly nodded at that as my other student returned, her rock bloody.

“ Tai Su, teacher Hao Wen, sorry for taking so long.” Bao Xiaoli said as she waved with her empty hand.

Her other hand held the stone she just used to kill a merchant.

“No problem Bao, thank you for doing it for me as well, I don’t like stoning people, if someone is to die then it should be in one hit.” Tai Su replied warmly with love in his eyes.

“No problem husband, someone from our family had to teach the trash a lesson. Hopefully she'll learn some virtue in her next life.” The other woman said.

She was a respectful student, a pleasant and bright young woman that loved asking me of my home town and clan and that has written an absolutely lovely piece of poetry to describe it based on my recollections of and right now treated killing a merchant like it was a chore.

No, a chore is not something one finds pride in and my second student found pride in the act if her smile is anything to go by. To kill a merchant was a virtue here and I could feel my legs go even number as this piece of knowledge internalized.

I was very glad I took my student’s offer to rebrand from being a merchant of calligraphy into a traveling teacher forced to engage in trade as I teach others to read and write.

The last few months turned from a miserable hell filled with insults and nearly avoided beatings, to a pleasant stroll filled with people presenting their children to me to teach, giving me free food after teaching children and adults to write their own name. One man even accidentally made me trip yesterday and apologized profusely for it.

I know it was by mistake, because before being taken in by my student’s family it was me that had to apologize and beg to not be kicked.

‘Calm, calm, the humans don’t want you ill Hao Wen, they are respectful and friendly.’ I thought as I tried to calm down.

I heard stories from my fellow clan members before leaving home to how foxes were treated, but it seemed they were wrong. Foxes are treated poorly, but they weren’t beaten because they had a tail, but because they were merchants.

“Come teacher, I am sorry you had to see this, but the Village Head insisted that all noteworthy individuals participate and you are among them. We can go back home and have you rest and recover.” Tai Su said as he gently squeezed my should and slowly guided me to his home.

“Sorry? Oh, I’m so sorry teacher Hao Wen I forgot!” Bao Xiaoli said as she dropped the blood rock still dripping with blood to the ground.

“It-it’s alright little Bao, I know you don’t mean m-me harm.” I replied stuttering.

I’ve never seen someone be killed like that, someone who died for something I didn’t even bother to check or would have thought twice seeing back home. The worst part is that the same people that have treated me kindly the past few months were still smiling at killing someone I would have called a senior a few months ago.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Learning to read and write was in my past life the task of a month's of dedicated study to learn the basics and the 31 characters that when combined could form any possible word. You didn’t even need some of them as 24 were all you needed to have someone understand what you meant. That’s not even counting numbers of which there were only ten. Or the punctuation signs of which one could get away with only using four of them.

Imperial on the other hand does things different and all I can do is thank the heavens it’s not a language like chinese or japanese.

One hundred thirty-eight characters, one hundred unique symbols for numbers and a single writing system were far, far easier to learn than those monstrous languages.

Nonetheless, two months under teacher Hao Wen were enough to make both myself and Bao capable of understanding most texts and counting beyond ten without making me look like an idiot, because base ten is for chumps apparently.

“Teacher Hao Wen are you certain that you are well?” I asked the woman that made me literate in this life.

She was still shaken since we came back home in the morning.

I just came back from the rice fields and the twenty-something year old woman was still shaken from what she saw.

Bao left to look after her and they wrote some poetry together which seemed to have helped, but her fox ears as always betrayed her. Before the execution she was relaxed, her ears rarely twitched but now each and every noise elicited the same reaction as if it was mother doing them

“I am better Tai Su, it… it was too much.” She replied tiredly.

I nodded at that and I had to think of how to pull my teacher out of it before she decides to just leave out of fear. I could see that she was marinating in her own fear and insecurity.

“Do you want me to take you back into the Town? I know you don’t want to lose that bet, but you’ve held your end of the bargain and I am willing to escort you back there if you want to. You don’t have to stay here if you are scared.” I offered.

If there’s one thing I noticed of my teacher is that she is a very proud woman, just the mention of her bet would have been enough to pump her up now that she saw a path forward… But now? Not so much.

“I won’t be leaving yet Tai Su. It takes a lot more than that to bring this Hao Wen down. ‘Fear is temporary but Victory is Eternal!’ as your Empress likes saying.” She denied with a brittle smile.

I breathed a sigh of relief. In my new life things are surprisingly simple and the people generally kind, but that’s only because they can take their anger on easy enough targets like the merchants.

“This is why I decided to help you teacher, I don’t like it when people get treated like that, not when it’s so easy to avoid it for most.” I continued.

People think in two way about merchants, the legal definition and the popular one. For the most part they are aligned, but people have a soft spot for artists and teachers trying to teach others and engaging in trade to feed themselves. Despite the law calling them such, they are not considered merchants by most, just people trying their best at the start of the road and doing some bad choices.

By having Hao Wen present herself as a teacher for children first and foremost she is now someone respectable that has to resell some of her teaching supplies because she fell on hard times and people here understand hardship.

“I still don’t understand why your people think like that Tai Su.” She asked without truly asking.

Left unsaid was the, ‘why are things like this?’ and the answer was far too simple.

“Reselling something is seen as theft. You take someone’s opportunity to buy something and then proceed to charge them for the privilege, many don’t understand that what you are doing is saving them time and giving them convenience, but all it takes is a few miscreants stockpiling food during a famine while people starve and people will think that the only good merchant is a dead merchant, even if the food stockpiled there would have only been in the settlement because of the merchant.” I explained.

“That doesn’t make any sense whatsoever Tai Su.” She remarked heatedly.

“It’s the truth.” I replied simply.

Her ears twitched even as her face remained impassive as she tried to calm herself down.

“What question do you have for me?” She asked.

“What makes you think I have one?” I asked back.

“Your voice, it’s always a bit lower than normal when you want to ask a question and are holding back, I’m not sure you can notice it but with my ears it’s pretty easy to spot.” She answered.

Someone else having much better hearing than you was annoying.

“Teacher, what do you know of cultivation?” I asked her

She did not like that question, if the way her hair bristled was anything to go by.