Chapter Eighty-Seven: The Core Cast

“Do you truly mean to erase their slave status?!”

The yamen runner at the gate stared at Qin Zhen, dumbstruck, as though he were looking at the greatest fool under heaven.

It was not only him. At that moment, the slaves themselves were equally stunned.

No one had imagined that in that bleak and hopeless world, a ray of light called hope would suddenly appear.

“We bought these people with hard silver,” Li Han said uneasily. “If we just cancel their slave status like this, what if they run away? Wouldn’t all that money be wasted?”

“That’s right, Zhen’er. At the very least, you ought to keep some hold over them,” Chen Shu urged as well.

Slave status was nothing less than a deed of sale.

Once that thing existed, a person became livestock to be trampled at will, bound to do anything their master commanded. The master, meanwhile, bore no responsibility toward the slave. He could decide life or death, and order them about however he pleased.

And all of this was protected by the laws of Great Shang.

If their slave status were removed, these people would recover the standing of ordinary folk. Qin Zhen would no longer be able to curse them as he liked, much less force them to work.

Without question, for Qin Zhen this was a losing bargain.

He turned and looked at those faces, shocked beyond measure yet lit with eager expectation; at those cheeks dulled by suffering, gray and lifeless.

“I will remove your slave status. But in return, you must work for me for one year. During that time, I will pay you wages, feed you, clothe you, and give you a place to live. After one year, whether you stay or leave will be your own decision.”

With that, before everyone’s eyes, he tore the stacks of contracts to shreds.

As they watched the scraps whirl through the air, the numbness in their eyes shattered at once, replaced by the bewilderment of people granted a new life. Many wept for joy. Many seemed as though waking from a dream. Bathed in sunlight, all of them bent low before that young figure.

“No kneeling!”

Qin Zhen suddenly shouted, startling them all.

“I am not worth your kneeling!”

Yet though he said so, they could not stop themselves from bowing and knocking their heads to the ground before him.

The commotion drew the attention of many townspeople. When they crowded over and learned that Qin Zhen had just removed these people’s slave status, they were greatly astonished.

“Well I’ll be damned! Someone really did buy slaves just to set them free?”

“What do you know? Young Master Qin is righteous and benevolent! He can’t bear to see common folk suffer! Which of these slaves isn’t a bitter soul?”

“Then why doesn’t he save every slave in the labor pits? Just a hundred or so people—who’s he putting on this show for? If you ask me, Qin Zhen is only pretending at benevolence!”

“Did you stuff your mouth with filth? What are you, exactly, to dare speak ill of Young Master Qin?!”

...

“Young Master Qin, these people still need to be entered into the household register,” the yamen runner said in a low voice, his eyes full of admiration. “Otherwise, without registration, if someone seizes them again, they’ll become slaves once more.”

“Register them under Little Fishing Village,” Qin Zhen said lightly.

“Blockhead, take them to the inn and get them each a change of clothes. Have them all wash up, find them something to eat and drink. Once they’re settled, record their information. I’ll need it.”

“Right away!” Li Han bellowed at once, “Everyone follow me! Don’t get separated, or you might get snatched up by traffickers again!”

“You really aren’t afraid they’ll run?” Chen Shu could not help asking.

Qin Zhen answered with certainty, “They won’t run.”

Just then, the two little girls whom Third Master Chen had taken a liking to earlier came over.

The younger one hid timidly behind her sister. The older one, with her short hair and tomboyish look, bowed deeply to Qin Zhen.

Her soft voice was filled with sincerity.

“Thank you for saving us.”

Had Qin Zhen not stepped in, it was not hard to imagine what would have become of them.

He reached out and gently patted the elder sister’s head, while inwardly wondering what he ought to do with these two children.

He could hardly make them child laborers.

Then again, on second thought, they were only two children—just two extra mouths to feed. What great matter was that?

In a few days, he could simply take them back to Little Fishing Village and leave them in Miaoyun’s care.

“What is your name?” Qin Zhen asked gently, brushing the grime from the elder sister’s hair.

“Daiyu,” the girl said, biting her lip, somewhat at a loss at his gesture.

Qin Zhen quickly realized that his manner might have been too intimate. After all, this was an ancient world, not the modern age; it might cause the little girl to misunderstand.

He immediately withdrew his hand.

The younger sister then said timidly, “My name is Qingwen.”

Daiyu? Qingwen?

The names felt strangely familiar to Qin Zhen, as though he had once seen them in some film.

But for the moment, he could not place where.

“What is your family name?” he asked again.

The elder sister lowered her head and said nothing, who knew what thoughts were passing through her mind.

In ancient times, names of two characters were considered more honorable; generally speaking, two-character given names belonged to legitimate children, while three-character names were often for those born of concubines.

The sisters’ names clearly came from a cultivated, literary household, utterly unlike names such as Wang Goudan, Li Hanzi, or Zhang Ermazi. If nothing else, they were likely daughters of a fallen family, probably concubine-born. Seeing that the girl remained silent about her surname, Qin Zhen did not press her, only sighed inwardly for the hardship of their fate.

“Where is your home?” he asked instead.

If it was nearby, perhaps someday there might still be a chance to help them find their kin.

“We have no home anymore.” Daiyu lifted her head, and the stubbornness in her eyes was enough to break one’s heart.

Qin Zhen said no more and led them all toward the inn.

The innkeeper’s smile was so wide it nearly bloomed like a chrysanthemum.

So many people had arrived at once; every one of them meant business.

The inn was not large. Many had nowhere to sit and could only squat on the floor, gnawing at steamed buns.

Simple though the fare was—just buns and pickled vegetables—for those who had only just cast off their slave status, it was already a rare and satisfying meal.

At that moment, Li Han came running over in a rush.

“Zhen’er, I’ve finished registering this group. Most of them are illiterate farmers and village women, and their names are all sorts of odd ones. Take a look first.”

Taking the bamboo slips, Qin Zhen raised his brows. “Well now, not bad. You can write these days?”

“I learned from reading storybooks.” Li Han had never liked studying or learning characters, but there was no helping it. If he wanted to read those tale books, he had to force himself. A full-grown man like him could hardly keep shamelessly begging little children to tell him stories every day.

“Good, very good.”

A flicker of satisfaction rose in Qin Zhen’s heart, as though a good-for-nothing son who had only eaten and waited to die had finally begun to strive.

He gave the bamboo slips a quick glance, then raised his voice and asked, “Is there anyone here who can read? Or do arithmetic?”

“I can do arithmetic. I can use an abacus too,” several people said timidly, raising their hands.

But not one of them could read.

Education, for the people at the bottom of this world, was a luxury forever out of reach. Knowledge was monopolized by the scholar-gentry and official class, creating a vast divide. Without exaggeration, nearly ninety percent of the people of Great Shang were utterly illiterate.

That was also why, after Qin Zhen displayed his literary talent at Boyang Tower, those aristocratic scholars who had once disdained him began treating him with courtesy.

Could anyone who knew letters truly be an ordinary person?

Qin Zhen sighed.

The road to universal education in Great Shang, he thought, would be long and difficult indeed.

Just then, a soft, clear voice rang out.

“I can read.”