Chapter 20: Catching Fishes from Troubled Waters[1] 

The big buffalo pulled on the cart as Grandpa Lu sat at the front with a long whip to drive the animal. Granny Lu sat in the middle of the cart on a thin pile of straw, hugging the small yellow dog which had greeted us the night before. We learnt that its name was 'Pidan'. Pidan's loud panting was the only thing audible besides the creaking of spinning wheels.

Fu Wanxi and I perched on the edge of the cart, our backs facing the front of the road and our legs dangling freely from the cart.

We had set out before dawn and travelled for a couple of hours. According to Grandpa Lu, at this point in time, we were nearing Guizhong City. The narrow country road gradually became wider as roadside tea stands and buildings came into view. Tianxing Teahouse, Fujia Guesthouse, Xinzhuang Inn. The teahouses and inns appeared to be fully occupied, with groups of people camping out in the front yards of these places. On a closer look, these people seemed to also be refugees who had escaped from their hometowns with little valuables and only the clothes on them.

"Old man, all the inns here are overflowing with people. Do you think that the city is refusing to let us in?" Granny Lu expressed her concern as we passed through the small town where the nearest teahouses and inns outside the city could be found.

"How can the local government reject refugees?" Grandpa Lu replied angrily. He shook a fist in the air before reassuring Granny Lu. "Don't fret. Our son is in the city; it can't be that they will prevent us from entering the city?"

I casted a sidelong glance at Fu Wanxi. She was chewing on the inside of her cheek and appeared to be deep in thought. Feeling my gaze on her, her head snapped up and she gave me a bright smile. "Don't worry, Ah Yu. There'll always be a way out of a difficult situation, even where your circumstances might tell you that there is none." As she squeezed my hand reassuringly, I felt the bubbling anxiety within me subside.

The buffalo cart slowly came to a stop. Turning around, I saw the magnificent city walls in the near distance. The green words—Guizhong Cheng—were carved on a huge plaque, mounted over the closed city gates. Refugees were huddled close together in families by the towering city walls, numbering in the thousands. Grandpa Lu dismounted from the cart and made his way through the sea of people. As he approached city gate, the guards standing in front of it waved him away dismissively. Grandpa Lu seemed to be trying to reason with them but we could not hear anything from afar. A guard escorted him away from the city gate and Grandpa Lu tried to push something into the guard's hands. The guard seemed to reject whatever it was and walked with Grandpa Lu for a few metres before turning back to return to his post.

Granny Lu let out another sigh as she lamented something under her breath.

Grandpa Lu made his way back to the cart, shaking his head hopelessly. "They won't open the gates. The Guizhong City administration refused to allow refugees in, citing concerns about overpopulation. I said that Ah Dong is living in the city but they still refused. I asked the guard earlier to help bring word to Ah Dong that we have arrived but are barred from entering."

"We can wait out here in the hope that they will open the city gates, but how long must we wait?" Granny Lu burst into a loud cry. "We'll eventually run out of food and water—will we just wait to die then?"

A few other villagers turned to look at us upon hearing Granny Lu's distraught cry. The nearest family with several young children was the first to speak to us. "We've been waiting out here for three days already. There are many others who have been here for a week, but the gates remain shut. I have so many mouths to feed, our supply of food would only last us until tomorrow. Maybe we should have just remained in our village if we're just going to die anyway!"

"We've been here for a week already. At first we stayed at the guesthouses, but then we ran out of money. So we're camping out here now." Another family shared their story, invoking a collective sigh from all the listeners.

"Has no one tried to force them to open the gates?" I asked, truly puzzled at the sight of all the villagers who had escaped from the war sitting around the city gates peaceful.

"They aren't desperate enough, yet." Fu Wanxi leaned closer to me and whispered in my ear. "They still have some hope in themselves, but when forced into a dead-end, these people will fight their way into the city."

"I wish that I could garner enough support amongst the refugees here so that we will have a large group of just rallying and demanding that they open the city gates," I lowered my head and responded in a hushed voice.

We spent the rest of the day baking in the sun as I waited for the plot to slowly unfold. The city gates would surely open eventually—we just didn't know when. When it was nightfall, the scattered groups of refugees began lighting up fires for warmth. The guards standing on the city walls and the citadel had also changed their shifts. The four of us on the buffalo cart had a brief and simple dinner before spreading out blankets on the ground and resting for the night.

In the middle of the night, there was a loud disturbance coming from the direction of the town with the teahouses and inns. Groups of people emerged from the woods and dashed across the vast open space to head straight for the city gates. I sat up immediately upon hearing the muffled shouts coming from the distance. Very soon, everyone was awoken by the noise and fear spread like a contagious disease.

"The small town nearby has been attacked in the night!" Someone nearby us shouted before telling his family to pack up their belongings.

"The Bei Yue army is coming! We need to get into the city now!"

"Open up the gates! Open up the gates! Open up the gates!"

Herds of villagers began to gather closer to the city gates, shouting and demanding for the gates to open.

Fu Wanxi and I helped the Lu couple to pack up their belongings before we followed the crowd and waited closer to the city gate. But we were unable to get close enough with an animal and a cart. We could only stand around nervously while watching the new developments unfold before us.

The ground suddenly seemed to tremble as the sound of horses galloping grew increasingly loud. From the same direction as where the sudden onslaught of escaping refugees came from, there was an army on horseback as well as foot soldiers fast approaching the city.

It was a dark night and the sight of an incoming army threw the crowd into a chaotic frenzy. But the cry of a battle horn accompanied with the sudden halting of the army drew everyone's attention.

A loud booming voice shouted from the amongst the army: "The governor of Guizhong City to comply with the Imperial Edict! General Yi Yan has received the order from His Imperial Majesty to assist in the administration of Guizhong City as of this moment in order to squash the invading forces in the Province of Nanli. Open the city gates!"

A collective whisper came from the crowd as people slowly identified the flag of Da Jin carried by soldiers. Immediately, the crowd of refugees parted like the red sea before kneeling down in the dust and crying out to General Yi Yan with pleas to open the city gates to everyone.

The heavy city gates swung open slowly but no one stood up to rush in. General Yi Yan rode his warhorse forward towards the opened city gates, and his army marched slowly behind him.

It was a dark night but the silver armour that General Yi wore shone brightly, giving hope to all. Fu Wanxi's eyes were also fixed on him. "That person..."

I turned to look at her and could not help but ask in jest. "That person... you know him?"

"He just looks like someone I once knew," she answered simply before her eyes swept downwards to look at the ground.

***

About one and a half shichens after the Da Jin army was welcomed into the city, the city gates opened once again. A soldier stood at the edge of the citadel, announcing that General Yi Yan was allowing displaced villagers to seek refuge in the city but his instructions were quickly drowned out by the excited crowd demanding to be let in.

Before the barricades inside the city could be removed, people jostled and pushed their way through the crowd to enter the city. Someone pushed against me from behind and I stumbled forward, almost losing my balance. Another person elbowed me as she scrambled forward, and not a second later, a child's foot struck me on the head as his parent carried him on his shoulder.

"Ah Yu!" I heard a faint cry from behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I caught a glimpse of Fu Wanxi stretching out a hand to pull me back. But a burly figure knocked against Fu Wanxi and blocked her from my view. To prevent myself from falling down and being trampled on in a stampede, I could only let myself be swept up in the current and pushed forward. Hugging my baggage in front of me, I followed the flow of traffic to the city gates.

"Keep moving to the left! Don't stop!" Several soldiers were standing in a certain formation, directing the flow of people. It struck me that they did not bother to check official documents. Wouldn't that mean that an enemy spy could masquerade as a refuge and infiltrate the city?

"Niang, where are we going?" A young child beside me asked her mother. Her mother replied in a fatigue voice: "If you behave well, the people in this city will give us a roof over our heads."

Behind us, the soldiers carried a wooden barricade to cut off the stream of people going in our direction. Some of the people around me suddenly turned back in panic.

"My husband is still behind! We can't be separated—please let him come over!" The young mother heaved her daughter up into her arms and dashed towards the barricade, trying to cross over.

I trailed behind her, trying to make out familiar faces in the stream of refugees who were being directed in the opposite direction. But it was too dark and the light from the fire torches around me did little to help.

The soldier replied resolutely with an uncompassionate pokerface. "The yi camp is full! Go to your temporary settlement first. You can reunite with your family members again soon."

"Which camp are those people being led to?" I asked a nearby soldier. His eyes roll downwards to examine me before he said, "the bing camp."

"And will there be an official administrative record of every person in the camps?"

"Yes."

I hurried over beside the woman who was pleading along with several others to be placed in the other camps or to allow their relatives to come over.

"Dajie," I said while crouching down beside her. "I was also separated from my family and I'm the only one here. When we get to the temporary settlements, they will record down our names and personal information. Why don't we go to our camps first, and in the next couple of days it would not be too late to find out which camp your husband is in. I can help you out with that."

She quietened down to gaze at me with eyes misted over with tears and nodded before getting up on her feet again.

Before entering the temporary settlement site, we were requested to queue up to report our identities. Some people in front seemed to be producing wooden tokens to prove their identities, but there were also several others who did not. My scalp prickled as it was nearing my turn.

"Your household register?" The soldier sitting behind the table asked without lifting his eyes from his record book.

"I don't have it right now. I lost it." I suppressed the urge to stammer and ramble on with excuses.

As he looked up at me in scrutiny, he dipped his brush into the black ink before moving it back to the book of names.

"Your full name, age, address?"

"Shi Ah Yu, 18 years old, from Wujia Village."

The soldier jotted down my personal particulars before handing me a small wooden token with the character yi written on it. After that, I was allowed to enter the site.

Temporary shelters were set up in an open space which was likely to have been a town square. Blankets and straw mats were spread out on raised platforms underneath the shelters. I walked up and down the rows of shelters, looking for a safe space to settle down, but as i was one of the last few directed to the camp, most of the shelters were already fully occupied.

"Guniang!" The woman from earlier held up her palms as she shouted to gain my attention. "Come over here, there's still space beside me."

"Thank you," I said as I marked the narrow space at the edge of the shelter as my territory with my belongings. "I was getting urgent that there didn't seem to be any more space."

She smiled gently and sat down cross-legged before placing her child on her lap. "My name is Sanniang. and my daughter's is Qu'er. What's yours?"

"Ah Yu."

Sanniang continued to smile at me, despite her haggard and tired-looking appearance. "You were right about them keeping a record of us. Like this, I still have some hope that my family will be reunited. It's just that I don't know how he's doing right now...'

I made no answer and only curved up the corners of my lips. Staring at Sanniang tuck her daughter under the warm blanket, I leaned against the wooden frame supporting the shelter and huddled up.

How was Fu Wanxi now? Was she also directed to a temporary settlement or had she already encountered Yi Yan? Now that I had lost sight of my target, was this the end of my mission?

How was I going to reunite with her?

Burying my face in my arms, I could not help but feel a sense of loss and distress.

***

[1]: 浑水摸鱼 Hun shui mo yu, one of the Thirty-Six Strategies, describes the act to seize an opportunity in chaotic or unclear situations.