He Lingchuan kept silent as well.
He had established this courage test himself; both the Gale Army and the Yuheng Army conducted similar trials. It was the final trial for recruit enlistment, and also the hardest; weeding out more than eight in ten was standard practice.
When meeting on a narrow path, the brave prevail. Without a shred of guts, courage, or an adventurous spirit, why even step onto a battlefield?
Better to go home and farm.
"Cowards," Lu Feiyan scoffed with a dismissive tsk. "Why do you think people enlist? You expect to wine and dine without risking life and limb?"
She looked down at the base of the cliff. "This is just a test of nerve, not sending you to your deaths. Only one person was smashed to death in two whole months—that's far lower than the casualty rate on the battlefield."
The man who had shouted to withdraw did not know who she was, sneering back, "If you're so brave, why don't you jump?"
Lu Feiyan eyed him askance. "If I jump, will you follow?"
The man was struck dumb.
"How about you? And you?" Lu Feiyan had a mischievous streak, deliberately asking them one by one.
Three or four men in a row held their tongues, but two recruits flushed crimson with provoked pride. "If you dare to jump, we'll follow!"
Lu Feiyan looked over at He Lingchuan. Seeing her calm, fearless gaze, he smiled and said, "If Lady Lu would be so kind as to set an example for these boys, I'll personally gift you a prime storefront on the main street."
Lu Feiyan snapped her fingers. "Done. It's a deal."
She tossed her cloak to Moqi Feng, tossing out, "Hold this for me," then walked to the cliff's edge. In that split second, she suddenly realized why He Lingchuan had told her a few days ago to bring extra changes of clothes.
Bah, I got played.
Facing the crowd, she spread her arms wide and smiled. "I'll be waiting for you down below."
With that, she leaned backward, falling straight down.
Of all the people who took the cliff leap to test their courage, she was the only one who jumped backward.
Before plummeting off the edge, she didn't forget to wave to everyone with a brilliant smile.
Everyone craned their heads over the edge and watched her plunge arrow-straight, headfirst, breaking the surface with a soft plop and barely a whisper of spray.
A crisp, clean, yet quiet high-cliff dive.
Everyone, He Lingchuan included, couldn't help applauding.
A drop of eight zhang was nearly thirty meters.
Yet she controlled her splash so cleanly that if someone only listened without looking, they would think a mere pebble had fallen in.
Moqi Feng waited a few breaths, then nodded. "The spray hasn't turned red. She's fine."
Just as he spoke, Lu Feiyan breached the water, leapt onto a reef along the shore, and waved to the people atop the cliff, signaling that she was unharmed.
The soul-snatching mirror murmured, "This girl is quite wild."
He Lingchuan smiled. "Not bad. Not bad at all."
Bazhang Cliff only looked terrifying. In truth, nine chi beneath the surface, yin hui had cleared away three submerged reefs and hollowed out a deeper basin, providing nearly three zhang of deep water to cushion a high dive.
As for the jagged, interlocking crags that appeared to lie "directly below," they were merely an optical illusion caused by parallax. Short of gale-force winds, anyone falling from the cliff would never hit them.
Some recruits had been knocked unconscious during the trial, but no one had ever died from the fall.
Moqi Feng's claim that "someone was smashed to death two months ago" was nothing more than an intimidation tactic for greenhorns.
Someone had died, so they wouldn't jump? Because it was unsafe?
Was a battlefield safe, then? People died in war—did soldiers refuse to charge because of that?
Seeing a young woman leap without hesitation, one of the two recruits who had bet with her gritted his teeth, charged forward, let out a yell, and plummeted down.
He Lingchuan watched and nodded in satisfaction. "Very good. Pass."
The other recruit turned pale and green by turns, then suddenly spun around and bolted backward.
Moqi Feng overtook him in two strides and grabbed him by the collar. "A real man keeps his word!"
Before the man could react, he felt weightless, soaring out over the cliff as though riding the clouds!
"Aaaah—"
The shriek cut short, followed by a loud splash.
"Got less guts than a lass." Moqi Feng dusted off his hands. "Next!"
With Lu Feiyan having set the example, the grown men waiting in line summoned their nerve, and five or six leapt in succession.
Lu Feiyan was nimble and agile, quickly climbing back up to the cliff. Moqi Feng noticed she had already changed into a set of dry clothes, with only the ends of her hair still dripping.
Lei Ni immediately handed her a white towel. Lu Feiyan unbraided her hair, drying it as she asked He Lingchuan, "I set an example for your recruits. You won't go back on your promise about that shop, will you?"
"Rest easy, it's guaranteed," He Lingchuan smiled. "The deed will be delivered shortly."
Satisfied, Lu Feiyan took a gold clasp and loosely bound her thick, long hair at the nape of her neck.
The girl finally looked somewhat gentle and feminine, drawing repeated glances from the soldiers nearby.
Taking her cloak back from Moqi Feng, she thanked him with a cheerful grin, then asked He Lingchuan, "I see you have quite a mixed bunch here—refugees, Bailong tribesmen, even archipelago pirates. Aren't you worried it'll be too chaotic to manage?"
"What is there to fear?" He Lingchuan laughed. "My only worry is not having enough people."
Lu Feiyan asked seemingly offhandedly, "Oh? What do you need so many people for?"
"Numbers bolster courage," He Lingchuan replied with equal casualness. "Otherwise, too many covet Yangshan. I told them this place isn't as good as it looks, but none of them would believe me."
"What's not good about it?" Lu Feiyan sighed. "I've only been here half a day, and I already want to stay for good rather than return to the smoke and fire of the front line."
Lei Ni chimed in from the side, "Indeed. No one wants war."
He Lingchuan stood with his hands behind his back. "Someone must protect home and country."
"True." Lu Feiyan nodded. "You're far more open-minded than my mother. She nags from morning till night, insisting women shouldn't be on the battlefield."
Just then, an egret descended from the sky, perching beside He Lingchuan and spitting out a slip of paper from its beak.
He Lingchuan unfolded it casually, skimmed it, and handed the slip to Moqi Feng. "Trouble's here. Suspend the test. We're heading out."
"Yes, sir!" Moqi Feng took one look and understood. He waved to his subordinates. "Fall out!"
Wearing an apologetic look, He Lingchuan said to Lu Feiyan, "Something has come up, so this afternoon's guard drills are canceled. My apologies for having you make the trip for nothing."
"How could earning a prime storefront be for nothing?" Lu Feiyan asked curiously. "What sort of trouble has cropped up? Mind sharing?"
"The Qinglong tribe to the east took delivery of a grain shipment from us, but they're welshing on the final payment. The manager sent by the Yangshan Chamber of Commerce to collect was even thoroughly humiliated."
"The Qinglong tribe?" Lu Feiyan pondered. "Isn't that a tribe from the Ya Kingdom?"
"Indeed," He Lingchuan said as he led the way down the mountain. "That is no way to do business. We need to have a proper chat with the Qinglong tribe and talk some sense into them."
"Talk sense into them? You..." Lu Feiyan started, then realized what he meant and let out a prolonged "Ooooh."
The message just now had been sent by Guan Ke via the egret.
The Yangshan Archipelago had recently sold a shipment of grain to the Qinglong tribe of the Ya Kingdom, but the buyer defaulted, refusing to pay the remaining funds.
With a bumper harvest of winter wheat, the archipelago had kept enough for its own needs and could sell the rest.
Rain had been plentiful and sunshine abundant this year, with favorable weather prevailing. Barring unforeseen events, the autumn harvest three or four months later would overflow the granaries even further.
Ding Zuodong and Guan Ke had lined up buyers long in advance; as soon as the grain was harvested, it was loaded onto ships and transported out. Cargo ships queuing to leave port had become a familiar sight along the shores of the Yangshan Archipelago.
Naturally, the primary buyers of this grain were merchant guilds from the Mou Kingdom, but He Lingchuan had also instructed his men to sell a portion to the Ya Kingdom to the east.
Among them, the Qinglong tribe placed the largest order. Yet after the Yangshan Archipelago delivered the grain to their doorstep, the Qinglong tribe claimed the wheat kernels were shriveled and of abysmal quality, refusing to pay the balance.
He Lingchuan knew perfectly well, however, that all grain sold from the archipelago had passed spot checks before leaving the storehouses.
Under the circumstances, the manager sent by the archipelago offered to take the grain back, but the other party refused, claiming it had already been thrown away.
The Qinglong tribe paid only a deposit and expected to keep all the grain?
How was that any different from open robbery?
When the manager went a second time to demand payment, the Qinglong tribe seized him, shaved his head bald, smeared eye-catching red paint over his scalp to humiliate him, stripped him of everything inside and out except for a pair of pants to cover his modesty, and drove him back onto the boat amid roaring laughter.
Upon the manager's return to the Yangshan Archipelago, Guan Ke promptly reported the matter to He Lingchuan.
"The Qinglong tribe's credit has always been dubious; even other nearby tribes in the Ya Kingdom avoid doing business with them," Moqi Feng remarked as they walked. "They've never done business with us before, have they?"
"They bought grain from us twice before, paying in full both times. Only on the third order did they ask for such a large quantity, after which they defaulted." It had clearly been premeditated.
"My clansmen tell me the southern part of the Ya Kingdom saw sparse rain this year, so the harvest was mediocre. Quite a few folks will probably go hungry."
"Did the Ya Kingdom not use origin power for climate control?" One function of origin power was to ensure favorable weather. The Ya Kingdom had possessed great momentum in recent years, so its supply of origin power should have been abundant.
"They probably did; otherwise, it would have been an outright severe drought this year, wouldn't it?"
A "mediocre harvest" was already far better than "total crop failure," thanks to the regulation of origin power.
The heavens followed their own laws. No matter how formidable origin power was, it couldn't magically turn parched wasteland into fertile fields—otherwise, why would Panlong City have clung so desperately to the Chipa Plateau?
"A poor harvest in southern Ya Kingdom?" He Lingchuan mused. "That bodes ill for the neighboring countries."
The territory of the Ya Kingdom was expansive, yet predominantly made up of barren steppes. Its south served as the vital grain-producing belt, the breadbasket of the entire realm.
If such a country ran short on grain, given its temperament... well.
Moqi Feng assumed the island master had stepped into a pitfall out of ignorance regarding the Qinglong tribe, unaware that this was the very opportunity He Lingchuan had been awaiting.
Train an army for a thousand days to use it for an hour.
He had recruited and drilled troops for nine months; the time had come to test their mettle.
Lu Feiyan spoke up at once. "Take me along, will you?"
He Lingchuan feigned a touch of surprise. "Lady Lu, there might be conflict on this trip. Besides, it's quite a distance—two days by boat."
"Since I couldn't watch the drills, wouldn't actual combat be even better?" Lu Feiyan laughed. "My brother has already set out for the front lines, and they can spare me for now. I've got plenty of free time."
"Blades and spears show no mercy in battle..."
"I can protect myself." With a faint flash of light in Lu Feiyan's hand, she drew a longsword and twirled it into an effortless flourish.
Chapter 1058