After crossing the Longmen Yellow River Bridge, the procession advanced smoothly toward Han City, a key hub within the Tongguan Circuit.
Han City was no small town.
It sat astride one of the most important military and transportation arteries linking Guanzhong to the Central Plains. Garrisons were strong, defenses intact, and the imperial banners still flew from the walls. Unlike many regions ravaged by chaos, Han City remained firmly under court control.
Which made what Shi Kefa saw next all the more striking.
He deliberately detoured to a grain store.
There was no need to announce his rank. He asked like an ordinary traveler, inquiring about prices, availability, and recent fluctuations.
The answer confirmed his suspicions.
"A dou of grain—one hundred and twenty wen."
Shi Kefa paused.
That price was astonishingly low.
Not famine-low, not panic-low—but normal-year low. Barely higher than prices in years untouched by flood, drought, or rebellion.
And the pattern held true everywhere he checked.
The closer they drew to Chengcheng County, the cheaper grain became.
The effect of this abundance was immediately visible.
Markets were lively. Workshops had reopened. Peddlers called out cheerfully from street corners. Even the poor looked less hollow-eyed, their shoulders no longer bent under constant dread.
A city that had exhaled after holding its breath for too long.
As Shi Kefa walked through the streets, his attention was drawn to a small teahouse by the roadside.
A storyteller stood at its entrance, fan in hand, voice rising and falling dramatically as he addressed a gathered crowd.
"…Now this fellow, Shi Jian, traveled all the way to Gao Family Village in Chengcheng County! He worked himself half to death, earned a bit of copper, and then thought to himself—'Is this all there is? A lifetime of labor for a handful of coins?'"
The crowd leaned in.
"So he made up his mind! Packed a sack of flour, two ounces of cured meat, and set out to apprentice under a blacksmith! But just as he stepped past the bamboo grove—thwack! A sharp pain at the back of his head, and down he went! Knocked clean unconscious!"
Even Shi Kefa stopped.
Against his will, curiosity hooked him.
"And then?" someone urged.
The storyteller snapped his fan shut with a sharp clack.
"For the rest of this thrilling tale," he declared smugly, "you must return for the next telling!"
Groans erupted.
Shi Kefa frowned. "You stop there? Just as it becomes interesting? Is this how performers earn a living—by tormenting their audience?"
The waiter hurried over, bowing apologetically. "Please, noble sir, have some tea to soothe your temper."
Shi Kefa accepted the cup absentmindedly and took a sip.
His hand froze.
His eyes widened.
This was… Longjing.
Not just any Longjing—pre-Qingming Longjing, the highest grade imaginable. Even in Jiangnan, such tea would only appear at the tables of high ministers or wealthy clans.
Yet here it was.
In a roadside teahouse.
"Where," Shi Kefa asked slowly, "did this tea come from?"
The waiter smiled proudly. "Our owner's younger brother! He teaches at the Gao Family Village School in Chengcheng County. This tea was a 'comfort gift' for the teachers—bestowed by the Dao Xuan Tianzun Himself! He doesn't care much for tea, so he sent it back. The owner thought it'd be a shame not to serve it."
At the words Dao Xuan Tianzun , everything clicked.
Shi Kefa nearly laughed.
A man who could bestow a bridge across the Yellow River—what was a little tea to him?
He gently patted the waiter's shoulder. "Tell your owner this tea is extremely precious. Even in Jiangnan, it is not easily obtained. He should not serve it carelessly."
The waiter blinked. "Is it really that valuable?"
Before Shi Kefa could answer, the storyteller had vanished.
Disappointed, Shi Kefa asked, "What was the rest of the story?"
"Oh, that?" the waiter chuckled. "It's from Gao Piao. Most folks have already read the comic. The storyteller just adds flair."
"Comic?" Shi Kefa echoed.
"Yes, sir. There's a bookstore just around the corner."
Shi Kefa went.
Inside, shelves stretched wall to wall.
About half the books were familiar: the Four Books, the Five Classics, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin.
The rest were utterly baffling.
Chinese.Mathematics.Physics.Chemistry.
He understood the first two titles. The latter two might as well have been spells from a Daoist scripture.
Then he saw the illustrated volumes.
Chronicles of the Dao Xuan Tianzun, Dao Xuan: Demon Slayer.
His heart skipped.
Recalling the golden hand, the bridge, the casual defiance of Heaven and Earth—Shi Kefa bought all six volumes without hesitation.
Further in were more illustrated works: Generals of the Yang Family, Legend of Yue Fei, Romance of the Three Kingdoms—and finally, Gao Piao.
On impulse, he bought everything unfamiliar.
By the time his attendants staggered out under the weight of books, Shi Kefa was already flipping pages.
Mounted on horseback, he read as they traveled toward Heyang County.
Volume after volume.
Slowly, the image sharpened.
Dao Xuan Tianzun.
The bridges. The fertilizer. The rain. The strange tools. The casual reshaping of fate.
A chill ran through him.
So it was truly him, Shi Kefa thought. The deity from the pages… standing before me at Dragon Gate Ferry.
"My lord," an attendant reported, "the crops in Heyang County… they're growing unusually well."
Shi Kefa closed the book and looked.
The fields were lush beyond reason. Thick stalks, heavy heads of grain. Not merely healthy—abundant.
Calmly, he said, "Celestial Fertilizer."
The attendant stared.
"The third volume explains it," Shi Kefa added. "Yields double. Sometimes more."
He withdrew his confidential report and reread the line: 'Grain prices are suspiciously low.'
He sighed.
"During the Tianqi reign, Chengcheng and Heyang together supported roughly two hundred thousand people. In good years. Now, with doubled yields, they can sustain four hundred thousand. With reclaimed land… half a million."
He folded the letter.
"I feared their ability to absorb refugees was unnatural," he murmured. "But now I see—it is merely sound calculation."
Heaven had intervened.
But humans had risen to meet it.
And that, Shi Kefa realized, was the most unsettling truth of all.
Trivia:
Court vs. Reality in the Late Ming Dynasty (Why the System Was Already Cracking)
1. Paper Governance vs. Ground Truth
By the late Ming, the imperial court increasingly ruled by memorial, not by observation.
Officials were evaluated on how good their reports sounded, not how accurate they were.
Disaster reports were routinely softened:
"Localized difficulty" = mass starvation
"Bandit disturbance" = full-scale rebellion
Grain output, population numbers, and tax capacity were systematically inflated to avoid blame.
Result: The court believed stability existed because paper said so, while reality burned.
2. The Tyranny of "Precedent"
Late Ming officials were trapped by precedent.
Even when conditions changed drastically (climate cooling, floods, famine),
Policy responses were expected to match earlier dynastic solutions, regardless of relevance.
Example:
Famine relief quotas were based on old population registers, many decades outdated.
Counties that had lost half their people were still taxed as if fully populated.
Reality adapted. The court refused to.
3. Silver Economy Collapse
The Ming tax system depended almost entirely on silver, not grain.
Taxes were paid in silver.
Soldiers were paid in silver.
Transport and logistics required silver.
But:
Global silver inflows dropped in the 1630s (Japan & Spanish Americas).
Rural China ran out of currency.
So peasants had:
Grain, but no silver → couldn't pay taxes
Officials demanded silver anyway → forced grain seizure
Result: grain existed, people starved, and the court saw "tax resistance."
4. Officials Feared Being Correct
Telling the truth was dangerous.
Reporting "grain is abundant" → higher tax quotas next year.
Reporting "grain is scarce" → accusation of incompetence or corruption.
Reporting "local order has collapsed" → dismissal or worse.
So most officials reported:
"Barely stable, but under control."
Which meant:
No emergency response.
No troop redeployment.
No real reform.
The system incentivized lying conservatively.
5. Jinyiwei Intelligence Became Theater
By Chongzhen's reign:
Jinyiwei still gathered intelligence,
but reports were filtered multiple times before reaching the emperor.
Sensitive information was softened to avoid panic.
Ironically:
Bandit leaders often knew more about real conditions than the court.
Refugees moved faster than information.
The state knew too late, always.
6. Local Solutions vs. Central Suspicion
When local officials did succeed:
Stabilizing grain prices
Absorbing refugees
Maintaining order without military force
The court response was often suspicion:
"Where did the grain come from?"
"Are they hoarding?"
"Are they forming private power bases?"
This paranoia:
Discouraged innovation
Punished competence
Ensured dependency on failing central logistics
A functional county was seen as a political threat.
7. Why Shi Kefa Is Historically Believable
Shi Kefa (史可法) historically:
Was methodical, cautious, and morally rigid
Believed deeply in verification by observation
Distrusted exaggerated reports — both good and bad
His hesitation to submit a report until he personally confirmed reality is extremely accurate to late-Ming reformist officials.
Men like him existed — they were just too few and too late.
Bottom Line (One-Sentence Truth)
The late Ming didn't collapse because nothing worked — it collapsed because the court could no longer recognize what did.