As they crossed from the southern province of Guangdong into Jiangxi, the river—a vital artery of the empire—began to feel like a narrowing throat.
The Gan River was "shrunken," its water levels depleted by the erratic climate of the Little Ice Age. In the prosperous years of the Ming, poets had written of the lush banks echoing with the calls of monkeys; now, those sounds were replaced by the rhythmic, haunting wail of the starving.
They had been traveling for fifteen days. Shen Li sat at the bow, the rhythmic scritch-scratch of her scalpel against a whetstone marking the passage of time. She hadn't needed to kill many in these two weeks, but she had saved plenty—mostly to ensure their Wupeng boat, a small vessel with a signature black awning, kept its "priority" status as they navigated the increasingly lawless waters.
"Traveler, Ji'an Prefecture is just ahead," Old Zhang whispered, his voice trembling as he pointed toward the gray mist masking the water. Ji'an was an administrative heart of the region, but today it looked like a fortress under siege. "But... I don't think we can pass."
Shen Li looked up.
The river ahead was choked. It was a floating city of misery—shattered fishing boats, crude rafts, and even heavy wooden doors lashed together to serve as makeshift floats. These weren't merchants; they were a sea of refugees fleeing the collapse of the north.
Thousands of displaced souls were being held at bay by a massive government blockade. High atop the gray stone battlements of Ji'an, archers stood ready. In this desperate year of 1644, the government's mercy had run dry: any refugee who dared come within three hundred paces of the city gates was shot without warning.
"They say the refugees brought the Geda Wen—the 'Lumpy Plague'—down from the north," Zhang said, clutching his mute grandson. "The Governor has sealed the river. No one goes in, no one comes out."
The Lumpy Plague.
The movement of Shen Li's whetstone stopped. She knew this demon well. In the West, physicians called it the Bubonic Plague, or the Black Death. It was a butcher far more efficient than any army in the Thirty Years' War, having once claimed a third of all life in Europe.
"Move us closer," Shen Li said, stowing her blade. "I have a way through."
The boat picked its way through the wreckage of human lives. The air was thick with a cloying, sweet rot—the scent of decomposing flesh mixed with human waste.
Shen Li saw a young mother on a small skiff, cradling an infant whose body had already gone cold and gray. The child's neck was swollen with a purple-black lump the size of a walnut—a "bubo," the hallmark of the plague. Nearby, on a pile of floating corpses, rats moved with terrifying boldness, feasting in the broad daylight.
This was the grim reality of the dying Ming Dynasty: while the far south still dreamed of silk and wine, the heart of the empire had become a charnel house.
As they neared the heavy iron water-gates, militia men wearing protective face masks and brandishing spears began to shout: "Back! Fall back! Ji'an is sealed! Death to all who intrude!"
"I am not entering the city," Shen Li stood at the bow, holding up a parchment wrapped in oilskin and a bottle of high-proof alcohol she had distilled herself. "I am a physician. I can treat your commander's wound."
The militia hesitated.
High on the watchtower behind the gate, a man in a Ba-zong's uniform—a junior garrison lieutenant—was groaning in agony. An arrow wound in his thigh had turned necrotic; the flesh was black and foul-smelling. In this era, without antibiotics or proper surgery, such a wound meant either a crude amputation or a slow death by sepsis.
Fifteen minutes later, Shen Li was "invited" onto the tower.
The lieutenant was deathly pale. He trembled at the sight of Shen Li's gleaming willow-leaf blade. "You... a woman? A doctor? You're going to use a knife on me?"
"If you want to live, shut up," Shen Li said coldly.
She didn't bother explaining the principles of sterilization to men who still believed in humors and demons. She poured the alcohol over the blade and struck a flint. Blue flames danced along the steel, reflected in her unblinking eyes.
"Is this the 'Fire Therapy' of the West?" a trembling old Imperial physician asked from the corner, watching in disbelief.
Shen Li ignored him. Her hands moved with a precision that made the old doctor gasp. She sliced through the rot, bypassing major arteries with a surgeon's ease, and extracted the barbed arrowhead buried deep in the muscle.
"AGH!" The lieutenant screamed once and surrendered to unconsciousness.
"Sutures," Shen Li muttered, dropping the bloody arrowhead and pulling catgut thread and a curved needle from her kit.
The surgery was over in the time it took to burn a single stick of incense.
Shen Li washed the blood from her hands and looked at the old physician, Dr. Li. He was a renowned scholar in Ji'an, but faced with modern trauma and the plague, his ancient texts on herbal medicine felt tragically useless.
"Lady... your skill is divine," Dr. Li stammered, bowing low. "Where did you study such arts?"
"In the West," Shen Li pointed toward the setting sun. Then, she cut to the chase. "Tell me the truth of the plague in the North."
Dr. Li sighed, the wrinkles on his face deepening.
"Tragedy. The plague has swept down from Beijing. They say in the capital... thousands of bodies are carried out every day. Even the Emperor's elite guards are falling in their tracks." He lowered his voice to a fearful whisper. "And it is not just the sickness."
"What else?"
"The rebels," the old man whispered. "News reached us two weeks ago: Li Zicheng, the 'Dashing King' who leads the peasant uprisings, has declared himself Emperor in the west. His army of a million is crossing the Yellow River even as we speak. They are marching to encircle Beijing. And General Sun Chuanting... the last great general holding the empire's military together... is dead."
Shen Li's heart constricted.
Sun Chuanting is dead.
In Europe, she had heard merchants speak of him as the only man capable of stopping the rebel tides. There was a saying now spreading like wildfire: "When Chuanting dies, the Ming dies with him." It wasn't just news; it was a death knell for the dynasty.
"So, the road to Beijing is now a road to hell?" Shen Li asked.
"Worse. It is the gate of ghosts," Dr. Li urged. "With your skills, why go north to die? Stay in the South. Go to Nanjing. It is the 'Southern Capital,' still rich and safe. You would find wealth there beyond imagining."
Shen Li remained silent, looking toward the brooding northern sky.
Wealth? Fame? The tools in her trunk could buy her a life of luxury in any city. But some debts—like the one she owed her brother—had to be settled in the heart of the storm.
"Thank you for the warning, scholar."
Shen Li picked up her trunk and headed for the docks.
The lieutenant, now awake and desperate to repay his savior, had given her a "command flag" of the Ji'an Patrol. With this official banner, Old Zhang's boat finally cleared the blockade between life and death.
As the boat reached the center of the river, Shen Li looked back.
The mother with the dead child was still there, staring blankly at the sky. Behind her, something moved among the floating corpses.
Shen Li pulled out a brass "thousand-mile lens"—a telescope she had brought from Europe—and focused.
In the lens, she saw figures moving under the cover of night. They were stripping clothes from the dead... and some, driven mad by hunger, were carving meat from the bodies.
Shen Li collapsed the telescope with a sharp clack.
"Zhang, increase the pace."
"Where to, Traveler?"
"Nanjing," Shen Li's voice was as cold as the river. "Before the world completely collapses, I need to buy supplies that only the Southern Capital can provide."
The rain began to fall—an icy, night rain that muffled the wails of the ghosts on the water. Shen Li leaned against the cabin wall, clutching her brother's letter, and didn't sleep a wink.