Breaking the Ming, Seizing the Throne

Zhong Huaiqian: “This is what the world should look like: granaries full of millet in Chang’an’s wards and markets, no bones bleaching atop Luoyang’s walls, and the rice paddies of Jiangnan reflecting children reciting the Thousand Character Classic. The boatmen’s chants on the Yellow River should carry the fading notes of the Guangling Melody. But what lies beneath my feet now? ‘Two-legged sheep’ for sale outside Qingzhou, marked with signs around their necks; the rotting corpse of a man wearing an imperial graduate’s cap floating on the Qinhuai River. Those men sit high in the grand hall, laughing as they shave the bamboo strips of the Rites of Zhou into knives to scrape the bones, and boil human flesh soup with the pages of Mencius. How absurd! How hateful!”

“I see it clearly now. What they call contending for the throne of the Central Plains is nothing but building the steps to a new dynasty with millions of bones.”

“If benevolence and righteousness must be paid for with bones, then I’ll be the one holding the knife. I only hope that a hundred years from now, there will be no more winter nights when people eat their own children.”

“And you think you can do it?”

“Not by myself. Have you ever heard that a single spark can start a prairie fire?”

“It’s too hard. You’re too naive.”

“Just because it’s hard, we shouldn’t try? Should we let foreign hooves trample the common people? Naive? What’s the harm in trying? Whether you stick your head out or keep it tucked in, the blade will fall either way. That’s life.”