Song Chu: Dad, if you don't work hard, how can I just lie down and relax?

Chapter 33: Midnight rebellion

"Open the door! Open the door now! It's the inspectors! Routine check!"

"Sir! Sir! It's the middle of the night, please wait a moment, just a little while, let my wife and I get dressed and then we'll open the door for you, please don't break down my door!" came the shopkeeper's tearful plea from inside the door.

To his surprise, the soldiers outside were even happier. They had started banging on the door because they heard noises coming from inside the shop.

In ancient times, most shops were used for both business and residence. Late at night, the shop owner and his wife were having sex. The soldiers were not happy about this: "The brothers have to patrol the night in this cold weather, and you are at home sleeping with your wife?"

This is only the beginning of a new dynasty, and the brothers aren't as prosperous as they were in previous dynasties. Everyone's living in fear and trembling. And you dare to exercise at night? And you dare to drool over us?

You're looking down on us men.

Ignoring the shop owner's pleas, the crowd kicked the wooden door of the shop with even greater force, some even pulling out short hammers from their waists and smashing them, cursing as they kicked:

"Stop talking nonsense! We brothers patrolled all night, we're freezing! Who are we patrolling day and night for? Isn't it for you, the common people?"

The shopkeeper dared not delay any longer. Forgetting his clothes, he hastily threw on a pair of trousers and quickly opened the door, holding a bag of money in his hand.

"Sir! Sir, this is what our shop has sold over the past two days. This is all we have. Please take this. It's for tea. Please take it and buy some hot wine and tea to warm yourselves. This is my way of showing my respect to you."

"Hmm, you're quite sensible."

The leading officer put the money bag in his pocket, but suddenly peeked inside. The proprietress hadn't even had time to get dressed and was hiding under the covers, refusing to show her face.

"Sir, sir, my wife is ugly, not worth looking at, not worth looking at at all."

"Ugly? Let me see just how ugly it is."

As they spoke, the group filed in, and when the boss tried to stop them, he slapped him aside.

"Hey guys, this woman's pretty fair-skinned."

"Haha, yeah, she's quite fair-skinned."

Seeing this, the boss sighed, but decided to accept his fate and went outside on his own, where he sat down on the ground and started crying.

Kaifeng has experienced two massacres in the past ten years. The first was when Zhang Yanzhe's troops entered the city and searched for three days. Historical records state that the market was emptied and the streets were filled with corpses.

One instance was ten years ago when Guo Wei massacred a city. The original order was to plunder for ten days, but at Chai Rong's urging, it was changed to one day and one night.

His wife had already been violated twice during those two massacres, so one more round wouldn't make a difference. She wasn't some unmarried young girl; she could just endure it.

The young girl has to endure it; one must first survive.

I just don't know when this hellish world will end, or if it will ever end.

"Stop right there! The Emperor has ordered that the army is forbidden from looting. Which garrison are you from?"

Suddenly, a very young voice shouted.

The shopkeeper looked up, somewhat bewildered, and saw a young man come out holding a short knife, shouting to stop him.

The young man had a fair complexion and wore an extremely luxurious embroidered Shu brocade robe. He had a jade pendant hanging from his waist, a large pearl on his hat, and even the scabbard and hilt of his short sword were clearly inlaid with valuable gemstones.

He looks like a noble young master from some wealthy family.

Behind the young nobleman were two other young noblemen of similar age, half a step behind him. They were also armed, with solemn expressions and tense faces.

It was Zhao Guangmei, Wang Lu, and Li Jilong who were in the group. Because they hadn't carried lanterns, and the night patrol soldiers hadn't been patrolling seriously, they hadn't seen them earlier. They just happened to run into this incident.

Wang Lu tried to stop her, but he couldn't, and Zhao Guangmei still managed to break through.

"Where did you come from, little brats? Who are you?"

The soldiers and bandits, whose good time had been interrupted, were about to shout and curse when they saw Zhao Guangmei's attire and were instinctively stunned. Although Wang Lu and Li Jilong looked nervous, they obviously didn't show any fear on their faces and immediately swallowed their curses.

Although the soldiers of the Five Dynasties were a bit arrogant, they were not stupid.

"Whose children are you? Why are you wandering around outside so late at night, violating curfew?"

Upon hearing this, Zhao Guangmei was about to remove the ivory waist tag from his belt, which was the forbidden palace pass and his proof of entry and exit.

Zhao Kuangyin had only one wife and two concubines. There were only a handful of men in Kaifeng who could produce this jade plaque, so this ivory plaque was sufficient proof of his identity.

Seeing this, Wang Lu stepped forward and blocked Zhao Guangmei's path, drawing his sword fully and thrusting it at the soldier's face.

"Who do you think you are to ask my young master's name? Where is Wang Yansheng, the inspector of Kaifeng? Are you his soldiers? Tell him to get over here and see my young master."

The thugs hesitated for a moment, then said things like "We'll go call them right now" and ran off.

Zhao Kuangyin did indeed issue a strict order prohibiting robbery. It was one thing to disregard it in private, but it was a completely different matter once it was weighed.

Zhao Guangmei and her two companions are clearly not ordinary people. They are still so confident at this time. They are most likely not the children of civil officials from the previous dynasty. They don't even care about Wang Yansheng, a confidant of the emperor. Why don't they run away?

Seeing that everyone had run away, Zhao Guangmei turned to glare at Wang Lu: "Why did you let them escape? I was planning to arrest them and deal with them according to military law as a warning to others. And why didn't you let me take off my badge?"

Wang Lu first looked at the shop owner and said, "Go back to sleep."

Seeing this, the boss quickly knelt down and kowtowed three times to them before rushing back into the house and closing the door, which was now severely damaged.

Wang Lu then explained, "Your status is too high. Firstly, I'm afraid they might be desperate and try to kill you in the middle of the night to cover it up. Secondly, and more importantly, now is not a good time to enforce military discipline."

"Why isn't this the perfect time? Now is the perfect opportunity to arrest them all, let our eldest brother kill them, enforce military discipline, serve as a warning to others, and restore true peace to Kaifeng."

I've figured it out. With these soldiers so unruly, grain prices in Kaifeng won't come down. Living in such conditions every day, the people are naturally going to hoard grain like crazy.

"Do you think the Emperor is unaware of these things?"

Zhao Guangmei opened her mouth, her eyes wide with anger, but she was speechless.

Even Wang Lu knew about these things, so how could his elder brother not know?

"My elder brother, doesn't he have the ability to control the army either?"

"It's not that they lack the ability, but that the timing is wrong. When the timing is wrong, the results are half as good as twice the effort. When the timing is right, the results are twice as good with half the effort. It's not that the officials don't want to get involved, nor that they lack the ability to get involved. They are just waiting for the right opportunity. When the time is right, they will naturally get involved."

"Timing? What timing? Explain yourself! What timing?"