Chapter Fourteen Eye of the Storm

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EYE OF THE STORM

When the men in my village weren’t watching Chrysalis battles on their tablets, they’d be watching cùjū games, shouting in unison as sweaty men in loose, cropped clothes and frayed topknots kicked a ball around a massive arena. I’ve glimpsed Chang’an’s Phoenix Nest stadium many times on various screens, overflowing with bright lights and fifty thousand cheering spectators.

The seats are full tonight, though no one is cheering. The blocks and blocks of people don’t speak any louder than murmurs. Through a random draw open to low-income Chang’an households, they received an invitation to witness what’s about to happen.

From a dark passageway at the ground level, I keep an eye on the audience. If things go off the rails, I can turn my wheelchair around and escape at once. And so can Yizhi, if he needs to.

“Keep yourself safe, okay?” I say to him across the passageway.

“I will,” he says, maintaining as much distance from me as possible. It’s a beat later that he remembers to add, “Your Highness.”

I’d rather he didn’t.

He checks his wristlet, then adjusts his earpiece and says a cue. A floodlight in the stadium switches on with a loud sound, blanching a booth above the audience stands.

Yizhi raises a microphone and announces, “The Emperor and Empress of Huaxia have arrived!” His disembodied voice broadcasts through the stadium speakers. He’s not meant to be seen just yet.

Everyone hushes and pivots in their seats to kneel as best as they can toward the booth. Body doubles of me and Qin Zheng step into the light in their replica spirit armor, their respective masks disguising their features.

“My citizens!” Qin Zheng’s voice fills the stadium. A close-up of him plays on several jumbo screens, prerecorded in his quarantine chamber and edited over a shot of the booth. With his body double matching his gestures as he denounces Zhuge Liang’s message, even I have a tough time remembering it’s a stitched-up illusion.

“The reactionaries fear the economy will collapse if we change too much too quickly. The same economy that has been collapsing into crisis every few years? Do they believe me incapable of reading reports of the regular recessions since my disappearance? How many of you, the common folk, lost your savings and livelihoods when the residential property market imploded a mere three years ago?”

Scattered cries of outrage rise around the stadium. Then more join in, increasing in density and volume.

Three years ago…that was about when Yizhi and I first met. I vaguely remember him talking about this, remarking that while everyone else in the cities was panicking over going bankrupt, his father made sixty million yuan from the crisis by “shorting” the market, whatever that means. Honestly, investing doesn’t sound much different from gambling.

“It was the irresponsibility of the banks that caused the implosion, yet what did the old order do?” Qin Zheng’s recording continues after a pause, as if he anticipated exactly how the audience would react. “It bailed them out with taxpayer money— your money! You paid the price for decisions made by the grotesquely wealthy, who learned no lesson besides that they can act without consequences! This is the system the reactionaries wish to defend?”

The audience roils more fiercely, many shouting while pumping their fists in the air.

Qin Zheng’s voice carries on over the turmoil. “Violence is not the answer, they say! But what do they count as violence, pray tell? Do they count it when landlords buy up all housing with their existing wealth and then grow even wealthier off of tenants they would not hesitate to throw into the cold? Is it not violence when a hospital turns away a patient for being unable to pay for treatment? Is it not violence when a laborer breaks his body in a factory, only to receive a mere fraction of the profits from his work? Where was the concern, the horror, of the reactionaries against these everyday acts of violence? In the name of stability and security, they condemn only the violence that challenges the status quo, never the violence that perpetuates it. Yet those of us born of the streets know full well that stability and security have only ever existed for the elites! Violence is indeed the answer when the question is whether we ought to endure exploitation so others can live in luxury!”

The audience grows close to boiling over the stands, rising to their feet while yelling in agreement.

“Enough with these excuses to do nothing so a minority among us may cling to comforts built on the backs of the less fortunate! I heard the same fearful rhetoric about revolutionary upheaval two centuries ago, yet what has their beloved incremental progress brought upon Huaxia? A future that’s become more incrementally corrupt! Clearly, there is no path forward for the humble within the comfort zone of the elites. To them, I say: This is no longer a world that caters to your delicate sensibilities. As I was reborn, so shall Huaxia be!”

Qin Zheng’s body double spreads his arms in rehearsed sync with the video on the screens. Goose bumps sweep across my skin as fifty thousand voices erupt into screaming cheers and chants for him to live for “ten thousand years, ten thousand years, ten thousand upon ten thousand years.”

I have to admit to a sense of awe at how he can captivate an audience without even being present. This is power beyond having the biggest Chrysalis or being the most skilled with spirit metal. This is the kind of power that makes a leader.

I know from Shimin’s case that becoming the strongest pilot doesn’t automatically get you the respect and adoration of the masses. If I’m to build my own power base to push the changes I want in Huaxia—changes that will free women and girls from destinies they don’t want—this is yet another skill I need to master.

I swear, the list never ends. But I have to catch up. I have to.

Qin Zheng can’t terrorize me into reining in my ambitions.

The floodlight aimed at the booth shuts off, leaving our body doubles as backlit silhouettes. Other lights switch on to illuminate the stadium’s packed-earth base, covered in markings for cùjū matches.

Yizhi cradles his microphone. This is his cue. He nearly gives me a look, but stops himself before his head fully turns. Instead, he leaves me with nothing more than a slight nod before walking out into public view. Light bathes him, turning his purple robes several shades paler. A metal gate slams down on oiled tracks in front of me. It’s meant to protect me if things go wrong, yet I can’t help the anxiety that flutters through me at not being able to rush out and protect Yizhi.

“My fellow citizens,” Yizhi says into his microphone after reaching the center of the stadium. He raises his left fist, his words and image broadcasting across Huaxia. “My name is Gao Yizhi. However, it is not a name I am proud to have, because my family’s legacy was built upon deception, coercion, and exploitation.”

With his raised left hand, he pulls out the long pin securing his hat, pushes his hat to the ground, and unties his topknot. His hair falls free over his back.

My anxiety rises. What he’s about to do will be controversial.

“For too long, I watched my father and his associates live outside the law, amassing their fortunes by exploiting the common folk without mercy. The crimes of my bloodline run deep, too much for me to atone for in one lifetime. But I will certainly make an effort!”

Yizhi tucks his microphone into a leather belt at his waist. From another side of the belt, he whips out a dagger that glints in the stadium lights. He gathers his hair and puts the blade to the bundle.

A collective gasp goes through the stadium. It takes several drags for Yizhi to slice through his hair. The surviving locks fall beside his neck in uneven lengths. He swaps the dagger for his microphone once more and raises his severed hair like an offering toward the booth with mine and Qin Zheng’s body doubles.

“From this moment on, I shall take the family name of my mother, a humble-born concubine who died by my father’s whims! I, Zhang Yizhi, pledge my utmost loyalty not to my crooked kin, but to His Majesty the Emperor, who will free Huaxia from its corruption!” Yizhi turns in a circle, showing his severed hair to the audience. “Other sons of criminals, I urge you to join me before it’s too late!”

He opens his hand. His hair scatters away. Turning some more, he points at a passageway in the stadium opposite mine. “Bring in the accused!”

The gate of the passageway lifts up. Soldiers usher in three shivering men. Their robes are of the finest embroidered silk, yet they’re chained at the wrists and ankles. Earlier today, Yizhi named them to Qin Zheng as three of Chang’an’s most notoriously corrupt men. Judging by the jeers that swell through the audience the moment their faces appear on the big screens, he wasn’t exaggerating.

Three more people emerge from a different passageway, wearing tunics and trousers of much rougher fabric. Witnesses to the men’s crimes. Although we guaranteed safety for them and their families, they don’t look any less nervous than the captured oligarchs.

The soldiers spread the three accused men across the stadium grounds, then they give Yizhi a raised-fist salute before forcing the men to their knees. Yizhi walks over to one of them, a lanky, gray-haired man in emerald-green robes adorned with complex embroidery. On the big screens, the venom in Yizhi’s eyes is unmistakable. I have a feeling this man is one that Gao Qiu sent Yizhi to as a child.

Yizhi speaks with no emotion. “Cai Jing, owner of Huashi Construction, do you admit to embezzling millions from government building contracts, cutting costs with cheap materials and dangerous work conditions, and bribing the officials of the old order to look the other way?”

Yizhi angles his microphone toward Cai Jing.

“I did no such—!” Cai Jing lurches up, but a soldier pushes him back down.

Now Yizhi calls on one of the witnesses. “Miss Qiu. Your husband worked on a project of Cai Jing’s, where he and many other workers developed a debilitating lung condition from inhaling toxic dust. Is this true?”

The woman scuttles over to Yizhi on natural-sized feet, evidently from a family that never considered the possibility of her marrying rich. After giving a hesitant raised-fist salute, she takes out a folded piece of paper, wrinkled and yellowed with age. “I—I have the doctor’s report…”

“But Cai Jing’s company refused responsibility, didn’t they?” Yizhi asks. “And the courts sided with him?”

Miss Qiu nods, eyes squeezing shut.

Yizhi takes a baton from a soldier’s hip holster and offers it to Miss Qiu. “Citizen, I’m deeply sorry the old order failed you. But in the new Huaxia, you don’t have to swallow this injustice any longer. Now, you can be the first to finally punish Cai Jing for his crimes.”

The stadium goes so silent I can hear wind whistling through the seats. I drive my wheelchair up to the gate of my passageway, nearly pressing my face against the metal grid in anticipation of what she will do.

For a long spell, she makes no move, her attention bouncing between the baton, Yizhi, Cai Jing, the soldiers, and the booth up high. It’s understandable. I’d suspect this is some sort of trap, too.

Cai Jing’s face reddens with strain, then he bursts out shouting, “Gao Yizhi, release me! You have no proof of what—”

Miss Qiu grabs the baton and swings it into Cai Jing’s jaw. Shock explodes through the audience, many hands flying to mouths. The wrath on Miss Qiu’s face vanishes by the next second. She staggers backward, dropping the baton on the dusty ground.

Some part of me expects the soldiers to lunge for her, because that’s what happens when the powerless strike against the powerful. Yet they don’t move. Not even as Cai Jing shrieks and curses, clutching his jaw. Blood dribbles from his mouth, staining his pristine robes.

Gulping down air, Miss Qiu double-checks everything around her, confirming the lack of consequence to her act of vengeance. Then fury crawls back onto her face like a twisted mask. She picks the baton up and swings it into Cai Jing’s face a second time, knocking him over. This time, the audience’s gasps come charged with glee. Cheers and applause break out. People call for her to do it “Again! Again!”

She does. Fifty thousand cries of jubilation drown out the sounds of her baton smashing into Cai Jing’s flesh and bones. Several blows later, she stumbles and pants with exertion, yet her eyes are wild and bright, like she’s coming alive after walking around half dead for years. I recognize the feeling. I felt the same when I came out of the Nine-Tailed Fox and dumped Yang Guang’s corpse at my feet.

As if heaven and earth have switched places, a change ripples through the air. No doubt everyone watching across Huaxia can feel it.

“Gao Lian!” Yizhi heads over to the next accused: his own uncle, kneeling in crimson scholar-bureaucrat robes as the governor of Chang’an. He was at the coronation, a witness to Qin Zheng’s collapse. His fate will serve as both a testament to Yizhi’s resolve and a warning to other officials. Sima Yi should be watching this with the rest of the Sages right now, observing their reactions.

Gao Lian, on his knees, screams something at Yizhi, inaudible over the audience’s heckling. He thrashes against the soldiers as Yizhi’s amplified voice lists the crimes he’s accused of: selling government positions, taking staggering amounts of bribes, and forcibly evicting families to make way for new development projects. The second civilian witness stares at Gao Lian with the hunger of a predator. Before Yizhi finishes confirming that the witness’ family was beaten by thugs so they would sign over their property, with the witness’ elderly father dying from his injuries, the witness snatches a baton and unleashes his fury onto Gao Lian.

The audience’s delight roars toward the stars as bones snap, skin breaks, and fine silk soaks with blood.

The third accused shivers as though he’s in a rainstorm, though any pity I might’ve felt for him evaporates when Yizhi announces that he was in charge of a company that used toxic chemicals in its foods to falsify flavors and nutritional content. Despite independent journalists finding evidence, the company faced no real repercussions, and instead the journalists were jailed for “incendiary activities.” The third witness is a young mother whose baby died from kidney stones related to tampered formula produced by the company. Her wrath is just as bloody as that of the wife who lost her husband and the son who lost his father.

My head spins. The energy in the air is too feral, too infectious.

Two weeks ago, I’d have been cheering the loudest. Except now that I’m empress, whatever this leads to will be my problem. And I can’t shake the feeling that we’ve unleashed something we might not be able to control.

Yizhi stands in the middle of it all like the eye of a violent storm, short hair blowing on a breeze, expression unreadable.