The poison had entered the body, and herbs alone could not possibly pull out the deathly miasma that was a mixture of plagues from generations past.
Her gaze fell upon the roster, on those rows of names crossed out in red ink.
In the world of Daqian, the common folk had no method to combat smallpox.
This method of variolation—when a vicious plague ran rampant, the boldest among them would take the light scabs of the afflicted, grind them into powder, and blow them into the nostrils of the uninfected through a thin tube.
The body, upon receiving this trace of poison, would typically burn with high fever for several days. If one could endure and survive, they would henceforth be immune to smallpox.
The trebuchets beyond the city walls could at any moment hurl down diseased corpses again, and the threat to the water supply within the city had yet to be eradicated entirely.
The medical officers of the Bureau of Medicine clung to ancient formulas and dared not use the living to test such a perilous approach. This matter could only be brought to light by her, the Imperial Commissioner.
Xu Qinghuan began to write medical orders on sheets of almanac paper.
"To the medical officer, Lao Sun."
"This plague is fierce beyond measure. Conventional decoctions can only prolong life; they cannot eliminate the root. To protect the soldiers and citizens of the city, we must take a gamble—we must practice variolation."
The brush tip moved down the page.
Xu Qinghuan paused, recalling the symptoms of the patients in the Anji Hospice, then continued writing.
"Enter the hospice and seek out those who have just fallen ill, bearing only faint red rashes that have not yet suppurated. Mark well: the course of the illness must not exceed half a day, and the pustules must be bright red. Never use the black-purple dead flesh."
"Take a silver needle and puncture the pustule, gathering the thinnest layer of venom at the surface. This venom has not yet invaded the patient's internal organs—it is relatively mild."
"Then summon strong, uninfected young soldiers from the ranks. Use a willow-leaf blade sterilized in boiling spirits to cut a half-inch shallow wound on the outer forearm, until blood appears. Immediately rub the collected venom deep into the wound, letting this faint poison travel with the blood."
At this point, she pressed the brush against the edge of the inkstone, scraping away the excess ink.
To carry out this plan was no different from killing with a blade.
To plant the plague venom into the flesh of the healthy was to manufacture disease by human hand.
Those who received the variolation and were robust of body could withstand the onset of the poison—endure a few days of high fever and gain a constitution immune to all manner of ailments.
But if their constitution was weak, these dregs of venom would slip along the meridians into lungs and viscera, and within two days, they would turn into suppurating dead flesh.
Life or death—it all came down to each one's fate.
She continued writing, laying the matter out in plain terms.
"This method is perilous, with odds of life and death even. Yet before us lies the certain doom of a breached city. Rather than wait for the trebuchets beyond the walls to break through, let us risk this method to fight for a chance at survival. Immediately select fifty condemned prisoners under guard—the first batch to undergo the procedure."
"Post heavy guards. Record each person's temperature changes within twelve hours. If any can survive three days without dying, their fever breaking and scabs forming, then extend this to the entire city. All soldiers and citizens of Daqin, regardless of age, rank, or station, must submit to this cut."
The paper was filled; the ink seeped through to the back. She pulled over a sheet of oiled, moisture-proof paper, wrapped the letter tightly, and pressed it to the very bottom of a sandalwood box.
"Qingque," she called out.
The door opened from without. Qingque, a short blade at her waist, stepped across the threshold.
She walked to the desk and stopped, awaiting orders.
Xu Qinghuan's fingertip rested on the lid of the wooden box.
"Take this and seek out Marshal Tie."
Xu Qinghuan's words were short and clipped. "Once you leave this door, tread through the quicklime. Do not change hands along the way, and do not let anyone touch this box."
"You must place it personally on Marshal Tie's table."
Qingque stepped forward, reaching for the box.
"Wait."
Xu Qinghuan, suddenly struck by a thought, stopped her.
She pulled over the paperweight at the corner of the desk and drew out a slip of stiff yellow notepaper, three inches long and wide.
On it, Xu Qinghuan dashed off a single line.
"To break this deadlock, Marshal Tie must be prepared to lose more than half of his men."
These few words set the tone for the deaths of tens of thousands.
A breached city meant death. Infection meant death. Even variolation meant death.
Only by hardening one's heart to the point of not fearing the dead, by treating lives as mere numbers to be spent, could one carve a bloody path through this death trap.
She set down the short brush and placed the stiff yellow slip flat on top of the sandalwood box.
Qingque steadied the base of the box with both hands. As she lowered her gaze, her eyes naturally fell upon those words on the yellow slip.
Seeing them, she paused for two breaths.
Behind those few strokes of ink lay a vision of mountains of corpses and seas of blood.
As her personal guard, no one knew better than she did that once this order went out, Zhenbei Pass would turn into a butcher's yard.
Qingque said not a word. She stepped straight into the snow, heading for the General's Mansion.
...
Southern Cross Street, inside the inner city.
At the street corner, two defensive lines were built from sandbags, the gaps packed with white quicklime.
Several great iron cauldrons stood in a row, set up at the center of the crossroad.
Beneath them, firewood burned bright red.
Thick smoke, curling with sparks, was blown low along the ground by the north wind.
The water was boiling.
The cauldrons brewed heavy doses of skullcap and isatis root. The muddy medicinal broth roiled within.
The bitter, herbal smell rose into the air, mingling with the acrid stench of quicklime on the ground, burrowing deep into the throat. And yet, it could not suppress the stench of death that drifted out of the alley mouth.
On the right side of the street corner lay several courtyards marked as "suspected grounds," their gates nailed shut with pine boards and plastered with the red official seal of the General's Mansion.
From behind the walls came the intermittent wails of those fallen to swelling disease.
At first, the sounds from within were only low groans caught in the throat.
By now, they had become hoarse screams tearing at the voice box.
The noise was interwoven with the thud of bodies slamming against wooden doors. The soldiers nearby could not bear to listen.
By one of the iron cauldrons, a militiaman tasked with brewing the medicine crouched in the mud.
His arms hung limp over his knees a pile of unburned firewood scattered beside him.
He stared at the flames dancing beneath the cauldron, making no move to feed the fire.
From the alley, the screams rose to a new pitch, followed by the muffled thud of something heavy hitting the ground.
The man's shoulders sagged. He opened his mouth, and his words were steeped in utter despair.
"It's hopeless."
His voice was barely a whisper, stripped of any trace of life.
"This broth can't hold back the rot of living flesh. We'll all end up in those dead houses sooner or later."
Three paces away, an old soldier leaning against the wall stirred.
He wore a sheepskin coat full of holes.
Hearing this, he turned his head and looked at the gate plastered with seals.
He let out a long, hoarse sigh.
"Zhenbei Pass has stepped straight through the gates of hell this time."
The old soldier swallowed.
"Fifty years ago, that plague in the southern frontier killed nearly a million. Not even a blade of grass grows there to this day."
"This time, none of us will escape."
The wind ran down the long street, scattering these words of resigned surrender to every corner.
By the iron cauldrons, a line of common folk and their families stood with cracked bowls, waiting for their ration of medicine.
Wrapped in threadbare winter clothes, they heard the old soldier's words. Not one of them spoke in protest.
At the end of the line, a woman holding a child lost her grip. The bowl fell to the ground and shattered.
On any other day, spilling the life-saving medicine would have drawn furious curses. But this was only the second day, and the people around her did not even turn their heads.
Even the military judge, who usually patrolled the streets with a horsewhip in hand, now leaned against the hitching post at the intersection, turning a deaf ear to the defeatist talk spreading around him.
Everyone stood motionless in the wind, and a mood of despair pressed down over the entire city.
How many more days could the soldiers in this city hold out in such a desperate situation?
