Rouge and Powder Shop. Wang Daxia was enthusiastically recommending rouge and cosmetics to a noble-born female customer shopping for her dowry. Her skin was as fair as milk, with large, expressive eyes that sparkled with charm—a true beauty.
Wang Daxia praised, "With your naturally lovely complexion, miss, you hardly need any cosmetics. If everyone were as beautiful as you, my shop would go out of business."
The customer blushed shyly, her cheeks tinged pink. "I want the lip rouge you're wearing and the almond-scented powder with mica flakes that Zhongjin Khatun uses—the one that shimmers."
Wang Daxia brought out an array of cosmetics from the counter. "Zhongjin Khatun uses products from my shop. I have the powder, lip rouge, blush, and moisturizing pots. There's also the essential oil Anda Khan uses to maintain his beard—it's from our store too. Right now, we're offering a promotion: spend over fifty taels of silver and receive the beard oil and a mustache comb for free."
Without even asking the price, the customer said, "I'll take it all. Please wrap everything up."
She was clearly wealthy. As Wang Daxia packaged the cosmetics, a commotion arose outside on the street. The customer glanced out, then suddenly dashed outside, calling loudly, "Ba Han Naji!"
Ba Han Naji was on horseback, escorting the sect leader Zhao Quan, followed by an endless line of empty carts heading out of the city to transport (or plunder) grain from Bancheng. Hearing a familiar voice call his name, he turned and saw his fiancée, Hastuya.
The affluent customer was Hastuya, a name meaning "beautiful jade," one of the most common Mongolian names, similar to names like "Suzhen" or "Cuie" in the Central Plains. True to her name, she was a renowned beauty among the Mongolian nobility, soon to become the second wife of Anda Khan's favorite grandson, Ba Han Naji.
The grasslands practiced polygamy, with both wives holding equal status as Bigi. Ba Han Naji had married his first wife, Dacheng Bigi, at age twelve. By eighteen, with no children yet, Anda Khan selected Hastuya, daughter of the Mongolian noble Tuchejin, as his second wife to ensure heirs.
After the marriage was arranged, Hastuya entered the palace to meet San Niangzi. Struck by San Niangzi's beauty and sharing a universal appreciation for loveliness, Hastuya learned about the Rouge and Powder Shop and came to purchase dowry items.
Ba Han Naji, born into nobility, was tall, handsome, and young. Hastuya was very pleased with her fiancé. Women of the grasslands were less reserved, so upon seeing her beloved, she rushed out to greet him.
Ba Han Naji also adored his beautiful fiancée. Like any young man, he enjoyed showing off his power and charm to his lover. Despite his busy schedule, he dismounted to speak with her.
Ba Han Naji said, "I'm going to Bancheng to transport grain for Ados. Once they receive the supplies, they'll withdraw their troops, and we can hold our wedding as scheduled."
Seeing his stunning fiancée, Ba Han Naji wished they could consummate their marriage that very night.
The two began exchanging sweet nothings right there on the street. Meanwhile, Wang Daxia, having packed the items, realized Hastuya hadn't paid yet. Worried she might change her mind, he hurried out with the bundles. "Miss, that will be fifty-seven taels of silver, thank you."
Since these were dowry items and he had encountered her, Ba Han Naji felt it improper to let his fiancée pay. With a wave of his hand, he covered the cost. "Put the packages in the cart. I'll have someone escort you back."Lost in love, Hastuya only wanted to spend more time with her fiancé and said, "When you go to Bansheng Land to transport grain, I want to come with you."
Ba Han Naji, after all, was only eighteen. His fiancée's request wasn't for a dangerous campaign, so in a moment of impulsiveness, he agreed and brought a gentle old mare for his fiancée to ride.
Ding Wu, carrying Anda Khan's response, went out of the city again to negotiate a withdrawal with Ados. "...Twenty thousand dan of grain will be transported from Bansheng Land immediately. Once you receive the grain, you must withdraw your troops at once and cease harassing Fengcheng."
"So soon?" Ados had burned his bridges this time, prepared for battle since survival seemed impossible. He never expected the notoriously tough Anda Khan to concede, agreeing to his demands with almost no haggling.
Ding Wu said, "You should thank Zhongjin Khatun. If she weren't about to give birth, and if people in the Khanate Court weren't watching her closely, Anda Khan would have gone to war. But fearing something might happen to his beloved young wife in the court, he decided to slaughter the White Lotus Sect—the pig he'd been fattening for years—to resolve this crisis. Otherwise, you wouldn't have succeeded so easily."
Ados laughed wildly at the sky: "Heaven blesses the Aldos tribe! Our tribe is saved!"
Ding Wu thought to himself: Thanks to your uprising and demand for grain, the White Lotus Sect wouldn't have fallen so quickly. It seems even heaven couldn't stand Zhao Quan deceiving his followers and treating them as less than human, forcing the sect leader to reveal his true nature.
Let's see how you keep up your mystical charade now.
In Bansheng Land.
Ba Han Naji led his men in sweeping through granaries everywhere, ignoring the pleas of the sect followers and even seizing seed grain, loading it all onto carts.
The followers begged their leader Zhao Quan to persuade Ba Han Naji to show mercy and leave them a way to survive, even if it meant only having a bowl of thin porridge each day!
But Zhao Quan, usually so eloquent, was ashen-faced and silent. No matter how the followers knelt and pleaded, he remained expressionless, like a clay Bodhisattva, unmoved.
It wasn't that he didn't want to keep the grain—he simply lacked the power to do so. If he resisted, the hot-headed Ba Han Naji might publicly behead him!
Zhao Quan was now in a state of paralysis, completely at others' mercy.
Seeing the granaries emptied, their livestock taken away, and their leader silent, the followers' years of faith crumbled in an instant.
Anger, disappointment, grief—all their passion came flooding back. They had followed their leader in betraying their homeland to open up wasteland in a foreign land, believing their faith would purify them, cleanse their sins, and ensure rebirth in the Pure Land after death.
Even when half their members were lured back to their homeland last winter by promises of "returning home to open wasteland, having enough to eat with surplus grain, and five years of tax exemption," they had stayed in Bansheng, firmly holding onto their faith. They believed that by joining the sect to avoid disaster—famine being one such disaster—they would persevere to the end.
Indeed, Zhao Quan had lived up to their expectations, exhausting his family wealth with a martyr's determination to protect his followers from suffering and starvation.
But no one could have predicted that just three months later, Zhao Quan would personally lead Ba Han Naji to Bansheng to strip the followers of their remaining grain reserves.
This time, Ba Han Naji wouldn't show anyone mercy—not even sparing the granaries of Li Zixin, the White Lotus Sect's second-in-command.Li Zixin naturally refused, "You can't do this! I guided you—most of the Khanate Court's wealth was plundered from the Ming dynasty by your cavalry under my lead! You can't burn the bridge after crossing the river!"
After saying this, Li Zixin began unloading grain from the carriage. Ba Han Naji, humiliated in front of his fiancée, grew furious. He lifted Li Zixin barehanded from the carriage and flung him into the freshly thawed field.
Li Zixin landed flat on his back, unable to get up for a long while, watching helplessly as the grain was requisitioned (seized).
With a month until spring planting and half a year until autumn harvest, they could endure at most ten days without food before starvation set in.
Hunger defeated the White Lotus Sect. What the Embroidered Uniform Guard had failed to achieve, hunger accomplished.
Seeing leader Zhao Quan's indifference and deputy leader Li Zixin's wretched state, like a stray dog, where was their usual divine aura on the altar?
The followers wept and pleaded until their tears dried, their hearts completely disillusioned with the White Lotus Sect. Gathering their valuables, they fled with their families toward their homeland, singing along the way a ballad composed by the Embroidered Uniform Guard:
"The White Lotus Sect, devoid of conscience, toils all year yet starves, all grain given to the great khan.
Return to the homeland, reclaim wasteland, eat and drink without worry, surplus grain in store, five years tax-free with no levies."
Back to the homeland! The homeland welcomed these wandering children like a mother—hot meals, warm clothes, heated beds, returning to their roots like falling leaves.
One by one, the followers passed by Zhao Quan, some even bumping into him, no longer showing their former reverence—at his peak, some had even kissed the soil beneath his feet.
Zhao Quan stood on the road like a statue. Ba Han Naji, having obtained the grain, hurried to deliver it to Ados and abandoned Zhao Quan in Bansheng Land, discarding him like squeezed-out dregs.
Li Zixin, struggling to his feet in the field, broke off a branch and limped over to Zhao Quan. He hesitated, but ultimately said nothing, returning home to instruct his family to use their gold and silver to exchange for grain in Fengcheng.
The White Lotus Sect crumbled, leaving only an empty name. Gold and silver were the eternal gods.
Zhao Quan agonized over the gains and losses of the past twenty-plus years. The White Lotus Sect he founded had risen and flourished by relying on Anda Khan, yet it was also devoured by over-dependence on him. Truly, success and failure both came from the same source.
Anda Khan and the White Lotus Sect were like a crocodile and a plover: the crocodile ate the big meat, while the plover cleaned its teeth with its beak, mutually dependent. But when the crocodile grew too hungry, it simply ate the plover. Even a mosquito's leg is meat, and the plover's flesh was all the more so.
Ordinary followers could return to their homeland and start anew. But for fugitives like Zhao Quan and Li Zixin, heavily wanted by the Ming with high bounties, returning was impossible.
Was total defeat inevitable? Zhao Quan sank into despair.
Meanwhile, Ados, besieging the city, saw the large flow of refugees and, puzzled, quickly deployed troops in formation, standing ready.
Ding Wu hurriedly intervened, "These are all White Lotus Sect members—the metal tools they carry are farming implements, not weapons. Their grain was entirely taken by Ba Han Naji. They're seeking a way back to their homeland to survive; it's hard enough for them. Don't block the road—let's all spare each other."
Sympathizing with those just trying to fill their bellies, Ados ordered his men to clear a path, allowing the White Lotus Sect refugees to pass.Ba Han Naji arrived with the provisions, accompanied by a stunning beauty in red who captivated all who laid eyes on her—his fiancée Hastuya. Her lips were painted with Wang Daxia's fiery crimson lip color, and her face was dusted with the same almond honey powder used by San Niangzi, mixed with ground mica flakes that made her shimmer brilliantly, impossible to look away from.
As the saying goes, "Well-fed and warm, one thinks of lust." With his hunger satisfied by the provisions, Ados immediately sought higher pursuits—women. He fell in love at first sight with the red-clad beauty beside Ba Han Naji and wanted to take her back as his ninth wife to bear his children.
Ados wrote a letter to Anda Khan, entrusting it to Ba Han Naji to deliver, saying, "Please ensure this reaches Anda Khan. The Ordos tribe will forever remember that the Great Khan provided us with life-saving grain and pledge eternal loyalty to Anda Khan."
Ba Han Naji, still young and naive, was unaware of the greed and schemes of middle-aged men and foolishly acted as the messenger.
The other tribes, having received their share of the provisions, immediately withdrew and returned to their own territories. Only the Ordos tribe remained encamped outside the city.
At the Khanate Court, Anda Khan opened Ados's letter. Besides expressing gratitude and swearing continued allegiance, it also proposed marrying Tuchejin's daughter, Hastuya. The letter revisited an old grievance, stating that Zhongjin Khatun had originally been his fiancée and was about to marry him but ended up wedding Anda Khan instead.
"The Great Khan owes me a wife. Just exchange one for me—give me Hastuya as my bride—and I will never mention this matter again. No one will gossip behind your back about Anda Khan stealing another's betrothed."
No wonder the Ordos tribe had not yet withdrawn! They were waiting to take Hastuya home with them.
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