Mo Yan - Sandalwood Death

“Sun Bing,” he said loudly, “how can you continue to beguile and bewitch your followers when rivers of your men’s blood already flow across the fortification?”

When Sun Bing’s bodyguards rushed up from behind, the Magistrate quickly moved around Sun, took a glistening dagger from his sleeve, and placed the point in a spot directly behind Sun’s heart.

“Do not move!” he commanded.

“You dog of an official!” Sun Bing hissed. “Once again you have broken my boxing magic! I am iron head, iron waist, iron body, impervious to bullets, resistant to water and fire!”

“Fellow townsmen, go take a look at the fortification, then tell me if flesh and blood can stand up to cannon shells!” He chose this moment to make a bold assumption: “There you will even find the mangled body of your finest warrior, the mighty Sun Wukong!”

“You lie!” Sun Bing screamed.

“Sun Bing,” the Magistrate said callously, “have you really mastered the art of resisting knives and spears?”

“Nothing can penetrate my body, not even shells fired by those dog soldiers!”

The Magistrate bent down, picked up a brick, and struck it against Sun Bing’s forehead before he had time to react. Sun fell backward, but the Magistrate caught him by the collar and held him up.

“Now show these people your indestructible body!”

Dark blood snaked down from Sun Bing’s forehead, like worms squirming across his face. Zhu Bajie swung his rake at the Magistrate, who jumped out of the way and flung his dagger; it stuck in Zhu’s abdomen, sending him tumbling off the brick pile with agonizing screams.

“Have you seen enough, fellow townsmen? These are your altar master and one of his senior aides. If they have failed to withstand even the modest brick-and-dagger efforts of a local official, how are they going to repel enemy cannon fire?”

The adherents’ confidence was shaken, to which the buzzing below the platform bore irrefutable witness.

“Sun Bing,” the Magistrate said, “as a man of valor, you must not send these people to certain death just to satisfy a personal desire. I have secured a promise from the German Plenipotentiary that he will withdraw his troops if you surrender to him. You have already accomplished something so astonishing it has captured the attention of the whole world, and if you are willing to sacrifice yourself in order to keep your fellow townsmen from harm, your legacy will live forever!”

“Heaven’s will!” Sun Bing said with a sigh. “It is heaven’s will.” Then he began to sing: “ Ceding territory and vanquished by the Jin~~I forsake the Central Plain and abandon the common people, a decade of exploits squandered in a single day~~Humiliated, we sue for peace, remorse follows an overturned nest~~I fear the whale will swallow our land away. Do not falsely consign me to confinement with no end, for when I am gone, the Yue army will stay~~ Fellow countrymen, disperse!”

The Magistrate led Sun Bing down from the brick pile, taking advantage of the chaos below to head to the township’s main gate. He forgot that he had come on horseback.

As he single-handedly brought Sun Bing out of Masang Township, the Magistrate was bursting with a sense of his own valor. What happened next dealt him a crippling blow, causing anguish over the knowledge that he had made yet another imbecilic mistake, this one far worse than the humiliating hostage exchange. Instead of withdrawing his troops, as he had promised, von Ketteler ordered the artillery commander to open fire the moment the Magistrate and Sun Bing were standing before him—with a roar, twelve cannons sent deadly shells flying past the defenses. Explosions erupted all over town, sending flames and smoke into the air. The screams of dying townspeople raised a terrible cacophony as an enraged Sun Bing spun around and began throttling the Magistrate, who put up no resistance, welcoming the death he felt he deserved. But Ma Longbiao signaled his guards to pull Sun Bing away and save his colleague’s life. County Magistrate Qian Ding closed his eyes as Sun Bing railed against him. Though he was lightheaded, he heard the clamor of the German attack, and he knew that Gaomi County’s most prosperous township had ceased to exist. Who had caused that to happen? Sun Bing, perhaps, or the Germans. Or maybe he himself.

The chief yamen attendant, Song Three, only yesterday a browbeating toady who took advantage of his favored position, a universally feared man whom people called Third Master, today stood at my door with an ingratiating smile. A petty servant who only the day before had stood tall and proud was now bent nearly double. You young men, in more than forty years, there is nothing I did not see in the capital, men and affairs, and I tell you that shitty little functionaries are all like that. If one from this county were to be the exception, then Gaomi would be outside the Great Qing Empire’s sphere of influence. He bowed deeply at my door and sputtered:

“Old… old… sir, if it please you, shall we carry in what you requested?”

I curled my lip and smiled inwardly. I knew that the “old” dripping from that dog’s mouth was intended to be followed by “master,” but clearly I was not his master. I think he wanted to be familiar by calling me Old Zhao, but I was sitting in a chair bestowed upon me by the Emperor Himself. Having no choice, he had to settle for “old sir.” A wily son of a bitch. With an almost imperceptible wave of my hand, I said, “Bring everything in.”

Mimicking a stage voice, he announced loudly: