Chapter 32: It Is the Knees That Break, Not the Conscience

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At daybreak, the cold outside the ancestral hall was bone-chilling.

Shen Yongzhi had been kneeling for so long that both his knees had gone numb, yet the pain still bored deep into his bones.

Every breath felt like inhaling shards of ice, leaving the taste of rust in his throat.

His vision swam black, and his body swayed from side to side. Had it not been for the stubborn will holding him up, he would have collapsed long ago.

Suddenly, a heart-rending cry shattered the silence.

“My son! My poor lifeblood!”

Madam Zhang, her hair disheveled, led several women who usually banded together with Madam Li Cuihua and charged toward the ancestral hall door. Weeping as though she were about to lose her breath, she cried, “Elder Sun, please, have mercy! Yongzhi is still only a child. How could he endure such punishment? You’re trying to kill him!”

Li Cuihua joined in, pounding on the door and slapping her thighs as she shouted, “That’s right, Elder! The boy was foolish. A few blows and a scolding would have been enough. Why punish him as though you meant to beat him to death?”

“That hard-hearted woman, Shen Guilan, has a heart more poisonous than a snake’s! For the sake of the family property, she’s even willing to abandon her own son!”

Inside the ancestral hall, Elder Sun’s temples throbbed, and his face flushed crimson.

He had not slept all night and was already irritable. Now, with the women crying and shouting, his temper flared.

But as a clan elder, he could hardly lay hands on a group of women. All he could do was sit there with a dark expression and endure their uproar.

In truth, even he felt the punishment was too severe.

But the rule had been proposed by Shen Guilan, and he had publicly agreed to it.

If he changed his mind now, who would take him seriously in the future?

As he hesitated, a series of steady footsteps came from outside. They were neither hurried nor slow, yet they overwhelmed every cry and complaint.

Everyone turned to look.

Shen Guilan approached, carrying an old bamboo basket in each hand, her expression calm.

She said nothing. Her entire figure seemed cast from iron, and the pressure of her presence made the troublesome women instinctively retreat half a step.

Elder Sun sighed and opened the door himself.

Shen Guilan entered the ancestral hall and placed the baskets beside the altar table.

Inside one basket was a bowl of coarse-grain porridge still steaming, along with a pair of new straw sandals.

She did not look at her son. First, she bowed deeply before the ancestral tablets. Then she spoke. Her voice was not loud, but every person present heard her clearly.

“Forefathers above, my son Shen Yongzhi has violated the family rules. As his mother, I failed to discipline him properly, and I will not plead for mercy on his behalf.”

When she had finished, she picked up the bowl and walked over to Shen Yongzhi.

“But he is the son I gave birth to. I cannot stand by and watch him starve to death.”

With that, she slowly knelt before everyone and brought herself level with her son.

The entire hall fell silent. Even Madam Zhang forgot to cry.

Shen Guilan scooped up a spoonful of porridge and brought it to her son’s cracked lips.

“Eat a mouthful. This is your mother’s love.”

Shen Yongzhi stared blankly at his mother, his eyes bloodshot. Yet he still opened his mouth and swallowed the rough porridge.

It was difficult to get down, but once it reached his stomach, a wave of warmth rose within him and nearly brought him to tears.

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After feeding him one mouthful, she set down the bowl and handed him the straw sandals.

“After you have knelt for three days, put these on yourself and walk home. That is the Shen family rule.”

A bowl of food, a pair of shoes—gentle on one side, unyielding on the other.

When she had finished, she rose and swept her gaze over everyone. Then, word by word, she said, “I am punishing him today not because I hate him, but so that he will understand—and so that the entire village will understand—that we do not raise sons merely to support us in old age, repay debts, or take the blame for our crimes. We raise them to teach them to stand straight and live with honor!”

Her words fell like a hammer upon the ground, making everyone’s heart tremble.

Elder Sun shuddered. He looked at Shen Guilan’s rigid back, his eyes filled with shock.

In a low voice, he asked, “Guilan, could you not… reduce the punishment by one day?”

“No!”

Shen Guilan’s answer was decisive.

“Elder, if you forgive him once, he will dare steal again. If you let him off once, he will dare deceive others again. As the days pass, he will become a useless man who steals chickens, touches dogs, and lies through his teeth! When that happens, how will I ever face his dead father?”

Before she had finished speaking, the sound of a cane striking the ground came from the doorway.

Old Madam Lin entered, supporting Xiuxue. Without a word, she draped an old cotton quilt over Shen Yongzhi. Then she looked at Shen Guilan and nodded.

“Good child. By kneeling here, you have upheld the rules, and you have won the hearts of the people. This village truly needs its rules restored.”

With even Old Madam Lin speaking out, Madam Zhang knew there was no point in making a scene any longer.

She shot Shen Guilan a vicious glare, turned, and left, shouting as she went, “Everyone, look carefully! She’s only putting on an act! She really wants to force her own son to death! My poor grandson!”

Before long, even uglier rumors spread throughout the village.

“Shen Guilan thinks her son is a burden and is forcing the clan elder to cast him out of the family!”

In the face of such filth, Shen Guilan neither lost her temper nor offered an explanation.

The next day, beneath the great locust tree at the village entrance, she erected a new wooden sign.

It read: “Guilan Embroidery Workshop—Apprentices Wanted.”

She had Xiuxue stand beside it and loudly read the conditions for recruitment before the entire village.

“Anyone at least twelve years old, from a poor household, and willing to sign a Declaration of Self-Reliance may apply. The workshop provides food and lodging. Once they have learned the craft, they will be able to work and support themselves.”

“Mother, what is a Declaration of Self-Reliance?” one child asked.

Xiuxue cleared her throat and read aloud:

“First: Do not rely on your parents. Handle your own affairs yourself!

“Second: Do not live on credit. Earn the money for your own expenses!

“Third: Do not gamble, do not steal, and live honorably as a person of good character!”

“Do not live off your parents, do not buy on credit, do not gamble, and do not steal.”

Those twelve words struck like twelve slaps, leaving certain people with burning cheeks.

The families too poor to keep food on the table, yet desperate to find their children a way forward, suddenly brightened.

This was no mere offer of work. It was a way for poor children to survive!

Within three days, seven older children, led by their families, pressed their fingerprints onto the contracts and signed their names.

That night, Gu Changshan slipped quietly into the rear courtyard of Shen Guilan’s home.

He carried half a wild hare over one shoulder. Hidden inside the hare’s belly was a letter wrapped in oiled paper.

“Cuihua had the escort convoy deliver it at full speed,” Gu Changshan said in a low voice.

Shen Guilan opened the letter. In the candlelight, its contents were perfectly clear.

It was the account book from the gambling house in town.

It stated that Shen Yongzhi had not only gambled away all his money, but had also brazenly used the name of the Shen family’s eldest branch to buy wine and meat on credit in town. Altogether, he owed seven qian and three wen.

“Wonderful. What a fine ‘eldest branch of the Shen family’ indeed.”

Shen Guilan gave a cold laugh.

Did Madam Zhang not always use the eldest branch to bully others?

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Then Shen Guilan would make that title into a brand too hot to touch.

Early the next morning, a clearly written IOU was posted outside the ancestral hall. Beside it, Shen Guilan attached a letter:

“My son, Shen Yongzhi, incurred debts outside the village in the name of the eldest branch of the Shen family. If the clan elder and the clansmen believe this is a family matter, and that the eldest branch should pay the debt, then let the clan treasury settle it. If they refuse to acknowledge it, then the debt has nothing to do with the clan and must be repaid by him personally.”

The letter fell into the village like a stone into water, stirring up a tremendous commotion.

Elder Sun stared at the IOU, his hands trembling with anger.

Use clan funds to repay a gambler’s debt? He could never bear such humiliation.

But if he refused to acknowledge it, that would amount to publicly declaring that Shen Yongzhi’s actions had nothing to do with the Shen family. The disgrace would strike Madam Zhang’s family so hard they would never be able to raise their heads again.

“Tell that fool Zhang to pay the money at once!” Elder Sun roared. “Otherwise, the entire family will be removed from the clan register!”

With nowhere left to turn, Madam Zhang had no choice but to sell the family’s last two acres of land. Only then could she repay the debt.

After that, Shen Yongzhi became the laughingstock of the entire village.

He spent his days huddled in a corner of the ancestral hall, his eyes empty, saying nothing, as though he had lost his soul.

Another night of wind and snow arrived.

The cold wind howled like a ghost in mourning.

There was no fire in the ancestral hall. The place was as cold as an ice cellar.

Shen Yongzhi’s lips had turned purple from the cold. In a daze, he saw a faint, warm glow through the window of his own home.

It came from his mother’s room.

A warmth stirred in his heart. Bracing himself against the ground with numb hands, he swayed to his feet and began inching toward home.

He wanted to knock on the door and go inside to warm himself by the fire, even if only for a moment.

But just as he reached the window, he heard Xiuxue’s voice from inside.

“Mother, Brother has been kneeling for so long. Can he still come back?”

There was a brief silence.

Then Shen Guilan answered calmly, “When he has finished kneeling for three days, he can walk back on his own.”

Shen Yongzhi stood frozen in the wind and snow, his heart cut as though by a knife.

Far away, before a rocky cave deep in the mountains, Gu Changshan stood amid the freezing wind.

In his hand was a freshly polished copper whistle. Beneath the moonlight, it gleamed coldly. Four words were engraved upon it:

“Seventh Company—Return to Camp.”

He raised his head and gazed at the waning moon veiled by clouds. At last, he lifted the whistle to his lips and blew the first note.

The sound was not loud. It was low and distant, traveling through the wind and snow and echoing across the mountains and forests.

It sounded like a lone wolf calling for its companions, and like a military order that had lain dormant for many years, rekindling the first spark of fire in the frozen night.

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