5. The local regions have reached a state of utter exhaustion.

The next day, Lu Xiufu and Li Rang went off to discuss the matter of the thousand white-armored soldiers in Wuxi. Zhang Xun had no pressing business but did not indulge in sleeping late either. He got up early to check on Madam Zhang’s well-being—or at least to have breakfast with her.

While they were eating, a steady stream of family members and servants from the entire courtyard began lining up outside the door. Naturally, they had matters to attend to, or sought instructions from Zhang Xun.

In the past, Zhang Xun hadn’t paid much attention to such affairs, since Madam Zhang and his elder brother usually handled them. Now that he was in charge, he took a keener interest. He noticed Li Da leaning against a corridor pillar, trying to cut in line. After all, Li was a retainer of the Li family and no longer part of the old Zhang household, so he had no qualms about jumping the queue.

So Zhang Xun turned around, holding his bowl, and asked Li Da if he had eaten breakfast. Li Da replied that he had just finished training with his son that morning and hadn’t eaten yet.

Seeing that Madam Zhang had already finished, Lu Xiufu pointed to two plates of oily pastries and a large basin containing only two bowls of lotus seed soup, instructing the servants to move them to a small table so Li Da and his son could sit in the corridor and eat.

You ask where they sat? Naturally, on a low stool—a footstool, a small bench used for convenience when seated on a raised platform.

Li Da repeatedly bowed to Zhang Xun and Madam Zhang, even having his son kowtow to Madam Zhang. She was an elder and could bear it; Zhang Xun let it pass. Li Da’s son looked about thirteen or fourteen, a young gentleman, so such formalities were unnecessary.

Once they sat down and began eating, Zhang Xun finished his soup and asked Li Da what brought him here. Li Da, handing pastries to his son while swallowing a bite, said that the tiger skin mattress for Old Lord Feng had already been sent to be prepared and asked if Zhang Xun wished to inspect it.

“No need to check. Deliver it before autumn and winter; it’ll serve as a mattress for Madam Zhang.” Zhang Xun was a robust young man who sweated profusely sleeping on a tiger skin bed at night. Madam Zhang, in her fifties, was considered elderly by today’s standards and would benefit from it.

“Very well,” Li Da quickly stood, acknowledging the order.

“Ah, if I had known, I’d have let you finish eating before asking. Please continue.” A servant brought a platinum basin for Zhang Xun to wash his hands and then a vial of clove water for him to rinse his mouth.

Wiping his hands and mouth, just then, a collateral relative who had come to borrow money the day before arrived. Madam Zhang asked Li Da about the tiger skin mattress, then, feeling tired, excused herself and left. Everyone understood her unspoken intent—to give Zhang Xun room. If she stayed, others would likely seek Old Lord Feng’s approval.

After all, a legitimate county lady with an official title was none other than Old Lord Feng herself.

“Zhang San?” Zhang Xun recognized the man bowing and called out instinctively.

No doubt, he was one of the original owner’s questionable friends—those who once ran wild, setting fires and splashing water in the streets. When committing misdeeds, if not a close cousin, no one would dare expose you.

“Yes, yes, that’s me,” Zhang Xi replied with a rather sly smile.

“Oh, come in and sit, let’s talk,” Zhang Xun invited.

Zhang Xi belonged to the seventh branch of the old Zhang family, though Zhang Xun could not recall which exact branch. The clan had expanded for centuries; who could remember all the details? But in childhood, Zhang Xi often helped Zhang Xun, so they had been companions. As for “Zhang San”? In their branch, he was the third Zhang, hence the name. Zhang Xun himself was the second Zhang in his branch, thus called Zhang Er. Such naming conventions were common; even the Zhao family had their eight or nine princes. When the minister served as a prince, he was the ninth prince, as everyone called him.

“The authorities say this year they want to convert the wheat tax into silk, but after nine rounds of assessment, they still won’t relent...” Zhang Xi was somewhat educated and spoke coherently.

The imperial court levied summer taxes, which should have been paid in wheat. But the Song government often adjusted the required goods according to current needs, demanding items from all over.

Thus began the many conversions: doubling, tripling, first demanding one item, then doubling it; two strings of coins became four, and so on. The people had long accepted such changes. When you went to pay two strings, suddenly they would require other military supplies instead, doubling the amount. The endless conversions could escalate the tax on Zhang Xi’s family to sixty strings of coins.

Such harsh policies were not new. Early Southern Song, in Huainan, demanded four and a half dou of wheat per mu, more than five times the regulated value.

The problem wasn’t the sixty strings, but why they dared tax the Zhang family.

The “Chronicles Since Jianyan” noted: “In the twenty-first year of Shaoxing, in the first month, households were summoned to the county, treated with wine and meat, then taxed again. The lower households were not given cash but were forced to pay taxes repeatedly. For the poorest, they were further squeezed with various imposts under different pretexts.”

The wealthy negotiated loans; the rest were pressured for additional payments; the poorest were stripped bare. The Song dynasty had no use for paupers.

“You mean they didn’t know your surname was Zhang?” Zhang Xun asked, immediately regretting it. If they had come to collect taxes, how could they not know?

“Well, it’s not just me...” Zhang Xi first shook his head, then nodded reluctantly.

Various Zhangs were being taxed repeatedly. Hearing this, Zhang Xun finally understood: even those without official positions in the family were targeted by the tax office. Without protection, who else would they go after but those with some money?

Look at Jia Yun—he had only separated two or three generations ago and still lived in the capital rather than the old home in Jinling. His father married only a merchant’s daughter; his friends were street ruffians like Niu Er.

Even sharing the same surname, after two or three, or four generations, though not strangers, one’s influence dimmed. Wealthy relatives might not even offer help.

“To have come to this...” Zhang Xun lamented not the coldness of human relations but that local finances had collapsed to such an extent.

Previously, the Zhang family’s reputation was feared, and with ninety thousand main households and sixty thousand clients in the county, the tax base was broad enough to sustain levies. Now, years of warfare in the Two Huai and Jinghu regions had bankrupted first and second-tier main households; the able-bodied clients had perished on the roads.

The people were exhausted.

For tax collectors to impose five to six times the tax on so many Zhang clan members, someone must have been backing them. Locally, if not the old Zhang family, then some bureaucrat within the government.

To risk offending the Zhang family by collecting taxes, the official was either upright and incorruptible or desperate with no other options. Clearly, the prefect who had zealously delivered a tiger skin full of spirit sticks to the court was not such a just man.

The populace had become paupers, with no more resources to squeeze. The tax authorities turned their sights to the two great families in the southern city.

Collateral relatives of the clan still had some standing within the main branch. Like Zhang Xi, they could still seek help. Zhang Xun could reduce sixty strings back to two with a single word. For those estranged and rarely in contact, they had no choice but to comply with the conversions.

Failing to secure Zhang Xun’s protection, the ravenous tax officials would grind a family down to ruin by the next year.

The prefect likely made a firm decision: collect as much as possible. Paying the full tax might allow him to be transferred elsewhere; failing to do so would mean a formal inquiry.

“Yes, yes, sir...” After saying so much, Zhang Xi cautiously gauged Zhang Xun’s attitude.