304.
Bloodless Entry into Yangzhou — "The End of a Battle Without Blood"
Early summer of the fourteenth year of Zhizheng (至正).
Birds wheeled low beneath the skies of Yangzhou.
Outside the city walls, the Goryeo army advanced no further.
They raised only their banners before the gates, in silence.
Upon the banners was inscribed a single line:
「民心卽天命 — The people are Heaven.」
A Battlefield That Only Watched
For several days, the fighting had ceased.
Park Seong-jin's army did not move.
Zhang Shicheng's forces remained shut behind barred gates, huddled within.
Soldiers on the walls stared tensely across the river.
Yet there were no blades there, no flames.
Along the riverbank, soldiers rowed quietly.
Goryeo officers distributed grain to the people.
It looked like a fragment of a peace long lost.
The people of Yangzhou were starving.
Zhang Shicheng's army had confiscated grain.
The markets had closed long ago.
One day, beneath the city walls, Goryeo soldiers hung sacks of grain.
Written clearly upon them were the words:
「飢民得食 — The hungry must eat.」
Hands reached out furtively through cracks in the gate.
At first only a few.
Soon, lines formed inside the city.
From atop the walls, soldiers murmured.
"The people… they're leaning that way."
Disorder in Zhang Shicheng's Camp
That night, the lights in Zhang Shicheng's main camp did not go out.
The commanders gathered, but their words clashed.
"We must seal the gates and endure."
"The people can no longer bear it."
"Desertions are increasing again."
"Just today, a hundred vanished."
The strategist Wei Zhen (魏震) stood in silence.
The great momentum was tilting.
Before any battle was fought, the city was already collapsing.
Slowly, he lifted his head toward Zhang Shicheng.
"My lord, guarding the city may be the very path to losing it."
Zhang Shicheng's face hardened.
"If we do not defend it, where are we to go?"
Wei Zhen's voice was quiet, yet firm.
"A city is built of stone.
A state is built of hearts.
This city no longer has a heart."
That night, fighting broke out among the soldiers within the walls.
An officer trying to stop desertion was stabbed to death.
The granaries caught fire.
The people surged in, dividing the sacks of rice among themselves.
Yet amid all this chaos, the Goryeo army did not take a single step forward.
They kept their lamps burning across the river.
At dawn, a soldier guarding the gate tore down the banner fixed above it and hurled it away.
As if to himself, he said,
"It's over…"
Just before sunrise, Zhang Shicheng made his decision.
He set fire to the tent where he had long resided.
"Yangzhou is abandoned."
Leaving only those words behind, he mounted his horse.
Dozens of close retainers followed him.
After they departed, the city gates opened quietly.
Entry Without Blood
The Goryeo army entered in silence.
Not a single arrow flew.
Not a single blade was drawn.
Before the gates stood ragged townsfolk, lined up in rows.
Relief rose on their faces before anything else.
Park Seong-jin reined in his horse and slowly looked up at the sky.
Beside him, Song I-sul said softly,
"The battle is over."
Park Seong-jin replied,
"No.
This is where it begins.
The struggle of the heart opens from here."
Yangzhou opened without a drop of blood.
Fear collapsed first.
"Victory Without Blood, a Living Land"
Three days after Yangzhou's gates opened, the city began to breathe again.
Smoke rose from the fire-scarred market.
In the once-empty streets, children's laughter could be heard.
Park Seong-jin sat in a temporary council hall, fashioned from an old warehouse near the south gate.
Across from him sat Yi In-jung, Song I-sul, and Yun Dam.
The scent of cold tea mingled with dust.
Park Seong-jin spoke first.
"The war ends here.
If we abandon this place, bandits will come.
If the people starve, new enemies will be born."
Yi In-jung nodded.
"Right.
Battles are won with blades, but a state is held with food."
Yun Dam smiled quietly.
"Food is simply another name for Dao.
To the hungry, a bowl matters more than Heaven."
Park Seong-jin lowered his head.
"Yangzhou will be our first proving ground."
From that day on, the Goryeo army took up plows instead of swords.
Horses moved across ruined fields.
Soldiers leveled the soil and sowed seeds.
They were scattering grain.
They were scattering order.
Yun Dam erected wooden posts along the roads and affixed notices:
「飢民耕田, 兵食於地」
— The hungry till the fields; the army eats from the land.
At first, the people did not believe it.
But the soldiers shared grain.
They drew water for children.
Slowly, people came out.
After one month, green shoots emerged across Yangzhou's fields.
The Beginning of Self-Rule
After consulting with Park Seong-jin, Yun Dam established a new system.
Autonomy officers (自治員) were placed within the city, allowing the people to determine taxes and labor themselves.
In each village, instructors (訓導) and local clerks (鄕吏) were reinstated to teach letters and rites.
Learned men and respected elders were invited to form councils of sages (賢者).
Each week, they met at the market crossroads.
The soldiers guarded, but did not interfere.
Park Seong-jin stated the principle clearly.
"We do not rule.
We help them stand on their own."
Yun Dam's Forward Vision
At a midnight council, Yun Dam spread a map beneath the lamplight.
The waterways stretching south from Yangzhou led directly into Jiangnan.
Tracing the currents with his brush, he spoke.
"We will make this our forward base.
Yangzhou is the gateway to Jiangnan.
It becomes the first foothold of a new world."
Yi In-jung frowned.
"A forward base—does that mean more war?"
Yun Dam shook his head.
"The war has already begun.
Now we gather.
We weave with the heart what the blade cannot reach.
That is our Jiangnan campaign."
Park Seong-jin bowed deeply.
"The vision is great.
But vision alone will not move the people."
Yun Dam smiled.
"That is why you are needed."
A few days later, crowds gathered in Yangzhou's market.
The newly formed self-governing council convened.
Above it hung a signboard reading:
「民心爲本 — The people are the foundation.」
Farmers, merchants, even former soldiers of Zhang Shicheng stood gazing at it.
They looked upon one another not with fear, but with hope.
An old man said,
"If an army rules by law rather than by the sword,
perhaps it is right to call them rulers (君)."
That night, at the final meeting, Park Seong-jin closed the ledgers and spoke quietly.
"Yangzhou is the first land we have taken.
A land held in our hands.
A land we have borrowed."
Yun Dam replied,
"Yes.
Land is borrowed for a time.
The heart remains long."
They had not occupied a city.
They had restored the people's will.
Food and words opened the road of the realm.