The day Beijing changed its flags, the sky was the color of old paper—grey, tired, rubbed thin.
Wind threaded through the seams of the watchtowers and brought with it a smell that was hard to name. Not simply smoke. Not simply dust. Something else: the sour, crowded scent of too many people packed into one city, trying to stay alive. Along the streets, shop doors sat half-latched; eyes watched through the cracks. At the mouth of an alley a dog did not bark—only lay in shadow, ears pricked like two small blades.
Qin Zhao walked close to the curb, a torn bundle slung across his back. There was no grain inside, only a few wrinkled sheets of paper—his "life," saved up over months of running errands: scraps of proof, notes, passes, names. Small things that could, on the right day, buy you one more day.
He had fled from Shaanxi all the way to the capital, thinking that under the shadow of the imperial walls he might finally draw a full breath. But the night the city fell, he saw with his own eyes that even breathing was a matter of luck.
He had survived on two things: fast legs, and faster eyes.Fast legs let him slip into alleys. Faster eyes told him when to slip.
Today his eyes were telling him one thing:
Something was about to happen.
Because the city was too quiet.
Not the quiet of peace, but the quiet of pressure—quiet held down, like a bowstring drawn tight to the ear, no one daring to be the first to loosen it.
At the street corner a line of drums began: thud, thud, thud—steady, unhurried, as if someone were knocking on your heart. Then came the yamen runners' cries, rolling down the street like a wave:
"By command—assemble! Hear the order—!"
The crowd was herded toward an open square. Qin Zhao's body wanted to turn away on instinct, but his mind was quicker: to refuse was to stand out. He slipped into the mass, head lowered, his feet still keeping an exit in reserve—flatbread stall to the left, a doorway into a side lane to the right.
He lifted his eyes and swept the scene.
At the front: the old and the weak, shoved forward first.In the middle: young men with white faces, holding themselves upright by sheer stubbornness.At the back: those who claimed they were only "watching."
But Qin Zhao saw it at once—some of the watchers were wrong.
They wore Han clothes, yet their stance was military. They didn't look at the proclamation board; they looked at the crowd. Their eyes held not fear, but waiting. Waiting for someone to move first. Waiting for someone to panic first.
Qin Zhao's throat tightened.
This wasn't an announcement. It was a snare.
Not long after, a file of Qing soldiers marched in, step by step, perfectly paced. Iron boots struck the ground with a sound that made teeth ache. At their head, a herald snapped open a scroll of yellow paper. His voice was not loud, but it scraped the air like a blade against stone.
"…A new dynasty is founded. The four seas return. All people within the city shall—shave the hair and change dress, as a sign of submission."
The moment those words fell—shave the hair and change dress—the crowd did not shout. It inhaled.
As if countless throats had been seized at once.
Someone touched their hair without thinking. Someone pulled a child hard against their chest. Someone's fist clenched until knuckles cracked. Qin Zhao even heard the joints of a Han soldier beside him go white—one of the men who had come in with the Qing. Even he was grinding his teeth.
The herald raised a hand with deliberate calm. Behind him two soldiers set a row of razors on a table. The metal caught the light—bright enough to sting the eyes.
The herald smiled. "Shave, and you are new subjects. Refuse—"
He paused, as if hanging the next word in midair on purpose.
"Refuse, and you are rebels."
And what was a rebel?
A rebel was someone you could treat like livestock—and afterward tell everyone it was merely "the rule."
Qin Zhao felt his stomach drop.
He remembered the night the city fell, someone yelling, "As long as you live, anything is fine!"But hearing the word shave today, he understood for the first time:
Not every way of living counts as living.
Then, from within the crowd, a voice rose—quiet, not sharp, yet unmistakable:
"I won't."
Four words, dropped into boiling water like a stone.
Qin Zhao turned toward the sound. The speaker was a scholar—sleeves worn to fuzz, soles split thin, yet he stood straight, spine like bamboo pinned into the earth.
The herald narrowed his eyes. "Won't? Then how do you wish to die?"
The scholar lifted his head. His voice was not loud, but it cut clearer than the drums.
"How do I wish to live."
For a breath, the square fell silent.
In that instant Qin Zhao saw faces change.
Heads that had been lowered, lifted.Shoulders that had been caved in, drew back.Feet that had been edging away, stopped—anchored as if nailed to the ground.
The herald's smile cooled, inch by inch. He tipped his chin to the side.
The Qing line stepped forward as one.
The synchronized thunder of boots was suffocating.
Cold sweat broke across Qin Zhao's back. He shifted back an inch on instinct—only for his heel to bump another heel. Someone else was moving too.
He glanced behind him and saw a girl in a conical hat at the edge of the crowd, still as stone.
The brim sat low, showing only the line of her chin—sharp, unyielding. She wasn't watching the herald. She was scanning the square: the alley mouth, the eaves, the archers in the distance, the "watchers" in Han clothing buried among the people.
Her gaze stopped on Qin Zhao for half a heartbeat.
Then she gave him the smallest nod.
It was a gesture that spoke like a sentence:
Don't rush. Watch first.
The herald's voice hardened. "Seize this rebel. Start with him—shave him first."
Two soldiers reached out.
The scholar did not retreat. He stepped forward instead, making himself an even straighter obstacle.
And just as a hand was about to clamp his shoulder, another figure burst from the far end of the street—a woman clutching a child. The child's forehead was wrapped in white cloth; the crying was so tight and breathless it sounded like something inside him was tearing.
The woman dropped to her knees and screamed:
"Sir! He's the last root of our family—don't force us—!"
It wasn't begging. It was something splitting open.
In the crowd, someone muttered a curse. Someone ground out, "Too far… too far…" Qin Zhao saw the old flatbread seller slide his hand beneath the chopping board, fingers curling, inch by inch.
Qin Zhao knew what was hidden there: a thin knife.
The herald lifted his hand in a snap. "Shave first! Anyone who stirs—behead on the spot!"
When blades came free, the square went taut as a spark in dry grass.
On one side: iron and "rules."On the other: flesh and humiliation.
If you did not move, the blade would fall on your head.If you did move, it might fall anyway—but at least you would not be kneeling when it did.
And then, in the fraction of a moment when the steel was about to drop—
the girl in the conical hat moved.
She did not charge. She did not shout. She did not brandish a weapon.
She simply flicked two fingers.
A tiny stone snapped through the air—pop—and struck the herald square beneath the throat.
His body pitched sideways. The yellow scroll slipped from his hand.
When that paper hit the ground, it carried a kind of meaning with it:
An "imperial command" thrown down into dust.
And dust—dust was where people stood. Dust was where the living crowded together.
"Do it—!"
No one ever knew who shouted first. Perhaps the flatbread seller. Perhaps the woman driven beyond herself. Perhaps the scholar, and the young men behind him finally lifting their heads.
But the cry hit like a gate smashed open, and the breath held in a thousand chests burst out at once.
Qin Zhao's mind went blank, his body moving faster than thought.
He was not a hero. He simply understood—too clearly—that right now you either did something, or you were going to be made into something.
He lunged to the flatbread stall and snatched up the thin knife. At the same time one of the "Han-clothed soldiers" sprang at him from the side. Qin Zhao rolled with it, shoulder slamming into the board. Hot cakes and splinters flew across the ground.
In the chaos he found half a step of space. He didn't slash for flesh—he slashed for rope.
At the corner stood a thick line tied to a temporary flagpole. The new flag had just been raised, hanging there as if to mock the city.
Qin Zhao drew the blade across with everything he had.
Hiss— the rope snapped.
The pole lurched.
Crash!
The new banner fell into the mud, throwing up dust.
For a beat the crowd simply stared. Then it was as if lightning struck them awake—
Someone howled, "The flag's down—what are we still afraid of!"Someone grabbed the razors and smashed them to the ground.Someone shoved children behind them and seized a brick.Someone hauled one of the "Han-clothed soldiers" down and fists fell like rain.
The Qing troops finally reacted; a wall of steel came down together.
The square became a storm: crying, shouting, boot-thunder, boards breaking—everything boiled into one iron-clanging chaos.
Qin Zhao was pushed forward by bodies, carried by panic and fury. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the scholar protected in the middle by several men, retreating as he shouted:
"Don't scatter! Don't scatter! Into the alleys—if we scatter we become meat under the blade!"
The words drove into Qin Zhao like a nail.
Chaos could save you.But scattering would kill you.
The girl in the hat squeezed to his side. Her hand shot out and clamped his wrist. Her fingers were cold—yet steady.
"You run fast," she said under her breath. "Come with me."
Qin Zhao gasped, teeth clenched. "Who are you?"
She didn't answer. She slammed her shoulder into a rushing man in Han clothes and shoved Qin Zhao into a side lane.
Her movements were fast in a way that wasn't theatrical—nothing like stage martial arts. It was the speed of someone who had trained, killed, and survived.
The alley was darker still.
Behind them the footsteps thickened, and the shouting came hard:
"Catch them!""Seal the alley mouths!""Don't let the rebels run!"
Qin Zhao's heart hammered like it would burst. Yet his footing grew strangely surer with each step. He vaulted a collapsed fence, hopped a pile of broken bricks, nearly stumbled—and the girl yanked him back with a backward pull strong enough to wrench his shoulder into place.
"Don't look back," she said.
"Why?"
"Because if you look back, you'll be afraid." Her voice stayed low. "Afraid makes you slow. Slow gets you killed."
Qin Zhao clenched his jaw. He hated that she was right.
A torch flared ahead at the next turn—someone was blocking the way.
The girl didn't pause. She dragged Qin Zhao tight along the wall and slipped them past. At the base of the wall was a door. A broken lantern hung there with the single character "Pawn" painted on it—an old sign on the edge of falling apart.
She raised her hand and knocked three times: light, heavy, light.
A slit opened. An eye peered out.
The girl said only four words:
"Guiyi Society."
The door swung wide at once. A hand seized Qin Zhao and hauled him inside. The door clicked shut. Outside, the running footsteps skimmed past the wood, like wind scraping bone.
Inside it was dark, heavy with the smell of medicine.
A voice hissed from somewhere, furious and controlled: "You made it this big—are you insane?"
The girl pulled off her hat. Her face was clean-cut, decisive; her brows and eyes were sharp as if carved. She answered coldly:
"If we don't make a noise today, there won't be anything left to make noise with tomorrow."
Qin Zhao sagged against the wall, breathing like a bellows torn open. He looked down at the thin knife in his hand. There was no dramatic slick of color—only mud and ash—yet suddenly the knife felt unbearably heavy.
Because he knew:
From the moment he cut that rope, he was no longer "Qin Zhao the errand-runner."He was a rebel.Someone to be seized, to be killed, to be written into notices as an example.
He lifted his head, voice hoarse. "Guiyi Society… what is it?"
The man in the room fell silent for a breath, as if weighing whether Qin Zhao's life was worth the trouble of an answer.
Then, from deeper in the darkness, came a calm voice:
"It's a place where we write the words 'we will not kneel' for all under Heaven to see."
Qin Zhao followed the sound and saw only a pair of eyes—nothing feverish, nothing wild, just bright. Eyes that seemed to say: you're already inside. Don't pretend you haven't seen.
The girl set her hat down on the table, pressing the air flat with the gesture. She looked at Qin Zhao and spoke, each word clean:
"Remember today. What you cut was a flag."
"Tomorrow you'll have to learn what to cut—"
"is the road."
—The chronicler adds one line:When the capital changed banners, many called it "Heaven's will."But from this hidden alley onward, there were those who meant to tell the realm:Heaven's will is not handed down by Heaven—it is seized back by human hands.
(End of this chapter)