Chapter One: Flight for Survival

In the spring of 1960, the drought that had persisted for more than a year showed no sign of abating. In a small village in northwest Zhejiang, home to about a hundred families, the fields had long since turned into expanses of yellow earth, cracked and dry like flaking pine bark. The river had vanished, the crops had failed the previous year.

This place was called Hong Village, its origins lost to time, and most of its inhabitants were refugees who had fled famine from various regions during the late Qing and early Republican eras. The tales and histories of the original villagers were long buried beneath the earth. At the entrance of the village stood an old archway, supported by two stone pillars as thick as water barrels, each resting atop a stone beast.

People of the time had no knowledge of the legends behind these beasts; they simply called them “old tortoises.” Upon their backs stood the pillars, and above them hung a stone plaque engraved with a bold character: “Hong.” Thus, the village was known as Hong Village.

Newcomers with strength would choose plots of land, occupy a house, and settle with their families, bringing seeds and tools to take root. Some came from the interior, others from the coast, from Anhui, Henan, or Jiangxi. In those days, people sought food and peace, and wherever those were found, they stayed. My ancestors originally hailed from Anqing in Anhui; from my great-grandfather’s generation, they escaped to this place and became villagers of Hong.

No one knew when Hong Village was founded, nor what had transpired here. Stone figures and horses, crumbling temples and grand residences dotted the landscape, many dismantled in those years. Broken stone horses were hauled away to build embankments and dams, temple bricks repurposed for pigsties and bathhouses. By my generation, only the General’s Temple and a few half-buried stone carvings remained.

Northwest Zhejiang, lying at the intersection of two provinces and three counties, was once an important post station in ancient times. As early as the Qin dynasty, the First Emperor officially established a prefecture here, and evidence of human activity predates even the Qin. Yet, the Taiping Rebellion swept the local natives away entirely.

The newcomers found ready houses and farmland left behind, and as more arrived, a community formed. Hong Village was one of the more secluded mountain villages in northwest Zhejiang, surrounded on all sides by hills, with a river running through the center. Villagers settled along the water, channeling the river to irrigate their fields. The later generations lived and multiplied here, survived the war against Japan, the civil war, and finally welcomed the liberation of New China.

As the saying goes, “the mountains are high and the emperor is far.” In 1960, at the height of the Great Leap Forward and the People’s Commune movement, China’s land was dotted with earth kilns smelting steel. Every commune had its annual steel production targets, broken down to brigades and teams.

Every village had its tasks, every person their quota, eating from communal pots, drinking from communal vats. To achieve “catch up with Britain and surpass America,” the people handed over their iron pots and copper kettles, determined to contribute to the construction of socialist New China.

By 1960, the drought dragged on. Northwest Zhejiang, once thickly forested with green bamboo, now appeared yellow and scorched from every hilltop. Women searched the fields for wild greens on empty stomachs; men carried hoes into the mountains to strip bark for food; the elderly resorted to eating clay, yet construction of socialism could not cease.

In that era of severe food shortages, Hong Village’s steel output ranked among the highest, regularly making headlines. This was not exaggerated propaganda like “sows giving birth to elephants” or “hundred thousand pounds per acre,” but genuine production.

Northwest Zhejiang produced no iron ore, so how did Hong Village achieve such remarkable steel output? Because the land was littered with iron lumps. With a hoe in hand, anyone could dig in their backyard and turn up iron lumps of all shapes and sizes—some as small as a bowl, others so large they required a dozen men and pulleys. The largest, it was said, weighed several thousand pounds, shaped like a triangular incense burner, and took several days and nights of pounding to break into pieces for the kiln.

Besides these iron lumps, other items would often surface—jars, bottles, and the like. If they could be cleaned and reused, they became household items; those lucky enough might find gold ornaments, while jade pieces usually ended up as children’s toys.

In the 1970s, outsiders frequently came to collect those jars and bottles, trading plastic basins, plastic flowers, or scissors and knives for piles of them. Children’s jade toys could be exchanged for a few sweets.

The story begins with the final stage of the 1960 steel-smelting campaign, the year someone unexpectedly dug up a child while searching for iron lumps.

In the autumn of 1960, several strong men from Hong Village went into the hills to search for raw materials. They knew which iron lumps were what; the elders called some of them “funeral objects,” meant for burial with the dead.

No one knew who first thought to smelt steel from these objects—perhaps desperation—but since they were for the dead, it was seen as the ancestors contributing to socialist construction.

Not everyone could search for these iron lumps; it required expertise. At first, one could simply dig where stone figures and horses stood. Later, when most had been excavated, experts had to be consulted.

So-called experts, in those days, operated with caution—descendants of tomb raiders, in fact. In Hong Village, one family’s ancestors hailed from Henan, settling near Luoyang.

The ancients said, “Born in Suzhou or Hangzhou, buried in Beiyang.” A third of China’s emperors are interred in Luoyang. Some lived off the land or the water; others made their living from the dead—these were tomb raiders, known in some places as “Captain Mojin.”

This expert’s surname was Li. He claimed kinship with the famous Li Duck, belonging to the same clan. Whether true or not, his ancestors certainly brought the skills of the Luoyang shovel to Hong Village.

Tomb raiding is not a respectable trade; digging up ancestors’ graves is a business courting heaven’s wrath, but the profession follows a rule: months of nothing, then a windfall. With luck, a large tomb meant untold treasures. Li’s grandfather was a renowned “Eye Master,” skilled in feng shui and apprenticed. It was said that with one glance from a hilltop, he could spot every old grave within five miles, no matter how deep.

Li the Second arrived in Hong Village in the early twentieth century, among the earlier settlers. He was not a refugee, but a fugitive, wanted by the government at the time. In his native Henan, the Li brothers had a fierce reputation. In their line of work, most had blood on their hands; Li himself had killed a minor warlord, buried him alive in a tomb over a dispute about spoils.

In those days, any petty leader could gather a gang of rogues and claim a mountain, and with a few guns, set up their own banner, styling themselves Commander or Marshal. So long as their men stayed loyal, they were local kings—but even commanders needed to pay their men and procure weapons.

Thus, these warlords set their sights on underground relics, and Second Li became their target for recruitment.

Wealth unbalances all souls, none are immune. After Li finally opened a large tomb, the promised split was about to be swallowed by the “Commander.” Rather than be betrayed, Li and his brother struck first, tricking the Commander into believing they had found Wu Zetian’s tomb—a matter of great importance, requiring his personal attendance.

The Commander, greedy for treasure, brought only a few adjutants to lie in wait nearby. As expected, Second Li lured him to the pit’s edge and ended his life with a blow. When it came time to fill in the grave, the guards discovered the plot, and Li escaped under a hail of bullets, beginning a night-long flight.

They fled for days; upon reaching the northwest, Li’s eyes shone with excitement. The valley was dotted with ancient tombs—surely, this was heaven’s way of granting him fortune.

Shortly after arriving in Hong Village, Li could not resist temptation. One night, he set out with his tools for a hillside he'd eyed since his first day. His brother, his own elder sibling, accompanied him.

Shovel after shovel, the brothers worked by moonlight, stripping to their waists, digging with fervor.

“Damn, we’re about to strike it rich. Who’d have thought that running for our lives would land us atop a treasure trove,” said Li’s elder brother. He and Li’s father shared both parents, but the two were utterly unalike.

The elder was burly and powerful; the younger, thin as a monkey and dark-skinned. The pair had stirred up trouble in Luoyang for years before being reported to the authorities—a crime punishable by death. Packing their valuables, they fled by night, traversed half of China, and finally settled here.

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