In fact, ever since Henry Clark entered the village, he had always presented himself as a scholar. But with his height of 1.8 meters, he looked extremely robust wherever he stood, and in these vast mountains where people survived by force, the image of a warrior was even more respected. So the more Brooks the Second spoke, the more everyone felt regret: such a teacher, skilled in both literature and martial arts, yet Brooks Hollow couldn’t keep him—what did we do to offend him?

　　Adam Brooks continued to recall, “The second time I realized he was no ordinary man was that winter, when it snowed heavily and the weather was bitterly cold. I invited the teacher over to drink some Pan Sheng wine that Ethan Brooks had brought back from Fan County, but the master only took a small sip and refused to drink any more. I urged him repeatedly, but he only said: ‘The taste is bland, hard to swallow!’

　　From then on, I knew the master was not raised in an ordinary family—he couldn’t get used to the finest teas, nor would he touch the most famous wines. This is not how a child from a common family is raised.”

　　The clan leader’s words were essentially repeating Brooks the Second’s point, but his final addition had a bit of a “shocking statement” flavor.

　　“Zhao is a royal surname!” Amid the crowd’s astonishment, he glanced at the faces around the fire pit and continued, “Zhao is a royal surname! ... This man’s attire and manner are both unusual—but this isn’t something we villagers should discuss, so let me just share my thoughts.

　　I heard that before the teacher (in the Song dynasty, ‘teacher’ was a title for Taoists, monks, and doctors) appeared, there was a great drought in Qin-Feng, and two hundred thousand refugees entered the xiang, being relocated to Huainan... The teacher refuses to talk about his origins, so to put it simply: perhaps he is a refugee who fled into the xiang, but I suspect he might be a ‘xiang general’—a xiang general with a royal surname...”

　　The so-called “refugees entering the xiang” was a specific policy in the Song dynasty. Whenever disasters struck, the Song government would select the strong and able-bodied from among the refugees, enroll them into the xiang army, provide them with basic food, meager or no pay, and have them serve or labor, thus keeping the “sources of trouble” among the refugees under control.

　　However, xiang soldiers were actually treated as slaves. They toiled at all kinds of labor, were even treated as household servants by officials, and the income they received was barely enough to feed their families. As a result, large-scale escapes among xiang soldiers were common, especially among those from prominent families. With better education and sharper minds, they were unwilling to become slaves and sometimes even incited the whole army to flee.

　　If escaped xiang soldiers were caught, it was basically a death sentence, so most of them fled into the mountains and became bandits. If all the subordinates escaped, the “xiang leader (xiang general)” in charge of the relocation would also take the opportunity to flee, becoming a major bandit or villain.

　　What Adam Brooks described was a guess, one that fit the times best—if Henry Clark had indeed been forced into the xiang army, then he might have escaped into the mountains during the relocation... When he returned to society, he naturally wouldn’t reveal his background or identity.

　　On the positive side, perhaps Henry Clark thought: the Cheng family of Brooks Hollow was not a powerful clan, not enough to shelter a fugitive like him. If he really revealed his true identity, the villagers would be put in a difficult position, so he preferred to remain mysterious.

　　After Adam Brooks voiced his guess, Brooks the Second, ever the blunt one, was still puzzled: “Big brother, how can you be sure he’s leaving?”

　　By this point, everyone already understood that a man of such talent in both civil and martial arts, if even the xiang army couldn’t keep him, how could he settle down in Brooks Hollow? But everyone also saw that in the past two years, Brooks Hollow had gained many benefits, all thanks to Henry Clark’s guidance, and during this time, Henry Clark had no selfish motives and took nothing for himself. With such a person, the villagers were truly reluctant to let him go.

　　“A few days ago, the master came to ask about household registration, and now he wants to take students to Huangzhou Prefecture. I suspect he wants to register the children,” Adam Brooks said with a serious face. “Maybe after the registration is done, the master will have repaid our clan’s life-saving kindness. After that, why would he stay in Brooks Hollow?”

　　In fact, Adam Brooks misunderstood. When Henry Clark asked about “registration,” he was inquiring about his own household registration. But Henry Clark didn’t realize that the Song dynasty was a patriarchal society, and commoners didn’t have “household registration” in the modern sense—only scholars needed a place of origin, and students taking the exams needed to register at the prefecture, which was called “scholar registration.”

　　Following his own logic, Adam Brooks guessed that Henry Clark’s advice had transformed Brooks Hollow. Now he was eager to help the village register for “scholar status.” If a remote place like Brooks Hollow could produce ten “scholar registrations,” that kindness would be enough to repay the villagers. After that, could Brooks Hollow possibly keep such a remarkable person?

　　It never occurred to Adam Brooks that his actions today had affected Henry Clark’s rights... But he couldn’t be blamed; even today, clans can still handle their children’s ventures this way. Of course, from Brooks Hollow’s perspective, it wasn’t entirely wrong, since those were the rules—Henry Clark had occupied their land, started these enterprises on their territory without investing a penny himself, so losing them was inevitable. This was also why Henry Clark ultimately gave up arguing.

　　There was a chorus of agreement around the fire pit. Adam Brooks patted the chair beside him and said firmly, “This chair should have been for the master. Our Cheng clan owes everything we have today to the master. In this one year, the master has done more for our clan than we could have achieved in a hundred years on our own. Now, Brooks Hollow faces another hurdle: our village has already surpassed a hundred households, and the authorities can’t be kept in the dark any longer. That’s why we need the master—the master must sit in this chair!”