Song Bei

First Meeting1 / 6

Divine Constable of the Great Song, granted the Imperial Silver Fish Bag and the right to bear a sword before the Emperor.
Chief Commander of All Constables Under Heaven, empowered to pursue and arrest criminals in Yuezhou.
He moves through the Jianghu, and counts as half a Wulin man.

Biographies

He holds the office of Seventh-Rank Security Officer, and though it is only the seventh rank, add the title of Swordbearer to the Emperor and not even a first-rank minister of the court may insult him at will. He is the Emperor's blade, and proud of it.

Save for the Son of Heaven, he is neither haughty nor humble to anyone. This is the Emperor's expectation of him, and also the courage he has tempered from the Jianghu.

If he uncovers a corrupt official, he dares to arrest even a King; yet he is also full of human feeling. He knows the Song Code backwards and forwards, but when he meets a case the law cannot forgive yet which is excusable in the heart, he often turns a blind eye, or pleads for leniency.

He once arrested a young girl who had been imprisoned in a cellar as a plaything, and who, in fleeing, stabbed the villain to death to save herself.

Out of compassion he set the innocent offender free, and his elder brother's political enemies seized on it and reported him to the Court of Judicial Review.

Song Bei argued with stern conviction: "The Code has stood for two hundred years, and the customs of the people have changed; it is not fitting to cling to old rules. Moreover, the law was made by our forebears, and forebears are only men. Sitting high in the halls of power, they did not know the people's hearts, and so there must be oversights. What defies reason harms the realm instead. Where the law falls short of its intent, I show mercy, and my conscience is clear."

Yet his defense failed. Song Bei was fined half a year's salary and confined to his residence. Fortunately his elder brother Song Ci moved through the court on his behalf, and the people petitioned as well, so the Court of Judicial Review revoked the order and granted him a special pardon.

Notes

• His elder brother Song Ci may be a historical figure (1186–1249), who in his life redressed countless wrongful cases and wrote the Collected Cases of Injustice Rectified, the first forensic work in world history to systematically classify causes of death. Wikipedia