Xiao Feng's Khitan identity and estrangement from the Central Plains

Xiao Feng’s Khitan identity becomes more than a disclosed ancestry: it estranges him from the Central Plains world that once knew him as Qiao Feng, while drawing him into the conflicts of Liao and its neighbors. His responses to that division—protecting people across ethnic lines and questioning the logic of reciprocal raids—show how inherited political boundaries contend with personal loyalty and a broader sense of shared humanity.

Identity and Estrangement

At Little Mirror Lake, the people around Duan Zhengchun learn that the man who had introduced himself as Xiao Feng, a Khitan, is also the famous former chief of the Beggar Society, Qiao Feng. The revelation astonishes Duan Yanqing and the Dali men present. His name had carried a world-wide reputation as one half of the saying “North Qiao Feng, South Murong,” and the onlookers conclude that his reputation for courage and chivalry is deserved. Yet the revelation also exposes a split between public fame and social belonging: the celebrated Qiao Feng is the same man whom Central Plains heroes now despise as a Khitan.

That estrangement is not abstract. After encountering a powerful stranger who has killed Bai Shijing, Xiao Feng considers approaching him, then stops because the man had asked him not to follow. He suspects the stranger, too, may hate Khitans. The episode leaves him praising the man’s martial skill and judgment while regretting that they cannot become friends. Xiao Feng has been expelled from the Beggar Clan, has fallen into deep enmity with Central Plains heroes, and has broken with his former friends; even an apparent chance of fellowship is narrowed by the ethnic suspicion he fears. At the same time, the long-standing suspicions that had troubled him have been resolved, so his grief and relief coexist.

His estrangement is also voiced directly by Madam Ma. When she asks him to kill her, he answers that he is no longer chief of the Beggar Clan and refuses to take pity on her. She blames him for her condition and curses him specifically as a Khitan. Xiao Feng remains silent as she vents her accumulated anger. The encounter shows how the change in his public identity can make him a target even where he does not accept responsibility for the accuser’s suffering; it also contrasts his former title with his present isolation from the institution and community that title represented.

The Frontier and Competing Loyalties

Among the Jurchen, Xiao Feng is not treated as an enemy merely because he is Khitan. A Han-speaking trader, Xu Zhuocheng, interprets for him and explains that the Jurchen and Khitans are at war, but both admire worthy heroes. Wanyan Aguda’s high regard for Xiao Feng persuades the tribespeople to welcome him as an honored guest. Aguda gives up his own tent for Xiao Feng and A'Zi, and the tribe holds a feast in their honor. The contrast with the suspicion Xiao Feng encounters among Central Plains heroes makes belonging appear contingent on conduct and recognition, not ancestry alone.

That welcome does not remove the conflict between his affiliations. When Khitan riders approach while Xiao Feng is with Aguda’s party, Aguda urges a retreat, but Xiao Feng stays to observe because he feels kinship with the Khitans. The Khitan riders call the Jurchen enemies and begin shooting. An old Jurchen hunter is killed; Aguda’s men return fire, and the two sides exchange casualties. Xiao Feng does not want to injure his own people, so he first disarms Khitans without killing them. Once their attack threatens the Jurchen, however, he joins the defense, using arrows to knock four Khitan riders from their horses without killing them. His intervention neither denies his ancestry nor makes it an absolute command: he acts to protect companions under attack while limiting the harm to his own people.

The violence belongs to a recurring frontier economy, not an isolated clash. Xiao Feng later sees Liao soldiers return with hundreds of Song captives and stolen goods. He recognizes the pattern from the other side: at Yanmen Pass he had seen Song soldiers seize Khitan civilians, and now Liao forces have seized Song civilians. Liao troops receive neither provisions nor wages, and the account explains that they are expected to obtain what they need through raids into neighboring territories. The Liao call this “Beating The Grass Valley”; Song retaliation is called “Beating The Standing Valley.” The different names disguise a shared practice in which border residents live under repeated threat of capture.

From Martial World to Imperial Office

Xiao Feng’s personal crisis unfolds alongside the political structures of Liao. The account traces a succession dispute back to the Holy Emperor, whose eldest son ZongZhen became emperor despite their mother’s preference for the younger ZhongYuan. ZongZhen warned his brother of their mother’s scheme, and ZhongYuan did not seize the throne. After ZongZhen’s death, however, the throne passed to his son HongJi rather than to ZhongYuan, who had been placed next in succession. HongJi compensated his uncle with titles, military command, and exceptional privileges, while making ZhongYuan’s son, NieLuGu, Prince of Chu and head of the Southern Chancellery.

This settlement helps explain the rebellion’s danger. When NieLuGu rebels, HongJi has only about one hundred thousand troops with him, while his uncle can command a far larger force. An edict declares HongJi a false emperor and ZhongYuan the legitimate ruler; HongJi fears that the claim will weaken the army’s loyalty. Xiao Feng, though HongJi’s sworn brother, initially intends to leave rather than accept office. The crisis and their bond make departure difficult, and he eventually serves Liao as Lord of the Southern Chancellery. His appointment thus carries him from an identity contested in the martial world into a position inside the state whose war-making practices trouble him.

The political setting extends beyond individual ambition. Liao’s possession of the Sixteen Prefectures, ceded by Shi JingTang in return for imperial support, is described as a strategic advantage in its long conflict with the Song. The territory lets Liao launch attacks deep into Song lands, while the Song lacks comparable defensive positions. Xiao Feng’s divided sense of belonging therefore takes shape amid inherited borders, military institutions, and policies that turn civilians into resources of war.

Release of the Song Captives

At Nanjing, Xiao Feng sees the human consequences of that system in a returning raid. About eight hundred soldiers bring back hundreds of captives, mostly young women, along with goods taken from the Song. Their captain presents the captives and valuables for the Prince of Chu to choose from, treating the plunder as an expected privilege of office. Xiao Feng remembers having seen Song soldiers capture Khitan civilians at Yanmen Pass; the sight before him makes the reciprocity plain without making either side’s victims less real.

One captured girl begs to return to her parents, while hundreds of captives kneel before him. A youth alone remains standing and asks to speak with Xiao Feng privately. Before turning to the young man’s claim of an important secret, Xiao Feng confronts the meaning of the raid itself. His thoughts reject the cycle in which one side raids and the other retaliates, and in which each calls the other by contemptuous names. He reasons that shared speech and food make it difficult to draw a moral distinction between people merely by labeling them Song, Khitan, Jurchen, or Korean.

Xiao Feng releases the captives and tells them to flee, warning them to move away from the border because he may not be able to save them again. They hesitate, unsure whether they are being ordered to run before an attack, and believe him only after he repeats his instruction. Their gratitude reflects the peril they face: poor captives cannot redeem themselves with gold and silk, and many would otherwise disappear into captivity. The release gives practical force to Xiao Feng’s refusal to let his official position erase his judgment of the raids.

Significance

The contrast between Qiao Feng’s rejection in the Central Plains and Xiao Feng’s reception among the Jurchen complicates any simple equation of ethnicity with loyalty. His ancestry can make former allies suspect him and enemies welcome him, while his own choices cross those boundaries: he protects Jurchen companions from Khitan attack, spares the Khitan riders he brings down, and later frees Song captives held by Liao troops. These are distinct decisions shaped by immediate circumstances, but together they resist the expectation that identity must dictate whom he harms or helps.

The story also places that ethical position under pressure. Xiao Feng accepts a powerful Liao office out of loyalty to HongJi, although he had hoped to resign and live in seclusion, and the institution he serves relies on raids that he considers cruel and immoral. His Khitan identity does not resolve the conflict between personal kinship, political duty, and sympathy for civilians. Instead, it makes that conflict visible: the borders that define him are also the borders across which violence is repeatedly justified, while his actions insist on the humanity of those caught within them.