Chapter 16: - Something’s Off

“You sure you can carry all that?”

“Listen to you, Master. This little bit of weight is nothing to me, Xue San.”

“If it gets too heavy, tell me.”

“Yessir. Many thanks for Master’s concern.”

Feng Siniang had prepared Zheng Fan’s armor and spare clothes and packed them into a chest, which Xue San carried on his back.

A saber had also been strapped to the dwarf’s body.

The load was obviously heavy, yet Xue San’s tiny frame still moved with complete ease beneath it.

Liang Cheng wore his own armor and carried a saber in one hand.

Originally, Fourth Lady had planned to buy a horse for Zheng Fan and another for Liang Cheng, but Blind Man Bei rejected the idea outright.

His reasoning was simple. Their household was already sending men with their own armor and weapons. Thrown into a civilian labor force, that would probably be enough to get them made minor overseers, standing guard and looking impressive while the others transported grain and fodder.

But if they showed up with horses too, some officer might decide to pull them out and use them as auxiliary troops on the battlefield.

Blind Man Bei might have said it would be good for Master to go out and see the world, but he had absolutely no intention of letting Master somehow die for the State of Yan for no goddamn reason.

For the same reason, the armor and weapons the inn purchased were all ordinary pieces. Nothing had been decorated with flashy nonsense. As long as circumstances allowed it, they intended to keep as low a profile as possible.

The farewell breakfast was especially lavish.

Blind Man Bei asked Zheng Fan for permission to spend the period while Master was away reorganizing Tiger Head City’s local underworld. By the time Zheng Fan and the others returned, everyone could formally begin the first step of their Tiger Head City strategy.

But those were matters for later.

Especially once Zheng Fan, Liang Cheng, and Xue San walked out of Tiger Head City and reached the army camp beyond the walls.

Looking at the dense mass of people moving inside, Zheng Fan genuinely felt as though he had crossed into another lifetime.

He had been reborn into another world only a few days ago.

And now he was already going to war.

Hoo...

A large tent stood outside the army-camp entrance, where clerks registered and counted the arriving civilian laborers.

Poor men, or those without families and property tying them down, had simply been seized and thrown into the Transport Camp when the labor rolls were checked the day before. Men with wives, children, or property had been given one day to prepare.

Those men were harder to run away.

The monk could flee, but the temple could not. If they escaped, the authorities could simply confiscate their property.

The clerk handling registration clearly disliked the sight of Xue San. But after Xue San said he knew how to feed horses and had brought his own rations, the man stopped objecting and allowed all three into the Transport Camp.

Soldiers guarded the entrance. Beyond the perimeter, a cavalry unit could be seen moving back and forth.

Once inside, Zheng Fan saw three men tied to wooden posts just behind the gate. Their backs had been whipped into bloody ruin.

The three had tried to flee the night before. They had been caught, flogged, and tied here as an example to everyone else.

In earlier years, Yan’s levy of civilian labor had followed certain limits. A household might provide one man out of four, or one out of three. Even in harsher times, taking one out of every two able-bodied men was about the worst it got.

But Yan was crowded with great clans. Every clan controlled its own estates, dependent tenant households, and private troops. These aristocratic houses clung to the body of the empire like leeches, sucking away its nourishment. Over time, the taxes and manpower the court could directly extract had grown increasingly limited.

Then came this sudden military operation.

With no time for proper preparation, the authorities had no choice but to drain the pond to catch the fish, scraping together laborers by brute force.

No wonder the current ruler of Yan had spent the years since taking the throne trying to centralize authority and curb the feudatories. The empire looked powerful from the outside, but insects had already eaten it hollow within.

Fortunately for Yan, the State of Qian and the State of Jin were hardly healthy either. They did not suffer from the same concentration of hereditary great clans, but their scholar-official classes had long since become swollen, decadent, and impossible to dislodge.

The State of Qian was especially ridiculous. It controlled the rich lands south of the great river and possessed flourishing commerce, yet its court could barely collect commercial taxes. State finances remained perpetually strained, to the point that even the northern frontier armies stationed against Yan’s iron cavalry often had their grain and pay delayed.

Because the “old Zheng household” owned property in Tiger Head City, and because Liang Cheng looked particularly formidable once armored, the laborer camp made him a File Leader.

Five men made one file, so three more civilian laborers were assigned to them.

Why only three?

Because Xue San did not count as a person here.

By the time all the fuss was finished, their tent erected, and their belongings put in order, it was already afternoon.

Zheng Fan, Liang Cheng, and Xue San sat outside the tent eating flatbread.

Scallion pancakes, heavy with oil and stuffed with meat.

They were genuinely delicious.

When Zheng Fan noticed the envious looks from the other three men in their file, he handed each of them a pancake.

The three nameless extras accepted them with delight and thanked him over and over.

Liang Cheng showed no reaction.

He simply sat there in silence, watching the Yan cavalry units that occasionally passed around the camp.

“What are you looking at?” Zheng Fan asked.

“Our future enemies.”

“...” Zheng Fan.

The words “you lunatic” rose to Zheng Fan’s lips.

After hesitating, he swallowed them back down.

He did not feel any particular attachment to Great Yan, nor did he especially like it. But he had not been in this world long enough to spend every waking moment dreaming about rebellion.

Clearly, though, the Demon Kings beneath him had already begun making those calculations.

In any case, Zheng Fan’s entire first day felt almost like a camping trip. Walk out into the wilderness, pitch a tent, then lie under the stars once night came.

But the instant the military horns sounded the next morning, all that leisure vanished.

Soldiers carrying leather whips came through, shouting and driving everyone to get moving.

The disorderly laborer camp began moving in disorder and then, still in disorder, took to the road.

The main army was presumably somewhere ahead. The laborers traveled behind it, transporting grain and fodder. The main force had apparently departed a day earlier.

Aside from a fifteen-minute break at noon, they spent the entire day escorting the supplies.

The farther they entered the desert, the heavier the wind and sand became.

To Zheng Fan’s surprise, he had expected his body to give out. Instead, he gritted his teeth and made it through the whole march without needing much help from Liang Cheng or Xue San.

When they made camp after dark, Zheng Fan even had enough strength left to help Xue San gather firewood and light the campfire.

A small iron pot went over the flames to boil water. Xue San took out flour from their own provisions and began kneading dough for noodles.

Fourth Lady had prepared their logistics almost obscenely well.

When it came to spending money on Zheng Fan, none of them had ever shown the slightest reluctance.

Besides, no one in their group had any concept of “saving for retirement.”

Now that they had chosen their road, people like them only had two possible endings: either prosper while stirring up trouble, or get themselves killed while stirring up trouble.

The three nameless extras in their file sat nearby on their knees, practically drooling.

Once the noodles went into the pot, Xue San produced packets of precious spices from their supplies.

The three extras became even more excited.

“Food’s ready!”

Xue San shouted.

He filled a large bowl for Zheng Fan first, then bowls for himself and Liang Cheng. After that he pointed at what remained in the pot.

“You three split the rest.”

The three men immediately crowded around and fished out the noodles.

In the end, they even drank every last drop of broth.

After dinner, warmth and laziness spread through Zheng Fan’s limbs.

He had just been preparing to crawl into the tent when Liang Cheng called him over.

“What is it?”

“Something’s wrong.” Liang Cheng glanced around them.

“What?”

“Master, while we were escorting the supplies today, I checked the grain and fodder we’re carrying.”

“And?”

“There isn’t enough.”

“Not enough?”

“And by all logic, the main army should be ahead of us. But all day today, I never saw any trace of a large army having marched along this route.”

Civilian laborers had no right to know military intelligence.

Truthfully, even ordinary regular soldiers rarely knew the real strategic objective of a campaign. Civilian laborers needed only to transport grain and fodder and help build camps. If the situation turned desperate, they might even be driven forward as cannon fodder.

“More importantly, Master, everything is happening too quickly. From drafting laborers to the army marching out, there was no advance rumor at all. No preparation.”

Where were they attacking?

No idea.

How large was the army ahead?

No idea.

How large was the enemy force?

No idea.

Was this a lightning campaign or a prolonged war?

No idea.

At that moment, Xue San leaned over and lowered his voice.

“Want me to grab a tongue?”

For most people, “grab a tongue” meant crossing over to the enemy and capturing someone for interrogation.

Xue San, however, was clearly proposing to kidnap one of the officers supervising their own labor camp.

Two Centurions oversaw the camp. One handled movement and order inside the column. The other commanded a cavalry detachment that traveled nearby.

A little over two hundred regular soldiers watching two or three thousand civilian laborers was probably enough.

Liang Cheng shook his head.

“Wait another two days and watch first.”

Zheng Fan remained silent.

When it came to this kind of thing, he was a complete novice.

More importantly, he trusted Liang Cheng and Xue San.

If nothing unusual happened and they could all return safely after the campaign, excellent.

But if something did go wrong, his survival would depend on these two.

At least Zheng Fan knew his own fucking limits.

The night passed peacefully.

On the second day, the labor column continued forward and camped again that evening.

The third day was equally calm.

At dusk on the fourth day, the laborer camp halted once more.

This time, the camping ground looked excellent. A river ran beside them, while sloping ravines rose on both sides and blocked much of the wind and sand.

Once camp was made, many laborers went down to the river to wash.

After several days marching north through the desert, it felt as though layers of sand had been pasted onto everyone’s bodies. They had lacked the conditions to wash before. Now that water was available, everyone naturally wanted to clean themselves up and sleep comfortably for once.

Of the three extras in Zheng Fan’s file, one fetched water, one gathered dry firewood, and one pitched the tent.

Xue San only needed to cook.

The camp did distribute meals. Most civilian laborers obviously did not enjoy the conditions of the “old Zheng household.”

But compared with their private little mess, the camp food was basically pig slop.

Zheng Fan bathed in the river.

When he climbed back onto the bank, he saw Liang Cheng standing there.

For an instant, the sight gave Zheng Fan the bizarre impression of a princess bathing outdoors while a general stood guard nearby.

Naturally, he would never say that aloud.

Not even as a joke.

It was too disgusting.

But Liang Cheng clearly was not standing there simply to guard him.

Once Zheng Fan came ashore, Liang Cheng walked over with a grave expression.

“Master, something will probably happen tonight.”

“What makes you say that?”

“What does Master think of this campsite?”

Zheng Fan thought carefully.

He knew nothing about ancient warfare and had never been a military enthusiast in his previous life, so he could only analyze it through ordinary logic.

“First, there’s guaranteed access to water. Second, camping inside this valley means fewer directions need defending. If the enemy launches a night raid, it should be easier to hold. And we don’t have to worry as much about someone cutting off the water supply.”

“Master is wise.”

Zheng Fan had already noticed that all these people were learning bad habits. The flattery was so cheap and insincere it might as well have been free.

And he knew perfectly well that this praise was only the setup.

A “but” was coming next.

“But Master may have overlooked one thing. If three thousand soldiers were camping here, then even if they were not elite field troops, as long as they were proper regulars, this terrain could indeed be used effectively for defense.”

Liang Cheng’s voice turned colder.

“But Master, we have barely two hundred soldiers here. There are another two hundred or so men like us who brought their own armor and weapons. Everyone else is just an ordinary civilian laborer.”

“All it would take is a few hundred cavalry. Attack hard from one side, then strike the other. The entire camp would collapse.”

Zheng Fan had already seen the quality of these laborers for himself.

If a night attack came, expecting men who mostly did not even possess weapons to suddenly transform into iron-blooded soldiers was obviously impossible.

If anything, they would become the fuse that set off a camp-wide panic, causing the camp to collapse from within.

“Did you tell the officers about this?” Zheng Fan asked.

Liang Cheng shook his head and pointed toward the cavalry in the distance.

“There’s something else strange. Using cavalry to escort a supply column is perfectly normal. But that cavalry force has never dispersed to act as scouts. For the past few days, they have stayed together as a complete unit. Rather than escorting the labor column, it feels more like they’re monitoring the laborers.”

“Yeah.”

Now that Liang Cheng had pointed it out, Zheng Fan noticed it too.

“Did you fight wars before?” Zheng Fan suddenly asked, completely derailing the conversation.

A distant look appeared in Liang Cheng’s eyes.

“In ancient times, yes.”

“Oh.”

Was that from one of the bonus stories in *Zombie Liang Cheng*?

Zheng Fan could not remember those details clearly.

At that moment, Xue San’s voice suddenly came from behind the two of them like a ghost.

“Master, I found something very wrong.”

The sudden voice sent a chill straight up Zheng Fan’s spine, making him suck in a breath.

Still fighting down the aftershock of being startled, he asked:

“What did you find?”

“While I was cooking just now, this subordinate thought I’d go over to the grain carts and skim a little food for ourselves. Who knows how long it’ll be before we get home. Better to save our own supplies wherever we can.”

“To avoid being spotted, I deliberately chose one of the sacks at the very bottom of a grain cart.”

Xue San opened his palm.

Pebbles, one after another, fell from his hand.

[End of Chapter 16]