Chapter 501: - Scrounging

A migration by a tribe this large could never be completely hidden from outside eyes. The only exception would be if the tribe contained no elderly, women, or children at all and consisted entirely of able-bodied warriors capable of riding and drawing bows. A force like that could conceal itself through rapid movement, plunder, and killing witnesses along the way. Once families and baggage were involved, secrecy was basically impossible.

At the same time, nearby Savage tribes began sending their own warriors to observe the newcomers. More and more of those warriors gathered. Two or three thousand from one tribe, four or five thousand from another. Before long, more than twenty thousand Savage warriors from different tribes were watching the migrating group like hungry tigers.

The tribes also began rapidly exchanging information with one another, while new warriors continued arriving from farther out.

The snowfields had always possessed their own model of survival and development.

As the Blind Man put it, the lower a place’s productive capacity, the clearer its laws of survival became.

The entire snowfield was one gigantic Gu jar.

A few years ago, that jar had produced a Savage King.

After the Savage King was defeated by the Yan, the Black Dragon Banner flying above Snow Sea Pass became a nightmare to countless tribes across the snowfields.

Fortunately, that nightmare had shown no intention, for now, of marching deep into the snowfields in force. So while no one dared jump around like the Naiman Tribe had, the tribes certainly continued swallowing and absorbing one another as they developed.

This newly appeared migrating tribe was a flock of lambs waiting to be butchered.

The warriors gathering around it had come to carve up the meat.

Before long, elders with some experience began making guesses based on certain features of the migrants. Most believed this tribe had probably come from the extreme north.

The snowfields were vast, but there were actually very few places suitable for long-term settlement and reproduction.

Even to the Savages themselves, the extreme north was a forbidden region for life.

That did not mean no tribes survived there at all.

Some did.

But such tribes were generally very weak and scattered.

Any tribe powerful enough to survive elsewhere would long since have left the extreme north and seized a pasture somewhere else on the snowfields.

The leaders of the surrounding tribal forces had also noticed that although the migrants looked like one tribe, they were probably a patchwork assembled from many groups.

Tribal migration was common on the snowfields.

Large tribes sometimes moved from one pasture to another to let old grazing grounds recover. That was a luxury only large tribes possessed.

For medium and small tribes, changes in weather and water or shifts in the grasslands often forced the entire tribe to relocate. That was the true norm of the snowfields.

As a result, nearly every Savage tribe had experience with migration and knew its procedures very well.

During a proper migration, livestock herds and the elderly, women, and children all had assigned positions. The tribe’s warriors would be consolidated, with one main force moving at the front as a fist and another force roaming around the tribe as a screen.

The first displayed strength to any tribe tempted to make trouble.

The second guarded against opportunists trying to fish in troubled water and create chaos.

The migrating tribe before them clearly had no such order.

Its warriors were very poorly equipped. Armor was almost never seen. Yet there were actually quite a lot of fighting-age men among them, and very few elderly people.

That also meant there were few true burdens.

After all, in a place like the extreme north, anyone who survived had already passed through nature’s brutal selection.

But their young men were scattered throughout every part of the column rather than gathered into a unified force. Especially after discovering the hostile tribal warriors outside them, they had almost instinctively split into group after group.

There was an old law of survival on the snowfields.

When a pack of wolves surrounded you, you pointed your last arrow at one specific wolf.

That way, every wolf in the pack would fear becoming the one you chose.

This column had clearly failed to do that.

Several large tribes that had sent forces here were already sounding their horns and raising their banners.

They had waited earlier for two reasons.

First, they wanted more warriors from every direction to gather.

Second, they needed to negotiate how this migrating group of thirty thousand people would be divided among them.

It was going to be a feast for everyone.

At the front of the migrating column, a gray-haired old man with a string of human skulls hanging around his neck narrowed his eyes and surveyed the surroundings.

Nearly a thousand warriors protected him.

He was Sanghu.

He had once been one of the Savage King’s great generals.

Originally an enemy of the Star Priests, he had been placed by the Savage King in the position of Grand Elder of the Guides of Stars.

After the defeat at the Wang River, Sanghu and the Savage King had been separated.

After enduring countless hardships, Sanghu finally made it back to the snowfields.

As one of the Savage King’s most loyal subordinates, he sought out the eight hundred loyal warriors the Savage King had deliberately left behind before entering the passes.

That force had been the final fallback.

With those eight hundred men, Sanghu went into the extreme north.

There, he gathered a large number of scattered small tribes and finally built something resembling a real force again.

He waited.

He waited for the King to return.

Even though outside rumors claimed the King had been killed by the Yan or captured and taken to Yanjing, Sanghu continued waiting.

He had no sons.

No daughters.

Nothing tying him down.

Men like that were often the most loyal of all.

At last, he received a letter from the King.

So Sanghu immediately led this patchwork tribe south.

Now, facing the tribal armies surrounding him from every direction, Sanghu showed not the slightest fear.

Instead, he silently ordered his men to raise the Savage King’s royal banner.

The Savage King’s banner was made from snow-wolf hide.

Under the sunlight, it gleamed with a silver sheen.

The original royal banner had been lost on the battlefield and carried back to Yanjing by the Yan as a trophy.

Sanghu had personally hunted a snow wolf and made this new one.

When the Savage King’s banner appeared once more, considerable unrest immediately broke out among the tribal forces watching from outside.

The Savage King had once been the pride of the snowfields.

Like a proud lone wolf, he had nearly led the Savages in creating a miracle.

He had ultimately failed.

Even so, it had been the most stirring feat the Savages had achieved in centuries, and the closest they had come to reclaiming their old homeland.

But before long, the various chiefs and nobles steadied their warriors.

The Savage King’s prestige might still hover over the snowfields.

But the man himself was gone.

Why fear someone who no longer existed?

Sanghu silently drew his saber.

In his eyes, the surrounding tribal armies were not kin.

They were true enemies.

The present order on the snowfields was essentially a reshuffling after the age of the Savage King.

Back then, the tribes that trusted the Savage King and were willing to follow him sent their elites into the passes with him.

The great tribes that thought too highly of themselves remained behind and watched.

Then news came that the Savage King had been defeated.

Those great tribes immediately began swallowing the tribes of his followers.

The Naiman Tribe was one of the clearest examples.

Tribes that had once contributed their warriors, and even their chiefs, to follow the Savage King had suffered devastating losses among their young men.

Their strength collapsed.

When other tribes came to annex them, they no longer possessed the ability to resist.

Their noble lines were slaughtered.

Their people became low-ranking slaves of the tribes that absorbed them.

Sanghu remembered something the Savage King had once told all of them.

The true reason the Sacred Race had declined lay within itself.

It lay in the Sacred Race’s own flaws.

They all claimed to accept the guidance of the Stars, yet every tribe lived beneath a completely different sky.

The Savage King had taught them that they had to allow short-sighted members of their own race to continue existing.

Once their own great undertaking succeeded, they could lead those people and draw them back to their side.

But what had those people done?

What had they done?

When Gelimu led troops against Snow Sea Pass to open a road for the army’s retreat back to the snowfields, the tribes behind Snow Sea Pass chose to remain motionless.

If those tribes had attacked too, Snow Sea Pass might not have been able to survive assaults from both front and rear.

Instead, they watched their own kin die.

Then they began devouring the tribes those dead warriors had left behind.

Sanghu hated those Savage tribes even more than he hated the Yan.

In truth, there was not much reason to hate the Yan.

The Yan had genuinely been stronger.

They had defeated them outright.

Even in defeat, the Savages had been convinced.

But kin who ate from the inside while helping outsiders always awakened a far deeper disgust and hatred.

When an enemy outside drove a blade into your chest, it was a sharpened steel saber.

When he pulled it free, the blade carried your own hot blood.

The pain lasted only briefly.

If you died, then you died.

At least, in your heart, you could still cling to the blessing of the Stars.

But when your own people stabbed you in the back, the weapon they used was smeared with livestock dung.

Even after you died, that filth would continue defiling your body.

The Savage King had once told Count Pingye that the current generation of Savages was already finished.

The next generation was finished too.

And the generation after that.

He had gathered everyone among three generations of Savages who possessed vision, courage, ambition, and the will to act.

They had staked everything.

Then they had lost.

They had lost far too completely.

People could die and more people could be born.

But once the soul of a people was gone, no matter how many were born afterward, they would only be a herd of swine.

Count Pingye had understood the Savage King’s lament.

For a people to rise, countless opportunities had to align. Only when the elite of an age happened to join forces and erupt together could that people open a new world for itself.

If those elites lost their way, the entire people would be led astray and collapse.

And if the true elite of a people were wiped out completely, then there truly was no saving them.

Sanghu’s saber gleamed coldly beneath the sun.

He knew the patchwork tribe behind him could hardly form much real fighting strength.

Had he continued developing along the edge of the extreme north, perhaps in ten years or twenty years he could have built a tribe truly belonging to himself and branded it with a clan emblem of his own choosing.

But he had still obeyed the letter.

In it, the Savage King had told him very plainly:

He was tired.

He wanted to live once for himself.

Sanghu thought that was right.

Compared with possessing a tribe of his own, he would rather see the Savage King one more time before he died.

Just as years ago, when the Savage King’s strange sense of humor had pushed Sanghu, an executioner whose hands were soaked in the blood of Star Priests, into the position of Grand Elder of the Guides of Stars.

Sanghu had asked him why.

The Savage King answered:

Because it made him happy.

Right now, Sanghu was rather happy too.

His gaze had already locked onto one tribal banner ahead.

A black wolf.

That tribe had three thousand warriors.

Its chief wore extremely gaudy armor.

Sanghu thought the thousand warriors under his command should be enough to create an opportunity for him to kill that Black Wolf chief.

He was not afraid of death.

He had long since become numb enough to choose the manner of his death and the final flash of glory before it came.

Outside, as horn calls grew denser and denser, the warriors of tribe after tribe began readying themselves to charge and plunder.

The migrating column, meanwhile, separated even more clearly into isolated groups, waiting to be defeated one by one.

But then, the tribal warriors preparing to charge suddenly fell into enormous disorder.

This time, even the nobles and chiefs in their ranks could not calm them quickly.

The battlefield, moments from erupting, suddenly froze.

Because from the south, a cavalry force in black armor had appeared.

It carried the Black Dragon Banner.

And a banner bearing the character “Zheng.”

There were not many riders.

Only a little more than three hundred.

Yet the instant they appeared, every eye on the battlefield turned toward them.

The Naiman Tribe had once killed a group of Jin refugees near Snow Sea Pass.

That alone had enraged the Count at Snow Sea Pass and brought about the destruction of the entire tribe.

Now, perhaps not the whole snowfield, but at the very least every tribe across the eastern snowfields understood one thing.

No matter what else happened, the man at Snow Sea Pass had to be shown sufficient respect.

Jin Shuke silently removed the bearskin gloves from his hands.

It was summer on the snowfields.

The weather was not particularly hot, but there was certainly no reason to wear gloves.

Jin Shuke’s bare hands were already slick with sweat.

But he liked wearing them.

Because they were a personal gift from the Count.

More than that, he was obsessed with folding the gloves together after taking them off, then snapping them against the back of his hand with a crisp smack.

He had learned the gesture from Count Pingye.

Jin Shuke did not know the word “cool.”

He simply felt, instinctively, that the movement looked very good.

“Pass my order to those Savage tribes. Anyone who dares make a move, I’ll destroy his tribe first.”

“Yes, General.”

“Yes, General.”

A group of messengers broke away from the formation.

One of Jin Shuke’s deputy generals asked:

“General, should we send word to the rear and call up reinforcements?”

Jin Shuke shook his head.

“No hurry. People have come from the north, and a guest has arrived from the south. I suspect there won’t be much need for us to act.”

“That’s a shame,” the deputy said, clearly disappointed.

“That man once served as our Count’s superior. Even the Count has to give him some face. Besides, you ought to be grateful he came. Otherwise our Count probably hadn’t planned to fight this battle yet. So many Savage tribes. Heh. I suggested to the Count long ago that we carve out a pasture of our own north of Snow Sea Pass. The Savages know how to herd. What, do we Barbarians not know? The weather here may be bitterly cold, but once winter passes, the grasslands really are fat.”

At that point, Jin Shuke seemed to remember something.

He turned and gave another order.

“Have the men prepare campaign rations.”

“Yes, General.”

“Wait.”

Jin Shuke hesitated.

Then he said:

“Forget it. Don’t prepare anything in advance. Wait for the Count’s formal order.”

...

Count Pingye had indeed already received news from the north.

Because Snow Sea Pass had lacked the manpower and other conditions to expand into the snowfields before, no serious northern development had yet begun. Even so, thanks to the efforts of charlatans like Kongyuan and Liaofan, a number of small tribes around Snow Sea Pass had secretly submitted.

The moment that migrating column appeared, those tribes scrambled over one another to report it to Snow Sea Pass.

Count Pingye’s first reaction was that the Savage King’s hidden force had finally arrived.

He immediately sent the Blind Man to handle the matter.

Zheng Fan himself could not get away.

Because Li Fusheng had come.

Li Fusheng wore no armor.

He was dressed in ordinary clothes and looked almost like an old farmer.

He had ridden here on his Pi Beast, with only seven or eight personal guards beside him.

“Hahahaha! Wine! Bring wine! Little Zheng, your big brother has been craving your wine for ages! And food too. Good food, good drink, hurry, hurry, hurry! I deliberately starved myself for an entire day before riding here!”

Count Pingye’s life could not be called extravagantly luxurious.

But it was unquestionably refined.

Before Zheng Fan arrived, Xiao Yibo had already ordered the kitchens to prepare food.

By the time Zheng Fan entered the hall, Li Fusheng had already poured himself an enormous bowl of wine.

“Come, come, come. Sit. Drink with your big brother. Heh-heh. I came here to scrounge off you. Isn’t it strange? There’s practically nobody living around Snow Sea Pass. By rights this should be one of the poorest, bitterest places anywhere, yet when I arrive and look around, you’re somehow living a thriving little life. In my opinion, posting you here at Snow Sea Pass was a waste of talent. They should have sent you to Yingdu instead. The grain and money for the second half of the year just arrived there, and somehow it was cut even more than the first half. If I didn’t already know war was coming and more batches of grain and silver would be arriving soon, I’d have sent people to Yingdu and had a very serious talk with those fine official gentlemen.”

“These civil officials really are unreliable.”

Count Pingye joined in the cursing.

His face did not redden in the slightest.

Because the resources cut from Li Fusheng’s force had, in truth, been redirected to him.

After Snow Sea Pass’s provisions and military funds for the second half of the year arrived, its allocation was double the normal quota.

That was double compared with what a command should normally receive.

If one compared it with the other garrison commanders, who were currently getting only a little over sixty percent of their proper allotments, Count Pingye had received almost three times as much as an ordinary man.

Having people at court made official life easy.

Having someone local looking after you made it even easier.

Li Fusheng raised his wine bowl.

“I came under a military order from Prince of Jingnan.”

Zheng Fan did not rise to receive the order.

They were all their own people now.

And in a setting like this, too much ceremony would only make them feel distant.

“War’s about to start. His Highness ordered me to bring the forty thousand men of my own force, plus thirty thousand men from two Jin camps. Seventy thousand in total. We’re coming here to scrounge a little. The troops are still behind me. They should arrive around tomorrow morning. I came ahead to freeload some food and drink. Heh-heh.”

If they were “scrounging,” they certainly were not going to eat Snow Sea Pass.

They were going to eat the snowfields.

In truth, before Zheng Fan left for Yanjing, Tian Wujing had already told him he would send troops to help Zheng Fan clean up the snowfields first.

But then Emperor Yan happened to decide to go to war with Chu.

Count Pingye had assumed the snowfield operation was probably dead.

Who could have guessed Tian Wujing truly had not forgotten all those Savage herds?

Zheng Fan smiled.

“Well, isn’t that a coincidence? Just earlier, I received a military report. Several dozen li north of Snow Sea Pass, tens of thousands of Savage troops have already gathered.”

“Pfft!”

Li Fusheng spat out the wine he had just taken into his mouth.

That instinct was ingrained in him.

During wartime, he did not drink.

At the same time, Li Fusheng’s eyes immediately began turning red.

His old problem had returned.

He urgently shouted for one of his guards.

“Quick! Send the order! Tell them to speed up the march. The vanguard must get here before midnight! If those little bastards make me miss this opportunity, I’ll skin every last one of them!”

After giving the order, Li Fusheng suddenly seized both of Zheng Fan’s arms.

Wildly excited, he shouted:

“Little brother, give them to me. You have to give them to me! Give them to your big brother! I really can’t hold it in anymore! Your big brother has been pent up for too damn long!”

Crash!

Outside the hall, Liu Ruqing, who had been carrying in a plate of pastries, accidentally dropped it.

A close family friend had arrived.

By etiquette, one of the women of the household ought to show herself.

The Fourth Lady was working in the signing room and could not get away.

The princess now held an official Yan title. If she came out to receive Li Fusheng, he would have to salute her first, which would make everything inconvenient.

So the only option was Liu Ruqing, who was half a concubine in all but name.

Seeing Liu Ruqing preparing to crouch down and pick up the broken pieces, Zheng Fan immediately walked over and pulled her back to her feet.

“Let the servants clean it up. Don’t cut your hands.”

Liu Ruqing raised her head and looked timidly at Count Pingye.

“Yes. I understand.”

Mm.

Why did her gaze look so strange?

And why had her face gone a little pale?

In truth, Liu Ruqing was thinking:

No wonder he has never wanted me all this time.

No wonder he only likes hearing me call him Uncle.

So it turns out he actually...

[End of Chapter 501]