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Chapter 56 The Jurchens Launch an Army Attack, Tiger Mound and Rabbit Besiege the City (Please add to your favorites and read on)

Thousands of miles away, in the city of Daning.

A biting wind whipped up snowflakes, lashing against the crumbling city walls. This former stronghold of the Doyan Guard had become the temporary headquarters of Buyan Ahai, the Hongtaiji of the Kharachin tribe. Inside the city, yurts mingled with the remnants of Han-style houses, the air thick with the stench of mutton and oxen and the smell of burning pine resin.

Inside the tent, a charcoal fire roared. Buyan Ahai, the Hongtaiji of the Kharachin tribe, a dark-skinned Mongolian man with high cheekbones, sat drinking with a Jurchen nobleman dressed in blue cotton armor and a sable fur hat. This man was none other than Amin, the Second Beile of the Later Jin and the banner lord of the Bordered Blue Banner!
The tent flap was suddenly flung open, and a blast of cold air, mixed with snowflakes, rushed in. A Kharachin scout leader, accompanied by several scouts covered in snow, knelt on the ground, panting heavily: "Reporting to Hong Taiji! Reporting to Your Highness! Huduntu Khan of the Chahan tribe... has personally led tens of thousands of cavalry to invade Xuanfu Town! Inside Xuanfu Town... there's a mutiny and a demand for unpaid wages; the soldiers have no will to fight! The eunuch Wei personally came to suppress it, and... and even beheaded the Grand Preceptor Choerji Lama sent by Huduntu Khan! His head is displayed on the city wall!"

"What?!" Buyan Ahai's silver bowl clattered onto the felt carpet, spilling mare's milk wine everywhere. He abruptly stood up, a glint of light in his eyes: "Is the news accurate?!"

"It's absolutely true! Our scouts saw three plumes of black smoke rising into the sky from Xuanfu! The golden banner of the Chahan tribe is right outside Zhenchuan Fort! Beneath the walls of Xuanfu, a horde of soldiers are fighting like a tidal wave, their shouts deafening! It's said that the head of Lama Choerji... is hanging on the west gate tower of Xuanfu!"

"Hahaha! Good! Good! Well done, Wei the eunuch! Well done, Tiger Rabbit!" Amin slammed his hand on the low table in front of him, making the cups and plates jump, and burst into laughter. His eyes gleamed with excitement: "Opportunity knocks but once!"

He stood up abruptly, his tall figure stretching long in the firelight. With a wave of his hand, he shouted sharply, "Turgh! Doron!"

"Your servants are here!" Two heavily armored and burly Later Jin warriors responded by lifting the curtain and entering, kneeling on one knee.

"Order! All armored men and servants of the Bordered Blue Banner, prepare yourselves immediately! Bring enough rations for ten days! Assemble outside the city in twelve hours!"

"twitter!"

Amin turned his head, staring intently at Buyan Ahai: "Hongtaiji! Where are your Kharachin warriors? Are they still warming themselves in their tents?!"

Buyan Ahai was intimidated by Amin's imposing manner, but his heart was also burning with fervor. Xuanfu was in chaos, and the Ming army was preoccupied with its own problems. If not now, when? He suddenly drew his curved sword from his waist, cleaved off a corner of the low table in front of him, and roared, "Send the order! Summon all the warriors! Target—Kuanhe Fort! Take back ten times the grain, cloth, and ironware that the Han people owe us!"

"Woo-wu-wu-"

The piercing sound of horns instantly shattered the tranquility above Daning City. Immediately afterwards, more and more chaotic horn sounds rose from all directions, converging into a chilling cacophony.

On the snow-covered plains, the curtains of countless yurts were lifted. Kharachin cavalrymen, wearing fur hats and bulky fur robes, charged out, cursing and swearing, stuffing frozen jerky into their mouths while frantically saddled their horses. The horses' hooves pounded the snow with a dull thud.

On the open ground west of the city, the assembly of the Blue Banner soldiers presented a starkly different, grim scene. More than two thousand Later Jin soldiers, clad in blue cotton armor, stood like silent reefs, rapidly forming ranks in the wind and snow. Their movements were swift and silent, save for the cold rustling of their armor plates and the occasional snort of their warhorses. Blue banners with red borders and dragon designs fluttered in the cold wind, and beneath them, a burly young Jala Ejen was issuing low reprimands to his men in Jurchen—Turgh, one of Amin's subordinates.

Amin Beile mounted his horse, and beneath his cold iron helmet, his eyes swept over the mixed yet murderous army before him—more than ten thousand Kharachin cavalrymen like a restless pack of wolves, and two thousand elite Bordered Blue Banner soldiers like silent tigers.

He suddenly drew his long sword from his waist, the blade pointing southeast, and shouted in a broken mix of Mongolian and Jurchen:
"Warriors! Wide River Fortress! Grain! Cloth! Women! They're all there! Follow me, Prince! Slay them!"

"kill!"

"Oh ho!"

Ten thousand horses neighed, their hooves thundering! The black torrent and the blue iron torrent merged into one force, breaking through the wind and snow, rushing straight toward the newly built wooden fortress, Kuanhe Fort, outside the Great Wall of Jizhou in the Ming Dynasty! On the snow, only countless messy and deep hoofprints were left, which were quickly covered by the new wind and snow.

On the 25th day of the twelfth lunar month, west of Xuanfu Town.

A biting wind whipped up snowflakes, lashing against the frozen blue bricks of the city wall with a rustling sound. Wei Zhongxian, wrapped in a heavy mink cloak, rested his hands on his brows, squinting as he gazed out of the city. Behind him, the large banner that read "By Imperial Order, Supervisor of Grain Transport for Xuanfu and Datong, and Grand Master of Ceremonies Wei" fluttered in the north wind.

On the distant snow-covered plain, a dark mass of people, like a slow-moving swarm of ants, surged toward the city walls. Cries, wails, the crack of whips, and the shouts of Mongol cavalry, mixed with the cold wind, faintly reached the top of the city walls.

"What...what's going on?" Wei Zhongxian frowned, his shrill voice tinged with confusion. "The Tartars are driving...the people to attack the city?" Standing beside him, Hou Shilu, the commander-in-chief of Xuanfu, had a livid face and a hoarse voice: "Reporting to Your Excellency, it is indeed...the Tartars, Hudun Tu Khan, who swept through dozens of villages and hamlets around the town, abducting tens of thousands of people! Most of them are...mostly the families and elderly of the soldiers of Xuanfu!"

The supervising eunuch, Liu Yingkun, peered through the gaps in the wall at the approaching crowd with his single eye, and added, "Your Majesty, please be wise! The Tartars are trying to force our people to carry earth and attack the city! They're forcing these old, weak, women, and children to pave the way for their cavalry with their own flesh and blood! What's even more insidious is..."

He paused, then lowered his voice: "There must be Tartar assassins mixed in with the crowd! As soon as the city gates open, they will seize the opportunity to break through! Once the city falls, the consequences will be unimaginable!"

Wei Zhongxian's face turned ashen. He saw the crowd drawing closer and closer. The staggering figures were mostly elderly people with white hair, women in tattered clothes, and even children whose little faces were purple from the cold, tightly held in their mothers' arms! Each of them carried a bulging cloth bundle in their arms, their steps faltering, their cries deafening.

Wei Zhongxian gasped, feeling a chill run from his feet to the top of his head. He abruptly turned his head, staring intently at Hou Shilu and Liu Yingkun: "Then... what should we do?!"

Liu Yingkun's voice was hoarse: "Grandfather! Mercy is not the way of an army! At this critical moment of life and death, the only way is... the only way is to use muskets to repel them! We must not let these people get close to the trench! We must not let them throw the earthen mounds down from the city wall!"

Hou Shilu's lips trembled slightly, as if he wanted to say something, but ultimately he closed his mouth, only closing his eyes in anguish. Among the weeping faces below the city walls were perhaps the parents, wives, and children of his soldiers!
Wei Zhongxian's face twitched. He stared intently at the approaching, deafeningly loud crowd below the city walls...

"Sun Zushou! Zu Dashou!" Wei Zhongxian slammed his fist on the battlements, his shrill voice distorted with rage. "I thought the Jizhou garrison had been too ruthless! Now it seems we killed too few! We killed far too few!"

He turned abruptly, his finger trembling as he pointed at Hou Shilu and Liu Yingkun: "Quickly! Quickly mobilize troops! Guard the city gates for us! We absolutely cannot let these civilians get close! And we absolutely cannot let those Tartar assassins infiltrate!"

"My lord!" Hou Shilu exclaimed urgently, "The morale of the troops in the city... I fear it's about to change! Those are all..."

"Change?!" Wei Zhongxian's eyes turned red, his voice shrill. "We can't care about anything now! We can't care about anything now! If the city falls, we're all finished! Liu Yingkun! Hou Shilu!"

"The slave is here!"

"The general is here!"

"Gather all the guards! All the household servants! Assign them to the various gates! Especially the west gate! Guard the gate openings at all costs! No one is allowed to open the gate without my order! Anyone who dares to approach the gate will be killed without mercy!"

"Yes, sir!" Liu Yingkun and Hou Shilu replied in unison, then turned and ran down the city wall.

Outside the west gate of Xuanfu Town.

The biting wind was like a knife, stinging people's faces. Tens of thousands of driven civilians, under the threat of the whips and scimitars of the Mongol cavalry, cried and shrieked as they moved step by step toward the wide, frozen surface of the moat. The earthen mounds they carried were incredibly heavy, bending their backs, and their frostbitten fingers gripped the cloth tightly.

"Mother! I can't walk anymore!" A seven or eight-year-old boy fell on the ice, the mound of earth in his arms rolled off, and frozen soil was scattered all over the ground. The woman behind him rushed to help him up, but was whipped on the back by a Mongol cavalryman next to him, tearing his fur coat and revealing bloodstains.

"Hurry up! Throw the dirt down to the base of the city wall!" the Mongol cavalryman roared in broken Chinese, and lashed out with his whip again.

The woman screamed and threw herself on top of the child, shielding him with her own body. The mother and child curled up in a ball on the ice, their cries heart-wrenching.

Further away, the Mongol general Dorjigunchuk, mounted on his horse, coldly observed everything. Behind him, tens of thousands of armored and armed Chahar cavalrymen, poised for battle, hung like a silent, dark cloud over the western snowfield. Further back, on a makeshift platform, Huduntu Khan Lindan Batur held a finely crafted telescope, observing the movements on the city wall. Beside him, his uncle, Juntu Taiji, stroked his beard, a smile on his face.

"Great Khan," said Juntu Taiji with a smile, "the Ming people value filial piety and family ties the most. Seeing their parents, wives, and children wailing below the city walls and being whipped by our warriors, their hearts... must have long been in turmoil! This city gate will be opened sooner or later!"

Lindan Khan put down his telescope and sneered triumphantly: "Wei Yan? What does a eunuch know about fighting? Once the city gates open, Dorjigunchuk's iron cavalry will charge in, and Xuanfu will be ours! The silver, grain, and women in the city... hahaha!"

(End of this chapter)