Mount and Blade Central Asia

"Master Nayan, I will not interfere in your family affairs." Li Rufeng smiled and shook his head. Facing Qinggeli Nayan's disappointed eyes, he said, "Aleppo City needs to move forward."

Just as Li Rufeng said, Aleppo has to look forward. With the arrival of the rainy season, hardworking farmers have begun working in the fields.

This will be a rare time of the year when many forces will put aside their prejudices and recuperate. At least before March next year, few people will resort to large-scale warfare.

Li Rufeng had no intention of breaking this tradition, but that didn't mean he would be completely safe during this period. He had to send someone to test the reactions of all parties first.

Anyway, he has a lot of soldiers and generals under his command, and most of them are professional soldiers who do not do any production. Even if a war breaks out during this period, it will not affect Mr. Li's production plan. Why not do it?

"You already have a target?" Qinggelinayan was a little surprised. He had been paying attention to Li Rufeng and naturally knew that Li Rufeng was not under any external threat at the moment.

He just didn't expect that Li Rufeng had already ambitiously planned to start actively expanding outward.

This was the last thing Qinggelinayan wanted to see, because in his eyes, both the Mamluks and the Black Sheep were powerful enemies, and it would be best not to provoke them if possible.

The Mongols were a small force with only tens of thousands of people, and could not catch up with Li Rufeng's ambitions.

"Not yet, but it will be soon." Li Rufeng calculated the time and planned to test the reaction of Damascus first. Regardless of whether the Knights Hospitaller were willing to cooperate or not, there had to be a result between the two sides since he had occupied the city of Hama.

Chapter 373 Anxiety in Damascus

Damascus, one of the earliest continuously inhabited areas in the world, had already formed the prototype of a city as early as 3500 years ago.

From the Aramaeans to the Semites, from the Assyrians to the Babylonians, from the Persians to the Macedonians, from the Greeks to the Romans, no matter who the rulers were, Damascus's status remained unchanged.

In 636, the second caliph of Islam, Omar I, conquered Damascus and made it his capital. Since then, for the past five or six hundred years, Damascus has been one of the most important cities in the Islamic world.

From the Umayyads, Abbasids, Fatimids to the Ayyubids, until the arrival of the Mongols swept everything away, the glory of Damascus came to a temporary end, and for more than 100 years thereafter, it existed as an important province of the Mamluk Empire.

Later, Timur, the king of Inner Asia, arrived. He used a trick of first besieging the city and then pretending to retreat, which made the defenders of Damascus choose to surrender after losing all possibilities of victory and hand over the city.

The tragic massacre in Aleppo made the city lose its determination and courage to resist to the end. Fortunately, Timur was a king who kept his word. He did not kill people in Damascus, but he took away the craftsmen that made Damascus famous, leaving only empty buildings and barren land outside the city trampled by countless war horses.

But this is a city loved by God after all. Ancient Arabic books once said: "If there is a paradise on earth, Damascus must be in it; if paradise is in the sky, Damascus is as famous as it."

In ancient times, Damascus was famous for its vast wheat fields, orchards and vegetable plots, hence the name "Damascus", which comes from the Aramaic word darmesheq, meaning irrigated land, and its water source mainly comes from the Barada River.

The Barada River splits into seven tributaries around Damascus, creating prime agricultural land, so although Timur nearly destroyed the city from its foundations, it quickly recovered after Timur's departure.

The current Emir ruling Damascus is Sayyid al-Had. His family is very prominent in Amman, but Amman is a small place after all. Sayyid's father is determined to bring his family to a more glorious place to match his ambitions.

Therefore, after the Sack of Damascus, Sayyid al-Hadd (Note 1) was pushed to the position of Emir of Damascus by his father when Nasir Sultan's reputation plummeted and he was unable to control the Syrian region.

His family paid a heavy price for this. The wealth, land, oases, and herds accumulated over hundreds of years were given to the Syrian emirs as gifts in exchange for Damascus.

In addition, in order to rebuild Damascus, Sayyid Hader's family also borrowed a lot of loans and paid a lot of benefits far into the future.

In the past few years, Damascus has been developing well, and with the political status attached to Damascus, Sayyid Had's family has gradually become the leader of the Syrian emirs as they wished, confronting Nasir Sultan across the sea and maintaining the semi-independent status of the Syrian region.

Thanks to his father's foresight, although Sayyid Khadr has always been walking on thin ice in exercising his rights, his status and position have been rising. On the one hand, he has maintained close ties with the emirs, and on the other hand, he has been playing political games by currying favor with the powerful people in Cairo.

However, a sudden plague interrupted Said Had's dream life.

In just a few months, Damascus and the surrounding areas fell into a state of danger. Almost every day, corpses were dragged out from every corner of the city and thrown out of the city by the city guards to be burned.

Outside the city, due to the spread of the plague, the sowing that should have started during the rainy season did not begin as scheduled.

Some farmers who do not have enough food reserves have begun to leave their hometowns with their families and beg along the way to survive, and this behavior has also accelerated the spread of the plague.

The plague is an internal threat, but Said Hadd also has to face external threats.

He was naturally well aware that Hama had been occupied by Mongols from Aleppo, but he really didn't have the energy to interfere in Hama's affairs.

As the plague spread, the first thing to be cut off was naturally commercial activities within the city of Damascus. The large caravans that had heard of the plague would rather take a detour or simply go by sea than risk passing through the plague area.

As business activities declined, the loans borne by the Sayyid Had family and the connections bought with real money became a burden.

To use a modern financial term, the Sayyid Khadr family's cash flow was cut off.

Although Sayid Hadd didn't want to admit it, the fact was that if he couldn't find a way to solve the problem before the end of the rainy season, the opportunity his family had fought for with all their might would turn into poison that would backfire on the family.

After all, there are people who are jealous of Sayyid Had's family sitting in this position, and many people are waiting for them to fall from their high position.

Ever since they proved that the pseudo-rebellious will from Cairo was not as risky as they had imagined, those former allies have begun to have evil intentions. Damascus's current embarrassing situation is because those allies are waiting to see what's going on.

There are often people who add icing on the cake, but few who provide timely assistance, so Sayyid Had could only hold on by himself. However, he did not have much food left, and the plague was getting worse. Three people died of the plague in his palace alone yesterday.

Among them was Sayyid Had's youngest son. Although Sayyid Had had many wives and concubines, and was gifted and had many sons and grandchildren, he was still very sad.

Because the child was born when Sayyid al-Had had just taken control of Damascus, he named him Baibars, after the great Sultan who had broken the myth of the invincibility of the Mongol army, so he was deeply impressed.

Now that Baibars is dead, the Mongols from the north are coming again. Said Had had to take this as a sign that a storm is coming.

He also heard that the Mongols in the north had found a medicine that could cure the plague, and he had sent spies to steal it. God willing, I hope it will also work in Damascus...

But Sayyid Had heard that the leader of those Mongols was a pagan who believed in the sky, and he doubted whether the pagan's methods could be effective on believers in Allah.

Said Had was feeling both excited and worried, feeling very conflicted.

Chapter 374 The Faith Behind the Decoction

The distance from Hama to Homs is only 50 kilometers. For the Mughal cavalry who come and go like the wind, this distance is as close as their own doorstep.

So under the command of Muzaffar, Li Rufeng's military forces in Hama City have already found out the situation in Homs.

Like Aleppo and Damascus, Homs was also a city that was ravaged by Timur's army. To this day, the city walls of Homs have not been fully repaired.

The population living within the city walls is only more than 3,000 people, but because Homs is close to the Asi River and there are many oases nearby, its recovery will be faster than that of Hama, but that definitely does not include this year.

Thanks to the anti-disease medicine that Li Rufeng brought out, the city of Hama has basically gotten rid of the impact of the plague.

As the city closest to Homs, Hama has refugees fleeing from Homs almost every day.

These refugees, with their families and their only belongings, tried to bribe their way around the blockade set up by the Mongols and enter the city of Hama, which they regarded as a pure land.

The plague in Hama has been eradicated, and this news is no longer a secret. The problem Muzaffar faces now is that almost every day there are twice as many refugees as yesterday trying to pass through the blockade he set up.

These refugees not only want to enter Hama, but some also want to bypass Hama and go to the more prosperous Aleppo.

Muzaffar knew Li Rufeng's attitude towards the population, so he had been trying his best to resettle the refugees. He also set up a special refugee camp outside the city of Hama, just as Li Rufeng had done before, to isolate the sick and the healthy.

It’s a pity that this resettlement method must be based on mutual trust. The reason why Li Rufeng was able to establish a refugee camp in Aleppo to isolate the plague was because before that, Li Rufeng had already established his own prestige in the surrounding area.

Those who were quarantined believed that Li Rufeng would not harm them. Even so, Li Rufeng took out real money to buy people's hearts. You know, in this era, giving two new sets of clothes as soon as you enter the refugee camp is absolutely generous, but not every lord can afford this money.

Muzaffar is now restricted by this. Although he provides clean water and food to the refugee camp, the act of isolating the refugees outside the city and detaining them by fully armed soldiers still makes most refugees feel uneasy.

So when the father of a family of five showed obvious symptoms of plague such as coughing and red eyes, and was forcibly taken away by the soldiers on duty, his eldest son clashed with the soldiers in order to protect his father, and stabbed one of the soldiers with a knife.

This behavior obviously caused great anger among the soldiers, who killed the young man on the spot, and this incident then triggered a larger-scale conflict.

When Muzaffar arrived, the angry soldiers had already completed the massacre of the entire refugee camp. More than two hundred people had died. Only a dozen survivors were left at the scene. They looked at the blood-covered soldiers in horror and dared not move.

Muzaffar knew something was wrong after just one look. He first supervised the soldiers to clean the blood off each other's bodies, then drank the medicine that had been proven to be effective in curing diseases in Hama, and then asked the soldiers to gather all the bodies together and burn them together.

Strangely enough, these simple-recipe decoctions were effective for the residents of Hama and the soldiers from Aleppo, but had little effect on the refugees coming from Homs and even Damascus.

Muzaffar was puzzled, but he could only prioritize maintaining order.

Thick smoke from burning bodies could be seen in almost all the refugee camps around, and this smoke exacerbated the uneasiness in the hearts of these refugees, who had seen many such scenes before leaving their homeland.

Those lords who were helpless in the face of the plague could only use this method to ensure that the corpses of the patients would not become new sources of infection, and now the shadow of the past has reappeared.

That night, another riot broke out in a refugee camp, but this time the refugees did not directly clash with the soldiers. They relied on their numerical advantage to break through the refugee camp and then dispersed in different directions.

But their ultimate goal was obviously to go north, because the plague was more serious to the south.

Muzaffar had to send out cavalry to hunt down these daring refugees along the way, which was obviously contrary to his original intention.

If it were any other general under Li Rufeng, they would probably have no choice but to send someone to ask Li Rufeng for help, but Muzaffar is indeed the person with the strongest comprehensive ability under Li Rufeng.

Muzaffar reacted almost immediately, risking contracting the plague and going alone to several other refugee camps to meet with the elders who had high prestige among the refugees.

These refugees who started fleeing early were basically impoverished families with no surplus food at home. There were no impoverished nobles or prestigious folk leaders among them. Some were just elderly people who served as leaders. These were the people Muzaffar wanted to meet.

"Kirkuk, I want to know, do you still trust me?" Muzaffar wore a thin mask on his face, which was a leftover from the last siege. He soaked the mask in strong liquor before coming. He now only hoped that doing so could effectively resist the erosion of the plague.

The man he called Kirkuk had completely white hair and beard and looked to be at least sixty years old, but in fact he was only fifty-two years old, which was considered a rare old age among this group of people.

"Sir, we naturally trust you. You provided us with food and water free of charge. We will always remember this kindness." Kirkuk said humbly.

"Okay, since you trust me, I only ask one thing of you. Wait here peacefully until the plague is over. Can you do that?" Muzaffar asked seriously.

"But..." Kirkuk sighed, looked up at Muzaffar and asked, "What if the plague doesn't end? The children have been watching your soldiers take their families away from them. They are terrified, and I am terrified too... I can't completely control everyone. I was only elected by them because of my age."

"Since you believe the plague in Hama has been eradicated, you should trust me and believe that I can handle this matter," Muzaffar said confidently. "Otherwise, why did you come here? Wouldn't it be better to stay at home?"

Kirkuk stared into Muzaffar's eyes for a long time. "Sir, I am not going to live long at my age. To be honest, I am not afraid of death. I am just worried that the children in my family will die in such an unclear way. Tell me..."

"Is there really a cure for this plague?" Kirkuk finally asked eagerly.

Muzaffar couldn't answer his question, which puzzled him. Why did the same medicine work well inside Hama but not so well on the refugees outside? Unless...

"There is indeed a cure, but it was prepared by our shaman and requires the protection of Eternal Heaven to be most effective." Muzaffar said, thinking of giving it a try. "So it worked on us, and it worked in Hama, and you..."

Muzaffar didn't finish his words, but his meaning was clear.

Kirkuk hesitated for a moment, then nodded with a grim expression. "Okay, I understand, sir. I'll go back and talk to our children now. Even God wouldn't blame someone for choosing to survive, right?"

Chapter 375 New Believers

Li Rufeng didn't know at this time that Muzaffar was helping him expand the faith market, and in fact, Muzaffar himself had only converted to the Eternal Heaven for only two months.

Muzaffar was not a Mongolian, so he did not have a deep understanding of the belief in Eternal Heaven. For him, converting to Buddhism was more of an act of expressing loyalty to Li Rufeng.

But what happened in Hama made Muzaffar begin to think that there might really be forces in this world that cannot be named.

The belief in Eternal Blue Sky, which originated from the Mongols, has always had a market on this continent. The Mongols left too many deep impressions on this land and the people living on this land. For hundreds of years, they regarded the Mongols as invincible.

Therefore, the belief in Eternal Heaven was regarded as a fashionable thing for a long time.

It’s a pity that the shamans under Changshengtian were suppressed so harshly by Genghis Khan that the ones who were passed down were basically people like the old shamans.

They lived their own lives on the Mongolian Plateau, and maintaining the purity of their tribal beliefs was naturally not a problem. But when they rushed down the plateau and stepped into this land of faith where they had fought bloody battles with the Crusaders for hundreds of years for their religious beliefs, those tricks naturally didn't work.

Therefore, although the conversion of the Mongols was carried out from top to bottom, there was almost no obstacle at any class.

Li Rufeng felt that the shamans of Changshengtian might have felt that with fewer believers, their work would be much easier and their lives would be more comfortable.

Now, in order to pick up the market that he lost that year, Li Rufeng has to go on stage and perform "miracles" himself whenever he has time.

But what happened in Hama was indeed an unintentional event.

Mr. Li felt at the time that Chinese medicine had been passed down for thousands of years and must be effective. The reason why Chinese medicine was no match for Western medicine in later generations was actually more like a martial artist no match for a shooter. The two sides were not on the same track at all.

One is to prevent illness, as stated in the Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine: "The best doctor treats illness before it occurs, not after it has occurred. This is what is meant by the best doctor." Modern medicine, especially in Li Rufeng's era, has become so utilitarian that it prioritizes the use of medicine over illness. As Trump once said, "They're trying to sell vaccines!"

Of course, the above is off-topic. In view of the situation Li Rufeng encountered at the time, Aleppo, which used decoctions to cure diseases, had reached the stage of trying everything possible. If the disease could be cured, it would be the best. If it couldn't be cured, Master Li would probably have to use extreme methods to prevent the epidemic.

As for now, why the residents in Hama were cured after taking Li Rufeng's medicine, while the refugees outside Hama had no obvious effect after taking the same medicine, I am afraid no one can tell the specific reason.

At this time, the reasons that Muzaffar came up with from an idealistic perspective were very convincing.

Kirkuk, an old Muslim who has believed in Allah all his life, actually cannot even remember all the stories and proverbs in the Koran. He himself is illiterate, and he relies on the sheikh in the tribe to preach to interpret his piety.

But when the plague broke out, the Sheikh, who had surplus food at home and had built high walls, immediately closed the door of his house and refused to see anyone, leaving the devout believers to starve to death or die of disease without saying a word.

So after all that has happened, if you ask how much piety is left in Kirkuk, I'm afraid it's just that...

As soon as Kirkuk returned to his tent, he called all his children to his side and said to them very seriously: "From today on, we will begin to believe in the Tengri. This is not a betrayal of God, but a sacrifice made by believers to protect themselves. If anyone is unwilling to convert, I don't blame him."

He took this matter very seriously because he had believed in God all his life.

Although God did not give him any real benefits, Kirkuk knew that without faith, he would not have been able to survive the hard times of so many years.

Natural disasters and man-made disasters can still be tolerated, but the taxes and levies from the lords and emirs are unbearable. If there is no spiritual comfort, he would have been like his friends in his youth, drawing his scimitar and finding a gang to do evil.

But as Timur's army swept through, life became more and more difficult. Kirkuk knew that even without the plague, his family would not be able to survive.

In order to restore prosperity to Damascus, Sayyid al-Hadd indeed squeezed the surrounding areas more harshly than ever before.

As Kirkuk expected, his children did not show much emotional change about converting to Christianity. A difficult life will naturally make the power of faith more tenacious, but it always has a limit.

Just like a bowstring, when it exceeds its limit, it will naturally break.

And now, for the Kirkuk family, the bowstring is about to break.

In just one month, Kirkuk's family lost nine relatives, including his favorite little daughter and the grandson of his eldest son.

And then there is hunger...hunger like never before.

If they had not left their hometown in time, an old man of Kirkuk's age would probably have become food for other people in the village.

So Kirkuk converted very happily. He set up a tablet for Eternal Heaven at home that very day. It was a very simple thing, just a flat wooden board with the word Eternal Heaven written in Mongolian on it. This was what Muzaffar told him.

He said that life was not easy for them, the refugees, so they should keep things simple. Eternal Heaven did not care about conventional rituals. As long as they were pious and sincere, He would naturally favor all believers.

Kirkuk immediately felt that Eternal Sky was a very generous god, completely different from any faith he had encountered before.