Chapter Eighty-Nine: The Blood-Stained War Banner
The scene unfolded on a frozen northern plain.
“Let go of us! What right do you have to arrest men?”
“What military law did I break?”
The two weathered old soldiers being dragged away struggled with all their might. Their faces were twisted, yet their voices trembled with a strange panic, their lack of confidence plain to see.
“What right?” Xiao Qi gave a savage smile and suddenly seized the tunic of the old soldier on the left, tearing hard with both hands. There came the sharp sound of cloth rending, and the cotton coat was ripped open on the spot. The eyes of the several hundred soldiers in the front ranks all fell at once upon the man’s waist, where two sable pelts were plainly hidden.
The other old soldier had two sable pelts wrapped around his own waist as well.
Xiao Qi pointed at the pelts and barked, “What is this, then?”
Caught red-handed, the man actually grew calmer. With a cold sneer he replied, “Just two sable pelts. What’s the big deal? We’ve bled and fought for you, come all the way to this icy, snowbound Mongol steppe to risk our lives. Are two pelts really too much to ask?”
“They are deserved!” Wang Pu took over at once, his voice like a lash. “Of course they are deserved! For the merits you have earned, let alone two sable pelts—even two oxen, twenty horses, even two thousand taels of silver would still be well within your due!”
The old soldier lifted his chin. “Then on what grounds are you arresting us?”
“But you must not steal from the common store!” Wang Pu roared. “I have said it long ago: all spoils must be turned in first, and only then shall rewards be granted according to each brother’s feats in battle. If every one of you were like this, if everything seized in battle were swallowed by your own bellies, then what would I use to reward the brothers who fought with their lives on the line, were wounded, and thus lacked the strength to seize spoils? What would I use to provide for the families of the fallen? If this goes on, who will still be willing to rush to the front and shield you from arrows? Who will still be willing to sacrifice himself to save the rest of us? Who will still be willing to be your brother?”
“The army is one body!” Wang Pu thrust a hand toward the sky and bellowed, “What we need are brothers who stand together in life and death, open and honest with one another. Not petty, selfish cowards who think only of their own gain! I do not want to take men like you into battle, and no one wants to fight beside men like you!”
At last the two old rogues lowered their heads in shame.
In the eyes of the several hundred soldiers, anger rose like fire. Tang Sheng, standing in the front rank, in particular seemed ready to kill the two men on the spot, for they had been selected by him from the border troops of Da Tong.
Some of the older soldiers also showed expressions of shame and fear. In truth, more than these two had been hiding spoils; Wang Pu could not possibly have arrested them all and punished them one by one. Had he done so, the result might well have been the opposite, sparking mutiny among the veterans. Thus Wang Pu had seized only these two unlucky men.
Wang Pu glared murderously at them. Suddenly he shouted, “Drag them away... and behead them!”
“Yes!”
Four personal guards roared their acknowledgment and hauled the two miserable wretches away.
“General, spare us!”
“We know we were wrong. Give us a chance to mend our ways...”
“Please, sir, I have an eighty-year-old mother at home, and a child who has only just begun to walk. General, show mercy just this once...”
The two old soldiers broke free of the guards’ grip with all their strength, fell to the frozen grass, and kowtowed furiously toward Wang Pu, weeping bitterly as they did so.
Wang Pu nodded and shouted, “I would spare you if I could, but military law will not spare you. Drag them away. Kill them!”
He had made up his mind to use these two heads to discipline the army. Even if the Son of Heaven himself appeared now, he could not save them.
“General!” Tang Sheng suddenly strode out, clasped his fists, and cried, “This subordinate has something to say.”
Wang Pu thundered, “Speak!”
Tang Sheng turned back and glared venomously at the two old soldiers. “Zhang San and Zhao Liu have shamed the border troops of Da Tong. This subordinate begs permission to cut off their dog heads with my own hands!”
Wang Pu declared loudly, “Granted! Do it here, before all the soldiers!”
The two old soldiers were still wailing.
“General, you cannot kill us!”
“General, please, spare us!”
“General, have mercy!”
But Wang Pu remained utterly unmoved.
With a glance, Wang Pu signaled Xiao Qi, who, together with four guards, spread a square of white cloth, prepared in advance, upon the grass. The two old soldiers were brought to the center of the cloth and forced to kneel before the army of four thousand. Tang Sheng slowly drew his saber and stepped forward.
“Zhang San, Zhao Liu!” Tang Sheng raised the blade high and snarled, “Walk your last road in peace.”
“No...”
The two old soldiers cried out at once.
Tang Sheng’s hand fell. The heads of Zhang San and Zhao Liu dropped one after the other, hot blood spraying from the severed necks and in an instant staining the white cloth spread upon the grass. The four guards loosened their grip, and the two bodies collapsed forward onto the cloth. The blood that poured out at once soaked two great red patches into it.
Wang Pu lifted his face and sighed to heaven. “Tang Sheng.”
Tang Sheng sheathed his saber, turned, and answered, “This subordinate is here.”
Wang Pu said, “When we return to Da Tong, give each of their families five hundred taels as a pension.”
“Yes.”
Tang Sheng clasped his fists with both hands and answered respectfully.
Wang Pu waved again, and two guards dragged away the corpses of Zhang San and Zhao Liu. Xiao Qi had already led men to raise the bloodstained white cloth. Wang Pu stepped forward two paces and pointed at it. “Do you all see this? From today on, this blood-soaked cloth shall be the banner of our army, the blood-soaked battle flag!”
“I hope that every time you see this banner, you will remember what happened today. I hope you will never forget that this army of ours is a single body, and that every man within it is a brother bound by loyalty and honesty, not a selfish wretch like Zhang San and Zhao Liu! I also hope you will remember that military law is supreme. Whoever violates it shall be punished without mercy!”
He paused, then turned and shouted, “Xiao Qi, raise the banner!”
“Yes!”
Xiao Qi roared his assent, took the long bamboo pole from a guard, and tied on the bloodstained banner. Then he swung himself onto his horse and heaved the great blood-red flag into the air. The north wind howled; in an instant the banner unfurled, snapping and streaming in the bitter gale, the two dark stains upon its face glaring all the more fiercely in the cold light.
Wang Pu gazed long and hard at this blood-soaked battle flag and said loudly, “From this day forward, wherever this banner appears, there our army shall be. This banner is our soul. Each and every one of us must defend it with our lives. There is only one circumstance in which it will fall into the hands of the enemy: when all of us are dead! The banner stands, and we stand. The banner falls, and we fall!”
“The banner stands, and we stand! The banner falls, and we fall!”
“The banner stands, and we stand! The banner falls, and we fall!”
“The banner stands, and we stand! The banner falls, and we fall!”
The dozens of guards behind Wang Pu joined in with three mighty shouts.
The eyes of the four thousand soldiers fixed at once upon the bloodstained banner, and they too roared in unison.
What had happened that day left a deep brand on every soldier’s heart. From then on, no one dared lightly violate the seven military laws laid down by Wang Pu. More importantly, these old veterans who had suffered defeat after defeat, together with the marauding horse thieves and bandits accustomed to plunder, had begun to see themselves as part of this army’s whole.
The blood-soaked banner was like a lamp, burning within them at all times. Whenever danger or temptation arose, what flashed through their minds was no longer I.
It was we. We, this army!
As the shouts of the four thousand soldiers gradually died away, Wang Pu cried out, “The whole army rests here. Big Beard, Scarface, Tang Sheng, and Monk Zhang, the four of you come here.”
The four captains gathered around Wang Pu one after another. Zhen Youcai took a map from his chest and spread it on the grass, pinning down the corners with stones before pointing to it and saying, “The first step of this surprise strike on Guihua has been completed, and it went extremely smoothly. Next we will sweep west to east along the Black River and the Yellow River, all the way to Mianmaochuan, driving the Tumed people who pasture along the eastern bend of the Yellow River toward the far side of Anye Sea.”
Tang Sheng asked, “Will the Tumed gather their forces first and then break westward?”
“No,” Zhen Youcai shook his head. “The Tumed khan is dead. Without his orders being passed down, the Tumed cannot assemble effectively. Besides, to the west lies the Yellow River. Though it is frozen now, beyond it is the Great Ming’s Shaanxi Garrison. If the Tumed try to go west, they’ll be seeking death.”
Wang Pu added, “You all remember this well: this time we kill only Mongol men. We cannot kill women and children anymore. Our brothers have not tended herds and do not know the trick of driving off cattle and sheep, so these women and children must be left alive. You will follow behind and force them to drive the cattle, sheep, and horses to Anye Sea.”
“Yes.”
The four men answered together.
Wang Pu then said, “Youcai, Xiao Qi.”
Zhen Youcai and Xiao Qi replied in unison, “This subordinate is here.”
Wang Pu said, “Count the spoils, livestock, horses, and camels taken in Guihua. Take everything that can be carried, and destroy on the spot whatever cannot. Before you leave, do not forget to set the place ablaze. Since the Mongols chose to side with the Jurchens, they must pay the price for that choice.”
“Yes.”
Zhen Youcai and Xiao Qi answered together.
Wang Pu swung up onto his horse and looked down at Big Beard and the others. “Take your men and move out!”
“Yes!”
The four roared in reply and turned away at a brisk pace.
Half an hour later, the four thousand-strong army had left Guihua. Along with the Ming troops departed more than three hundred camels and over two thousand horses, all of which were used to carry the plunder. As for the great herds of cattle and sheep kept in the pastures outside Guihua, aside from a small number of sheep taken as provisions, the rest were all driven into the city, which, together with the whole settlement, was then reduced to ashes.
Over the next two days, Wang Pu’s four-thousand-man force became like a giant scythe, sweeping down along the eastern banks of the Black River and Yellow River. Along the way Wang Pu repeatedly detached small units of a hundred men each, fanning out from west to east in a broad swath. To guard against a desperate counterattack from the Tumed in their final moments, the hundred-man units maintained proper spacing so they could gather into thousand-man formations at a moment’s notice if needed.
Just as Zhen Youcai had predicted, with the Tumed khan slain, the Tumed nomads of the Fengzhou grasslands could no longer muster an effective concentration. Wang Pu led his troops southward from Guihua in a relentless sweep all the way to Mianmaochuan, then the more than four thousand men split into over forty spearheads and pushed eastward.
The Tumed living around the Fengzhou grasslands suffered an unprecedented calamity. Several hundred settlements were destroyed, more than three thousand adult men were slaughtered, and the remaining more than six thousand old people, women, and children drove a flood of more than a million cattle and sheep, fleeing east in utter panic.
The poor Tumed had no idea they were stepping, one by one, into a deathtrap long since laid by the Han people.
Anye Sea.
Where once there had been emptiness by the lakeshore, now there stood a sea of felt tents. As early as two days before, on the third day of the first lunar month, the impatient Zhang Zian had already led his army here to pitch camp.
Such is the saying: in a thousand calculations, there will surely be one miss.
Although Zhen Youcai had repeatedly stressed that Zhang Zian must reach Anye Sea on the sixth day of the first lunar month, he never imagined that Zhang Zian, driven to the edge by the six hundred thousand taels of back pay weighing upon him, would in his desperation actually arrive three days early.
Because Zhang Zian set out three days ahead of schedule, disaster very nearly followed.