Taichang Ming Dynasty

Chapter 314: Hunter and Prey

This hunting party didn't actually stray far from the Jin army's path. They hunted and traveled, confined to the mountainous terrain between Magendan Fort and Fengji Fort. This area was dotted with numerous villages. After the Han people who lived there moved away, either voluntarily or involuntarily, these vacant villages were either occupied by the Bannermen or simply left vacant.

The village the hunting team found was small, consisting of only two dozen thatched huts with fences within a low earthen enclosure. The only "mansion," with a tiled roof, housed a small City God Temple. The City God still existed, but the temple had been demolished by the Jurchens at some point. The beams and tiles had vanished, leaving only a few remaining ruins, providing shelter for the now-dead City God.

"!" Even before entering the village gate, the eldest brother, Hushubu, noticed something unusual on the road. He instinctively crouched, lowered his voice, and gestured for silence. "There are footprints. Very fresh."

Erbihe and Yindahu nodded silently, put down the prey on their shoulders, and entered the "hunting" state again.

The three men followed the footprints and tiptoed to a house. Inside the house was an empty barn and a single house. The door of the single house was unusually closed, and it looked out of place among the other houses that had been ransacked countless times.

Hushubu put away his bow and arrow, drew out his sword, and gently pushed the door panel with the tip of the sword.

He couldn't push it open; the door was bolted. So Hushubu used his eyes to signal Erbihe and Yindahuqi to move left or right.

Erbihe and Yindahuqi nodded in understanding, sheathed their bows and arrows, and drew their swords. Then, they both raised their feet simultaneously and kicked the door hard.

Bang! The bolt was kicked off, and the doors flew open. The three of them rushed in side by side, taking in the entire hut in an instant.

"Brother! Look." Yindahuqi pointed the tip of his knife at a "prey" curled up in the corner, his voice full of surprise.

This was a young man, perhaps fourteen or fifteen. His face was filled with fear, anxiety, and hatred, yet a vestige of his childishness remained. In his hand, he held a piece of moldy wood he had taken from the firewood pile in the front yard for self-defense. But facing the three ferocious Jin soldiers, he didn't even have the courage to lift the wood and throw it.

When Hushubu saw the boy's appearance, his slender eyebrows curved instantly. He walked over, kicked the "weapon" out of the boy's hand, and then roughly took off the tattered hat covering the boy's head. Seeing the small braids and the traces of fresh shaving on his head, Hushubu immediately laughed. "Hahahaha!" He turned to Erbihe and said, "Look, haven't you found the explanation you wanted?"

"Yes!" Erbihe's heart finally settled down.

Although the eldest brother had previously planned to capture a Han Chinese to report to his superiors, there were not so many ready-made Han Chinese for him to capture at this time. Now that he had come across a slave who had been forcibly shaved, it was obviously God's mercy, giving them a way out.

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There were three main types of Han Chinese under Jin rule. The first type consisted of those Han Chinese and their descendants who, unable to endure the constant harassment from civil officials, generals, and eunuchs before Nurhaci's rebellion, chose to abandon the Ming and follow the Hu. Liu Aita, a Han official under the Zhenghong Banner, was a typical example of this type.

The second type is the Han people who betrayed the court or voluntarily surrendered to Nurhaci after he launched his rebellion. Li Yongfang, the former Fushun guerrilla of the Ming Dynasty and the current third-class general of the Jin Dynasty, and the brothers Tong Yangxing and Tong Yangzhen belong to this category.

The third and largest category is the spoils captured by the Jurchens after Nurhaci rebelled against the Ming Dynasty.

These Han people were either soldiers or civilians, but to Nurhaci, they were just spoils of war, slightly more advanced than cattle and sheep, who could use tools and plow the land. He distributed these people to his sons and nephews, who would then make a secondary distribution among the banner owners.

With the spoils being distributed among the inhumane, it was clear that life was not going to be easy. Recently, Yehe had just annexed the Jin Dynasty, and with the arrival of Mongol refugees, supplies were tight. Even the bannermen were cutting back on food, let alone these slaves. Being able to eat one meal and then go hungry for two was considered a blessing; being full was a rare experience.

So, as soon as they got the chance, some Han Chinese would flee. The lucky ones would make it to towns, where, after being questioned and cleared of suspicion of spies, they could be recruited into the service of Liao generals or choose to pursue their own lives. The unlucky ones, however, would be captured, as they were doing now.

"Brother, are you going to chop him off? You should be able to report back with just a head." Yindahuqi gestured a few times at the boy's neck with the knife.

The boy's already fearful eyes were filled with even more terror.

Hushubu thought about it and finally had a kind thought. He walked over and pulled the boy up from the ground. Seeing that the boy had all his legs and feet and could stand and walk, he was not a burden. So he said, "Let's tie him up first."

"Okay." Yinda Huqi sheathed his knife after hearing the command, then took out the hemp rope used to tie up the limbs of large prey and tied the boy up tightly.

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The three settled down there. The eldest, Hushibu, and the second, Yindahuqi, went back to the village to retrieve the prey, while the third, Erbihe, stayed in the yard to light a fire and watch over them while they gave their "explanation" to the higher-ups.

Erbihe brought with him a flint, a steel sickle, and some dry tinder for easy ignition. As he bent down to build a fire and burn the tinder, he asked the young man in Jurchen, "What's your name? Which banner are you from? Are you the only one who escaped? If you can reveal your accomplices, you won't be punished when you return, but will actually be rewarded."

Erbihe was clearly lying. Such a slave who escaped would not be rewarded, regardless of whether he betrayed his accomplices or not. The biggest difference was only whether he would be stabbed or whipped.

The boy's eyes flashed, but he only stammered a few words in Chinese that Erbihe could not understand.

"Can you speak the language of the Great Jin?" The tinder was lit, and Erbihe quickly gathered some hay and dead leaves and spread them on top, blowing on the sparks. Soon, a cloud of white smoke rose, followed by a flame.

The boy subconsciously wanted to shake his head, but then his neck froze and he continued to speak in Chinese.

"Forget it," Erbihe gave up. He piled dry branches over the open flames, and once they ignited, he added more firewood from the yard. Thus, a long-lasting campfire was built. Not long after, Hushubu and Yindahuqi returned to the yard with their prey. "Erbihe, come and help skin the animal," Hushubu called.

"Oh! Yes." Erbihe quickly put down his hands that were warming the fire and went to help the two men skin and debone the prey.

The skins of these animals were valuable. In the past, before the Ming and Jin dynasties broke apart, many tribesmen would ship these skins to border towns like Fushun and Kaiyuan, trading them with the Han or Mongolian people in exchange for daily necessities like salt, rice, tea, and pottery.

After the Ming-Jin split, the Ming Dynasty imposed a strict embargo on Jin goods, leaving the Jin with only North Korea as a unique trading partner. However, North Korea was small, and even if it engaged in a two-pronged diplomacy between Jin and Ming, it still had to publicly side with its suzerain, maintaining an anti-Jin stance.

The combination of these factors resulted in a commodity that had previously been in short supply becoming something with only utility but little exchange value. Unsaleable furs were naturally a bad thing for the lower classes; scarcity makes things valuable, and an overabundance of them was of little use. But for the rulers of the Jin dynasty, this wasn't entirely a bad thing. At least Nurhaci didn't have to declare martial law to prevent the widespread outflow of furs, thereby increasing the armor coverage of his troops and outfitting most of his shield-carriers with "leather armor."

"Won't you give him something to eat?" Erbihe asked Hushbu while tearing the rabbit meat that had no salt, no taste and was full of fishy smell.

"It's good that he's still alive." Yindahuqi glanced at the boy and said, "Looking at his condition, he shouldn't starve to death for a while. If he's really too hungry to walk, we'll chop off his head and take it back. After all, we'll probably kill him with a knife when we get back."

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As the three of them were enjoying the barbecued meat, chatting and imagining the battlefield a hundred miles away, a nomad on a low slope near the village, looking for prey in all directions, spotted a solitary column of smoke in the mountains.

After a moment's hesitation, he decided to go over and take a look. If they were Han people who hadn't fled, he would ask for a meal. If he couldn't get anything, he would rob them. If they were outnumbered, then forget it.

He carefully observed the traces on the ground, chose paths without signs of human activity, and carefully shortened the distance between himself and the lonely smoke.

Soon, the wanderer found the village where the hunting team was staying. He did not rush in, but chose a tall tree that could block most of his body and climbed up.

The wanderer climbed a tree and saw several men dressed as Jin soldiers sitting around a bonfire in the courtyard, roasting the meat they had divided up. The wanderer slowed his breathing and observed them carefully. He discovered that these four men were not entirely Jin soldiers who had left the main force and were acting alone. There was also a tightly bound captive.

The wanderer was somewhat tempted. Although he had never served in the army, he knew the value of a Jurchen head. As long as he could bring the three heads back to Weiningburg safely, he could exchange them for a large sum of silver, which was much more cost-effective than hunting a dangerous wild boar.

Now the enemy is in the dark while he is in the light, and his vision is clear. As long as he shoots fast enough, he can turn them into heads to be cashed in before they can react.

He did what he said. The wanderer sat on a thick branch, then drew his arrow, drew his bow, and nocked the string. His posture restricted him from fully drawing the bow, but fortunately, the distance between hunter and prey was less than thirty steps. Even at half-drawn, the arrow would still pierce a human body.

"Hoo!" The wanderer let out a long breath. The arrow flew out of his hand, piercing his throat!
Yindahuqi had just swallowed a piece of half-chewed rabbit leg before it slid into his stomach when an arrow pierced his throat. The arrow went from top to bottom, from right to left, piercing his throat diagonally along his cervical spine, connecting his Adam's apple to the rabbit leg.

"Uh" He subconsciously held his throat, raised his head and glanced sideways to find the vagrant shooting arrows. "Enemy"

Yindahuqi was speechless and could only point his hand to the other two in the direction of the enemy attack. However, the order of the vagrants' shooting was deliberately chosen, and Hushibu and Erbihe had to turn around so that their sights could align with the direction of Yindahuqi's arm.

The two men reacted quickly. Without any hesitation, they quickly stood up and turned around, grabbed the bows and arrows on the ground and prepared to fight back.

By the time they followed Yindahuqi's lead and saw the archer leaning against the tree, the nomad's second arrow had already landed. He aimed for the neck, but Hushubu's movements were so swift that the arrow barely caught the flesh of his neck, grazed his collarbone, and pierced his right shoulder. It was finally stopped by his shoulder blade, preventing him from piercing through. This was enough to deprive Hushubu, a skilled archer, of his ability to launch a long-range counterattack.

Hushbu immediately abandoned his bow and arrow and turned to support Indahuqi, who was still alive. He tried to use his still-strong left arm to drag him to a corner of the wall, away from the range of the vagrants' shooting. Blood was gushing out, and Indahuqi would not live long.

Erbihe had already taken aim. At this distance, the homeless man's first arrow would accurately hit Yindahuqi's neck, so Erbihe would naturally not miss. Furthermore, the homeless man had no way to dodge; if he moved even slightly, he would fall from the tree several feet high. He would die from the fall alone.

"It's over!" When Erbihe drew his bow to the full, the vagrant's third arrow was just on the string.

At this critical moment, the prisoner suddenly exerted force with his legs, and like a forest frog that had just emerged from hibernation, he jumped up and hit Erbihe's calf hard with his head.

This strike didn't cause any harm to Erbihe, but it greatly disrupted his aim. The arrow was thrown, but it only stuck firmly in the branch beside the wanderer.

The vagrant shot his third arrow! The arrow hit Erbihe's left chest. If it had been a little more to the left, it would have hit his heart.

Although he had been struck by an arrow, he hadn't lost his ability to fight back. If he had quickly drawn his bow and fired a second arrow at the nomad in the tree, his life would have been in jeopardy. Because the nomad had only two arrows stuck in the tree, to fire a fourth, he would have had to reach back into his quiver. However, in his shock and anger, Erbihe made the wrong decision. He kicked the captive, sending him sprawling and throwing him to his knees, preventing him from interfering with him.

"Die." The wanderer seized the opportunity. The fourth arrow was shot steadily and accurately hit Erbihe's heart.

His heart was pierced, and all the strength in Erbihe's body suddenly disappeared. He fell limply to the ground, and the light in his eyes gradually faded.

"I'm sorry." The captive squirmed and turned sideways, apologizing to Erbihe in Jurchen. He still remembered that this Tartar, who was about the same age as him, tried to persuade his elder brother to share a bite of food with him.

(End of this chapter)