The Red Demons of the Mountains

The camp lay under a watch drawn tight as wire. Passing through the heart of it, Garshakan took in everything around him.

The armor of the Kara Cho'oha was the same issue worn by the Tiger Hunting Army. The crimson plate on the men about him, though, was cut to a slightly different pattern—above all the helms.

"This way. If you please."

Garshakan followed the warrior guiding him and stepped into the tent.

A young warrior of refined bearing sat in a folding chair. Ranged to his left and right, the others sat in solemn stillness. When every eye turned on him, Garshakan met them with a cold stare.

"It has been a long time, Garshakan."

At the familiar voice, Garshakan nodded.

"And for me as well. Guchu Kagetora."

The senior warriors of the Akuto frowned. Some, plainly offended, even laid hands on the hilts at their waists and let a killing intent seep into the air. What displeased them was that he had offered no courtesy before the daisho who stood for them all—Great General Hojo Kagetora.

"Insolence! How dare you!"

The warriors bowed their heads beneath the voice heavy with authority.

"This man was sent by our lord! Would you dare forget who stands above you?"

"F-forgive us, Daisho!"

Kagetora raked his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠subordinates with a sharp glare, then inclined his head to Garshakan.

"I beg your pardon, Garshakan."

"No need. I don't know courtesy. I only carry out the Khan's—no. Our lord's orders."

Garshakan faced him with an indifferent look, a man like a wolf. He was one of the northern warriors Lord An Hyeon kept always near, together with Ulgyan and Indahun—men Kagetora himself acknowledged. They were akin to the hokoshu, the household guard that attended a shogun at his side. The numbers they led in Jiangnan were not great, yet he had heard that beyond the sea, in that northern country, they commanded Jurchen cavalry in the thousands.

Choi Heuk-ryeo, An Hyeon's foremost vassal and a warrior Kagetora honored—these were the beasts that man had raised for their lord. A brave warrior was owed respect in kind.

"For our lord to send a man of your standing in person..."

"He said the matter was important."

Kagetora tilted his head.

"You and yours may be at home in the mountains, but you would not have known the roads."

"Our lord attached men who know the ground. She folk, hill people familiar with the country hereabouts. They were a help."

"Those mountain people? It seems our lord has already taken them in."

Kagetora nodded and came to the point.

"What order did our lord give?"

"Here."

Garshakan held out the sealed orders he had kept carefully against his chest. Kagetora broke the wrapper and read down the page.

They were to match their timing and close on the enemy from three directions. In the plan their lord had drawn, the hardest problem had been the taking of Yanping, which held both the waterways and the enemy's lines of supply.

Kagetora had been driven into a forced march over the rugged Wuyi Mountains so as not to come too late. That march had been no easy thing—yet it could hardly be set beside the seizure of a fortress whose name was that it could not be taken.

"To think our lord has already gone over the walls..."

"Well. I'll be damned."

The officers of the Akuto had thought they themselves had come at a tearing pace, and they clicked their tongues to hear they had still fallen behind their lord.

"Our lord said that if the enemy means to break the net and run, it will be here. To the north."

"If they mean to flee toward the Shaowu they hold, this is the way. And to break south now, they would first have to take Yanping themselves."

Kagetora finished the letter and sank into thought. Lord An Hyeon had told them not to try to stop the enemy at the price of heavy losses, should matters turn against them. Delay. Hinder the flight where they could.

"And the rest?"

"He said he leaves all of it to you. As the situation warrants, at your discretion—whether you open them a road, or fight."

Garshakan regarded Kagetora for a moment.

"Wholly to you, Kagetora. He said he would trust you with it."

A face of noble white, brows thin and black as a crescent moon. Warrior of high blood that he was, Kagetora smiled a smile at once cold and beautiful.

"You have my thanks for coming all this way to bring word. I shall have a proper meal laid. Eat, rest well, and then return."

"No. Just something simple to take. I'll shut my eyes a while and leave at once."

At the blunt answer, Kagetora nodded.

"When you go back to our lord, tell him this. Kagetora will see to it that he has nothing to worry over."

"Understood. Then..."

Garshakan went out with the warrior assigned to guide him. Kagetora gave a bitter smile and let out a sigh.

"To lay a worry on our lord... Is that not a shame, for a vassal? For a warrior?"

He looked to the officers under him, and his eyes flashed.

"All of you. Is it not so?"

"It is, Daisho!"

"We are truly without face!"

The warriors of the Akuto bowed their heads and cried out. Kagetora rose in a surge and shouted.

"Those men have lived their whole lives on lakes and water and marsh. Will such as they be our match in these hard mountains and side paths, merely because they number in the tens of thousands?"

"No, Daisho!"

"This fight is before our lord's own eyes! A chance to win merit while he himself looks on!"

Kagetora's voice rang through the tent. The warriors of the Akuto nodded, eyes gleaming.

"To the lawless men who dared stand against our lord—we will teach them, clear as day, how fearful the red demons of the mountains can be!"

"Ha!"

The senior warriors of the Akuto bowed as one and shouted.

"Prepare to march!"

Kagetora set a crimson faceplate painted with a demon's fangs over his face, and settled his helm upon his head.

Blood-hungry red demons went into the mountains.

Peep, peep...

Phee-oh, phee-oh, phee-oh——

Late summer lay muggy over the ridges. Birds called through the thick woods along the crest, and the same birds, looking down on a strange company trudging past in a pour of sweat, set up a noisy clamor.

"Damn it all. At least it ain't as hot as home..."

"That's 'cause it's the mountains. You can get out of the sun, and the air's a bit cooler..."

Grumbling as they went, the soldiers groaned on aching legs up the steep pass. The column stretched away down the winding mountain road. People beyond counting were climbing the narrow path, so many that the end of them could not be seen.

Near the head of the column, Jiang Tai was studying the country around him. He glared at the middle-aged guide, who had gone rigid with fear.

"You certain this side path gets us back to Jianyang County? This the road to Jianyang?"

"Yes! I-it is, General! This is the fastest way! Fifty li—twenty kilometers! Just that much more, and..."

"Damn these endless mountains!"

Whichever way he looked there was nothing but ridges and peaks without end, mountains choked with primeval forest walling off the whole of his sight. The strangeness of it was enough to suffocate him.

Jiang Tai was a man of Hubei, a country of broad plains and marsh, lakes and waterways. Until he left home he had never so much as set eyes on a hard mountain. He had met mountain country for the first time in Jiangxi, but that was nothing to set beside Fujian. Since they had come into Fujian the year before, it had been steep mountains in every direction and roads narrow as thread, forever climbing and dropping until a man's strength ran out of him.

His Hubei subordinates could handle anything on the water, but they were not used to mountain ground. Forcing a hard mountain road with men like that was killing him. There was nothing else for it.

"They haven't caught on that we're swinging around, have they?"

"Didn't we leave ten thousand in front of their camp? We set up plenty of dummies too, and told them to shift about and make it look like there were more of us..."

Jiang Tai nodded at his subordinate general's words.

He had come north at the head of thirty thousand to destroy the enemy who had taken Jianyang County. Before long he had found them blocking a stretch where the waterway narrowed. They had planted a palisade across the narrow throat and raised a camp along the ridge. He had probed them lightly, then fallen back under a storm of arrows, judging them no easy mark. He was not fool enough to charge head-on into a mountain stronghold so stoutly prepared.

"While they're fixed on our men, we swing around behind and take Jianyang, and that is the end of it. Cut their retreat and their morale drops through the floor. Then we close on them front and rear and wipe them out."

"And after that?"

"We see how it stands. Either we go for the Duke of Yue's main body, or, if that won't serve, we fall back by the mountain roads."

To move quickly on the hard side paths, Jiang Tai himself had left his horse and gone afoot, and sweat soaked him through. He came down over yet another pass, gasping, and shouted.

"A short rest, then we move! The whole army, rest!"

"Rest! It's a rest!"

Twenty thousand men strung the length of a long ravine sank down at the roadside, rubbing their legs and drinking water.

"Why no word from the scouts who went ahead? How long has it been, and they still aren't back?"

"I... well, I'm not sure either... Shall I send the boys out again?"

Jiang Tai looked at his deputy with an irritated eye, then turned on the guide.

"How much farther?"

"Well, another thirty li or so. Twelve kilometers, and..."

Listening, Jiang Tai felt something unclean in it and lurched to his feet.

"Something's wrong. Something's off."

"Eh? Th-this road is right, I swear! Go north, and..."

He shoved the guide aside and scanned the ground. The birds that had been chattering noisily only a little while ago—not one of those damned birds could be heard in the quiet ravine. A chill ran up his back.

"The... the flanks..."

Hssssss—thuk.

"Kkh—!"

The middle-aged man who had been staring blankly at Jiang Tai, the man dragged along as guide, clutched the shaft buried in his throat, staggered, and fell.

"Am-ambush! It's an ambush!"

"Aaaagh!"

Arrows poured from the shadows of the brush.

Rumble, crash, boom.

"Look out! Get clear!"

Boulders came rolling off the ridge. A stone the size of a man's head, gathering speed as it descended, shattered the leg of a soldier who could not get out of the way.

"Aaaagh! My leg!"

"S-save me!"

Arrows rained down all along the drawn-out column, and every time a boulder rolled from the crest a scream burst out.

"Get hold of yourselves! What are you doing? There aren't many of them!"

Jiang Tai shouted himself hoarse, fighting to steady an army sunk in confusion.

"You lot! Straight up the slope! Get in among the trees and the arrows and the stones can't reach you! Move!"

"Yes, General!"

They had been hit from ambush, but Chen Youliang's men were veterans of the field all the same. They smothered the confusion quickly and turned to answer it. Once Jiang Tai and the officers commanding each stretch of the column had sent their nimblest soldiers up the mountain, the rain of arrows and stones ceased almost at once.

"How did it go? Did you take them?"

"They ran off down a side path before we could! Just as you said, General, there weren't many of them."

Jiang Tai ground his teeth.

"General, hasn't this means they've noticed the flanking move? It's dangerous. We ought to turn straight back..."

"Don't talk like a fool! If we fail to break the encirclement, every one of us is a dead man!"

He flared, then mastered his temper and settled the officers.

"If there had been many of them, we would have taken heavy losses here. But they turned and ran. That means the force holding Jianyang isn't large."

"True enough..."

The officers who had been uneasy nodded.

"What they want is for us to hesitate. They're buying time, hoping the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠troops we've got pinned will come back to them."

The ten thousand he had left to hold the enemy would keep them fast. What he needed now was to push on as fast as he could and take Jianyang.

"Understood, General!"

"Good. We pick up the pace! Once we're off this mountain road and into Jianyang, it's finished!"

So resolved, the army set off again—and had to endure one sickening attack after another.

Hsss—thuk, thuk.

"Aaaagh!"

"Catch them! Catch those bastards!"

At every turn, enemies lying in the brush poured arrows and stones down on them.

Rumble, rumble.

"Open the ranks! Look out! Get clear!"

Stones rolled from the steep crests. In the narrow defiles, great trees had been felled across the path to bar the way.

"Look at what they're doing! They're clawing for every moment they can steal!"

Jiang Tai and his officers and men were beside themselves. Red-eyed, they cleared the crude obstacles and raised shields against the arrows. And they went on. And on.

"These damned bastards. I'll kill them. I'll kill every last one of them!"

It took more than half a day to cover fifteen li—barely six kilometers. Not many had been killed or hurt, but they were deep in the mountains, and the sun had already sunk until the light was failing.

"General, the sun is going down. The dark will be dangerous. We ought to camp here..."

"You want us to stop in the middle of the mountains? A little farther. Just a little farther, and it's Jianyang! We go a little farther!"

So the army marched a mountain road gone dim. Before long the moon was up, and fires were lit on torch-poles along the column to light the way. They had marched under unbroken tension through ambush after ambush, and the tired, hungry soldiers nodded and staggered as they walked.

"All of you, take heart! Just a little farther, and..."

"G-General! There!"

The marching column stretched the length of the ravine below. Along the ridges that cupped them, torches caught, one and then another.

One became two. Two became four, then ten. Dozens, hundreds, thousands—the torches multiplied until they lay about the valley like a closing arm.

Beneath the flames burning high, thousands of silhouettes looked down on them. No—tens of thousands.

"Wh-what... what in the world is this..."

"D-didn't they say the enemy was ten thousand? Ten thousand, my ass! That's thirty thousand. Forty, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠even!"

Exhausted and starving, the soldiers were ringed by torches beyond counting, burning along the crests. Fear took them, and they began to murmur.

"Th-that's a bluff! It's a trick! If they had that many, why have they been clawing at us like this until now?"

Jiang Tai bellowed until his throat threatened to tear, fighting to stop the wavering.

"B-but, General..."

"Anyone who shakes the army's heart dies where he stands!"

Jiang Tai drew his sword and snarled, and the officers nodded and shouted with him.

"They're playing a false trick! Don't waver! That's a bluff! Those aren't men!"

Kagetora watched the enemy column, its agitation plain to see, and his face did not change.

Countless torches burned bright along the crests and ridges. Most of them were nothing but a bluff—fires set to poles a handful of soldiers had planted beforehand. Spread as wide as that, they could not have ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠fought properly in any case.

But that was precisely the way of the Akuto. A trick, against a stronger army sent to crush them, of making one's own numbers look greater than they were.

A bluff alone, though, could never break an enemy.

"Send the signal to attack."

"Yes, Daisho!"

At Kagetora's order, a warrior of the Akaoni lifted the conch at his neck and blew with all his strength.

Bwooooooong————

A low, vast note rolled through the valley. From the ridge opposite, conches answered it.

Bwoong——

Bwooong——

Bwoooong————

Bwooooong—————

One regiment was holding ten thousand of the enemy. Aside from them, five regiments of the Akuto had gathered here. When every one of them answered with a conch from the place of his ambush, the valley in the dark boomed and rang.

Beyond the torchlight, banners of pure white streamed. On each of them the word Evil was painted, red as blood.

Kagetora drew his tachi, swept it high against the sky, and shouted.

With a roar that shook heaven and earth, the warriors of the Akuto who had been waiting their moment charged down. Down upon enemy soldiers wailing in the dark, mad with fear and lost in confusion.

"S-save me! Save me!"

"Run! Flee!"

"Demons! They're demons! The demons are coming!"

Out of the darkness came demons in armor the color of blood.

"Ooooh——!"

Warriors shrieked as they swung keen tachi and naginata. The red demons ran wild on every side, painting pictures in blood.

Demons drenched in blood.