Invasion (1)
Bing Province. From Shangdang Commandery, tucked away in the mountains, all the way out to Shuofang Commandery in the far north, where boundless grassland rolled to the horizon — a territory so vast that on a map it dwarfed even Jizhou, currently under Yuan Shao's control. And yet beyond its sheer size, it possessed not one other advantage to speak of.
For starters, not all of Bing Province actually belonged to the Han. Set aside Shangdang and Taiyuan Commanderies in the southeast, which bordered Jizhou, and the empire's hand never truly reached the rest. The reason was simple. Past the Taihang Mountains that rose between Jizhou and Bing Province, even the hills gave out entirely into a boundless plain — and that plain, in practice, lay in the grip of the nomads known as the Xiongnu.
Bing Province had suffered its share of raids from the Wuhuan and the Xianbei as well, but if you had to name the people who plundered the region most, there was only one answer: the Xiongnu. Here, however, was where things got a little strange. In the original history, the Xiongnu had split into Northern and Southern branches and warred with each other until the Southern Xiongnu — backed by Han support — destroyed the North and unified the tribes. In this world, that had never come to pass. For whatever reason, the Northern Xiongnu were desperately digging in their heels and refusing to give up the Mongolian Plateau.
Did you know of the Huns — the people whose impact on the fall of the Western Roman Empire was nothing short of enormous? Some historians argue that the Xiongnu and the Huns shared some manner of connection. No definitive conclusion has ever been reached, but at the very least, most scholars accept that the Huns were the Xiongnu's descendants. There is even a theory that the Northern Xiongnu, defeated by the South, migrated west and became the Huns.
These days their power had shrunk drastically, split between North and South and at each other's throats — but in their golden age, they had been monsters who crushed even Emperor Gaozu of Han, the man who toppled Xiang Yu the Hegemon-King, and wrung steady tribute out of him year after year. The Han, realizing a head-on contest was hopeless, spent long years patiently sowing discord until the Xiongnu weakened themselves with infighting. In fact, until the rise of Emperor Guangwu — a genuine once-in-an-era munchkin — the Han gnashed their teeth at the Xiongnu constantly.
And what does that tell you? It means that if you looked only at the current size of their territory and scoffed at them as a power on its last legs, you might well find yourself beaten half to death and left weeping in a corner. When foes that formidable split their forces into small bands and ran wild across a plain without a single obstacle in sight, what exactly could the court do about it? A few of the gentler Xiongnu clans had submitted to the Han, but true to nomadic nature, the violent sort whose eyes rolled back at the mere mention of plunder were far more numerous. In crude terms: their entire way of thinking was different from ours. Why bother trading away goods we barely have enough of ourselves, when there's a farming people right there to take them from? That was their logic.
Truth be told, the nomads' strangely high combat prowess owed a great deal to this way of life. For settled agricultural peoples, war usually broke out over the ambitions of the high and mighty; nomads honed their fighting skills for the simple reason of staying alive, so their mindset was different from the very start. The merciless weather that came crashing down without warning. The parched earth where nothing but weeds would grow. Raised in such a land, a savage temperament came naturally — and a savage temperament meant they fought among themselves nearly every day, carving flesh from their own hide. The result was a people whose fighting power was high but whose unity was abysmal; without an exceptional leader, their limits were plain for all to see. The Wuhuan and the Xianbei were no exceptions. Unless someone like Modu appeared again — the second Chanyu who led the Xiongnu to their golden age and shattered Liu Bang himself — there was no need to tremble before them…
"…Say that again. The Southern Xiongnu did what?"
"Yes, my lord! Yufuluo, the current Chanyu of the Southern Xiongnu, is leading the Xiongnu tribes in an advance on Bing Province!"
At this headache of a report, I clutched my head. Just as we were finally getting ready to move somewhere else, they pick now to invade. What maddening timing. Right — no wonder things had been so quiet lately. Barbarian chieftains sweeping down to raid was common enough in this era, so I muttered with the weariness of an old routine.
"Looks like I'll be setting foot on my homeland's soil again before long."
"……"
Looking around at the people who met my muttering with silence, I gave the order.
"Prepare the army. We march on Bing Province."
"Yes, my lord!"
"And make haste. These are men with terrifying mobility."
When their horses tired mid-gallop, they simply swung over onto fresh mounts riding alongside and kept moving. Add to that an extreme composition of horse archers alone — not a single foot soldier among them — and their marching speed was simply beyond comparison.
The lands already devoured by the Xiongnu were beyond saving, but the commanderies strung along the Taihang Mountains had fortified themselves thoroughly. Of course, thorough defenses alone would not let them hold back the nomad offensive on their own.
In a straight clash of armies, we would not lose. Our faction was packed with veterans who had long since cut their teeth on subjugating barbarians. Lü Bu, bearer of the title Peerless Under Heaven, went without saying — and there were also Zhang Liao and Gao Shun, who had hammered nomads at her side. Besides, Yufuluo was hardly a legend like Modu; what was there to find difficult?
Which meant the single most important question in this campaign was this: could the defenders hold out until we arrived? One way or another, we would have to send relief and drive the nomads off — for as mentioned, nomads like the Xiongnu were a different breed entirely from common bandits. If aid came too late, the Bing Province we had worked so hard to revive would be ravaged all over again, and all we could do was watch the Xiongnu chuckle their way home with their plunder in tow.
If only we could run them down hard before they reached their home base, we might catch them and crack the backs of their skulls — but hmm, would that work? Whether master horsemen would meekly let themselves be caught was doubtful to begin with, and if we overextended in pursuit and got mauled in return, we'd be counting ourselves lucky.
After all, the nomads' core strategy was the Swarm Tactics. Simply put: hit and run. An agricultural people couldn't help but field infantry in their armies, and splitting horse from foot over a difference in speed only raised the risk of being picked apart piece by piece.
…But that applied only to ordinary armies. Ours was not one.
I opened my mouth and called to Lü Bu at my side.
"Lü Bu."
"Hm?"
Lü Bu blinked and answered my call. As usual, she had dumped her duties onto her subordinate officers and was hovering near me under the pretext of guarding my person. Looking into her blood-red eyes, I said,
"I'll put Zhang Liao under your command, so take the cavalry and ride on ahead."
"Really?"
I nodded. Even the Swarm Tactics the nomads prided themselves on would be blown apart in a single stroke by a cavalry force led by Lü Bu and Zhang Liao.
Why is heavy cavalry called heavy cavalry? Because they wore heavier armor than light cavalry — hence the "heavy" — and that very weight meant their endurance and speed were necessarily inferior to the light horse. If lightly armored horse archers like the nomads' simply kept their distance and rained down arrows, there was no answer to be had; but the moment heavy cavalry closed the gap and made contact, the horse archers would be smashed flat without any means of reply. And our faction currently possessed commanders brilliant enough to match the pace of an army built entirely around horse archers, as the Xiongnu's was.
"Yes! Then I'll get ready right now!"
Seeing my reaction, Lü Bu bounded out of the building, practically glowing with energy.
"……"
Zhang Liao, her brown hair catching the light, watched her go with an expression that said, That woman is hopeless.
Lü Bu and Zhang Liao. With those two leading the vanguard, even the Xiongnu could not afford to take them lightly. The cavalry under their command were elite soldiers who had fought every kind of nomad since their days in Bing Province — no cause for worry there. If things went well, they might scatter the Xiongnu before my main force even arrived. The odds of that were vanishingly small, of course.
Since returning to Luoyang we had kept ourselves ready to march at a moment's notice, so the preparations took no great time.
"…I don't like this one bit."
"Your Majesty?"
"Barely any time has passed since you returned to Luoyang, and already you march out again."
The Emperor kept grumbling under her breath.
"Do you not know that We draw Our strength from the sight of your face?"
"……"
Once again her words swooped in from out of nowhere, and I showed my troubled look. Seeing my reaction, the Emperor's expression turned positively delighted.
"This time, see that you return as swiftly as may be once the business is done."
"I shall obey your command."
I answered with all due courtesy.
The Emperor went on.
"Ah — now that I think of it, of late Our younger sister has been saying she wishes to see you."
"…Is that so?"
So the Emperor's younger sister — Liu Xie, the Prince of Chenliu — wanted to meet me. As I made a puzzled sound, picturing the Prince of Chenliu and her black bobbed hair, a smile touched the corners of the Emperor's mouth.
"Your sin, General-in-Chief, is truly a deep one."
"…I'm afraid I cannot fathom what you mean."
I put on a look of surprise. It was all too abrupt — I couldn't keep up with the conversation. To my question, the Emperor offered no answer, only a quiet, knowing smile.