Chapter 388: The Giant

In the height of summer in the fifth month, Runan Commandery was sweltering. The drone of the cicadas was so deafening that even the march of tens of thousands of troops could not drown it out.

Toward the rear of the army, a "giant" over ten feet tall stood out conspicuously. The man called himself Tian Elai and strode along with a great halberd on his shoulder, full of vigor and force. His true identity was Juwuba, Wang Mang's last bodyguard.

Juwuba possessed astonishing leg strength. Where others needed two steps, he covered the distance in a single stride, yet he held his pace, waiting for Cui Fa, who trudged behind carrying a bamboo spear, and Wang Mang...

"Your Majesty..."

"Call me Old Tian."

Because Juwuba had won the favor of a Greenwood commander, he had been appointed a Centurion, with several dozen able-bodied men under him. Using this small privilege, he had placed Wang Mang and Cui Fa among his troops, allowing the old emperor to ride a mule and keep up with the army.

Having compared miseries with the Gengshi regime, Wang Mang was actually in better spirits than when he had been in Hanzhong. A habitual micromanager, he had never actually fought a battle and could not read the situation at all. All he knew was that the march was very slow — so slow that a septuagenarian like him could easily keep pace on a mule. He also noticed that the army contained many gray-haired men and no small number of half-grown boys.

The dignified former emperor of a dynasty being press-ganged by the Greenwood Army was a rather farcical affair, but because of Wang Mang's age, his literacy, and Juwuba's protection, he had gained a small measure of standing in the camp. A Greenwood commander casually pointed at him and said, "Old Tian, you'll be the grain officer!"

When distributing rice, looking at the Xin-dynasty bronze square-sheng measure in his hand, Wang Mang felt a sense of displacement. He was, after all, a good man. In other battalions, officers skimmed off the top at every level and pocketed empty pay slots, but Wang Mang issued exactly what was due. Before long, the hundred-odd men under him all came to respect this elder.

The former emperor of the Xin Dynasty had, at last, acquired his own direct command within the Greenwood Army.

At the same time, Wang Mang sighed with emotion: "I once butchered the realm under heaven; now I butcher the grain for a hundred men. Truly, this is using an ox-slaughtering cleaver to kill a chicken."

Meanwhile, Cui Fa put his own talents to use, snooping around in all directions.

He gradually pieced together the facts: this army numbered fifty to sixty thousand men and was marching to Runan to fight the Red Eyebrow Army. The commander was the Greenwood Han "King of Yinping," Chen Mu, whose official post was Grand Minister of Works. He had formerly been the leader of the Pinglin troops and had once done a favor for the Gengshi Emperor, Liu Xuan, and was therefore quite trusted and favored.

"So Liu Xuan actually chose the Grand Minister of Works to go to war." What Wang Mang was thinking of was the yin-yang military divination art of victory and defeat. Wang Yi, who had lost all three hundred thousand men at Kunyang, had also been Grand Minister of Works.

"Your Majesty, if the Greenwood and the Red Eyebrows truly clash, what should we do?" Cui Fa had heard that the Red Eyebrows in Runan numbered a full three hundred thousand! A truly hair-raising figure.

His suggestion was to take advantage of the battle to have Juwuba pull their hundred-odd men out and flee, and not get mixed up in it.

Wang Mang, however, had his own plans.

"More than the Greenwood Army,"

"I wish to know why the Red Eyebrows rebelled, and what exactly it is they want to do!"

In the same army as Juwuba were Wang Chang and Ma Wu.

One was a partisan of Liu Bosheng. After the defeat at Tong Pass, Wang Chang had returned to Nanyang on his own to beg forgiveness. Liu Xuan had stripped him of his royal title and the post of Commandant of Justice, leaving him idle at home.

Ma Wu was Liu Xiu's brother-in-law. He had once been sent to persuade the Red Eyebrows and had gotten on very well with the Red Eyebrow Elder, Fan Chong. It was only Liu Xuan's shortsightedness, his desire to casually fob off the Red Eyebrow Army, that had ultimately led to armed conflict between the two sides. Yet instead of reflecting, Liu Xuan had blamed Ma Wu and also dismissed him from his post as General.

To bolster the pro-Liu Xiu faction, Li Tong had advised Liu Xuan to reappoint these two men skilled in warfare. But Liu Xuan was extremely petty. He restored their titles of General but gave them no troops, only attaching them to King of Pingyin Chen Mu as advisors.

One day, when the army halted to rest, Wang Chang returned from a council of war, deeply troubled.

"We have now entered Runan territory. King of Biyang Wang Kuang has moved south from Luoyang and joined forces with King of Rang Liao Zhan in Yingchuan, with a total strength of thirty thousand. King of Huaiyang Zhang Ang has moved south from Chenliu and joined forces with King of Ruyin Liu Xin in Huaiyang, with a total strength of twenty thousand."

"Together with our Nanyang army, five kings advance in separate columns for a combined strike, a three-pronged converging attack, uniting one hundred ten thousand men at Runan!"

The Greenwood domain was vast; they still had to leave troops to garrison Wancheng, Wu Pass, and the Central Plains. This operation had already committed the greater part of their forces, hoping to achieve total victory in a single campaign and annihilate the Red Eyebrows in Runan.

The number of people joining the army swelled continuously. Many powerful families in Runan, unable to endure the Red Eyebrows' grain seizures, voluntarily joined the Greenwood Army, hoping it could drive them out.

It should have been a perfect moment to console the people and punish the wicked, but the Greenwood Army revealed its unsavory side. The Red Eyebrows at least only plundered the wealthy and middle-class households. The Greenwood Army's discipline was worse than the Red Eyebrows' and had already caught up to that of the former imperial army. They looted all along the way, causing great disappointment in Runan and completely losing the people's hearts.

And next, the western route army encountered the Red Eyebrows' unique tactics: large numbers of small Red Eyebrow bands began appearing frequently, attacking the Greenwood grain-seizing squads. This slowed the great army's advance even further.

By the time the army reached the vicinity of Shangcai in early June, they discovered there was no sign of the main Red Eyebrow force anywhere nearby. Only an empty city remained.

But this did not stop Chen Mu from grandly marching into the city walls and announcing the recovery of lost territory!

Chen Mu believed the Red Eyebrows had been frightened and fled in disarray. Next, they need only continue advancing cautiously, seize the Runan capital of Pingyu, and they could send someone back to report their achievement.

The problem was, where had the Red Eyebrows fled to?

"Toward Yangcheng in the northeast?"

Yangcheng was the hometown of Chen Sheng from the late Qin. The moment he heard this name, Wang Chang knew things were bad!

"The King of Huaiyang and the King of Ruyin are about to be in dire straits!"

Several days later, the King of Huaiyang, Zhang Ang, fled to the western route army, which was still delayed at Shangcai, and informed them of disastrous news.

"The Chenliu and Huaiyang armies encountered the Red Eyebrows first and were completely annihilated!"

Zhang Ang was truly unlucky. In the spring, he had attacked Puyang, only to have his grain supplies burned by Ma Yuan at Wuchao. He then advanced south to Guandu and suffered a crushing defeat. By the time Zhang Ang called upon several nearby lords for help, Ma Yuan had already withdrawn back into Henei.

Zhang Ang had been nursing his resentment. Who could have imagined that, after being ordered south in the summer, he would walk straight into a Red Eyebrow ambush?

The Greenwood generals were horrified. Only after detailed questioning did they get a clear picture of what had happened.

The Red Eyebrows' encirclement was staggeringly vast; they had deployed at least over a hundred thousand men. There was no overly refined tactic — just a massive camp of ten thousand men swarming in like a hive, but the soldiers fought with a ferocity that feared no death.

Realizing they were surrounded by the Red Eyebrows, the Greenwood troops had also fought desperately. The two armies clashed for several hours. Just past noon, the sky turned dark and gloomy, making it hard to see even a foot ahead. The King of Ruyin, Liu Xin, ordered torches lit for illumination to direct the battle. The Red Eyebrow Army exploited this, sending death squads to strike from darkness against the light, and in one charge, they broke through the King of Ruyin's personal guard. Liu Xin died in battle.

The Greenwood Army's morale instantly collapsed. The Red Eyebrow Army, taking advantage of the heavy fog, crossed the trenches, tore down the palisades, and overran the Greenwood camp fortifications. Casualties were extremely heavy.

Zhang Ang alone escaped with his life; his troops were almost entirely wiped out by the Red Eyebrows!

But he insisted that after half a day of fierce fighting, they had also killed or wounded over ten thousand Red Eyebrows.

Once he learned the Red Eyebrows' heading, Chen Mu felt an even greater sense of dread: "This is bad! The northern route is about to be attacked too!"

The Greenwood Army had divided its forces to advance; the Red Eyebrows massed their forces to fight. No matter how many routes you came by, Fan Chong focused on striking just one, while using scattered stragglers to delay the advance of the other routes, buying time to achieve local superiority and overwhelm the few with the many. Though the Red Eyebrows did not understand military classics, relying on years of experience in raising troops, they already knew how to win battles.

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Thinking of this, Chen Mu decided to change direction and begin marching north toward Yingchuan, hoping to rescue the northern route army before it was attacked...

But Wang Chang, who had earlier proposed a swift march to Yangcheng to rescue Zhang Ang's army, now vehemently opposed this.

"King of Pingyin, the Red Eyebrows' combat strength far exceeds our assumptions. They are roving bandits, adept at movement. Now that one of the three prongs is missing, encirclement is difficult. A hasty pursuit and forced march would be disadvantageous. In my view, the best plan for now is to temporarily hold at Shangcai, aid the powerful families of Runan, strengthen our defenses and clear the countryside, so that the Red Eyebrows cannot get their hands on the autumn grain. When winter comes, that horde will collapse on its own."

But Chen Mu refused to heed Wang Chang's proposal and instead sneered: "Drag things out with the Red Eyebrows until winter? I'm surprised you could think of that. Could it be that you want to keep the Red Eyebrows around, waiting for someone to return?"

Liu Xuan had told Chen Mu that he suspected Li Tong, Wang Chang, Ma Wu, and others still yearned for Liu Xiu. Therefore, men of the Liu Bosheng brothers' faction must never be given military authority.

At a time like this, they were still thinking of internal strife. Wang Chang was quite anxious. Although he leaned toward the Bosheng brothers, he was, after all, a Greenwood elder and the commander of the Xiajiang troops. He could only say bitterly to Ma Wu:

"No wonder in Nanyang there's a children's rhyme that goes, 'Harmony or not, it lies with the Red Eyebrows. Victory or not, it lies in Jiangdong.' It seems to me the Gengshi Emperor will be defeated by the Red Eyebrows, and the one who can ultimately settle the realm will still have to rely on the King of Wu in Jiangdong!"

The Greenwood Army was already a bird startled by the mere twang of a bow. Along the way, when they encountered ordinary Runan refugees, they would slaughter them as Red Eyebrows too. Man or woman, wherever the great army passed, it left behind only village after village massacred on the charge of "colluding with the Red Eyebrows" — and conveniently seized whatever meager grain and wheat the victims still had.

Watching this, old Wang Mang, now serving in the ranks, could only shake his head. "Greenwood truly are bandits. Back then, everyone at court advocated amnesty and recruitment; I alone insisted on fighting to the end. It seems I was not wrong to suppress them — only a pity the bandit-suppression campaigns failed, allowing them to grow into a real menace, bringing calamity to the state and suffering to the people!"

Wang Mang's opinion of Greenwood sank lower and lower. At the same time, he grew even more baffled: how had his own generals ever managed to lose to such a third-rate army?

Two days later, as they approached the Yan County area, the outlying detached troops on Greenwood's main-force perimeter began running into genuine Red Eyebrows — men with red clay or fresh blood smeared on their foreheads — with increasing frequency. The Red Eyebrows seemed utterly incapable of putting up a fight; every time they made contact with Greenwood, they immediately broke and fled.

Prince of Pingyin Chen Mu concluded that they had caught the Red Eyebrows' tail and could now coordinate with the northern-route army to crush them in a pincer attack!

Gradually, however, things began to feel wrong. Red Eyebrow activity grew more and more frequent — they were even appearing in swarms behind the army's rear!

They camped for the night at Yan County. Just as the sky was barely light, Prince of Pingyin Chen Mu was hastily roused from bed and climbed the watchtower. Following the trembling finger of a scout, he saw that the Greenwood encampment was already surrounded by an even more massive force!

They blotted out the heavens and covered the earth, boundless and without end. Moving in units of ten thousand, they surged in from every direction, massing like summer storm clouds. The red marks on their brows were more starkly vivid than ever.

The Red Eyebrows had appeared so frequently that the Greenwood scouts simply could not determine their direction of approach or point of origin. By the time the Red Eyebrows began closing the encirclement, escape was already far too late.

Prince of Pingyin Chen Mu now finally understood. The Red Eyebrows' plan to defeat them in detail was not wrong — but they had been mistaken about one thing...

"So the Red Eyebrows' target for annihilation was our main army all along!"

"What your daddy's hitting is exactly the main army!"

In the first ten days of the sixth month, in the outskirts of Yancheng, a great battle lasting two full days was drawing to a close. Corpses littered the ground; more Red Eyebrows had fallen than Greenwood men, for their armor and weapons were crude and many had fought on empty stomachs. Yet in the end, they had used superior numbers to crush Greenwood's loose and ragged battle lines.

At this very moment, Fan Chong stood atop his trophy — the command carriage of the Greenwood Han Prince of Pingyin, Chen Mu — brimming with triumphant pride.

The Red Eyebrows had spread their forces very wide. Upon learning that Greenwood was advancing in three separate columns, Fan Chong ordered Red Eyebrow contingents everywhere to find ways to pin down the Greenwood main force. He first annihilated the twenty thousand men from Huaiyang and Chen, then had several Elders take tens of thousands to block Wang Kuang, coming from Yingchuan, striking him before he was prepared and tying him down.

Meanwhile, Fan Chong himself took over a hundred thousand men and waited on the unavoidable route the Greenwood main force had to take in its northward advance — waited for them to walk right into the encirclement!

At this moment, Fan Chong's right-hand man, Xu Xuan, a man from Donghai, returned from the front to report the latest battle situation to Fan Chong.

"The Prince of Pingyin Chen Mu, along with Wang Chang, Ma Wu, and the rest, have taken twenty thousand battered survivors and fled west, withdrawing toward Kunyang. Zhang Ang also scattered and fled amid the chaos of battle; he has not yet been found."

Fan Chong immediately cried out in regret.

"When General Ma Wu came earlier to urge surrender, his temperament suited me well. How fine it would have been if we could do great things together."

He added, "This time Greenwood sent five princes to besiege us, yet we only killed one. That can't be counted as total victory."

Xu Xuan, however, smiled and shook his head. One column annihilated, another crippled, and word was the northern-route army had also been forced back — Greenwood Han's encirclement campaign had utterly failed. How was this not total victory? Giant Fan's standards were rather high.

As he spoke, Xu Xuan could not resist stroking the carriage beneath Fan Chong's feet. "Truly a fine carriage."

And was it not supremely fine? The carriage was inlaid with engraved bridle fittings and painted in color, even gilded with gold and silver, adorned with ear ornaments and flying axle-caps — that is, its body was lacquered, painted, and embellished with silk. Silver and yellow splendor adorned the left canopy-post, with tasseled cords binding the carriage pole — the canopy top was set with gold and jade, and even the shafts were wrapped in the finest cured leather.

Xu Xuan was the most cultured Elder in the Red Eyebrow Army — he had once served as a jail clerk in Donghai Commandery. He always felt that this rootless, orderless drifting about was no way to go on. In the past he had not dared to raise the matter; now that they had defeated a powerful foe, and the next step might be to march on Wancheng and smash Greenwood entirely, perhaps there were certain things they could begin to consider.

Are kings, lords, generals, and ministers born of noble stock? If Liu Xuan and the Greenwood men could ride in such a carriage, why could the Red Eyebrows not?

But Fan Chong disliked it. With a wave of his hand, he ordered: "Bring firewood!"

Taking a pine torch, Fan Chong, right before Xu Xuan's eyes, directly set the silk on that splendid, beautiful carriage alight, letting it be devoured inch by inch by the flames!

Xu Xuan was horrified. "Giant Fan, why do this?"

"Over a year ago, Greenwood could still deal heavy blows to the Xin dynasty's imperial armies and stood as equals to the Red Eyebrows. Now they are this fragile." Fan Chong was furious; Greenwood had truly disappointed him greatly.

Think back to the beginning: the Greenwood Army had once won a great victory like Kunyang. Even if Liu Xiu had been instrumental, many of the officers and men from that day were still in the ranks. But they had sunk into decay together with the Gengshi regime. In barely a year, they had rotted and fallen in Wancheng and Luoyang. The chieftains feasted and drank, their brains grown fat and their guts greasy, while the soldiers beneath them, finding they had gained no benefit and were subjected to constant abuse, deserted in droves — those who could leave, left; those who could run, ran. Hearts scattered. By now, they even had to fill the ranks by press-ganging able-bodied men, and were already indistinguishable from the imperial armies of old.

The Red Eyebrows, by contrast, had maintained their fighting strength even while on the run. Most men joined only because they could not survive and wanted a full belly. Fan Chong led by example; although military discipline grew worse and worse, he persisted in and strictly practiced frugality.

Fan Chong could not articulate these things clearly, but he dimly sensed that the corruption, from the princes down to the chieftains, was one of the reasons Greenwood had plummeted so precipitously.

He then promptly tossed the Han banner, presented by a soldier, into the flames as well, letting it turn to ashes together with the ornate carriage!

Seeing that Fan Chong remained so obstinate, Xu Xuan swallowed back the counsel that had risen to his lips. Let it be — next time, then. Within the army's upper ranks, more and more people failed to understand Fan Chong; he would only find himself increasingly isolated...

Just then, a clamor arose not far away. A knot of Red Eyebrow soldiers, greatly excited, were surrounding a man as they walked this way. Even from several dozen paces, one could see his head and shoulders towering above the rest like a crane among chickens.

There was no such figure among the Red Eyebrows! Fan Chong, astonished, walked over for a look. He saw that the forehead of this giant, over ten feet tall, was indeed smeared with the Red Eyebrow mark. And tucked under his arm was another man, whose hands and feet appeared to be broken, his face twisted in agony.

Ju Wuba flung the captive to the ground and prostrated himself before Fan Chong. "This humble one, Tian Elai, together with my master, Old Tian, had the misfortune to be seized by Greenwood and pressed into service as conscripts. Now, admiring Giant Fan's lofty righteousness, I have captured the Greenwood Prince of Huaiyang, Zhang Ang, and come to present him. I wish, together with Old Tian and the hundred-odd men under us, to lend our strength to the Red Eyebrows!"

"Two of the five princes — excellent!"

Fan Chong raised Ju Wuba to his feet and roared with laughter.

"Rise, no need for such ceremony. You and I — we are both 'giants'!"

"Once you have entered the Red Eyebrow Army, no matter if you were a tenant farmer, a peddler, or a menial runner in the past — so long as blood is smeared on your brow, your strength is bent to a single purpose, and you share your rice together — every warrior is a giant, equal in standing with all others!"