Chapter 445: Chencang

With Diwu Lun's proclamation as Emperor, "the third year of the King of Wei" instantly became "the first year of Wude."

In the fifth month of summer in that first year, sweltering heat swept across the Wei River valley, and Chencang was so scorching that even the cicadas had no strength to buzz.

Inside the county office, the clerks sat in their rooms drenched in sweat, and the work varied from bureau to bureau — some were reviewing last month's prison cases, some were tallying granary stores, and some were passing around printed materials from Chang'an: ever since last year, when woodblock printing and paper were used to mass-produce brainwashing articles about how "the Han house's fortune is exhausted," the block-print style personally decreed by Diwu Lun and called "regular script" had become the standard for official documents.

This particular piece, for example, was a war manifesto titled "Proclamation for the Punitive Expedition Against Longyou," and it even contained content in which the former dynasty's Empress Dowager Wang Yan vouched for Diwu Lun and bitterly denounced Liu Xin and the Wei clan for their selfishness in putting the child Ying in harm's way.

Not every clerk regarded the Wude Emperor as sacred and inviolable — one sharp-tongued minor clerk thought of something, let out a snicker, and whispered to the person beside him: "On the same proclamation, there's both an Emperor and an Empress Dowager — anyone who didn't know better would think it's the current Empress Dowager!"

"Do you want to die!" His colleague was horrified, and then immediately sensed the Assistant Magistrate's gaze: "What are you two talking about?"

The two minor clerks jolted upright, rose, and said in unison: "We were saying, His Majesty's insight is profound!"

The Assistant Magistrate's brows furrowed deeply — treating his clerks like disciples and being fond of instructing them was his style. This man was named Cheng Gong, courtesy name Shaozi, and the previous year he had become famous for leading a group of impoverished students, carrying rice and cauldrons on their backs, all the way to Chang'an to take the examinations.

Because his essays were simple and easy to understand, Cheng Gong was specially raised to tenth place by Diwu Lun, which could be considered "a farm boy in the morning, in the Son of Heaven's hall by dusk." With this credential, his official career was naturally quite smooth, and after completing his Palace Gentleman training in the palace and being sent down to the grassroots for half a year, he was quickly promoted to Assistant Magistrate of Chencang.

He glared at the two slacking minor clerks and said: "Copy this proclamation thirty more times."

The petty officials outwardly mumbled their assent, but behind his back they grumbled quietly: "Chang'an has so much paper, why don't they just print a few more copies."

Because financial and material resources limited Diwu Lun's imagination, paper and printing had so far only been promoted in the Western Capital, Luoyang, and the Northern Capital. Although it improved central efficiency to some degree, the local commanderies and counties were still the same old mess as before. Before the technology fully spread, whether it was cheaper to ship paper from Chang'an or use the rough wooden tablets made by local slip workshops was self-evident.

The court generally only sent each county enough documents to distribute to a few townships, but Cheng Gong was a meticulous man, and his requirement for his subordinates was: "His Majesty's edicts must be seen by every single watch station."

In the office, someone else asked Cheng Gong, who had seen the wider world at Weiyang Palace in Chang'an, with deep worry: "Assistant Magistrate, since the proclamation has been issued, will Chencang soon become a battlefield?"

In fact, several days earlier, when General Wan Xiu returned from Chang'an, Chencang, as the seat of the General of the Guard, had already become suddenly tense. The Chencang Assistant Magistrate, besides documents and prison law, also managed granary affairs, and the Assistant Magistrate and his clerks were frequently summoned to the military camp for questioning.

"How could Chencang become a battlefield?" Cheng Gong said. "The battlefield will certainly be on the other side of the Long Mountains!"

But as a frontline base for grain reserves, Chencang was destined to become a distribution hub for the main army and its supplies, and the local people would be affected to some degree — even as minor clerks, they could be conscripted into the army!

"What of it if we are conscripted?" Assistant Magistrate Cheng was full of confidence: "I have over ten disciples, all serving as clerks in the military."

In last year's grand examination, countless people failed, but Diwu Lun showed grace — anyone who took the civil service exam and persevered to the end could receive a tally and serve as a petty clerk in the garrisons everywhere. Though not an ideal starting point for an official career, it at least put food on the table.

"And you won't be required to personally charge into battle and kill the enemy. Even within the ranks, aren't the duties similar to what you do here in the county office?"

The minor clerks looked at each other — similar? How? In Chencang County, they could shelter under the eaves from the scorching sun; even if they occasionally accompanied Cheng Gong to the fields, they would return after a few days. After work, they went back to their lanes in the city, embraced their wives and children, even had servants to attend them, and enjoyed good food and drink.

But in the army it was different. Once war broke out, they would have to follow on long treks. Even if they didn't have to walk themselves and merely sat on ox carts or horse carts, the jolting over mountains and ridges was no easy thing to endure. Coupled with the unbearable scorching heat, the likelihood of dying along the way was very high, and at any moment they could be separated from their families by the divide between the living and the dead — and this was the Long Mountain road where even ghosts would walk weeping!

And the work was harder too. In the county office, you just finished your assigned monthly tasks, but in the army, who knew when a new batch of grain would arrive and need you to count and store it — if there was even a slight discrepancy, you might even be made a scapegoat and executed!

Here's a joke: it's said that in the Wei army, the casualty rate among grain officers was higher than that of the shock troops!

"If the army is so great, why doesn't he go himself?" someone grumbled quietly.

Unexpectedly, after they had finished their silent complaints in the morning, that very afternoon, a Palace Gentleman sent directly from Chang'an arrived to deliver orders to Cheng Gong.

"Assistant Magistrate Cheng."

The young Palace Gentleman Yin Xing swept his gaze over this fellow "presented scholar" of the same examination cohort and repeated Diwu Lun's oral decree.

"Order the Chencang Assistant Magistrate Cheng Shaozi to join the army and attend the imperial carriage, awaiting deployment!"

When the Wude Emperor arrived, the local authorities were never notified of the time in advance — first, to prevent the officials from making a panicked fuss and organizing large crowds to welcome him, wasting the people's time and energy.

Second, to guard against leaks that would allow those with ulterior motives to arrange an assassination in advance.

Thus, when Cheng Gong reached the foothills outside Chencang city, he saw Diwu Lun, surrounded by a platoon of his personal guard, standing atop the high ground of the "Cock-Sacrificing Platform," pointing and gesturing at the county town by the Wei River with the accompanying Palace Gentlemen and military officers.

Seeing Cheng Gong arrive drenched in sweat, Diwu Lun merely smiled first and had him join the retinue. There, Cheng Gong saw Du Du, whom Diwu Lun jokingly called "the Encyclopedia" — a man of vast learning and strong memory, who could answer nearly any question about ancient and modern history, events, and allusions with perfect fluency.

And whenever Diwu Lun asked the assembled men when Chencang was built and what history it had, Du Du would always rush to answer before anyone else.

"I venture to inform Your Majesty: the histories record that Qin arose under Duke Xiang and flourished under Duke Wen. The ancestors of Qin originally dwelt in the Western March of Longyou. When the Zhou moved east, they made a pact with Qin: 'The Rong are without principle and have seized our lands of Qi and Feng; if Qin can attack and expel the Rong, it shall possess those lands.' Thus Qin fought bitterly among the Rong tribes, but the bitter struggle lasted for generations. It was not until the time of Duke Wen of Qin that they advanced east to the confluence of the Qian and Wei rivers and ordered divination to determine whether the place was suitable for habitation — and so Chencang City was built at the foot of Mount Chencang."

Behold this city: backed by foothills, fronted by a high embankment, built according to the terrain, capable of housing several thousand people.

And the flat foothills outside the city could also encamp large bodies of troops — Wan Xiu's camp was set up there.

Diwu Lun nodded and summarized for everyone: "Qin arose in Longyou. After Duke Wen of Qin moved to Chencang, he gained the lands of Mount Qi and the Zhou Plain, and from there gradually encroached eastward upon the feudal lords, ultimately marching into the Central Plains — a process that took four hundred years in all."

"But now, we must march in the opposite direction — from Chencang westward, crossing the Long Mountains to strike the Wei clan!"

As for the time frame, if they could not achieve victory within four months, then Diwu Lun could call off the troops and withdraw, waiting for the coming spring — because once winter set in, the Long Mountains would become an impassable death trap, with snow flying in the tenth month and only beginning to melt near summer.

When asked about Chencang's past just now, Du Du could speak with eloquence and ease.

But when Diwu Lun summoned Cheng Gong forward and began asking about Chencang's grain reserves and the views of the officials and commoners on the war, it was Du Du's turn to know nothing, while Cheng Gong answered with perfect fluency — every detail Diwu Lun cared about, he could recite as if enumerating his own family treasures.

When the conversation turned to popular sentiment, Cheng Gong did not mince words, saying: "Whether clerks or commoners, all are quite apprehensive about the war."

They worried that the hard-won rough peace in Chencang would be dragged down and ruined by war, and feared being conscripted to shed blood and sweat in the Long Mountains.

Diwu Lun nodded, then asked: "And what does Cheng Shaozi think?"

Cheng Gong cupped his hands: "In my hometown, there is a common saying: 'Better a short, sharp pain than a long, dull ache.' Chencang is a transportation hub — southward one can enter Hanzhong, westward one can reach Longyou. The current rough peace exists only because Long and Shu have not yet invaded. Once hostilities begin and battle is fought on the Chencang Long Slope road, the disaster this place suffers will be far worse, and if the conflict drags on, there will be no peace at all!"

"It would be better, as Your Majesty has decided, to use thunderous force to swiftly annihilate Longyou — only then can Chencang be transformed from a frontline into the interior at an early date, and only thus can lasting peace and order be achieved."

Well said. Diwu Lun felt he had indeed not misjudged this man. People like Du Du were well-versed in empty formalities and elaborate rituals and could be used for pomp and embellishment; people like Cheng Gong, whose words were plain and unadorned, could speak in terms that common folk and ordinary soldiers and clerks could understand, and could be used for practical affairs.

In his pleasure, he promoted Cheng Gong on the spot.

"I hear that in Wan Junyou's army, many of the military clerks are your disciples. That being so, the post of Pacification Clerk for the three armies shall be filled by you, Cheng Shaozi."

After surveying the logistics base of Chencang City from afar and learning about the local granaries and popular sentiment, Diwu Lun returned to the main camp to discuss the strategy for dispatching troops with Wan Xiu.

"At present, the Longyou territory controlled by the Wei clan is not large — four commanderies in total."

They gathered with the army staff officers in the main tent, before them a rough map of the Longyou situation, on which were placed military counters representing the forces of Long and Wei respectively. Diwu Lun now greatly enjoyed doing war games with his staff and took endless pleasure in it.

"To the north is Anding, to the east Tianshui, to the south Longxi, and to the west Jincheng."

The registered commoner households of the four commanderies totaled at most seven hundred thousand people, and if one added the dependent-state Qiang and Hu tribes not counted in the registers, the total Han and barbarian population was still under one million. Even though the people of this region were brimming with martial vigor, the sixteen Longyou clans led by the Wei clan, for all their militarism, could not possibly field a total force exceeding forty thousand.

Reckoned this way, it was only a minor power — Diwu Lun could concentrate over a hundred thousand soldiers and civilians to strike it. But Longyou's greatest reliance was still the terrain it occupied, which was enough to nullify the enemy's numerical advantage.

"In the Music Bureau songs of the Former Han, there are often 'Songs of the Long Head.' Once they are sung, it means parting between the living and the dead. The Long Slope winds nine times back — its hardships and perils even surpass those of the Taihang Mountains. Even the people of Chencang, when the Long Head is mentioned, turn pale with fear."

Thus, Longyou, sitting secure behind the peril of Long Pass, needed only a little over ten thousand troops to make Diwu Lun's army, several times that size, gaze up and sigh in despair.

So for this campaign, we stick to the old rule — divide the troops!

"This offensive into Longyou will advance along three lines."

His subordinates had noticed it, though none knew why: the Martial Virtue Emperor seemed to relish three-pronged advances.

Diwu Lun spoke with keen enthusiasm: "The eastern line is our main force, with Junyou as overall commander, further split into upper, middle, and lower routes."

"The middle route sets out from Cangcang and attacks Long Slope from below, drawing the enemy's main strength to concentrate at Tianshui."

"Then several thousand men take the lower route, advancing west along the Wei River, felling trees and opening a path through the hills, making a show of a surprise strike along the river straight into Longxi Commandery!"

"The upper route goes through Beidi, advancing along the Xiao Pass road to attack Anding Commandery."

The upper route of the eastern line was the one with a real chance of breaking into Longyou. Diwu Lun intended to have Wu Han lead this operation, and he had already assigned an exceptionally fierce army to it.

"This will be the Northern Army."

Diwu Lun's finger found New Qinzhong on the map and traced a straight line south from there: "Geng Bozhao will lead the Bing Province cavalry along the Kushui River, strike the seat of Anding Commandery, and link up with the eastern line's upper-route troops at Xiao Pass — a pincer attack from front and rear. I refuse to believe we can't break through!"

"As for the west…"

Diwu Lun sighed and delivered grim tidings: "Word just arrived. The Dou clan has lost Wuwei. Diba Jiao led a hundred riders toward Jiuquan but was ambushed on the road by Longxi troops from Zhangye. A handful of survivors barely made it back — and Jizheng's whereabouts are unknown."

Though his heart was deeply anxious for Old Eight and he trusted his loyalty, as commander he could not pin his hopes on a slender miracle. Diwu Lun therefore swept the war token representing the Hexi allied forces off the map.

"This time we can only rely on the combined strike from east and north."

"There is no western line!"