Chapter 238: Reorganization in Xining

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Chief Chen's men scattered everywhere around Xining, carrying news of the city's shops to the various chieftains.

Within three days, the news had spread to all fourteen chieftains, immediately stirring a huge uproar in this frontier military town.

Anything in Xining City that could be divided up had long since been divided. Of the fourteen chieftains, apart from Qi Guoping, who had been granted some land by the court after his father died in battle in Liaodong, the remaining thirteen had not added a sliver of wealth to their families during their entire tenures.

Now, with such an opportunity laid before his eyes, there was no doubt that Chen Shiwen's mood was growing worse and worse.

He felt like slapping himself twice... How was his brain even wired?

Since he'd already thought of borrowing money from Liu Chengzong, why hadn't he just asked Liu the Lion for a hundred shops, borrowed three thousand taels from him, and taken on the whole matter himself!

Why on earth had he gone and dragged all fourteen chieftains into this? Why drag them in!

And now, wonderful — not a single one missing, they're all in on it.

Yang Dingrui walked round and round Xining City, asking the old-timers there how deep the heaviest rain had ever flooded the city streets. Only then did he draw up a granary plan that required raising the ground level by three inches.

The fourteen chieftains launched a frenzied mobilization, as if going to war, quarrying stone from the hills and felling timber from the forests outside the city, sending a steady stream of materials into Xining.

Liu Chengzong was finally at ease.

As autumn came, the hills along the Beichuan River turned red. He sent Fan Sanlang to the silversmith to order a set of silver jewelry for his mother with four taels of silver, and spent an afternoon with her watching the scenery by the riverbank.

But his mother was still very worried. Ever since her two sons had risen in rebellion, she had been worried all the time.

"Mother, you should eat some meat. Your complexion is poor from always avoiding it."

His mother had not eaten meat for a long time. Liu Chengzong knew the reason — she had taken a vegetarian vow for the sake of her two brothers who walked on the edge of a blade.

When he thought about it, it was still his fault. Busy with military affairs, he had only focused on the army's work and spent little time with his family.

No matter where his mother was, the news that arrived each day was always that her son had fought government troops somewhere again, or that her son had led his soldiers off to some other place.

What father or mother could rest easy with that?

His mother did not answer that question of his, only saying, "Lion, Xining is quite nice, but when are we going into Qinghai? Once we're in Qinghai, we won't have to fight others anymore, right?"

In the past, his mother had never wanted to go to Qinghai, but the huge commotion in Xining City these past few days had truly frightened her. Countless natives emerged from the mountains in a vast, mighty tide, sweeping away all her goodwill toward Xining, as if this place had become the most unsafe spot under heaven.

Liu Chengzong laughed. "Fourteen chieftains, directing thirty thousand men, pouring all their strength into hauling earth and stone and carrying great trees — Xining is very safe. They are no match for Big Brother."

Lady Cai glanced at the supremely confident Liu Chengzong and sighed in silence.

What she thought in her heart was: that's because you don't know how lost your elder brother feels inside.

To be precise, from the day they raised their troops until now, every single person she had met had been lost at some point. No one knew how much longer these days of wandering and displacement would last.

Yet her second boy, wild and stubborn as he was, only knew to press forward with his head down, and against all odds, he had actually carved out a path.

Only now, hearing her son's tone, it seemed Qinghai was even more dangerous than Xining. "Haven't the battles all been fought? Haven't you made peace with the court? Why must there be more fighting?"

"Mother, just stay in Xining, with Big Brother. Once I've built a city in Qinghai and gained a firm foothold, I'll bring you over. Eat more meat, and don't pray and fast for my sake. Even if the Buddha were real, if I am to deliver all living beings, he cannot deliver me."

His mother chided him gently. Steeped in vegetarianism and Buddhist prayer, she could not bear to hear her son speak with such wild arrogance. Yet when the words reached her lips, she knew in her heart she could not dissuade him, so she did not argue, only smiling and saying, "You shouldn't speak like that."

Just then, a scout rider came galloping along the riverbank. As he neared, the guards on alert reined in and dismounted, conveying a brief message. Fan Sanlang stepped forward and said, "Commander, the scout horses sent to the Western Sea have returned. There is news of Chen Qindai."

"Understood."

Liu Chengzong replied, then looked at his mother, his face apologetic and troubled as he sighed. "I thought I'd have half a day. This..."

Lady Cai's face showed reluctance, but she still nodded and said, "Go attend to your important matters. Mother doesn't need you to keep her company. Let Sanlang accompany me for a stroll."

"Alright." Liu Chengzong agreed, then looked at Fan Sanlang and said, "Sanlang, then you—"

Before he could finish, Fan Sanlang beamed brightly and said, "Commander, go with peace of mind. The scenery here is lovely. I'll sing a tune for the Old Madam."

With yellow leaves covering the ground beneath their feet and a clear song drifting in the air, Liu the Lion took leave of his mother, swung onto his horse, and rode off toward the snow-capped green mountains to the north.

Lady Cai watched the Lion's receding figure; deep within her proud gaze for him lay a profound worry.

In this world, what mother prays for her child to be ever-victorious and deliver all living beings? Her vegetarian prayers were nothing more than a plea for their safety.

When he was no longer visible, Lady Cai lowered her head and spoke softly to the mountain: "Mother believes you can win."

Liu Chengzong grabbed two garments and a small notebook and entered Chief Chen's yamen. A moment later, he came out frowning, called for two artists from the ranks, and finally dragged in Chen Shifo, who understood the Mongol tongue. The oil lamp in the main hall of the yamen burned until dawn the next morning before it was extinguished.

They were deciphering the coded message Chen Qindai had sent back.

Chen Qindai was young but had a complicated past, carrying the blood of two peoples. He had studied under several masters and learned many skills.

He could geld livestock and forge iron, rob as a mounted bandit, and was quite adept at setting broken bones for wounded soldiers. Bold yet meticulous, and skilled in martial arts, he was a fine young man.

His literacy, however, was truly limited. He had only begun learning to read and write after joining the Lion Camp. The Chinese and Mongol characters he recognized combined amounted to about two hundred, and he could write perhaps fifty.

The intelligence report he sent back was done with great care. It could not be called clear at a glance; essentially, it was a game of Pictionary.

Liu Chengzong and the others spent two hours just roughly grasping the logic to decipher Chen Qindai's code.

The two garments were the Lion Camp's earth-yellow military uniform — a top and trousers. On the back of the top was roughly drawn what appeared to be a map of Qinghai, because Qinghai Lake in the northeast corner was very recognizable and easy to understand.

The map was hardly detailed, but mountains and rivers were all there, and their general courses could be made out. However, it differed slightly from the topographic map of Qinghai in the Lion's mind.

In any case, without that lake, he would have believed it was northern Shaanxi.

The strangest thing was that the map was marked with circle after circle. Liu the Lion thought this might represent territorial divisions?

But the things on the trousers were much harder to identify. Swords, spears, clubs, staves, axes, halberds, hooks, and tridents; little cats, little birds, little chicks, little tigers — the whole thing looked like a picture of youthful innocence preserved.

As for the small notebook the Lion Camp issued to its warrant officers, the first few pages were relatively clear.

They were all phrases recorded during his time in camp, like "The Emperor is heartless, the gentry are useless," and "As one side wanes, the other waxes; we are ever-victorious." The handwriting was crooked and twisted, clearly showing he was just learning to write.

In the middle, there was a page with a drawing of a Mongol woman, and beneath it the words: "Fight back to Monan, bury my mother." It must have been a portrait drawn in longing for his mother.

The latter half of the notebook went completely off the rails. Every page had drawings, interspersed with all sorts of wrong characters and invented words that mashed Chinese characters and Mongol script together.

Liu the Lion prided himself that his level of education was one in a hundred even in the Great Ming, yet this "Qindai Script" — he truly could not read it.

And it wasn't just him; Chen Shifo, who knew both Chinese and Mongol, couldn't read it either.

Liu the Lion was filled with regret. Back then, he had only focused on making sure Chen Qindai could understand the language when he entered Qinghai; he had not anticipated that Chen Qindai would not return in person and would be unable to convey messages accurately.

In the middle of the night, Chen Shifo, utterly fed up with staring at that pair of trousers as if reading a face, threw the clothes on the ground, performed a monk's salute to Liu Chengzong, and said, "Commander, let me go into Qinghai. I have been to the place where he is."

"Quiet!"

The trousers Chen Shifo had thrown on the floor were draped right over the clothes. Liu Chengzong stared, eyes going wide, then suddenly understood. "It's a set — look at the drawing on the trousers, it lines up exactly with the big and small circles on the map."

With that, he pointed at the Haibei area on the map, which lined up with a little chicken drawn on the trousers, and quickly flipped through Chen Qindai's little notebook. "Top-left corner — there's a page in this notebook where I've seen this little chicken too."

He flipped to that page, and sure enough, Chen Qindai's name was written on it. At the very top was "Qindai from the North," below that "Qindai from the East," and further back eight names in a row, with "Centarch" written after them.

Once you grasped his logic, it became much easier to understand.

It meant the place he was at had been occupied by a minor Mongol noble with eight hundred troops — roughly the equivalent of three Chen Shiwen.

After that, map, drawing, and notebook were cross-referenced one by one, and with Chen Shifo, who had grown up in Xining, verifying the intelligence, they quickly compiled all the information Chen Qindai had sent back.

The next day, Liu Chengzong sent word to Liu Chengzu and the army's commanders, inviting everyone to the Beichuan River at dusk to discuss matters.

Once everyone had gathered, Liu Chengzong smiled. "We've only just arrived in Xining. The place isn't bad, and you all look to be in good spirits."

As he spoke, guards unfurled the Qinghai map and spread it across the center of the main command tent.

This map used the one Chen Qindai had sent as reference, supplemented by Chen Shifo's oral account and redrawn by the Lion Camp's cartographers — essentially, only the northwest of Qinghai was reasonably accurate.

Liu Chengzong said, "There's word from Chen Qindai. He's in Haibei, following a minor Mongol noble called Daiqing, and he sent back a map of the situation there."

"This Daiqing came from Mobei. He has roughly eight hundred riders under him. He also has associates in Qinghai — all of them came from Mobei."

"Chen Shifo says this is because the Chahar tribe's Hundun Tu acted tyrannically, causing his followers to scatter. One group defected to the Eastern Invaders, another fled to Mobei. The Mobei Mongols fought over these herders, and they lost."

Cao Yao narrowed his eyes. "The Eastern Invaders have grown even stronger."

Among those present, only he and Feng Rang had ever seen the Eastern Invaders — though what Old Cao had seen was the Eastern Invaders of ten years ago, back when even the Yehe tribe had not yet been fully subjugated by Nurhaci.

In the past, Cao Yao could never have imagined that the Eastern Invaders would be capable of fighting the Great Ming on one front while simultaneously wrestling with the Chahar Great Khan on another.

He warned Liu Chengzong, "Commander, do not underestimate the Eastern Invaders."

"I won't underestimate them. I believe that if we can hold out until we crush the court, the only ones capable of contending with us for the realm will be the Eastern Invaders."

The commanders were all seated. Chen Shifo, draped in a red robe, stood at the back. Hearing this, he drew a sharp breath, stepped back half a pace, and stood frozen in silence, not daring to make a sound.

D-do the people of this Qinghai Pacification Commissioner's office always talk this hard?

The old man tapped his pipe against the small table. "That matter is too far off. For now, we must guard against the Chahar entering and seizing Qinghai in force. Here in Xihai, we can only win, never lose. If we win, Xining remains Xining. If we lose, we'll be attacked from front and rear... and lose the whole game."

"Father is right."

Liu Chengzong nodded. "So the reason I've called everyone here today to discuss matters is just one thing: military organization and training."

"First, the Xining Camp. Our men have fought several tough battles, and half of them are fine soldiers from the border garrisons. But when they were in the army, the weapons meticulously crafted in Yulin and Gansu were of a single type, while other miscellaneous arms were shoddily made and nearly unusable."

Liu Chengzong continued, speaking to his elder brother. "Xining is a good opportunity to familiarize ourselves with all kinds of military equipment — things like fire arrows, landmines, war wagons, and various mixed firearms and light cannons."

"What Xining has, we will use. What Xining doesn't have — as long as we've heard of it and know how to make it — we will produce a batch to the highest quality."

"We may never equip these mixed weapons in the future, but we cannot afford to have never seen them, never used them, or not know their form and power. Otherwise, on the battlefield, men will die because of it."

His elder brother nodded in acceptance, and the one most excited by this was naturally Cao Yao. "Commander, will we make divine machine arrows and wind-chasing lances?"

"Make them. Make them all. Test them all."

After settling this matter, Liu Chengzong continued, "Apart from this, the army will be reorganized. In addition to the Xining Garrison Camp, three new camps will be established, corresponding to infantry, cavalry, and artillery."

The earlier talk of manufacturing various weapons to strengthen the army's familiarity with armaments was nothing surprising to the group — it was basically consensus within the army and drew little reaction.

But when Liu Chengzong got to the matter of forming the three camps, it immediately caused a huge stir inside the commander's tent.

Although everyone knew the army was severely over-strength, now that the moment had truly arrived, they all still looked at one another.

This meant they were about to be promoted!

By this point, however, the moment Liu Chengzong said infantry, cavalry, and artillery camps, practically everyone knew who the camp commanders would be.

The Lion Camp had three sentry commanders whose command specialties were the most distinct: Wang Wenxiu, who led infantry in tough fights; Yang Yao, who led cavalry in flanking and encirclement; and Cao Yao, who was expert in using artillery.

The moment infantry, cavalry, and artillery were mentioned, it had to be those three.

Then Liu Chengzong spoke, and everyone wore an "I knew it" expression. "Wang Wenxiu will serve as Infantry Camp Adjutant General, Yang Yao as Cavalry Camp Adjutant General, and Cao Yao as Artillery Camp Adjutant General, each commanding their respective camp. Each camp shall have three Brigade Commanders, six Squad Commanders, thirty Centurions, sixty File Leaders, and three hundred Squad Leaders, with a full strength of three thousand four hundred soldiers."

The three naturally showed delight, but Cao Yao noticed that Liu Chengzong had changed the officer titles — those commanding over a hundred men were all called "Commander," and those commanding a hundred or fewer were all called "Leader," separating the generals from the field officers by name.

"Each of you will have three Brigade Commanders under you, chosen by yourselves. The women of the work sentry post are weaving the commissions right now. Once you submit your candidates to me, I will affix the seals. But don't think promotion is all good news... the troops will rotate."

"You can think of these three camps as training camps. Your mission, beyond leading and drilling troops, is to have veterans train new recruits and strong soldiers train weak ones, to wholeheartedly teach officers and soldiers the tactics of infantry, cavalry, and artillery, and to summarize the lessons of every major battle."

After saying this, Liu Chengzong addressed the three. "So I suggest that in recommending Brigade Commanders, past battle merit should be the standard. You cannot recommend anyone without battle merit. These nine Brigade Commanders must learn their craft well. When our forces expand in the future, each camp can draw out one Brigade Commander to form an entirely new camp."

"In addition, I will personally lead a Central Army Camp of two thousand men, with my father overseeing the camp. All Squad Leaders promoted to File Leaders, File Leaders to Centurions, and Centurions to Squad Commanders must enter the Central Army Camp for training."

Hearing this, the sentry commanders who had not been made camp commanders looked considerably more at ease. It seemed that promotion was in store for all of them regardless — it was only a question of sooner or later.

With this matter decided, Liu Chengzong offered words of encouragement to everyone and then dismissed them. The camp had already prepared the evening meal, and it had been a long time since they had all eaten together.

Once the tent had mostly emptied, Liu Laoye tilted his head back, looking rather pensive, lost in thought for a moment. Then he said, "Lion, Li Bei wants to see you."

Liu Chengzong had been putting away the map. At these words, his movements halted, and he let out an abrupt laugh. "Ma Ke saw him once and got thrown right back into prison. Of course he wants to see me. No rush to see him."

"Let's put on a little play — the execution of Ma Ke. I'll do the killing, and Father will do the persuading. He shouldn't want anyone else trying to assassinate me now, should he?"

Liu Chengzong smiled. "Sparing Ma Ke is easy — as long as Li Bei comes to my Central Army Camp to serve as an instructor."