Chapter 432: Inspecting the Horses

For all of Mongolia, the sixth year of the Chongzhen reign was the worst year.

The Great Khan of all Mongols died in Qinghai; the Eastern Mongols all submitted to the Jin Kingdom; the Western Mongols submitted to China. Of the three great independent Mongol divisions, only the crumbling Khalkha Mongols remained.

Dunta Ulus was China.

The Khalkha were not an old tribe. Their ancestry could only be traced back to the Jiajing period, founded by Geresenje Jalair, the eleventh son of Dayan Khan.

He nomadized north of the Hanhai, first taking the name Khalkha. His seven sons became the seven Khalkha divisions, of which the eldest, second, and youngest sons formed the Right Wing; the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth sons formed the Left Wing.

The earliest Khalkha also had no Khan; they were the Khalkha Tumen under the leadership of the Khan's court.

The Left Wing's third son, Weizheng Nuonuohuo, fathered a son named Abadai. At that time, the Khan's court was in decline, and Anda proclaimed himself Khan.

Abadai personally traveled to Anda Khan's Tumed tribe, presenting tens of thousands of sable pelts, tents, silks, and livestock. He paid homage to the Third Great Monk of the Yellow Sect and was bestowed the title of Khan, becoming the first Khan of the Khalkha.

Abadai then took command of the Khalkha Left Wing himself and installed his brother Laihul as the Khan of the Right Wing.

From this point on, the Khalkha Left and Right Wings each had a Khan, both descended from the line of the third son, Weizheng Nuonuohuo.

By the fifteenth year of the Wanli reign, near Kubuke'er by the Khangai Mountains, a battle erupted between the Khalkha Right Wing and the Oirats. Laihul died at the hands of the Oirats.

Nine years later, in the twenty-fourth year of the Wanli reign, the Khalkha Left and Right Wings convened a khuriltai by the Tarni River and elected Subadi as Jasaghtu Khan.

Thereafter, Subadi raised troops to avenge his father, conquered the Oirats, and established a Khong Tayiji to govern them. Later, in the third year of the Tianqi reign, the Four Oirats united to drive him back and break free of his control.

The two sides warred and made peace intermittently, a situation that has persisted to this day. This is the origin of the Khalkha Right Wing's Jasaghtu Khan.

While the Right Wing maintained its power, the Left Wing, being closer to the Khan's court, received fleeing tribesmen every time Ligdan Khan stirred up trouble south of the Gobi.

This was originally a good thing for the Left Wing, but because the spoils were always divided unevenly, several internal conflicts broke out. For example, the fifth-ranked great noble of the Left Wing in the past, a loser in the infighting, was expelled by the Left Wing, left his homeland, and was finally buried at Eight-Corner City. His name was Choktu Tayiji.

Another example was Setsen Khan Sholoi.

The Khalkha Left Wing consisted of the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth sons among the seven.

The third son's line became the later Abadai Khan. The fourth son was named Amin Dural; he was also Abadai Khan's fourth uncle.

According to Mongol tradition, Abadai's line claimed the title of Khan and became the head of the Left and Right Wings. But Amin Dural's luck was exceptionally good. His fifth brother, Dalai, had no sons. By tradition, after the fifth brother's death, his subjects all went to Amin.

Amin had two sons, but the eldest also had no sons. The second son, Moro, only fathered a single son. In other words, while other families had many sons and much fortune, their tribesmen and wealth grew ever more scattered through inheritance. Only Amin Dural's line, through two generations of single-son succession, completed the primitive accumulation of wealth.

That only son was Sholoi.

If one says that the Golden Family were all born with a golden key in their mouths, then Sholoi was born not only with the golden keys left to him by his grandfather and father in his mouth, but he even held the golden bowls left to him by his fifth grand-uncle and his eldest uncle in his hands.

This kind of golden key and golden bowl was terrifying — it was simply a meal served by Heaven itself.

The entire Khalkha could mobilize one hundred fifty thousand troops: seventy thousand from the Right Wing, forty thousand from the Left Wing, and forty thousand under Sholoi. If the Left and Right Wings wanted to go to war, the Khan first had to pull together a coalition of Mongol Tayijis, Noyan nobles, and feudal lords. Going out to fight still required first convening a khuriltai.

They could fight with the wind at their backs, but against the wind, everyone pondered preserving their own strength. After all, after the war, they still had to return to their own tribes and live their lives. And once they returned, the mountains were high and the Khan far away — the lord might not even be able to find them. This meant that sometimes the feudal nobles' interests in war did not align with the Khan's.

Ligdan Khan's abandonment by all his allies was precisely this — discarded by the nobles, ending with him leading his forty thousand core troops to die in Qinghai.

Sholoi was different. All the men under his command were directly-ruled tribes, uniformly led by Jaisangs, Darkhans, and Baatars. He pointed, they struck — all Mongol troops capable of fighting tough battles.

After all, if these men didn't give their all on the battlefield, Sholoi, as their master, could directly behead them. Even if they ran, when they got home, wasn't it still Sholoi's directly-ruled tribe? Where could they run?

The Left Wing had four original shares in total. Sholoi alone inherited two of them — one percent short of a controlling stake.

Long before the Left Wing's infighting, a Tayiji like Choktu, when signing the "Birch Bark Code" at the Khalkha Left Wing's khuriltai assembly, had to rank behind the junior Sholoi. Sholoi ranked fourth.

The three people ahead of Sholoi were the previous Left Wing Mergen Khan Elek, Sain Noyan Tumenken, and Sono Daiching Khong Tayiji — all one generation senior to Sholoi.

Those ranked behind Sholoi were also all old fellows a generation above him. Among those of his own generation, the highest-ranking was the Great Khan's son, Gombu Tayiji, who ranked seventeenth.

And that was only because Gombu Tayiji had the immense influence of the Abadai Khan line; otherwise, his status would have had to step back a bit further.

When Ligdan Khan moved west, Sholoi, through marriage ties, became the primary choice for Chahar refugees. That controlling one percent arrived, allowing him to rightfully exercise all the powers of the Left Wing's Khan.

At that moment, the Left Wing's Khanate was vacant. After Mergen Khan Elek's death, Gombu was supposed to succeed, but succession required convening the Left Wing's khuriltai, and convening the khuriltai assembly required the consent of Khong Tayiji Sholoi.

Sholoi didn't mind convening the khuriltai. To put it bluntly, his strength already allowed him to ignore whether the Left Wing had a Great Khan or not. But the Chahar nobles who had thrown in with him were unwilling. They believed that since Ligdan Khan had fled, the hope of preserving all of Mongolia was concentrated in Sholoi.

Having already abandoned Ligdan Khan, they naturally hoped the Great Khan would ascend to Heaven soon, so that Sholoi could declare his succession to the Khanate by force, command more tribesmen, and resist the Jin Kingdom's encroachment and annexation of Mongolia.

In fact, outsiders had long called Gombu the Left Wing Khan and Sholoi the Setsen Khan. But in reality, Gombu had still not inherited the Khanate, and Sholoi's traditional title was actually Dalai Setsen Khong Tayiji.

The khuriltai assembly could not be convened smoothly, so Gombu could not inherit the Khanate. Sholoi governed the Left Wing as Khong Tayiji, but his title was not legitimate, and the Right Wing did not recognize him. The Right Wing's Khan, Subadi, thus became the leader of the Khalkha Left and Right Wings.

In a world where only Gombu was hurt, everyone discovered that not convening the khuriltai assembly wasn't so bad either. Gombu's succession was thus left awkwardly hanging.

So, in fact, the Khalkha's tribute to Liu Chengzong lacked no one. Matters of the Left and Right Wings could be settled by Subadi and Sholoi.

Moreover, the standard of the Khalkha Mongols' tribute to Liu Chengzong was extremely grand — Subadi came personally, bringing Sholoi's fifteen-year-old second son, Babu.

As the nominal ruler of the Mobei Mongols, Subadi should not have appeared in this kind of first-contact scenario between two powers.

In truth, at this moment, merely sending envoys would already have been the greatest respect shown to the Daichin Khitan Khan of Dunta Ulus, more than enough to lay the foundation for friendly relations between the two sides.

It was just that this tribute mission, for the Khalkha, required more than mere friendship.

Just before Subadi set out, the leaders of the three Khalkha divisions received an edict from Dunta Ulus, backed by the Oirats, demanding the Mongols submit.

In a way, Gombu should thank Liu Chengzong. Without that letter, his succession would likely have remained awkwardly stuck for a long time.

It was entirely because of the Oirats backing the Khan of China that Subadi had no choice. He convened the long-stalled khuriltai assembly and proposed that Gombu inherit the Left Wing Khanate. As a compromise, Sholoi was acclaimed by the tribesmen as Setsen Khan.

But to follow tradition, Sholoi had to refuse acceptance and submit the tribesmen's request to Gombu, who had inherited the Left Wing Khanate. Only after Gombu's approval could he then be called Setsen Khan.

This way, there would be no procedural issues.

The reason Subadi was willing to do this was that he could already foresee a war brewing south of the Gobi — a war where East and West would collide to decide their fate.

In Subadi's eyes, this imminent war was undoubtedly a farcical tragedy, because the two sides were Han on one side and Jurchens on the other, yet what would ultimately be decided was the fate of the Mongols.

As the last surviving independent Mongol alliance... the Khalkha were not originally an alliance, but Subadi needed an alliance that could sustain a war. So he was willing to let Gombu and Sholoi both claim the title of Khan, maintain the Right Wing's strength advantage, and meld the three Khans into a single Mongol alliance.

Only if the three great nobles holding power in the Khalkha worked together could the Khalkha, the last surviving independent Mongol alliance, be pushed onto the battlefield as a participant.

Subadi believed that in this war, the Khalkha could not hide and could not flee. The final battle would certainly be fought at Fengzhou Beach.

That place was where the territories of China, the Jin Kingdom, and the Khalkha converged. It held the richest land in all of Mongolia and also possessed the most proper fortifications in all of Mongolia — Guihua City. This meant that whoever occupied Fengzhou Beach would control all of Mongolia.

The three Khalkha power-holders had differing views on this matter, but they shared one common point: none were willing to be controlled by others.

The Left Wing Khan, Gombu, had no great ambitions. He believed the Khalkha need not heed any invitations from the Jin Kingdom or China, nor need they concern themselves with the Chahar Khan's court. The Khalkha alliance, with one hundred thousand troops, could shut its doors and stay out of it.

The Right Wing Khan, Subadi, leaned toward a softer view. He believed they could, without recognizing the Han inheritance of the Mongol Great Khan's legacy, form an alliance with the Khan of China, Liu Chengzong, to jointly deal with the Later Jin, who had already occupied Guihua City.

This was mainly because the Khalkha Right Wing bordered the Oirat. The Jin Kingdom could campaign far against the Khalkha, and Subadi figured they could not reach the Right Wing, but Liu Chengzong could very tangibly have the Oirat chastise the Khalkha Right Wing.

Because of new grudges and old hatreds, and the Oirat pledging themselves to a new master, one could foresee that in the coming years they would unite as never before, campaigning in all directions to expand. Expand where?

Expand toward the Khalkha Right Wing.

Subadi was not particularly afraid of the Oirat.

If they fought the Oirat, victory was far from certain. It was just that the current situation no longer permitted the Khalkha to open another war with the Oirat.

Originally Subadi had wanted to reach an agreement with Batur Khong Tayiji of the Dzungar, but now that a figure like Liu Chengzong existed, Subadi felt it better to come in person and speak with Liu Chengzong.

If Liu Chengzong could restrain the Oirat, then both sides could coexist in peace, freeing the Right Wing from worries about its rear.

If Liu Chengzong could not restrain the Oirat, the situation would be even better — not just a little better, but greatly better.

That would show this Han Khan's grip on power was insufficient, and then he could join Liu Chengzong in a punitive expedition against the Oirat, seizing the chance to swallow the Oirat's tribes and expand the Khalkha's territory.

The Chechen Khan, Sholoi, did not share Subadi's concerns, nor did he think much of Gombu's utterly irresponsible behavior.

He was, at this moment, the grand noble of the most exalted Mongol birth and the strongest power in his own tribe, duty-bound to uphold the legitimacy of the Khan's court and accomplish the great feat of reviving the Mongol Khanate.

Of course, not in the manner of Ligdan Khan, who first cut off his own arms and then made the whole world his enemy. Sholoi advocated building strength and biding his time — he did not know what Liu Chengzong's situation was, but he knew the Jin Kingdom's situation.

Compared to the Jin Kingdom, aside from troop numbers, the Khalkha had no advantage in any respect.

Their rate of iron equipment was very high, but less than one in ten pieces of advanced gear from Ligdan Khan's era remained. Most equipment dated to Dayan Khan's era, the more outdated pieces to the time of the Grand Preceptor Esen, and it would not be surprising to stumble upon a few armor plates forged during the Zhiyuan reign of Sechen Khan Kublai.

How to put it — back then heavy equipment was in vogue, and after continuous grinding down, in this present era where light equipment was in vogue, it was just right.

The Left and Right Wings might handle the Khorchin without much trouble, but if they wanted a decisive battle with the Jin Kingdom's Eight Banners troops, only Sholoi's own directly-ruled tribesmen had any hope.

But after the fight, his thirty thousand men and the Chechen tribe would be gone.

Therefore Sholoi wanted to accumulate strength, send envoys to both the Ming and Jin sides, wait for the right moment, and then lead his army into the contest.

If no opportunity could be seized, he would avoid war as much as possible to preserve the Mongol Khanate's independent status. Even if war was unavoidable, he would do his utmost to ensure that when it ended, there would still be a place north of the Gobi where Mongols could walk as Mongols.

Carrying their different hopes, Subadi and Sholoi's fifteen-year-old son Babu rode into the source of the Hehuang region, bearing gifts and approaching the new city.

Ever since entering Qinghai Lake, they had seen herd after herd of warhorses driven by Mongol grooms, their hooves thundering past before their eyes, making the uncle and nephew knit their brows.

Those Hequ great horses were without exception the same: leg muscles bulging, hindquarters round, ribs visible one by one, manes and tail hair glossy and smooth — as great Mongol nobles well-versed in warhorses, they recognized clearly that these were batches of warhorses already conditioned to a battle-ready state.

And they were warhorses conditioned by the Mongol method.

In the era of the Mongol Khanate's strength, the physique of conditioned warhorses was exactly like this.

In early autumn, let the warhorses eat until fat, then carry a rider at a fast run. At night, give them fresh grass and also stockpile large amounts of dry fodder. Once the warhorses are stout from eating, ride them up mountains, put on horse armor, sprint, walk slowly, then climb slopes again. After that, scrape off the sweat and drape them in felt, and at night continue giving fresh grass.

After persisting for about a month or more, feed only grass, alternate training between light-armor long runs and heavy-armor fast charges, stop giving grass at night, and begin reducing the warhorses' weight.

In the end the warhorses would develop this physique, and could go out to war after autumn, one rider with two horses, unstoppable.

The Khalkha had not conditioned horses like this for a long time. The ancestral skill was still there, but the ancestral wealth was gone.

All along the way, Subadi counted over a hundred herds of such conditioned warhorses, at least six or seven thousand in total, and the sight made him mutter uneasily to himself.

He said to his traveling companion, Sholoi's son Babu: "When you meet the Khitan Khan, I think you had better kowtow according to their rites. These horses of theirs... what does it mean — whoever doesn't come, they're ready to beat them up?"

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Good afternoon!