Chapter 642: Sarhū and Its Surroundings

"Commander, we advanced far too fast. If only we'd waited for the other columns, how could we have ended up in this situation!" The man who spoke these words carried a tone of resentment.

The mountaintop was thick with banners and troops; the most conspicuous great banner bore the character "Du," though it was now stained with mud and grime.

Across the valley floor, one could see large numbers of troops on the opposite summit and slopes as well, their eight-colored banners fluttering ceaselessly. The soldiers and officers beneath the "Du" banner stared at the slope opposite, their faces betraying unconcealed alarm and fury, even though night was falling fast and nothing could be seen clearly.

Those resentful words just now had been spoken beneath that great banner. The household troops surrounding Shanhai Pass Commander-in-Chief Du Song glanced at this comrade; no one rebuked him. Everyone knew this man was Du Song's nephew and had the standing to complain — and everyone wanted to voice that same complaint themselves.

Du Song stood at the very front, gazing intently at the great army of the Jianzhou Jurchens across the way. He was already past fifty, his build somewhat stout, yet his household troops knew their commander's martial prowess was undiminished by age. Though he had lived idle at home for over ten years, he had never once let his combat skills lapse. The armor weighing dozens of catties that he wore would be unbearable for a young man, but Du Song bore it with ease.

"Do you think I, Du the Bold, was impatient? That I was out to steal glory? Weren't you whelps the ones who thought this merit would come easy at the start?" Du Song shot back. There was not the slightest trace of dejection or tension in his words; instead, there was a hint of ease.

The personal guards around him were left speechless. None of them had imagined things would come to this. They had assumed the enemy would collapse at a single blow, that their army's rapid advance would surely earn them the first merit. The beginning had indeed gone smoothly — they had taken two stockades in succession along the way — and then they had ground to a halt. No one could have foreseen that here at Sarhū they would encounter the main army of the Jianzhou Jurchens, an army several times their own size.

At the first clash, Du Song's trusted officers immediately understood the ferocity and tenacity of the Jianzhou Jurchens. They could do nothing but contract their lines continuously, watching helplessly as the enemy's forces kept arriving. But in the current situation, even retreat was no longer possible.

"Commander, we men aren't afraid to die, and we bear no grudges, but we only brought six days' worth of provisions..." Another voice emerged. In this predicament, certain things were no longer taboo to speak of.

"Ridiculous. I've been fighting wars for decades — my brain isn't addled. Do you think I don't know that running out of grain will cause the camp to mutiny? You think I didn't want to bring more provisions? We could only bring six days' worth, not a single day more!" Du Song laughed coldly.

Silence fell all around. Du Song chuckled ceaselessly, as if he had let go of all restraint: "You think the granaries in Liaoyang are full? A joke — they've been empty for ages. You think I burned the granary ten years ago for no reason..."

He stopped short at that point and spat on the ground. The personal soldiers remained silent. The older ones among them knew well that back when Du Song served as Liaodong Commander-in-Chief, the charge that had gotten him dismissed from office was setting fire to the granaries.

The silence did not last long before the sound of drawn-out horns came drifting from the opposite side. Then the muffled beat of drums began, and on the mountain across the way, the roar of drums and shouting erupted in full force.

The faces of the personal guards around Du Song all changed color. Du Song, however, laughed again and raised his voice: "You lads — are you afraid to die?"

"We are willing to die for our commander!" There was no hesitation in the reply. Fed full with silver in peacetime, treated as brothers and sons — wasn't it all for this very moment?

Du Song roared with laughter and declared: "Good! Follow me into the slaughter! The Great Ming has let us live in comfort all these years — time to repay it!"

Drums thundered, banners waved, and scattered torches flared to life on the Ming army's side. At this moment, no one deserted. Even though the troops of Shanhai Pass Garrison had been drawn from various places and lacked any real cohesion, with provisions unable to last two more days, stranded deep in Jianzhou territory and surrounded by the enemy, there was nowhere to flee. They could only fight to the death.

The world is bitter cold, and Liaodong even more so. A heavy snow had just fallen, and the base color of the Sarhū valley was snowy white — yet within the Sarhū valley, not a trace of white could be seen.

Ming troops in great formations descended from the mountain. At first they still held some semblance of formation, still maintained order, but as they moved downhill, they could not help picking up speed. Especially when they saw large formations of enemy troops also descending the opposite slope, everyone knew they would collide and slaughter one another in the valley floor.

No escape, nowhere to go — only battle remained, only death. Sustained by this conviction, the Ming soldiers could not help but feel their blood boil.

The drums beat urgently, and the furious shouts of the Company Commanders and Platoon Commanders rang out one after another. Every man's steps quickened involuntarily, from walking to striding, from striding to running. No one cared about formation any longer; they only wanted to charge over, charge down, and fight those Tartars to the death!

On the opposite slope, loud commands rang out as well. The steps of the Jianzhou Jurchen Jin army quickened too, but they never broke into a run. They pressed down slowly, steadily...

A night passed...

The stench of blood in the Sarhū valley had already dissipated considerably. Once the wind blew, nothing remained. The valley floor was no longer snowy white; everywhere lay corpses and bloodstains.

On the battlefield, some moaned in agony, but their voices were already weak and feeble, not far from death. Some wailed, but their cries dared not grow too loud, for captives who made too much noise and disturbed people would be slaughtered.

There were not many captives. Most had died in battle or scattered in flight. But in this frozen, uninhabited wilderness, to scatter in flight meant death by cold and starvation all the same.

"... So this merit goes to Beile Laimbu after all. That Suo kid's luck is rotten — he thought shooting Du Song dead would earn him a few steps up in rank..."

"... Keep your voice down. You want a knife in your back and have it passed off as dying in battle too?"

"... Tsk tsk, come to think of it, the men around Du Song were no pushovers. Not one surrendered — they fought to the death. Tell me, if all Ming troops could fight like that, wouldn't we be in real trouble?"

Several Jianzhou soldiers in leather jackets were muttering among themselves, occasionally cursing and shouting as they urged the utterly exhausted Ming soldiers to hurry up and haul away the corpses.

The fatigue of the march, the hunger of empty stomachs, and the terror after the slaughter — every Ming soldier was on the verge of collapse. From time to time, someone would topple to the ground and never rise again. Yet none dared entertain thoughts of resistance, even though the Jurchen troops left behind here numbered barely over a thousand. The true Jurchen main army had departed at first light. That night's slaughter had struck fear and chill into every heart.

"They've broken through! They've broken through!" Someone cried out in utter terror.

"They've broken through! They've broken through!" Someone's voice brimmed with excitement.

The sky was frigid, the ground frozen solid — the Liaodong earth was still hard as iron, utterly impossible to dig. Digging trenches and planting stakes to build fortifications had become empty talk.

Precisely because of this, when word came that Du Song's column had suffered a crushing defeat, Kaiyuan Commander-in-Chief Ma Lin's column immediately halted its advance and began setting up camp and building stockades to hold their ground. Yet in such weather, they could not construct any decent fortifications. Even less did they imagine that the Jianzhou Jurchen army would arrive so swiftly.

Some grumbled that Du Song had advanced too rashly, but no matter how rashly an army of tens of thousands advanced, it could not move all that fast. So after the Jianzhou Jurchen forces had smashed Du Song's army, they immediately sought out Ma Lin's column — and by then, Ma Lin's camp stockades were still unfinished.

Seeing an enemy several times their own number, Ma Lin and his entire command were instantly stricken with terror. In this open wilderness, there were too many choices; everyone felt they could flee, that there was no need to fight to the death.

The Jianzhou Jurchen army hurled itself at the Ming camp. The moment the first breach was opened, Commander-in-Chief Ma Lin immediately fled first. Under the escort of his personal cavalry guard, he galloped away from the rear of the camp. The entire army began to collapse.

Only the Yehe tribe's forces, who were traveling with Ma Lin's column, could barely hold their own. But seeing the Ming army collapse to such a degree, they too had no heart for a death-struggle against their hereditary foe, the Jianzhou tribe, and simply withdrew slowly.

As for the Ming officers and soldiers, not many fled. After the one-sided slaughter, many no longer even had the courage to run and simply knelt on the ground and surrendered.

Mobile Corps Commanders, Regional Commanders, Company Commanders, Platoon Commanders — officers of all these ranks, just like the common soldiers, knelt trembling in the snow, awaiting the judgment of the Jianzhou Jurchens. Every one of them was stricken with terror.

In the past, when men of their status came to the Jianzhou Jurchens, even the most exalted personages of this tribe would treat them with courtesy and ingratiating smiles. But now, whenever they saw anyone on horseback approach, all they could do was kneel and kowtow.

Those who did not kneel had their heads chopped off directly. Kneeling there, faces pressed into the snow, they had no idea what sort of personages were passing by, nor could they make out what those Tartars on horseback were actually saying.

"'No matter how many columns they come in, I go in just one.' The Fourth Beile's words are truly extraordinary. We're stronger than the Ming troops, and our numbers are no greater than theirs. If we devour them column by column, is there any reason we can't win?"

"The Fourth Beile is brilliant and divinely martial — far superior to the other ones!"

"Don't let the other three Beile hear you say that. If the Second Beile heard it, he'd have you boiled alive in a cauldron for sure."

"With Amin's foul temper, sooner or later he'll end up just like his Ama — nailed inside a chest."

The Second Beile Amin was Nurhaci's nephew. His father, Šurhaci, had been nailed into a wooden chest by his own elder brother Nurhaci back in the day and suffocated to death. But the Bordered Blue Banner under Šurhaci's direct command was too powerful to simply swallow up, so they had no choice but to let Šurhaci's son Amin continue as banner lord.

Yet this Amin had an extremely violent and cruel nature. Despite the cautionary tale of his own father right before his eyes, he showed not the slightest restraint and acted with reckless abandon, killing and plundering without any measure. He was especially brutal toward the Han people of Liaodong, treating human lives as no more than grass, trees, chickens, and dogs — even those who had surrendered were no exception.

His conduct provoked resentment from top to bottom. The First Beile Daišan, the Third Beile Manggūltai, and the Fourth Beile Hong Taiji were all deeply dissatisfied with Amin. This dissatisfaction naturally filtered down to the banner troops below. There were even rumors that Amin's own younger brother, Jirgalang, harbored grievances against him as well.

The mountains and plains were covered with people — people running with faces full of panic. No banners, no baggage, not even weapons or provisions. Every man was fleeing, fleeing without cease.

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