Chapter 31: Zhaojia Village Attacked
The incident at Wangjia Village had thoroughly frightened the people of Zhaojia Village, and the news that followed was increasingly alarming.
First, the authorities interrogated the survivors of Wangjia Village and found the bodies of two bandits, confirming that they were from Banpo Village.
The authorities sent people to Banpo Village, only to find the entire village deserted. Not to mention the crops, even the wild grass in the fields had withered and died.
It turned out that Banpo Village was a settlement of refugees who had fled from Liangzhou more than thirty years ago. They relied on a mountain spring to barely grow some potatoes and sweet potatoes to survive. The recent drought had caused the mountain spring to dry up. Not to mention growing crops, even drinking water had become a problem.
Even so, it was hard to justify the entire village turning into bandits. Coincidentally, the recent rumors of rogue soldiers passing through reached the ears of this group of people who had lost all hope of survival.
The people who had fled the famine more than thirty years ago were not yet dead. They had traveled through several provinces and had seen blood. They felt they could take advantage of this opportunity with the rogue soldiers to fish in troubled waters, first robbing some gold, silver, and grain, and then pretending to be refugees and fleeing to other places.
“Next time, we must send people to buy some good land. We can’t just find an uninhabited, poor mountain gully and settle down again,” the leader of Banpo Village squatted on the ground, swatted a mosquito, and then plucked a tender foxtail grass stalk and chewed on it. Feeling a hint of sweetness in the grassy taste, he squinted his eyes in delight. “So we have to do one more job. Don’t any of you back out. Although the news we heard is that Zhaojia Village has organized people for training, they are all country bumpkins who have never seen blood. We just need to put on a show, and we can scare them to death.”
This group of people was on the outskirts of the great green mountain behind Zhaojia Village. In order not to alert the enemy, they didn’t dare to cook here. Each person could only take a dry biscuit and gnaw on it. Then they smelled the aroma of meat coming from the mountain below. A thick meat broth was being boiled over a large fire, and the aroma drifted more than ten li on the wind.
The sound of more than a hundred people swallowing their saliva in unison was somewhat unsettling. The leader’s words of encouragement had originally only moved a small number of people; most still wanted to take the silver and grain they had robbed and flee as soon as possible. But the aroma of the meat broth was more enticing than the leader’s words. More than a hundred pairs of eyes suddenly looked up and stared at the leader. His son, who was behind him, spoke the thoughts of everyone: “Let’s do it tonight. We want to eat meat.”
Although they said “tonight,” it was still before the sun had set. If they waited until it was completely dark, most people wouldn’t be able to see the road.
The red clouds filled the sky, as if heralding a bloody slaughter. Most of the people in Zhaojia Village had already started eating dinner. Eating before it got completely dark and then going to bed could save a little lamp oil. This was a habit that had been formed over generations.
However, Scholar Zhao’s family was not so stingy. They had lit the lamps in the house early because Scholar Zhao still had to study in his study to prepare for the autumn examination in the second half of the year.
Suddenly, he heard a knock on the door. “Master, it’s time to eat.” Scholar Zhao frowned upon hearing this voice, because it was his daughter-in-law’s.
Scholar Zhao pushed open the door, his expression not very good. He had always been very authoritative at home. His daughter-in-law was used to his expression. She lowered her head and said meekly again, “Master, it’s time to eat.”
As Scholar Zhao walked forward, he asked with dissatisfaction, “Why is it you calling me today? Where is Wencai?”
“My husband is not feeling well and needs to rest in bed,” the daughter-in-law replied cautiously, following behind.
Scholar Zhao’s personality was a bit old-fashioned, but he was not a fool. He quickly thought of the reason why his son was not feeling well, but this did not appease his anger. Instead, he became even more dissatisfied. “Everyone else is full of life after training, but he can’t even get out of bed after just two days. What a waste.”
Hearing her husband being scolded, the daughter-in-law did not dare to retort. In this family, the father-in-law was the one in charge. Anyone who dared to disobey him would surely be in trouble.
As expected, Scholar Zhao didn’t care about his daughter-in-law’s reply and complained to himself, “I don’t know if that boy Zhao An was lying about the Wangjia Village incident. He doesn’t do proper business all day. I don’t think he’s a good person.” Then he said, “Let him be complacent for two more days. Let Wencai persist a little longer. We should still believe it rather than not.”
Just as Scholar Zhao was about to sit down at the dinner table, he suddenly heard the clanging of a gong from outside. And this urgent striking was exactly the rhythm he had agreed on with Zhao An and Liu Huan last night for the patrol team to sound an alarm when they encountered an enemy attack.
Just as Scholar Zhao was wondering if the patrol team was playing a prank, three people suddenly rushed out from his cousin’s house next door. Scholar Zhao chased them out, only to see their distant backs. It should be his cousin and two nephews.
At this time, his son, Zhao Wencai, also limped out of his room. “Father, should we go out and take a look?”
Scholar Zhao’s lips trembled slightly. He really wanted to tell his son to quickly close the door and hide in the house. But as the village head of Zhaojia Village, Scholar Zhao knew that if he didn’t show his face this time, regardless of whether anything happened, he would have no prestige in the future.
No matter how terrified he was, he could only straighten his back and say to his son, “Get your wooden stick, and get me a kitchen knife. Let’s go.”
By the time the trembling Scholar Zhao reached the place with the loudest shouting, the battle was already over.
In fact, before the patrol team had sounded the gong, they had already engaged in a skirmish with the first group of people from Banpo Village who had rushed out. Almost as a conditioned reflex, when they saw people rushing out of the forest, they formed two lines, gripped the sharpened wooden sticks in their hands, and charged at the enemy.
The weapons of the people from Banpo Village were nothing more than sickles and kitchen knives. They dared to rush into Zhaojia Village only with a bit of desperate courage to seize food. When they crashed down, their chests and abdomens were pierced, and they let out miserable wails. The people following behind sobered up a bit, but before they could think of a way to respond, the people in the back line staggered past the front line and charged again.
The second charge was not as smooth as the first. Only one person on the far left managed to stab an enemy’s thigh. The bandits already knew to flee. From a flood-like stream of people, they instantly scattered in all directions.
The leader of the bandits also had a lot of prestige. Seeing his men about to flee, he immediately roared, “There are only a few of them! Surround them with me! Kill~~”
Originally, the people in charge of patrolling were still dazed when they charged with their wooden sticks, because they had subconsciously made this move when they saw the enemy running over. This was also a muscle memory they had formed during their training. Then, according to the training procedure, they were to throw away the wooden sticks after hitting the target.
Then, three of them untied the wooden shields from their backs and held them in front of them, while seven drew the long-handled firewood knives in their hands, forming a modified Mandarin Duck formation. When a group of rabble met a militia trained in battle formations, there was naturally no suspense as to who would win.
However, the disadvantage in numbers still brought them some trouble. Because a person’s physical strength is limited, after they had cut down a few more people with their blades, they gradually began to run out of energy, panting heavily.
It was only then that a person holding a wooden shield suddenly remembered that he had a small copper gong at his waist. Taking advantage of the rotation of the battle formation when there were no enemies in front of him, he quickly sounded the gong.
In fact, even if they hadn’t sounded the gong, the several families living nearby had already heard the sounds of fighting. It was just that they had panicked for a moment and didn’t know how to inform the rest of the village. After hearing the gong, an old woman immediately remembered and grabbed her sturdy daughter-in-law, who was about to rush out with her son. “Get our iron pot and bang it along with them.”
When the sound of gongs came from all directions, and the shouts of the villagers running out could be heard in the distance, the bandits who had tasted sweetness once suddenly sobered up. Zhaojia Village was not the flock of chickens waiting to be slaughtered like Wangjia Village. They had sharp blades in their hands and were a dormant beast.
When the bandits realized they couldn’t gain an advantage, no matter how the leader scolded, half of the men still turned and ran into the forest, and the entire team had disintegrated.
Zhao An arrived at the scene of the fight before Scholar Zhao and his son. But by the time he arrived, he only saw the figures of many people fleeing towards the back of the mountain. The people who had rushed over with Zhao An wanted to chase after them without a second thought. Zhao An quickly stopped them. “Don’t chase! It’s dark. It’s easy to get lost in the mountains.”
Although he shouted as loud as he could, many hot-headed people couldn’t hear the outside world and still chased after the bandits. Helpless, he could only quickly walk to the patrol members who had sat on the ground after being exhausted, took a gong, and beat it desperately. “Everyone, assemble now!”
This was a command they heard every day. Only then did the hot-headed people stop in their tracks and realize that they had already entered the dark, dense forest. Looking around, there was no trace of the enemy, only the faint sound of hurried footsteps.
When everyone had gathered, Zhao An had someone light torches and then instructed a few of the sturdy women who usually helped him cook to make food. Only then did he check, one by one, if any of those who had participated in the battle were injured.
To his surprise, apart from one person holding a shield whose arm was dislocated, only one person who had chased after them at the end had accidentally sprained his ankle. Although a dislocation could have after-effects, as long as there was no blood, it was a good thing. In this era without antibiotics, an infected wound could be fatal.
Zhao An breathed a sigh of relief, but the others gradually became excited again. Coupled with the other villagers who arrived one after another, the sound of conversation gradually grew louder.
Zhao An felt that he couldn’t let these people get too excited. He looked at the bandits lying on the ground, either wailing loudly or sobbing softly. “The rest of you, disperse. The guard team, come up. In pairs, carry these captives to the training ground.”
Only then did everyone see the dozen or so people wailing in pain on the ground. They were not yet dead, but the blood that flowed out had stained the ground beneath them red. Someone finally felt scared and ran home with a pale face.
Whether excited or scared, most of the people followed Zhao An and the guard team. Only Scholar Zhao and his son were left to look at the trampled sweet potato field.
Zhao Wencai asked, “Should we ask Zhao An to compensate us for our sweet potatoes?”
“No need,” Scholar Zhao said, clutching his chest as he looked at the bloodstains on the ground. “You have to be more serious in your training in the future.”
He was scared. He was scared that the blade would cut him. He no longer dared to sing a different tune from Zhao An.
