One month after returning to Jizhou, Li Chi received an urgent message sent from the Nalan Steppe.
The Khan of the Nalan Tribe, Bürte Chino, had also led his forces back to the steppe to recover after the battle on the northern frontier. Their army had been away from home for several years, and this time, when they returned, the men who had fought so long could at last be reunited with their families.
The steppe was divided into north and south by the Yanshan Range. The Nalan clan’s territory lay within the inner passes, and though it was not as vast as the steppe beyond the passes, it was by no means small.
When they had set out, sixty thousand Nalan warriors. When they came home, close to ten thousand had not returned — left behind on the battlefields of the Central Plains in gratitude to Tang Pidi and Li Chi, lives given in repayment.
After returning this time, Bürte Chino planned to keep the great majority of his men, rest and recover for a while, then rotate in a fresh batch of cavalry to head south.
Not all would remain, of course. Roughly two-thirds of the veterans would stay. The remaining third would still need to come along and quickly get the new soldiers accustomed to operations.
Bürte Chino understood clearly that this was not simply a matter of brotherhood and loyalty — it was also a matter of whether the Nalan Steppe could rise again. By helping Prince Ning unite the Central Plains quickly, Prince Ning would in turn help him restore the Nalan tribe’s former glory.
The people of the inner steppe harbored an ambition to fight their way back beyond the passes.
But trouble came just after their return.
The Nalan Steppe lay between Liangzhou and Jizhou City. From there, one could also pass through the Yanshan Gorge and cross the northern desert to reach the outer steppe beyond the passes.
The reason the Heiwu forces had never attacked the Central Plains from this direction was, first, that to get here they would have to cross the entire outer steppe and then the northern desert — the supply lines would be impossibly long, making it practically unworkable.
Second, the Heiwu forces did not fully trust the Tiehe people. If the Heiwu forces found themselves in difficulties, the first to turn on them might well be the Tiehe.
As for the Tiehe — they could dominate the outer steppe, but they had never once attempted to covet the Central Plains. A single reason: even marshaling the full strength of their entire people, could they assemble an army of more than five hundred thousand?
Against the vast Central Plains, five hundred thousand cavalry might be nearly unmatched in the open field — but what of siege warfare? A Tiehe warrior off his horse, what was there to fear?
And setting aside whether such wealth and resources could sustain five hundred thousand cavalry, just how long could that be maintained?
One fortress city after another would grind their cavalry down in waves.
But on the northern frontier, the Tiehe had suffered a loss — slaughtered by tens of thousands of Nalan elite riders until their dignity was in tatters. Even the Khan’s own younger brother, Wur’wa, had been killed. A blood debt like this, a humiliation of this magnitude — the Tiehe, by their nature, could never endure it.
When the Tiehe Khan, Ligo, learned of the crushing defeat on the northern frontier, he flew into a rage and ordered his forces mobilized for reprisal against the Nalan tribe.
They knew how to reach this place. In former times, though the Yanshan divided the steppe, it had not always been the clean break it was now. The people of the inner and outer steppe had become bitter enemies.
To give the Nalan no time to prepare and strike without warning, Ligo personally led two hundred thousand troops, cut through the northern desert, entered the Yanshan Gorge, and burst suddenly into the Nalan grasslands.
When the battle report reached him, Li Chi immediately summoned his generals.
“Dantai.”
Li Chi looked toward Dantai Yajing. “Take all the cavalry and ride through the night to the Nalan Steppe. Resupply along the way — once the forces are assembled, take a few days of dry rations and set out immediately.”
Dantai Yajing immediately saluted. “Understood!”
With a single acknowledgment she turned and went.
Li Chi looked at Xiahou Zuo. “On the Jizhou side, muster every force that can be raised. Many soldiers have gone home on leave — call back as many from nearby as can be reached. Within three days at the latest, troops must move out. Leave capable people behind to continue recalling soldiers from farther out; once the roster is full, they follow to the Nalan Steppe.”
Xiahou Zuo nodded. “I’ll go assign people now and see how many can be mustered.”
Li Chi looked at Gao Xining. “You stay in Jizhou City. I’m taking the Tingwei Army’s black cavalry and riding with Dantai.”
Gao Xining nodded. “I know.”
This sudden war broke the leave of many.
Li Chi brought all the Tingwei Army’s black cavalry; Dantai Yajing brought every mounted soldier in Jizhou. They left Jizhou City the next morning and rode hard toward the Nalan Steppe.
At the same time, Li Chi dispatched a courier riding at a thousand-li-a-day pace to deliver a message to Grand General Dantai Qi in Liangzhou, requesting that the Liangzhou army send a portion of its forces.
The fighting on the northern frontier — one wave had barely calmed before another rose.
Though the Tiehe were nowhere near what the once-supreme Chile had been, they had established themselves as unmatched across the outer steppe. In the past ten years especially, the Tiehe had warred without pause, wiping out dozens of smaller tribes while the rest submitted and bent the knee.
The place where the Tiehe had entered the passes was not unfamiliar to Li Chi. On his first journey to the Cloud-Hidden Mountain, they had encountered the bandit force of the Great Thief of the Northern Wastes along the way — and the place where they had fought was the Yanshan pass, also known as the Yanshan Gorge. Beyond the Yanshan Gorge lay the northern wastes, a stretch of land that seemed utterly devoid of life, haunted by great numbers of bandits on horseback.
The Heiwu forces had not failed to consider attacking the Central Plains from this direction. But they had assessed it in person and abandoned the idea.
The man who had assessed it was later killed by Li Chi’s forces — a Heiwu operative who had once stirred up considerable trouble in the Central Plains: using Daoist priests to establish a heretical cult, spreading influence in the northwest, until Li Chi wiped it out.
That man had assessed in person and concluded that the Heiwu Empire had no possible way of entering the Central Plains through the northern desert.
For Heiwu to attack the Central Plains, they could not mobilize fewer than five hundred thousand troops — and even five hundred thousand would be only the initial commitment. Without a million soldiers, there was no possibility of bringing the Central Plains under their control.
And just to walk from the Heiwu southern encampment to the northern desert would take over four months — just the walking.
Once in the desert, there was no water supply sufficient for a vast army, and the terrain offered no cover and no defensible ground.
Before crossing that wasteland, they would first have to cross the entire outer steppe — march straight through Tiehe territory. Even if the Tiehe were frightened enough to comply, or coerced into cooperating and providing grain and supplies for the great army, after another two-plus months of marching through the desert and through the Yanshan Gorge, the first territory they would enter was the Nalan Steppe.
A joint Heiwu-Tiehe army, attacking with everything they had — taking the Nalan Steppe would be within reason. But that was not the end; it was only the very beginning.
To defend against steppe peoples, the former Grand General Xu Qülu had once built extensive defensive works in the area. The true border was not on the northern edge of the Nalan Steppe but on the far side of it.
After Heiwu took the Nalan Steppe, what they would face was the solidly fortified border cities of the Central Plains.
Just getting to that point would take half a year, even seven or eight months, consuming incalculable amounts of money, grain, and supplies — and all the while fighting the Nalan people to the death. And this would merely be equivalent to arriving at Beishan Pass.
Why go to all that trouble?
Moreover, Heiwu’s assessment of the Tiehe was that they could be enslaved but not made into true allies.
Imagine: a million Heiwu soldiers, after every hardship imaginable, arrive at the Nalan Steppe. After a fierce battle, they begin their assault on the Central Plains’ great fortified cities.
At that point, with their grain and supplies exhausted at a devastating rate, and the cities here even taller and more formidable than Beishan Pass, Heiwu is forced to retreat.
The Tiehe and other steppe peoples might then develop certain ideas. They could let this Heiwu force pass back through — and back in Heiwu, the Khan would punish the steppe people, laying the blame for the defeat on them and using it as a pretext to suppress them. Heiwu had always operated this way.
Or they could refuse to let them pass — destroy this million-strong army, now cut off from its grain and supplies, and Heiwu would be crippled. The steppe peoples could then completely shake free of Heiwu’s control, and might even counterattack into the Heiwu Empire’s heartland.
So the layout of this world seemed to have been settled by nature itself long ago.
—
Northern Nalan Steppe. Beneath the Yanshan Range.
The Tiehe Khan Ligo stood atop a great boulder, gazing into the distance.
They had already won one battle. The sudden strike into the Nalan Steppe had delivered them a great victory. They had driven in several hundred li, slaughtering at least sixty or seventy thousand Nalan — and the bitter humiliation of the defeat at Beishan Pass had, it seemed, been partly vented at last.
But Ligo had no intention of simply withdrawing.
Two hundred thousand troops, come all this way — to parade through the Nalan people’s grassland and go home again would be rather like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
This time, he judged that the Nalan would surely lose.
The Nalan’s pillar of support was Prince Ning, Li Chi. But after the great battle on the northern frontier, Li Chi’s forces had suffered tremendous losses.
The Heiwu forces had failed to break through Beishan Pass, true — but the Ning Army’s toll had been no small number either. And after such a great battle, the Ning Army would inevitably need to recover and could not provide timely aid to the Nalan. So Ligo judged that he had at least several months to make the Nalan suffer.
The first surprise attack had sent his cavalry careening unchecked across the Nalan grassland — but that meant little. The Nalan had been completely unprepared, and those they struck had all been herders. The sixty or seventy thousand they had killed were ordinary civilians.
The Tiehe had lost over ten thousand elite cavalry at the northern frontier. If this campaign did not thoroughly crush the Nalan cavalry, Ligo would not be satisfied.
“My Khan!”
A subordinate came galloping back from ahead and dropped to one knee. “Scouts have brought word. Around a hundred li out, Nalan cavalry are approaching — approximately four to five thousand.”
“Four to five thousand?”
Ligo smiled faintly. “Either stragglers trickling in to die, or a Nalan diversion force. Pass the order — all units fall back. Let those four or five thousand through. Once they’re safely in, the Nalan main force behind them will dare to advance.”
“Understood!”
The subordinate received his orders, turned, and mounted his horse.
Ligo stood on the heights surveying the distance and slowly drew a deep breath.
“To think that the inner steppe’s grassland is this lush. In former times this was our territory too. Now the Nalan grovel before the Central Plains people as slaves — they are unworthy of such beautiful grassland.”
Ligo looked toward his subordinate general, Shurige. “The Nalan forces will throw themselves here with everything they have to fight me to a decisive battle, which means their rear will certainly be exposed. Shurige — I’m giving you fifty thousand cavalry. Detach from the main force now and swing around to the Nalan’s rear.”
He smiled. “Bürte Chino cut a path through and back across the Heiwu encampment. So I’ll learn from him and cut a path through and back across his own backyard.”
Shurige bowed. “My Khan, rest assured — I will burn the Nalan royal court to bare earth!”
—