Han Qian met with County Magistrate Song Ze and Han Chengmeng outside Wugang County town. Using the Third Prince’s strict order prohibiting disturbance to local areas as an excuse, he declined Song Ze’s banquet invitation and did not enter Wugang City. Instead, he led his people directly to Huaxi Stronghold, a manor west of the county seat.
Huaxi Stronghold was located in a valley at the eastern foot of Snowy Peak Mountain. Because it sat at the eastern entrance of the Snowy Peak Mountain post road, the stronghold—though only about two hundred acres and built as the Luo family’s private property—was constructed against mountain cliffs and extremely solid. The stone-built stronghold walls were over a zhang wide.
When Luo Jia fled south with his rebel forces, he had taken away almost all the supplies he could carry. What couldn’t be taken and the wooden buildings were burned. Huaxi Stronghold was left as a ruined fortress with only two to three hundred broken-down houses with nothing but crumbling walls remaining.
A stream several zhang wide flowed past the ruined stronghold, with the post road extending along the stream’s northern bank toward and away from the mountains.
The terraced fields on both sides of the stream and behind the mountain totaled over three thousand acres, all Luo family private property.
Fortunately, the rebel forces had no time to destroy the crops in the fields. Two hundred households of granted slaves had been relocated here first, arriving just as the field crops matured. By the time Han Qian and his group arrived, over four thousand shi of grain had already been stored in the ruined stronghold’s granaries.
These two hundred households of granted slaves mainly consisted of surrendered officials from Wuling and Hanshou cities and their family members who had been incorporated into the logistics and medical camps after those cities fell. This naturally included the family members of Zhou Chu and Zhao Jicheng.
Honestly, these surrendered officials and their families were mostly unaccustomed to agricultural work. Using them to manage the manor was far less effective than using slaves who had originally worked the land for the Ma family and other Tanzhou clan estates. At the same time, their minds wandered and they were quite restless, possibly even harboring thoughts of fleeing south to Yongzhou to join Zhao Sheng and Luo Jia’s rebel forces.
However, Han Qian had requested them as his reward mainly because, apart from these surrendered officials, their children were among the rare educated people of this era. If he could properly discipline them, their value would be much greater than fourteen or fifteen hundred ordinary slaves.
The current steward of Huaxi Stronghold was Han Laoshan’s nephew Han Dong, a sturdy man in his early thirties. Compared to when he had come to Tanzhou City to meet Han Qian a month ago, Han Dong had lost considerable weight, showing that managing two hundred households—fourteen or fifteen hundred restless surrendered official family members—with only seven or eight assistants brought pressure far greater than imagined.
Of course, to prevent these people from escaping, Han Chengmeng had specially deployed a militia squad from the county to garrison at the valley mouth east of Huaxi Stronghold.
Regardless of whether Han Qian appreciated it, Han Dong had to report truthfully.
Since the two hundred granted slave households moved into Huaxi Stronghold, besides harvesting grain fields, planting winter crops, and repairing buildings, Han Dong had also followed Han Qian’s instructions to organize nearly three hundred youths for concentrated military training, and organized the women to spin hemp thread and weave cloth and clothing.
After nearly a month of chaotic reorganization, Huaxi Stronghold had become quite orderly, with no escaped slaves.
Anyone else seeing this scene would surely be greatly surprised.
Even someone like Han Chengmeng, who came from a scholarly family background, had received a good education since childhood, and had spent many years managing family affairs, would find it difficult to organize such a complex group of people with such restless hearts into an orderly stronghold in such a short time. But in the eyes of accompanying personnel like Zhao Qi, Xi Fa’er, and the Du siblings, this was quite ordinary, and they could even identify many areas where Han Dong hadn’t done well enough.
Standing on the five-chi-wide stronghold wall, Han Qian gazed at the crystal-clear stream before the stronghold.
In deep autumn, with lower water levels, the stream could only accommodate fishing boats gliding across it, unable to support cargo vessels. The Snowy Peak Mountain post road remained primarily an overland mountain route.
“Although you have all been demoted to slaves and laborers, you were ultimately coerced into joining the rebellion. In the future, there will certainly be opportunities to earn merit and be freed from slavery,” Han Qian said to Zhou Chu and Zhao Jicheng behind him.
“In the next few days, go tell each family that I, Han Qian, have no intention of enslaving or exploiting them. If they can settle peacefully in Huaxi Stronghold, the nearby farmland and dwellings will all be distributed to them by household. They need only pay a portion of grain according to the field tax system practiced in Xuzhou. Women working at the weaving workshop will also receive wages according to regulations. Each family should have no problem maintaining their livelihood. As for His Highness’s permission for my father and me to recruit three hundred family troops this time, any young men over sixteen in your families who are willing to enlist will be paid grain rations like recruited soldiers, and after establishing military merit, they will likewise be recommended for official positions. The only difference is the term of service compared to ordinary recruited soldiers…”
The recruitment system currently practiced in Xuzhou’s provincial garrison primarily recruited Xuzhou natives for five-year terms. After their term ended, they would transfer to five-year reserve status.
During the five-year reserve period, they needed to participate in four months of rotation training and rotation garrison duty in the prefecture and counties each year, with military pay continuing during garrison duty. Outside rotation periods, they found their own employment and received half pay.
After the five-year reserve period, they found their own employment and received half pay until death.
The family troops Han Qian was recruiting this time, apart from those who earned meritorious positions and received separate appointments, would serve for life.
This time, besides Marquis Xinchang Li Pu having already reorganized his family troops and further expanded them to five hundred men (including portions rewarded to Li Chong and Chai Jian), Han Qian, Shen Yang, and others all gained qualification to maintain private soldiers.
As the primary contributors, Han Qian and his father Han Daoxun saw their family troop numbers surge from thirty soldier households to three hundred soldier households.
The farmland and dwellings granted to them were mainly used to support these family troops.
This also meant Han Qian and others had become newly risen powerful local forces following the Third Prince in Tanzhou after the削藩 (vassal reduction).
For Han Qian, the greatest benefit beyond the Xuzhou provincial garrison led by Tian Cheng, Yang Qin, Xi Chang, Feng Zhang and others, and Guo Que’er, Lin Zongjing, Guo Nu’er and others who followed Gao Shao into Jinyun Tower, was that Zhao Wuji, Xi Fa’er, Kong Xirong, and Zhao Qi could all step into the open as retainers to lead his family troops.
The Xi clan youths who had trained bitterly for many years could now be formally incorporated into the Han family’s household troops.
Of course, beyond these, the elite family troops who could actually fight in battle were still severely insufficient. But to ensure the provincial garrison’s combat effectiveness, too many elite veterans couldn’t be transferred, requiring additional recruitment and training of new personnel.
The two hundred slave households at Huaxi Stronghold were nominally the Han family’s private slaves, so naturally priority would be given to recruiting from among them.
Han Qian could forcibly conscript the physically strong youths and able-bodied young men, but he still hoped Zhou Chu and Zhao Jicheng would do ideological work to minimize negative resistance as much as possible.
Zhou Chu, having risen from militia ranks to county police chief, was now over forty but still capable of assisting with training and commanding family troops.
Of course, when Zhou Chu and Zhao Jicheng did their work, it was both coaxing and threatening.
Han Qian offered such generous conditions—each family at Huaxi Field could average fifteen acres of subsistence farmland, they could work at the weaving workshop, and apart from their unchangeable slave status, this essentially exempted them from the hard labor duties they would otherwise face that could plunge them into nightmarish suffering for the rest of their lives. What more could they ask for?
And if they wanted to shed their slave status, the path was extremely narrow. Enlisting as family troops under Han Daoxun and Han Qian father and son, gradually becoming trusted confidants—this was actually the brightest path forward for them.
Three days later, when Han Qian departed from Huaxi Stronghold to cross Snowy Peak Mountain toward Qianyang City, his force quickly expanded to over two hundred men.
Han Qian left Han Dong and Zhao Jicheng behind to manage Huaxi Stronghold. He appointed Zhao Qi, Zhou Chu, and Kong Xirong as commanders, leading these two hundred newly recruited family troops along the post road that had been broken for many years, returning to Qianyang City…
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The Snowy Peak Mountain post road began at Wugang County town, passing through Huaxi, Jiangkou, Huoma, Xiazhou and other strongholds to reach the Yuan River bank opposite Wukou Stronghold.
This was a route opened during the Han Dynasty for military operations against the Wuling barbarians. From the beginning, it was extremely steep. During the middle and late periods of the previous dynasty, conflicts between natives and settlers intensified, combined with regional fragmentation, and this post road basically fell into disuse.
Under the deterrence of Tian Cheng’s troops, the various tribal strongholds dared not set up checkpoints, but most of the mountain roads had collapsed stone steps and landslides, with many passes impassable on horseback.
It took Han Qian and his group a full six days to traverse this Snowy Peak Mountain post road of merely one hundred thirty li.
When Han Qian’s party departed Wugang County town, they brought over forty horses, carrying no supplies. Along this journey, seven horses accidentally fell off cliffs and were lost.
Additionally, despite traveling so slowly and cautiously, three newly recruited family troops unfortunately slid into deep valleys and died, with over twenty more suffering falls and injuries. This showed how treacherous this post road was.
The difficult terrain was also the fundamental reason why Xuzhou and Shaozhou, though very close during the vassal reduction conflict, were unable to send troops against each other.
Coming out of Snowy Peak Mountain, there was a wild persimmon grove. This being deep autumn when forests turned colors, the wild persimmon grove’s red leaves blazed like fire, spectacularly beautiful.
Yang Qin had been waiting on the eastern bank with two war sail ships for two days. Watching eagerly for Han Qian’s group to emerge from the mountains, he said, “We agreed on a time, and I thought you’d encountered trouble in the mountains. If the old master hadn’t remained calm, Tian Cheng would have led troops into the mountains to meet you.”
“If the tribal strongholds in the mountains really made trouble, could you have fought your way in with troops?” Han Qian laughed. “It rained several times in the mountains, making the roads even steeper and slipperier. With so many people, being three days late is actually fast.”
Han Qian and everyone boarded the ships, arriving at Qianyang City just as night fell.
Three full days behind schedule, the Xuzhou side had been somewhat worried. Seeing his father standing before the city gate tower watching intently, Han Qian’s heart warmed.
Without arranging any elaborate banquet, after Han Qian returned to Furong Garden, he simply had Han Laoshan’s wife Zhou Shi prepare a few dishes to accompany wine, inviting Han Laoshan, Fan Xicheng, Zhao Kuo, Tian Cheng, and Yang Qin to drink.
Han Qian knew his father definitely wouldn’t be happy discussing Emperor Tianyou’s bloody treatment of the various criminals, nor would he want to talk much about the rewards the Han family received this time. During the meal, they only discussed the extreme dangers of the Snowy Peak Mountain post road and the magnificent autumn scenery along the way.
“From Tanzhou going south along the Xiang River, passing through Hengyang to Ningxiang, reaching Lion Ridge at the boundary between Hengzhou and Yongzhou requires traveling over five hundred li by waterway. But from Xuzhou’s Qianyang County Wukou Stronghold, taking the Snowy Peak Mountain post road through Wugang County to Five Finger Ridge at the boundary between Shaozhou and Yongzhou is just over three hundred li overland.”
Han Daoxun hadn’t had the opportunity to personally travel the Snowy Peak Mountain post road, but he had deep considerations about its significance. Contemplating, he said:
“No matter how difficult, this post road must still be repaired. When that time comes, for goods other than bulk commodities like grain—smaller volume, higher value goods like tea, medicine, cloth, iron implements, paper, salt, and silk—it will naturally be more convenient to travel overland across Snowy Peak Mountain between Shaozhou and Xuzhou. Personnel movement will be even faster.”