Taiheiki

Chapter 334 The Mountain People's Invasion

The desperate slave traders were shoved by the guards into the small square in front of the palace. This square was surrounded by a pool, connected to the outside world only by a small bridge. Crocodiles were kept in the pool—the pets of the King of Funan. The two dwarfs were already fully equipped, dressed in ancient Indian-style bronze armor, carrying 1.5-meter-long lances, with curved swords at their waists. Each rode a goat, with javelins and hand axes hanging from the goats' saddlebags. If you ignored their height and the size of their weapons, they could be described as "heroic and dashing."

clap clap clap!
The Prince of Funan clapped his hands vigorously: "Beautiful! I'm starting to believe you weren't lying. Your pair of treasures are indeed worth five hundred silver coins. Hurry up and choose your weapons, the show is about to begin! Come on, I can't wait!"

The desperate merchant grabbed a spear, donned a leather armor, and was herded onto the platform. The impatient King of Funan picked up his horn, blew it loudly, and shouted, "Remove the bridge! The duel begins! Only the victor can leave the platform alive!"

The merchant instinctively spread his hands, as if wanting to say something to the two dwarfs, but a javelin interrupted his voice. He instinctively dodged to the right, the javelin swept past and landed in the water, startling the crocodiles into scattering in all directions.

"Fool, aim carefully, don't hurt my precious one!" King Funan raised his wine cup and shouted loudly.

The dwarf who threw the spear adjusted his helmet, kicked his goat hard, and charged at the merchant with his spear. The other dwarf spurred his goat, circled diagonally to the left, and twirled the sling in his hand, looking ready to pounce.

"Look closely, I am your master!" the merchant shouted, clumsily trying to stab the dwarf knight charging towards him with his spear. But the dwarf knight seemed to have no idea what his former master was saying, ducking to avoid the spear tip and charging forward.

"what--!"

With a piercing scream, the merchant dropped his spear and knelt on the ground. In his panic, he used the spear to deflect the dwarf's attack, but his thigh was rammed hard by the goat's horn. He endured the excruciating pain, grabbed the dwarf on the goat's back, and tried to pull him to the ground, but was hit on the forehead and immediately lost consciousness.

"Beautiful! The outcome is clear!" King Funan clapped his hands on the throne. It turned out that while the merchant and the dwarf knight were entangled, another dwarf threw a stone, which hit the merchant squarely on the head and knocked him unconscious.

The dwarf, who had been thrown to the ground, caught his breath for a moment, then stood up, drew a dagger from his waist, walked to the merchant's side, grabbed his hair, and pulled it back forcefully, exposing his vulnerable throat. He looked up at the throne, where the King of Funan had raised his right thumb and pointed it downwards—a signal for execution.

The dwarf immediately plunged the dagger into the former master's throat, then pulled hard. The merchant, whose trachea and carotid artery had been severed, convulsed in agony, blood splattering everywhere and staining the stone floor of the platform bright red.

clap clap clap!
"Beautiful, beautiful!" King Funan clapped his hands vigorously, his face flushed with a sickly redness. "I admit, your master wasn't lying. You're worth the price. It's just a pity he can't collect the five hundred silver coins anymore! Hahahaha!"

Just as the King of Funan was laughing heartily on his throne, a messenger hurried up the steps to the palace. He was stopped by the guards in front of the pool. After a brief conversation, the head of the guards quickly walked to the King of Funan and whispered, "Great King, a messenger has arrived from the northern city of Taran."

"Messenger? What is it now?"

"Barbarians from the north have invaded!"

"Barbarian invasion?" The King of Funan frowned. "Isn't that a big deal? It happens every year."

"This—" The guard leader gave a wry smile: "It seems that this time the scale is particularly large. According to the messenger, several major city-states further upstream on the river have already been conquered!"

"Alright!" The Prince of Funan shook his head in disappointment. "Clean this place up, and also, invite the Prime Minister and the General to come and discuss this together!"

The Funan king's dismissive attitude is not surprising. Looking at Southeast Asian history, a core conflict in its civilizational development has been between the fertile plains and deltaic civilizations of the south and the mountain peoples of Zambia in the north. Geographically, the entire Indochina Peninsula is covered by an extremely vast mountainous region, extending eastward to encompass southwestern China (Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, etc.) and westward to northeastern India. Large alluvial plains exist only at the mouths of a few major rivers and along the coast. This vast mountainous region is referred to by modern Western sociologists as the Zambian region.

Clearly, the ancient civilizations that centered their rule on the fertile plains had very weak, even hostile, control over the Zamya region. The history of ancient Thailand (Khmer and Funan), spanning approximately twenty centuries, can be summarized as waves of mountain people migrating from the Zamya mountains to the more southerly plains and coastal areas. After conquering the existing civilizations, they would learn from the indigenous cultures, establish their own new states, and then face the next wave of mountain influx.

Therefore, for the King of Funan, whenever the dry season arrived, the land became dry and easy to traverse, and the weather turned cold, the mountain people, after harvesting their barren crops, would take up arms and flock to the fertile plains to the south. Their roles could be conquerors, mercenaries, laborers, thieves, or merchants, while the inhabitants of the plains would wary of these outsiders. For the King of Funan, who occupied the most fertile land beside Tonle Sap Lake, the invasion of the mountain peoples was a distant prospect. After all, between those savage mountain peoples and his throne lay at least dozens of small and medium-sized city-states that submitted to him; worrying about that was far too premature.

"You can speak now!" The Prince of Funan rubbed his forehead wearily; the performance had made him a little too excited. He pressed his temples with his fingers, wondering if he should have a masseur help him relax, when he was suddenly startled by what he was about to say.

"Your Majesty, the invading enemy is said to number one hundred thousand—"

"Wait, an army of 100,000?" The King of Funan interrupted the messenger: "Really?"

“That’s what the messengers from the several city-states that requested help said!” the messenger said with a wry smile. “Moreover, the barbarians who are invading this time claim to be the General Who Pacifies the Barbarians of the Great Han Dynasty. He has received the imperial staff of the Great Han Emperor and has been ordered to punish the unruly barbarians in the south!”

"The staff, you didn't hear me wrong, did you?" The prime minister of the King of Funan was an old man with a thick beard. Most of his head was bald, so he simply shaved it off, making his head look like a gray ostrich egg, which looked somewhat comical.

"You heard me right! That's exactly what the letter said!" "Did the letter describe what the scepter looked like?"

"It looks like a bamboo pole with a cow's tail at the top!"

"Damn it!" The prime minister slumped down, his face ashen. The general beside him was startled and asked, "What's wrong? Is something amiss?"

"Your Majesty!" The Prime Minister bowed to the King of Funan on the throne. "When your father was in power, an envoy from the Great Han Kingdom visited our country. At that time, I was still a young man and was tasked with receiving this envoy. The Han envoy held a bamboo pole with a cow's tail hanging from its end in his hand, never letting it go. He said that this staff represented the Emperor of the Great Han, and as an envoy, even if he died, he could not lose that staff!"

"You mean those barbarians weren't lying?" the general asked. "They really were acting on the orders of the Han emperor to attack us?"

"I don't know! But it's very likely true. After all, how could a bunch of mountain barbarians gather an army of 100,000?"

Silence fell over the room. The prime minister's words were indeed convincing. No one knew how many people lived in those boundless mountains, but these mountain people belonged to countless tribes of varying sizes, independent of each other, and even hostile to one another. This was why, in most cases, the plains dwellers, also under a "Mandala"-like decentralized city-state system, were able to resist the invasion of the mountain people. And with the official position and imperial staff of the Han emperor, all of this made sense. After all, even in the remote and desolate mountains, they had heard of the might of the Han emperor. For a mountain chieftain who had received the rank of general in the Han's campaign against the barbarians and the imperial envoy's authority, gathering an army of 100,000 was still difficult, but at least it was no longer so inconceivable.

"Then, what should we do?" The King of Funan's voice trembled. "One hundred thousand barbarians is one thing, but does the Emperor of Han really intend to conquer us? How should we respond?"

“Yes!” The general’s face was also grim. “Those mountain people are alright, anyway, once the rainy season comes, they can’t do anything. If I remember correctly, a few years ago the Han army just destroyed the Kingdom of Lin-yi. They still have a stronghold in Puliango (the King’s Forest, Funan’s name for the Mekong Delta region), where merchants trade. It’s not far from here; it takes at most seven or eight days by water. If we attack from both the north and south, that would be troublesome!”

"Yes, yes!" The King of Funan slapped the gilded armrests of his throne twice. "What about Priango? Should we have the governor there conscript soldiers to take down the Han people's strongholds first?" It's no wonder he was so nervous. In fact, neither the King of Funan nor his generals were that nervous about the invasion of the northern mountain people.

It wasn't that they were confident in their army's fighting capabilities, but rather the unique local climate. Southeast Asia has a dry season and a rainy season, and any major military operation can only be carried out during the dry season. Once the rainy season arrives, all military operations must cease, and soldiers must return home, to be rescheduled for the following year. The mountain tribes' invasion could only last until May of the following year at the latest, and then it had to stop.

With so many troops, once they were disbanded and each went back to farming, it would be extremely difficult to regroup them. So, as long as the Funan people could withstand the first wave of attacks, the rest would mostly be a matter of negotiation and wrangling. After all, the mountain people left the mountains for land and food, and in the plains of Southeast Asia at that time, it was incredibly easy to find land to farm and have enough to eat. There were no brutal militaristic states like the Khmer Empire and the Thai kingdoms that came later.

But the Han people are different. The exhilarating victory the Han people displayed in annihilating the Kingdom of Lin-yi a few years ago still terrifies the King of Funan. Who knows if the Han emperor has already ordered the complete annihilation of Funan?

“In my opinion, there’s something wrong with this Han Chinese emperor’s staff!” the prime minister said.

"You think it's fake?" The King of Funan felt as if he had been granted a pardon.

"That's not necessarily true, but something feels off!" the prime minister said. "I remember when I was serving that Han envoy, I spoke with him. The envoy said that the Han capital is extremely far from our Funan, so no matter how much grain and cloth they get from us, they can't transport it back to the capital. Sending troops to conquer them would be extremely costly, and the soldiers would die from acclimatization problems. Therefore, the emperor will not easily send troops to conquer them!"

"Could it be for gold, silver, jewels, ivory, and spices? We have plenty of those in the city!" The Prince of Funan was still very nervous.

“The Han people can easily exchange these things with us through trade, for example, with silk. The cost would be far less than sending troops to conquer them. How could the Han emperor, who is so wise, do such a foolish thing?”

"So, what do you mean?"

"It's simple. Immediately send an envoy to Priango, but not to attack the Han strongholds. Instead, send someone to investigate the situation there. If the Han emperor truly intends to conquer us, then there should be some activity in the Han strongholds in Priango and their southern border regions, right? If there's no activity, then the northern barbarian invasion is probably a bit suspicious!"

"Excellent, excellent!" The Prince of Funan clapped his hands twice in satisfaction. "Then, if there really is something fishy going on, what should we do?"

"Then tell the Han Chinese governor in the south about this. Impersonating a Han Chinese envoy is no small matter!" the prime minister laughed.

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The messenger sent by the King of Funan quickly received a reply. The Han Chinese governor of Rinan Commandery was shocked to learn that a mountain tribe leader claiming to be the Han General Who Pacifies the Barbarians and carrying an imperial envoy was attacking Funan. He immediately wrote back to the King of Funan to assure him that this was absolutely untrue, and simultaneously dispatched a messenger to Panyu to report the matter to the governor and the Protectorate of the Hundred Yue. In addition to informing the King of Funan of the matter and expressing his gratitude, he also sent a messenger and a guard of four hundred soldiers to the capital of Funan to verify the truth of the matter.

The setting sun cast a golden blanket over the vast lake before us. The water, usually a murky yellow, now seemed like molten gold, warm and rich. The shadows of stilted bamboo houses and canoes on the shore were reflected on the lake, long and twisted, like the Sanskrit inscriptions on the walls of a distant temple. Smoke rose gently, merging with the evening glow. The air was filled with the pungent smell of fish and the aroma of burning firewood. The entire lake merged with the endless rice paddies on the shore, stretching to the distant dense forest, seemingly without end, like a land and sea.

(End of this chapter)