Distant Mountain Battle Song

Chapter 177 Hardships and Perseverance Lead to Success

This is how a normal person understands national governance.

I pay taxes to you, accept your management, you protect my personal safety, and you guarantee that I will receive basic fair treatment.

This is what people often refer to as the principle of equivalence between rights and obligations.

In many situations, power and obligation are mortal enemies.

Everyone wants more power and fewer obligations, rather than keeping the two in a relatively balanced state.

However, the constituent elements of power and obligation are different; one is metal, and the other is ice and snow.

When power is at the bottom of the scale, obligations are lifted high, exposed to the elements, and eventually vaporized until they disappear.

When obligations are eroded, power rises; when the sun shines upon power, it is bathed in golden light.

Looking back at history, we can come to an answer: whenever the world is in chaos, the emperors or rulers of that era are elevated to godhood.

Whenever power declines to lower levels, the emperors and rulers of that era are condemned to the pillory of history.

However, that's all. Once those in power say "let the common people suffer," those literary descriptions of "widespread suffering," "children being exchanged for food," and "bones exposed in the wilderness, with not a rooster crowing for a thousand miles" will become reality.

Because of his education and the influence he had been exposed to, Yun Ce would never dare to allow such cruel literary terms to appear in his territory.

Therefore, he would lead his men hunting every day at dawn and return from the wilderness laden with their spoils very late into the night.

Even so, he still couldn't feed 20,000 mouths.

Hunting is a very private matter. This kind of work might be able to support a family or a village, but to think that hunting can support more than 20,000 people is pure fantasy.

Even if Yun Ce is the most skilled hunter in the world, it won't work.

Feng An and Liang Kun left Jingkou Pass with more than a hundred cartloads of wild animal pelts, carrying with them the Yun family's meager assets, intending to purchase some grain elsewhere.

Zhang Min wrote to Wu Tong, who was far away in Chang'an, every day, pleading for help with increasingly humble words and harsher descriptions.

Eji led the women to clear away the snow and ice and part the grass in the desolate wilderness where there were no wild beasts, searching for every piece of food that could be eaten. Sometimes, they would not even let go of some grass roots that still had a little bit of green.

After Cao Kun sent eight thousand men, the food supplies at Yun Family Manor began to decrease at a visible rate.

At this point, Yun Ce realized that if everyone had to go hungry, stability could only be guaranteed by going hungry together. Therefore, the rationing system naturally emerged.

In the Yun family manor, the best food was given to children, pregnant women, and the warriors guarding the well pass. They were the ones who could be guaranteed two meals a day. The rest of the people, including Yun Ce himself, only had one meal a day.

Angie's little kitchen hasn't emitted any smoke for many days...

However, the people in Yun Family Manor were relatively stable, especially since they saw that Yun Ce and E Ji, the couple, were just like them, having only a bowl of porridge and a straw cake every day. Even if they were dissatisfied, they couldn't say anything else.

When she went to sleep at night, Eji quietly leaned against Yun Ce's chest and did not move. The long days and long nights of the Han Dynasty were a severe torment for people who were hungry.

Eji's egg broke, so she ate Zhang Min's egg instead, but she was still very hungry.

Eji would only poke Yun Ce's chest with her finger when she was so hungry she couldn't bear it anymore. Usually at this time, Yun Ce would conjure up a roasted rabbit leg or a large piece of roasted meat for her out of thin air.

Today is no exception.

It was a very large grilled fish.

The grilled fish was wrapped in large leaves of grass, and although it had cooled down, the aroma was still incredibly strong.

Eji was very hungry, and although she knew that she could get a large piece of food by poking her husband with her finger, she never used this power lightly.

She would only use it when she was absolutely starving. She knew that her husband couldn't conjure up much food. If he had enough, he would have taken it out long ago. The food he gave her was probably what he had saved from his own meals.

Eji got up, grabbed the grilled fish, and went out. Yun Ce could hear Anji and the others' suppressed cheers.

In this situation, Yun Ce felt somewhat guilty. Perhaps he really should have accepted Cao Kun's advice.

“It’s actually quite nice to go hungry together.” Eji returned to Yun Ce’s arms, bringing with her the smell of grilled fish.

"At least, the people in Yun Family Manor now seem more like a family. I saw some children saving their food and secretly giving it to those who were too hungry to walk. I also saw women secretly giving their meager food to a man they liked. Furthermore, I saw many men who participated in the hunt cooking the offal of wild animals that they wouldn't have eaten before and giving it to the women they liked."

My lord, you are truly a good man. It's rare to find someone so kind and righteous, no matter where you are. Back in Hekou Village, this is how we all spent the winter.

Once we survive this famine, we'll truly be one family.

Yun Ce hugged E Ji, not wanting to speak. He had a way to keep these people from going hungry, but unfortunately, he couldn't do it. Doing so would be extremely detrimental to the future development of the army.

"Let me see again." Eji had some food in her stomach and started acting up again.

Yun Ce straightened his left arm, and that arm transformed into the dragon claw shape that E Ji loved so much.

Even after the change in its arms, they remained as cold as ever, with scales gleaming with a metallic sheen, and sharp dragon claws still as powerful as before.

Eji held the dragon claw, somewhat reluctant to let it go. She picked up a handkerchief, intending to wipe the dragon claw properly, but seeing Yun Ce's unfriendly expression, she awkwardly stopped.

Women are naturally drawn to strength, and Eji preferred her husband to become incredibly powerful. Even if he had this dragon claw, their child might also have such a claw, but Eji still loved it.

"Tomorrow, I'm going to Danwang Mountain."

This was something that had been discussed long ago. Yun Ce should have gone to Danwang Mountain long ago, but the mountain village was short of food, so Yun Ce had to stay and actively hunt to get more food for everyone.

If we don't leave now, things over there might come to an end.

"Go ahead without worry. Feng An wrote that he has already exchanged some grain, and Wu Tong in the capital also said that he has prepared some grain and it is being transported. I went to the Rabbit Plain again yesterday and dug sixteen holes. There is quite a lot of grain inside."

Yun Ce truly felt he couldn't ask for more from the woman in his arms who had given all her beloved jewelry to Feng An in order to raise money for buying grain.

She used to be very poor, and all those pieces of jewelry were things she got for herself. As a girl, she had a genuine, passionate love for glittering things. She would often lay them out one by one, wipe them clean, and carefully arrange them before going to sleep. When she woke up in the morning, the first thing she would do was check if her precious treasures were still there...

Yun Ce left before dawn. E Ji pretended to be still asleep, but tears welled up in the corners of her eyes and soaked her pillow.

The chestnut horse galloped wildly across the wasteland, the wind whistling past Yun Ce's ears, and the earth rushing past. Now, since being burned by the earth fire, the chestnut horse seemed to have become even stronger. It almost ignored the rugged road, crossing mountains and valleys, still as fast as lightning.

When Yun Ce stopped his horse and looked out over the mountain ridge, he discovered that this once famous mountain in the Han Dynasty had now become a burning volcano.

At the foot of the mountain, fierce battles were still raging. Just by looking at the corpses on the battlefield where another battle had just ended not far away, one could tell that the two sides were truly engaged in a fight to the death.

Yun Ce spotted Cao Ling through the telescope. Cao Ling was wielding twin swords and fighting a short, stocky man with a large beard. Judging from the ferocious fighting power he was displaying, they were clearly gaining the upper hand on the battlefield.

Having neither seen Cao Kun on the battlefield nor Cao's old steward, Yun Ce was convinced that the two must be nearby.

The short, stocky Fire Clan seemed to be retreating, and Cao Ling and his men stuck close to them, unwilling to let the Fire Clan leave their battle group.

They were probably worried that the Fire Clan had powerful long-range area-of-effect weapons.

The fire tribesman who was being held back by Cao Ling suddenly roared and stopped retreating. Instead, he slashed out three times, forcing Cao Ling to take two steps back. The fire tribesman did not retreat, but instead led his few companions straight into the middle of Cao Ling's army.

Then, the fire tribesman stopped fighting and instead opened his arms as if to welcome something. The other fire tribesmen also stopped fighting and did the same.

Instead, Cao Ling seemed to have seen something terrifying. He slung a giant shield over his back, then ran on all fours faster than a horse.

Unfortunately, it was too late. Suddenly, a large black dot appeared in the sky. After reaching its highest point, it quickly fell. This thing was not a feathered arrow, but it fell more than twice as fast as a feathered arrow. Then, Yun Ce saw the warriors who were originally besieging the fire people fall to the ground one after another, blood gushing from all parts of their bodies.

Of course, the fire tribesmen who remained on the battlefield suffered the same fate; they were hit even harder. Yun Ce witnessed firsthand how the strongest fire tribesman's body was riddled with holes by black specks falling from the sky.

Cao Ling was still alive, and the giant shield on his back was riddled with iron spikes that had fallen from the sky.

A suspension bridge on Danwang Mountain was slowly raised, and with a loud bang, it stood upright, blocking the entrance to Danwang Mountain. Outside the gate, as the suspension bridge was raised, a bottomless ravine stretched between the two groups of people.

Yun Ce finally spotted Cao Kun through the telescope. This guy, who always acted like a spoiled brat, was now wearing armor and standing among a group of people who were also dressed in magnificent armor. He seemed inconspicuous, but in fact, he had long become the center of everyone's attention.

(End of this chapter)