The Revolt of the Three Feudatories: All-in at the start in Beijing

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The wounded foot soldiers in the open space were almost all finished off with a final blow, and five hundred corpses lay scattered everywhere, covering the dirt road at the north entrance of the town.

Some lay face up, some lay prone on the ground, and several were piled on top of each other. Blood seeped from under the bodies, flowing down the tire tracks and gathering into streams.

A foot soldier who wasn't quite dead was crawling out of a pool of blood. One of his legs was broken, dragging behind him like a limp rope. A savage from the North Sea walked over, glanced down at him, and with a swift stroke, brought his knife down, abruptly ending the scream.

At this moment, the town was in complete chaos, with screams and cries echoing through the alleys, and wooden clogs clattering on the stone slabs.

Doors on both sides of the street were kicked open one after another. Each cracking sound of breaking wood was followed by a scream. Rice shops, salt shops, blacksmith shops, and pharmacies were the main areas targeted for looting.

The entire castle town became a dead zone in less than the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, and the dark clouds in the sky looked like a gathering of souls.

The third shop at the east end of the street was a rice shop, with a crooked wooden plaque bearing the character "rice" hanging above the door.

The shop wasn't big; the front was the storefront, and the back was where people lived. Behind the door, three thick wooden beams supported the door. The old shopkeeper saw through the crack in the door that the wild men from the North Sea were kicking down doors from house to house. He turned around and whispered to the person behind him, "Don't make a sound."

Behind him was his family, Xikou. His eldest son, west, was about ten years old. He was a farmer who had worked the land all his life, clutching a carrying pole with his knuckles white from gripping it so tightly.

The daughter-in-law was squatting in the corner, holding a little boy in her arms. The little boy's face was pressed against her chest, and he was trembling with fear.

The shopkeeper was holding his granddaughter in his arms. She was fifteen years old, had just put her hair up in a bun, and her face was still tender and hadn't fully developed.

With a loud bang, the door panel shattered, and the three thick wooden beams broke apart like matchsticks. Splinters of wood flew into the room, hitting the old shopkeeper on the forehead and drawing a bloody gash.

Five wild men from the North Sea crowded at the entrance, each covered in blood, their knives dripping red.

The leader was a short, stocky man with an old scar on his left cheek that ran from the corner of his eye to his chin. He bent down, stepped over the threshold, and looked around at the people in the room.

The old shopkeeper shielded his granddaughter behind him, took two steps back, and leaned against the wooden wall of the rice warehouse.

"Get out! This is our home!" The eldest son raised a carrying pole to block the doorway, his voice loud, but the pole itself was shaking.

He had just peeked through the crack in the door and seen these people kill an old man across the street who was running too slowly. The old man's blood was splattered on the mud wall and hadn't dried yet.

The leader of the wild men from the North Sea tilted his head and glanced at him. He didn't understand what he was saying, nor did he need to. He simply raised his arm, and the blade swept diagonally from the lower right to the upper left. The carrying pole in the eldest son's hand was broken in two, and a gash appeared on his neck, running from his collarbone to his ear. Blood spurted out more than a foot and splashed onto his daughter-in-law's face.

Then his body swayed and he collapsed onto the threshold with a thud. His legs twitched twice, and then he stopped moving.

The daughter-in-law screamed, released the child in her arms and rushed to grab her husband's hand. Before her hand could even touch her husband's shoulder, another savage from the North Sea had already stabbed her in the back.

The tip of the knife protruded half an inch from her chest. She looked down at the knife tip in her chest, her lips moved as if she wanted to say something, but she didn't. She fell forward and landed on her husband.

The little boy stood in the corner, his face covered in his mother's splattered blood. He didn't cry, but his mouth was open, his eyes were wide open, and his whole body was trembling.

The leader wiped the blood from his face, pointed the tip of his knife at the old shopkeeper and his granddaughter, and said to his men in broken Mandarin, "Keep the young ones, kill the rest."

After he finished speaking, he strode to the back of the counter and began rummaging through the drawers to search for valuables. In the drawer was a small bag of loose silver, a few strings of copper coins, a book of credits, and two land deeds. He emptied the loose silver and copper coins into his pocket, glanced at the land deeds and threw them on the ground, then squatted down to move the small, locked iron box under the counter.

The remaining wild men from the western North Sea had already been assigned tasks, and upon hearing the order, they did not object but stepped forward to draw their knives.

One of them walked up to the old shopkeeper, swiftly brought down his knife, and a deep, bone-revealing gash appeared on the old shopkeeper's neck. He covered his neck with both hands, trying to stop the gushing blood, which spurted out through his fingers.

His little granddaughter screamed and rushed forward, but was pulled back by her hair from behind.

The savage from the North Sea who killed the old shopkeeper turned around and saw the little boy still standing in the corner. He took a step forward—the boy didn't make a sound, but fell backward onto his mother.

A pockmarked man from the North Sea leaned against the doorframe without making a move. Only after everyone else had finished did he stand up and walk toward his granddaughter with a wicked grin.

The little granddaughter was dragged by her hair and forced to kneel on the ground, her face streaked with tears, her whole body trembling like a leaf. The pockmarked man squatted down, reached out and pinched her chin, twisting it from side to side, then grinned with satisfaction.

The leader stood up from behind the counter, tucked the iron box under his arm, and said to the pockmarked man, "Hurry up, there are still several shops outside that haven't been searched."

"What's the rush?" the pockmarked man said without turning his head. Not long after, the little girl's screams came from the rice shop. The pockmarked man, carrying a blood-dripping knife, hurriedly walked out of the house and followed the other Westerners to other shops.

At this moment, Dorgon stood on the open ground, stepping on the corpse of a foot soldier. He slowly wiped his Japanese sword on the corpse's clothes, cleaning the blood off the blade and adding a few small nicks to the edge.

He held the knife up to his eyes, examined the blade against the setting sun, then sheathed it and glanced back at the town.

The entire castle town had been ravaged for more than an hour. There was not a single Japanese person left on the streets, all the shops had been emptied, and some were even on fire.

Those savages from the North Sea, Deen Ababa, seem to have already begun storming into residential houses, and ordinary Japanese civilians are also being looted.

Dorgon turned his gaze away from the town and called out to a savage who was running over carrying two iron pots. This man was his clansman and also a messenger.

"What the hell do you want this thing for?"

"Put the iron pot down now and immediately inform them that some men must be left to guard the town entrance. Don't just focus on looting; check if there are any surviving Japanese soldiers left in Xizhou. Don't let them escape."

"Also, send two quick men to Takatori Mountain to find Yarha and tell him—the Akizuki Domain has been captured, and the Fukuoka Domain's home base has been destroyed by us."

The savage put the iron pot on the ground, took out a dry biscuit from his pocket, took a bite, and turned to relay the order.

……

Meanwhile, Kuroda Mitsuyuki had been besieging Takatoyama for three days, but instead of receiving reinforcements from Saga, he received letters from various places requesting help.