Chapter 239 - Where Have I Heard About This Surname?
Chapter 239 - Where Have I Heard About This Surname?
Chapter 239 – Where Have I Heard About This Surname?
The four peach brothers bowed at each other. Since they were brothers-in-arms now, Liu Bei began setting up the hierarchy.
Because Liu Bei was 22 this year, which he was the oldest among them all, he became their elder brother. As in history, Guan Yu was the second brother, followed by Zhang Fei.
Although Jiang Man had the same age as Zhang Fei, he chose to be their fourth brother so he would not provoke an ire from the others.
"What should we do next?" Liu Bei asked all of his new brothers since he was inexperienced.
"First, we have to use our gold to forge weapons and armor. Then, we will save some to buy provisions and hire mercenaries. We can also recruit volunteers, but we will have to pay them, or none of them will be willing to serve us."
As a reincarnator from the modern world, Jiang Man acted like their strategist before Liu Bei had assigned him the role. It was necessary for him to establish his influence in this group, or he would be useless in the future.
"That's right. Without gold, no one will follow us."
"Let's do that."
…
The sun had set.
In the end, Jiang Man had to do everything himself as Zhang Fei and Guan Yu were still new at handling domestic affairs. Liu Bei had been taught by Lu Zhi so he knew hot to organize people. He assigned blacksmiths to make weapons first.
Zhang Fei, Guan Yu, and Liu Bei were busy all day, designing their personal weapon instead of helping Jiang Man recruiting troops.
'A bunch of simpletons,' Jiang Man thought while he glanced at the happy trio in disdain.
'It's better this way. The more stupid you are, the easier my job will be.'
While the three were touring the blacksmith shops around the city, Jiang Man had finished hiring militias with his gold. With these people, they had 1,000 volunteer troops of their own.
The problem was the provision. Because of the bad harvest last year, the food price was expensive. One ton of food was selling at five to six golds.
'With my gold, I can only support them for a month. I'll need to borrow or have Liu Bei beg for food and supplies from the local.'
'Damn it, I wish I had continued hanging with that idiot Zhang Yan and live a life of bandits. Being a bandit is easier than babysitting these fools.'
…
…
January 20th, 183 A.D.
Tong and 5,000 heavy infantries had arrived at Zhongshan Commandery City, which located north of Julu, and south of the Ji city. They brought along food supplies and weaponry to prepare for the battle against Zou Jing of Liu Yan.
In front of the gate, Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang were there to welcome their nephew.
"Long time no see, Tong. You sure are famous now!" Zhang Bao laughed and patted Tong's back.
Zhang Liang was as usual. He still had a solemn expression and nodded at Tong.
Besides the two brothers of Zhang Jiao, the former governor of this city who had surrendered to Zhang Bao, Zhen Yi, was also there.
"Welcome, young master Zhang. I'm Zhen Yi, the current governor assistant. Welcome to Zhongshan!"
Tong tilted his head as he had heard about this name before, but he forgot where he had heard it. It was not the name of a famous historical figure, but somehow he felt like he was someone important in this era.
'Zhen clan is not a dominant family in this age. I wonder why I have an urge to google his name.'
Unfortunately, Tong could not use the internet or a smartphone to search for this person's name. Thus, he entered the city with a confused expression and a wry smile.
Upon entering the inner area, Tong refused Zhen Yi's welcome banquet invitation. He began organizing troops and provision supplies in this city.
The discovery of this city's situation depressed Tong.
People of this city had already suffered from the famine last year. Thirty percent of the population became starving beggars who had no job to feed their family.
"We have an influx or migrating people from abandoned villages and small counties. It seems that bandit gangs are pretending to be a part of our force. They are wearing yellow scarves and shouting our slogans," Zhang Liang explained.
"Won't they hate us? We're also wearing yellow clothes."
Zhang Liang shook his head, "We've explained everything to the migrated people and gave them food. Most of them understand our circ.u.mstances, but there are a few who believed that we have set this up to gather them into this city."
This was the headache that the Yellow Turban in history and this world had faced, the imposters. The purpose of the Yellow Turban founding was to relieve the people from hunger and give them human-aid.
However, the bandits exploited Zhang Jiao's honest thought and ruined his reputation. The Yellow Turban would soon become a symbol of rebelling bandits which would spread across the country for another half a decade.
'Dealing with all the imposters will be impossible. But differentiate between our army and bandits is easy.'
…
There was a fairy tale in Tong's previous world, which was a story of a writer and a plagiarism copycat.
The writer created a magnificent work which every reader loved it. However, another imposter copied his story claimed that he wrote it. The copycat then framed the real author that he plagiarized copycat's story instead, which made everybody angry.
Despite being cursed at by the misunderstood readers, the real author did not panic. He merely said, "I can continue the story while the imposter can't!"
The author continued writing the story and published it, proving himself that he was the authentic one while the copycat was later prosecuted by the readers as he could not maintain the story as the real writer did.
…
"Third uncle, we have to change our dress code," Tong suggested his two uncles.
"Change it? But, what about the other cities? Will they be confused by the sudden change?"
"Right, Tong. Suddenly changing the uniform will waste our budgets. What's the point of that?"
"There is a purpose of this second uncle, third uncle. Currently, the bandits are using our yellow uniforms to plunder villages. If we're still using the same uniform as them, we'll be prosecuted by the people forever. However, if we make uniforms of another color, those bandits won't be able to mimic us."
"Huh?"
The two uncles still could not understand what Tong was trying to do. They looked at each other in confusion.
"If we change the cloth color, can we still call ourselves [Yellow] Turban?"
Tong rolled his eyes, "What should we name ourselves with a color?"
"Because it's easy to differentiate when we're fighting enemies."
Hearing the answer of his uncle, Tong facepalmed, "Listen, we can always change it back to yellow. But for now, I want all soldier clothes blue. We'll overhaul the uniform codes and make other color uniforms as well. We won't only use a fixed color in the future, but we'll use all color!"
Zhang Bao almost stumbled and sat on the ground.
"We're soldiers, not those p.r.o.s.t.i.t.u.t.es in the red-light district. Why are we dressing in too many colors!?"
"Just do it, or you'll want our descendants to read the historical records that everybody here is bandit leaders?"
"…"
In the end, both Zhang Liang and Zhang Bao conceded and invested in tailor shops to get new clothes for their men. Tong also messaged the others in the clan chat to correct their uniform color.
Later, Tong went to Bo Cai and taught him about scouts and message relaying. Because his radar map was disabled by Lilim, he had to rely on the old way of gathering intelligence.
However, he was terrible at commanding cavalry units. As Tong had led an army of hors.e.m.e.n and fought against them before, he knew how bad Bo Cai's skill and intelligence was.
Tong simulated the situation and asked Ba Cai, "You have 1,000 light cavalry unit, and the enemy have 500 elite spearmen in a porcupine formation. What will you do in this situation?"
"Cavalry charge!"
"The battlefield is muddy because of the rain, and it's hard to use a rush tactic. The enemies are 5,000 archers, but you have 1,000 hors.e.m.e.n. What will you do?"
"Cavalry charge!"
"The enemy is inside the castle. You have …"
"Cavalry charge!"
"You are traveling in a forest …"
"Cavalry charge!"
"…"
Tong massaged his temples as he had a headache.
'How Dafuq did he defeated Huangfu Song in my timeline!? Is it because he was too much of a simpleton that he caught the Imperial Army off-guard?'
Tong changed the questions, "Instead of hors.e.m.e.n, you are leading 5,000 infantry soldiers. The enemy has 10,000 elites, and they are coming for you …"
"I'll dig traps and use the ambush tactics. On their way to our base, I'll arrange my troops into five shifts and harass them all day and all night to the point that they won't have the times to sleep or eat. Then, I'll set up pitfall traps on the road …"
"…"
An awkward smile appeared on Tong's face.
'Dafuq is wrong with you. Why are you so fluent when you're simulating infantry tactics!? Why da hack do you only use cavalry charge when you're leading hors.e.m.e.n!?'
Tong covered his face with his palm and waved the other hand to stop Bo Cai from continue talking.
"That's enough. From now on, you're in charge of Zhongshan infantry units. I'll give the cavalry roles to someone else."
"Yes, sir! Good choice, sir!"
"Did you do it on purpose?"
"No, sir!"
…
…
Tong went to his prepared room to rest.
Zhen Yi and his family had prepared a room for him so Tong could not turn down the offer as he had no other place to rest.
'It's good that I realize this now. If I make this guy leading a heavy cavalry team, it would have been a disaster.'
Tong felt like he had stopped a timed-bomb before it exploded. Bo Cai was terrible at cavalry, but he was good at infantry. However, they had been using Bo Cai as a cavalry general for so long.
Tong hands pushed the wooden doors opened, and he stepped into his new room. The room had already been decorated, and the lambs had already been lit.
Two charming girls who looked like in their late teen in a dancer clothing were standing beside the bed, waiting for Tong.
"Welcome, young master Zhang," The two girls bowed.
Seeing the two girls, Tong frowned. He did not ask for a chambermaid as he never needed a woman to relieve his stress in a time of war.
The girls noticed Tong's facial expression, so they introduced themselves.
"My name is Zhen Jiang. I'm the eldest daughter of the assistant governor Zhen Yi."
"This concubine is Zhen Tuo. I'm the second daughter of Lord Zhen Yi. We're here to serve you, young master Zhang."
The frown of Tong's face deepened as he understood what the former governor of this city tried to do.
'Another old fox! If I were an innocent young man, I would have fallen for their charm and would have taken them in as my concubines. Then, Zhen Yi's status will rise because of this connection!'
Because of the suspicious, Tong had to chase them away first, or the two possessive tigresses at home would castrate him again if they learned about it.
"I'm thankful for Lord Zhen's generosity, but I'm too tired for today. I wish to sleep alone."
The two girls looked disappointed, yet relieved. They bowed and excused themselves without protesting Tong.
After they had left, Tong pondered.
'Their names sound familiar. I don't remember where I heard this.'
'Which famous figure in the three kingdoms period has the surname of Zhen?'