In the dry season, there is gentle sunshine. The lush forests fall on the rolling mountains. The villages of the Otomi people are always built in the valleys between the mountains, where flowing springs gather and nourish the barren bean fields. Outside the village,
Most of them have a shallow fence to guard against coyote attacks. In the villages, small sheds are built around them to raise turkeys and native dogs.
However, this crude defense is meaningless to the warriors of the alliance. The mountain people who are fettered by the village are like birds whose feet are tied, broken under the fierce attack of the lynx, leaving only a feeble sound.
's mournful cry.
Soon, villages and farmland were turned into flames, women and children were driven away, and black smoke covered the sun rose in the sky. This was a cruel war, full of blood, fire and death.
Shulot followed the warrior brigade of two hundred people and silently watched everything in front of him. His three views were like iron blocks, being constantly beaten, changed, and forged into steel.
He didn't know how Avit persuaded the commander-in-chief. Maybe it was food, maybe it was efficiency, maybe it was friendship, or maybe it was the future. Early the next morning, Totec changed the plan and divided the warriors into groups of two hundred people.
The small team burned the village, executed the men, but spared the women and children, and drove as far as possible to the city of Guamare.
The process of destruction accelerated rapidly, and after a few more days, all the villages within two days of Guamare had disappeared. Thousands of hungry women and children were also accumulated in the alliance camps. The war potential of the Otomi people
, are being eliminated continuously.
Avit sent an envoy to negotiate with the city of Guamare, but there was a quarrel at the scene, and no agreement was reached on the surface.
At night, Thulot saw an envoy from the city-state quietly coming to the camp. Then, bags of food were hoisted down from the top of the city. After receiving food for eight thousand people for two weeks, Thoth
Ke nodded with satisfaction.
Early the next morning, the army was preparing to break camp. Before leaving, Hulot took one last look at the city of Guamare. The priests in black and white robes also stood silently at the top of the city, looking at the retreating Mexica army below the city.
From a distance, the little coyote priest and the old black and white priest looked at each other. They could only see faint dots of each other, and could not hear each other's voices. Only complex emotions surged.
Shulot shook his head and turned to leave. However, he saw a young follower warrior digging a small hole in the ground with a wooden shovel. Then, he put a small cotton bag into the hole and buried it.
Get up. There is something vaguely wrapped in the small bag.
Finally, the young warrior knelt down, prayed to the sun, and recited the name of the god "Huitzilopochtli".
Shulot was a little surprised and looked at the young warrior and asked.
"God bless you! My warrior, what kind of ceremony is this?"
The young follower looked expectantly and answered respectfully.
"God bless you! Dear Coyote Priest, this is not a formal ceremony, it is just a prayer. Last year, before joining the war, I just gave birth to a boy. In the cloth bag is his umbilical cord, which I always carry with me.
"
"This should be the farthest battlefield I can reach. According to the custom of warriors, I buried my son's umbilical cord here to pray for the protection of the God of War. In this way, when he grows up, he can receive blessings from the distant earth and become
A powerful Mexica warrior. He will follow the Mexica Legion to set foot on this land again and completely conquer the Otomi people!"
"Is it the custom of Alliance warriors..."
Shulot murmured to himself, then nodded to the warrior and smiled.
"Praise the Lord God! The great patron saint will bless you and your son! We will come back again."
The legion then set off, burned the camp outside Guamare, released the useless prisoners, and headed for Otopan.
The returning Mexican Legion turned into a squid. Teams of warriors kept extending like tentacles, and warriors kept returning. Along the way were burning flames, fields reduced to ashes, and tribes scattered in all directions.
woman and child.
"Within twenty years, there will be no more threats to the city-state of Guamare!"
As Avitt walked, he looked at the black smoke burning along the way and couldn't help but sigh.
"The villages will be destroyed, all the men will die, and the fields will be barren. These city-states will not be able to gather the food for the expedition, nor the manpower for logistics. Even if they still retain warriors, they can only stay in the city."
"Avit, don't forget, there are other city-states of the Otomi people further to the west."
"It's too far there. Even if we send warriors, the food supplies must come from Guamare."
Avitt smiled, somewhat unconcerned.
"Not to mention, seeing the tragic situation in Guamare, the small city-states of Te Caicos may not dare to continue participating in the war."
Hearing this, Shulot nodded silently. This was also a kind of shock, the shock of killing like a jaguar. Then, his thoughts changed and he asked curiously.
"How is the situation going with the king?"
"Witness the Lord God! It's still the same."
Avitt shook his head and his expression became serious.
"The Otopans were determined to hold on and hid in the mountain city and were beaten to death without coming out. The king was a little impatient and tried to attack once, but was shot all the way up from the bottom of the mountain. Before the ladder could be put up on the top of the city, stones were piled up one after another.
It kept falling down. Then I barely climbed up once, and the ladder was quickly pushed down, and the leading warrior was gone. It is estimated that more than 400 warriors and more than 500 militiamen were killed in total, and even more were injured."
Hearing this, Shulot also shook his head.
"A meaningless attack, another camp was lost... This kind of mountain city cannot be defeated by a force attack. The king lost his head this time."
"Ha ha."
Avitt smiled softly, with an unclear meaning hidden in his smile.
"The commander-in-chief, Totec, is not here. It is not possible to fight with the king alone! Casal is greedy for merit and does not care about the life and death of the warriors. In a siege, he is not a qualified commander."
"really."
Shulot thought about the king's qualities as a theologian and his grandfather's song, and secretly gave the king a cross.
"In the final analysis, this is all a problem of grain roads. The grain transportation efficiency of grain roads in mountains and forests is really too low!"
"I remember that the west side of the capital is connected to the Leman River. The Leman River flows along the plateau and flows westward through the Mexica city-state of Tepanicapan, and then flows westward through the border between the Otomi and Tarasco peoples.
, can flow to the southern border of the city-state of Otopan, and even to the mountains and forests south of the city-state of Guamare."
"This river is only less than a week's mountain road away from Otopan City. If we can use this river, then the Otomi people will not be able to threaten our food routes!"
After hearing Xuelot's analysis, Avitt turned and faced the south. To the south were vast mountains, forests and rivers, and beyond the Leman River were the Tarasco people.
"Not bad! This route is indeed the shortest."
Avitt pondered for a moment and agreed.
"But the Leman River is right under the Tarascans' noses. The Tarascan legions can arrive at any time."
"We cannot place the key node of food supply here, otherwise once the Tarascans declare war, the army will be cut off from supplies!"
Hearing this, Shulot thought about the possibility of breaking the situation and made another suggestion.
"God bless you! What if we maintain two supply lines at the same time?"
"This is the key now. We can't figure out the attitude of the Tarascans, and we don't want to provoke them and start a war on both sides."
Avitt stretched out his fingers and tapped his forehead lightly.
"The alliance's scouts discovered that the Tarascans are gathering legions on the northern border with the Otomi. There is a high probability that they will invade the weak Otomi to the north, but we must also be careful."
"Actually, I am more worried about the movements of the Alliance's life and death enemy, the Tlaxcalans, than the movements of the Tlaxcalans. This war has been going on for a long time. It has been so long that all nearby forces have been mobilized.
Always be prepared for war!"
Hearing this, Shulot lowered his eyes. He was also worried, but this worry could not change the overall situation because he did not have the power to decide the overall situation.
"The Lord God witnesses! Perhaps retreating is the best choice."
The return trip of more than half a month passed quickly. Along with the black smoke along the way, the Mexican Legion mercilessly destroyed the foundation of the Otomi people and plundered the food along the way.
When he saw the solid mountain city standing in the distance again, Shulot breathed a long sigh of relief. This time he participated in the expedition, and he marched hundreds of thousands of miles and saw tens of thousands of deaths. All of this left him physically and mentally exhausted.
Tired. Soon, the legion returned to the besieged camp, and the commander-in-chief Totec ordered the disbandment. And dragging his exhausted body, with the help of Bertard, he finally returned to the familiar hut.
"Mountains and forests one after another, wastelands after another, city-states after one, and villages after villages dying... This is the war in the barbaric era. Peace is so far away..."
The moment he entered the room, Shulot finally relaxed, raised his head, shook off his feather crest, and let out a long yawn. Then, he took out a piece of wood and wrote and drew on it. Then as soon as the pen was loosened, the boy looked up and
He laid his head on the deerskin carpet and fell into a deep sleep.
Bertard gently carried Xuellot to the bed. Looking at the young man's sleeping face, he smiled slightly. Then he covered the young man with a thin quilt.
Then he picked up the wooden board on the table and saw a black tengu painted on the left, a three-color feathered snake painted on the right, and a line of words below.
"War and Peace."
Word by word, Bertard recognized the alliance's traditional graphics and characters, as well as the corresponding Chinese characters. After a moment, he couldn't help but sigh.
"The priest really loves to learn!...Could it be...him?..."
