Chapter 159: The Great Wall Defense Line

"Ah, exactly this scent. The land of the Central Plains has this very smell; I can already sense the breeze blowing from the south, carrying the faint scent of Han cowardice."

Shibi Khaghan, leading his army south from the Turkic royal camp, arrived near the defensive line of the Great Wall. Having dealt with the Han people for a long time, Shibi Khaghan did not rush to launch an attack on the same day. Instead, he ordered his troops to pitch their camp right where they stood while maintaining high vigilance against those cunning Han raiders who might attack by night.

Dismounting, he grabbed a handful of earth from the ground and brought it to his nose to inhale deeply. He could not help but sigh at how times had changed. The last time he had smelled such an odor was when he was fleeing in panic northward from Mayi Commandery. But today was different from the past. After a year, he had finally pacified all unstable elements within the grasslands while intimidating external forces that cast greedy eyes upon them. Now, reorganizing his troops, he once again led the warriors of the steppe southward, determined to teach a profound lesson to these Han people who had repeatedly tarnished his prestige.

"Loss of my Yanzhi Mountain, leaving our women without color. Loss of my Qilian Mountain, making our livestock unable to multiply." Reciting the mournful song chanted when the Xiongnu lost their territories in the Hexi Corridor, Tuoba Shishu turned to Shibi Khaghan and said, "Those Han people snatched our pastoral paradise from the hands of the Xiongnu, forcing us to dwell only in the colder north whenever winter arrives. Countless of our clansmen lose their lives every year because of this. Worse still, taking advantage of our internal strife, those Han people split our once-mighty Turkic nation into two, turning us into mutually hostile sworn enemies. Just as their Han saying goes, the national hatred and family feud between us and the Han are irreconcilable. Now Heaven has granted us this opportunity, plunging the once-powerful Han dynasty into internal chaos and rendering it extremely weak. This is precisely the time for us to demand an accounting from them. This southern expedition is not only to thoroughly defeat them and reduce them to a vassal state of our Turks, but also to reclaim the land that rightfully belongs to us. We must let those Han people know who the true masters of this steppe are."

Tuoba Shishu was actually the son of Shishu Huxi. Back then, Shishu Huxi resided on the steppe, offering counsel to the Turks. His son had been sent to the Tuoba clan of the Xianbei—who had thoroughly assimilated and settled in the Central Plains—to serve as an adopted son. In return, the Tuoba clan provided Shishu Huxi with certain conveniences for his operations on the steppe. Otherwise, relying solely on his status as a subject of a minor Western Regions state, how could he have possessed such immense influence to attain the position of chief advisor to the Turks?

After being sent to the Tuoba clan, Tuoba Shishu followed their customs and changed his surname to Tuoba. Wishing to stay on good terms with the future crucial advisor of the Turks, the Tuoba clan directly used the name "Shishu" as the adopted son's given name, which was how the name Tuoba Shishu came to be. Later, Shishu Huxi was lured and killed by men of the Sui dynasty in Mayi Commandery, leaving a critical vacancy for a strategist among the Turks. Seizing this opportunity, the Tuoba clan sent Tuoba Shishu back to the steppe. Leveraging their own connections as well as the lingering goodwill and prestige of Shishu Huxi, they quickly enabled Tuoba Shishu to succeed his father's position. Combined with Tuoba Shishu's own considerable competence, he won the approval of various tribal chieftains across the steppe and within the Turkic royal court, succeeding his father as an essential advisor by Shibi Khaghan's side. Therefore, in this campaign of vengeance against the Han, Shibi Khaghan brought him along, hoping he would offer strategies and help defeat the Han.

As Tuoba Shishu recited those two lines of Xiongnu poetry, he could not help finding it somewhat ironic. The very person who had previously defeated Shibi Khaghan—the master he now served—was a Han from the Western Regions, namely a subordinate of Li Wenyuan. The Yanzhi Mountain and Qilian Mountain mentioned in the poem were both currently under Li Wenyuan's rule. Yet times had changed; while Qilian Mountain remained Qilian Mountain, few people still remembered Yanzhi Mountain. Nowadays, people only knew of the Shandan Military Horse Farm, which was most famous upon Yanzhi Mountain.

At this thought, Tuoba Shishu marveled at the magic of fate, wondering if Li Wenyuan himself, in his capacity as the Superintendent of the Western Regions, had any inkling that he had unknowingly accumulated so many deep grievances with the nomadic tribes of the steppe, and whether it would cause him any vexation. But soon, recalling that his own father had died at the hands of those cunning Han, Tuoba Shishu hardened his heart and asked Shibi Khaghan, "What are your plans, Khaghan, after you capture Wuwei Commandery?"

"What plans?" Shibi Khaghan brushed the dirt from his hands, having dropped it to the ground, and replied arrogantly to Tuoba Shishu, "Naturally, I shall lead the warriors of the steppe to strike westward all the way, letting those Western Turkic cowards—who have repeatedly lost territory before the Han—see what true steppe warriors should look like. I will thoroughly humiliate their so-called Khaghan right before his face, and then force him to kneel and return the Golden Wolf Banner to me, acknowledging me as the sole Khaghan of the steppe!"

"Yet, Khaghan, have you ever considered the nearly one million Han people living in the Western Regions? How do you intend to deal with them?"

"Nearly one million Han? Since when have the Han gathered such a massive population in the Western Regions? You must remember that even during the Kaihuang era, the most prosperous period of the Central Plains dynasty, the entire Western Regions held only six hundred thousand Han people, with the rest being cowards who abandoned the steppe to throw themselves into the arms of the Han," Shibi Khaghan said, his brows knitting in a heavy frown upon hearing Tuoba Shishu's words.

"That is precisely what Khaghan does not know. Ever since the internal chaos in the Central Plains, a vast number of Han people have fled outward to escape the ravages of war. Liaodong has been a land of bitter cold since ancient times, and furthermore, the Sui and Gao dynasties harbor an age-old feud. Therefore, these Han chose not to flee toward the northeast. Instead, guided by the subtle hints of interested parties, they chose to flee to the Western Regions. Through the accumulation of time, the Han population in the Western Regions now exceeds one million," Tuoba Shishu explained in detail regarding the recent demographic shifts in the Western Regions.

"Nearly one million Han." Shibi Khaghan muttered these words repeatedly, then shook his head with a trace of helplessness as he said to Tuoba Shishu beside him, "If they are willing to become obedient subjects of my steppe, then so be it. If they are unwilling, we shall simply slaughter them all."

Hearing the implicit leniency toward the lives of the Han in Shibi Khaghan's words, Tuoba Shishu quickly stepped forward and said, "Khaghan, the Han have a saying: 'Those not of our race must surely harbor different hearts.' If Khaghan shows mercy to these Han people now and spares their lives, then once the Han armies strike back in the future, they will become the most unstable factor under our rule. By then, with enemies coordinating from within and without, the mere loss of the lands we have reclaimed would be a minor matter; the casualties inflicted upon our steppe warriors due to the scheming of these Han people would be our greatest loss."