Chapter 202: The Yuan Army and the Camel Cavalry
Thud, thud, thud…
On the ragged road that had fallen into disrepair, a team made of a dozen wagons was riding towards Xiangyang City.
On the two sides of the road where a sandstorm was raging, many refugees were walking with bags on their backs.
Every once in a while, unburied bodies or simple tombs made of yellow soil could be seen among the grasses.
There were also dirty, emaciated children who were helplessly kneeling on the ground, and their parents were begging for someone to adopt them.
“Young Master, let’s stop the wagons and give them some food. We’ve brought a lot of food!”
When they passed what appeared to be a settlement of refugees, Nie Xiaoqian said to Ji Ye who was sitting in the front of the wagon sympathetically.
“We can’t give them anything!”
Ji Ye, however, shook his head. He seemed heartbroken as he looked at the starving people around him, but he declined her request determinedly!
“That’s…”
Nie Xiaoqian opened her mouth and wanted to say something.
However, as a maid, she had always listened to everything Ji Ye said.
She could only hide inside her carriage. She couldn’t bear looking at the refugees.
But she soon realized why Ji Ye was so “heartless”.
“Stop!”
At that moment, the wagon that Little Dragon Maiden and Zhou Zhiruo rode at the rear of the team was stopped.
Then, Zhou Zhiruo, wearing her green clothes, took out some of the food and water she carried in her wagon.
She gave the food and water to a girl, who had sallow skin and wore thin clothes in the freezing weather. The girl even passed out while kowtowing at the wagons due to the lack of food!
“My lady, give me some food, please! I haven’t had anything for three days! Please!”
“My lady, please buy my daughter and let her work as your maid! She can do anything as long as you give her some porridge! Please!”
This place had been a rendezvous point of refugees in the first place.
They had been dispersed by the intimidating animals of the Manor of Beasts. Now that they saw that the wagons stopped and someone was distributing food, they swarmed close and surrounded Little Dragon Maiden and Zhou Zhiruo’s wagon. They even spread to the wagons of other female players.
Even more unbelievable, some male refugees were robbing the little girl of her food.
Then, they were slapped to the ground by Zhou Zhiruo in her fury.
Even so, a lot of skinny refugees were flooding at her, making it impossible for the convoy to move on anymore.
“Look, this is why I didn’t let you do that!”
Ji Ye shook his head.
He was actually feeling rather peaceful.
It was partly because he had seen plenty of such scenes on TV back on Earth and partly because this was just a Battlefield of Providence and it was easier to accept things that weren’t real.
He had several solutions to deal with such a situation.
For example, he could invoke pressure on the refugees by releasing the Dragon Aura so that they would all drop to the ground in fear.
Or he could create scary illusions with the Mirage Dragon Pearl so that the refugees would run off in fear.
“Huh?”
However, before he adopted any of those methods, Ji Ye sensed something and looked ahead at the road.
Thud, thud, thud…
Some dust was rising on the road ahead. Then, it could be seen that certain creatures, which were similar to camels but were larger with four humps on their backs, were slowly riding to him with soldiers who looked slightly different from the Song men on the top.
“Master, it’s the Yuan Camel Cavalry! We must retreat!”
A middle-aged man cried in the convoy. He was a guide that the Manor of Beasts had hired. He was from Xiangyang City and knew the Yuan people quite well.
The convoy was still more than two hundred kilometers from Xiangyang City, yet they had already encountered Yuan soldiers!
It was because the Song Dynasty was weak and could only concentrate their soldiers in important strongholds such as Xiangyang City. Yuan, on the other hand, was able to send out troops to collect food for the battle while they surrounded the cities.
Those special camels were exactly Yuan’s vehicles to transport food. Because they were large and had a high capacity, each of them could carry enough food for two or three households to eat for a whole year.
At this moment, there were a hundred camels among the Yuan soldiers, which meant that the food that hundreds of Song families depended on had been looted.
Besides, they could’ve only been part of Yuan’s food collectors. No wonder there were so many refugees on the road!
“Ah! The Yuan troops!”
“Run! The Yuan troops are here again!”
Noticing the food collectors of Yuan, the refugees who had gathered around the females in the team fell into chaos without Ji Ye having to do anything.
The old, the weak, the sick, and the disabled all ran in the opposite direction of the Yuan intruders or simply into the woods next to the roads.
Although the Yuan emperor had disallowed his soldiers to slaughter civilians who were incapable of resistance, it was only lip service to convince the Song people to stop resisting, and the rule was never really followed by the bottom-level soldiers.
It could be seen that the weapons many Yuan soldiers carried on the backs of the camels were still stained with blood.
On the other hand, with his hearing that had been strengthened by True Seer, he obviously detected the crying of a baby from the camel team!
At the very front of the camel cavalry, a baby had been impaled by a long spear and was hanging ahead of a camel.
Judging from the scene, the Yuan soldiers seemed to be using the Song baby as bait to lure the camel to run faster, like one might use a carrot to attract a donkey!
“Stop it!”
Ji Ye wasn’t the only person who noticed that.
A furious voice echoed, and a man jumped out of the wagon behind Ji Ye’s. His gray clothes fluttered in the wind, and he charged at the Yuan soldier who raised the baby with a spear like an eagle unfolding its wings.
Inside the wagon behind Ji Ye was Yang Guo and Shi the Third. Since Shi the Third wasn’t really good at alacrity skills, it was naturally Yang Guo who charged forward.
More than ten years earlier, when the Party of Heroes was held, Yang Guo had encountered similar things around here.
Although the Mongols had been replaced by the Yuan people on this Battlefield of Providence, his memory hadn’t been changed. The Swordsman Condor certainly couldn’t hold himself back!
Pa!
The Yuan soldier who was at the front of the team had been stomped upon by Yang Guo before he could realize what was going on.
That stomping was astonishingly powerful under the boost of Yang Guo’s fury. Not only were the Yuan soldier’s ribs dented, but even the camel under him couldn’t take it anymore and fell on the ground with broken limbs.
The Yuan soldier’s long spear was seized by Yang Guo, who laid his two left fingers on the tip of the spear and cracked it with an exertion of strength on his fingers.
After that, he carefully nestled the baby in his right arm.
That’s right. After all these days, Yang Guo had finally regrown his right arm. Although it was still not as strong as his left arm, he was still able to use it in a normal way.
The baby was a girl, probably one or two years old. Her head was slightly large due to malnutrition. She was still alive because none of her vitals were pierced by the spear.
“Ah! Ah…”
Waving her short arms and legs, the baby opened her mouth and cried for her parents. But her wound was ripped apart because of her struggling, and the blood that flowed out of her abdomen and mouth further blurred her cry.
“Who is it?”
“He’s a Song native!”
“Kill him!”
Yang Guo’s action, as well as his attack that collapsed the camel that could carry a weight of several thousand kilograms, made the Yuan soldiers who saw the scene change their expressions.
However, instead of running away in fright, they all shouted in rage and spurred the camels they were riding while they swung their long spears and pierced at Yang Guo without any hesitation.
