In this era, strong men are the foundation for the successful survival of a regime. There are three major tribes in Karelia. Among them, the Isotarva tribe of the Great Horde has the largest population and is able to dominate the family.
The Dazhang tribe was arrogant because of the large number of people, and because of the large number of people, they had to take the initiative to expand and find the most abundant pastures for grazing reindeer in the forest and snow fields.
The past glory was suddenly lost with a tragic defeat. Although as many as 10,000 people still managed to escape from the large camp by the lake, the tribe's military capabilities had been dealt a fatal blow. Nearly 4,000 men died in this battle. The tribe was almost destroyed.
Are they about to collapse?
The young women fled with their children. They had to take care of a large herd of deer, and their escape was too hasty. This group of people did not escape too far. Fortunately, they were covered by the forest, and their existence had not been detected by the Ross army.
If Rurik seizes the time and orders the army to pursue and kill regardless of priority, the Russian army can probably catch the fugitives and obtain sufficient results.
He did not do this because he would not risk the entire army at a time when the enemy's situation was unclear and the geographical situation was unclear.
The invaders did not continue to advance, and the fleeing Karelian women did not know whether they were already at war or what the situation would be like.
Finally, hundreds of defeated men crossed the forest in despair. On a dark cloudy night, they saw a bonfire formation under the mound in the distance.
Could that be the enemy? The frightened men were so frightened that they would rather wait until daytime. When they saw clearly the brown-grey shadows of winter, they concluded that they were huge deer herds, and then they walked away confidently and boldly.
The Karelian women's new camp is thirty kilometers away from the destroyed Isotalva camp. This seems not that far away, but now that there are no roads, they are escaping with their children and belongings all the way. , according to the plan, they will go straight to the winter pastures in the north.
Even if the Rus' army does not start a war, the Karelian Great Horde tribes will still begin to migrate. Winter is not far away, and winter grazing related to next year's reindeer herd breeding must start early in the autumn. Even for domesticated reindeer, migration is an instinct engraved in their genes. The spontaneous migration of reindeer has been broken by human domestication. Are they actually migrating under the leadership of their Karelian masters? But looking back, the Karelia people, who rely heavily on reindeer breeding, are also forced to migrate with their domesticated livestock every year.
Unless they have a steady supply of high-energy feed, winter grazing becomes redundant.
Animal husbandry is an alienated form of agriculture, and the reindeer herd is like a "walkable field."
Ross needed to control large numbers of livestock to supplement his burgeoning plantation agriculture, and Ross's demand for pelts of all colors only grew each year. So the Karelians, who control an astonishing number of reindeer, must either surrender their humans and animals or die.
Rurik did not engrave such a strategy on the wooden board, but he did launch a war with a large army to achieve this goal.
The Karelian women who evacuated with their deer herd were not stupid either. When the defeated people of their tribe suddenly appeared, the heartbreaking news instantly spread throughout the camp, and for a while there was a lot of wailing...
What to do next? What do the intruders want to do?
They used themselves to save others and also knew the enemy's purpose: to kill the men, kidnap the women and children, and kill all the deer.
The Karelian Tribe Alliance used this strategy to deal with the Tavastians, and they were the source of a group of slaves who evacuated with the women.
Isotalwa has disintegrated, and to make matters worse, an autumn rain has finally fallen.
In the desolate environment, more than 10,000 people from the Dazhang tribe drove a total of as many as 200,000 large and small reindeer and dragged wooden carts towards the winter pasture. A large amount of tent materials were lost, and thousands of people could only rely on the dense pine needles of the red pine forest to protect themselves from the rain. The rain protection effect was negligible. The woods were full of shivering shelters, and the plague also began to appear.
Some people catch a cold and cough desperately, while others die directly from hypothermia.
The rain has been going on for three days. In these short three days, more than a hundred infant children died, adding another sorrow to this tribe that had suffered a great disaster.
Even the older priests were in critical condition due to weakness and illness, and finally even the priests died on a rainy night...
People dug pits in the mud and buried the dead, large and small, praying that their souls would smoothly enter the sea of ancestral souls and no longer suffer in this mortal world.
Some women lost their husbands and children and had to run to the northern winter pastures in the cold and damp conditions. Their own situation was also precarious and they were so weak that they were about to die. More than fifty women looked for vines, strips of cloth, and even tendons to bind supplies, using them as ropes to tie their necks and end their lives quietly.
The rain lasted for eight whole days! When the sun finally emerged again, the once-mighty Great Horde tribe had lost as many as a thousand men during the rains.
The bow drill, the only fire-making tool that could be used in the muddy environment, could not complete the ignition. When the dried meat they carried was eaten, they could only kill the deer, eat the fresh deer meat and drink the deer blood.
Young children can only eat raw meat like adults. They complain that the meat is not delicious, and their mother blames all this on the intruders.
Some children ignorantly asked when their father would come back. Will he return to the camp next year?
The more the child asked this question, the more the mother cried.
The mother can only pinch the child's face and order him to take revenge when he grows up...
This fleeing team did not simply rush to the winter pastures. When the material problem encountered big trouble, they took the initiative to rush to the small tent tribe, hoping to get help from their traditional allies.
Even though the situation was tragic, a miracle happened!
A team came from the distance, and the frightened people gathered around the reindeer herd. The men dragged their tired bodies, holding spears, and looked warily at the group of people coming from the west.
Soon the alert was lifted, and the person who came was not an enemy, but our chief Valheba!
A thousand of the strongest warriors of the Karelian Great Tribe were walking on the smoothest road back, and the entanglement with the Suomi people delayed the great chief Valkhba for some time. They left the lakes in the west again. They were a group of people carrying more than a hundred canoes and walked overland through the flat forest area, and then found streams in the damn rain and rushed to their hometown.
They moved forward in twists and turns of waterways and drifted in heavy rain. Not only did people have to struggle to control the boat from being capsized by the turbulence, but they also had to fight against the cold. They were very surprised to see a crowd not far away, and after a little exploration, everyone was shocked.
The family was finally reunited, but this reunion caused the soldiers fighting on the front line to almost collapse psychologically.
Valkhba is the chief of the tribe and the leader of the entire Karelia.
He is also a man, the husband of his wife, the father of his children, and the brother of his relatives.
Both his brothers and nephews died for the tribe, and the entire tribe's strong and young men were lost. Now there are less than 2,000 men who can hold weapons.
The large camp by the lake collapsed, his wife and concubines were missing, and his younger sons were either massacred or died on the muddy road to escape.
Valherba looked up at the sun and cursed loudly, then hugged his head and cried. Suddenly, his head buzzed and he fell to the ground.
What a cruel blow is this?
Thousands of people have been running around in sorrow for so many days. The appearance of the great chief is a miracle. The low morale has just improved. Now the great chief has fallen. There are rumors that the chief died in grief.
This is not the case, but the situation is not much better.
Valheba was suffering from a high fever. Lying in the temporary tent, he completely broke his original plan of returning to the lakeside camp to defend against the enemy.
The original plan was completely meaningless. The Great Tribe was finished. At least he personally felt that he had no hope of making an offer.
What he needed most was the truth, so when he was dying, his eldest son sat next to him, and he invited several escaped men who had personally participated in the battle to enter the tent to explain the situation.
Five people came, and they saw the great chief suppressing his blushes, or falling to the ground crying out of shame or sadness.
"You...don't cry. Tell me, what happened to Isotalva? What exactly was the attack...Why did you lose...lose so miserably!"
The last word was actually emphasized, and everyone saw that the chief actually spat out a mouthful of old blood.
Yes, why did it fail so miserably? It is incomprehensible in any way based on Valkhba’s three views.
Even if they were involved in the battle, those who fled did not fully understand how they were defeated.
Someone explained: "Azailas sent people to guard the mouth of the river, but the enemy's ships were as big as mounds, and their masts were as high as the pine trees here. Those ships fired deadly javelins, and our arrows could not hit them. Our people were They were easily killed. A horde of iron giants jumped from their armor, and the enemy could not be killed. Spears and arrows could kill deer, but they had no effect on them."
Such rhetoric is too ridiculous, but in fact, this is what the Karelian warriors think of the Russian Viking army.
But in the eyes of the Suomi people, this is what the Rus army looked like. When the Ross fleet suddenly appeared, their tentative attack was easily crushed. The leader Uko, who knew the current situation, immediately surrendered. Only by playing the role of a submissive hound and the magical "internal aid" of Jevro did he get Su Peace among the Omi people under Rus.
Then someone else said: "I saw the Tavastians. There are many of them, and they follow the iron giants to kill us."
"Tavastiya?!" Valkh Bachchan, who was squinting, worked up his energy to sit up. Just as he was about to say something, he found another mouthful of old blood.
"Father." His son immediately helped him up.
"Don't help me, let him continue talking."
"Yes." The man continued: "They must be Tavastia people. They must have traded their souls with the mysterious iron giant. We all know that only Tavastia hates us the most in this world. Maybe all this will It was their plan to sell their souls in exchange for the evil god's army. How can we defeat the god's army? Everyone at the Bear Altar was killed, and our Isotalwa camp is full of slain people."
Someone quickly followed this statement and explained: "Lord Aisaelas must have noticed this situation and made the women flee with the deer. We fought until the end, no matter how we were the opponents of the magic soldiers, we successfully found other People, please forgive us, Chief."
The Tavastians sold their souls and signed a contract with the evil god in exchange for the "Iron Giant" to destroy the Great Horde.
Valherba felt that this was believable, and even felt that it was the only reasonable explanation.
But his son Kaskuwe thought this was ridiculous.
"The army of the evil god defeated us? The Tavastians do not have this ability yet. Father, this world must be very huge. Maybe a powerful enemy from outside the territory is eyeing us..."
"We didn't see the Tavastians in the west at all. They disappeared! Many people must have sacrificed their souls." Valheba ordered his son to shut up first, and then sighed.
The tent fell into deathly silence. Finally, as the chief, Valheba spoke. He had thought a lot.
"If it is a new enemy from outside the territory, we may kill them. If it is the army of the evil god, when the Tavastians have no more sacrifices, the evil god will not continue to help them." He I don’t know the truth, but this dialectical speculation has indeed found psychological comfort for the confused and frightened people of the Dazhang tribe.
"We may not be able to defeat the evil god's army, so we should evacuate first. If it is actually a new enemy, we can still win by recharging our strength. Son!"
"Father." Caskuwe quickly turned his head.
"I'm going to die... Now I hand over the entire tribe to you. You are not afraid of evil gods or any enemies. This is why everyone recognizes you as the next leader. Now that the tribe has suffered a catastrophe, only the remaining men are left to fight. There are more than 1,000 people, and we still have 10,000 women and children who need to be protected by them, as well as more than 100,000 reindeer... You must not recklessly seek revenge on the enemy."
"I will."
Seeing that his son's attitude was not firm, Valheba suddenly raised his arm, gripped his son's elbow, and said while spitting blood: "At least for a few years! No revenge is allowed! Before we understand the enemy's situation, we will not be able to recapture it. Bear Altar.”
His hands were covered with blood vomited by his father. Kaskuwe opened his eyes wide in fear, "I dare not disobey."
"You are the leader now. Take my sword and lead all the clansmen to the small tent tribe. You go to marry the daughter of the leader over there. You must unite all the Karelia people! This is a disaster for all of us. , you have to lead the others to fight to the end!"
After saying that, Valherba had already passed out...
That night, the chief of the Karelian alliance fell into a coma due to high fever. His vomiting of blood was actually stomach bleeding. This was a secret he hid from his tribe. Now he suffered a series of blows. Gastric bleeding combined with severe fever finally led to his death. His life. The blood blocked the trachea, and Valkhba, who was in a coma, died of suffocation.
The chief died of illness, and the people who were talking a lot early in the morning heard the bad news.
The people whose tears have dried up are now left with howls. They are not only sad for the death of the chief, but also sad for themselves and their tribe's tragic fate.
Such a cruel scene did not frighten Kaskuwe. He stood tall and wore a gold-decorated antler crown that symbolized the leader's status. He raised high the broad-bladed iron sword of the great leader left by his father and declared that he would immediately Succession.
"People! My father's soul has gone to the ancestral spirit! I am now your leader, and the leader of all Karelia people. We are going to build a new camp in the winter pasture! Women! Give birth! Men ! Guard our women and let them give birth safely! Guard our children and let them grow up safely! In ten years, we can recover.
I will bring you into a closer alliance with the Xiaozhang tribe. I will marry their women. I will still be the big leader recognized by all tribes. I will definitely lead you to regain your brothers and regain our lost glory! "
What they need most is hope, and Caskuwe gives them hope. He is not a born brave leader, events create people, and he must lead his people to get back on their feet immediately after the catastrophe.
He was not the bravest warrior on the battlefield, and now he must be the first warrior of the Great Tribe, even if he is still acting.
Valkhba ended his life. He was already suffering from an old disease. It was his greatest hope for the rest of his life to carve out a large fertile land from the lakes of the west to become the new paradise of Karelia. He died and his dream was gone.
There was no glorious funeral, just a muddy pit that was his grave. There was no tomb, no tombstone, and no markers of any kind. This was Valheba's last wish for his successor. If the tribe suffered a devastating blow during his tenure, he would not deserve a funeral and should be hastily buried as a guilty person.
The reindeer trampled the earth flat, and the whole tribe began to run north in the new rain, enduring the cold and shedding tears.
History followed the general trend at this moment. Rurik basically expelled the Karelia people a generation ahead of schedule and essentially occupied the entire lakeside area of Lake Ladoga.
This is not an escape for the Karelia people, but a strategic contraction that they have to make for future counterattacks.
Kaskuwe became the new chief. He categorically did not believe what those people said. The "iron giant of the evil god" was the nonsense of those who were frightened. It was to excuse the self of those who fled the battlefield. It must be the new enemy. ! The so-called conclusive statements are ridiculous, because Suomi prisoners captured in the West are saying that the Tavastians were completely killed by the Russian army.
Ross? The enemy should be Ross!
The more he thought about it, the more reliable it seemed to Caskuwe, and finally he began to preach the results of his "investigation" to the people who were migrating.
Those were not the "apostles of the evil god", but the Rus, a group of bandits who came from a distant place, the bandits who made the Suomi people surrender, and the bandits who killed the entire Tavastia clan.
The enemy is human! Even people can be killed. As long as everyone cultivates their martial virtues again, victory will belong to Karelia.
Kaskuwei has already guessed the truth of the matter, but the entire immigrant group is still struggling with the fact that they were defeated by the evil god's army.
It wasn't until the priest who spread the news about the "evil god" was directly killed by Kaskuwei, and threatened to kill anyone who dared to speak ill of the truth again, that everyone was forced to shut up.
Finally, they braved the new rain and arrived at the winter pasture, the traditional winter pasture of the Dazhang tribe, not far from the White Sea. This is already an extremely remote area, and the cold weather always accompanies it. After losing half of its people and 20% of its reindeer, the Dazhang tribe finally fled here to start a new life.
Many people believe that they finally escaped the land of right and wrong...
