The wind and snow stopped and fell, covering up the trajectory of the attack and hiding the surging death. When the reindeer sleigh ran out of the hills in the middle of the peninsula and onto the coastal plains on the west side, the speed of heading north suddenly accelerated!
Every morning at dawn, the deer set off to the north, walking along the cold coast until dusk in the evening, and can cover nearly two hundred miles a day. The 400-man sled cavalry only traveled north for seven days and covered thousands of miles on the peninsula.
Along the way, the west side is the reflective bright white ice sea, the coast is the vast gray snowfield, and the east side is the gleaming silvery white mountains. And between the ice sea and the mountains are the territories of various mountain branches, as well as the snow-covered tundra. The people marched on a large scale, and occasionally they met panicked and shocked mountain hunters on the coast. After all, this force of more than 400 people is enough to defeat any tribe on this bitter and cold peninsula, and there is no opponent!
At this time, the hunter Mutu, who is driving a six-dog sled, will always rush up quickly to comfort these panicked and fearful small tribes with the name of the shaman of the old grandmother of the mountain. As for the other party's reaction, they either nodded and left uneasily, or they picked up their bows and arrows and joined. The further north you go, the more young people from the small tribes choose to join. It seems that the hostility and hatred of the various mountain tribes towards the deer tribe have long been buried in their hearts and are unbearable.
In the afternoon of this day, exploration captain Zuvalo lay in the mobile tent of the big sled, bumping and falling into a drowsy sleep, showing his true "general style". There is a small heating oven in the reindeer's big tent for sleeping at night and for making simple meals. The strong smell of deer oil and blood in the tent made people feel dizzy, and it was difficult to adapt to it in a short period of time, so they had to make do with it and fall asleep.
"Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!"
"Charge up! Surround them! Kill! Don't leave any of them!..."
The moving sled tent suddenly stopped. Zuvalo, wearing leather armor, finally slept soundly, but suddenly he heard the dull barking of dogs and the low cry of killing outside the tent. He suddenly woke up from his shallow dream. After a few breaths, he took out the copper ax from his waist and got out of the tent.
"The Lord God bless you! Shi Jian! Mu?!...What's wrong? Did you encounter a sneak attack by the Lubu?!..."
"God bless you! Captain, this is not a sneak attack, we encountered a herd of nomadic deer. There were not many of them, dozens of people, and the camp was very small, just over there... The hunters from the mountain tribe dispatched four or five teams. , are surrounding and killing them!..."
"Ah! Nomadic Shikabe? Let me see! Let me take a closer look!..."
Exploration leader Zuvalo stood on tiptoes and looked north. He saw teams of dog-drawn sleds rushing out from the team, carrying the winged hunters from the mountains, and surrounding the camp under the northeastern hills. The camp was built in a low-lying area and could not be clearly seen, except for the hundreds or thousands of reindeer gathered there. The noisy shouts and screams went far to the north and soon became fainter. Even if they were blown by the cold wind, only some short screams could be heard!
Icefield in December, covered with fluffy thick snow. There are porous laminated gaps inside the snow, which are natural sound-absorbing materials that can blur and silence distant sounds.
"O Lord God! The hunters of the Yamabe are very skilled in fighting methods, just like a pack of wolves... No, they control wolf dogs and are themselves a pack of wolves!..."
Zuvarro watched the fighting on the snow. Although it was only a few hundred meters apart, it was separated by a thick curtain, as if he were watching an extremely distant sacrifice.
He watched the hunters in the mountains scatter in all directions and close together, hunting like a pack of wolves, while many frightened reindeer ran around, throwing up large amounts of snow and fog. He watched several deer hunters wrapped in leather robes running in panic in the snow, and were easily caught up and shot down by the mountain sled cavalry. He also looked at the leather-armored man who rushed out at the end, driving a sled with two wolf dogs, and rushed over the mountain at high speed. And the mountain sleds pulled by four teams of six wolf dogs immediately pulled the dog ropes and chased after them!
On a snowfield with calf-deep snow, a brisk sled is much faster than a hard walk. A short-distance dog sled sprint is faster than a long-distance deer sled sprint. As for the sled pulled by six dogs, it is faster than that pulled by two dogs! The leader of the deer tribe worked hard to rush over the top of the mountain and was almost out of Zuvalo's sight. The hunters from the mountain tribe who were chasing him had already caught up with him, only ten meters behind. Then one person on the sled was driving the dog, another person drew the bow, and shot four bone arrows one after another! …
"Whoosh! Whoosh!..."
Zuvalo could not hear the sound with his ears, and could only hear the sound of the shooting bow in his mind. The man immediately turned over and fell to the ground, lying motionless in blood. The two silly dogs pulled the unoccupied sled and ran out of sight. After a moment, they ran back again. They anxiously surrounded their dead master and kept circling, seeming to be shouting with their mouths open, and also seemed a little dazed. Soon, the hunters from the mountains gathered around, took out something and fed it. The silly dogs lowered their heads and ate a few mouthfuls before being led away by their new owners.
"Huh! This kind of tactics that relies on speed and running and shooting, if you don't have a sled and encounter it on the snowy field... it will be really troublesome!..."
The reindeer sleigh tent set off again, heading to the camp they had just captured not far away. Zuvalo was silent and stared at the fallen corpses of the tribesmen around the camp. Many of them had arrows in their vital organs and pierced their leather armor, revealing the precise and powerful shooting of the hunters. The compound recurve bow used by the mountain hunters on their sleds does not seem to be much weaker than the Kingdom's longbow, but the rate of fire is actually faster...
"Blessed by the ancestors and the sacred mountain! None of the fifty or sixty deer tribesmen escaped! Captain Sage, what about the dozens of prisoners in the camp?"
"Mulu, we are about to fight a big war. We don't have time to send people to guard them... Just follow the old rules in the snowfield, keep the fertile women, and kill all the men who are taller than the reindeer!..."
"Well, okay! Captain..."
The hunters in the mountains looked calm. Some were feeding deer and dogs, some were cleaning up camp, and some were setting up bonfires and preparing meals for the night.
"He's a little taller..."
"Then kill him."
"What about this one? It's just right."
"Look at the palms of your hands. Are there any calluses from reindeer roping?"
"Yeah, quite a bit. He's a reindeer since elementary school..."
"Then stay!"
Several senior hunters from the hunting team pulled out the male captives, found a male reindeer that was concentrating on eating lichen, and measured the height. They easily determined the male's life or death: the male who was taller would use The stone knife cut across his neck, and he fell to the snow. The children who were a little lower were pushed into the women and held in the arms of their frightened mothers. As for the old people, there are no two in the tribe, and they will not be left...
Life and death are decided next to the reindeer in the snow. There was no sound or any emotion. It was like the high, cold mountain in the snowfield, or the cold sky in Tengger.
"Witness the Lord God! Mm? Why did you kill these captives Ding Zhuang for nothing?..."
Seeing the understatement of killing in front of him, exploration captain Zuvalo was a little surprised and a little distressed. He found the hunting captain Mu Dog and asked eagerly.
"Grandma promised! Promise me 70% of the captives... Our population in the Haibu is too small, and we need more captives!..."
"Ah? Zu, this is an old rule in the snowy plains! The tribe needs so many mouths to eat, and it will not be able to feed them. These adults are unreliable and will run away... Actually, it is better to bring the women back and have a batch of children. After the children are here, just wait until the children grow up, they will grow up soon!…”
"Mom! We are short of people in the sea department and need strong men who can be used as soon as possible! We also need women and children, but it always takes a few years for the children to grow up... As for food, we will fish from the sea, and we will definitely be able to feed it! Our territory is also in the southernmost part of the peninsula. As long as we can bring it back, we don’t have to worry about them escaping..."
After hearing these words, the hunting captain Mu Quan scratched his head, looked at his son-in-law Zuvalo, and then at the twenty or thirty deer women and children who had been sifted. He blinked apologetically, thought for a while, and then readily made his promise. The lives of these captives are just like the herds of deer captured by the tribe. No matter whether they are alive or dead, people don't care that much. What Yamabe really cares about are hunting grounds and pastures, territories that can support the tribe for a long time and increase the upper limit of the tribe.
"Okay! Once we break through the Lutai River Division, if there are any captured men, we won't kill them and leave them to you!..."
"The Lord God witnesses! You swear to your ancestors!..."
"Okay! Ancestors swear! Now that you can control and support them, the men captured later will be handed over to you!..."
Hunting captain Mu Quan smiled innocently, with the usual simplicity and cruelty of the snowfield nomads. Then, he pointed to the tent where the bonfire was lit and gave a warm invitation.
"Come! Zu, come over and eat roasted deer meat together! The newly killed deer after conquering this tribe!..."
"The powerful Deer Moss River Department is two hundred miles to the north. Tonight everyone will have a feast, and the reindeer and dogs will be fed! Tomorrow we will rush for two hundred miles, even if the deer and dogs are killed, we will not be able to survive. I have to ignore it and kill the main camp of the Lutai River Department!..."
"Blessed by the ancestors and the sacred mountain! Who will own the north of the peninsula during this long winter snowstorm? It all depends on the ax tomorrow!..."
