The Fall of the Golden Empire (Novel) (Volume 1) "Bloody Sunset" by Zhang Baotong
The Quito army, led by the two commanders Chalcuchima and Quiskis, defeated the 80,000 Inca army led by Chief Chamul on the mountain pass plain under Chimborazo, and marched straight in to take advantage of the victory. Chase him all the way. The Incas just looked for the wind and fled, but forgot to arrange some officers and soldiers to guard the dangerous passes and passes to prevent the Quidos from pursuing. Therefore, after the Quitos captured the city of Tumebamba, they carried out crazy revenge on the city. Then, they sent their troops southward and continued to pursue the defeated Inca officers and soldiers. These tens of thousands of troops in Quito only encountered some trouble when encircling and suppressing the remaining Inca troops who fled to Napu Island, and were delayed for some time. After that, they marched day and night non-stop all the way south, and then stopped at Cajamarca. After resting and recuperating, they took advantage of the situation and marched down a long distance until they reached the capital city of Cusco.
However, the strange thing is that along the 1,500 kilometers leading to Cusco, there are almost lofty mountains and dangerous roads. In some places, it can be said that one person is responsible for the pass. If the army is guarded, it can block the passage of the Quito army and buy enough time for the Inca king to mobilize troops from all over the country.
However, on the royal march road from Quito to Cusco, not only were there almost no soldiers guarding it, but the granaries, houses and material warehouses built on both sides of the road were not damaged at all. The large army's pursuit of victory provided very convenient conditions. Therefore, the army of Quito encountered little difficulty and went directly from Cajamarca along the royal road to the ferry of the Apurimac River.
The Apurimac River is the largest tributary of the Amazon River, with a length of 960 kilometers. It flows down from the Chilca Snow Mountains with an altitude of 5200 meters, and passes through the narrow plateau between the Eastern and Western Cordillera Mountains. The river passes through the Apurimac Canyon 13o kilometers west of Cusco and exits the Eastern Cordillera Mountains. It flows down the slopes to Atalaya, where it joins the Urubamba River that also exits the Andes Mountains in southern Peru.
This river can be said to have high mountains and steep banks, rapid rivers, significant drops, and dense waterfalls. It should have become a natural barrier to Cusco, but the Incas gave up this opportunity.
When they arrived at the crossing of the Apurimac River, the Quitos thought that the Inca must have set up an ambush here or wanted to block it, at least it was impossible for the Quitos to cross the river lightly. But to their surprise, the entire ferry was as usual, unattended. And even the rope bridge over the river was not destroyed.
When the sunset shines, the sun has stopped on the Western Mountain. A hundred-meter-long cable bridge is quietly bathing in the afterglow of the setting sun. Under the bridge is a river valley hundreds of meters deep, and the surging river water makes a shocking noise. . A stream of cold wind blew from the valley, making people feel chilly.
It is said that the fifth Inca king, Capac Yupanqui, was the first to build a bridge across the Apurimac River. When he sent troops to march westward, he passed through the wide Apurimac River. King Inca ordered the construction of a bridge to allow the army to pass. To this end, he consulted several skilled Indian craftsmen, drew drawings, and ordered them to be built according to the drawings. When building such a bridge, a large amount of wicker is collected. There are many varieties of wicker, which are slender and flexible. Use three single strands of wicker rope to make a wicker rope that is the same length as the sedan chair, use three three-strand wicker rope to make a nine-strand wicker rope, and then use three nine-strand wicker rope to make a 27-strand thick wicker rope. Finally, the twenty-seven strands of thick wicker were woven into a thicker wicker rope. This keeps increasing the number of shares. The willow rope becomes thicker and thicker until it is as thick as the human body or thicker. A total of five such thick willow ropes were braided and transported to the other side of the river by Indian dry water or rafting.
These Indians tied a thin rope to their bodies, and the thin rope was tied to a thick rope. The thick rope was as thick as a wild ramie branch. A willow rope was tied with this thick rope, and many Indians pulled it until it came from the south bank. Pull it over here to the north bank. After the five willow ropes were pulled over, they were fixed on the two tall bridge piers. The piers are made of exposed rocks on the shore, with large stone holes cut into them to fix the rattan. As for the rope bridge over the Apurimac River, the piers on one side are made of raw rocks from the cliff, and the piers on the other side are built with huge stones because there are no suitable raw rocks on the shore. The piers are hollow and concave, with solid stone walls forming on both sides. Five or six beams as thick as the body of an ox cross the hollow between the two walls of each bridge pier. They are arranged in a ladder shape in order and scale. Each thick wicker is wound around each beam to make the cables The bridge is tight and strong and will not sag due to its huge weight. But no matter how tight it is, it will always loosen into a bow shape, getting lower toward the middle and higher toward the sides. As long as the wind is slightly stronger, it will swing back and forth.
Three thick willow ropes were placed as the bridge deck, and the other two were used as the bridge rails on both sides. On the willow rope used as the bridge deck, thin wood as thick as an arm is laid across it in turn, forming the shape of a large bamboo basket, with the same width as the bridge. The thin wood is placed to protect the willow rope to prevent it from breaking quickly. The heel rope is laid out. They were tied together tightly, and the tied branches were laid out one after another on the thin wood. This was to give the animals a place to rest their hooves and prevent them from slipping. From the willow ropes used as the bridge deck below to the willow ropes used as the bridge rails above, many branches and thin wooden sticks are crisscrossed and tied tightly to form a guardrail of the same length as the bridge. This way, people and animals will be safe. .
The Apurimac River Bridge is the longest of all the bridges in the Inca Empire, about 200 paces long. In order to keep the bridges in good condition, all bridges must be renovated every year, and nearby provinces send dedicated personnel to work and assemble materials.
There is a bridgehead on each side of the bridge for the people who guard the bridge. There are residences for the bridge keepers and a granary inside. The granary is full of corn. Because everyone who wants to cross the bridge must pay two bowls of corn to the bridge guard as a bridge toll. Because they saw the arrival of Quito's army, the bridge defenders had already disappeared without a trace. The rope bridge was neither burned nor destroyed.
Chalkuchma led a group of soldiers to the rope bridge. After looking across the bridge for a while, he saw that the mountains opposite were shining with the light of the setting sun. It was very quiet and peaceful, so he ordered an elite team to cross the bridge. Because the load capacity of the rope bridge is limited, people must cross the bridge one by one, and the rope bridge shakes very badly in the air. However, these battle-experienced soldiers walked quickly as if they were walking on a flat road. Arrived on the other side of the bridge. The commander asked the messenger to shout for the soldiers crossing the bridge to go to the nearby mountains to see if there were any Inca ambushing nearby. The soldiers crossing the bridge looked around for a while and replied that there was no Inca ambush. Therefore, Charkuchma ordered the soldiers to cross the river on the bridge, and then occupied the dock on the other side of the river, so that he could organize the soldiers to cross the river through rafts and rafts.
Because these Quito soldiers have been fighting all year round, they are very good at things like building ships to cross rivers. They cut tree trunks from the river bank, cut off the branches and leaves, and tied the trunks together with strong vines to make rafts or rafts. The raft consists of five or seven long logs tied together. The middle one is the longest, the two adjacent ones are shorter, the outer one is shorter, and the outermost one is the shortest. In this way, the bow of the boat is not flat and can better cut through the water and move forward. The stern is the same as the bow. Two more ropes were tied to drag the raft across the river. Because there is no one to support the raft, a very thick and long rope must be fixed to the big trees or stone pillars on both sides. People can cross the river back and forth by standing on the raft and pulling the rope that stretches from north to south.
However, the river is very wide and the water is fast and the waves are high. It is not only dangerous to cross the river back and forth in this way, but also the number of people carried each time is very limited. Once the Inca army came over, the people in Quito on both sides of the strait could only watch each other from across the strait, but they were unable to save each other. To this end, Chalkuchma asked the soldiers to make dozens of wooden rafts and use very strong ropes or rattan to connect these wooden rafts in series. In this way, the entire raft became a pontoon bridge on the water, allowing the army to continuously pass through the bridge.
At this time, it was late at night and dawn, the river breeze was blowing, the moon was dim, and the entire ferry was illuminated brightly by thousands of torches. The army crossing the river was tense, orderly and busy. Chalkuchma's troops had already secured their camp and began to cross the river on rickety rafts. If at this time, as long as the Inca kill a team of thousands of people, they will deal a heavy blow to Quido. However, the Incas had long since given up on this idea.
After a while, Kiskis' troops also rushed over. The mighty 60,000-strong army gathered at the ferry, crowding the spacious ferry into a sea of people. Although the pontoon bridge built by wooden rafts was much more efficient than using wooden rafts to carry people, due to the strong current, the wooden rafts in the river were carried far away by the river and shook violently. Therefore, the soldiers moved from the bridge You have to be very careful and slow when walking on it. If you don't pay attention, you will fall into the river. The river water is very cold at night, especially if the river water is fast, people will be carried far away. However, in order to worry that the Incas would send people to attack at any time, Chalkuchma always stood on the high point of the ferry to observe and direct the troops to cross the river, and urged the soldiers to speed up from time to time. Even so, the crossing was not fast enough.
Soon, spies came to report that the Inka King Huascar had personally led an army of about 80,000 to 90,000 chiefs and palace nobles, waiting for a decisive battle with them in the Kipaipan Plains. Chalkuchma asked Quiskis to be called, and the two began to discuss how to fight the Incas on the high slope opposite the ferry. However, they only passed by the Quipapan plain area on the outskirts of Cusco on the marching road, but did not observe it on the spot. They were still confident in destroying the Incas and capturing Huascar alive.
After the two armies of 60,000 troops and the follow-up troops of 20,000 troops had all crossed the Apurimac River, Commanders Chalkuchma and Kiskis led the troops on a rapid march along the Royal Road and arrived in the morning. We started camping in a long and narrow mountain valley one hundred kilometers away from Cusco.
