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The dawn in Anyi was beautiful, perhaps due to the influence of the Great River. Whether it was the nearby trees or the distant mountains, all were cloaked in a thin layer of mist, imbued with a moist vitality that made everything seem so full of life.
But Fei Qian had no mood to appreciate this beauty.
Around early morning, the moisture in the air finally gathered into raindrops, falling from the sky in delicate threads, one drop at a time. Soon, they moistened the long-parched earth. The cracked yellow soil, as if drinking its fill, let out a burp, releasing bubbles before the cracks vanished.
When the yellow earth was sated, it turned to mud, pools of it serving as proof. This rain was a long-awaited blessing for the parched plants, but for Fei Qian, it was far from pleasant.
Rain meant no training for the soldiers…
It wasn't that Fei Qian had the harshness of a taskmaster like Zhou Bapi; it was simply unavoidable. To mold new recruits into a fighting force, training was essential—repetitive drills to build instincts, so that on the battlefield, they could respond instinctively to mid-level officers' commands.
Such instincts weren't formed overnight. They required constant repetition, over and over, until even those who couldn't tell left from right could act correctly under orders.
But now, the rain had interrupted everything.
Fei Qian wasn't foolish enough to order soldiers to stand in formation in this chilly spring rain just to demonstrate military discipline. In an era with scarce medicine, a simple cold could escalate into a widespread outbreak of typhoid. Even ginger soup wasn't a cure-all. Who could guarantee that one or two bowls of it would keep the entire camp free from illness?
The rain also disrupted Fei Qian's plans to stir trouble for the Wei family.
With the rain, outdoor activities were impossible, and copying scrolls in the courtyard was out of the question. The Wei family wouldn't open all their rooms to accommodate a crowd of scholars.
Thus, they opened only the study hall, setting up twenty desks, meaning only the first twenty scholars to arrive could copy books today.
First come, first served—no one could argue, not even those hoping to cause a commotion.
For the wandering swordsmen, blending into a crowd to create chaos was their forte, done without hesitation. But standing openly before the Wei family to confront them directly? Even with a million doses of courage, they wouldn't dare.
Most crucially, it seemed the Wei family would likely adopt this model moving forward: twenty slots, no more, no less, first come, first served.
Now, the attention of the impoverished scholars would focus on securing one of those twenty spots. As for copying the Guicang? Well, they'd need to secure a spot first before dreaming of anything else…
Could this be considered the heavens helping the Wei family?
Jia Qu felt a bit dejected. Both suggestions he had offered Fei Qian had failed to materialize, though they were decent ideas.
Fei Qian, looking at the strings of rain outside the tent, listening to the pattering drops on the canvas, said, "Liangdao, have you ever seen a goshawk hunt?"
Jia Qu replied earnestly, "No. I've read about it in books and seen hawks flying in the sky, but I've never seen one hunt…"
Cough, cough…
Alright, you win.
Fei Qian turned to Jia Qu and said, "A goshawk circles in the sky, seeking the right moment to strike, but it doesn't always catch its prey…"
Jia Qu blinked, beginning to grasp Fei Qian's meaning, and bowed slightly, saying, "I understand your teaching."
Talking to smart people was indeed effortless.
Fei Qian nodded, then turned to Huang Cheng and asked, "Shuye, how's the progress with the soldiers' training?"
"Everything's normal. But…" Huang Cheng scratched the back of his head, "…we're short on tunzhang (company commanders) and junhou (battalion commanders)…"
This was a tricky issue.
In the Han military structure, the smallest unit was the wu (squad), with five men led by a wuzhang (squad leader). Two wu formed a shi (section), with ten men led by a shizhang (section leader). Five shi formed a dui (platoon), with fifty men led by a duilü (platoon leader). Two dui formed a tun (company), with one hundred men led by a tunzhang. Two tun formed a qu (battalion), with two hundred men led by a junhou.
The tunzhang and junhou ranks were critical, bridging the gap between upper and lower levels. The problem was that not just anyone could fill these roles.
A good wuzhang could easily become a good shizhang, as the number of men only doubled from five to ten.
But being a duilü was far more challenging. If a wuzhang led the most basic combat unit, a duilü was the lowest-ranking commander, responsible for a platoon of five sections, organized into front, rear, left, right, and center—a small formation. They had to consider how to deploy, engage, and rotate troops.
For tunzhang and junhou, with even larger units, the responsibilities grew exponentially.
Of the fifteen Huang family soldiers Fei Qian had brought, three died at Hangu Pass, leaving twelve. These men now held basic officer roles, but their numbers were far from sufficient.
With the influx of new recruits and not enough veterans to lead them, this was a thorny problem with no immediate solution.
Fei Qian had considered giving extra training to these junior officers, but such measures wouldn't yield instant results, especially with the sudden surge of new recruits.
A unit's combat strength didn't depend on how robust the new recruits were but on how resilient the veterans were and their proportion. With equal equipment, a unit of pure veterans could easily overpower two or three times their number of green recruits.
Fei Qian's current ratio of new to veteran soldiers was nearly 2:1, and it would likely worsen. Huang Cheng had raised a pressing issue.
At that moment, a soldier braved the rain to report that over thirty people were at the camp gate, claiming to be Ma clan remnants from old Shangjun, requesting an audience.
"Remnants of old Shangjun? The Ma clan?" Fei Qian repeated softly, puzzled, then overjoyed.
He stood, walked to the tent's entrance, picked up an umbrella, hesitated, then set it down, stepping directly into the rain…
Huang Cheng and Jia Qu exchanged a glance and hurriedly followed.
The spring rain wasn't heavy but was cold, quickly soaking their clothes…
Fei Qian reached the camp gate, and through the misty rain, he saw a somewhat familiar figure, a slight smile forming on his face…