Chapter Summaries

Luo Chong visited Liuyang Commandery during the winter to check on its crowded townships and the food shortage among its people. He turned to the frozen river and asked whether fish could be caught beneath the ice.

• Luo Chong ordered the Hanyang County Office to conduct a household census and create bamboo-slip household registers, then left with supplies for Liuyang Commandery.
• Dashu and the other Patriarchs welcomed Luo Chong, while Dashu explained that a late influx of newcomers had left people eating two bowls of thin porridge a day.
• Dashu reported that veteran clanspeople resented sharing their grain with the newcomers, but there had been no fighting because the newcomers were reclaiming wasteland for food.
• Luo Chong inspected Shangtian Township, Linze Township, and crowded Fengyi Township, then said some newcomers could be moved to Ruyang Commandery next year.
• Luo Chong asked Dashu whether fish could be caught beneath the frozen river's ice, and Dashu questioned whether it was possible.

Luo Chong organized the people of Liuyang Commandery to catch fish beneath the frozen river using a huge dragnet, easing the winter food shortage with a massive haul. By nightfall, they had cast five nets, gathered more than two hundred thousand pounds of fish, and distributed the catch among households.

• Luo Chong led the tribesmen in drilling holes through the ice and threading a huge dragnet beneath the river.
• Luo Chong directed the people to spread the net under the ice, where it trapped fish that leaped through the holes.
• Luo Chong ordered the crowd to stay off the ice, then led thousands of people in hauling the fish-filled net ashore.
• The tribesmen brought in several thousand fish and softshell turtles, then marked the ice holes so they could fish there again.
• Luo Chong moved the fishing teams to new locations, and they cast five nets in one day, catching more than two hundred thousand pounds of fish.
• Dashu and the Patriarchs distributed the fish among households while people cleaned, gutted, and hung the catch to preserve it.

Luo Chong returned to Hanyang City with a huge haul of fish and learned that Rat Shaman had stopped eating after losing his role overseeing the warehouses. Luo Chong offered him a new position as Imperial Observatory Official, and Rat Shaman agreed to record the sun’s shadow.

• Luo Chong finished the winter fishing operation, sent fish to Ruyang Commandery, and brought the remaining fish and fish bladders back to Hanyang City.
• Big Mouse told Luo Chong that Rat Shaman had not eaten for days, so Luo Chong went to visit him.
• Rat Shaman explained that he had lost his warehouse duties and felt useless, despite being glad that the tribe’s people now had food and shelter.
• Luo Chong realized Rat Shaman could still serve the tribe by using his knowledge of the stars and calendar.
• Luo Chong appointed Rat Shaman Imperial Observatory Official and explained that he would record the sun’s shadow rather than look directly at the sun.

Luo Chong established the Han Tribe’s Imperial Observatory Official and reviewed Hanyang City’s census and production plans. He then began a demonstration to show Big Mouse why crossbows were useful, but the chapter ended after children struggled to shoot longbows.

• Luo Chong appointed the Rat Shaman as Observatory Director and a female student as deputy, then established the Imperial Observatory Official to record the sun’s movements and announce the time.
• Luo Chong reviewed Hanyang City’s census, found that all 594 homes were occupied, and ordered Bai Qi to produce a standardized household-registration form.
• Luo Chong inspected the Woodworking Workshop’s production quotas for cavalry bows and infantry crossbows as Big Mouse argued that longbows were better.
• Luo Chong led Big Mouse and the others to the plaza and recruited five children to compare the weapons’ accuracy.
• Big Mouse taught the children to shoot longbows, but their arrows missed the Straw Target or fell at their feet.

Luo Chong compared longbows and crossbows by having five youths practice with both, then explained why crossbows suited the Han Tribe despite their slower firing speed. Big Mouse accepted that crossbows were easier to learn, less tiring to use, and especially useful for defending a city.

• Big Mouse scolded five youths for their poor longbow shots, but Luo Chong told him to continue the test and then have them try crossbows.
• You Ye taught the youths how to load, aim, and fire crossbows, and all five hit the target in each of their three rounds.
• Luo Chong explained to Big Mouse that crossbowmen could be trained much faster than archers and could shoot accurately without sustaining a longbow's draw weight.
• Ying Rui pointed out that crossbows would help defend city walls because they could be used for long periods and required little strength or training.
• Big Mouse agreed that crossbows had distinct advantages and that a weapon's suitability depended on its users and purpose.

Luo Chong unveiled a three-bow bed crossbow and described ways it could launch explosive and incendiary bamboo bolts, while its limited production kept it from being deployed widely. He then sent three groups of interns to Liuyang Commandery with standardized household forms and official uniforms, and explained the clothing and rank-marked hats he had designed for Great Han officials.

• Luo Chong showed the Woodworking Workshop a three-bow bed crossbow that its craftsmen could draw with a rear winch.
• You Ye suggested using lighter bolts, and Luo Chong proposed filling bamboo shafts with explosives and tung oil to make them destructive projectiles.
• Luo Chong said the bed crossbow was only a prototype and that the tribe lacked enough craftsmen to equip city defenses at scale.
• Luo Chong returned to the county office and asked Bai Qi about the printing progress of standardized household registration forms.
• Luo Chong selected the three best-performing groups of interns and sent them to Liuyang Commandery with forms, official uniforms, seals, and rank-marked Beam Crowns.

Luo Chong planned the Han Tribe’s expansion, laws, etiquette, schools, and exploration for the coming year. Big Strength then warned that the rivers were rising unusually fast, and Luo Chong rushed to investigate the threat of flooding and prepare for a possible evacuation.

• Luo Chong planned to build Horse Binding Pass and Ruyang Commandery, settle incoming tribes across three locations, and launch two river Exploration Caravans.
• Luo Chong set out to compile Han Rites and a Law Code, while assigning students as teachers, officials, and exploration-record keepers.
• Big Strength reported that the Ru River and Liuyang River were rising faster than in previous years and might flood farmland and cities.
• Luo Chong ordered Big Strength to summon the Elder, Beast Tooth, One-Ear, Stone, Feather, Big Mouth, and other longtime Han Tribe members to inspect the river at the eastern city gate.

Luo Chong prepared Hanyang City for a possible flood after noticing the moat’s unusually high water level and suspected a downstream blockage. In Liuyang Commandery, Dashu learned that southern migrants had fled devastating floods the previous summer, revealing that the danger was real and raising questions about why the water was rising again.

• Luo Chong noticed the moat was much higher than usual and ordered flood precautions, including filling Hemp Sacks, blocking city gates and sewers, and cutting the moat off from nearby rivers.
• Luo Chong suspected that a downstream blockage was trapping water and sent word to Liuyang Commandery to check river levels.
• Dashu and the Patriarchs confirmed that the Liuyang River was also rising, then gathered to discuss what to do.
• Patriarch Hua revealed that floods had destroyed southern settlements and forced his tribe to migrate north.
• Dashu learned that more than forty tribes had fled the southern floods and asked the Patriarchs when the disasters had occurred and how severe they were.

After Dashu's report confirmed that a downstream landslide had blocked the Liuyang River and formed a growing barrier lake, Luo Chong decided to open a breach rather than evacuate the Han Tribe. He assembled a large expedition and summoned eyewitnesses to guide it, then asked whether they could still find the landslide beneath the floodwaters.

• Dashu heard a Young Chieftain describe how delayed flooding had forced his people to move upstream, then warned the old Patriarchs to watch the newcomers and sent Luo Chong detailed reports about the river.
• Luo Chong concluded that downstream mudslides had blocked the river and created a barrier lake that threatened to flood several commanderies, so he decided to clear the blockage.
• Luo Chong ordered Dashu to prepare flood defenses and send at least three hundred able-bodied men, while he organized boats, equipment, weapons, food, and glycerin for the operation.
• Luo Chong recruited men in Hanyang City, including experienced boat handlers, and the three hundred men from Liuyang Commandery arrived after four days of preparation.
• Luo Chong summoned the Young Chieftains who had witnessed the landslide and asked whether one of them could guide the expedition to the old river channel and collapsed rocks.

Luo Chong led a 400-person boat fleet south to investigate the mountain collapse believed to have created a vast barrier lake. After a slow first day on the water, the fleet entered flooded forests where submerged vegetation made travel difficult, and camped overnight under guard.

• Luo Chong summoned Young Chieftains, including Patriarch Hua, to help identify where the mountain had collapsed, then ordered them to prepare for an expedition.
• Ying Rui showed the Young Chieftains Hanyang City's workshops and boats, while workers prepared clothing, flatbread, and other provisions for the journey.
• Luo Chong appointed Ying Rui to oversee Hanyang Commandery and spring farming during his absence, then led the 400-person fleet out onto the Ru River.
• The fleet learned to row in formation and traveled south as the river widened and submerged trees revealed the extent of the flooding.
• Luo Chong concluded that a vast, deep barrier lake had formed downstream after the fleet struggled through flooded woods and moored among the trees for the night.

Luo Chong’s fleet found corpses in the river, rescued a woman who had been thrown into the water, and continued toward an island despite her warning. As they approached, they saw an old man conducting a ritual and two children being thrown into the lake as sacrifices, prompting Luo Chong to order an immediate rescue.

• Luo Chong warned the fleet not to drink river water after they found a dead Cave Lion and other animal corpses.
• Luo Chong discovered that a woman floating on driftwood was alive and pulled her aboard, giving her his Bear Skin Coat and food.
• The rescued woman warned Luo Chong not to approach an island, but he ordered the fleet to land after the men spotted cooking smoke.
• Luo Chong saw an old man with Deer Antlers conducting a ritual as two adults threw a pair of young children into the water.
• Luo Chong ordered the fleet to row faster and rescue the children before anyone could eat.

Luo Chong rescued the Zhan Tribe’s child sacrifices and landed his fleet on their flooded mountain, where his armed force confronted the tribe. After a crossbow shot stopped their charge, Zhan Mao approached to negotiate.

• Luo Chong’s fleet rescued the two children from the river, and Luo Chong treated them until they revived.
• Luo Chong ordered the boats to circle the island and find a place to land while the Zhan Tribe mistook him for a thief who had stolen their sacrifices.
• The Zhan Tribe’s flooding and food shortage had driven them to sacrifice people in hopes of appeasing the River God and making the waters recede.
• Luo Chong’s people landed and formed a defensive square as Zhan Mao led hundreds of Zhan tribespeople toward them.
• Luo Chong shot a charging tribesman in the thigh with his crossbow, stopping the crowd, and Zhan Mao approached the formation to negotiate.

Luo Chong negotiated with Zhan Mao’s tribe, treating their wounded man and trading rice seed for White Salt. He used a sand table to explain how to drain the Barrier Lake, and Zhan Mao understood that the Han Tribe needed to find and reopen the blocked river channel.

• Luo Chong refused to return the three sacrifices and warned Zhan Mao’s tribe not to disturb the Han Tribe’s camp.
• Zhan Mao and the shaman decided to approach Luo Chong, hoping to negotiate for the Han Tribe to take them away from the flooded mountain.
• Luo Chong fed the rescued girl and two children, then arranged for a Snake Tribe healer to treat the wounded Zhan Tribe man.
• Zhan Mao traded a sack of Paddy Rice to Luo Chong, who gave him White Salt in return.
• Zhan Mao asked Luo Chong to use the Wood Boats to evacuate his people, but Luo Chong said the Han Tribe had come to lower the rising water.
• Luo Chong reenacted the flood and the formation of the Barrier Lake on a Sand Table, showing Zhan Mao how reopening the blocked river channel would drain it.

Luo Chong secured Zhan Mao’s help in locating the landslide blocking the Great River, then led a fleet southeast to investigate it. He found the collapsed riverbed and spotted several glittering objects on the dry ground below.

• After seeing Luo Chong’s sand-table explanation, Zhan Mao agreed to provide two guides to help locate the landslide, while keeping open the possibility of leaving with the Han Tribe.
• Zhan Mao and the Zhan Shaman approved the plan, and the next morning Luo Chong prepared his people to set out while the girl chose to stay with him.
• Luo Chong took the girl and two children aboard ten boats with Zhan Mao and a guide, then sent a letter to Ying Rui by giant eagle.
• Zhan Mao guided the fleet southeast through a great waterway, where Luo Chong found the collapsed rocks blocking the river and saw glittering objects on the exposed riverbed.

Luo Chong discovered gold in the dried riverbed below the collapsed Barrier Lake and hid his plan to reopen the waterway from Zhan Mao. He persuaded Zhan Mao to arrange the Zhan Tribe’s relocation to the Han Tribe’s settlement, leaving the two tribes preparing to move while Zhan Mao remained wary of the arrangement.

• Luo Chong sent You Ye and Big Strength with their crews to inspect the exposed riverbed, where they found abundant gold particles.
• Luo Chong ordered everyone to leave the dangerous riverbed and kept his excitement over the gold hidden.
• Zhan Mao suggested that the Han Tribe transport the stranded Zhan Tribe upstream, and Luo Chong pretended to be helpless so Zhan Mao would propose leaving.
• Luo Chong agreed to transport the Zhan Tribe to the Han Tribe’s settlement in groups, while Zhan Mao offered payment and negotiated safeguards.
• Luo Chong agreed that a Zhan tribesman could return with each empty boat to report on the destination, but required the Zhan Tribe to provide its own food and clothing during the journey and temporary stay.

Luo Chong organized the Zhan Tribe’s evacuation while preparing workers to breach the dam, and the first group of migrants reached Hanyang City. The newcomers were settled in the Han Tribe’s teaching buildings, leaving the Zhan shaman awestruck by the city and its windmill.

• Luo Chong planned to open a gap in the dam by clearing downstream silt and using explosives from upstream, while Zhan Mao prepared the Zhan Tribe’s first group of migrants.
• Luo Chong asked Ying whether she would leave with her tribespeople, and she chose to stay with him; he learned her name and renamed her Zhan Ying.
• Zhan Mao’s first group boarded boats under Big Strength’s leadership, while Luo Chong sent You Ye and workers to begin clearing silt below the dam.
• After two days on the river, Big Strength brought the migrants past one Han Tribe settlement and delivered them to Hanyang City, where Ying Rui received them.
• Ying Rui housed the Zhan Tribe’s people in a cleared Teaching Building, and the Zhan shaman stared in amazement at the city and its windmill.

The Zhan Tribe immigrants settled into Hanyang City and were astonished by its buildings, livestock, and way of life as Ying Rui followed Luo Chong’s plan to win them over. Luo Chong invited Zhan Mao to the dam, where he intended to show him how the Han Tribe could solve the problem of the enormous boulders, while Ying Rui began early spring plowing to prepare for expanded farming.

• Ying Rui housed the first 300 Zhan Tribe immigrants in the Teaching Building, provided porridge and animal hides, and allowed them to explore the city under a curfew.
• The immigrants watched Hanyang City’s children play, examined its wells and workshops, and marveled at the livestock and youths riding horses in the Breeding Area.
• Big Strength returned to the island with supplies, additional people, and two new ships, while Zhan Mao heard reports of Hanyang City and waited for the next group to depart.
• Luo Chong sent workers to clear silt downstream of the dam, but sand and water kept flowing through the stones and threatened to block the dam again.
• Luo Chong invited Zhan Mao to visit the dam, and Zhan Mao traveled there with Zhan Ying and attendants while warning his people to guard their camp.
• Ying Rui began spring plowing early so Hanyang City could expand its fields and supply grain to Ruyang Commandery and Horse Binding Pass.

Luo Chong used nitroglycerin jars to blast open the dam, release the river, and awe Zhan Mao into joining the Han Tribe. After Zhan Mao pledged loyalty, he proposed bringing the relocated tribespeople back to farm the newly exposed fertile land, and Luo Chong viewed his suggestion with suspicion.

• Luo Chong sent sealed jars of nitroglycerin into the dam's whirlpools, and the explosions blasted a wide opening through the boulder barrier.
• Zhan Mao mistook the blast for divine power, and he and the others knelt before Luo Chong as his tribesmen praised him.
• After waiting for the floodwaters to subside, Luo Chong and the others returned downstream and found the camp's remaining tribespeople gathering stranded fish.
• Luo Chong offered Zhan Mao leadership as the Zhan Clan's Patriarch in the Han Tribe, and Zhan Mao pledged loyalty.
• Zhan Mao proposed bringing back the relocated tribespeople to farm the fertile river flats, and Luo Chong suspected he was putting on an act.

After returning from the flooded lands with the Zhan Tribe, Luo Chong began plans to integrate them and reorganize the Han Tribe as its population grew. He prepared a general assembly to introduce household-based administration and a state-controlled Land Allotment System, but had not yet announced the detailed plan.

• Luo Chong named the restored gorge Dark Gorge, the converging river Gold Sand River, the plain Jinchuan, and the forest Giant Wood before bringing Zhan Mao and the others back to Hanyang City.
• Zhan Mao saw the Han Tribe’s irrigation, livestock-powered plowing, and varied crops, then discovered that Luo Chong had already sown the Zhan Tribe’s glutinous rice seeds and begun teaching his people to farm.
• Luo Chong ordered 2,500 households from Liuyang Commandery moved to Ruyang Commandery and Horse Binding Pass, and arranged for You Ye to meet two northern Tribe Alliances migrating south with livestock.
• Luo Chong planned a post-plowing general assembly to establish household-based military administration and introduce the Private Ownership System through state-allotted land.
• Luo Chong drafted rules granting adults twenty mu each, assigning women Auxiliary Fields, and giving children tax-free plots that increased when they reached six years old.

Luo Chong devised land, tax, livestock, and Wildmen policies to grow the Han Tribe’s population and territory, while lamenting that he had to formulate the rules without capable advisers. As spring migration began, Suritu’s tribe traveled in Han-style clothing and used carts, while Suritu carved a high-backed saddle and stirrups.

• Luo Chong planned tax-exempt land for families who raised children, livestock rentals and sales to ease farm labor, and a system that gave outsiders two years of service before granting them Han Tribe citizenship.
• Luo Chong designed registration, collective penalties, and tax-cut rewards to prevent citizens from keeping Wildmen as permanent private slaves.
• Luo Chong concluded that the policies needed regional adaptation and centralized rule, then sighed over the burden of governing without advisers able to help formulate laws.
• In the middle of spring, Suritu’s tribe migrated to its pastures using six carts they had acquired from the Han Tribe’s caravan.
• Suritu traveled in clothing modeled on Han Tribe styles and carved a high-backed saddle and a pair of stirrups from wood and woven rattan.