Kang Country, Wu Province.
Wu Province had not always been called Wu Province. It was once called Ten Crows.
Why had Ten Crows changed its name, and why had it become part of Kang Country? The story began with the Battle of Yonggu Pass.
When the battle ended, Ten Crows' elite forces had suffered a devastating blow. Many nobles had perished, and the young and able-bodied had been killed or wounded in great numbers. The Ten Crows royal court had completely lost its grip on the tribes. Eight out of ten mid-sized and smaller tribes rose up in revolt, and began to challenge the largest tribes for dominance.
The two sides fought bitterly over water, food, mineral deposits, military power, and a host of other conflicts. Su Shi Yilu, formerly a Great General of the royal court, was the first to break away. He gathered a number of tribal forces dissatisfied with the old royal court and established a new one. The old and new royal courts fought major battles across the land. Ten Crows' lowest-ranking slaves seized the opportunity to rise up, spreading their ancestors' legends everywhere and uniting people through faith.
As one side waned and the other waxed, three powers eventually stood in opposition.
But the faith faction was founded on ancestral inscriptions, which everyone interpreted in their own way. So, just as the three powers were locked in their fiercest fighting, the faithful began to feud and split among themselves. After years of bloody conflict, Ten Crows' population plunged to half its original size, and the land splintered into fifty or sixty mutually hostile forces. That year also brought harsh weather. Forces in harsh terrain with scarce resources were the first to buckle, while the major powers sustained themselves by devouring the smaller ones. In the