The next day, Liu Yuanfu brought six Liu Family disciples to the official office. Yang Zhengshan spoke with him for a while, then took them to the school.
The so-called school was really just a small courtyard. The usual three main rooms had been turned into one large room, big enough to hold forty students at the same time.
The east and west wings served as the teachers' offices and resting rooms.
Next door was a slightly larger courtyard, which Yang Zhengshan had prepared for the soldiers to learn their characters.
On the eighth day of the tenth month, the school opened. The first batch of students were forty children selected from within the Tun Fortress; of course, Lin Zhan was among them as well.
That same day, the first batch of soldiers in training completed their month-long basic training.
Once their basic training ended, they had to go back, taking over from the others in the garrison duties at the beacon towers and signal fire towers, so the other soldiers could come to Yinghe Fortress for basic training.
Of course, their going back did not mean their training was over.
After they returned, they would have to carry out combat training on their own—saber techniques, spear arts, archery, and so on. All of that required their own practice.
Yang Zhengshan set the date of the Yinghe Fortress Martial Arts Tournament for after the New Year. By then, all the soldiers should have completed basic training, and Yang Zhengshan could select some outstanding talents from among them to fill the vacant official posts.
Busy days always passed quickly, and in the blink of an eye, it was already the twelfth lunar month.
A heavy snowfall turned the eight hundred li of the Thousandfold Mountains into a world wrapped in silver.