Only Battle! Beg for Life! The Rebel Path

The vast land had become a hell on earth.

The Empire had now lost both the Rhine River and the Danube River—roughly equivalent to losing the defensive lines of both the Yangtze River and the Yellow River.

"The Empire's remaining main forces are being tied down by the Hun army."

"The barbarian tribes of Greater Germania crossed the Rhine River, seized Upper and Lower Germania, and pushed into the heart of Gaul. They have completely lost control over the region that would later become France."

A row of wooden stakes had been planted at the fork ahead.

From afar, crows pecked at them while flies swarmed through the air. Each stake bore a severed head. A rough count put them at several hundred, their features long since mangled beyond recognition. Judging by the outlines of their faces, they seemed to have been slaves and tenant farmers. Rebellions had been constant within the Empire in recent years. After the imperial treasury completely collapsed, the authorities had no choice but to squeeze the common people at the bottom even harder, driving slaves and tenant farmers across the land into revolt.

Protector of Rome Aetius was a renowned general, brave and formidable in battle, but he possessed little talent for internal affairs. He spent most of his years on the border battlefields.

If history did not diverge too greatly, he would be murdered by the Emperor of the Empire within the next few years.

Rows upon rows of heads had been impaled.

The heads lined both sides of the road like streetlamps, one every meter, stretching for over two hundred meters. This was a cruel punishment left over from the era of Spartacus's uprising. Romans had always been brutal toward slaves. Rebellious slaves were put to death, and after Spartacus's uprising failed, the roads from Rome to Capua were lined with executed slaves. Around six thousand people had been nailed to crosses.

More than four hundred heads in total—enough to build a Jingguan. Looking at those heads with their eyes still open in death, Duncan truly felt the cruelty of this age.

The Barbarian Invasion had come to seize money, land, and people. Those lowly wretches at the bottom of society truly lived worse than pigs and dogs.

They would die if they rebelled, and they would die if they did not.

"It was a Burgundian slave uprising."

Anya, who seemed to know more, said softly, "The Burgundians rebelled again and swept up large numbers of slaves and tenant farmers."

"Although they were suppressed by Aetius back then, quite a few of the rebel slaves still escaped elsewhere."

"They often secretly incite the slaves of large estates to revolt. Once discovered, they are exterminated and executed, then nailed along the roadsides as a warning to others."

The massacre that suppressed the Burgundians was the prototype for the Germanic epic Nibelungenlied.

Aetius had been close to Attila, king of the Huns, since his early years. As a youth, he had been held hostage at the Hun king's court, somewhat like Guo Jing and Tolui in novels. In the end, with the Huns' help, he forced the Western Empire to restore his authority and became commander of the Western Empire.

The history of this period was somewhat like that of the Song Dynasty and Mongolia, because Aetius had relied on Hun mercenaries to fight many wars in his early years. (The Huns were a loose collection of tribes. The defeated fled into imperial territory, and even now many Hun mercenaries still served the imperial nobility.)

Most interestingly, after Aetius was murdered, it was his two Hun friends who avenged him. While the emperor was reviewing his troops, they stabbed Valentinian III to death.

Not a single soldier in the camp stepped forward. They simply watched as the emperor was stabbed to death on the spot.

He who commanded strong troops and mighty horses was Augustus!

Although Anya was a Two-Star Blank, Duncan learned much more about the Empire's current state from her, and gained a clearer understanding of the source of the endless uprisings throughout Gaul.

The Bagaudae movement.

This rebellion within the Empire had lasted for centuries. It began in the 260s AD, nearly collapsing Roman rule in Gaul. It was suppressed in the 280s, but rose again in the fifth century, dealing the Roman Empire a heavy blow.

The scale of their uprising even far surpassed that of Spartacus. If they had not been suppressed by Aetius, the Empire's last great general, they might have overturned all of Gaul.

These rebels were marginalized people at the bottom of the Empire. They hid in Gaul's mountains and forests, and had yet to be completely eradicated.

The group continued north.

Perhaps seeing Duncan's interest in these matters, Witch Anya elaborated, "Three years ago, Aetius suppressed the Bagaudae in Armorica."

"It is said that he massacred tens of thousands."

"In one stroke, he crushed the rebel army's main forces and brought all of Gaul back under imperial rule."

"But before long, the corrupt rule of Roman officials drove large numbers of people to flee again. In the end, those rebels once more became wandering Bagaudae."

Rebel forces?

Sources of soldiers!?

After listening closely to everything Anya had said, those words immediately sprang into Duncan's mind.

That was right—sources of soldiers.

The Empire's rebels!

Those rebel forces who had endured oppression, possessed no social standing, and could only hide in dense forests were among the best sources of soldiers in Duncan's eyes.

"There are only two choices in the imperial camp."

"One is Protector of Rome Aetius, and the other is the incompetent Emperor Valentinian III."

"I don't want to choose either of them."

"Although Aetius was a famed general in history, he was ultimately only a fierce commander. His conflict with the Emperor of the Empire has become increasingly irreconcilable."

"In the first future deduced by the Law of Causality—"

"The Human Form, as the adopted son of the Aetius Family, was actually severely wounded on the battlefield, then died under barbarian siege."

"This probably involved factors from the Empire's internal political struggle as well."

"The Empire's decline has become too deeply entrenched to reverse."

"Joining it would be like stepping into a cesspit. I would only be unable to fully spread my wings."

Duncan's thoughts grew clearer and clearer.

"The Hunnic Empire needn't be considered. Nomadic peoples relied entirely on their leader. The moment Attila died, they would immediately fall apart."

"Besides, most of their ruling class are Huns."

"The barbarian tribes and the Visigoth Kingdom aren't much better. They rarely put outsiders in important positions."

"The British Isles."

"The most important factions are the Celts and the Saxons."

"The Celts have their own kingdoms, along with numerous tribal leaders. Even if I helped them, I might not be able to establish a foundation of my own."

"Then where will my core base come from?"

An outsider.

Where could Duncan recruit the foundation of his power?

He certainly did not want to swear fealty to some king, chieftain, lord, or the like. At most, he could become a mercenary. Besides, in this era, overthrowing one's superiors was no easier than starting from scratch on his own.

The Bagaudae!

Prompted unexpectedly by Witch Anya, Duncan quickly thought of a special group.

—Imperial rebels.

As early as the late second century AD, the Roman Empire's socioeconomic system had already fallen into a severe crisis.

Having long commanded the vast resources of the Mediterranean world, the Empire's core population had rapidly become corrupt. Whether citizens enjoying their bread in the cities or retired veterans receiving pensions and land, they all consumed enormous resources at the fastest possible rate.

Had it not been for the convenient maritime transport across the Mediterranean and Rome's relatively efficient administrative system, this situation might have deteriorated as early as the Empire's founding.

Yet as the gap between rich and poor continued to widen, the proportion of the utterly impoverished began growing exponentially.

The Empire's capacity to maintain welfare, however, could not reach every corner of its territory. This was especially true in the western provinces, where large cities were scarce. Around plantations and farming settlements, countless overburdened people on the fringes of society were always overlooked.

Furthermore, local economies often relied more heavily on slave labor, further ruining their economic structure.

Thus, large numbers of displaced people began wandering along the edges of mainstream society, gradually developing into independent large-scale groups.

The Romans called these marginalized groups the Bagaudae.

The word originally meant "warrior" in the Gaulish dialect.

This group later grew steadily larger, absorbing many bankrupt farmers, debt slaves, criminals, deserters, and others.

Around the third century AD, the hidden Bagaudae groups gained a new opportunity for expansion.

Due to the eastern war against Parthia and the southward advance of the northern barbarians, the Roman army began suffering from a severe shortage of manpower. The emperor at the time, Marcus Aurelius, massively expanded the military, conscripting large numbers of gladiators, slaves, and bandits.

But they were utterly unable to endure the intense training and the discriminatory abuse of their officers, often finding ways to flee to nearby Bagaudae territories.

This was the source of strength behind the first uprising.

The arrival of the gladiators quickly gave them considerable combat power, turning the marginalized people at the bottom of the Empire into rebels capable of fighting. (Note: This was somewhat like Spartacus's uprising, where gladiators played an important role.)

In the end, they launched a massive uprising that shook the land.

For a very long time afterward, the Bagaudae were repeatedly suppressed, repeatedly rose in revolt, and repeatedly fled into exile. When successful, they pillaged and slaughtered the Empire's powerful; when defeated, they fled into the deep mountains and forests, breaking up into smaller groups.

It was not until three years ago, when Aetius suppressed the uprising by slaughtering tens of thousands, that it was finally further crushed.

At that thought, Duncan almost wanted to lift Witch Anya high into the air.

He had never been able to figure out where his core base should come from. Joining the Empire would still mean attaching himself to powerful patrons; without an army of his own, he could easily die in political struggles. Joining other factions would likewise leave him with little status. In this chaotic age of shattered lands, without an army that belonged to him, he would not have even the slightest sense of security.

But where would the army come from?

Where would the recruits come from?

Reality was not a game. He could not pass through a village and recruit a few troops like in Mount & Blade, then pass through a city and recruit a few more.

Everything pointed toward four words—[Imperial Rebels]!

The most marginalized people at the bottom of Imperial society, the Empire's wretches of every identity—Gauls, Celts, Franks, Romans, Germanic Barbarians, and more. They came from backgrounds such as farmers, slaves, bankrupts, herders, criminals, deserters, and so on.

These people were the Empire's true wretches!

Wretches beneath contempt.

Most of them did not even have an identity. Only when they could no longer survive and rose in revolt could they claim the identity of "rebel."

These people would be the easiest source of recruits for Duncan in the future!

What Empire? What barbarians? What Huns?

Right now, only the rebels were one of the factions through which he had the best chance of rising rapidly.

"Something's ahead!"

A raven's cry came from the sky. Raven Queen Triss instantly reined in her horse and turned to look at Duncan.

Before they knew it, Duncan had become the leader of this group.

The Witch had a wider scouting range, while Triss seemed able to influence birds and beasts. However, her scouting could only detect major events—for example, battles involving hundreds of people, or places with large numbers of corpses. If it was merely a small-scale bandit raid, the Witch would almost certainly be unable to detect it in advance.

Duncan instantly picked up the Northern War Bow and focused his consciousness into the Dimensional Space.

Under God's Eye View.

About ten kilometers ahead in their direction of travel, two forces were fighting on either side of a road through dense forest.

Strictly speaking, they could not really be called armies.

One of the forces even included farmers and herdsmen wielding pitchforks. Their equipment was extremely crude. Among several hundred people, fewer than a third carried weapons that could barely be called decent, while most had no armor at all. Only a small number wore simple leather armor, and several who appeared to be leaders wore battered scale armor from Roman border garrisons.

The other force was well equipped and dressed much like a Roman Field Army, but they were clearly private soldiers. They looked like mercenary sergeants within the Empire. Their weapons and armor were close to those of regular troops, and they were even equipped with bows and light crossbows, using just dozens of men to hold back nearly ten times their number.

Of course, most of the enemy were farmers, tenant farmers, and slaves. If they had truly faced a regular army of that size, they would have been defeated long ago.

--Bagaudae [Exiles] [Rebels]!

--Imperial Private Corps (Estate Guards) (Barbarian Foreign Legion) (Privately Raised Knights)!

The disparity in strength between the two sides was enormous.

Rebel corpses lay scattered along both sides of the road. They simply could not break through the wagon barricade ahead. At least dozens of bodies lay by the roadside, while many more arrow-wounded men wailed in agony. They had charged several times and been driven back each time. Their morale had clearly collapsed, yet they still refused to retreat. Many stared fixedly at the food and supplies on the wagons.

These rebels looked sallow and emaciated, as if they had suffered from malnutrition for a long time. Only several dozen of them could truly fight; most were cannon fodder at best.

The Empire called these lowborn people Bagaudae, while they called themselves "Exiles."

It meant people with no land, no homes, and no property.

They were the truly destitute.

Over the centuries, the Empire had suppressed countless rebellions, yet the rebellions had never ceased. This was because a constant stream of people from the lower classes within the Empire fell into ruin. The Empire's exploitation and oppression of its people were endless, while years of warfare further sucked them dry. In the end, the destitute had only two paths.

One was to become slaves and tenant farmers.

The other was to become Exiles, fleeing westward and becoming drifters on the fringes beyond civilization.

As long as the Empire existed, lowborn people would continue becoming "Exiles."

Duncan himself could actually be considered an Exile.

Bran Village on the Empire's frontier had been massacred by routed soldiers. He had fled to Gaul, with no land, no home, and nowhere to establish himself. He was a genuine vagrant, only one step away from raising a rebellion.

It was just that he had cheats and formidable strength, so he had forcibly carved a bloody path for himself.

The other Exiles were not so fortunate. They joined the rebels and had only been suppressed and massacred by Protector of Rome Aetius a few years ago. The surviving remnants continued fleeing west. If not for the Hunnic Empire's large-scale invasion, they would likely have continued being hunted down by the Barbarian Foreign Legion.

These Exiles had been completely scattered. They fled into the deep mountains and ancient forests. Some became bandits and robbers, while others retained their rebel organization, building mountain strongholds deep within dense woods. Whenever they could no longer survive, they came out to plunder.

Perhaps because of the influence of Spartacus's uprising, after these Exiles looted the estates of Imperial nobles, they would even provide a little aid to the poor. Thus, many tenant farmers and slaves at the bottom of society secretly supported them and even provided them with intelligence.

Their early slogan had been, "Turn slave owners into slaves," before they were repeatedly suppressed and slaughtered.

"Beggar Army!"

"These people are practically a Beggar Army by nature!"

Duncan thought of an army from the era of the Uprising of the Five Barbarians.

They were a group of people struggling to survive in the cracks.

Duncan watched the sallow, emaciated Exiles. Though they were utterly outclassed in equipment, weapons, military discipline, and even individual physical fitness, they kept surging forward. They left behind more than a dozen corpses, then fell back, rested briefly, and surged forward again, leaving behind even more bodies.

They had no hope of taking the wagon barricade, yet they stubbornly refused to leave.

These people only wanted to live. They fought for nothing but survival!

They faced a cruel age of chaos, no less terrible than the Uprising of the Five Barbarians across the Central Plains. The lowborn had no choice: submit, and be exploited to death by the Empire; resist, and be exterminated as rebels.

Since both paths led to death, they might as well rise in a glorious rebellion!

That was how the Exile Rebels came to be.

Duncan knew what he needed to do next.

How many troops he could recruit depended entirely on how corrupt the Empire was and how many people had been driven beyond the point of survival!

Whether he intended to establish roots in the British Isles through migration or rebel in the Empire's western regions, he needed people like these—people willing to fight to survive!

In this incomparably turbulent era, where human lives were worth less than grass.

Only a "Beggar Army" could truly pledge loyalty to an outsider of lowborn origins who had risen from nothing like him!

To hell with the Empire. This time, he would build his power on the rebels.

[Note 1: Exile Rebels were lowborn people from the bottom of society on the fringes of the Empire's west. When they could no longer survive, they rebelled. They faced exploitation by the Empire, barbarian invasions, and the threat of the Huns. Compared with other factions, the rebels had no organization, no discipline, and poor equipment. They were mainly farmers, tenant farmers, and slaves, but they were also the easiest to recruit. All they needed was a way to live and something to eat.]

[Note 2: These Exiles were a mixed lot and extremely numerous. In the end, they were absorbed by the Franks, contributing to the rise of the Frankish Kingdom and supplying large numbers of young, able-bodied laborers and soldiers.]

[Note 3: One branch of the Law of Causality's deduction was that the Human Form became Aetius's adopted son. This stemmed from the Roman Empire's tradition of adoption, which was effectively a replacement of identity and a way to cast off a lowborn origin. If an Emperor of the Empire had no suitable descendants, he would adopt an heir as a son. Of the Roman Empire's first seventeen emperors, seven ascended the throne as adopted sons.

Noble families were much the same. If they had no male heirs, or if their descendants were not outstanding, they would have an adopted son take on the burden—usually by arranging a marriage and giving him a daughter—allowing him to inherit their power, status, and political legacy. An adopted son possessed lawful inheritance rights.

In the Empire's traditions.

Once a person was adopted as a member of a family, regardless of what status that person had held before—whether barbarian or lowborn—their current status would thereafter match that of the family that adopted them.

These adopted heirs would not be treated any worse than biological children.

When nobles adopted someone, they would generally select a woman from the family to marry him. The adopted son inherited the family name and political legacy, and his status was recognized by both society and the law.]

The death of the Human Form in that branch meant that one of the legitimate heirs chosen by Aetius, Protector of the Realm, had died suddenly on the battlefield.

At first, Duncan had not realized his adopted son held such a high status. Only later did he understand that his adopted son's death was little different from losing a biological son.

After all, the Empire's political aristocrats only adopted outstanding younger successors they valued highly.

Another point was that, under Roman tradition, adopted heirs were all adult men. Trajan was adopted at the age of forty-five, named heir to the Empire, and went on to carve out the largest territory in Roman Empire history.

In the Empire's later years, adopting heirs was more like Ding Yuan taking Lu Bu as his adopted son—done more for political purposes—but the status of an adopted son remained extremely high.