"Main God bless us! Take captives! Take captives!!"
"Don't chop their necks, chop their arms! Knock away their weapons, beat them down into the snow, tie them up with hemp rope!..."
"Ritsu, ritsu!"
The sky gradually darkened. The clear sunlight was a brief song of joy, while the icy chill of falling snow was the eternal, unchanging theme of the snowfields—just like the cold-blooded slaughter between tribes on this land.
"Main God bear witness! There are more than twenty men from the Big Ship Tribe, and less than half are warriors carrying spears and blades. They're short, but they fight and charge like wolves, they know how to cooperate with each other, and they still have some order to them. Those Sailors with short knives, though—they huddle together like deer, with no room even to swing. One charge and they collapse!..."
Snowflakes fell, dancing lightly through the air. Exploration Captain Zuwaro squatted beside the tall Jurchen Horse and, neither hurried nor slow, tied up the unconscious horse keeper Sukeichiro. He saw that Sukeichiro's hand was still clenched tightly around the Main God's golden talisman, smiled indifferently, pried it out, and put it back on the man, hanging it properly around his neck.
Then he rose with a distant expression and watched the Kingdom's thirty heavily armored warriors step through deep snow pits and burst into the Wagoku camp beside the great ship. Immediately after, the Kingdom warriors swung their long spears and Copper Axes, raised their wooden shields, and skillfully seized the tribesmen in the camp, just as they had in the jungles of Mesoamerica.
"Main God bless us! Roar!..."
"Buddha, help me! Ah! Ugh..."
Warrior captain Shijian struck with his shield and landed a precise kick, knocking Ship Magistrate Murakami Suemichi, who had come forward to negotiate, down into