The bonfire flickered all night, and the captives tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Early the next morning, before the sky had even brightened, the camp bustled again. It was winter in December, and the daylight on the Kamchatka Peninsula had already shrunk to less than eight hours. Even when day broke, the heavy clouds always hung dim and oppressive, foretelling the great blizzard to come.
"May the Main God bless us! We have to head south as soon as possible—we have to leave today!..."
Exploration Captain Zuwaro gazed for a while at the northern sky, then spoke for a while with Mu Tu, the Mountain Tribe hunter, and learned how urgent time had become. After that, he first ordered the warriors to pack up the wine, ironware, and grain in the camp, then found the monk-soldier Watanabe Masumi, whose eyes were ringed with deep black circles, and appointed him as the captives' squad leader and interpreter. "The Main God is witness! Divide the captives into two groups: one group with skills, the other without! Those with skills get preferential treatment in the kingdom! Great preferential treatment!..."
The Kingdom Warriors stood in a ring with axes in hand, and Zuwaro, his expression stern, summoned the nineteen big-ship captives. Watanabe Masumi used Japanese and Korean respectively to explain the requirement of grouping them by skill. Then the horse keeper Sukeichiro, his face blank, wearing the Main God's Gold Amulet around his neck and clutching it tightly in his hand, walked over to the other side.
"Sukeichiro knows how to raise horses! Go over there..."
The captives' eyes widened, and they all looked eagerly at Sukeichiro. Soon, two Kingdom Warriors removed Sukeichiro's ropes, issued him a warm fur robe, and gave him a waterskin filled with deer blood. Then he was assigned