"Great Ming, Joseon, and Wagoku; Mongol and Jurchen; Ainu and Sanda"
In the Royal Tent, a wisp of Divine Smoke rose. Xolotl sniffed the smoke, rubbed his head, and once again began reading the letters from several Western Sea priests—especially the one from Zuwaro, the Western Sea Chief Priest.
Northeast Asia lay twenty thousand li away, and Zuwaro's letters were the most distant of all. They took at least a year, even two, before they could arrive before his desk. And when he wrote back, that took another year or more. With communications taking two or three years for a round trip, never mind remote command—just hearing news and intelligence from the Western Sea was an extreme luxury! In truth, over all these years, only two Zheyang Ship fleets had returned from the Western Sea to the kingdom. And this letter in his hands was also the second letter he had received from Zuwaro after three years!
"Revered, supreme, divinely inspired His Majesty! As I write this letter to you, I am in the snowbound harbor on Karafuto Island. Once spring comes, I will set out with the warriors, heading north from Karafuto Port, then west along the Heilongjiang, to reach the Nurgan camp. After that, I will go with the Wild Jurchen allies there who believe in the Main God, along with Chief Aguda of the Maha Tribe, to the Mongol tribes of the Three Guards of Duoyan in the west to buy horses!"
"Those Mongol tribes are said to have many good, cheap horses, and as long as we can produce a sack of salt or a piece of ironware, we can trade it for a tall warhorse! This price is far cheaper than those cunning Wajin to the south! In fact, if we buy enough horses back,