"Don't touch the cattle and sheep. Lead the horses away! Slaughter a few more full-grown big pigs too, and let everyone in the column taste some meat!"
"Go! Cut down their barnyard millet fields. It'll be perfect for feeding the horses! After running so long, the horses have all gone thin!"
The sun slanted west, and red clouds reflected on the river. They were all tribes who had fought and rolled through blood in the Forest Sea, and the Yi'erguli Guard had a sturdy guard-post stockade besides. Naturally, there was no reason they would submit outright just because the horse column had thrown out a few harsh words. Like most northern barbarian tribes, the chieftains of the Jurchen tribes had to show courage. They ruled their tribes by personal prestige and force of arms, not by the clan rites, status, and order of the Han lands, so they could not show weakness lightly.
As a tribal chieftain who had newly seized power, Shangtuha had two choices in response to the provocation from the tribute horse column. The first, according to Jurchen custom, was to duel the opposing chieftain or warrior, using individual strength and the life-or-death result of single combat to decide the rights and wrongs of the matter. And this choice, after he saw Wu Xiong, Tiger Slave, and Maha Aguda, was directly pressed down into the depths of his heart. As for the second choice, it was to express submission to Maha Aguda, the chieftain and leader of this horse column, offer certain benefits, and make a degree of compromise. Yet Shangtuha hesitated over and over and, for the time being, made no choice at all—or rather, he chose to "hold fast and wait."
"Wuu-wuu! Di-wuu!"
Inside the guard post of the Yi'erguli Guard, a new horn sounded,