Fresh mulberry-bark paper had been pasted over the window lattice. Firelight shone through it, stretching the shadows of footsteps in the snow outside long and thin. Against the wall was a big earthen kang, heated until it burned hot, with brand-new blue-cloth bedding stacked on top. The three of them sat cross-legged on the warm kang, two with the flush of wine on their faces, one with the killing frost of wind and weather. The newcomer shifted his backside, unused to it, and spoke.
"What kind of kang is this in here? It's really warm! Warmer than the birch-wood fire pit we keep burning all night back in the tribal camp!"
"Of course it is. This is Guiyi Hall! The Great Emperor is generous and benevolent. Could the lodging he arranged for us be bad? Brother Aguda, there are actually even better lodgings, over at godfather's place. That's what you call a land of soft pleasures."
"What, soft women? Can they catch fish? Can they hunt? Are their arms and legs thick? If they can't do any of that, what use are they!"
"Uh... they, they have skin as smooth as marten fur, and faces as pretty as foxes."
"What martens and foxes? None of them are as good as my fish! My Fish Scale Armor!"
"Ha ha!"
Aguda took it as only natural, Ali was left speechless for a moment, and Zuwaro clutched his belly, roaring with laughter. The differences among the Jurchen Tribes, the gap between sinicized tribes and Wildman tribes, were simply like wheat and barnyard grass. The former clustered around the inside and outside of the Border Wall, gathered together and lived by relying on their ties with the Han lands. The latter were everywhere, from the Forest Sea all the way to the marshes, spread