Chapter Summaries

Xolotl accepted the Lake Chapala region's formal submission while recognizing that its loyalty would last only under military pressure. After Avet departed with most of his army, Xolotl took charge of the Patzcuaro Lake Region and ordered his forces to focus on spring plowing and consolidating his rule.

• Prince Penguari's envoy submitted the Lake Chapala region to Avet and Xolotl, offered tribute, and requested a Mexica royal bride for the prince.
• Xolotl examined the submission register and recognized that the region's submission was largely ceremonial, while considering how to exploit divisions in its faith.
• Avet outlined his departure and left Xolotl more than three thousand royal warriors, advising him to establish his rule through flexible governance and food supplies.
• Xolotl rejected Avet's offer to leave the captured Tarasco nobles behind and declared that he would build a centralized kingdom without relying on the old ruling system.
• Avet departed north with over ten thousand warriors, leaving Xolotl to rule the region.
• Xolotl ordered Bertad to oversee spring plowing and Kuluka to report on the fief as messengers spread his commands across the region.

Chiwako, Weizti, and thousands of surrendered Tarasco men worked the Alliance’s military farms as the rainy season began. As the chapter ends, Oltar and Puapu agreed to share experienced farmers, both hoping the new harvest would support a campaign against the Lake Chapala remnants.

• Chiwako and Weizti planted corn, beans, and squash in the newly measured fields while Chiwako reflected on the expected yields and the burden of farming ten mu per man.
• Chiwako and Weizti rested at a field shade shed, where Mexica overseers discussed rewards, military service, and hopes for future campaigns.
• Weizti prayed at the Main God’s altar, and the men returned to work before marching back to their camp under their officers’ supervision.
• Puapu led his agricultural garrison camp past Oltar’s disciplined Sky Family warriors, who were grieving the destruction of their family’s homeland by Feather Prince.
• Oltar asked Puapu to lend experienced farmers to help his warrior camp meet its planting quota, and Puapu agreed.
• Oltar and Puapu toasted the prospect of raising enough grain to campaign against the Lake Chapala remnants.

Xolotl inspected a lakeside village under his direct rule, checking its fields, religious practices, administration, militia, and granary. He returned to the Palace of Wind and reviewed the latest scout intelligence on his vast fief.

• Xolotl inspected the new maize seedlings and concluded that the spring sowing had been completed before the heavy rains.
• Xolotl questioned the village priest, who described the community’s prayers, sacrifices, and reading of Alliance decrees; Xolotl ordered that human sacrifices be forbidden.
• Xolotl questioned the village headman about cultivation, manure collection, and the granary, then promised bricks for repairs and ordered the granary made waterproof.
• Xolotl praised the militia captain, gave him a red cloak, and told him to maintain order and put down roots in the village.
• Xolotl returned to the Palace of Wind, where Kuluka handed him the latest scout intelligence and Xolotl smiled at the map.

Xolotl estimated the land, population, farmland, and agricultural output of his fief to plan its taxes, military colonies, and reforms. He divided the territory into three administrative regions and ended by unveiling his plan to grant fields for military merit, with the southern Purple Grass County still to be reorganized.

• Xolotl calculated that his fief covered about fifteen thousand square kilometers and could yield roughly 1.3 million koku, enough to support over a million people.
• Xolotl outlined farming quotas, tribute taxes, and a military levy based on his estimates of how much land and grain each person could manage.
• Kuluka reported that River Mouth Fortress had been repaired, the surrounding villages were orderly, and the Lake Cuitzeo region had fertile land but lacked priests.
• Xolotl established River Mouth County around River Mouth Fortress and designated the central Patzcuaro Lake Region as the capital region, with residents divided into military and civilian colonies.
• Xolotl designated Apatzingan State as Kuramo County, or Purple Grass County, and ordered an investigation of local nobles' fiefs.
• Xolotl pressed his hand over Kuramo City and revealed a book titled “Granting Fields for Military Merit!”

Xolotl unveiled a military-merit land-grant system to reward his legions and build a new order in the Land of the Lakes. He promoted his commanders and revealed that the land, slaves, and servants needed for the grants would come from Kuramo City, setting up the next campaign.

• Xolotl explained that warriors would earn ranks and farmland through military merit, and that the system would admit qualified militiamen, slaves, and foreign mercenaries.
• Bertad and Kuluka examined the grant plan as Xolotl assigned land, servants, and military duties to warrior ranks and nobles.
• Xolotl promoted Kuluka and other commanders to hereditary noble, then named Bertad the fiefdom's sole Honorary Noble; Bertad accepted and agreed to a future expedition east.
• Bertad questioned the system's restrictions on top nobles, and Xolotl confirmed that he intended to cultivate middle-rank warriors while curbing the old great nobles.
• Xolotl said the rewards for 11,000 soldiers would require 1.7 million mu of land and 85,000 slaves and servants, then pointed to Kuramo City as their source.

Xolotl reviewed reports from across his fief and set policies for neighboring tribes, captive purchases, trade, and the new Tarasco diocese and Institute of Divine Inspiration. As the rainy season continued, the learned Purepecha elder Jatiri arrived at the Palace of Wind at Xolotl’s invitation.

• Xolotl decided Lake Patzcuaro needed dikes and water control after seeing how far the rainy-season waters had risen.
• Xolotl rejected the Tecos’ request to ransom their captured warriors and instructed that Otopan City be quietly informed that Tepopollo could not send troops north that year.
• Xolotl approved buying young captives from the Dog-kin tribes, prioritizing salt and wine for trade and ordering priests to join Balamo’s northern caravan.
• Xolotl barred the Tepanec from trading bronze and Obsidian, while permitting restricted trade with the Mixtec and ordering the gunpowder formula and new weapons kept secret.
• Xolotl learned that King Avet’s army had defeated the Tlaxcalan twice and that he would lead the new Tarasco archdiocese as its youngest fifth-rank archpriest, with a new Institute of Divine Inspiration under his authority.
• A guard announced that Jatiri, the learned Purepecha keeper of epics, had arrived to meet Xolotl.

Xolotl welcomed Jatiri, a surviving keeper of Tarasco history, and asked him to teach the Purepecha people’s epics and traditions. Jatiri interpreted the Palace of Wind’s new mural as a warning that the Mexica should blend naturally with local culture rather than impose a divided, short-lived order, then asked Xolotl which style he would favor in ruling his fief.

• Xolotl greeted Jatiri with respect and asked to become his student, seeking guidance on Tarasco epics and Purepecha culture.
• Xolotl served Jatiri honey-and-Vanilla hot cacao, and Jatiri pointed out that its ingredients represented a year of a farmer’s labor.
• Xolotl redirected the conversation to the new Palace of Wind murals after acknowledging that the people’s strength should not be abused.
• Jatiri praised Xolotl’s efforts to organize spring plowing, remove obstructive nobles, renew the murals, and spread the Main God’s faith.
• Jatiri identified the mural’s distinct artistic traditions and judged Teotihuacan’s style the most natural fit, Tula’s the most inclusive, and the southern city-states’ style too divided to last.
• Jatiri asked Xolotl which painting style he favored for governing his fief.

Xolotl discussed governing the Purepecha with Jatiri, who urged him to unite his subjects through shared customs, language, laws, faith, and a common history. Xolotl asked Jatiri to help tell the Purepecha people’s epic, and they set off to examine the ancient books and murals.

• Bertad confirmed that the palace murals had been painted by artists from Teotihuacan, Azcapotzalco, and Mixtec.
• Xolotl asked Jatiri what the different relationships between the Mexica Alliance and its subjects meant for governing the Purepecha.
• Xolotl promised to treat the Purepecha as he treated the Mexica and to avoid harsh taxes on their commoners.
• Jatiri explained that shared customs, language, law, faith, and history could bind subjects to their ruler, and offered to help recount the people’s origins.
• Xolotl eagerly accepted Jatiri’s offer to tell the Purepecha epic, and they walked toward the stone forts to consult the ancient books and murals.
• Bertad watched them leave and reflected that the king now had a cunning old fox alongside his loyal warriors.

Xolotl and Sage Jatiri interpreted the ancient Sun Era myths as a shared history that could unite the continent’s many tribes under Xolotl’s rule. Jatiri began explaining the causes behind the fall of the Toltec and Urichu kingdoms, pointing to another stone slab.

• Xolotl brought Jatiri to the palace hall of ancient records, where Jatiri reunited with the inheritance slabs he had left behind.
• Jatiri explained that the first Sun Era represented humanity’s rise from the jungle and that the Olmec people of the second era formed a common origin for the tribes.
• Jatiri described the third era’s pyramids as evidence that the Olmec descendants had branched into civilizations such as the Teotihuacan, Zapotec, Maya, and Loma Alta.
• Xolotl expanded Jatiri’s proposed shared lineage into seven branches, including northern Dog-kin, eastern lake islanders, and a southern golden kingdom.
• Jatiri framed the fourth era as a time of Dog-kin migrations and renewed fusion, declaring that Xolotl would complete the peoples’ unification in the fifth era.
• Jatiri said the Toltec and Urichu kingdoms had fallen for internal as well as external reasons, then pressed his hand onto a neighboring stone slab to reveal the crucial factor.

Jatiri showed Xolotl how a catastrophic flood destroyed the Post-Urichu Kingdom and how migrating Chichimec Dog-kin founded the Tarasco Kingdom in its wake. He began explaining the new kingdom’s governing strategies, which Xolotl could use in the future.

• Xolotl studied the second stone slab and recognized its scene as a flood and the sacrifice of a Post-Urichu prince.
• Jatiri explained that a ninety-nine-day rain caused lakes to rise, submerged settlements and farmland, and sparked migration, conflict, famine, and political collapse.
• The Post-Urichu king sacrificed his prince to appease his subjects, but nobles later poisoned him, and the kingdom’s old order never recovered.
• Xolotl reflected on the danger floods posed to civilizations and the importance of water-control works.
• Jatiri showed Xolotl the third slab and described how migrating Chichimec Dog-kin conquered the divided Urichu Kingdom and established the Tarasco Kingdom at Tzintzuntzan.
• Jatiri said the Tarasco kings centralized power, controlled nobles and priests, and merged with the Urichu people, then offered to explain their strategies to Xolotl.

Jatiri explained how Tariacuri built the Tarasco kingdom by reconciling rival nobles through intermarriage and frontier enfeoffment, giving Xolotl models for governing the conquered Purepecha. Xolotl resolved to adopt similar policies and considered how to extend his future empire across the Americas.

• Xolotl listened as Jatiri described the rival Nahua military nobles and Urichu nobles who competed for land after Tariacuri founded Tarasco.
• Jatiri explained that Tariacuri arranged marriages between Nahua and Urichu nobles and warriors to unite the peoples and create a new Purepecha elite.
• Xolotl decided that Mexica warriors should intermarry with Purepecha commoners as state policy.
• Xolotl recognized that Tariacuri had sent powerful nobles to guard the frontiers, while the Hummingbird Family's Chief Ministers balanced their growing power.
• Xolotl considered using roads, ships, future horses, frontier enfeoffment, intermarriage, and tribute to unite the Americas, then reflected on the burden of his future rule.

Xolotl learned how the Tarasco Kingdom’s dual centers and three-tier hierarchy had worked, while planning how to use its institutions to govern his fief. Jatiri became Chief Minister of Deliberations and agreed to help incorporate Purepecha priests into the Alliance’s religious system before leading Xolotl to the final two stone slabs.

• Jatiri explained that the Tarasco Kingdom had two centers of governance, Tzintzuntzan City and Ihuatzio City, and Xolotl decided to rebuild Ihuatzio as a religious and trade center.
• Xolotl appointed Jatiri Chief Minister of Deliberations, and Jatiri pledged his learning and service to the king’s plans for unification.
• Jatiri described the kingdom’s hierarchy of king, nobles, priests, bureaucrats, warriors, village headmen, and low-ranking priests, while Xolotl considered how its institutions could inform his own administration.
• Xolotl ordered that Purepecha low-ranking priests be trained at the Lake Capital and accept the Alliance’s faith, and Jatiri agreed to assist and accepted a fourth-rank chief priest status.
• Jatiri finished explaining the binary, three-tier system and directed Xolotl to examine the final two stone slabs.

Jatiri explained how the Tarasco kings centralized power through noble investitures, royal control of resources and trade, centralized crafts production, and borderland alliances. Xolotl issued a decree promising protection for Purepecha merchants and left with a model for strengthening the new lake kingdom.

• Jatiri described how the Divine Eagle king divided central fiefs among hundreds of nobles, strengthening royal authority while limiting the reform to the Patzcuaro Lake Region.
• Jatiri explained that the royal house controlled natural resources, taxed trade, and used royal merchants to gather intelligence, prompting Xolotl to decree protection for Purepecha merchants abroad.
• Xolotl ordered Bertad to record and send the decree, while Jatiri pledged to spread the king’s message among priests, scholars, and merchants.
• Jatiri explained that royal workshops produced goods and military supplies, helping the kings control border nobles and equip the Royal Legion.
• Jatiri described how the royal house settled and armed submitted border tribes to balance military nobles, and concluded that centralized wealth and tribute sustained the kingdom’s power.

Xolotl learned from Jatiri how generations of Tarasco rulers reshaped their gods and epics to unite peoples and strengthen royal authority, then turned his attention to rebuilding the fiefdom and its industry. After discovering an iron knife among the inherited relics, he ordered preparations to inspect the Artisan Camp and southern mines in September.

• Jatiri explained how Tarasco rulers reinterpreted the gods, the royal lineage, and the founding epic to integrate the Nahua and Urichu peoples and legitimize their rule.
• Xolotl drew lessons for governing his new fiefdom and asked Jatiri to recommend capable officials regardless of tribe or personal closeness.
• Xolotl found an iron knife in the stone hall, and Jatiri said it had been captured from the Tecos tribes of southwestern Colima State.
• Xolotl asked Bertad about mining, artisan production, bows, bronze farm tools, and small cannons, and Bertad reported that a trial cannon could not yet be used.
• Xolotl ordered Bertad to prepare for a September visit to the Artisan Camp and the mines south of Ihuatzio before the autumn harvest.

In August 1484, Bruno Cao joined Portuguese captains Diogo Cao and Bartolomeu Dias aboard a fleet preparing to sail south, where they discussed exploration, the Ottoman threat, and Portugal’s rivalry with Castile. The chapter ended with Diogo warning that Spain might turn its attention toward Portugal after conquering Granada.

• Bruno Cao and his sailors reached Lisbon’s harbor, where Bruno stopped them from taking drunken foreign sailors aboard as laborers.
• Bruno boarded the flagship and greeted Diogo Cao and Bartolomeu Dias, who praised his earlier voyage and his discovery of the Kingdom of Kongo.
• Dias explained that the king and the Roman Curia urgently wanted further exploration, and Diogo swore to seek the ocean’s edge and Prester John’s kingdom.
• Dias argued that Portugal should focus on maritime exploration, overseas expansion, and defending its independence from Castile.
• Diogo asked how King João viewed Spain, and Dias revealed the king’s ambition and Prince Afonso’s betrothal to Princess Isabella.
• Diogo warned that after Spain conquered Granada, its court might turn its attention toward Portugal and asked who could support the Portuguese on land.

Diogo and Bartolomeu Dias discussed Portugal’s need to counter Spain, secure support from the Holy See, and expand overseas before Diogo’s expedition sailed south. At the harbor, Columbus’s bid to join the Portuguese voyage failed, and Eleazar demanded that he sign a contract in exchange for more time to repay his debt.

• Diogo and Bartolomeu Dias assessed the political threats from Spain and the weakness of Portugal’s potential allies, concluding that the Holy See was their best hope.
• Diogo received Dias’s silver cross and discussed his navigation log, while Dias said Martin Behaim would accompany the expedition and record its route.
• Dias told Diogo that King John II had executed the Duke of Braganza and restarted Cruzado gold-coin minting using gold from the Gold Coast.
• Diogo and Dias prayed together as the Portuguese fleet set sail to explore the southern seas.
• Columbus cursed the court for rejecting his proposed route to Asia and declared that he would find a monarch willing to fund his voyage.
• Eleazar confronted Columbus over his debt, threatened to throw him into the harbor, then offered him more time if he signed a prepared contract.

Xolotl inspected the Artisan Camp and learned that Kundiri had improved the Longbow and developed a cheap Bamboo Bow. He made Kundiri a military-merit noble and ordered him to develop a composite bow and organize mass production of standardized Bamboo Bows before continuing to the kingdom’s bronze workshop.

• Xolotl inspected the Artisan Camp’s production centers and tested a wheelbarrow, then ordered rewards for its makers and improvements to its reinforcement.
• Kundiri showed Xolotl his recurve Longbow and Bamboo Bow, explaining their range, power, and low production cost.
• Xolotl made Kundiri a military-merit noble and appointed him to lead Longbow production in the capital.
• Xolotl tasked Kundiri with developing a shorter, more powerful composite bow and standardizing the Bamboo Bow for mass production.
• Xolotl announced rewards and noble titles for craftsmen who improved production or developed new tools, then posted the policy in the camp.
• Xolotl led his guards toward the secret workshop where the kingdom made bronze.

Xolotl inspected the bronze workshop and ordered improvements to increase bronze production. After learning the workshop’s methods and alloy ratios, he asked Tiripi about the bronze sword he had commissioned.

• Xolotl visited the bronze workshop and met the craftsman brothers Charape and Tiripi, who had converted to worship of the Main God.
• Charape explained the disposable clay furnaces and the five-day process for producing bronze, while Xolotl judged the output too slow.
• Xolotl drew a design for a deerskin bellows and ordered Charape to build reusable green-brick shaft furnaces and expand production with a regular supply of charcoal.
• Charape revealed the kingdom’s copper-to-tin ratios for different bronze implements, and Xolotl praised his explanation.
• Xolotl turned to Tiripi and asked where the bronze sword he had commissioned was.

Xolotl tested a newly cast Qin-style bronze sword and discovered it broke easily against an obsidian war club, so he ordered Tiripi and Charape to keep researching its craftsmanship. He then tested the new cloth-covered bronze armor, found it highly protective despite its weight, and considered what a thousand armored warriors could do in battle.

• Tiripi presented Xolotl with a sharp Qin-style bronze sword, which Toltec tested on a leather-armored dummy.
• Toltec struck the sword with an obsidian war club and broke it, prompting Xolotl to order Tiripi and Charape to find a way to make bronze swords both sharp and sturdy.
• Charape presented Xolotl with a forty-five-jin cloth-covered bronze Long-body Armor, which Toltec tested against blows from his war club and arrows from a longbow.
• Xolotl praised the armor’s protection and awarded the repaired suit to Toltec.
• Xolotl asked what a thousand warriors wearing the heavy armor could accomplish, and Toltec said they would be invincible under heaven if they could fight for two quarters of an hour.

Xolotl assessed the labor and cost of bronze armor, accepted a lighter medium-armor design, and ordered enough armor to equip the Royal Guard before the January festival. The chapter ended as Charape presented the Two-man Bronze Plow he had made from Xolotl’s design.

• Tiripi explained that a suit of cloth-surfaced heavy armor required sixty man-days, while Charape presented Xolotl with a decorated medium-armor suit.
• Xolotl tried on the medium armor, and Tiripi estimated ordinary versions would require a little over thirty man-days as Bertad judged their defensive ability to be about seventy percent of heavy armor.
• Xolotl ordered five hundred suits of heavy armor and two thousand suits of medium armor for the Royal Guard by the January festival, despite Tiripi’s estimate that production would take at least half a year.
• Xolotl assigned Charape three hundred coppersmiths, summoned tailors and apprentices, and ordered him to complete all twenty-five hundred suits within four months.
• Charape presented Xolotl with a Two-man Bronze Plow made according to Xolotl’s design.