Autumn nights in the south are always damp, but this year's dampness carried the smell of sulfur and gunpowder. While the Golden Crow Army was tying up the million-strong army of the Masataka on the southeastern plains, a dark red torrent was stealthily moving through the night in the coastal mountains further south.
The million elite troops of the Land of Whirlpools were like drops of water melting into ink; ten thousand formed a "whirlpool," ten whirlpools formed a "tide," and three tides connected end to end, winding through the mountain paths like a silent giant python. Wind Release scouts glided across the mountain peaks, their cloaks blending into the night; Earth Release ninjas cleared the way ahead, their feet automatically filling in potholes with loose stones; numerous ninjas carried Explosive Tag, their steps as light as cats leaping through trees. The largest main force of ninjas marched swiftly without drawing their swords, only the soft rustling of armor plates echoing through the valleys.
In the autumn of the twenty-seventh year of Flying Swallow, on the third day of the eighth month, the morning mist had not yet dissipated, and the garrison of White Frost City was yawning as they changed shifts. City Lord Shimoshiro Jūrō stood on the city wall, looking at the woods outside the city, and couldn't help but sneer.
"Ninjas from the Land of Whirlpools? I think they're just rats hiding in the mountains, too scared to come out!" Shimoshiro Jūrō pulled his cloak tighter around himself and boasted to his retainers, "See that wall? My Shirashiro family's Earth Release technique can turn bricks and stones into iron. Not even a pangolin could get through, let alone a person."
As the retainers were busy echoing their sentiments, a muffled rumble suddenly came from beneath their feet, as if a giant beast was turning over underground. Before anyone could react, the bricks and stones on the city wall suddenly trembled violently. Then, as if cleaved by a giant axe, the western wall collapsed with a loud crash, sinking more than ten feet deep, and the dust it raised instantly swallowed half of the city tower.
"Enemy attack--!" The shrill cry had barely rang out when countless red-headed, black figures surged out of the fog. Their movements were too fast to see clearly, and they flung out streaks of Kakkō that exploded and burst into flames upon hitting the city wall. Shimoshiro Jūrō's proud Water Release was immediately vaporized into white mist by the flames, and even his cloak was scorched and smoking by the Mars.
"Stop them! Use Earth Release!" The Marquis drew his sword and slashed wildly, but a masked ninja suddenly appeared in front of him, a short sword pressed against his throat.
"Your water is quite warm when it's boiled." The ninja's voice was like ice shards, and he quickly tied him up tightly.
The city fell in less than half an hour. As the first rays of sunlight pierced the morning mist, crimson banners were already flying all over the White Frost City's mansion. The three hundred members of the White Frost Clan were herded into the courtyard. All the men over the age of six were forced to their deaths on the stone steps, their blood flowing like streams through the cracks in the bluestone slabs. Women and children, weeping and wailing, were led onto prison carts to be sent to the capital of the Land of Fire as government slaves. An old servant cried and begged for mercy, but the ninja coldly replied, "Queen Tian Flying Swallow has decreed that traitors and rebels, whose crimes extend to their entire clans, shall all be executed."
The new flags raised atop the city walls fluttered in the wind, and beneath the golden flame patterns, the five large characters " Tian Flying Swallow " were so striking they hurt the eyes.
On the seventh day of the eighth month, the army of the Land of Whirlpools arrived at Crimson Haze Pass. This pass was built between two mountains, with walls over ten zhang high. Two hundred thousand noble allied troops were stationed there, and the drawbridge at the pass was raised high. The general stood on the arrow tower and patted his chest. " The Golden Crow Army is being held back in the east. The Land of Whirlpools only has this many people. You won't be able to break through the pass without ten times their number!"
But he didn't live to see dawn.
In the dead of night, Kakkō suddenly shot into the sky behind the pass. The Uzumaki Ninja army flew over the mountain ridge and dropped bombs into the granaries where grain was stored. The dry straw ignited instantly, and the crackling flames illuminated half the sky, even turning the river in front of the pass a crimson gold.
"The granary! Our granary!" Chaos erupted inside the pass. Soldiers peered over the city walls, and in the Kakkō, they could vaguely see figures fleeing. Cries and shouts for help mingled together in utter chaos. The defending general, enraged, drew his sword and chopped down the flagpole. "What's the panic! It's just air raiding! Holding the pass is the priority!"
But once morale collapsed, it was like a breached dam. By dawn, not a single wisp of smoke rose from within the pass. The soldiers, starving all night, lay exhausted at the foot of the city walls, their weapons scattered everywhere. Some began to whisper among themselves, "The food's all burned; staying here is just a death sentence..."
"Boom--!" A loud noise shook the gate. The ground below the gate suddenly cracked open, and the ninjas of the Land of Whirlpools used rune-powered cannons to bombard the gate. The heavy gate was shattered, and amidst the flying debris, the ninjas of the Land of Whirlpools surged in like a tide.
"Those who surrender will be spared!" The familiar shouts echoed within the pass. Of the 200,000 defenders, half were conscripted commoner warriors. Seeing that the pass had been breached, they threw down their weapons and knelt down to beg for mercy. Those noble soldiers who stubbornly resisted were slit in the throat by the ninja army in the blink of an eye.
As the sun rose directly overhead, the banners of Crimson Haze Pass had been changed to flame patterns. When the spoils of war were tallied, more than 70,000 corpses lay piled on the ground, and 130,000 prisoners were lined up in long queues, being escorted to the rear. The news spread quickly, and the nobles of the southern cities slept restlessly at night. The guards on patrol always looked behind them, fearing that a ninja might suddenly appear in the darkness—the Kageko that "Jiangxia Pass was destroyed overnight" spread faster than a plague.
The ninja army of the Land of Whirlpools was like a swift knife, tearing open the festering wounds of the old world on the southern lands. Wherever they went, all the nobles were uprooted, and the lords of the fifty-three families either died or fled. Those families that had once lorded over the regions vanished without a trace within twenty days. The phrase "Within twenty days, there were no nobles in the south" in the later history books of the Land of Fire describes this breathtakingly swift sweep.
The ninja army's speed was not solely due to secret techniques and elite troops. Long before they entered the country, the " Flying Swallow Society " had quietly formed in the southern towns. This was a secret group spontaneously organized by the people, setting up a torch platform every ten miles. Tenzo the fire, and at night they would light the firewood to guide the army.
A farmer named Kisen was driving an oxcart to deliver millet to the army camp of the Land of Whirlpools, with cloth bags hidden in the ruts of the cart. When he arrived at the camp gate, he didn't say a word, but simply took a white feather from his pocket and stuck it on the cart shaft. He unloaded the grain and drove back. The ninja wanted him to stay for a reward, but he waved his hand and said, "I don't want a reward. I just hope that the Queen's soldiers can free my child from being a slave."
The weavers sewed red flags at night by moonlight, without lighting lamps. When noble retainers searched the woodpile, they would pretend to be sewing shoe soles, and when the ninja army arrived, they would emerge from behind the woodpile carrying the flags, shouting " Tian Flying Swallow!" with the troops.
The older children were more cunning. Armed with machetes and sickles, they hid in groups of three or five in the roadside woods. When a nobleman's messenger passed by, they would swarm him, tie him up, and take him to the Flying Swallow Society's liaison point. A Jūni- year-old boy wounded the messenger's horse's leg and was praised by the ninja for his "good skills." Blushing, he hid his machete behind his back. "My father said that killing a nobleman's messenger is more honorable than chopping wood."
Old women often burned incense by the roadside. When they saw ninjas dressed in black passing by, they would stuff boiled eggs into their hands, muttering, "May the Bodhisattva bless you to kill more nobles, so that our descendants will not have to pay back their debts."
The army of the Land of Whirlpools thus moved swiftly. Upon arriving at each city, the first thing the ninjas did was open the nobles' treasuries and distribute the stockpiled grain and cloth to the people; the second thing was to post proclamations, on which Tian Flying Swallow's promise was written in vermilion ink, "Three years of exemption from corvée labor, and five years of only light taxes."
As the people read the words on the proclamation, some cried and some laughed. Those families who had once been forced to sell their children by the nobles now dared to besiege the noble estates with hoes in hand, shouting "Queen Tian Flying Swallow's order," and distributing the estate's grain to their neighbors.
On the night of the tenth of August, the lord of South River City stood on the dike, gritting his teeth as he gazed at the faint Kakkō in the distance. He clutched the city lord's seal in his hand, while his retainers urged him from behind, "My lord, give the order quickly! Breach the dike! The flood will inundate half the plain; it will surely stop the ninja army!"
The city lord was originally the largest salt merchant in the south. He made a fortune by monopolizing the salt industry, and his family owned twenty granaries. He was reluctant to give up his family property and was even more afraid of suffering the same fate as the White Frost Clan. So he came up with the vicious plan of breaching the dikes to flood the fields—even if it meant suffering thousands of people, he wanted to preserve his wealth.
But he hadn't considered the will of the people.
At midnight, as the city lord's soldiers prepared to dig up the dike with hoes, countless dark figures suddenly emerged from the embankment. They were laborers from nearby villages, numbering in the tens of thousands, carrying carrying poles and shovels, their eyes blazing with anger.
"You corrupt official! Do you want us all to drown?" a lame old farmer shouted, leaning on his cane. "Our fields are all downstream! This is a despicable act that will bring ruin to our families!"
The laborers swarmed forward and began fighting with the soldiers. These farmers, usually honest and unassuming, now fought like madmen, some clinging to private soldiers and rolling into the river, others breaking their legs with their hoes. In the chaos, someone shouted, "Don't let that dog of a city lord escape! Dig the waterway towards his county seat!"
Thus, the floodwaters that were meant to inundate the plains were abruptly diverted. The surging river flowed back through the newly dug inlet, rushing towards South River City. By dawn, half of South River City was submerged, and the people were escaping to higher ground on rafts, cursing the city lord's name.
When the ninja army from the Land of Whirlpools arrived on bamboo rafts, this was the scene they saw. The lord had hanged himself in his mansion, his body bloated from being submerged in water. His chests, once filled with gold and silver, were now floating in the water, being fished out by the people to be used as firewood.
On August 13th, the last of the Masataka' forces arrayed themselves at Emerald Heights Plain. They still displayed banners proclaiming "500,000 troops," but it was clear to anyone with eyes that the soldiers' weapons were a jumbled mess, and less than 200,000 were truly capable fighters.
Prince Tenbutsu led the Golden Crow Army from the east, forming an encirclement with the ninja army of the Land of Whirlpools. Both sides carried crimson banners, one proclaiming "Golden Crow Facing the Sun" and the other "Long Live the Tian Flying Swallow," encircling Emerald Heights Plain like an iron barrel.
"Fight them!" the noble lords roared, drawing their swords, only to find that the soldiers around them remained motionless.
A gust of wind blew by, and the soldiers in the front ranks suddenly dropped their weapons and turned to run towards the Golden Crow Army. Immediately, more and more men followed, some even binding their lords and shouting, "We surrender! We brought our lord with us!"
"Mutiny!" The ranks crumbled instantly. The conscripted soldiers, having long suffered from the exploitation of the nobles, now saw the Flying Swallow army surrounding them and simply turned their spears around. One soldier, a tenant farmer, punched the retainer who was urging him to charge, and kowtowed towards the direction of the Tenbutsu: "Your Highness, we've wanted to surrender for a long time, we've been waiting for you!"
Tenbutsu stood at the front of the battle line, watching the endless stream of surrendering soldiers, and loudly ordered, "Those who wish to join the army, shall be incorporated into the Newly Attached Army; those who wish to go home shall be given three days' rations and dismissed on the spot."
As the news spread, even more people surrendered. In just a few days, 300,000 surrendered soldiers were incorporated into the army. These men were familiar with the terrain of the south and knew where the nobles stored their grain, making them a vital force in pacifying the south.
On August 16th, the last three noble families retreated to Red Lotus City. This city was built on an island in the middle of a lake, surrounded by water and connected only by a drawbridge. Clinging to their last hope, the nobles moved their entire families, along with their gold and silver treasures, into the city, declaring, "We'd rather die a glorious death than live a shameful life!"
But they forgot that the ninjas of the Land of Whirlpools were masters of Sealing Jutsu. That night, the ninjas dug from the bottom of the lake and, like fish, infiltrated the city's cellars. By the time the guards on the drawbridge noticed something amiss, many Four Violet Flames Formation had already been erected throughout the city, and important places were protected by Sealing Jutsu.
"Capture them alive! Don't let them self-immolate and destroy the city!" The ninjas broke open the stone door of the cellar and dragged out the nobles hiding inside one by one. Those gentlemen and ladies who were used to living in luxury were now covered in soot, crying their eyes out, and could barely stand.
The fire at Red Lotus City burned for a full half-day. The Kakkō reflected on the lake, resembling blooming red lotuses, before being extinguished by the ninja army. All the important valuables were saved.
August 20th, exactly twenty days. When the last noble banner was torn down, the southern sky finally cleared. Tenbutsu tallied the results of the battle: the Golden Crow Army suffered fewer than 30,000 casualties, and the ninja army of the Land of Whirlpools lost only 12,000, yet they had completely wiped out the noble forces in the south.
When the land and houses were being inventoried, the Tenbutsu ordered that the nobles' land be distributed to the common people according to their population, and also burned all the debt deeds. When the news reached the countryside, the people, young and old, knelt by the roadside. When they saw the army of the Land of Fire passing by, they burned incense and kowtowed, shouting "Long live the Queen!" The sound rose and fell, echoing for dozens of miles in the sky.
An old farmer, holding his newly allocated land deed, wept uncontrollably. "I've never seen my name written on paper before, especially on a land deed! Queen Tian Flying Swallow is truly a living bodhisattva!"
The historian wrote on the bamboo slips, "In the autumn of the twenty-seventh year of Flying Swallow, within twenty days, there were no more nobles in the south. The old clans were destroyed, the new system was established, and the people all turned to him." After writing this, he looked up at the window and saw the crimson flags fluttering in the sunlight, like countless Golden Crow spreading their wings and soaring high. The autumn in the south had finally brought warmth.