Chapter 326. Pursuit 2-2 — The Goryeo Army and the Balhae Troops
Youngwoo was pursuing Emperor Tianzuo with the Goryeo troops and the Balhae soldiers who had submitted.
There had been no time to fold them into the regular order of battle, so he organized them as a mobile detachment.
They were to reinforce whatever point needed them, drive in wherever a road opened, and withdraw quickly from danger when necessary.
The Balhae soldiers were hurriedly fitted with additional armor.
They already had armor, but much of it was too light.
Iron plates were added over what they wore.
It was nothing elaborate.
They used iron pieces recovered from the battlefield, leather thongs, and thick cloth, hastily fitted and bound together.
The result looked rough, and the rows of iron plates were uneven, but it gave them one more layer against arrows and blades.
Youngwoo judged that sufficient.
It was better to put men into armor they could wear today than lose them while waiting for something perfect.
He himself wanted to ride in the vanguard.
But Zongwang had returned from Song almost miraculously.
There was now someone else to lead the front.
Zongwang was an excellent horseman and worked well with the Jin commanders.
There was less need for Youngwoo to force himself into the foremost position.
What concerned him more were the Balhae troops.
They had served for years under the Liao military system and had only just submitted to Jin.
They could be called the old masters of this land, yet on this battlefield they were newly joined troops.
They had had little time to learn the Jin army's rapid maneuvering, its signals, its habit of withdrawing and striking again, or the coordination between mounted archers and heavy cavalry.
If they were simply pushed into the existing command structure, they could suffer badly while trying to keep pace with the speed of the battle.
Youngwoo was a man who distinguished public duty from private feeling.
Even so, he was moved by the argument that the Balhae troops should ride in the vanguard and win merit for themselves.
Part of it came from his own tendency to listen too readily to others.
Youngwoo always believed there was much he had yet to learn.
For that reason, he paid close attention whenever someone offered another opinion.
If another man suggested a different path, Youngwoo wondered whether there might be something in it that he himself had failed to see.
His desire to keep the Balhae soldiers safe collided with the thought that they needed military merit if they were to increase their standing.
The mobile detachment increased its speed as it followed the markers left by the forward scouts.
Red cloth tied to low branches, stakes driven diagonally into the roadside, and the direction of broken twigs showed the way.
The signs resembled methods used by the Goryeo army.
They were simple enough to understand at a glance while riding at speed.
Youngwoo drove the Goryeo and Balhae troops onward along those markers.
Go Youngchang, who had once commanded the Liaoyang Wuyong Cavalry, drew his horse alongside him.
As a former personal officer under Xiao Sixian, he understood military affairs well.
"Are we not hurrying too much?"
Youngwoo kept his eyes forward.
"Yes. We are hurrying. This is the first small opening we have seen in months. We must strike before they recover their senses."
His words were rough and somewhat awkward, but the urgency in them was unmistakable.
Only after making a wide detour around the area where the massive Liao camp had stood did Youngwoo finally ease his breathing.
They had now passed around the broad body of the Liao host and entered the road taken by the emperor's imperial guard.
"We have bypassed the main Liao army. Ahead of us are Tianzuo's personal troops. That does not mean they are few. But we can fight them. We can win."
Go Youngchang's eyes widened.
There was a strange power in those words.
The talk that had filled the Liao camps for years had always been gloomy and tangled.
Where the danger lay.
Who had been delayed.
What was lacking.
Whose order had been wrong.
Such words weighed men down.
Youngwoo spoke differently.
He did not hide the danger, yet he still gave men a place to move toward.
Even when someone voiced concern, he showed them where they could fight.
Go Hoewon, despite his age, kept close behind.
His white beard streamed in the winter wind, while his back remained surprisingly straight in the saddle.
He rode closer to Youngwoo and said,
"We must take the vanguard. We need to play our part in this battle."
Youngwoo had never raised the matter first.
He did not want to burden the Balhae troops.
He feared that asking men who had only just submitted to shed blood at once would look like exploitation.
But Go Hoewon's words were true.
Even now, many Balhae soldiers remained in the main Liao army.
There were also reports that Balhae troops had joined Yelü Zhangnu's rebels.
These men from Liaoyang were the only Balhae soldiers who had joined Jin.
Without a country of their own, Balhae people were swept from one side to another.
They were used with a foolishness that was painful to watch.
These Liaoyang troops were the only Balhae force now fighting with Jin.
If they earned merit in this battle, the Balhae people would gain a voice in the negotiations and the new order that followed the war.
They would earn the right to speak for their people afterward.
When a new order was built, the Balhae soldiers of Liaoyang could stand among those who had helped create it.
Merit was needed to protect people.
And only by protecting people could the Balhae name survive.
Youngwoo understood that.
At the same time, part of him wished that not a single one of them would die or be wounded.
The surest way to achieve that was to keep them off the battlefield entirely.
But that path would leave them with no place at all.
They had to enter battle to gain a name.
They had to gain a name if they were to save people later.
War always demanded calculations that cruel.
Youngwoo looked from Go Hoewon to Go Youngchang.
Then he turned his horse once more toward the red marker ahead.
"Very well. But move according to my command. Strike first, but do not remain engaged for long. If the road opens, go in. If the banner turns, withdraw. The Balhae troops must win merit today and survive to keep it."
Go Youngchang gave a thin smile.
Youngwoo treated them too much like fragile scholars.
"We are soldiers too."
Youngwoo answered with some difficulty.
"I acknowledge that."
Their horses raced along the red loess road.
The fierce wind blew their cloaks behind them, and frozen earth kicked low beneath the hooves.
Green branches of roadside thickets swept rapidly past.
Go Youngchang raised his voice.
"You said it yourself. You told us to stop fighting among ourselves and stand at the front of those who would destroy Liao."
Youngwoo tightened his grip on the reins.
"I meant that you should escape from a life of being dragged from side to side and used by others."
He still tried to avoid placing the Balhae troops in the vanguard.
Go Youngchang refused to yield.
"Do you not want to stand in the vanguard yourself? I have heard that you stood at the front in many battles."
Youngwoo swallowed.
He did.
He wanted to ride ahead of everyone.
But he did not say it aloud.
Then the thoughtless So Cheolun shouted loudly from behind.
"Our Commander Yi has been in the vanguard in every battle! He always smashed the enemy from the very front!"
Youngwoo bit his lip without a word.
The wind struck his face.
The desire to charge ahead and the responsibility to keep men alive collided inside his chest.
Neither could be abandoned.
What was a man supposed to choose at such a moment?
Youngwoo let out a long breath.
"I want that too. But I find it hard to accept the Balhae troops being used as arrow fodder."
At last his true feelings came out.
Go Youngchang's expression changed.
He spoke clearly even through the wind.
"Even if we become arrow fodder, if that becomes the first step toward restoring Balhae, we will do it willingly."
Youngwoo closed his eyes.
The horse continued to run, his body swaying with it.
Yet those words struck deep into his chest.
What extraordinary people.
What was it that made them stand once more before the name of a country that had fallen so long ago?
Had Balhae truly been such a good country?
Or were these simply such good people?
Youngwoo opened his eyes.
The red road stretched ahead, and between the green thickets the Jin trail markers snapped in the wind.
The battlefield was drawing closer.
He could no longer keep the Balhae troops behind him forever.
Youngwoo looked at Go Youngchang.
"Very well. I will put you in the vanguard."
Go Youngchang's face brightened.
Youngwoo immediately added,
"But you will obey my orders absolutely. Charging forward and dying first is not merit. You must live, shake the enemy, and live to open the next attack. Today the Balhae troops are not marching out to die. They are marching to reclaim their name."
Go Youngchang bowed his head.
"As you command."
Go Hoewon nodded behind him.
His white beard streamed long in the wind.
Youngwoo looked toward the marker ahead.
The red cloth left by the scouts whipped violently in the winter wind.
At the end of the road it pointed toward were Tianzuo's imperial guards.
And along that road, the Balhae troops began, for the first time, to ride beneath their own name.