Part 3, Chapter 15

Ch 15

Xia Lu, God of War rode at the front of his troops. They had been traveling for ten days and they were three days from the camp of the Heavenly Army. “Stop!” He called, “Guard!” The soldiers around him unsheathed their weapons and stared warily around them.

Xia Lu dismounted, followed by his generals. 

“What’s happening?” An Ming, Xia Lu’s aide asked as he came to stand next to his master. “Why did we stop?”

“Can’t you feel it?” Xia Lu asked, “We’ve entered the Red Desert.”

An Ming looked around, confused. “But, it doesn’t look like a desert… It looks like the rest of the land we’ve travelled through…”

“There are no spirits bonded to the land here. Everything has been driven out leaving the land barren. The only thing left is the Red Desert Tribe. It doesn’t have to be sandy to be a desert,” one of the generals replied.

“This is where the refugees came from,” Xia Lu said. He looked at his generals, gathering them with his eyes. With him at the center they formed a long line along the boarder of the empty land. “Now,” Xia Lu said, driving the tip of his sword deep into the earth and sending his power through it. The other generals copied his motions and slowly, inch by inch, they drove the power of the Red Desert Tribe out of the land. 

When they had finished they had regained a square of land three li by six li. The generals around Xia Lu fell to their knees. Xia Lu nodded to them and looked at his aide. “Set up a tent and bring refreshments for them. Then bring me a hundred soldiers. They will need to hold this land until it’s original inhabitants can return.”

An Ming bobbed his head and ran off. Xia Lu almost smiled. An Ming was very like his brother had been when they were children, always running after the warriors. His nephews were so very different from their father. Jianyu had always been so serious and trying to get Jiangou to focus on anything had been like trying to pin down a cloud. Just look where those children had ended up now, he thought bitterly.

Slowly and with great deliberation Xia Lu walked back to his horse and filled his head with calculations. The army would make slow progress through this outreach of the Red Desert. He would have to send scouts to see how far it reached so he could decide which route, around or through, would allow him to aide the Imperial Troops more quickly. Either way he would not be able to aid the Emperor in his bid to take back the Palace.