Chapter 13 Alliance

The Russians clearly did not expect to be ambushed here. In the blink of an eye, over forty men were knocked to the ground. The survivors, no longer daring to pursue anyone, hastily turned around and fled toward the rear. Yang Xiaolin was overjoyed. Without caring who had helped him from the woods, he hoisted Lu Laoliu onto his shoulders, waved his arm grandly, and shouted, "Into the woods!"

Without waiting for his call, the remaining bandits had already dashed inside. Just as Yang Xiaolin stepped into the dense forest, Zhang Zuolin sprang out from the side. "Yang Ghost-Killer, I knew you could only run this far! Follow me quickly!"

Yang Xiaolin smiled. Fortunately, Zhang Zuolin had not waited for him at Motianting either; he knew he was safe once more.

Though the sudden attack caused relatively few casualties among the Russians, it completely shattered their will to press the pursuit. Yang Xiaolin and Zhang Zuolin ran all the way to Motianting, where Feng Delin’s forces had already made preparations. Seeing them running up from the foot of the mountain, Lu Laoqi shouted excitedly, "First Brother! They're back!"

Cheers erupted from the ridge. Having received the news earlier, most of Feng Delin’s other troops had already come to reinforce the position. By now, more than twenty thousand bandits had gathered at Motianting. Though General Akberil, who had been tailing them relentlessly, felt deeply aggrieved, he had no choice but to halt his steps at the base of the mountain.

Feng Delin had already been freed from his shackles. When Yang Xiaolin and Zhang Zuolin reached the summit, he strode forward to greet them. Opening his arms wide, he pulled both Zhang Zuolin and Yang Xiaolin into a tight embrace, his voice stirring with emotion. "Brother Yang, Number Five, thank you both!"

With that, he gave Zhang Zuolin a pat on the shoulder—a gesture that clearly indicated Feng Delin had, at the very least, laid aside their personal grievances. As a man of considerable stature, Zhang Zuolin naturally knew how to step down gracefully when a ladder was offered. He chuckled softly and said, "Elder Brother, this younger brother was ignorant in the past and offended you. I beg you not to take it to heart."

Feng Delin burst into laughter. "When? Why do I know nothing about it?"

Hearing this, Zhang Zuolin laughed as well. Yang Xiaolin looked at the two of them and intervened, "We had better head up first and talk. The Russians are right behind us. If they spot the three of us together and drop a shell here, they'll save themselves a lot of trouble."

With Feng Delin leading the way, the three men reached the mountaintop, where Zhang Zuolin collapsed heavily onto the ground. "Damn it, I'm exhausted to death! These Russians are truly vicious. I had over two hundred brothers lying in ambush on the mountaintop, and a single round of their artillery reduced us to just over twenty men."

Yang Xiaolin glanced back at his own ranks. Of the one hundred brothers he had brought down from Gulou Mountain, only thirty or forty remained. The heaviest losses, of course, were borne by Feng Delin’s forces: entering the city with ten thousand men, they had emerged less than half an hour later with only two or three thousand.

If measured purely by numerical casualties, the losses they inflicted on the Russian army this time might only have amounted to a few hundred. Coupled with the eight hundred brothers under Tang Yulin, their own side had suffered seven to eight thousand casualties—a veritable crushing defeat. But the crux of the matter was that they had not gone there to wage a conventional war; they had gone to rescue a captive. Even if every single man had perished, as long as Feng Delin made it out alive, victory was still theirs.

Consequently, all of their spirits were remarkably high!

Feng Delin smiled. "To be able to pluck me right out of a Russian prison—such skill truly commands my utmost respect! To be honest with you both, I always believed that if anyone could ever get me out, it would only be the Japanese. When I heard Big Tiger roar out that shout, I actually wondered if I were dreaming! Hahaha!"

Yang Xiaolin chimed in, "Brother Feng is mistaken there. No matter what, the Japanese are outsiders. Western Liaoning belongs to us brothers. Whatever we brothers set our minds to do, there is nothing we cannot accomplish."

Feng Delin nodded repeatedly upon hearing this. "What you say makes sense! Western Liaoning belongs to us!"

Zhang Zuolin and Yang Xiaolin exchanged glances. Yang Xiaolin felt that the time was ripe to strike while the iron was hot.

"Brother Feng, I've been harboring a thought. You see, the Japanese and the Russians are on the verge of going to war. No matter what, this is our territory. If we don't make the slightest stir when the time comes, those foreigners will look down upon us Northeast men."

The moment he said this, Feng Delin’s smile vanished. Although he had put aside his personal feud with Zhang Zuolin, irreconcilable fundamental conflicts still existed between the two of them. In Feng Delin’s view, the Russians were his primary enemies, and he was willing to pay any price to drive them out, including cooperating with the Japanese.

Though Yang Xiaolin’s stance remained somewhat ambiguous, he maintained closer ties with the Japanese while continuously fighting the Russians, leading Feng Delin to believe that, for the present at least, they were on the same front. Zhang Zuolin was a different story altogether; the boy relied on no one, choosing instead to lean on the imperial government, which made him rather inscrutable to Feng Delin.

Knowing that Yang Xiaolin would speak to him thus in Zhang Zuolin’s presence meant the two of them had undoubtedly reached a consensus. Just what kind of commotion did Yang Xiaolin intend to stir up when the Japanese and Russians fought? Suspiciously, Feng Delin looked at the two of them. "My two brothers, speak your minds plainly."

Yang Xiaolin nodded. "Very well, I won't beat around the bush. Number Five and I have already discussed it. When the Japanese and Russians start fighting, whoever bullies us, we will strike back! Elder Brother, we want to team up with you."

Feng Delin looked at Zhang Zuolin, who nodded to confirm that Yang Xiaolin spoke the truth. Taking a long, deep breath, Feng Delin let his smile return. "Need you even ask? The ones bullying us right now are those Russian devils."

"Then let's fuck them up!"

Yang Xiaolin’s reply was utterly decisive. Feng Delin looked at Zhang Zuolin once more, and Zhang Zuolin rose from the rock. "Yang Ghost-Killer is right. If the Russian devils bully us, we fight them. If the Japanese dwarfs bully us in the future, we'll fuck them up too. Elder Brother needn't look at me like that—this younger brother only went to the authorities because Elder Brother drove me into a dead end. As long as Elder Brother is willing to lead us brothers again, I'll step down right this instant!"

In Feng Delin’s eyes, the Japanese were friends of the Qing court—benevolent and reliable. Therefore, Yang Xiaolin did not try to dissuade him the way he had persuaded Zhang Zuolin. As long as Feng Delin made his stance public before the tens of thousands of men gathered on the mountain, he would not be able to go back on his word later.

Sure enough, upon hearing Zhang Zuolin’s declaration, Feng Delin set his doubts aside, extending his large hand. "Good! From now on, our brothers share a single heart. Whoever bullies us, we'll take them down together!"

Yang Xiaolin extended his hand as well, gripping Feng Delin's. Zhang Zuolin placed his hand on top. The three large hands locked together, and as they exchanged glances, they all burst out laughing, their laughter echoing across the mountain ridge. Yang Xiaolin knew this meant that, from this moment on, they had formed an alliance.

The world of the green woods required no signed agreements, nor were there any permanent alliances in this world. Just like Yang Xiaolin’s relationship with Sun Yat-sen, this alliance was merely preliminary. If their interests conflicted in the future, or if one party's interests were blatantly infringed upon during their cooperation, the alliance would naturally dissolve.

The three men burned yellow paper on the mountaintop and casually swore an oath, thereby establishing the alliance. Feng Delin wanted to invite Yang Xiaolin and Zhang Zuolin to stay at Gaojiatun for a few days, but Zhang Zuolin had official duties pressing upon him, and Yang Xiaolin had numerous matters to attend to as well. The two politely declined and departed with their respective troops.

Walking along the road, Yang Xiaolin asked Zhang Zuolin what Zaitao was currently up to. Zhang Zuolin told him that Zaitao would undoubtedly prove to be a formidable adversary for Yang Xiaolin. Upon arriving in Fengtian, Zaitao had reduced the original garrison force of thirty thousand down to twenty thousand, driving out all the unqualified slackers and loafers who had merely been living off government pay.

At the same time, the Qing imperial soldiers currently inside Fengtian city were vastly different from those of the previous year. Zaitao had established his own arsenal, which meant that if fighting broke out again, the Qing dynasty's troops would no longer have to wait for foreigners to deliver rifles and cannons before they could go to war. Furthermore, Zaitao had formed an artillery force of about five thousand men, equipped with one hundred heavy cannons shipped from Germany. Unsatisfied with even this, Zaitao had another batch of heavy cannons already on the way, while a second artillery unit was currently being assembled.

Merely possessing weapons would not have terrified Yang Xiaolin, a fact Zaitao undoubtedly understood. He placed equal importance on the role of soldiers on the battlefield. Zhang Zuolin told Yang Xiaolin that while the Manchu court and the foreigners had repeatedly urged Zaitao to dispatch troops to suppress the bandits, Zaitao remained completely unmoved, focusing entirely on training. Zaitao had once remarked to Zhang Zuolin that during the First Sino-Japanese War, the Qing army's equipment had been superior to Japan's, and their warships larger in tonnage—so why had they lost? The reason lay in the soldiers! The soldiers lacked combat experience and the conviction to die for their cause; no matter how fine the equipment in one's hands, one would still lose!

Consequently, Zaitao continued to drill his troops and hired Germans to lecture the junior officers of the Qing army.

This news genuinely shocked Yang Xiaolin! In his impression, the Manchu princes were all good-for-nothing parasites who did nothing in Beijing except flaunt their Manchu banner and wait to die, and he had never heard of any achievements among them. Yet Zaitao’s current performance caught Yang Xiaolin completely off guard. If the Qing court could casually produce a prince this formidable, how on earth could the Manchus have fallen to their present state?

Yang Xiaolin and Zaitao had started their endeavors at virtually the same time. Over this extended period, Yang Xiaolin had accomplished a great deal, yet the gap between him and Zaitao had not widened. Zaitao had set up an arsenal; Yang Xiaolin had set one up too—though smaller, it would suffice once fully operational.

Zaitao had built an artillery force; Yang Xiaolin now possessed artillery as well. At Gulou Mountain, he had fabricated the kind of "heartless cannons" used by the PLA during the War of Liberation—essentially the oil-drum mortars the PLA used against the Nationalists, as seen in historical footage.

These weapons were formidable. Their caliber was exceptionally large, yet their technological requirements were low, and they were not overly demanding regarding explosive charges. Though their range was only a couple of hundred meters, they fired in parabolas, making them perfectly suited for the terrain of the Changbai Mountains.

Their drawback was that these cannons could only be positioned within Gulou Mountain itself—meaning they could only be used when enemies came to attack him or when he had the enemy surrounded. Firing them in a proper, upright artillery duel was out of the question.

That did not matter; Yang Xiaolin was preparing to acquire a batch of real cannons to equip himself. As he had stated, every regiment must have an artillery battalion.

Zaitao would not be able to gain any advantage by bringing his artillery into the mountains against him. In the base areas at the foot of the mountain, Yang Xiaolin had also begun developing militias in reliable villages. The firearms phased out during his recent re-equipping were used precisely to arm these militias. Not only did he teach the militiamen how to shoot, but he also instructed them in simple combat techniques and emulated tunnel warfare within the villages, having every household dig tunnels.

Yang Xiaolin possessed incomparable innate advantages, and as his sphere of influence expanded, the power of these advantages became increasingly evident. He did not fear Zaitao, but the performance of the Manchu court genuinely startled him. To think that this prince actually understood that both soldiers and weapons had to be modernized to wage a modern war!

In his mind, Manchu princes were all worthless idlers waiting to die, but Zaitao completely shattered that preconception for Yang Xiaolin.