At dusk, a group of Tunguska people dressed in roe deer fur robes and roe deer fur hats with only two eyes exposed, and skis on their feet appeared next to the camp.

In front of them was a local guide for a rescue team, followed by several Yakuts.

"This is our friend."

Li Xin learned through the translator that the group of people dressed like a large stupid roe deer turned out to be Evenks from the vicinity of here. The Tunguska tribe of Sipol spoke basically the same language, there was no barrier to communication, and with the nearby natives as the guide and interpreter, Li Xin quickly figured out the identity of the person who came.

They are indeed Evenks, but they claim to be from the Aoluguya tribe, which does not belong to any of the three major Evenki tribes. It turned out that they lived in the Lena River valley in their early years, and then gradually moved south, and their small branch moved all the way to the upper reaches of the Shilka River in the upper reaches of the Heilongjiang River.

The Tungusic word for Aoluguya means place with dense poplar forests. They are close to the tribe of Sore, and are also a tribe of deer. They make a living from reindeer hunting and fishing.

"Here they are a Ulilen, and there are about seven hundred of them." Soray told the teacher.

The Ulileng is an organizational unit of the Aoluguya tribe, which is equivalent to the Mao coaxing in the Solei tribe. A Ulilen is a small clan organizational unit that is grouped together by multiple families.

These people were very happy to see Li Xin's big team, staying at the foot of this great Xing'an Mountain, it is rare to see outsiders, especially such a large team of as many as five or six hundred people. Especially when they heard that there were many people in the team who were from the deer tribe, they were even more excited.

The leader of the team was an old man named Agdi, who was also the new Mamaleng of the 700-strong Wulilen, and was the leader of this small tribe.

The entire Ulilen is composed of more than a dozen families that are related by blood, and Agdi is elected by the heads of each family. The people of the Aoluguya tribe respect the elderly the most, so the chiefs are generally old people. And they revere warriors, so the old men chosen were once the bravest hunters in Wulilen.

The new Mamaleng is the patriarch of the entire Ulilen, and he arranges the hunting, distribution, family meetings, and even accommodation, clothing, and weddings and funerals of the Ulilen.

In their traditional concept, the hunting ground is dominated by the mountain gods, so the prey is also communal. Reindeer, hunting tools, birch bark boats, and sleds are also the public property of Wulilen, and everyone goes out to hunt collectively, cooperates with each other, and shares the harvest.

It is an honor for the best hunters to prefer to share less of their prey. For those who are old and lonely, they can be taken care of more.

In short, they were still in a kind of communal age.

The people of the Aoluguya tribe are hospitable. Li Xin and the others passed by, and they rushed to invite everyone to their village to stay. Li Xin kindly refused, and at this time Agdi also hoped to exchange some items with them.

Agdi brought with him a lot of deer and skins, including precious sable skins, black fox skins, and white bear skins.

Li Xin took out some tea, sugar, wine, cigarettes, and salt in exchange.

"We're going to the east, the Jurchens are oppressing our fellow Saurons, we've received their letters for help, and now we're going to rescue them. This is a venerable gentleman and a valiant general of the Han Empire in the south. On behalf of the Han Empire, he gathered the tribes near Lake Baikal. Many volunteer warriors were recruited, and this rescue team was organized to take us to the rescue of Sauron. Soray said to Old Man Agdi.

"Han Chinese, I know that I, Egdu Amma, once left the mountains and went south to the Mongolian steppe. It even crossed the steppes of the Mongols and reached the farther south. It's not as warm as the year-round snow and ice, and there aren't as many mountains and dense woods, but there are countless stone houses. And the walls made of countless bricks and stones, surrounded by many, many people who could not be counted, oh, there are Han people. ”

Agdi reminisced.

"When I came back, I told me that there were no reindeer among the Han people, but they had countless people, but they couldn't beat the Mongols or the Jurchens."

Soray explained to Li Xin that Egdu Ama meant uncle.

Li Xin didn't expect that there were still people in this northern tribe who had been to the Central Plains.

He smiled and said to Agdi, "The Central Plains is now the Han Empire, under the wise leadership of His Majesty the Emperor, we have defeated the Jurchens and conquered the Mongols, and now the Han has opened up to the shores of Lake Baikal, and in the near future, the entire West Pol will be included in the empire's territory." The Jurchens have been beaten by us like lost dogs, and they have fled to the Heilongjiang River in panic. ”

Soray translated these words to Agdi.

Agdi was a little surprised when he heard this, he knew that the Jurchens were so powerful that even the Maomingan Mongol tribes in the south paid tribute to the Jurchens, and they also received Nebuchu to pay mink and deer taxes every year.

He had no idea that such a powerful Jurchen had been defeated by the Han Chinese, whom his uncle had once described as weak.

As they were talking, there was a sudden shout, and the noise of their camp here woke up a black bear that had spent the winter in a nearby tree hollow.

Awakened, the bear was so hungry that it ran onto the ice of the river.

Agdi hurriedly shouted, ready to call his hunter boy to hunt the bear.

The lads of Agdi are fierce hunters, and they usually form a tatan of five or six people, a fixed hunting group, familiar with each other, and cooperate tacitly. Even bears, they are not afraid.

But before he could prepare his bow and arrows, Li Xin had already picked up his gun and clicked a few times, and he had already aimed at the big black bear that was swaying on the ice, and then there was a loud bang, and the black bear fell to the ground in response, and soon, a pool of bright red was reflected on the ice under the black bear.

Agdi stood there stunned, as did his group of boys.

Such a strong black bear, or a hungry bear, usually without three or five tatans to cooperate with each other, plus a dozen dogs, they dare not say that they can hunt.

But now, the young man who just looked extremely weak and afraid of cold in his eyes easily killed such a big bear at a distance of at least a hundred steps.

Incredible.

"What is this?" Agdi had never seen anything like this that made a loud noise, like lightning.

Li Xin handed the musket in his hand to Agdi. This is an old type of sniper gun, without rifling. It is smaller than the old nine-headed shotgun, but it is also larger than the general firearm, this gun is better and higher, and if it is loaded with special blocking bullets, it is easy to kill a black bear in 100 steps. However, this gun weighs fifteen pounds, and it is troublesome to load, especially his bullets are particularly expensive, and they are all hand-customized.

It is quite not cost-effective to use this kind of stunner gun to hunt, but at this time, Li Xin's shot still deeply shocked Agdi and other Tunguskas.

They came to the bear together, and the bear was dead.

"What a big bear."

Soray and the others laughed.

But Agdi sighed, "What a powerful gun." ”

He finally knew in his heart why the Han Chinese were able to conquer the Mongols. Defeat the Jurchens. No matter how powerful the bow and arrow are, it is not as good as this musket. A black bear of this size was killed by a single shot from afar, how strong a warrior is, how can it compare to a black bear?

"You can burn bear's paws tonight!" Li Xin said with a smile.

The Aoluguya people were in awe of the bear, and they used the bear as a totem, and Agdi begged Li Xin to let them kill the bear. Li Xin agreed, and Agdi and they began to slaughter the bear. It's more like they're performing a ritual.

They don't say that the bear is dead, but that the bear is sleeping.

Agdi took the lead in bowing down to the sleeping bear. Then start peeling. When they peeled the bear, they first cut off the male bear's ****, hung it on a tree, and then started to peel it, they thought that this bear would be honest when he saw it.

And when they peel the skin, they can't cut the artery, but they have to squeeze the blood into the heart.

The bear's neck can't be cut off casually. Instead, the small intestine must be taken out and circled around the bear's head three times before being cut off. Even a skinning knife cannot be called a knife, but a kergen, which means why it is also a blunt knife that cuts continuously.

When the bear meat was stewed, before the meal, Agdi invited Li Xin to the shrine in the northeast corner. The rest of the people sat in a circle around the fire in turn.

Agdi scooped up the boiled bear fat with a spoon and poured it into the fire to offer to the god of fire.

As soon as the oil "zela" burst into flames, Agdi and his people shouted: "Fire laughs, fire laughs". Then listen to the crow's cry in unison - "quack". Agdi then said, "It is the crows that eat your flesh, not the Aoluguya who eat your flesh," and then gave each of them a portion of the bear oil, and everyone began to eat the meat after they had drunk it.

According to their custom, whenever a bear is hunted, it must be eaten by all the members of the whole Wulilen. If you can't finish it at one time, eat it a second time until you finish eating.

But fortunately, there are many people in this camp, hundreds of people, and this bear can eat it all in one meal, no matter how big it is.

However, Agdi did not let people eat the bear's heart, head, eyes, liver, lungs, etc., because these things had to be buried.

Bear paws, two upper right ribs, three ribs, and two lower left ribs are also not allowed to be eaten.

These had to be tied with birch bark and then six with wicker. The head faces east, and it is buried on a beam between two larch trees that have been erected in advance, and the wind burial is carried out. Those who participated had to fake crying to die and toast the bear, similar to the funeral rites of the elderly.

Li Xin ate a unique black bear dinner, and secretly felt a pity for the four big bear paws. By this time, he already knew that the Aoluguya people regarded the bear as their totem, and even considered the bear to be their ancestor.

Li Xin respected their traditions, which touched Agdi very much.

After the meal, Agdi made a request.

"We are also Evenki, and the Sauron tribe is also our kindred, and now they are bullied and oppressed by the Jurchens, and even the Han, Mongols, and Yakuts are willing to come to the rescue, so we naturally can't sit idly by, and I am ready to take twenty Tatan boys with you to the Shilka River."

Twenty tatans are a hundred and twenty young hunters.

Li Xin thought about this request, and finally agreed, they had already walked more than 2,000 miles along the way, and there may be no less than 2,000 miles to go in the future, and too much time had been spent on the road, and he was afraid that he would be too late. It may be too late to help Sauron evacuate, so he can only bring as many people as possible to help them fight off the Jurchens.

Agdi went back with the boys, saying that he would make some preparations.

Early the next morning, Agdi came as promised, and he personally led the team, with a whole two hundred hunter boys, instead of the twenty and more than one hundred Tatans as originally promised.

They also came on reindeer-pulled sleds.

Agdi also led the nine white deer to Li Xin, and the nine white deer pulled the nine sleds.

"This is a white reindeer, a gift from the gods, and now we will pay tribute to the emperor of the Han Dynasty with these white deer blessed by the gods, please give them to the Son of Heaven of the Han Dynasty on our behalf."

In addition to the nine rare white reindeer, the nine sleds were also loaded with many deer leaves, musk, deer whips, deer blood, deer fetuses, deer tendons, as well as sable skins, black fox skins, bear skins, ginseng, fungus, hazelnuts and many other precious things.

After returning to the village last night, Agdi held a meeting with Wulilen. He told all the things he had encountered during the day, and then proposed to pay tribute to the Great Han and lead people to follow the team to rescue Sauron. This proposal was unanimously agreed by everyone.

Agdi also increased the number of people to support, and finally selected 200 young men to go.

He also took out a lot of precious items as a tribute to the Emperor of the Han Dynasty, and at the same time took a batch of deer leaves and other things, hoping to exchange some heavenly thunder from Li Xin.

Li Xin was very happy with the Aoluguya's request to attach tribute to it, and agreed. And when they called the musket a thunderbolt and wanted to exchange some, they didn't refuse.

In the end, he generously sent 200 guns to the Aoluguya tribe, so that each hunter who went out on the expedition was equipped with a gun. He also gave Agdi an old handicap and two handcuffs.

Under Li Xin's teaching, Agdi and his warriors eagerly learned to shoot, and when they finally released the first shot with their own hands, Agdi's face flushed, and he shouted excitedly, "With these heavenly thunders given to us by the Great Han, the vicious Jurchens no longer have to be afraid!" ”

Li Xin thoughtfully, he pulled Soray and the old man Agdi aside, and asked them how many other tribal villages there were on the five hundred miles to Nebuchu from here.

"The teacher wants to visit them?"

Soray looked at Li Xin, and then at Agdi, who was carrying a gun, and also understood a little.

Li Xin nodded, "The journey took much longer than we expected, and by the time we reached the Shilka River, we were afraid that it would be too late to evacuate the Sauron Tribe." After this journey and the contact with these tribesmen along the way, I think we actually have a lot to do. If we can march all the way east, we can recruit people from the villages along the road and march eastward together, and by the time we reach the Shilka River, maybe we will have an army of two or three thousand men. ”

In addition to this fully armed rescue force of 500 people, Li Xin still carried 3,000 muskets and a large amount of ammunition. With these 3,000 muskets and the many knives, guns, bows and arrows carried, it would not be a problem at all to arm the people recruited along the way.

Thousands of fierce Tunguska tribe hunters, equipped with steel knives, steel arrows and muskets made by the Great Han, waiting for the idle Jurchen Eight Banners, there is no need to be afraid.

As soon as this thought came out, Li Xin became more and more determined, why did I only think about persuading the Sauron to retreat?

Why should I withdraw, this vast area of the upper reaches of the Heilongjiang River basin between the Daxing'an Mountains and the Daxing'an Mountains, why should I abandon them? Why retreat from the Jurchens? We can organize and arm the young hunters here, and then rely on the hunters' familiarity with this place, and we can completely defend this place and prevent the Jurchens from touching the upper reaches of the Heilongjiang River.

Not only did they not have to withdraw, but they also had to be nailed to the upper reaches of the Jurchens like nails to prepare for the Northern Expedition of the imperial court in the future. (To be continued.) )