Chapter 1: Struggle for Survival

  This is a nearly empty room with only a small table and several bamboo baskets, on the small table, a small oil lamp flickers with bean-sized flames, the room is dimly lit.

  In the middle of the house, a shrine maiden wearing an embroidered black robe was dancing with her hands and feet, occasionally letting out strange and shrill cries, as if a vengeful spirit was demanding its life back, her cold and stern eyes fixed intently on a young man on the ground.

  The young man, who looked like he was only fifteen or sixteen years old, lay on a worn-out grass mat, wearing coarse linen clothes. His face was slightly long, with eyebrows like swords and a high nose bridge, looking handsome. His skin was slightly dark, and his physique was tall and sturdy, with hands and feet that were roughened from years of hunting life.

  But at this time he seemed to have fallen ill, and was in a coma, constantly shouting some strange words in his mouth, which was a local dialect that locals couldn't quite understand.

  "Lawyer Fang... when is the trial exactly?"

  ．．．．．．

  "What if I miss it and the train leaves?"

  This is a soul from the previous life, a young lawyer who loves sports fell into an unfathomable mountain cave while hiking outdoors. The soul did not die and traversed 1800 years of space-time to attach itself to a sixteen-year-old boy hunter who also fell into a rock crevice.

  He experienced an incredibly long journey through space and time in the darkness, with stars shifting and years revolving. When his soul awoke, he had traversed 1,800 years in the long tunnel of space-time.

  The young hunter was rescued two days ago, he only woke up once and soon fell into a coma again. He didn't get sick, but lost his soul, speaking nonsense that terrified the locals.

  In the corner, an old man of about sixty years old was squatting. He was the grandfather of the young boy. The boy's parents had died early and before their death, they entrusted the child to him. If something happened to the child, how could he explain it to his deceased son?

  At this time he was extremely worried, Sunzi fell into the mountain seam at Guixu Rock, but was caught by a thick shrub, narrowly escaping death.

  But the grandson who came back was like a different person, speaking incoherent and incomprehensible words. The people around him thought he had fallen into the Ghostly Gorge Mountain crack and unanimously believed that he was possessed by a ghost, and some even suggested burning him to death.

  The old man sighed and after all this was his grandson. No matter what he had to save him, all his hopes were pinned on the witch.

  Outside the broken window, a group of people gazed at the child on the ground with hateful eyes, whispering to each other.

  "Did you guys hear that? He's talking nonsense again. Something about a train... what is a train, have any of you heard of it?"

  The people around shook their heads, no one had ever heard of a train, someone shouted: "I know, this must be the carriage of the fierce fire king."

  "My goodness, he's a monster!"

  An old man glared at the young boy, gritting his teeth and saying: "He will bring disaster to our village, he must be burned to death!"

  "Kill him!" The villagers outside all shouted loudly.

  Just then, a burst of wailing and barking erupted from the distance, followed by a blaze that shot up into the air. Everyone was stunned, unsure what had happened. At this moment, a young man came running towards them, shouting in terror: "Li Kui, it's terrible! Cao's army has come to conscript strong men!"

  ．．．．．．．．．．

  In the sixth year of Jian'an, the Battle of Ru'nan broke out. Liu Bei absorbed the tens of thousands of Yellow Turbans led by Liu Pi and Gong Du in Runan Commandery and marched towards Xu Du, attempting to take advantage of Cao Cao's absence in Hebei to launch a surprise attack on Xu Du.

  At this time, Cao Cao had already ended the war at Cangting and returned to Xuchang with his troops. He personally led a large army south to attack Liu Bei. Cao Cao vowed that this time he would thoroughly eliminate Liu Bei.

  In the wilderness north of Ancheng County, Runan Commandery, a cavalry force of over 1,000 men led by Cao Cao drove tens of thousands of civilian soldiers to run in the open fields. These civilian soldiers were old and young men captured from various places in Runan Commandery, totaling about 50,000 to 60,000 people.

  These militiamen were not wearing armor, and they randomly held all sorts of "weapons" such as broken knives, rotten swords, hoes, wooden sticks, etc., and many people were still bare-handed.

  The colors were also very chaotic, with some wearing short linen clothes, others wearing scholar's robes, and even people wearing shorts, bare-chested, in groups, the teams were in a state of utter chaos, running aimlessly on the open fields.

  Cavalrymen kept galloping past the troops, and whenever they saw someone running a bit slow, they would lash down with their whips and shout loudly, "Run faster for me!"

  In extreme exhaustion, people kept falling to the ground, and Cao's cavalry showed no mercy, raising their long spears to stab these stragglers to death.

  "Run quickly! Daring to pretend to be dead will be killed without pardon!"

  The mournful cries rose and fell in the open country, striking terror into the hearts of every soldier, who ran eastward with all their might.

  In the team, a tall and agile young man was sometimes fast and sometimes slow, his movements were quick and he wouldn't fall behind to be whipped, but he also wouldn't run to the front.

  He was the young hunter who had just awakened from his coma, his previous life was named Liu Jian, a lawyer, who loved outdoor sports and had a strong physique, but unfortunately fell into the deep abyss while rock climbing.

  After waking up, he was possessed by a young hunter, and his later thoughts completely replaced the possessed young man, so that he was in a state of confusion and ignorance about this era, and even didn't know his name in this era, and was caught by Cao Jun as a strong recruit.

  He really wanted to ask the people around him, what year it was now and where he was. He knew that he had fallen into the Three Kingdoms era, and the giant Cao character on the banner was particularly eye-catching.

  "Run quickly!"

  A middle-aged man pushed him desperately, "The soldiers behind are whipping fiercely!"

  Liu Jian turned his head, dozens of steps away, more than a hundred Cao army cavalrymen were desperately using whips to drive them forward, many people were beaten with broken heads and bleeding, those who fell to the ground were immediately stabbed to death by long spears.

  Liu Jian sighed, his only advantage now was that he had a bit more brains than these sheep-like poor soldiers.

  He stretched his neck and looked back, in the distance there was a black line, about a few miles away, following them from afar.

  He had already guessed what Cao Jun was going to do. If he wasn't wrong, they were being driven to their deaths as cannon fodder. There should be thousands of troops waiting for them up ahead.

  He also didn't know how to survive, but one thing he understood in his heart was that he absolutely couldn't rush forward in a panic, nor could he fall behind; he could only look for an opportunity to escape when the Cao army was too busy fighting to pay attention to them.

  Liu Jian followed the crowd in a swift and agile manner, at this moment he was grateful for the blessing of heaven, which allowed him to possess a strong and nimble young body, giving him the capital to save his life.

  He was a young hunter in this life, living in the mountainous area south of Junan County. For years, he had been running in the mountains and fighting with wild beasts, his speed was extremely fast, and his body was agile and nimble.

  Good physical condition and the clever mind brought from his previous life gave Liu Jian the capital to survive. He did not despair like others, but instead waited patiently for an opportunity to escape.

  Just then, there was a sudden commotion ahead, with someone shouting loudly, "There are troops ahead, it's the Yellow Turbans!"

  Liu Jian also saw that about a mile ahead, suddenly appeared dense and numerous troops, with approximately 10,000 to 20,000 people, with swords and spears like forests, and banners like clouds. Under one red large flag, the soldiers were arrayed in a formidable manner, their formation layered, with several thousand archers at the front.

  Thousands of bows and crossbows were aimed at them, scaring the civilian soldiers so much that they fled in terror, shouting and screaming as they turned to run. Just then, the drums signaling Cao's attack began to beat: "Boom! Boom! Boom!" The drumbeats shook heaven and earth.

  One thousand of Cao's cavalrymen forced the civilian soldiers to charge towards the enemy lines, and at this time they no longer used whips to drive them, but instead used knives and spears to stab, and groups of civilian soldiers who tried to escape were killed on the spot.

  In front of them was the threat of death, while behind them was the bloody slaughter, the wailing before being killed, the severed heads, the piled-up corpses, the blood splashing everywhere, the limbs flying horizontally, and thousands of civilians were forced by the god of death to rush towards the Yellow Turbans, shouting and killing, echoing across the fields.

  The army ahead is the main force of the Runan Yellow Turban Army, with a total of 12,000 people, led by General Gong Du. He was ordered by Liu Bei to go and support Liu Bei's army, but did not expect to encounter Cao Jun's ambush halfway.

  "General Gong, why are all these people you've killed just a mob?" asked a deputy general with furrowed brow.

  "These are expendable civilians; the real Cao army is behind them."

  Gong Du sneered and loudly shouted: "Prepare bows and arrows!"

  Thousands of bows and arrows were raised, cold arrowheads aimed at the surging masses of civilians.

  Liu Jian was sandwiched among the crowd, but he was running in a slanting direction towards the northeast. He had already discovered that there was a forest in the northeast direction, and he immediately realized that it was his only way to survive.

  Liu Jian constantly dodged and weaved through the surging crowd, gradually shifting to the edge of the army, but he could no longer get past, a team of Cao's cavalry blocked his path to the north.

  At this moment, the Yellow Turbans launched a barrage of arrows, dense and numerous as locusts, shooting towards them. In an instant, cries of agony filled the air, and large numbers of civilians were shot down, their bodies unprotected by armor, completely unable to withstand the enemy's bows and arrows.

  Thousands of civilians were in a state of panic, wailing filled the air, they had nowhere to escape, surrounded by Cao's cavalry pressing them to charge forward, slightly retreating, they would be slaughtered mercilessly.

  Liu Jian was knocked to the ground in the chaos, and at this moment, he suddenly felt something. The earth was trembling.

  He suddenly turned his head to look back, his eyes fixed tightly on the distance. All he saw was a grayish mist in the west, with dust swirling everywhere, blocking out the sunlight. The setting sun had turned a bloody red color. In the distance, endless cavalry appeared.

  The earth shook even more violently, and the sound of hooves like muffled thunder rose from the northwest. A dense cavalry army came pouring in, covering the sky and killing everything in their path. The militiamen shouted in terror, "It's the cavalry!"

  Thousands of civilian laborers have been killed or wounded, their task completed, disrupting the Yellow Turbans' archery formation. A thousand Cao army cavalrymen who were responsible for escorting them abandoned them and charged into the archer's position first.

  At this time, no one cared about the life and death of these civilians. Liu Jian was waiting for this opportunity. He reacted extremely quickly and shouted loudly to the crowd around him: "Follow me quickly and run into the woods!"

  Liu Jian pulled his leg and ran wildly, but soon he found that it was not right. The forest was still several hundred steps away, and the cavalry of Cao's army had already killed two hundred steps outside. The speed was much faster than theirs. Before they could run out of the forest, they would be killed.

  Liu Jian, with his quick wit from the future, fully played out at this time. He immediately lay down in a depression and moved over 7 or 8 corpses to pile on top of himself, secretly looking back through the gaps between the corpses.

  At this time, Cao Jun's cavalry had arrived, dense arrows shot over, and several hundred civilians who ran a bit slower were shot down with mournful cries.

  This cavalry is led by Xiahou Yuan, with six thousand elite cavalrymen, ordered to launch a surprise attack on Liu Bei's relief troops. The army was divided into two routes, one thousand cavalrymen were responsible for escorting the captured civilians, and the other five thousand men waited under Xiahou Yuan's command, waiting for an opportunity to strike.

  At this time, the thousand Cao army cavalrymen who were escorting the civilians had already charged into the enemy's archer formation, so the main force of the Cao army cavalry was no longer threatened by arrows. They began to launch a pincer movement and rushed towards the main force of the Yellow Turbans.

  Xiahou Yuan was eight chi three in height, with a large waist and cold, piercing eyes like electricity. He wielded an eighty jin heavy iron spear as if he were a heavenly god.

  "He let out a loud roar, 'Kill them all!'"

  Cao Jun's iron cavalry arrived like a storm, the iron cavalry was like a tiger and leopard, wherever they passed, heads were chopped off, limbs were torn apart, blood mist filled the air, civilians who fled in all directions were trampled under the iron hooves, wailing filled the fields, horses trampled everything into mud.

  Gong Du led the Yellow Turbans to fight, he swung his big knife and challenged Xiahou Yuan, but after a few rounds, he was unable to withstand it, turned his horse around and fled. However, his horse was not fast enough and was caught up by Xiahou Yuan, who stabbed him in the back with his spear. Gong Du let out a miserable cry and died instantly. Xiahou Yuan lifted his corpse high and laughed loudly, "Is this the army of the Great Ears Bandit?"

  The Yellow Turban leader was killed and soon collapsed, a brutal massacre unfolded in the fields.

  When the last warhorse jumped over Liu Jian, he sprang up from the pit and sprinted madly towards a forest hundreds of steps away. This was his only chance to escape with his life.

  ．．．．．．