"When the wolves are starving, even frost tastes like meat." – Saying among border tribes
The snows came early that year, as if Heaven itself wished to bury the rebel cause beneath ice and silence.
Huai Shan sat beneath a pine tree stripped of bark, snow clinging to his shoulders like funeral cloth. Around him, what remained of Xu Liang's warband had dwindled to thirty-three men. Once, they'd marched under a dozen local banners. Now, they huddled under rags and stolen furs, their blades dulled and stomachs emptier than their flasks.
They had not eaten in two days.
The Cold Does Not Kill with Speed.
First, it bites. Then it whispers. Then it waits.
"We can't stay here," rasped Old Yun, a man whose beard held more frost than age. "If we don't find food by tomorrow, half of us die."
"And if we move," another snapped, "the Iron Banner finds us."
The forest whispered all around — creaking ice, distant wolves. Or worse. The enemy was near. Patrols combed the hills daily.
Huai Shan said little. He had become a quiet figure these past weeks — but when he spoke, men listened.
"We won't last till spring," he said. "So we take their winter from them."
"What the hell does that mean?" asked one, coughing blood.
"It means," he replied, standing up slowly, "we raid their supply run."
The Imperial troops camped at Lang Ridge, a narrow pass that fed directly into the southern garrisons. Every seven days, a supply convoy left Lang and rolled east through the pine valleys, escorted by no more than twenty lancers.
Huai had scouted it twice now — in secret, alone.
And he had a plan.
"We don't face them head-on," he said. "We bring the ridge down."
"You mean landslide?"
"Yes. Then we cut through the wagons before the dust settles."
They didn't argue. They were too hungry to doubt. Too cold to fear.
The Night Before
Huai sat with his sword unsheathed, using a whetstone by firelight. The blade was chipped — too many kills without care. He ran his thumb across the edge until it bled.
Beside him, a younger fighter — Wei Zhen, maybe seventeen — huddled for warmth.
"You ever killed before all this?" Wei asked, voice barely a breath.
"No," Huai answered.
"What'd you do?"
"Plowed fields. Ate roots. Buried my parents."
Wei nodded slowly. "Same."
They didn't speak after that.
The Ambush
At dawn, the rebels crouched above the narrow path. They had packed the ledge with snow-laced stones, lashed with ropes of bark and bone.
They waited.
Then they heard them — the heavy clop of horses, the rattle of wheels, the flagpoles snapping in the mountain wind.
"NOW!" Huai roared.
A dozen hands yanked the ropes, and the mountainside exploded.
Snow, rock, and trees thundered down in a roaring avalanche. Horses screamed. Men vanished beneath white death.
Before the sound even faded, Huai and the others leapt down with war cries, blades in hand. Smoke grenades — stolen from a fallen Imperial scout — were lit and tossed. The world became gray chaos.
Huai tore into the first wagon, slashing the throat of a stunned lancer. Wei Zhen rammed a spear through a supply officer's gut, screaming the whole time.
One by one, they cut down the survivors, grabbed everything they could — sacks of grain, salted meats, oil, arrows.
It lasted less than ten minutes.
Then they vanished back into the snow.
Victory Feast
That night, they feasted.
For the first time in weeks, there was warmth in their bellies. Laughter. They carved meat from the fire, tore it with dirty hands, and sang old songs — off-key, wild, free.
Huai did not join them.
He sat apart, watching the flames.
Wei approached, mouth full. "You saved us again."
"No," Huai said. "I bought us a week. Maybe two."
Wei's grin faded.
"We need more than fire and meat to win a war," Huai added. "We need a real army. Real steel. And someone who knows how to lead."
"That's you," Wei said.
Huai shook his head.
"Not yet."
But somewhere inside, beneath the scars and the frost, a spark caught flame.
He had tasted war.
And now he wanted more.