Refugees of the Small Cities is the 515th chapter of the Kingdom manga, written and illustrated by Yasuhisa Hara.
Summary
Royal Palace of Qin
Ei Sei, Shou Hei Kun and Shou Bun Kun received Ou Sen's message regarding the abandoning of Retsubi, being left defenseless. The court is struggling and is stressed due to Ou Sen's strategy, which makes Shou Bun Kun very angry and worried that the three armies' supplies might run out before they would take Gyou or any other Zhao forts. Shou Hei Kun studies the Zhao invasion map and saw that the Yo Tan Wa Army was split off to engage the 90,000 Zhao soldiers, acting as a shield, while the remaining troops attacked not Gyou, but a small town called Gota, located nearby Gyou. One of Shou Hei Kun's disciples proclaim that the Qin army doesn't rush to siege Gyou, more likely that Ou Sen, Kan Ki and the three squadrons (Ou Hon, Mou Ten and Shin) to act like pillagers in order to take supplies. Shou Hei Kun gets very suspicious of Ou Sen's strategy and what he's going to achieve from this plan.
Inner Zhao
Meanwhile, the Qin army, led by Ou Sen and followed by the three squadrons, Shin, Mou Ten and Ou Hon, watch the mass of people leaving a Zhao city. Ou Sen is appeased to see that his 'current' is working with A Kou wondering what his lord means, but Shin is outraged by these strange actions and tries to ask the Commander-in-Chief in why they aren't attacking Gyou. While Mou Ten and everyone is wondering the same thing, Ou Sen suddenly comes in front of Shin, towering over him with intimidating air while looking the late Ou Ki's Podao, but the General surprises the young commander and everyone present by answering their questions and worries with a strategic outlook as he states that even if it is the quickest way to finish things, it will take a day for Ri Boku to fix his political position in Kantan, then another day in order to mobilize his soldiers and lastly the other day in order to march to Gyou, being absolutely necessary to finish his operations.
Ou Sen discusses the strategy of splitting the whole army into three groups: the Ou Sen Army, the Kan Ki Army and the combined Hi Shin Unit, Gyoku Hou Unit and the Gaku Ka Unit, each group attacking every city in order to match up the pace, also including the pillaging of all villages and towns in order to not let supplies dwindle and starve their armies. One of Ou Sen's messengers arrive with the news that Retsubi is reclaimed by Zhao through 50,000 soldiers who marched past the Taikou Mountains, also forming a new formation. The only way now to march is go east, thus Ou Sen orders the messenger to send a message to Yo Tan Wa to make sure that she keeps up the pace with the others, thus increasing their pace.
Inner Zhao - Bachi Plains
The Yo Tan Wa army meets with Kou Son Ryuu's army, as Kou Son Ryuu tries to keep a defensive stance against Yo Tan Wa's army, considering the 'mountain apes' more likely to make no move if he doesn't make any moves. His adjutant also noticed that they were overestimated, more likely to be crazy to deal with them with an army half of the size of the Zhao army. Ryuu considers them foolish to try a shield cover for Ou Sen, as their neck 'grows tighter and tighter', since they will soon run out of supplies. Ryuu receives a message regarding other Qin's half army, marching eastward, thus ordering to maintain distance and follow them.
After Ou Sen's strategy worked accordingly, they marched eastward and pillaged villages and towns, they conquered the bigger cities such as Gota and Santan, leaving behind a swarm of people, starved, drowsy and weak. Still outraged by Ou Sen, Shin wonders why he would do such a thing to people, until Kyou Kai figured out that the swarm of starved people are 'locusts', people who would eat anything to their path eastwards.
Finally, Ri Boku arrived at Kantan with his army after finding out about the Qin army who pillaged and conquered all the minor villages and cities around Gyou.
Characters
Qin
- Royal Palace
- Ei Sei
- Shou Hei Kun
- Kai Oku
- Shou Bun Kun
- Shi Shi
- Kinryuu
- Unnamed messenger
- Unnamed officials
- Yo Tan Wa Army
- Yo Tan Wa (Mentioned)
- Unnamed members
- Gyoku Hou Unit
- Ou Hon
- Unnamed members
- Six Great Generals
- Ou Ki (mentioned)
Zhao
- Kou Son Ryuu Army
- Kou Son Ryuu
- Unnamed officers
- Unnamed members
- Ko Chou Army (Mentioned)
- Unnamed members (shown)
- Tei City
- Unnamed citizens
- Santan City
- Unnamed citizens
- Refugees from captured cities
- Kou Ben
- Unnamed others
High Points
Routes of the Qin armies and the refugees.
- Ou Sen does not even involve his closest commanders into his plan.
- Shou Bun Kun gets frustrated at Ou Sen's abnormal actions on aborting the plan without informing HQ.
- The Qin Army splinted up after capturing the second small city (this time into three parts):
- Part 1 Ou Sen Army
- Part 2 Kan Ki Army
- Part 3 Gaku Ka Unit
Gyoku Hou Unit
Hi Shin Unit.
- Kyou Kai calls the refugees "locusts" after realizing Ou Sen's true intent. Meaning that they will eat away anything on their path to the east and hopefully drain the food supplies of Gyou dramatically fast.
- The Qin court is informed about Ou Sen changing the original plan and completely leave Retsubi unprotected.
- The Qin army conquers 7 more cities on their way towards Gyou. Still, not harming any civilians, but are only taking food and creating refugees by casting them out.
- All the refugees head east, in the direction of Gyou which Ou Sen refers to as a "current".
- Ri Boku and his commanders reach Kantan.
- First appearance of Kou Ben.