“Report: Jiangyin County, Nanzhili, was overrun by Xu Hai, Ma Ye, and their pirate forces this morning. The pirates have been burning, killing, and looting without restraint. The moat outside Jiangyin has turned red with blood, and the sky above is darkened by crows circling overhead…”
At the Zhejiang Governor’s Office, scout Liu Mu led his team to report the fall of Jiangyin to Zhu Ping’an.
Liu Mu had returned from the capital yesterday.
From the capital, he brought back Emperor Jiajing’s rewards for Zhu Ping’an: a pack of preserved fruits, a jar of imperial wine, and a handwritten edict.
“Zhejiang’s pirate scourge—do your utmost. I await your victorious report!”
Upon receiving the emperor’s rewards, Zhu Ping’an was speechless. Emperor Jiajing was stingy beyond belief—a pack of fruits, a jar of wine, and a brief message to dismiss him…
“My lord, the preserved fruits and imperial wine are offerings from the grand ceremony of presenting captives, used to honor the ancestors at the imperial temple. Only cabinet ministers are privileged to receive such imperial gifts. Apart from them, you are the sole recipient,” Liu Mu added, beaming with pride.
Fine. In the eyes of people in this feudal era, this was already a tremendous honor…
Zhu Ping’an could only twitch his lips. Not a single practical item, yet the emperor had the gall to expect him to quell Zhejiang’s pirates. Jiajing was truly a master at getting something for nothing…
Back to the matter at hand.
Liu Mu, with the messenger, reported the fall of Jiangyin to Zhu Ping’an.
“The pirates don’t even rest on the second day of the New Year. It seems they’re determined to ruin everyone’s holiday,” Zhu Ping’an said, frowning, a strong sense of unease rising within him. Xu Hai’s band of pirates had started attacking county towns—a bad sign. If they could strike a county in Nanzhili, they could just as easily target Zhejiang’s counties. This meant Zhejiang’s county towns were no longer safe!
The common folk fleeing from villages to county towns for safety were no longer secure!
With pirates looming, Zhu Ping’an’s available forces were pitifully scarce. The eight thousand recruits from Yiwu, Dongyang, Yongkang, and Wuyi had only trained for ten days, far from battle-ready and nowhere near fit for the battlefield.
As for Yu Dayou, he’d been requisitioned by Zhang Jing, tasked with defending the garrison, and Zhu Ping’an had no authority to mobilize him.
The local garrisons were utterly useless—barely capable of defending city walls against pirates, let alone engaging in open combat.
A clever cook can’t make a meal without rice. It was truly vexing.
“Closely monitor developments in Jiangyin’s pirate situation. Deploy ten squads of Zhejiang troops, divided into five teams, to scout the northern Zhejiang border. Let them choose any mules or horses from the army. If pirates cross the border, sound the alarm immediately, instructing nearby civilians to hide in county towns or mountain forests. Additionally, grant each squad leader authority to make on-the-spot decisions—whether to engage, harass, annihilate, or retreat based on the pirates’ strength. No matter their decision, right or wrong, they will not be held accountable afterward.”
With no other choice, Zhu Ping’an had to deploy the Zhejiang troops. Given the shortage of forces, he could only send ten squads to patrol northern Zhejiang.
At this moment, Jiangyin County was a living hell. After the pirates overran the county, half their forces spread through the city’s districts, burning, killing, and looting.
Wealthy households were targeted by the marauding pirates. The hired guards, who once bullied neighbors and strutted arrogantly, were no match for the pirates’ blades. Every targeted household was breached, with killings and looting ensuing. The pirates, well-practiced, left a trail of atrocities, turning the city into a wail of despair.
The other half of the pirate forces, led by Xu Hai, Ma Ye, Ryuzoji Nobutake, and Matsuura Shirosaburo, besieged the Jiangyin county office.
The reason for splitting forces was that, after the pirates took the county, Jiangyin’s magistrate, Jiang Zhiqiu, neither fled nor surrendered. Instead, he armed the county office’s constables and servants with weapons from the armory, rallied over a hundred defeated soldiers, and fortified the county office for defense.
Magistrate Jiang was decisive. Rather than let the pirates benefit, he’d empower his own people. First, he distributed bows, crossbows, armor, swords, and shields from the armory to the constables, servants, and soldiers. Next, he opened the county’s treasury, dividing nearly ten thousand taels of silver among them to inspire them to defend the office to the death. Finally, he surrounded the grain stores with straw doused in oil, instructing a trusted aide to set it ablaze if the office fell, ensuring not a single grain would be left for the pirates.
Jiang himself donned armor, took up a long sword, and stood at the forefront on the county office’s walls, directing the desperate defense.
Through Jiang’s measures and the armory’s ample supply of bows, arrows, and armor, the makeshift force of constables, servants, and defeated soldiers, despite heavy losses, miraculously held off the pirates, preventing them from breaching the office’s gates.
“Get up there! Attack, you bastards! Hesitate again, and this is your fate! Break that gate, and I’ll twist off this dog magistrate’s head to use as a ball!”
Ma Ye was furious. Leading the assault on the county office, he hadn’t expected Jiang Zhiqiu’s ragtag band of defenders to withstand multiple attacks. Feeling humiliated in front of Ryuzoji Nobutake and Matsuura Shirosaburo, he hacked down a retreating pirate in a rage, forcing another assault.
Under Ma Ye’s bloodied blade, the pirates launched another fierce attack on the county office.
“Kill them all!”
“Die, die, die!”
“Charge in and slaughter them!”
True and fake pirates surged toward the county office. The walls, just over three meters high, could be scaled with human ladders.
“Everyone, if the pirates break in, we’re dead. Fight to the death to stop them, and we might survive!”
“I’ll tell you this: my life is worth more than yours, and I’m not standing here waiting to die. Rest assured, before the pirates breached the city, I sent for help from the governor and the Shandong gunners stationed in Changzhou.”
“Reinforcements are on their way. Hold on just a little longer, and they’ll arrive to save us!”
“If we hold until reinforcements arrive, after the battle, everyone gets an extra ten taels of silver. Those who die will have twenty taels for their families. I swear on my official hat—if I break this oath, may my hat fall and my head roll!”
Magistrate Jiang organized the constables and soldiers to resist the pirates while painting a hopeful picture, stressing he’d sought aid before the city fell and promising more silver for holding the line.
Faced with life or death, the constables and soldiers unleashed astonishing resolve, unbelievably repelling another fierce pirate assault.
But the cost was inevitable and brutal—nearly half were wounded, maimed, or killed.
In the era of cold-weapon warfare, a force typically collapses when losses exceed ten percent. Only exceptional commanders can maintain cohesion past twenty percent.
Under the threat of death, Jiangyin’s county office defenders achieved a miracle, holding firm despite nearly fifty percent casualties.
They had no choice—trapped in the county office with nowhere to flee, they could only fight to the death for survival.
