MEET ME ON THE BATTLEFIELD

CHAPTER 2 - WAR CAMP

YuLin held onto the soldier's waist as they galloped west. To the soldier's temporary camp, he was told. YuLin held on tighter as the wind grew stronger and whipped his hair in all directions.

"Eh... XiongDi, mind loosening up a little? You...you really smell."

*XiongDi- basically means brother, used when addressing brothers of many ages or a brother whom you do not know the age of.

YuLin chuckled and hugged even tighter, "Aiya, don't be so mean, I'm cold!"

The soldier shut his mouth and tried to breath as little as possible as they continued on the galloping horse. The little huts and houses whizzed by and YuLin saw many weeping women, his own eyes had tears in them however it was caused by the strong winds that blew his hair into his eyes. Soon enough, they were out of the town and rode up a small hill and when they were on top, YuLin gasped at the sight below.

"Wah... impressive army, look at all those tents!" YuLin wriggled his knees under him so that he could kneel on the horse to get a better view. "Hm, not as many horses though... great animals."

"Wei! Sit properly! You'll fall." The soldier said. YuLin chuckled and obediently sat back on his butt. The soldier sighed as he nudged the horse into a slow trot towards the camp. "You think ten thousand five hundred people is a lot? Ay... this is nowhere near what the demon armies have... If this is all the soldiers we're stuck with, we're basically marching into suicide!"

*Wei- chinese equivalent of hey

"Ho? Demon armies? Marching? What's going on?" YuLin tilted his head, he'd been travelling through the wilderness for the most part so he was perhaps... a little behind on the news. Might as well as dig some information out of this guy.

"Dear gods, have you been living in the wilds? Aiya, let this knowledgable brother tell you our current affairs. I'm XingGe, family name Xie, by the way. Anyway, about a year ago our scouts from Huo Province was patrolling the broader between the human realm and the demon realm and around night time one of them found many severed heads on our side of the border. At first, we thought the demons were just playing a prank but after some careful observations, the scouts found that those head belonged to Huo Province's soldiers! So the scouts reported immediately to the heads of the ruling houses in the Huo province and they ignored it at first. But that was only until many more heads begun appearing, daily." XingGe shivered imagining the scene, "Finally the houses decided to send some renowned cultivators to the demon realm to find out what was going on but after the cultivators entered the demon realm, we did not hear from them for six months... Brother, you know, they sent thirty-three cultivators, how many do you think made it back? One! And not even a whole man, that Cultivator was missing an arm and half his face had been scarred so terribly. He bought with him the news of demon armies gathering to expand their territory onto our human lands and to kill every living thing in its way. So hearing about this, the Emperor sent General Zhao to resolve the problem and wage war if he must, but the Emperor only provided him with an army of Ten thousand! Can you believe it? So now our General is facing much ridicule and hate for taking all the men able to fight to protect our country... Aiya, what a sorrowful fate for our General..." By the time XingGe had finished his tale, they had reached the base of the camp and YuLin was deep in thought.

"Come on now, I'll take you through registration and assign your roles and give you your clothes... and your bath, a bath is your top priority I say." XingGe slipped off his horse and YuLin followed suit and landed, barefoot, in cold mud. YuLin jumped up and down.

"Cold, cold, cold!"

XingGe laughed and said, "Come, let's get this done quickly." XingGe led XiuYin through a maze of dirty, beige coloured tents, through crowd after crowd of soldiers out of their armours and relaxing by their fires. At last, they stopped at a dark blue tent and XingGe slipped in pulling YuLin along. "Wei! XiaoRui, you there?"