Galdan glanced at the slave. He was a middle-aged man, but his eyes were green, similar to the Yarkand merchant he had seen. So he asked, "Who are you, how do you know my name?"

The slave returned: "The villain's name is Yehemaiti, a Yarkand merchant. I heard about your name in Taiji for a long time and knew that you were a generous and fair person and a real hero."

Galdan nodded: "Yemaiti, you don't have to praise me, that will not bring you freedom. Since you are a merchant, you should know the rules on the grassland. You are my slave now. If you want to restore your freedom, you must make contributions to me, but before that, you can only be a slave."

Yehemaiti crawled to Galdan's feet and said, "Yes, you are right. As long as you make great contributions for you, I can regain my freedom. I want to make contributions for you!"

Galdan looked at Yehemaiti. This guy has a fat body and smart eyes. You can imagine that he will definitely be able to write and calculate. After all, this is the basic quality of a businessman, but riding horses, shooting archery and fighting is not his ability, so he cannot make contributions.

Just as the public was laughing at him, Yehemaiti said: "Galdan Taiji, I have a news here about the Kazakhs. I know that they have a tribe with about 800 tents, and there are thousands of cattle and sheep in the tribe. With the strength of your command, you should be able to annex them! The cloth in my caravan is sold to them. Please believe me, I am willing to exchange this news for credit!"

"Okay, this is indeed a great contribution." Galdan said with a smile. His tribe had been migrating for more than a month and rarely received supplies. On the grassland, the best supply is to annex a tribe. A tribe with annexation of 800 tents is not big or small. Just so, if it can annexation, perhaps this winter will not be so difficult.

Galdan asked: "What do you want, you only provide information. This news is not that valuable, at least not worth the goods of this camel caravan."

Yehemaiti said, "No, Galdan Taiji, I don't ask for the freedom you said. I only ask for my son-in-law and my son-in-law's freedom. If you do your wish, please give me and my son-in-law two camels and let us return to our hometown, okay?"

Looking at the person Yehemaiti pointed at, Galdan nodded: "This requirement is not high, I promise you."

Ye Mait was very grateful, and Galdan also got the position of the tribe from his wish, and personally led the cavalry to raid overnight, encircled and annihilated the tribe in a valley, and successfully obtained thousands of tribes and tens of thousands of cattle and sheep, as well as warm tents, dry firewood and forage enough to survive the winter.

Galdan was very happy and called Yehemaiti and his son-in-law in front of him, and placed a purse in front of him, with a small bag of gold nuggets inside. Galdan asked, "Yehemaiti, I got what I want, now is the time to fulfill the conditions."

Yehemaiti looked at the gold nugget in front of him and asked, "Great Taiji, is this what you rewarded the humble Yehemaiti?"

Galdan shook his head: "No, it cannot be considered a reward. In fact, I plan to use these nuggets to buy your son-in-law's freedom. I found that he can write and calculate, which is the talent I need, but he is your son-in-law, so I will give you two choices, one is the son-in-law and the other is the nuggets. You can choose."

Yehemaiti thought for a while, suddenly put away his greedy gaze and said, "I chose my son-in-law. Yehemaiti has only one daughter. I don't want her child to lose his father."

"Hahaha, okay, I like people who value friendship! In fact, I was just a temptation just now, and Hemaiti. You are a businessman who value friendship. This is very good, I like it very much." Galdan smiled with his palm.

Yehemaiti scratched his head and asked, "That great Taiji, are you worth my service for you?"

"I heard that this is only two hundred miles away from Tashkent, but it is not convenient for me to appear there. I hope you can use this bag of gold nuggets to go to Tashkent to buy cloth, salt and gunpowder for me. I need cloth, salt and gunpowder. If you can complete the task, I will not only return your son-in-law to you, but your servants and friends can go with you. If you buy enough, I will even pay you the money for those cloths together. How about it?" Galdan asked.

Yehemaiti thought about it for a long time, hesitated for a long time, nodded and agreed, Galdan said, "It's good, give him two camels."

"No, Taiji, I need horses, and it's a good horse. It's snowing now. If I can't get to Tashkent as soon as possible, the city will be closed. In that case, I won't be able to go in or out." Yehemaiti said.

Galdan nodded gently and asked someone to prepare the horse. Yehemaiti pulled his son-in-law over and kept explaining to him in the language of Yarkand. He pulled him to kowtow in front of Galdan several times. Although Galdan couldn't understand their words, he was very satisfied with Hemaiti's performance. When the horse was brought in, Galdan also asked someone to prepare dry food and feed. Hemaiti reluctantly got on the horse and quickly disappeared into the snow.

This night, Galdan was hoping that Yehemaiti could buy enough supplies, but when he woke up, Anutana told him a bad news: "Galdan, you have been cheated, and Hemaiti has cheated you, and he will not come back."

"How do you know?"

Anutana said: "That person is not the son-in-law of Hemaiti at all."

"Impossible. You see, Hemaiti gave up gold for him yesterday, and he gave in a few explanations before leaving. You don't know how to speak Yarkand, how do you know?" Galdan shook his head and didn't believe it.

Anutana said, "This morning, I saw the man who was called a son-in-law by Yehemati, namely Hamaz, who worshipped the heavenly being with our soldiers. The Yarkand people believed in the Tianfang Cult, and a pagan son-in-law called Yehemati also believed in the Tianfang Cult. If that is the case, why did he worship other gods?"

"Bastard!" Galdan was furious and rose up. He pulled out his sword, but was stopped by Anutana: "Every businessman is the best actor. Ye Maiti has deceived you. You should not take your anger at Hamaz for this. No matter what, he can write and calculate, and the tribe needs him."

Galdan relieved his anger a little, and Anutana said again: "It's just some gold nuggets, isn't it? Galdan, in a chaotic place, these are not important, cattle, sheep and soldiers are the fundamentals."

"Yes, it's just a gold nugget." Galdan sighed, feeling a little lonely.

But what Galdan didn't know was that Yehemaiti did not escape from far away, but instead circled around and hid in nearby mountains and forests, observing Galdan's tribe, and found that they lived with the facilities left by the Kazakhs, and then stocked up grass and firewood before leaving.

Both Galdan and Anutana underestimated Yehemaiti. The two thought Yehemaiti was just a scheming businessman who cheated him of a bag of gold, but what they didn't know was that Yehemaiti was a non-staff member of the Empire's South Asia Development Company. In fact, many Central Asia merchants have a relationship with South Asia companies and work part-time spies for them. Unlike the barbaric Galdan, they often demoted merchants to slaves. In South Asia companies, merchants have a high status and will receive heavy rewards whenever they make contributions. Yehemaiti abandoned other members of their caravans and went alone to report the news.

Galdan's troops spent the most stable ten days since their westward migration in the valley, but soon, the scouts and horses scattered around were attacked one after another. Galdan immediately sent elite cavalry teams to investigate, but reported a terrifying news that a large number of cavalry were moving towards the valley. Galdan did not contact the attacker with Yehemati at this time, and did not even know the real identity of the attacker. The only thing he had to do was to lead his troops out of this area.

The tribe migrated to the northwest, but it had not been able to distance itself from the attackers. The cavalry behind the temple fought with the enemy several times and found that the enemy had excellent armor and weapons, and all had firearms. If they were not wearing armor, they were not standardized, and they did not have the iconic red cloak of the imperial cavalry. Galdan would think that the empire was catching up with him.

After four days of escape, he arrived at the banks of the Ulanya River. The cold weather had frozen the river, but the ice was not thick. Galdan personally led the cavalry hall and the Anutana command crossed the river. The grass mats and branches were laid on the ice. The vehicles became bunkers. The infantry were waiting behind the chariots, while the cavalry were placed on both wings. Everything was ready. However, when the attacking cannons sounded, the first to catch the enemy, the troops who had crossed the river, who had already crossed the river, rushed out of the mountains and forests on the snowy grass, and defeated the Junggar people who had just crossed the river, making Galdan, who was on the other side of the river, wondered whether to support or hold on.

The flock was dispersed, the young and strong were shot, and the supplies were ignited. Everything was cut from the hearts of Galdan and his soldiers like sharp knives. The smoke rising behind the pine forest on the other side of the river reminded Galdan that he was also under threat, and he would be in chaos and die. However, the cry for help and screams of the Junggar people finally made Galdan lose patience, and he chose to cross the river to rescue.

As the army began to cross the river, a team of cavalry galloped out of the pine forest. There were about a thousand cavalry, but they were all armored cavalry. These cavalrymen were all armoured, with only two eyes exposed on their bodies. The arrows shot, but they splashed a little flame. They were holding twelve-foot spears and rifles, which rushed into the array of the Junggar people like monsters. One impact was to open a huge gap. The Junggar cavalry and archers were unable to fight, and the iron armored cavalry were light cavalry who bent their bows and trampled on their horses and sprinted on their bows, which added a lot of chaos.

Galdan barely could control the army without disintegration, but was forced to retreat step by step and trampled on each other on the ice. When excessive people gathered, the ice surface was broken, the people fell into the water, and were shot by dismounted cavalry with muskets and bows. Blood was dripping in the river, and scarlet under the ice surface was red.

In the afternoon, the battlefield returned to peace. The army cleaned the battlefield and captured nearly 4,000 men, women, old and weak. Those who were seriously injured were executed. More than 600 heads were killed. Those who drowned in the river were difficult to count. The dead bodies piled up into mountains, and countless cattle, sheep and animals were captured. Even Anutana and others were captured. The only thing that was not beautiful was that the leader Galdan escaped.

"This woman is named Anutana. It turns out that the woman who was Sengge is now Galdan's woman, and she is the only woman." The subordinate introduced to Li Jundu.

Li Jundu glanced at her and found that although Anutana was embarrassed, she could vaguely see some bright colors between her eyebrows and eyes. She was a rare beauty on the grassland. Seeing a baby in her arms, she asked casually: "Is this child the seed of Sengge or Galdan?"

"Sir, this is Sengge's posthumous son." Anutana didn't know Li Jundu's identity, so she could only answer honestly.

Li Jundu nodded, cut off half of the roasted lamb in his hand and handed it to Anutana, and instructed his men: "Put a hundred Junggars out, each of them gives a horse and a bag of dry food, and ask them to find Galdan, and tell them that I will wait here for ten days, and I will not see Galdan in ten days. Everyone here, including Anutana and her two children, will die."

When Anutana heard this, she reached out to cover Minmin's ear and asked back: "Why do you Han people have to kill Galdan? It seems that everyone wants to kill him."

"I am the eldest son of the Supreme Emperor of the Empire and the eldest brother of the emperor. My name is Li Jundu." Li Jundu introduced himself to Anutana.

Anutana nodded slightly, but looked puzzled. Li Jundu said: "My father is a hero of the world and the first person in history. Even Genghis Khan is not as good as him. He rarely fears anyone. Your husband Galdan is one of them. About seven or eight years ago, my father said that if Galdan died, the successor of the empire would never have peace. When my father said that, I was also in the sequence of succession of the empire's emperor."

Anutana asked, "Then will you kill Galdan?"

"It depends on whether he can use it for me."

Galdan was awakened by a nightmare from the ice and snow. The armored cavalry that rushed around in the dream was simply a monster. Fortunately, he had a group of loyal and brave subordinates who tried to save him from the battle, but now he only had worn boots and sabers, and the only weapon on his body was the dagger in his boots.

There were only four people around him. What satisfied him the most was not the three strong and heroic guards, or a slave who led him to his horse. It was this elderly slave who found the marmot in the snow and ice, and used the meat of the worst creatures on the grassland to feed everyone.

Until a small team of cavalry arrived, it was part of the 100 people released by Li Jundu. Fortunately, the captain Zhuolba was loyal. He told Galdan everything and explained that some of the released Junggars wanted to capture Galdan in exchange for freedom of their family. More people hoped that Galdan would go back and make a way out for everyone from the hands of those demons.

"I will go back." Galdan said without hesitation.

"Taiji, you will die when you go back. Let's go quickly when no one finds you now." Zhuolba carefully persuaded.

Galdan said: "What can I do if I lose my tribe and my family? I may not even get through this winter. I will return to the embrace of the heaven of immortality sooner or later. So before that, I will do something earth-shaking, Zhuoerba, are you sure that the person who attacked us was the eldest brother of the Emperor of the Empire, the Li Jundu, who even the Manchus were afraid?"

"This is what they said in person."
Chapter completed!