Depart at five.

"Give them the time it takes for a stick of incense to burn to reunite with their families, then assemble for departure."

Wei Meng issued the order to the retainers beside him, who then relayed the instruction. Although Wei Meng was only a captain of a hundred men—a *baihu*—he kept seven or eight personal retainers. While he did not drill the regular garrison soldiers according to the manual, his retainers were constantly trained, making them the most capable fighters in the entire garrison.

Wei Guangde glanced at the retainers scattered around the perimeter. They only took orders from the old master because they were paid for their services; the other squad leaders and platoon commanders in the garrison could not move them. As for the hundred or so men in the main unit, it was best not to count on them—they were skilled farmers, but as for fighting, that was another matter entirely. Perhaps only Duan Da and those few archers were marginally qualified, as they often went hunting and had not lost their archery skills.

As the order was given, the unit that had finally gathered descended into chaos again. Many people from the crowd outside squeezed in; previously, they had been too afraid to approach, but now that Captain Wei had granted them time to reunite with their families, those inhibitions vanished. The soldiers instructed their wives to take good care of their parents and discipline the children; the women were mostly weeping, as they already understood what this meant. Only the elderly whispered quietly into their children's ears, likely imparting some survival wisdom.

Wei Guangde observed it all, guessing that they were probably teaching their children to run back if they saw something amiss on the battlefield, believing that as long as one could run faster than the person beside them, they could save their own lives. Wei Guangde had no heart to listen to what the parents were whispering; he felt that nothing would happen and that this was merely a false alarm. In his memory, by the mid-Ming dynasty, only the border troops still possessed any real combat capability, while the rest were huddled in the rear, focused solely on defense.

A battlefield? What was that?

Yet, Wei Guangde sighed inwardly. He had once thought, upon getting used to this era, that he might take advantage of the Ming Empire's corruption and decline to stage a rebellion. He mused that with his knowledge from hundreds of years in the future, he might actually succeed and eventually ascend the throne. However, after resting for two days and venturing out to see those so-called soldiers in the military fort, Wei Guangde decisively abandoned that notion. Thinking about rebellion, he saw only those few robust retainers at home and, outside, soldiers who couldn't even get a full meal. Forget it; why bother with such worries? To start a rebellion, one first needed money to raise an army, a thought that made his head ache.

In the armory, there were only those pieces of equipment. Wei Guangde had pestered his older brother to open the door so he could take a look—mostly long spears, a dozen sabers, and a few shields. The only things that caught his eye were two bowl-mouthed cannons. They were supposedly meant for patrol boats but had been moved to the armory because they were deemed a nuisance to fishing. As for the dozen or so matchlock muskets, he dismissed them; to Wei Guangde, they looked like sticks that were half-wood and half-metal, with an iron barrel over a foot long for the gunpowder and lead shot, but they were cumbersome to load.

When Wei Guangde first arrived, he was naturally curious. He took some gunpowder and, under his brother's guidance, test-fired one. You poured the powder into the pan, which was the amount for a single shot, then poured the rest into the barrel, packed it down with a ramrod, inserted the lead ball, and packed it again. After that, you had to manage the fuse. When firing, one hand held the wooden stock to aim at the target, while the other hand had to use a slow-match to light the fuse. After all that, Wei Guangde had a deep understanding of the Ming army's firearms: they truly had little practical value. As for the bowl-mouthed cannons, forget it; those things made too much noise, and his brother wouldn't dare let him fire one.

The time for the incense to burn soon passed. The unit, surrounded by the weeping crowd, re-formed its ranks. This time, they departed quickly. Wei Meng, as the captain, walked at the very front of the line. From the moment he stepped out of the fort gate, he never looked back.

Guided by the afterglow of the setting sun, Wei Guangde and Wei Wencai watched the soldiers march away from the top of the fort gatehouse until they were out of sight, then escorted their mother home. That night, no one in the house felt well, and the meal tasted of nothing. Although Wei Guangde knew in his heart that nothing would happen, he could not show his lack of concern at such a time. He knew his brother was good to him, but one had to read the room; if he did something inappropriate now, it wouldn't just be a simple beating he would receive.

After dinner, he would usually light a candle to practice calligraphy, but today he had no desire to do so. As a modern person, Wei Guangde was naturally extremely poor at the calligraphy of this era, and his writing was quite ugly, which was the reason he had been beaten by his tutor today. After Wei Guangde had accidentally fallen into the water and returned to the private school after resting for a few days, the tutor had encouraged him; at that time, seeing his writing had regressed, he hadn't said much. But after several days with no improvement, the tutor had finally lost his patience today. In truth, to the current Wei Guangde, the young Wei Guangde’s handwriting was only slightly better than his own.

However, what delighted Wei Guangde was that his current body seemed to have an excellent memory. According to the body's memories, the young Wei Guangde had started at the private school three years ago, at the age of eight. In those three years, he had not only completed enlightenment texts like the *Three Character Classic*, the *Hundred Family Surnames*, and the *Thousand Character Classic*, but had also studied the *Standards for Being a Good Pupil and Child*, the *Classic of Filial Piety*, and the *Young Learner's Forest of Gems*. He was currently studying Zhu Xi's *Elementary Learning*, and the tutor had mentioned that after finishing it, he would move on to the *Four Books*. As for which book he would read first, the tutor hadn't said, and he didn't know.

The strange thing was that after the time-traveling Wei Guangde had slept a couple of times, these previously memorized texts seemed to be imprinted in his brain. Perhaps they had been there all along, and it was only now that they connected with his own consciousness, becoming memories he could access at will. One had to realize that, coming from the future, he only knew two lines like "At the beginning, man's nature is good" and "Zhao, Qian, Sun, Li, Zhou, Wu, Zheng, Wang." As for what followed, Wei Guangde could swear he didn't know, as he had never actually read those books. The few lines he could recite were things he had picked up from watching television or reading novels; he had never seen the actual books before.

Early the next morning, after breakfast, Wei Guangde bid his mother farewell and headed to the private school. At the gate, he met his older brother, who had just finished patrolling the fort and was returning home. His brother was not alone; he was followed by two retainers whom their father had specifically left behind to run errands.

"Have you eaten?" his brother asked. Although it was a bit of a redundant question, it showed his concern for his younger brother. After a brief exchange, he gave Wei Guangde a few copper coins for his expenses.

The private school was in the town, over ten *li* away from the military fort. When Wei Guangde reached the fort gate, he saw his group of followers already gathered there, waiting for him. For this group of children around ten years old, going to the town school meant sticking together.

Having woken up early, Wei Guangde hadn't followed the tutor's instructions to review his lessons and memorize what was taught yesterday, because his memory was so good that he had actually memorized it all after reading it a few times. Seeing that everyone had arrived, the children laughed and joked as they left the fort gate and headed toward town; they couldn't be late, or they would face the tutor's rod on their palms.

Yet, amid the laughter, Wei Guangde still felt a bit worried. He could easily memorize the books, but that handwriting—that was a major hurdle.