Jason East sent the northern soldiers to round up the captives. Behind them, the four legions of House East marched forward slowly, applying even greater pressure on the fleeing wildlings.
The battle had ended far sooner than anyone expected.
When a wildling with a crude weapon faces a modern musket, the result is nothing less than a one-sided slaughter.
By this point, no wildling had the courage to resist. They simply fled, scattered by the pursuing northern army.
Jason East rode his horse through the battlefield. The ground was now covered in wildling corpses. He smelled the strong, coppery stench of blood and the faint, sour smell of death between his nostrils. It made him feel very uncomfortable.
Pulling the reins, Jason stopped his horse. "The First Northern Army stays here! Bud, Chris, take the Second and Third Northern Armies and the First Southern Army. I want you to capture the prisoners!"
"Yes, my lord!" Bud and Chris looked excited, knowing that capturing routed prisoners was an easy job.
"Remember," Jason called out, his voice sharp. "As long as the wildlings are willing to surrender, you must not hurt them again."
He paused, letting the order sink in. "These people are all useful labor. What I want are workers who are in good condition in the future!"
Jason felt he had to remind them. He was worried that these young soldiers, hot with blood from their first real battle, might get carried away. He couldn't allow the prisoners to be tortured or killed.
The wildlings had completely lost the idea of resistance. They were just like a flock of sheep, waiting to be caught. They were his trophies. Jason couldn't allow his loot to be destroyed.
Bud and Chris promised to restrain their soldiers and capture more intact captives for Lord Jason. They then took their tens of thousands of men to join the capture.
Jason dismounted from his horse. Immediately, a guard drove his luxurious carriage over. Attendants removed tables and chairs from the carriage, cleared out a clean patch of snow, and carefully placed the furniture.
Sitting comfortably on the soft chair, Jason instructed Dicken to bring his men and gather all the corpses on the battlefield. They needed to prepare them for burning.
These corpses had to be disposed of as soon as possible. The Night King could not be allowed to increase his strength.
A centurion, under the command of his officer, took a team to cut down a few trees from the nearby forest. They dragged the timber back to a clearing and began setting up fire racks, one after another.
Some soldiers carried the wildling bodies to the fire racks. They threw them randomly into the wood piles, which were then drenched in gasoline.
Just cutting down the trees, getting the wood, and handling the hundreds of corpses kept them busy until the afternoon.
At this time, the tens of thousands of northern soldiers Jason had sent to capture the captives also returned. They herded the thousands of frightened wildlings before them.
Except for a few wildlings who managed to escape, most of the army that Mance Rayder had brought south was captured.
Even the giants were captured, and dozens of them were brought back.
"Look, isn't this our savage king? Hahaha, the king has also become a prisoner!"
When Kar Pike, a man of the Night's Watch, saw Mance Rayder being captured by the soldiers, his eyes lit up. He strode over, grabbed Mance Rayder's collar, and spat right on his face.
"How is it, 'Your Majesty'?" Kar Pike's tone was filled with anger as he stared at the Night's Watch traitor. "How does it feel to meet your former Night's Watch brother, as a traitor?"
Mance Rayder closed his eyes and said nothing.
It was not until Jon and the others returned with the old and young, the women and children of the wildlings, that Mance Rayder looked over there, his face tight with panic.
Ser Denys Mallister, the Commander of the Shadow Tower of the Night's Watch, was reporting the situation of the wildling captives to Lord Jason East, the Commander of the Northern Army.
"...The wildling leaders all died on the battlefield. The giant-nemesis Tormund was wounded by soldiers and captured. Mance Rayder was captured. The giant leader, Mag, was beaten into a honeycomb by the flintlock guns. The remaining fifty or so giants were all captured, mostly because they were exhausted in their escape."
Ser Denys Mallister said this, his tone full of shock. He did not expect that the musket troops under Lord Jason were so powerful that tens of thousands of wildlings were defeated in less than an hour.
The Night's Watch didn't help at all in this war. No, he corrected himself, catching the prisoners and identifying the prisoners helped a little.
Jason East nodded. The wildling's leadership was basically either dead or captured. They had truly won this battle.
"Kneel down!" one of the soldiers yelled. "This is Lord Jason East, Earl of Starfire City!"
Kent and McCann pulled Mance Rayder, who was bound by thick rope, over to Jason. They kicked the back of Mance's legs, making him stumble and fall to his knees in the snow.
"My lord, this is Mance Rayder!" Kar Pike shouted at Mance Rayder, his face full of contempt. "He's the one they call the King-Beyond-the-Wall, a shameful traitor who defected from the Night's Watch!"
Mance Rayder struggled to stand up but was firmly held down by Kent and McCann, so he could only kneel on the ground.
"The Free Folk have never had a king!" Mance shouted, his neck straining. "We are born free! We don't have to bow down to anyone!"
Jason East looked at him with interest. "There is a saying in my hometown: 'The loser has no rights.' You are my captive, Mance, so you must obey my rules."
Seeing that Mance Rayder wanted to refute, Jason raised a finger and shook it. "Alright, let's be clear in advance, this is not a discussion with you. It's an order. Anyone who dares to disobey my orders and does not follow the rules will be punished."
He leaned forward. "You are a wise man, Mance. You know very well what to do next, as a prisoner!"
"Go," Jason said, "tell your 'Free People' that they will obey my rules honestly. As long as you are honest and obedient, I promise that you will not be harshly abused. You are all my spoils now, and I need you to work for me in the future."
Saying that, Jason waved his hand and motioned for Kent to drag Mance Rayder away.
Mance Rayder lowered his head and remained silent. Of course, he knew that the smartest way to be a prisoner was to obey the victor. That was the only way they would not be hurt again.
As he was being dragged away, Mance Rayder struggled to raise his head. He yelled at the young lord sitting in the soft chair beside the carriage, "The White Walkers are coming, my lord! You must be ready! In the face of a more terrifying enemy from the north... no one knows the undead monsters better than us, my lord! You need us, we can help you!"
Watching Mance Rayder being dragged away shouting, hoping to use ghouls to attract his attention, Jason just smiled and didn't care.
"As for those ghouls," Jason said quietly, "I think I might know better than you guys. I know much more clearly. So, you are not as useful to me as I thought."
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