Chapter 703: God of Slaughter

"Grand Commander-in-Chief, a word in private."

As the army marched, Wen You urged his horse forward and came up beside Luo Zhao.

Luo Zhao glanced back at him and saw the letter in his hand. Wen You gave him a slight nod.

Luo Zhao turned his mount and followed him away. Su Yuanbai and the others exchanged glances, then followed as well, while the main army continued on.

Once they were more than ten zhang from the official road, Luo Zhao saw Wen You holding the letter with an expression as though he wanted to speak but hesitated. He said, "Things have already come to this. Whatever bad news it is, I am prepared for it. Wen You, there is no need to hold back."

Su Yuanbai and the others who had followed frowned at the letter in Wen You's hand. One look at Wen You's expression told them it could not be good news.

At last, Wen You handed the letter to Luo Zhao and sighed. "Grand Commander-in-Chief, Meng Shanming has not forgotten the gift you sent him last time. He struck viciously and returned a gift of his own. He had one ear cut from each of the six hundred thousand prisoners and packed them into more than a hundred large chests. They have already been handed over to our patrols in the rear. The sight is too ghastly to bring here. This is Meng Shanming's letter to you."

The ears of six hundred thousand prisoners had been cut off? Su Yuanbai and the others were badly startled and visibly shaken.

Luo Zhao's face twitched, anger rising across it. With this one move, even if those six hundred thousand elite troops were returned to Song, wherever those men went with an ear missing, they would be a living humiliation Song could never forget.

He snatched the letter, pulled it from the envelope, and shook it open. There were only a few lines.

Earlier, you sent me a white horse as a gift. I failed to thank you in time. Today I return the courtesy with six hundred thousand severed ears. Are you satisfied?

If not, the subjects of Song are all before me. Their life and death are in my hands, mine to take as I please. I will not disappoint the Grand Commander-in-Chief.

Meng Shanming

The meaning seemed clear enough: Meng Shanming still intended to slaughter on a vast scale. Luo Zhao's eyes nearly split with rage. He could not help looking around, wanting to massacre Yan people merely to vent his fury.

Yet Yan had already been ravaged by war. Its common people were like startled birds, and those along the Song army's route had long since fled without a trace.

Nor was this a time for him to create fresh complications. He could not spend more time campaigning endlessly throughout Yan. Once Yanjing fell, he had to hurry back as quickly as possible. He could not allow Meng Shanming to continue wreaking havoc without limit inside Song.

The letter also made him realize that Meng Shanming was trying to provoke him, trying to keep him bogged down inside Yan. If he was delayed until his provisions failed, the consequences would be disastrous.

He knew perfectly well it was a provocation, yet Luo Zhao was still furious. These were not just anything; they were the ears of six hundred thousand soldiers under his command. He could not stop himself from saying through clenched teeth, "Meng Shanming, you old villain. Pray you never fall into my hands, or I will make you wish you were dead!"

Su Yuanbai and the others took the letter and read it in turn. Every face darkened.

Just then, a general galloped over. "Report! An imperial decree has arrived!"

Is His Majesty urging us to withdraw again? Luo Zhao wondered. But after taking the decree and reading it, his expression changed drastically. With grief and fury in his voice, he roared, "Old villain! I swear I will never share the same sky with you!"

What now? Su Yuanbai and the others took the decree to read. They too were shocked. Cutting off the ears of six hundred thousand prisoners had not been enough. Meng Shanming had actually buried all six hundred thousand prisoners alive!

In the decree, the Song emperor Mu Zhuozhen was furious. He told Luo Zhao explicitly that once Yanjing was breached, not even a chicken or dog was to be left alive. The city was to be massacred in vengeance.

Even so, the decree still took the larger situation into account. Luo Zhao was given a fixed deadline. If Yanjing had still not fallen by then, he was to turn back immediately and return to reinforce Song. In the meantime, the court would commit everything it could to organizing forces against Meng Shanming, delaying him as much as possible and buying Luo Zhao time to return with his army.

Dong Yinglai shook the decree in his hand. "Has that old dog Meng Shanming gone mad? Is he not afraid of Heaven's punishment?"

Chang Fei said grimly, "He dared bury six hundred thousand living men alive. Such savagery will surely cut years from his allotted lifespan. He cannot have long to live!"

At that moment, another Lingxiao Pavilion disciple rode over and handed Su Yuanbai a secret letter.

After reading it, Su Yuanbai silently passed it around. Everyone frowned once they had seen its contents.

The message came from the Song capital and contained information omitted from the imperial decree. It described the excuse Meng Shanming had used after killing the prisoners and then turning the blame back on Song: the Song army was still marching toward Yanjing, proving that it had no sincerity in negotiating a withdrawal; the court's refusal to exchange provisions for the prisoners proved that Song did not care whether those six hundred thousand sons lived or died; it was Song itself, together with the Song army, that had forced Meng Shanming to kill those six hundred thousand prisoners.

"What a sharp tongue!" Luo Zhao laughed coldly after reading it, rage turning into laughter. His face flushed red, then pale.

Wen You lifted his gaze from the secret letter and warned in a grave voice, "Grand Commander-in-Chief, this is Meng Shanming's scheme to sow discord. This bucket of filth is being dumped on you, and he also means to shake the morale of our Great Song's army. I fear Meng Shanming's side will now spread these rumors throughout Great Song. And there are people at court seizing the chance to strike at you as well. I fear this will be dangerous for you."

His judgment was correct. Meng Shanming had already had the three major sects arrange people to spread these claims throughout Song on a large scale, intending to shake both military morale and public confidence.

Luo Zhao ground his teeth. "Forget that for now. Pass down my military order. The vanguard is to attack the city immediately. The moment it falls, massacre it!"

At his command, the marching troops quickened their pace. The army was only half a day's journey from Yanjing.

...

"Ah..." Guan Fangyi could only sigh.

At first, Meng Shanming's sheer ruthlessness had genuinely frightened her. Now all she could do was sigh.

Niu Youdao slowly sat down beneath a large tree, holding the message Gongsun Bu had sent. For a long time, he said nothing.

The prisoners had been killed by burying six hundred thousand people alive. The news struck him with enormous force. He could not imagine the horror of what such a burial must have looked like. In his previous life, he had heard of similar episodes in history, but never in his dreams had he imagined something like that happening around him, with himself involved and even indirectly connected to it.

What he held was another reply from Gongsun Bu. After receiving the first news, he had sent a message asking why Meng Shanming had done such a thing. This was, in effect, Meng Shanming's answer.

Meng Shanming did not speak of any grand strategy. He sent only a few words from the heart.

Yan had fallen to such a state that countless commoners had lost their homes and families. The state was weak, powerful enemies watched from every side, and Yan's soldiers could burn with hot blood and be willing to die yet still remain unable to turn the tide. The reason did not lie in the foreign enemies invading from outside. The rot lay in Yan's own roots. If such tragedies were to be prevented from happening again, those rotten roots had to be torn out completely.

He would not disrupt the tempo of the campaign to save Yan from peril merely for the sake of one Yanjing. Let that bunch at court defend it if they could. If they could not, then let the Song army help clean them out. Let Song help Great Yan tear out its rotten roots once and for all. Only then, perhaps, would the three major sects consider the Prince.

Niu Youdao read the message again and again. In the end, he could only sigh softly. He did not know whether this was Meng Shanming's own intention or whether Shang Chaozong had instructed him to do it. At present, Meng Shanming held a massive army in his hands. Even the three major sects could do little with him. If Meng Shanming insisted, Niu Youdao had no way to stop him for now.

If these had been Nanzhou's troops, Niu Youdao would still have had influence over them. But what Meng Shanming now commanded was not Nanzhou's army. It was an army of more than two million, with Meng Shanming's old subordinates at its core, and all of them looked to Meng Shanming for direction.

Only now did Niu Youdao truly understand why civil officials feared military commanders. Once men who held military power slipped beyond control, corpses could pile into mountains and blood could run like rivers in an instant.

...

On a hillside, Huang Lie held the latest battle report, his face twitching.

Two words came to mind for Meng Shanming: God of Slaughter.

Beside him, Shang Chaozong stood in the wind without speaking for a long time. He too had never imagined that Meng Shanming would resort to such a brutal method.

He had long known that Meng Shanming was always cold-blooded and merciless on the battlefield, but even he had never seen the old general do anything this ruthless before.

...

"Your Majesty, a report has arrived from the front. Meng Shanming has buried all six hundred thousand Song prisoners alive!"

Inside the Imperial Study, Shang Jianxiong had been listening to Tong Mo's account of the mobilization for the defense of the city, following every detail closely for fear that something might go wrong.

Tian Yu had stepped out briefly when another eunuch delivered the memorial. After opening it and taking a look, his expression changed sharply. He returned to the map and made his report.

Shang Jianxiong, Tong Mo, Gao Jiancheng, and Shang Yongzhong all slowly turned to look at him.

"All six hundred thousand were buried alive?" Tong Mo asked.

Tian Yu nodded gravely.

Tong Mo drew in a cold breath. He considered himself ruthless enough, but even he would not dare shoulder the reputation for something like this. Six hundred thousand people had been buried alive!

Shang Yongzhong looked stunned. He had expected that Meng Shanming might kill the six hundred thousand prisoners, but never in his dreams had he imagined they would be buried alive.

Gao Jiancheng's expression was equally ugly. Six hundred thousand people buried alive. What kind of enormity was that?

Shang Jianxiong took the memorial Tian Yu presented, read it, then slowly closed it again. He muttered, "He is offending the Song army to the death. He might as well be begging them to massacre the city. For the sake of his own private grudge, he has completely disregarded whether the people of this capital live or die! They cannot wait for me to die. They cannot wait for me to die! They want to use another man's blade to kill me. I am the one they mean to kill!"

"Your Majesty, the Song envoy Qian Liansheng requests an audience!" a eunuch announced from the doorway.

Shang Jianxiong came back to himself and answered decisively, "I will not see him!"

The Yan army had committed an atrocity so appalling that even Shang Jianxiong did not dare meet Qian Liansheng now. If he did, he would only be subjected to a torrent of abuse.

He turned back to Tian Yu. "Are the eunuchs in the palace who can fight ready?"

Tian Yu bowed slightly. "Five hundred men have been selected with great care. Every one of them is a skilled fighter worth ten ordinary men. The Intelligence Directorate has also drawn five hundred experts. There are one thousand in all, under Ga Miaoshui's personal command."

Shang Jianxiong nodded. "Do as the Grand Minister of Works proposed. Send all of them to the walls to assist the army in defending the city. As long as the city stands, we stand. If the city falls, we die with it. Hold the city at any cost!"

"Yes!" Tian Yu accepted the order and left.

Outside the Imperial Study, he came to the square before the palace's main hall. One thousand eunuchs stood there in perfect formation, hands resting on the swords at their waists.

Tian Yu walked up to Ga Miaoshui and personally straightened his cloak. "Little Ga, His Majesty said: as long as the city stands, we stand. If the city falls, we die with it. The time has come to give your all in loyal service. Go."

Ga Miaoshui stepped back three paces, cupped his hands, and bowed. Then he straightened, turned, and swept out one hand, leading the thousand eunuchs out of the palace.

Outside the main gate of the imperial city, Song envoy Qian Liansheng had been stopped and could not get in no matter what he did.

Finally, driven beyond endurance, Qian Liansheng pulled out his hairpin and tore loose his topknot. He stripped off his shoes and socks, then tore away his upper garments.

Hair disheveled, barefoot and bare-chested, he stood there as if ready to die a heroic death and pointed into the palace gates, cursing, "Shang Jianxiong! You petty man without benevolence or righteousness, virtue or good faith..."

[End of Chapter 703]