Chapter 259: Kneel!

If the State of Qian was the holy land yearned for by scholars, then the State of Yan, Beifeng Commandery, and the Marquis of Zhenbei’s estate were places that nearly every martial man had dreamed of at one time or another.

Galloping across the desert, fighting savage barbarians beneath the lonely smoke rising over the wastes—such images were fantasies of blood and valor that men found difficult to erase from their hearts.

That, too, was a kind of cultural influence.

Just look at Angda, kneeling there now.

In his heart—and even deep in the Savage King’s heart—there was a dream that belonged to black armor and black banners.

They could not erase those memories, because those days, those experiences, had already been branded into their lives. There was no cutting them away.

Zheng Fan had once heard the Blind Man tell a story. The Blind Man had heard it from Wente, the Western Regions merchant in Tuman City.

It was said that after the barbarians’ failed westward campaign years ago, quite a few barbarian tribes did not return to the desert. Instead, they remained in the mountain forests bordering it.

Later, when Rome rose, it deliberately sent an army to wipe out the barbarians who had already lived and multiplied there for one or two generations.

The barbarians resisted fiercely.

The fighting between the two sides lasted for several years. Rome held the advantage throughout, yet never managed to completely pacify the region.

In the end, Rome used gold and “promises” to buy off the smaller barbarian tribes there, forcing them to submit. At the same time, it demanded that they send young boys from their tribes to Rome.

The peace was brief.

Less than twenty years later, the barbarians of that region rebelled again under Rome’s cruel rule.

This time, Rome sent a general who completely crushed the uprising in less than half a year.

And that general was one of the barbarian boys who had been taken to Rome all those years ago, raised there, and entered Roman military service.

More amusing still, the man who had ignited the barbarian rebellion twenty years later was his elder brother.

Before, Zheng Fan had only heard the story.

Now, the scene before him carried a faint taste of it.

What surprised Zheng Fan was that Tian Wujing did not seem interested in cooperating with that savage and continuing the performance.

He merely sat calmly atop his Pixiu, watching everything with an indifferent gaze.

City Defender Zheng, who was either guessing the exam question or on his way to guess it, spoke up.

“Marquis, men like this are precisely the ones we must never leave alive, because they know how to learn.”

At this point it was almost certain that the Savage King had indeed once served as a soldier in Beifeng Commandery.

Tian Wujing looked at Zheng Fan, then returned his gaze to the front.

“You’re afraid?”

“Uh... Marquis, this general only feels that for the sake of Great Yan, people like this—”

“No dynasty declines because its enemies learned from it and became stronger.

“It declines because it itself took the wrong path and weakened.

“Being afraid that others might learn from you is itself a form of insecurity.”

“This general has learned something.”

At that moment, Angda, who had remained kneeling without receiving any response, could only raise his head and shout, “May the Marquis of Jingnan understand: my King has always admired the splendor of Great Yan.

“When he heard that the Jin people had dared overestimate themselves and invade Great Yan, my King immediately raised troops and attacked Jin, hoping to shoulder even the smallest part of Great Yan’s burden.

“Now the heavenly host of Great Yan has descended upon the snowfields. This is a grand event unseen here in a hundred years.

“If my King knew, he would surely be beside himself with joy.

“Marquis—this lowly one has the finest milk wine, the tenderest lambs, and the warmest tents.

“I beg the Marquis to grant me the honor of welcoming you and the soldiers of Great Yan!”

The Yan army had suddenly appeared upon the snowfields.

Everyone understood what that meant.

Zheng Fan understood.

The savage kneeling ahead of them understood too. He was merely pretending not to.

That man did not want to fight the State of Yan.

More precisely, he did not want to go to war with Yan now.

He was willing to trample his own dignity beneath his feet for even the faintest possibility that the Yan people might withdraw.

Tian Wujing still said nothing.

The wind swept across the snowfields with a lingering chill.

Angda’s heart slowly sank.

Yet he remained unwilling to give up.

He did not know how many Yan troops had come.

The Yan people had defeated six hundred thousand Jin troops with only two hundred thousand cavalry.

Yes, the Emperor of Jin had opened his own gates and allowed the Yan army through Nanmen Pass, but the Yan people’s prowess in war was already known throughout the world.

At present, the King’s situation along the Snow Sea Pass front was excellent.

If the appearance of the Yan army caused a flaw in the Holy Race’s century-long great plan at such a moment—

Angda could not accept it.

“Marquis, before winter even began, my King already dispatched an envoy to Yanjing to convey the Holy Race’s reverence toward Great Yan.

“The Holy Race—”

Tian Wujing finally spoke.

“They’re all dead.”

“...”

Angda.

Angda silently rose to his feet.

He remounted his horse and slowly turned it around.

Before leaving, he looked back one more time at that familiar black dragon banner.

He gritted his teeth.

Then lashed the horse beneath him hard.

The horse cried out in pain and broke into a furious gallop.

Tian Wujing raised one hand.

The messengers immediately transmitted his orders to the various formations.

The Yan army began spreading out, gradually dividing into four sections: Left, Right, Center, and Rear.

The Central Army, where Tian Wujing was positioned, numbered four thousand cavalry.

The Left and Right Armies each numbered three thousand.

The Rear Army was Shengle City’s three thousand cavalry under Liang Cheng.

Zheng Fan understood that Tian Wujing was not deliberately helping him preserve his strength.

Rather, Tian Wujing did not entirely trust the actual quality of Shengle City’s troops, even though one thousand of those soldiers were Jingnan Army men to begin with.

If the Marquis of Zhenbei represented the bold and unrestrained school, then the Marquis of Jingnan represented the subtle and controlled school.

When Tian Wujing used troops, he liked to strip every matter down thread by thread until everything was completely grasped in his own hands.

He disliked uncertainty.

Once the army had finished forming its lines, Tian Wujing did not immediately order a charge.

Instead, he glanced at Zheng Fan.

“Do you know why?”

Zheng Fan replied, “Why involve outsiders in a family matter?”

Tian Wujing reached down and stroked the mane of his Pixiu.

He nodded.

“Very good.”

...

The distance was not especially great.

Angda’s horse was running like mad.

Yet to Angda, it felt as though an extremely long time had passed.

The black dragon banners still seemed to snap beside his ears.

He felt as though he had never truly escaped their shadow.

Not until Quemu’s voice finally rang out.

“Angda!”

Angda raised his head and looked ahead.

Many savage warriors were staring at him with contempt.

They had clearly seen him kneel before the Yan people.

Now the labels of cowardice and shamelessness had already been stamped onto him.

Quemu, however, rode forward on his own.

He reached out and patted Angda on the shoulder.

“Angda.

“You did everything you could.”

Quemu understood him.

It was easy for one man to act like a hero and drag his entire people into the grave with him.

To willingly bend your knees for the sake of your people’s survival that was difficult.

Angda drew his saber with his right hand.

With his left, he seized his own hair.

The blade swept across.

A fistful of hair, still attached to bloody scalp, remained clenched in Angda’s hand.

“Stars above, when I die in battle, guide my soul into the starlight!”

Then Angda turned his horse back toward the direction of the Yan army.

He said heavily to Quemu, “Quemu.

“We have to fight.”

There was no longer any path of retreat.

The Marquis of Jingnan had made Great Yan’s attitude perfectly clear.

Yan had decided to step onto the snowfields.

Quemu raised his iron staff.

Then he roared to the warriors behind him, “Warriors of the Holy Race!”

“OOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH!”

“The radiance of the stars guides us forward!

“When we fall in battle, we will be received into the depths of the brilliant river of stars, where we shall find eternal rest!

“For the Holy Race!

“For the snowfields!

“For our homeland!

“For the King!

“KILL!”

The original five thousand troops, joined by warriors who had rushed in from the surrounding tribes at the sound of the horns, formed a force of nearly ten thousand savages.

They brandished their weapons and charged with howls that rolled across the snowfields.

Fewer than three thousand wore armor.

Yet their morale was immense.

One could feel the ringing battle intent pouring from them and the determination to embrace death without hesitation.

This was a people in the midst of rising.

To the northeast, they had already defeated the forces of the State of Dacheng again and again, forcing the Situ Clan to surrender every last stretch of snowfield territory its ancestors had spent the previous century expanding into.

They dreamed of following their King through Snow Sea Pass and returning to the lands of the Three Jin.

And that dream was already being realized, step by step.

When a people stands at the threshold of revival, it can often erupt with terrifying fighting strength.

Zheng Fan knew countless such examples from history.

A small people with little population and no great reputation might suddenly appear blessed by fortune itself.

A whole generation of generals seemed to emerge already knowing how to wage war.

A commander with a grand strategic vision appeared.

A small but fiercely capable core of tribal warriors rose beside him.

Then they swept outward in every direction, and the enormous empires around them collapsed one after another.

Zheng Fan glanced at the Marquis of Jingnan beside him.

Then he looked at the black-armored cavalry surrounding them.

But the savages were not facing the weak State of Qian.

Nor were they facing Chu or Jin, both torn apart by internal strife.

They were facing Great Yan a power likewise on the rise, a dynasty just beginning to open its own age of kingly ascendancy.

In the distance, dust billowed upward.

The savage army was charging.

On the Yan side, however, before the Marquis of Jingnan gave the order, every Yan cavalryman remained perfectly still.

Even the warhorses beneath them did no more than snort softly and scrape their hooves against the ground.

The Marquis of Jingnan patted the Pixiu beneath him.

The beast opened its mouth.

The Kunwu Saber flew from between its jaws and landed in Tian Wujing’s hand.

The next moment, the Kunwu Saber rose high.

The Pixiu carried the Marquis of Jingnan forward until he reached the front of the army.

There was no slogan.

No speech.

No attempt to stir morale.

There was only a suit of gilded armor, a saber, one man, one mount.

Then they began moving forward.

Toward the enemy.

Slowly they accelerated.

Yet it was precisely that silence, precisely that sight, that seemed to ignite the blood of every Yan soldier at once.

Even Zheng Fan felt heat rising inside him.

One had to admit it.

Tian Wujing might not have been deliberately trying to look badass.

But every movement he made somehow became badass all on its own.

Watch his back.

Look in the direction he was going.

And immediately, something rose inside you the urge to follow him into battle, to protect him, to crush every enemy standing before him.

The battlefield was, after all, a place where the hot blood of men collided!

“Tiger!”

“Tiger!”

“Tiger!”

The Left Army.

The Right Army.

The Center.

Every cavalryman urged his horse forward.

They accelerated.

They charged.

Behind that single golden figure came a tide of black capable of bringing despair to the entire snowfield.

Zheng Fan raised his saber and charged as well.

Goddamn it.

If he searched his heart perhaps he had not yet reached the point of saying he “loved” this world.

But he absolutely had fallen in love with this feeling of charging together with the Yan army.

Adrenaline exploding through his body.

Tens of thousands of men sharing one heart, moving as a single whole.

Then crashing forward and destroying every enemy before them.

It was intoxicating.

On the savage side, when those three cries of “Tiger!” reached him, Angda’s hand tightened instinctively around his reins.

Long ago, when he had still been an auxiliary soldier, he had watched Yan cavalry launch charge after charge beneath those same three battle cries.

Then the barbarians ahead of them would be ground into meat.

The confidence of the Yan people.

Their strength.

The absolute conviction that no one on the battlefield could stand against them.

All of it had been branded into Angda’s heart back then.

Almost unconsciously, he looked toward Quemu beside him.

Then toward the fearless faces surrounding them.

Confidence began returning to his body.

Years ago, while drunk, the King had once asked him:

Would you be willing to abandon everything in this life and become nothing more than one cavalryman of the Zhenbei Army?

Then the King had asked again:

Or perhaps, one day could our Holy Race also field three hundred thousand armored warriors?

Angda raised his saber.

Stars above protect the Holy Race!

Across the snowfields, two torrents of cavalry drew closer and closer.

The earth itself seemed to boil beneath them.

Tian Wujing rode alone at the very front.

The Pixiu beneath him ran far faster than any ordinary warhorse.

That streak of gold looked like a blinding shaft of divine radiance descending into the mortal world.

Zheng Fan remembered something Liang Cheng had once told him: unless driven by absolute necessity, the commanding general did not need to charge at the very front.

It was true that a commander personally leading the charge could raise morale.

But if an army had to rely on such methods alone, that merely suggested the quality of the troops was lacking.

The Three Kingdoms era had produced clouds of martial generals and famous commanders.

At the root of it all, however, was the fact that war had continued almost without pause since the end of the Eastern Han.

The soldiers beneath many warlords and regional lords varied wildly in quality.

Under those circumstances, the personal martial prowess of generals naturally became far more important.

Zheng Fan had always kept Liang Cheng’s words in mind.

That was why, when fighting, he generally did not charge at the very front.

But Tian Wujing was doing exactly that now.

And no one could say he was wrong.

Because he was Tian Wujing.

A man who had defeated the Sword Saint.

A Third Grade Martial Artist of the present age.

Zheng Fan had once asked the Blind Man, “When will I be able to just let myself go, charge at the very front, and slaughter to my heart’s content for once?”

The Blind Man had eaten an orange, shaken his head, and answered with only three words:

“I doubt it.”

“SHHHNK!”

The front rank of Yan cavalry lowered their long cavalry lances.

The horses beneath them accelerated to their limit.

The Left and Right Armies began separating from the Center.

The Central Army continued straight forward without hesitation.

The cavalry on both wings curved outward slightly.

Zheng Fan held his saber to one side and lowered his head.

He knew that once the distance closed far enough, arrows from both sides would soon begin sweeping into one another.

Veteran soldiers with enough experience knew how to protect themselves at such a moment.

Sure enough the arrows came.

Zheng Fan’s luck this time was poor.

Extremely poor.

Two arrows struck him almost simultaneously.

One hit his chest.

The other struck his left arm.

His left arm hurt badly.

Fortunately, his armor was of excellent quality.

It looked ordinary on the outside, but Xue San had personally reinforced it long ago.

Beneath it, Zheng Fan was also wearing the Golden-Thread Soft Hedgehog Armor Siniang had woven for him.

So the arrowhead did not penetrate deeply into his flesh.

The arrow aimed at his chest was blocked by the Demon Child.

At that moment, City Defender Zheng desperately wanted to curse.

So Tian Wujing could charge at the very front without a damn thing happening to him, while Zheng Fan had to be born with the fate of some disposable extra collecting his boxed lunch?

If he had not been a pay-to-win player wearing premium equipment, with an overpowered “pet” riding along inside him, his script would have been exactly like some miserable bastard in a movie who gets one close-up of an arrow hitting him and falls from his horse then never appears in a second shot.

Tian Wujing was simply far too conspicuous.

So conspicuous that not only the Yan soldiers, but even the savages charging from the front could see him clearly as long as they were not blind.

The two tusks of the Wild Boar King beneath Quemu thrust outward.

As if sharing a single mind with its master, the beast charged straight toward Tian Wujing.

Quemu had indeed made grand declarations about personally tearing apart the Yan people and offering their heads as sacrifices.

But that was contempt for the enemy at the strategic level.

Tactically, you still had to take them seriously.

Even while charging, the opposing cavalry maintained an astonishingly orderly formation.

By comparison, the five thousand warriors Quemu himself had brought were still manageable.

But those young men who had only just rushed in from the surrounding tribes expecting them to preserve formation during a charge was practically impossible.

The immense order of the Yan battle line brought tremendous pressure down upon Quemu.

A hunter of the snowfields might never have heard the phrase “to catch bandits, first catch their king.”

But he absolutely understood that when facing a wolf pack, the first thing you killed was the wolf king!

The Marquis of Jingnan was Quemu’s primary target!

At that moment, the scene from the battle not long ago surfaced once more in Quemu’s mind.

In that battle, the King had personally led several of his strongest warriors straight into the central army of the Jin emperor.

One of their master archers had even struck the Jin ruler with an arrow.

The Jin army fell into confusion as a result.

Then that confusion gradually turned into collapse.

If the Jin people could break like that, then the Yan people could too!

White vapor streamed constantly from the Wild Boar King’s nostrils.

Its eyes were already flooded with blood-red fury.

At this moment, nothing else existed in its vision.

Only the Pixiu ahead.

It could feel the aura radiating from that Pixiu.

An aura that made it deeply uncomfortable.

Worse that aura was actually forcing it toward submission.

But how could it possibly submit?

Tear it apart.

Eat it.

Trample it into the ground!

The Pixiu beneath Tian Wujing seemed to notice the Wild Boar King’s gaze.

It felt offended.

To the Pixiu, this was the equivalent of some lowborn commoner daring to show disrespect toward a true noble.

It was a noble divine beast.

A guardian beast of the State of Yan.

And this barbaric mongrel dared behave arrogantly before it!

At last, the two torrents collided!

But just before the armies crashed together, the two commanders met first.

Quemu let out an enraged roar.

He raised his iron-spiked club.

His qi and blood erupted around him.

He would smash this arrogant Marquis of Jingnan into pulp with a single blow!

He would use his own martial prowess, his own strength, to prove it to Angda, to his King, to all of them the Yan people were not invincible!

If the Holy Race could defeat the Jin people, then it could defeat the Yan people too.

It could defeat any enemy.

The glory of the Holy Race was about to return!

The Marquis of Jingnan straightened his back.

He raised his saber.

His calm gaze settled upon Quemu, the enormous savage warrior already bearing down upon him.

Kunwu fell.

And with it came the Marquis of Jingnan’s level voice.

“For this Marquis...”

For an instant, Quemu felt as though everything around him had fallen into stillness.

An immense terror crashed toward him as though the heavens themselves had split apart.

It was a force that made his courage freeze.

An impossible pressure.

As though the battlefield around them, where tens of thousands were about to tear into one another, had been stripped away in a single instant.

Nothing remained except the saber about to fall before his eyes.

Almost purely by instinct, Quemu raised his iron-spiked club horizontally.

Before that saber, he had no choice but to defend.

“Kneel!”

Kunwu smashed down upon the iron-spiked club.

BOOM!

A terrifying shockwave exploded outward like thunder over dry ground.

The bones of the Wild Boar King beneath Quemu shattered.

Its body burst apart, turning into a mass of bloody chunks that sprayed in every direction.

Quemu, who had been riding upon its back, plunged downward.

His entire body sank into the filthy blood of his mount.

Then his feet struck the ground.

But the horrifying force bearing down through his iron-spiked club had not disappeared.

CRACK!

Under that crushing pressure, Quemu’s knees buckled forward.

And his entire body slammed down onto his knees!

[End of Chapter 259]