Chapter 966: National War (IV)

Before nightfall, the Savage army launched yet another assault.

The Chu held again.

In the end, leaving corpse after corpse behind them, the surviving soldiers on both sides dragged their rain-soaked, exhausted bodies away from the line and gradually broke contact.

Gou Moli sat on horseback.

This was the first time since the breakout fighting began that he had come forward to “watch the battle.”

Watch, because command remained in the hands of the generals below. He did not intervene.

Even after the army was repelled yet again, Gou Moli’s expression barely changed. The Savage King who had once excelled above all at inspiring morale now seemed to have become almost Buddhist in his detachment.

He closed his eyes, drew a deep breath, slowly released it, patted the top of his helmet, then turned his horse and rode back toward camp.

Morale inside the fortified camp was low.

Still seated on horseback, Gou Moli drew countless eyes from the soldiers on both sides.

To them, only their Marshal could still give them strength now.

Yet the Marshal merely rode silently to the command tent, dismounted, and went inside.

There was no charcoal brazier in the tent.

But dry firewood was burning.

At a time like this, even having dry wood to burn counted as a rare luxury.

Gou Moli removed his armor, sat beside the fire, spread his hands, and warmed them over the flames.

The Sword Saint sat in a corner with his eyes closed, looking as though he had already fallen asleep.

The precious dry wood crackled continuously.

Every so often, sparks flew upward.

Then a sudden clamor erupted outside.

Gou Moli did not move.

Before long, the noise vanished.

A little later, one of his personal guards entered and reported that some of the Chu auxiliary troops in camp had mutinied.

The disturbance had already been suppressed.

Gou Moli listened.

Then smiled.

“Idiots.”

As he spoke, he reached toward the Sword Saint.

His hand had just closed around the pouch of roasted flour hanging from the Sword Saint’s waist when the Sword Saint opened his eyes and stared at him.

Gou Moli did not withdraw his hand.

Instead, he thickened his face and said:

“One bite. Just one bite.”

...

“General, just take one bite.”

“I’m not hungry. Give it to the wounded brothers.”

“General...”

“That is an order.”

“Yes.”

Xie Yulou laid his saber beside him and leaned against a boulder.

He was exhausted.

Utterly exhausted.

But once exhaustion passed a certain limit, simple tiredness could no longer really be felt.

What remained was something called numbness.

Not far away, many soldiers huddled tightly together, seemingly hoping proximity alone could make them feel warmer.

Xie Yulou pressed his lips together.

Just as the Savage army was astonished by the determination and fighting strength of this Chu force, Xie Yulou was astonished by the combat power displayed by an army that appeared to be Yan but was, in reality, composed overwhelmingly of Savages.

It was completely different from the Savages he had imagined.

They had indeed gritted their teeth and held every assault so far.

But the problems on their side were actually little different from those afflicting the Savage army opposite them.

Morale was low.

Visibly low.

The one advantage was that everyone already knew their own larger army had completed the encirclement of the Savage force ahead.

Victory in this battle seemed almost within reach.

Perhaps that single belief was what allowed the men to continue holding on.

Some soldiers had already begun cursing, asking why the allied armies around them had still not launched a coordinated attack against the encircled Savages and instead allowed the enemy to charge their position over and over.

A trapped beast’s final struggle was the most terrifying of all.

And they were the men standing directly in front of that trapped beast.

This was the bitterest, hardest assignment.

During the council in the command tent, not one commanding general had volunteered for it.

To take this position meant spending the lives of one’s own men to grind away the enemy.

Xie Yulou had no choice.

He was different from Xie Yi.

Xie Yi was merely Xie Zhuyang’s nephew.

Xie Yulou was Xie Zhuyang’s adopted son.

That was why his name contained the character “Yu.”

In this age, the word “adopted” carried enormous weight.

An adopted son was much like the adopted wards graduating every year from eastern Jin’s schools. Whether one followed the dictates of one’s own heart or the moral standards of the age, when sacrifice became necessary... one had to step forward without hesitation.

Xie Yulou reached down and touched the wound on his leg.

Originally it had not been serious.

Normally, he could have sealed it well enough with his own blood qi.

But during battle, how could he possibly waste precious blood qi on something like that?

After being torn open again and again through constant fighting, the wound had worsened.

Most absurdly... it was already beginning to suppurate.

Food was running short as well.

They had made a fast march to swing around the enemy’s rear and had traveled light.

Beyond essential rations, they could never have carried much grain.

Fortunately, they had intercepted one supply convoy coming from Fan City.

Otherwise, they would already have gone without cooked food entirely.

Even so, what grain remained was extremely tight.

Most of the intercepted convoy’s load had not been grain at all.

It had consisted mostly of medicinal herbs, tents, and certain important components used to assemble siege equipment.

The convoy had even managed to set part of the cargo on fire when facing the Chu.

Heh...

What rotten luck.

“General, should this subordinate help clean the wound?”

“No.”

Xie Yulou refused the personal guard’s offer.

Cleaning it properly would require cutting away the rotting flesh.

If he did that, he would not be able to personally command the next fight.

He was afraid.

Afraid that if he was not there to command, those crazed Savages might simply tear open the line and break through.

Yet another thought kept sounding inside Xie Yulou’s mind from time to time:

Perhaps... letting the Savages break out would not necessarily be unacceptable.

This was not fear.

Not cowardice.

Not passive avoidance of battle for the sake of preserving his own strength.

Everything the Xie Clan possessed belonged to the Clan Head and the Young Master.

What did any of it have to do with Xie Yulou personally?

The true reason was simpler.

Unlike the ordinary soldiers, who were sustained by the belief that complete annihilation of this Yan army and final victory were already close enough to touch...

Xie Yulou remembered very clearly what he had seen and heard when he pulled his troops out of Guyue City.

He kept feeling... that something was wrong.

Genuinely wrong.

“But what exactly... is wrong?”

...

“Nothing is wrong.”

Xie Zhuyang’s eyelids drooped heavily from days of exhaustion as he said this to the generals who had come to report.

After speaking, the Xie Clan Head simply closed his eyes.

Seeing his posture, the Xie generals exchanged glances.

No one dared say anything further.

They rose, saluted, and withdrew from the command tent.

Only after the tent was empty did Xie Zhuyang open his eyes again.

He was tired.

But not nearly tired enough to fall asleep like that.

As the battle continued, the ordinary soldiers remained fine.

They were looking forward to the triumph of an annihilation battle.

But the true officer corps had already begun smelling something strange.

Their own force now formed the southern arm of the encirclement.

The Savage army kept attacking north, trying desperately to punch open a road home.

Yet the forces to the east and west had done little more than make thunder without rain.

Despite the completed encirclement, they had never launched any substantive attack on the Savage army.

Even Xie Zhuyang himself had made no attempt to exploit the opportunity and coordinate a north-south pincer.

He had simply allowed the brothers blocking the north to bear the Savage assaults alone.

“You look very tired.”

The little girl’s voice sounded inside the command tent.

Then her figure appeared.

“War is exhausting. How could it not be?”

Over this period, Xie Zhuyang had gradually become accustomed to the peculiar way of speaking and interacting with these two women, one grown and one young.

They were not his subordinates.

Yet they clearly belonged, somehow, to his side.

“Is it truly this exhausting?” the little girl asked.

“You can try it yourself.”

The little girl laughed and pointed at her own head.

“If I had this sort of brain, I would never have chosen the path of cultivation all those years ago. How could anyone in this world be proficient at everything?”

“There was one,” Xie Zhuyang said.

“That Prince Jingnan of Yan?” the little girl asked. “In the books and in the letters you gave me, he appears over and over throughout that period. Is he dead now?”

“He left.”

“‘Left’ means dead?”

“I don’t know. But I can feel that he will not return. When the time comes for him to die, only then will he come back.”

“You met him?”

“I’m still sitting here.”

“What do you mean?”

“That means I never met him.”

“Oh. So you’re still alive because you never met him. Is that what people call heroes cherishing heroes?”

“Not really. It’s just that if he were inside the Yan army right now, I would feel there was no hope at all.”

“But the Regent Prince’s fame should already have eclipsed his.”

“They are different. Tian Wujing gave people—especially opponents facing him before the armies—a sense of powerlessness. This Regent Prince is not Tian Wujing.”

“What I wanted to ask is this: when the fighting here ends, will your son return?”

“No hurry. No hurry.”

Xie Zhuyang shook his head.

“This here... is only the prelude.”

“REPORT!”

“REPORT!”

Messengers came galloping in at full speed.

The same scene that had once buried Gou Moli’s command tent beneath urgent military intelligence now repeated itself before the Chu commander’s tent.

“Yan cavalry has appeared at Xifengkou!”

“Yan cavalry has appeared at Shuize Bay!”

“Yan forces have been sighted at Shanshui Town!”

“...”

One military report after another fell like massive stones into an already suffocating pond.

If the battlefield in this region were simplified into one long, narrow strip... then Yan forces had now appeared all along its eastern side.

From the position of the Savage army... to Xie Zhuyang’s current position... and even down near Guyue City itself.

That meant one thing.

A large Yan army had already completed a strategic encirclement around the entire battlefield.

The turtle was not inside the jar.

The Yan had simply built a jar around the turtle.

How many Yan troops were required to achieve this degree of battlefield coverage?

Their appetite was terrifying.

They intended to swallow this entire battlefield in one bite!

“Clan Head!”

“Clan Head!”

One Xie general after another rushed forward, desperate to enter and request an audience.

Xie Zhuyang’s personal guards stopped them all.

A black figure appeared beside Xie Zhuyang.

“Shadow. Go tell the Young Master. His father... has been surrounded layer upon layer.”

“Yes, Master.”

The Shadow gave the little girl still standing in the command tent one long look.

Then his figure began fading away.

The little girl stepped forward and looked at Xie Zhuyang.

“Aren’t you afraid?”

“Hahahahahahaha!”

Xie Zhuyang suddenly burst out laughing.

He wiped away tears of laughter with the back of one hand.

Then said:

“I’m scared to death.”

[End of Chapter 966]