Chapter 1004: Military Orders Are Absolute!

The higher the ground, the stronger the wind.

Xie Yu’an reached up to press down the long locks hanging at his temples, then twisted them into loops and tucked them beneath his hat.

When he glanced back, the Swordsmith walking behind him had hair stirring lightly in the wind without a single strand falling out of place.

Xie Yu’an smiled.

“Doesn’t that get tiring?”

Clearly, keeping one’s hair perfectly arranged required a little blood qi.

The Swordsmith was willing to spend it.

He did not care in the slightest. If anything, he cast Xie Yu’an a faintly provocative glance.

“On the road earlier, I heard a piece of news. An official from the Ministry of Rites submitted a proposal to His Majesty suggesting that Great Chu change its hairstyle. He said the reason the Yan are so good at war is because Yan men don’t keep these two long side locks.”

Yan people did possess their own traditional hairstyle.

It was simply much less elaborate than the old Xia style.

That simplification was not limited to hair.

It appeared in all sorts of things.

Eastern Jin, meanwhile, had gradually come to favor... buzz cuts.

Under the Regent Prince’s requirements—and even his personal example—soldiers had their hair trimmed regularly.

Buzz cuts had nearly become standard throughout the army.

Long hair caused all sorts of inconveniences during war.

It could also create hygiene problems.

But eastern Jin had developed such a powerful culture of admiring the military that anything popular in the army was immediately copied by the people around it.

By now, even children in eastern Jin had grown used to finding barbers and asking for buzz cuts.

Eastern Jin’s soldiers and civilians were largely descended from refugees and migrants.

There were also many Barbarians and Savages among them.

So there had never been much cultural resistance over hairstyle.

And because Prince Pingxi Residence had effectively served as the main force resisting Chu throughout these past years, the image of Yan people and Yan troops inside Chu minds had gradually become almost inseparable from this hairstyle.

“What a joke,” the Swordsmith said with a laugh. “What does hair have to do with anything? We can’t beat them in war, can’t compete with them in national strength, and now even our hair is somehow wrong?”

Xie Yu’an laughed.

The Swordsmith looked puzzled.

“Why are you laughing?”

“Because you’re the same.”

“Oh?”

“In Great Chu, the people who keep this hairstyle are officials, noble houses, and aristocratic families. Ordinary commoners don’t bother with this much ceremony. The army certainly doesn’t.”

“Oh. I truly hadn’t noticed.”

He paused.

Then the Swordsmith gave a bitter laugh.

“So I really am no different.”

When you laugh at another man... sometimes you are only a man who has walked fifty steps laughing at the one who walked a hundred.

The Swordsmith turned toward the battlements and spoke with a trace of melancholy.

“There is something I have no choice but to admit. These past years, I’ve busied myself, run from place to place, struggled again and again... and in the end, I discovered that I was gradually living exactly like Yu Huaping.”

Run about enough... struggle enough... and Great Chu itself ended up on the verge of ceasing to exist.

Was that not exactly what had happened to Yu Huaping and Jin years ago?

“Human strength has its limits,” Xie Yu’an said.

He turned slightly and glanced at the Brocade-Clad guards standing not far away, nominally assigned to protect his safety.

“When I saw Xiong Tingshan’s severed arm, I finally understood that the battlefield value of these so-called great experts has fallen even lower.”

Xiong Tingshan had been a Third Grade Martial Artist.

Yet inside a true military formation, he had quickly been pushed into mortal danger and forced to sever his own arm to survive.

In the past, even if a peak Martial Artist could not defeat an army outright, he could at least withstand it for some time.

Eastern Jin alone had developed extremely precise methods designed specifically to kill apex experts.

If you dared come down... if you dared enter... then they would make you... die.

“That only works inside an army,” the Swordsmith replied. “It would be impossible in the jianghu.”

No jianghu sect, no matter how large, could gather that many disciplined men equipped so well and trained to coordinate like willing dead men.

Then the Swordsmith suddenly said:

“Speaking seriously... what if I escort you out of the city?”

“We’d be shot into a hornet’s nest,” Xie Yu’an replied.

The city walls were heavily guarded.

Brocade-Clad personal guards stood everywhere nearby.

“There would still be a chance,” the Swordsmith said.

“I don’t believe you would sacrifice yourself for me,” Xie Yu’an answered frankly.

“How do you know unless we try?”

“But I don’t want to try.”

The Swordsmith laughed softly.

“Look at it that way and Nian Yao may actually be the true loyal minister of Great Chu.”

Xie Yu’an shook his head.

“If this were the old Nian Yao when he was still Grand General, then even if the imperial-clan Imperial Guards were pulled away, he probably could have managed a true ‘a general in the field need not obey every imperial command.’ Now... that is difficult to say.”

Xie Yu’an slipped a hand into his pocket by habit.

He touched nothing.

Only then did he remember that he had stopped keeping oranges in his pockets long ago.

He had begun to fear them.

“So your father and Nian Yao are different,” the Swordsmith said. “The Xie Clan Army and the Imperial Guards are different too.”

“My father has only one son: me. As long as I remain here in Jinghai, the Xie Clan Army in Tongyan City will not reverse its spears.”

“So...”

The Swordsmith’s gaze sharpened slightly.

“If you were no longer here, would your father continue being loyal to Great Chu?”

Xie Yu’an tilted his head.

Then he looked at the Swordsmith and smiled.

“You’ve had many chances to seek death. Yet you never died. Compared with Qian’s Baili Sword, you certainly are somewhat better—but only somewhat. Among the Four Great Swordsmen, if Li Liangshen chooses to fight to the death, he genuinely will. Yu Huaping proved himself before Snow Sea Pass years ago as well. But you? You have always acted as though home and country were strapped across your shoulders. So go die for them.”

The Swordsmith tapped one finger lightly against his sword case.

Xie Yu’an stopped looking at him.

Instead, he turned his body away and drew a deep breath.

“My father is the same. The battle before Guyue City was already the limit of what he could do. More precisely, my Xie Clan has spent generations considering rebellion and replacing the Xiong Clan. My Xie Clan has been rooted in southern Chu for more than a century without being accepted as true nobility. Look at how the Ji imperial clan treated the old Li family in Yan. Then look at how Great Chu treated my Xie Clan. The Xie Clan never owed the Xiong Clan anything. We never owed Great Chu anything either. What we should have done, we already did. What we never needed to do, we did as well. If I die... heh. My father is at least one of the Pillars of State. Even using a pig’s brain he can figure out that the Regent Prince has absolutely no reason to kill me at a time like this. You think he won’t understand? If I die, then fine. My father will immediately lead every soldier under him and fight to the death for that Regent Prince. He will become the Yan’s vanguard completely. He will not hesitate to sacrifice the entire Xie Clan, even half of southern Chu, simply to avenge his son. Why do you think His Majesty tried so hard to win over the Xie Clan? Because the Xie Clan truly dares rebel. We genuinely dare smash the pot and stop playing altogether. We are not like those gullible fools in the Qu Clan, Xiong Clan, Zhao Clan, or your Dugu Clan! I don’t particularly care for Jin customs. So what I cherish is the dress and civilization of Great Chu. Not Xiong Old Fourth!”

The Swordsmith never opened his sword case.

The wind continued blowing.

It could no longer move Xie Yu’an’s hair.

And gradually... the Swordsmith’s hair fell as well.

No longer floating.

“You think so too, don’t you?” Xie Yu’an asked.

He reached out and placed a hand on the Swordsmith’s shoulder.

“Right? You think the same thing. This Regent Prince... this time, he probably still won’t lose. I didn’t feel it before. But after spending so much time around his commander’s tent recently, that feeling has only grown stronger.”

The Swordsmith looked at Xie Yu’an.

“You think he can still win?”

Xie Yu’an shrugged.

“I don’t know what he could possibly do to win. So I stopped bothering to think about it. All I know is... he doesn’t seem to have lost yet.”

...

The gates of Tongyan City opened.

Several Xie Clan cavalrymen galloped out toward Jinghai City to the south.

They were not carrying a military dispatch.

They were carrying a human head.

The head belonged to a Phoenix Nest Internal Guard agent.

An imperial decree had been found on the man.

Xie Zhuyang stood atop the city wall with both hands clasped behind his back.

He had traveled here sitting in a wheelchair.

Now, although he still used it often, he could already force himself to stand for some time.

“Xiong Old Fourth... you really know how to dream!”

Xie Zhuyang stared toward the setting sun and nearly growled the words.

“All your life, you’ve boasted that you resembled that late Emperor of Yan. Heh. Bah! You learned his patience. You learned his methods. But there is exactly one thing you never learned. His breadth of heart!”

A group of generals stood behind Xie Zhuyang.

Their numbers were almost half what they had been before the Battle of Guyue City.

The Xie Clan Army had suffered far too badly in the previous Yan-Chu war.

“Xie Hui.”

“This general is here!”

“The Qian outside the city are probably still waiting for us to cooperate with them. Tonight, take a detachment and raid their camp. I’m not asking for some great result. Just tell those Qian to stop hopping around in front of me like idiots and plant their camp properly. This Qian army... I’m pinning it here for that Regent Prince!”

“This general obeys!”

Xie Zhuyang turned around and swept his gaze across his generals.

They were household retainers.

Nephews.

Clan relatives.

His own people.

“Last time, I led you against the Yan because that was our duty beneath righteousness. We have fulfilled that duty. The Xie Clan has already done right by Great Chu. Done right by the Chu people. Hell, we paid back the Xiong Clan long ago. This time... I’m leading you to fight the Qian for that Regent Prince. I’m doing it... to win every one of you a decent future. Even if the Yan truly seize the entire realm someday and truly unify All Xia, you, you, you—and all the rest of you—will already have a place waiting for you. Do not think the brothers and comrades who died beneath Yan blades in the last battle died for nothing. No. They did not. If you shamelessly crawl over and surrender first, the Yan will only treat you like dogs. First uphold the greater righteousness. Then provide aid when it matters most. Only then, damn it, will they treat you like human beings! The Qian have wagered heavily this time. But I’m betting too. I’m betting that bastard surnamed Zheng... can still win!”

The generals accepted their orders and withdrew.

At that moment, a black shadow emerged beside Xie Zhuyang and handed him a letter from home.

Xie Zhuyang opened it and read.

“Damn it. Why didn’t you give me this earlier?”

“Master was giving his speech.”

Xie Zhuyang complained:

“If I’d read this before speaking, I could have sounded thirty percent more confident.”

He folded the letter.

“Fine. The brat left at home still knows how to behave.”

“Master, there are too few people beside Young Master. Should this servant...”

Xie Zhuyang waved him off.

“Don’t you find it strange? When I was risking my life for Xiong Old Fourth, my back always felt cold. But once I decided to help that bastard Zheng fight instead... heh. Suddenly I feel safe. That one is still our Emperor of Great Chu. This one... we were killing each other until the sky went dark only a short while ago. Ai. And nobody has ever said that bastard Zheng is some kindly saint. He has massacred cities. Slaughtered prisoners. Done plenty of things like that. I met him several times in the commander’s tent too. His temper isn’t exactly pleasant. But damn it... you simply feel secure.”

Shadow said:

“That is why Tian Wujing entrusted his child to him years ago.”

“Yes. Qu Peiluo and that dog from the snowfields are at his side too.”

At that moment, a courier reached the city and was escorted inside.

Very soon, a soldier hurried over.

“Clan Head, a brocade pouch from the Regent Prince, delivered by the Brocade-Clad personal guards.”

“Oh?”

Xie Zhuyang accepted the pouch and opened it.

Then shook it.

Nothing fell out.

There was not even a scrap of paper inside.

“Master, what does it mean?”

Xie Zhuyang burst into laughter.

“Hahahaha! It means... everything is understood without a word!”

...

East of the Qian River, a large Qian military camp stood in place.

Its outer scouting cavalry had spread far in every direction.

Across all of Great Qian, no other army possessed such a high proportion of cavalry.

No other army contained this many mounted troops either.

Ever since the reign of the previous Emperor...

Qian’s largest cavalry corps had been commanded by Zhong Tianlang, the Imperial Son-in-Law.

After the military coup and Zhao Mugou’s accession, Zhong Tianlang received great merit for supporting the new sovereign and was entrusted with even greater responsibility.

Now...

Zhong Tianlang had forty thousand cavalry around him.

These were the elite core of Great Qian’s mounted forces.

Even with Qian’s immense wealth, building this cavalry corps had hurt badly.

This was not the old Qian tradition of simply assembling something vaguely resembling the Western Army’s mounted units.

The force had been built to imitate the Yan army completely.

Set armor and weapons aside.

Even the horses were different.

They were not Qian’s small native mounts.

Nor were they the southwestern ponies.

They were high-quality warhorses purchased at enormous cost from the northern Qiang tribes, bred domestically at equally enormous expense, and supplemented by superior horses smuggled in from Yan and Jin.

Good sons of respectable households made up the manpower.

Training was strict and thorough.

Most unusually of all, more than ninety percent of the soldiers listed on its rolls actually existed.

That meant more than ninety percent of the military salaries had to be paid for real.

For Qian, a formation like this had been almost unheard of for nearly sixty years.

Even the other newly organized field armies generally maintained only around eighty percent of their listed strength.

The Qian had suffered far too much pain from the weakness of their own cavalry.

So this time, they had truly learned the lesson through blood.

Now...

Zhong Tianlang’s army faced the three garrisons ahead.

Roughly estimated, more than twenty thousand Yan cavalry occupied those three positions.

The true number was not much different.

Chen Xianba held the central garrison with fifteen thousand cavalry.

The two neighboring garrisons were held by Tian Tian and the grown wolf cub Zheng Man, each commanding five thousand.

The Regent Prince had brought only a little more than fifty thousand eastern Jin cavalry into Qian this time.

Half of them had been divided among those three young commanders.

That alone showed how highly the Prince regarded all three.

Under ordinary logic—and according to past experience between Yan and Qian—twenty-five thousand Yan against forty thousand Qian cavalry obviously meant: the advantage was with the Yan.

But Zhong Tianlang had more than those forty thousand horsemen.

Two Jiangnan local armies stood on either side of his main force, protecting the central camp.

Together they numbered around fifty thousand.

Those fifty thousand troops genuinely possessed poor combat strength.

Many were there merely to fill the ranks.

But even fifty thousand pigs occupying fortified camps could still provide excellent tactical support to the central army.

The other new Qian armies needed to maintain numerical pressure against the rest of the Yan forces west of the river.

No more elite troops could be spared for Zhong Tianlang.

The amount of grain you had eaten determined how much strength you had to produce at the crucial moment.

That was only natural.

Zhong Tianlang had just finished inspecting the camps.

He was already considering whether to change tactics.

His mission only required him to maintain the separation.

Defending in place could accomplish that.

Taking the initiative and attacking could accomplish it too.

A trace of agitation existed in his heart.

Years ago... his name had once stood beside Zheng Fan’s.

At one point, he had nearly killed Zheng Fan.

And now... he had been reduced to playing against Zheng Fan’s sons and nephews.

Still, those small emotions did not disturb his judgment.

He was no longer the frivolous young general of those years.

But then... one of his guards delivered the brocade pouch sent by the Yan messenger.

Zhong Tianlang opened it.

Empty.

There was nothing inside.

Even he... could not stop himself from drawing his saber.

Slash!

The table before him split apart.

“That bastard Zheng truly goes too far! He dares ignore me to this extent!”

...

Only half a day later, the commanders of all three garrisons received their own brocade pouches as well.

Even the finest Brocade-Clad personal guards faced danger carrying messages across a battlefield filled with forces interwoven from every direction.

Messages could easily fail to arrive.

The main reason every pouch reached its destination... was simply that there were far too many of them.

They were empty anyway.

There was a huge surplus.

So Liu Dahu had simply dispatched two different messenger teams in every direction.

With that level of redundancy... delivery success became extremely difficult to avoid.

Naturally, even before the pouches arrived, the appearance and deployments of the Qian armies meant both sides had already become aware of the other forces around them.

Each formation, from its own angle, could see at least part of the other side’s arrangement.

After Zheng Man received his empty brocade pouch... he dropped to his knees.

Facing the direction where the Prince stood, he kowtowed three times with tremendous respect.

One of his deputy generals asked what His Highness’s order meant.

Zheng Man’s eyes reddened.

He said:

“Adoptive Father means he owes me nothing, and I owe him nothing. Adoptive Father is trapped in danger now. There must be far more Qian troops surrounding Jinghai City than the forces facing us. Adoptive Father wants me to retreat. He is commander of the entire army. Naturally he cannot directly issue an order telling me to withdraw and save myself. So he used this method to hint at me. An empty pouch means... there is no need to save him anymore.”

As Zheng Man spoke, he looked around.

Many of the soldiers standing near him carried Barbarian faces.

“His Highness raised me from childhood. I owe him the grace of raising my body and life. His Highness has shown the Barbarian people even greater grace, treating us as true core troops. Now, even if His Highness has fallen into the Ninth Hell... how could we retreat and refuse to save him? And what stands ahead of us isn’t even Hell. These Qian troops are not worthy of being called ghosts or gods! We will die... but we will die beside His Highness! Pass the order! Prepare for battle. I will lead all of you through the Qian blockade and rescue His Highness! And send letters to the other two garrisons separately. Judging by distance, they should have received His Highness’s withdrawal order even earlier than I did. Yet there hasn’t been the slightest movement from either side. Heh. Don’t tell me they’re really thinking about the greater situation and planning to withdraw? Damn them. Ask them directly... are they eating shit?!”

...

“Hahahahahahaha!”

Inside his commander’s tent, Chen Xianba held the empty brocade pouch high and shouted toward the officers around him:

“This means His Highness trusts my ability! He is telling me I can do whatever I want, fight however I want, break this board with my own methods! Good! Since His Highness trusts me enough to hand me complete freedom... then this time... we are going to perform properly! We absolutely cannot disappoint His Highness! The Qian? Nothing but clay chickens and pottery dogs! As for the other two garrisons, I’m sure they’ve already received His Highness’s orders telling them to obey my command completely.”

Chen Xianba was rapidly becoming drunk on the confidence the empty brocade pouch had somehow bestowed upon him.

“Mm. Send word to our Heir Prince and that wolf cub. Tell them... tell them: Don’t panic. Your big brother’s here!”

...

Inside another garrison...

Tian Tian was still staring at the empty brocade pouch in deep thought.

Then two letters arrived from the neighboring garrisons.

Tian Tian set the empty pouch aside.

He opened the first letter.

“Don’t panic. Your big brother’s here!”

Then he opened the second.

“Are you eating shit?!”

“...”

Tian Tian.

[End of Chapter 1004]