The smoke of battle had yet to dissipate from Duanyun Fortress. The silver wolf banners atop the city walls fluttered violently in the bitter northern wind, which still carried the stench of burning.
The city defenses and granaries had been completely taken over by the Da Sheng army.
Bloodstains had not yet fully dried on the bluestone streets. Qin Feng, one hand resting on the hilt of his sword, strode through the wreckage of the outer fortress.
Deep shadows lay beneath his eyes, but his gaze was as sharp as a freshly honed blade.
“Dispatch two more squads to the city gates. Set up three checkpoints for inspection.”
Qin Feng issued his orders to the deputy general beside him. His voice was hoarse but firm and cold.
“Let them leave, but they must follow Da Sheng’s rules. Military supplies, weapons, warhorses, and armor are absolutely forbidden from leaving the city. Anyone caught concealing military provisions among their belongings is to be detained on the spot.”
Not far ahead, several Da Sheng soldiers were stopping a wooden cart preparing to leave the city.
The cart was piled high with worn-out bedding and several sacks of grain. A bony, emaciated donkey was pulling it.
An elderly Northern Di woman clutched a wooden box tightly to her chest. Her entire body trembled, but she refused to let go.
“These aren’t military supplies! They’re my old man’s ashes and ancestral tablet!”
The old woman shouted herself hoarse. Behind her, several young grandchildren were crying in fright.
The squad leader responsible for the inspection frowned. He unfastened the wooden box, glanced inside, and confirmed that it contained nothing but a crude wooden tablet and a jar of ashes. He then stepped aside and waved his hand.
“Let them through. Next household!”
Qin Feng walked forward and watched as the wooden cart slowly rolled toward the city gates. His brows furrowed slightly.
He turned to the quartermaster responsible for provisions.
“How is the inventory of the granaries coming along?”
“Reporting to the general, Granaries A and B have both been secured. Aside from some grain that got damp around the edges and some losses caused by stray arrows setting things on fire, ninety percent of the military grain remains intact.”
The quartermaster quickly flipped through the ledger in his hands.
“Additionally, as you instructed, every household leaving the city has been given three days’ worth of rations. As for the livestock belonging to the residents…”
“Military horses and livestock used for military transport are all to be taken over by our army. They’re spoils of war. There’s no room for negotiation.”
Qin Feng interrupted him, his tone practical and strict.
“But ordinary sheep, plow oxen, and donkeys or mules raised by civilians to make a living may be taken away, provided the quantities aren’t excessive and the owners have enough people to lead them. Once the animals have been inspected and cleared, they may leave with them. As for residents who choose to stay, they may retain their privately owned livestock after inspection and registration. However, if the military subsequently needs to requisition them for defensive purposes, compensation must be provided according to the records. No one is to seize them by force.”
He surveyed the surroundings. Those who had chosen to remain were huddled beneath the eaves, watching the Da Sheng soldiers moving back and forth in terror.
Qin Feng knew that if the fortress was to continue functioning, it could not be allowed to become a dead city.
“Go to the notice board and issue an order. Craftsmen, merchants, and farming households who remain will all be regarded as subjects under Da Sheng’s rule. As long as they abide by the law, Da Sheng will accept them and provide protection. From now on, however, they must pay taxes according to the law and register their household information. Anyone found secretly concealing weapons or colluding with enemy forces will be executed, along with those implicated.”
After issuing his orders, Qin Feng turned and headed toward the next defensive position.
He had not come here to dispense kindness. He had come to ensure that this fortress, seized at the cost of countless Da Sheng lives, remained firmly planted at the throat of Northern Di.
Prince Su did not need a Duanyun Fortress filled with hatred. He needed a stronghold that could continue operating and support Da Sheng’s northern defensive line. And slaughter and plunder alone would never be enough to accomplish that.
◆◇◆◇◆
A long line of people had already formed outside the city gates.
Among the crowd, a young woman from the Cangyuan Khanate named Tana held tightly to the hands of her two children, a heavy bundle strapped to her back.
She did not dare look back at the stone house where she had lived for many years.
Prince Su’s fearsome reputation, earned through years of warfare on the northern frontier, combined with the devastating shock of Duanyun Fortress falling, had filled her with an overwhelming fear of the unknown when it came to the Da Sheng army.
Although the Da Sheng soldiers had not massacred the city as the rumors claimed, and had even distributed rations, Tana did not dare stay a moment longer.
She intended to follow the main body of refugees on foot toward the Cangyuan Khanate’s distant hinterland, even if the journey ahead was long, uncertain, and filled with hunger.
Not far from Tana, however, the blacksmith Uliji had chosen to stay.
He squatted on the threshold of his own smithy, watching Da Sheng soldiers go from household to household with wooden tally sticks and registration books.
He was old, his legs no longer reliable, and he could not carry away the heavy tools in his workshop.
When he heard the Da Sheng officers announce that those who remained could keep their private property and would only be required to pay taxes according to the rules, Uliji let out a long breath of relief.
As long as he could keep his livelihood, paying taxes to a different ruler was still better than dying along the road while fleeing.
Among these civilians, whose faces revealed a variety of emotions, a few pairs of eyes displayed a wariness entirely different from that of those around them.
Manduola, dressed in a ragged sheepskin coat, kept his head lowered, deliberately allowing his disheveled hair to conceal most of his face.
His hands were covered in the calluses left by years of handling weapons. Although he had disguised his gait as a hobble, his movements still carried the steadiness of a trained soldier.
He was a Northern Di deserter who had taken advantage of the chaos shortly after the war began to discard his armor and escape.
He had had enough of Chimu Khan’s command and had no desire to throw his life away in a battle that was already doomed to fail.
He was not the only deserter.
Manduola did not know whether the Da Sheng army would intercept and kill them along the way. He only knew that blending in among the elderly, women, and children was his only chance of making it back to the grasslands alive.
He quietly studied the terrain around him and overheard several other deserters whispering about whether they should seek refuge at Baishui Pass, which was closer.
Manduola secretly shook his head.
Baishui Pass was a strategically vital location that both sides would fight to control. The Da Sheng army would certainly not leave it alone. Going there now was too risky.
He decided to cling to this stream of refugees heading toward the distant hinterland.
◆◇◆◇◆
On the official road leading south, another group was struggling forward.
They were Northern Di prisoners being escorted toward Linbei City, most of them wounded soldiers and the sick or frail.
Da Sheng guards carrying long spears marched in formation along both sides of the column.
As they reached a narrow mountain pass, the wheel of a supply wagon at the front suddenly sank into a muddy pit. The entire column immediately became congested.
Several escort guards hurried forward to help push the wagon, leaving a brief gap in the formation.
At that moment, several Northern Di wounded soldiers, driven to the brink by fear, exchanged glances. Taking advantage of the guards turning away to deal with the wagon, they dragged their iron shackles along the ground, suddenly shoved aside the soldiers beside them, and scrambled toward the dense woods on either side of the mountain pass!
“Don’t panic! Form ranks!” the Da Sheng squad leader immediately roared, drawing his saber.
The well-trained Da Sheng soldiers quickly tightened their formation. Their spears thrust forward, pinning several prisoners who had attempted to join the uprising to the ground and stabbing down the two most aggressive ones.
However, because the terrain was narrow and the column crowded, three or five wounded soldiers still managed to slip into the depths of the forest.
The disturbance was quickly suppressed, and the column resumed its dull, weary march.
“Damn it, they just can’t behave themselves. Even when the wagon gets stuck, they still have to make trouble.”
Several Da Sheng soldiers walked alongside the column, speaking quietly in the official Da Sheng dialect.
“Let them run. How many days can they survive in the mountains with those injuries?”
Another soldier shook his head with a laugh.
“But speaking of which, those Northern Di people really believed that our prince had only a little over a month left to fight. They even pulled back their border defenses because of it.”
“Exactly! Besides, Jiangnan had a bumper harvest this year. Transporting supplies from the rear might take some effort, but when have we ever truly run short of grain? Now we’ve even taken control of both major granaries in Duanyun Fortress. This war feels reassuringly solid.”
Among the prisoners, several Northern Di soldiers who understood the official dialect abruptly stopped walking.
The deadline had been a lie?
Jiangnan had enjoyed a bumper harvest?
Da Sheng was not short of grain at all?
And they had even taken control of the granaries in Duanyun Fortress?
Their superiors had previously told them that if they could hold out for just another month or so, Prince Su would withdraw, and the Da Sheng army would collapse without a fight.
They had firmly believed this. It had been the spiritual pillar that kept them going through the bloody battles.
Now, hearing these fragments of information was like being struck by a bolt of lightning from a clear sky.
Some turned ashen-faced. Others shifted their eyes suspiciously, wondering whether the Da Sheng soldiers were deliberately spreading false information.
Regardless, the seeds of these fragmented reports had already been planted. They began to spread through the minds of the prisoners and those who had secretly escaped.
◆◇◆◇◆
At the other end of the battlefield, the atmosphere inside the command tent at Pei Yi’s right-wing encampment was tense.
Xia Lanshi and Xiao had arrived at the camp not long ago and had not yet brushed the windblown dust from their shoulders when an urgent military report was delivered to the desk.
Three nodes of the Light Network had simultaneously lost contact.
Inside the tent, Xiao stared at the map spread across the table, his brows tightly furrowed.
All three nodes were located in buffer zones where the national borders were poorly defined. They had been hastily established specifically for this great war.
“Nodes Three, Seven, and Nine have not sent back any messages for the past half shichen.”
Xiao pointed to the map and analyzed the situation calmly.
“All three are located in ambiguous border areas. Their simultaneous loss of contact may mean they were destroyed by enemy patrols. We cannot rule out the possibility that the personnel stationed there have been captured, that the cipher data has been compromised, or that important military equipment has been seized.”
Xia Lanshi’s expression was stern, but his eyes showed no trace of panic.
When the Light Network was first established, they had already considered the risk of nodes being destroyed and discussed contingency plans.
“Immediately order all undamaged nodes to activate the reserve cipher system and discard the original corresponding codebooks.”
Xia Lanshi issued his orders decisively.
“Activate the reserve relay stations at the same time. Dispatch light cavalry couriers to relay messages manually through the disconnected areas. Priority must be given to important military intelligence. All nonurgent messages are to be postponed.”
Changing the ciphers and resetting the routes would increase the time needed to reconfirm procedures. However, when the security of the nodes was in doubt, this was a necessary price to pay to prevent the enemy from using compromised information to infiltrate the network in the opposite direction.
Outside the tent, Su Muchen was equally busy overseeing the medical and logistical arrangements he had just taken over.
Under the identity of Military Physician Shen An, Su Muchen had accompanied Mu Li to the wounded soldiers’ camp.
Mu Li, wearing a white gauze veil, had gone to carry out the task Su Muchen had assigned him under the identity of “Military Adviser Su.”
Faced with the camp’s pervasive smell of blood and the cries of the wounded, Shen An did not blindly seize authority. Instead, he first sought out the camp’s chief physician and the officials responsible for military supplies, presented his authorization, and quickly explained his proposed triage and sanitation procedures.
“Those with severe bleeding must be separated immediately from those suffering from fever and infection to prevent cross-contamination.”
Shen An’s tone was steady.
“Quartermaster, please confirm the quantities of alcohol and high-proof liquor in storage. Prioritize their allocation for medical suturing and cleaning instruments. All dressings must be thoroughly boiled in water and dried before use.”
Seeing how organized and capable he was, the elderly physician immediately relinquished control and allowed him to take charge.
Under Shen An’s coordination, the wounded soldiers’ camp, which had previously been somewhat chaotic, soon established a clear system for triage and treatment.
Shen An knew perfectly well that he could no longer return to Guichen Studio every day to replenish his supplies as he usually did.
The modern medical supplies he had previously brought through the Gate were dwindling with every use. Although he had calculated beforehand that they would last until the end of the war, actual conditions could always differ from his estimates.
If they truly proved insufficient, he would have to activate the backup plan and draw upon the reserve medical supplies stored in the Guimen Hall.
At that moment, although his thoughts remained fixed on whether Xiao Yuan’s operation would proceed smoothly and whether he would return safely, Shen An also understood that worrying alone would accomplish nothing.
For now, his priority was to properly arrange the logistics and medical services at the encampment in front of Baishui Pass.
◆◇◆◇◆
Several dozen li away, the howling wind swept across the barren wilderness, cutting through the cracked earth like a dull knife.
Helian Cang tightened the reins in one hand. The warhorse beneath him let out a heavy snort.
His sharp, ruthless eyes looked coldly down at the scout captain kneeling on one knee before his horse.
The scout captain bowed his head.
“Great Marshal, Xiao Yuan personally led a force of roughly a thousand men. After reaching the boundary marker at the forward outpost, they did not continue straight toward Baishui Pass. Instead, they turned northeast and began withdrawing in that direction! Their rear ranks have maintained their formation during the march, and scouts have been moving along the route.”
Helian Cang’s expression did not change in the slightest.
With one hand, he pulled open his leather pouch and spread out the sheepskin map, which had been treated with sheep fat.
His long thumb, roughened by calluses, traced an almost imperceptible crease on the map before finally stopping at several narrow ravines in the northeast, their sides as sharply cut as if carved by axes.
He did not regard these thousand or so men as a scattered remnant fleeing in defeat.
On the contrary, he had fought Xiao Yuan across the northern frontier for many years and understood his opponent’s habits all too well.
Xiao Yuan calculated every move with extraordinary precision and always kept a backup plan. After capturing Duanyun Fortress, he had divided his forces into several routes, yet personally ventured into danger with only a little over a thousand guards.
This was certainly no panicked retreat. He must have some kind of advantage to rely on.
“Did you get a clear look? Are there truly only a thousand or so men beside Xiao Yuan?”
Helian Cang’s voice rumbled like distant thunder.
“Reporting to the Great Marshal, we tracked their traces along the route and observed them from high ground. The Da Sheng army’s retreating force was not large. Our number is only an estimate based on visual observation, but they should not exceed fifteen hundred men.”
Helian Cang’s mind worked rapidly.
He was extremely familiar with the battlefield in this region. There were several dangerous areas to the northeast that were ideal for ambushes, as well as several shortcuts that could allow them to rendezvous with Pei Yi’s main force.
“Great Marshal,” the scout captain said, stepping forward and lowering his voice, “Xiao Yuan is full of tricks. The terrain to the northeast is uneven, and there may be an ambush. Would it be too risky for our army to pursue at full speed?”
“He has a plan. Does that mean I should cower and refuse to advance?”
Helian Cang snorted coldly, his gaze sweeping across the vast wilderness like cold iron.
“Xiao Yuan understands me. He knows I will pursue him. And I understand him, too. He would never stake his own life on some illusory stroke of luck. What he wants is to keep me tied up halfway there and buy time for Pei Yi to join forces with him.”
Victory on the battlefield had never depended on whose formation was more perfect. It depended on who could seize upon the flaws hidden among the tangled circumstances and tear open the other side’s throat with overwhelming force first.
As long as he could force Xiao Yuan into an open-field battle before he rendezvoused with Pei Yi, the entire strategic deployment of the Da Sheng army would be torn to pieces.
If he could kill Xiao Yuan here, Prince Su’s army would completely lose its central pillar. Da Sheng’s entire strategic game would be impossible to continue!
Was Helian Cang the sort of man who would be frightened into retreat?
Although Xiao Yuan had always been meticulous in his calculations, this was undoubtedly a rare tactical opening in Helian Cang’s eyes.
“An army of forty thousand, carrying its supply train, will only ruin its own formation if it pursues at full speed.”
“Listen to my command.”
Helian Cang’s voice was hoarse and cold.
“The infantry and supply battalions will maintain their original pace, advancing toward Baishui Pass in formation. I will personally lead twenty-five hundred elite light cavalry from the left and right wings. Discard spare equipment and unnecessary burdens, maintain formation, and pursue at full speed!”
He did not blindly assume this was a guaranteed victory. But he knew that if he could force Xiao Yuan to engage before joining Pei Yi, he could disrupt Da Sheng’s strategic deployment.
At Helian Cang’s command, the thunderous sound of hooves suddenly erupted.
Twenty-five hundred light cavalry surged onto the northeastern wilderness like a black blade drawn from its sheath.
◆◇◆◇◆
Far away, deep in the hinterland of the Cangyuan Khanate, the wind was no less restless.
Helian Yue sat inside the royal tent, staring at the military report that had just arrived, his brows drawn tightly together.
—After Duanyun Fortress fell, large numbers of refugees had begun fleeing north from the city.
He had no time to sink into anxiety over the unfavorable turn of the war. As a member of the royal family left behind to hold the rear, he had to issue countermeasures immediately.
“Send orders to gather all the ox carts and horse-drawn wagons currently available among the tribes in the hinterland. Form a relief convoy and send it to the designated staging area twenty li beyond the southern official road.”
Helian Yue calmly instructed the advisers inside the tent.
“First, dispatch scouts to observe the refugees’ movements. The convoy must carry the first allocation of supplies: half a month’s worth of rations and basic medicinal materials. Prioritize the elderly, women, children, the wounded, and the sick. In addition, set up temporary camps at the road junctions. Everyone who arrives must first be registered, examined for infectious diseases, and then assigned to the appropriate groups.”
The advisers accepted the orders and left.
Helian Yue looked toward the south and let out a soft sigh.
He knew that the tragic reports and horrifying scenes these refugees would bring with them would have a tremendous impact on the Khanate’s internal affairs.
However, until the information had been fully verified and the refugees had actually arrived, all he could do was make thorough preparations and preserve at least a sliver of hope for the Cangyuan Khanate’s survival beyond the war itself.
“Your Highness, our supplies in the rear are already inadequate. If we take in a large number of refugees, I’m afraid it will cause resentment among the various tribes…”
An elderly adviser wore a worried expression.
“If we refuse to take them in, they will become genuine bands of desperate people, looting food in the rear and triggering even greater unrest. We have no spare capacity to deal with that. Besides, they are all subjects of the Cangyuan Khanate. We cannot simply abandon them.”
Helian Yue’s tone remained calm, yet carried an unquestionable authority.
“Take stock of the warehouses and confirm how much grain remains. Also, assign more men to keep a close watch on the camps and prevent Da Sheng spies from infiltrating them.”
The elderly adviser accepted the order and withdrew.
Helian Yue walked alone to the entrance of the tent and gazed toward the hazy southern horizon.
The arrival of the refugees was not merely a logistical crisis. It was also a storm.
His gaze darkened slightly.
When the wounded soldiers with missing limbs and the civilians who had lost their homes finally stood before the tribal chiefs in person, how long would the grand declarations of inevitable victory from the war faction be able to hold up?
Perhaps those whose eyes had been blinded by the flames of war would finally be forced to see the true cost of this conflict.
Or perhaps they would remain stubbornly deluded.
But he could not act yet.
He had to wait until this wind truly reached the heart of the grasslands.
◆◇◆◇◆
The setting sun glowed blood-red. The sky gradually darkened, and the howling wind pressed the withered grass flat against the ground.
The twenty-five hundred light cavalry led by Helian Cang were racing across the wilderness. Far along the horizon, the dust raised by the Da Sheng army was faintly visible, and the distance between the two forces was steadily shrinking.
Inside Pei Yi’s right-wing encampment, torches were being lit one after another.
Some units had completed their initial assembly, and the various contingents stood at attention, awaiting orders.
Pei Yi stood before the tent where the map was hanging. The contingency plan for the Light Network had already been activated, but the signal had yet to arrive.
Far away, deep inside the Cangyuan Khanate, Helian Yue quietly watched the convoy carrying relief grain and medicinal supplies slowly depart the camp, heading toward the darkness where a wave of uncertainty was about to emerge.
The storm was gathering.
Amid the night and the smoke of war, the various forces were quietly building up their strength, waiting for the moment when the calm would finally be torn apart.