West, ever westward.
She wanted, just for a little while, to be a little selfish — to travel slowly, at her own pace.
Especially when the sun set in the west and they raced after its fading light, Ziqing found herself wishing she could simply keep traveling like this forever.
But the battle reports pouring in from the Tiger Army on the northern frontier, from Situ Haonan in the west, and the secret dispatches from Yingzi in the northern steppe — all of them urged, pressed, demanded that they hurry, hurry, and hurry still faster.
After Yelu Qianqian’s rescue, Jun Beiyue had ordered Jun Beichen to reinforce the Three Great Tiger Armies. The moment Xijing’s three armies joined them, the Tiger Army gained an even greater edge, sweeping through nearly everything in its path — now only two cities remained before they’d reach the northern highlands of Dong Qin.
But the situation in Dong Qin’s northern highlands was growing more volatile by the day.
Minhanmuder had personally led his troops to garrison the northern highlands, using the terrain to survey all of central Dong Qin from above, continuously drawing reinforcements from the Xiongnu.
Though the northern front kept sending victory after victory, the overall situation was growing increasingly urgent — the sooner Jun Beiyue returned, the better.
Meanwhile, on the western front, Situ Haonan and General Dugu had settled into a genuine stalemate with the Xiliang army. At this critical juncture, if either side received reinforcements, the other side would face certain defeat.
It could truly be said that they had reached the decisive moment — one battle to determine the war’s outcome.
Nangong City’s influence in the northern steppe, combined with the Xiongnu’s presence along the steppe’s border — if either force shifted westward to support Xiliang, Situ Haonan would be unable to hold.
And if they struck directly at Akbachu, Situ Haonan would be forced to divide his troops just to protect the capital.
Which meant Ziqing, too, had to return to the northern steppe region as quickly as possible, to prepare for battle.
The moment they entered Akbachu, they found Bingchan, head of the mercenary corps, waiting at the palace gates.
“Master, the entire Reverse Scale Corps has assembled. All gunpowder successfully manufactured to date has been fully accounted for and is ready to deploy on command,” Bingchan reported respectfully, brief and to the point. Ziqing’s subordinates, trained to mercenary standards, were arguably even more elite than Jun Beiyue’s shadow guards.
“Excellent. Head to the northern steppe region at once, and coordinate with the shadow guards there. Stand ready for further orders,” Ziqing said, her voice low but every word carrying weight and force.
“Understood!” Bingchan retreated at once.
To anyone unaware, it would have been impossible to tell that, in that brief moment, Han Ziqing had just quietly revealed her greatest trump card.
What she wanted wasn’t merely to hold the northern steppe — she meant to reinforce Situ Haonan as well.
Not long after Bingchan left, the palace gates swung wide open, and the Emperor of Xijing, having only just caught wind of their arrival, came rushing out on foot in plain clothes, not even having changed into formal robes.
“Qianqian!” he cried out, his eyes already welling with tears. In that moment, he wasn’t an emperor at all — he was simply a father, a father longing for his child’s return.
Ziqing and Jun Beiyue stepped aside. Though Ziqing thoroughly disliked the Emperor of Xijing, disliked how he’d schemed over Yelu Qianqian’s marriage, in this moment, she genuinely felt happy for Qianqian. Whatever else could be said of him, right and wrong aside, the Emperor of Xijing still treated Yelu Qianqian as his own daughter first, and a nation’s princess second.
Yelu Qianqian, ever the crybaby, hadn’t even reached her father’s arms yet before she burst into loud, wailing sobs, entirely forgetting how resolute and unflinching she’d been when she’d first left with Situ Haonan.
“Father! Waaah… Father, your daughter has been unfilial! Waaah…”
“Father, it’s all your daughter’s fault, all your daughter’s mistake, your daughter has been so unfilial!”
Sobbing, she rushed forward and threw herself into the Emperor of Xijing’s arms, crying with tears and snot running freely.
Only those born into royalty could truly appreciate how precious, how rare, such a moment was within an imperial family.
Jun Beiyue watched in silence, something stirring faintly in his deep, cold, dark eyes. He couldn’t help but think, unbidden, of his own mother.
Back then, he’d been so very young — it had left no real impression on him at all.
As for his father — he had two, in a sense. The one in the grand imperial palace needed no further mention. And the one on Liuxian Island — even in his own heart, he’d never truly acknowledged him as such.
Watching the Emperor of Xijing weep with the tears of an old man, Ziqing felt her heart pinched sharply, as if bitten by some small creature — an ache mixed with an inexplicable itch, a wave of bittersweet sorrow rising within her.
Children who had parents — how fortunate they truly were.
No matter how great a mistake you made, however catastrophic, however irreparable, they would never truly hold it against you. Gradually, they would simply treat it as if it had never happened at all, never harboring any lasting resentment toward you in their hearts.
This, she supposed, was what people meant by “parental favoritism” — the fierce, unconditional love that shields its own.
As Yelu Qianqian cried and cried, she finally cried herself into a faint.
The Emperor of Xijing, holding her, called out urgently, “Physician! Summon the physician!”
Shouting as he ran, he carried Yelu Qianqian off toward the inner palace. Ziqing and Jun Beiyue exchanged a glance and suddenly burst out laughing. “Prince Yao has graced us with his presence — please, come inside!”
This fellow was probably being left waiting off to the side for the first time in his life.
Once Yelu Qianqian was settled, the Emperor of Xijing hadn’t neglected Jun Beiyue and Ziqing in the slightest.
Sitting some distance away, Ziqing could clearly see the resentment buried deep in the old emperor’s heart. After all, the man seated before him was both his benefactor and his enemy, all at once.
The blood-debt of a murdered son — an enmity that could never coexist under the same sky.
Ziqing believed that if Xijing ever managed to reclaim its strength within the Emperor of Xijing’s lifetime, he would surely seek revenge against Jun Beiyue for it.
Unfortunately, circumstances now were stronger than his will, and he had no choice but to face Jun Beiyue with a composed façade.
“Heh, who would have thought Qianqian carried such weight, to warrant Prince Yao’s personal visit.”
The Emperor of Xijing phrased it beautifully. Of course, he knew perfectly well why Jun Beiyue had come in person.
“Princess Qianqian, alone, touched off a crisis spanning three nations, threatening the balance of all Longyuan — how could this prince afford not to trouble himself over it? I imagine the Emperor of Xijing has spent no small amount of effort on it himself, as well.”
Jun Beiyue’s words carried a double edge, and the Emperor of Xijing understood perfectly well. He didn’t bother with false pleasantries either, saying instead, “Since Prince Yao has come, might I ask after the state of the northern frontier?”
That was, in truth, the matter closest to the Emperor of Xijing’s heart. If Jun Beiyue was willing to spare additional troops to aid Xijing, driving Xiliang into retreat would be a matter of days.
The sooner this war ended, the better for Xijing.
Of all the nations caught up in this conflict across Longyuan, Dong Qin stood to lose the most — and Xijing came a close second. Because the northern battlefield lay entirely within Dong Qin’s own territory, while the western battlefield lay squarely within Xijing’s own borders — the devastation from either campaign alone would take at least a decade to recover from.
The sooner the war ended, the smaller the losses.
Though the Emperor of Xijing had been closely monitoring the northern front the whole time, consulting endlessly with his advisors, analyzing and predicting outcomes, none of that compared to a single word spoken directly from Jun Beiyue’s own mouth.
Faced with the Emperor of Xijing’s probing, how could Jun Beiyue possibly reveal his intentions, state his true position?
So Jun Beiyue offered a perfectly meaningless, noncommittal reply. “A stalemate on the western front is a good sign.”
The Emperor of Xijing wasn’t lacking in composure — it was simply that he stood at a complete disadvantage, and the longer he held his patience, the more he alone would suffer for it.
His eyes turned cold. “Prince Yao comes from a military background himself — surely you know the old saying about how quickly a collapsing army falls like a landslide. If that disaster spreads to threaten Da Zhou’s own western border, don’t blame this emperor for not honoring our agreement.”
Before Jun Beiyue could respond, Ziqing laughed. The Emperor of Xijing clearly wasn’t cut out for warfare — she had no patience left to listen further, and thought it best to let Jun Beiyue properly remind him just how crucial the northern steppe region truly was.
“I’ll go check on Qianqian,” Ziqing said, rising to excuse herself. Better to use this opportunity to search for Xuanyuan Lige’s bloodstained zither now, than to wait for some other time.