Li Xuandu set out again with a troop of ten-odd riders, heading once more for the Yumen Pass.

Still racing through the night, still without pause. But this departure — his heart was entirely different from those past days of bitter journeying. Even this hard road was full of anticipation. He felt not the slightest fatigue. Ten-odd days later, he had already covered nearly half the distance. On this day, he arrived near a small kingdom called Putao.

Going east from here another seven or eight days, through the White Dragon Mound, and the Yumen Pass would be within sight.

Putao was a small kingdom of fewer than a thousand people, its simple surrounding walls built of yellow mud, only a few li in circumference. But it was a necessary stop on this east-west road, where travelers replenished their supplies and rested briefly.

When Li Xuandu arrived, it was midday. Not wanting to disturb the townspeople, he sent someone inside to exchange money for provisions, and seeing the blazing sun overhead and the horses’ necks dripping with sweat, unfit for pushing onward, he ordered a rest on the spot.

The group rested and ate in the shade of several trees outside the city gate. Li Xuandu sat on a rock beneath a tree. The heat left him with little appetite; he drank a few sips of clear water, leaned back against the trunk, and pulled his bamboo hat down halfway over his face to rest his eyes. The scorching wind was dry and parching, making sleep impossible, and his thoughts drifted back again to the letter she had written him.

He had long since memorized every word of the letter, but almost every time he revisited it, he arrived at new understanding.

In the first half of the letter, she again spoke of what she called her “previous life” — and he still did not believe it.

Reading it for the first time had been just like that first night at the fort’s cliff edge when she had first brought it up — he thought she had grown up in hardship at the edges of society, and that dreaming of wealth and privilege was only natural. Given the Pu family’s former circumstances, she had known of Crown Prince Li Chengyu, and it was entirely expected — he had been the hope she dreamed of as her rescue from a life of misery. Day after day she had thought of him, and night after night she had dreamed of him, until perhaps even she herself could no longer tell dream from reality, and at last took the dream for truth, holding onto it and refusing to let go. Thinking of the situation of her childhood that Yang Hong had once let slip — she had probably endured far more hardship than that.

He could not fathom how much suffering she must have gone through before she had come to regard Li Chengyu as the only driftwood a drowning person could grasp.

He felt even more tender and protective toward her.

And now, reading again through her self-accounting in the letter, not only had she dreamed she married Li Chengyu — she had even arranged the rest of his life for him nice and tidy.

Li Xuandu felt a sudden heaviness in his chest, a faint trace of dissatisfaction rising.

Back in those days, before the Pu family fell from grace, he — the fourth prince, Prince Qin Li Xuandu — had been the foremost young man in the capital.

Though at that time she had been only eight years old and knew nothing, a mere little girl — he did not believe she had never heard his name.

In her dream she had envisioned him eventually becoming Emperor. So why, at their first encounter in He Xi, had she not made a play for him from the start? Why had she been dead set on attaching herself to his nephew Li Chengyu instead?

Had Han Rongchang not later muddled things with that chance intervention, it was quite possible she would have smoothly married his nephew. If she had truly become Empress then — given the degree to which she believed in her dream — she would have believed he would later become Emperor, and she would surely have moved against him.

He recalled the scene of their first meeting at that relay station called Fulu in He Xi.

He would admit that the circumstances at the time had not been exactly pleasant — but he had not wronged her. At the time he had even been generous enough that, had he not been truly overcome with fury at her degrading herself, he had very nearly taken off his own fox fur robe and given it to her.

How had she seen nothing in him worth pursuing?

And then there was the fact that shortly after she married him, she had actually wanted him dead early, so she could fulfill her dream of becoming Empress Dowager.

That was simply intolerable.

When he had retrieved her and brought her back, he would just have to see how she conducted herself from then on. If there was anything that left him unsatisfied, he was certainly going to sit down with her and have a very thorough conversation about all of this…

Li Xuandu’s face was still half-obscured by the bamboo hat. The exposed corner of his mouth curved up ever so faintly. The drowsiness was slowly stealing over him. He was drifting into a doze when a voice suddenly rang out close to his ear: “Your Highness! It’s Deputy Chief Ye! Deputy Chief Ye is back!”

Li Xuandu jolted awake with a start. His eyes snapped open and he swept the bamboo hat off his face, leaped up from the rock, and looked in the direction his attendant was pointing.

Several riders, heads of the blazing sun, came galloping toward them along the dry yellow dirt road from the opposite direction.

The man at the front was begrimed and road-worn, but his features and bearing were unmistakable — Li Xuandu recognized him at one glance.

It was Ye Xiao.

Ye Xiao had set out to pursue Han Rongchang, and by the count of days it had already been over a month. He had started out ten-odd days behind Han Rongchang and was trailing at the back. Her letter had already been sent back to the Protector-General’s Office, yet there had been no news from Ye Xiao the whole time. Li Xuandu had surmised earlier that Ye Xiao had probably taken a different fork in the road and missed the courier Han Rongchang had dispatched — on this long road to the Yumen Pass, with so many branch routes in between, missing each other was a common enough occurrence.

The attendants ran out from under the shade of the trees and shouted toward Ye Xiao and his party.

Ye Xiao had been pressing hard along the road all the way here. His rations and water were running low, and he had meant to enter the city to replenish. Riding hard toward the gate, he heard the commotion, looked over, and spotted Li Xuandu standing by the roadside. His eyes — both already threaded with red — went wide, and he gave a shout of “Your Highness!” and whipped his horse forward without hesitation, hurtling to a stop at close range.

The horse had barely halted before Ye Xiao rolled off its back, calling out, “Your Highness — this is bad! He Xi has fallen!”

Li Xuandu was shocked. He stepped forward in one swift movement, grabbed Ye Xiao off the ground, and pulled him upright. “What happened?”

Ye Xiao caught his breath and immediately reported what he had learned.

About a half-month earlier, he had finally tracked his pursuit of the Princess Consort to the vicinity of the Yumen Pass. But when he arrived, the situation had changed entirely.

“…There are no more of our He Xi defenders to be seen at the Yumen Pass. It has been completely occupied by the Eastern Di. A month ago, the Eastern Di’s one hundred thousand cavalry came through Rouyuan and attacked He Xi. At the same time, Shen Yang launched his rebellion in the Eastern Capital, and the northern border simultaneously erupted — emergencies in three places at once. At that time, the current Emperor was in He Xi on an inspection tour, and he actually ordered Jingguan closed and abandoned He Xi entirely. I had no choice but to turn back first and report the news to Your Highness. On the day I set out to return, I happened to run into a courier dispatched by Yang Hong, reporting that Yang Hong had set up defenses around the prefectural city and was fighting to hold it under siege — half of He Xi fell without a fight and has been lost for over a month. And that courier was already the third batch Yang Hong had sent out seeking Your Highness’s help!”

Over a month…

Which meant that in all likelihood, it was shortly after she arrived outside the Yumen Pass and wrote the letter to him that the Eastern Di army’s assault on He Xi had begun.

Li Xuandu’s expression shifted drastically. He demanded sharply, “And the Princess Consort? Is there any news of her whereabouts?”

Ye Xiao shook his head. “I asked the courier for news of the Princess Consort, but learned nothing at all. Seeing that the military situation was urgent, and the courier was not as familiar with the roads as I am, and He Xi’s hundred thousand soldiers and civilians were in grave peril, I had no choice but to come back first and report the military situation to Your Highness.”

Li Xuandu fixed his gaze on the direction of He Xi, his face iron-gray. His fist slowly clenched, and the veins on the back of his hand stood out in ridges.

Quickly, he ordered Ye Xiao to stand by, then turned and went to his horse. From the leather pouch hanging on the saddle, he took out writing materials, swiftly composed a letter by hand, folded it, and handed it to Ye Xiao. “Return at once. Mobilize the Protector-General’s Office troops to ride to the rescue! Then have someone send this letter to Silver Moon City to my aunt with all possible speed!”

Ye Xiao received it and acknowledged.

Li Xuandu ordered someone to hand Ye Xiao rations and water. Ye Xiao took them.

“Tell my aunt — the northern road is now open. If she can send troops, take the northern road straight to the Yumen Pass — it is more direct!”

Ye Xiao committed this to memory, then without further delay, gave Li Xuandu a salute, and immediately swung back into the saddle.

Just as he was about to leave, Li Xuandu suddenly called out to him again.

Ye Xiao looked back.

“Your wife is well. She should be giving birth soon. The Shuang clan woman is looking after her. By the time you return, you may already be a father.” He said this.

Ye Xiao was momentarily taken aback, then quickly, a look of deep gratitude rose in his eyes. He bowed respectfully to Li Xuandu, and rode away.

Li Xuandu also did not linger. After ordering someone to go back into the city to replenish supplies, he immediately set out again.

Ten-odd days later, when he finally arrived at the Yumen Pass, what he saw was exactly as Ye Xiao had described. Atop the gate tower, the Black Tortoise, White Tiger, Vermilion Bird, and Azure Dragon banners he recognized were all gone — in their place flew a wolf-head flag, brandishing its force and displaying its might. He skirted the gateway, crossed a section of collapsed Great Wall to enter, and made his way through the wilderness on side paths, passing through swath after swath of ruined military outposts and towns now occupied by the Eastern Di. Several days later, he finally slipped through to the area around the prefectural city.

On this day, it had been exactly two full months since half of He Xi had fallen. He Xi Commander Yang Hong had been fighting bitterly to hold the line for two months.

At the outset, he had had twenty thousand troops under his command, plus a hastily conscripted militia from across He Xi — roughly forty thousand in total. But only those twenty thousand regular soldiers had any real fighting capacity. The militia, though most of them were bold and fierce young men native to He Xi, had not received formal training. Facing the blood and steel of actual battle, whether in adaptability or in following orders, they simply could not compare to regular troops. At best, they could serve as emergency reinforcements.

The one saving grace was that the Eastern Di cavalry excelled at open-field charges across flat terrain, while attacking cities and fighting in narrow streets was not their strength — and this was the only reason Yang Hong had been able to hold out until today.

He had set up three defensive lines in front of the prefectural city. Over the course of two months, the first line had been broken through last month, and the second had fallen half a month ago.

Now the third line — set at the narrow mouth of Pipa Gorge, two hundred li from the prefectural city — was clearly on the verge of failing to hold as well.

Just a moment ago, he had received an urgent report from the front: the ten-thousand-odd defenders at the mouth of Pipa Gorge had already suffered nearly fifty percent casualties. Without reinforcements, they could not hold for three more days.

He was caught in a dilemma.

If he kept sending reinforcements and in the end still could not hold, then by the time the final stand around the prefectural city came, he might truly have no troops left at all.

But if he did not send them, the remaining defenders at Pipa Gorge would almost certainly mutiny — which would make an already desperate situation even worse, a pot of chaos on top of everything else.

Jingguan behind him was sealed, leaving him without any support. His only hope was that the messages dispatched to Prince Qin in the Western Regions for help would arrive in time and be acted upon — but this hope was so remote that almost no one dared truly count on it.

Vast numbers of refugees who had fled from the front were unable to get through Jingguan into the interior commanderies. Apart from those already inside the prefectural city, enormous numbers of civilians were still bottlenecked on the roads, continuing to pour in from all directions toward the prefectural city.

And the grain stores in the city could last at most one more month.

If things went on like this, even if the prefectural city were somehow held in the end, in a month they would face the desperate situation of having no grain at all.

Though Yang Hong had strictly ordered that this be kept secret, the news had gotten out anyway. Over the last several days, morale had begun to waver.

Inside the council hall of the Commander’s Office, a fierce argument was in progress.

Abandon Pipa Gorge, pull the remaining troops back, then close and seal the prefectural city gates, forbidding any more refugees from flooding in.

Only by doing this could they hold on longer, waiting for the relief force from the Western Regions Protector-General — a force that, in everyone’s heart, no one truly dared rely upon.

In fact, everyone understood — this was nothing more than a shred of hope they were clinging to, to give themselves a reason to go on.

Without this hope, they might not be able to hold out even one more day.

In the end, this proposal gained the support of the majority of the Commander’s Office officers, and they were waiting only for Yang Hong to make the final decision.

Yang Hong had not slept for three days and three nights. His face was haggard and darkened, his eyes bloodshot all the way through.

He hated the Emperor for closing Jingguan and cutting off the road for the hundred thousand soldiers and civilians of He Xi. If today he also gave the order to abandon Pipa Gorge and seal the prefectural city gates — what would be the difference between his actions and the Emperor’s?

Once Pipa Gorge fell and the city gates were closed, the tens of thousands of civilians still stranded on the roads would face merciless slaughter at the hands of the enemy.

But if he used his sole authority to suppress the will of most of his subordinate officers and insisted on not closing the gates — then a month later, with no grain left and no relief in sight, how would he deal with what came next?

A captain by the surname of Sun exchanged glances with several others nearby.

“Commander Yang!”

Several officers immediately stepped forward, pressing him all at once and kneeling to urge him.

Compassion has no place in command of troops — Yang Hong knew this.

If he said yes, they might hold out a while longer.

But tens of thousands of lives would very shortly be snuffed out at a single word from him…

His hand trembled slightly. He raised his eyes and looked at the familiar faces before him — strained almost to the point of distortion — and while he hesitated, suddenly from outside came a noise and commotion.

A soldier came running in to report that the troops had mutinied — a large mob had gathered and was now massing outside the Commander’s Office gate.

Yang Hong was alarmed and immediately rushed outside. Sure enough, a great crowd of soldiers had surrounded the Commander’s Office, and several ringleaders in the crowd were shouting aloud, demanding to know if it was true that the city’s grain stores were critically low.

Yang Hong immediately called out, “All officers and men — rest assured. The grain in the stores will be prioritized for military rations. There is enough for several months. Furthermore, I have already sent a request for rescue to His Highness the Qin Prince, Protector of the Western Regions! The grain rations are sufficient to last until the relief force arrives!”

He had always attended to everything in person and had a strong reputation among the He Xi troops. With him speaking like this, many of the soldiers fell silent and quieted down.

Yang Hong breathed a small sigh of relief. He was just about to order all the soldiers to disperse at once and return to their posts, when from behind him came another voice, someone contradicting him. “Brothers! Don’t believe Commander Yang’s words — don’t let yourselves be deceived by him! Never mind the distance from here to the Western Regions Protector-General’s Office — who knows if the message even got there in time. And even if it did, would Prince Qin dare throw eggs against a stone against the Eastern Di’s one hundred thousand cavalry? He sits there now controlling the Western Regions and is as good as his own ruler — if Li dynasty loses He Xi, what loss is it to him? And if he goes to the trouble of keeping He Xi, what does he get out of it? He is not going to send troops! As I see it, even the Emperor doesn’t want He Xi anymore — he’s abandoned us and left us to fend for ourselves. So what are we still defending? Better to just scatter — everyone save themselves!”

Yang Hong spun around. The one speaking was that Sun subordinate of his — and he was furious. Roaring a rebuke, he ordered the man seized and immediately beheaded for undermining military morale. But several other officers stepped forward to obstruct him, loudly voicing their agreement. Yang Hong’s own loyalists also drew swords and came forward, and the two sides immediately stood in a standoff. The soldiers erupted in debate, and the noise that had just begun to die down rose again in waves, crashing into Yang Hong’s ears.

The majority of the soldiers actually wavered, no longer willing to keep defending.

Yang Hong knew that this man named Sun had been harboring a grudge ever since Yang Hong had punished him for a past military offense. That he would have such thoughts at this moment of crisis came as no surprise. But these He Xi soldiers were mostly hot-blooded men — even when facing a formidable enemy, they were not normally the kind to waver and carry on like this.

This time, the root cause lay with that sealed iron gate at Jingguan.

Even the lord of all under heaven — the Emperor himself — had abandoned He Xi and left them to die. What sense did it make for these common soldiers to fight and die defending it?

“Come on — while the Eastern Di haven’t come yet, let’s go to the wealthy households in the city first and take whatever we want — better than leaving it for the Eastern Di…”

The captain surnamed Sun thrust his arm in the air and shouted.

Yang Hong’s chest heaved with a surge of blood and bile, nearly causing him to vomit.

If it were not for the thought of the defenseless civilians, even he himself would feel his heart going cold, with no will left to carry on.

He barely steadied himself and was about to speak again, to try desperately to hold the soldiers’ resolve, when suddenly — accompanied by a piercing whistle — an arrow shot through the air. It skimmed over the heads of the massed soldiers, fast as a falling star and bright as a flash of lightning, and flew in a straight line directly toward the captain named Sun, who was standing on the steps of the Commander’s Office gate with his arm raised in the air, still shouting.

Before the eyes of all who watched, in a single blink, the whistling arrow was upon him. Without a sound, it drove straight in through the center of his forehead, piercing through his skull and out the back. He stood there with his mouth still open — his words not yet finished — his eyes suddenly snapping wide, the pupils rolling back. Seven feet of body, carried by the arrow’s tremendous residual force, stumbled backward step by step, three steps, then fell straight down. With a heavy thud, he landed face-up on the ground. He convulsed for a moment, and was dead.

The crowd was left in stunned shock by this sight. Before they had recovered, they heard a rapid thunder of hoofbeats rising from behind them. They all turned. A troop of riders swept in like the wind, and in an instant was upon them, halting in a row and standing at attention.

The man at the fore wore plain ordinary clothes, yet carried himself with an air of dignified grace and exceptional distinction. One hand gripped a bow, the other was wound with a riding whip. His back was straight, his bearing upright as he sat in the saddle. His brows and eyes were sharp as ice, his expression stern and commanding, his gaze like lightning as it swept over the crowd of soldiers before him. The soldiers felt a tremor run through them to their bones, and gradually fell silent.

“His Highness Prince Qin has arrived —”

The guard behind him called out.

The soldiers were astonished. An instant of utter silence fell over the scene.

Yang Hong recognized him — the newcomer was indeed Prince Qin Li Xuandu.

For a moment Yang Hong felt as though he were in a dream, unable to fathom how he had arrived this quickly. Then the realization hit him, and a wave of intense emotion overtook him. He ran forward to receive him.

Li Xuandu dismounted and strode toward the Commander’s Office gate in long steps. The soldiers on either side made way.

Yang Hong rushed to him, overwhelmed with emotion, and went down on one knee to pay his respects.

Li Xuandu gave a nod and told him to rise. Then he stepped up onto the platform, turned, and faced the crowd of soldiers. He raised his voice and declared, “I, Li Xuandu, stand here now. By the blood of the Li imperial house, I swear to all of you — the Li dynasty has not forsaken He Xi. And I, Li Xuandu, will not sit by and watch as one hundred thousand soldiers and civilians are left to suffer!”

“Should I violate this oath — may heaven and earth alike strike me down!”

When he had finished speaking, he drew a dagger and cut across the palm of the hand he had raised.

Crimson blood welled up and dripped steadily down.

The soldiers stared at this sight. The doubt and suspicion on their faces faded, and their expressions gradually shifted to agitation and emotion.

“I have learned of He Xi’s peril on the road coming here, and have already called for relief forces — they are on their way. I give you my word: as long as all of you follow Commander Yang’s orders and hold on a while longer, the relief force will arrive before the grain runs out. At that time, I will stand side by side with all of you, and with the blood of the northern invaders, offer sacrifice to our fallen comrades!”

“I, Li Xuandu, thank all of you here and now!”

Every word he spoke resounded like a hammer-blow, vibrating through the air. When he had finished, he clasped his fists toward the soldiers before him and paid them a grave and solemn salute.

“Long live Prince Qin —”

A moment later, a roar erupted from outside the Commander’s Office. The soldiers knelt in unison and returned his bow with their own deep bow of salute.

After Li Xuandu returned their salute once more, amid the unceasing cries of acclaim, he turned and entered the Commander’s Office.

Yang Hong pressed down his own surging emotion, brought his men hurrying in after him. They entered the council hall, offered Prince Qin the seat of honor, and immediately began to discuss the plan of action going forward.

With almost no dissent at all, this time the orders came quickly: reinforcements were to be dispatched immediately to Pipa Gorge, at whatever cost, to hold that pass until the relief force arrived.

The officers received their orders and went their separate ways in haste. Li Xuandu held back Yang Hong and asked him directly whether he had seen the Princess Consort.

Yang Hong was startled. “The Princess Consort? Why would she be here? I don’t know anything about this!”

Li Xuandu’s face went pale.

Ever since he had slipped inside the Yumen Pass and pressed his way here these past few days, the greatest hope lodged in his heart without ceasing was that she had already safely reached the prefectural city.

Yet Yang Hong’s reaction was exactly this.

The only possible explanation was that she had simply never entered the area under Yang Hong’s control through Pipa Gorge.

Otherwise, if she had already come within Yang Hong’s territory, given her relationship with Yang Hong, she could not possibly have failed to let him know.

Jingguan had also been sealed long ago, making it impossible for her to have entered the interior commanderies.

The most likely possibility was that she was still stranded outside Pipa Gorge.

It had already been two months. All that time. The greater part of He Xi outside Pipa Gorge had long since fallen.

Was she alive or dead? Where on earth was she now?

Yang Hong saw his complexion go white, his gaze fixed and unmoving, and was greatly alarmed. He quickly said, “Your Highness need not be overly anxious! I will have people search for her at once! It may be that the Princess Consort has already entered the gorge but simply has not yet come to find me!”

Li Xuandu at first seemed not to hear him. He stood there, perfectly still, for a long moment. Then suddenly, he gave Yang Hong a nod, said “Thank you for your trouble,” turned on his heel, and strode out of the Commander’s Office in great steps.

On the road ahead, an endless stream of refugees who had lost their homes were moving in the direction of the prefectural city.

In the ceaseless human flow, like a river of ants, a single rider moved against the current.

The blazing sun sent up wisps of heat-shimmer. Yellow dust billowed in rolling clouds. Li Xuandu, heedless of everything, galloped off in the direction of the Yumen Pass.

He had thought of a place.

If heaven had mercy and she was still alive — she would certainly be waiting for him there.