Gao Guangxiao, leading his battered remnants, took up the role of guide and set off ahead of Tantai Yajing’s hundred-thousand-strong force toward Tong Province.

Li Chi’s own army rested and resupplied, then made ready to advance on Mei Mountain.

In early November, some four hundred thousand Ning soldiers — in this early winter — arrived beneath Mei Mountain in a vast, sweeping tide.

The Shu army soldiers watching that dark, dense mass of troops approach all felt a tension rise in their chests. They had full confidence in the impregnable defenses of the Mei Mountain Camp, yet seeing the scale of the Ning army, worry was hard to suppress.

The first thing Li Chi did upon arriving was to find high ground and survey Mei Mountain’s terrain.

Exactly as Fang Biehan had described — Mei Mountain was a fortress through and through.

Its terraced construction meant that heavy troops and siege weapons could be positioned at every tier. What did that kind of terrain mean in practice? It meant you would not be breaching a single wall — you would be attacking what amounted to a chain of cities, one above the other. Breaking through one tier gained you nothing, because the next tier would immediately press down on you.

Most agonizing of all was the problem of deploying force.

The terraced structure meant that the higher you went, the narrower the ground became. For defenders this was fine — the space was sufficient. But for attackers, it was impossible to bring numbers to bear.

At the first tier, the Ning army could advance on a broad front. That tier was perhaps a few dozen *zhang* wide — enough to sustain a continuous push. But by the third tier, the width narrowed to roughly ten *zhang*. How many soldiers could actually engage at ten *zhang*?

And at ten *zhang* wide, every fighter would be within arrow range of the fourth tier. The carnage would be unimaginable.

“Let’s look at the other side.”

Li Chi handed his spyglass to an aide and started down the slope.

They rode with their personal guard in a circuit around Mei Mountain — a large mountain, roughly five or six times the size of Xiu Mountain.

When they came around to the far side, Li Chi saw the Shu navy’s river camp.

The other face of Mei Mountain backed onto the Tao River. In this stretch, the Tao ran north to south, but further along it curved around Mei City.

Fang Biehan had mentioned that when Mei City’s moat was constructed, a channel had been dug to draw water from the Tao River.

So the Mei Mountain Camp’s naval force could sail straight down the Tao and appear at the walls of Mei City.

Li Chi found a high vantage point and studied the Shu navy’s camp through his spyglass. The masts were numerous; the ships were plentiful. Through the lens, most of the vessels were clearly merchant ships that had been converted for war.

There were a few old Chu warships, very few in number and visibly battered. But among the converted merchant vessels, at least several dozen were large enough to matter — at a rough glance, some must have been twenty-odd *zhang* in length. Their sides had been fitted with external defenses and looked formidable.

Within this Mei Mountain Camp: infantry, cavalry, and now a naval force as well. Its combined strength was, in truth, beyond imagination.

The picture they had built in their minds from Fang Biehan’s descriptions was nothing compared to the shock of seeing it in person.

Even Xiahou Zhuo felt a headache coming on. This place was truly impenetrable. The very contours of the mountain had been reshaped — turned into a fortress that was hard to attack from any direction, offering no weak point no matter where you looked.

“Look over there.”

Li Chi pointed to a spot.

Xiahou Zhuo and the others followed his gaze. There they saw several unusual tracks running down the slope.

“Slides?”

Xiahou Zhuo murmured to himself.

Li Chi nodded. “That’s what they look like.”

They had seen similar tracks when studying the other side of the mountain earlier.

So the soldiers in the upper tiers could use these slides to reinforce the lower defenses in the shortest possible time. Running down from the summit would take a while — but sliding down would be so fast it would beggar belief.

Beyond the slides, the routes between tiers were staircases, multiple sets of them at each level. These were the paths by which an attacker might theoretically advance, but one look at the layout made the difficulty plain: every staircase was not a straight run but a zigzag — cut into switchbacks. The high ground on either side could rake any force trying to climb through those narrow turns.

“Whoever conceived of a defense this close to absolute is a genius.”

Li Chi said softly.

Fang Biehan said, “Mei Mountain didn’t look like this ten years ago. It was Pei Jinglun who kept improving and expanding it until it became what it is today.”

Xiahou Zhuo said with a sigh, “I’ll say this much — just looking at the construction of this Mei Mountain Camp, the disposition of its forces, you’d have to call Pei Jinglun a master of defensive warfare.”

And the man was not even particularly old — he could not yet be thirty.

Fang Biehan continued, “What we see from outside is only the visible surface. The internal construction of Mei Mountain has always been classified, because Pei Qi’s trust in Pei Jinglun is such that even the *muyíng* was barred from any interference with the Mei Mountain Camp.”

Li Chi asked, “You mean the interior of Mei Mountain may very well contain tunnels as well?”

Fang Biehan said, “Not just tunnels. I suspect some of the barracks are inside the mountain itself. What’s visible from outside is not the full extent of the garrison.”

Yu Jiuling stood nearby and sighed, “If I were a giant, one stomp would cave in this hollow mountain.”

Li Chi glanced at him sideways.

Yu Jiuling said, “I’m just saying…”

Li Chi smiled slightly. “You can’t become a giant, and neither can I. But if we really can’t find another way, we might as well start preparing — to build a giant ourselves.”

Yu Jiuling: “Build a giant? How do you build something like that…”

Li Chi: “Can’t build the whole thing. Just build a part.”

He raised the spyglass again and studied Mei Mountain’s tiers. There were a significant number of catapults at each level. He turned and instructed his aides to sketch a rough layout and mark the position of every catapult.

Xiahou Zhuo immediately understood: wherever a catapult stood, the ground below it was almost certainly not hollow. The catapult itself might not collapse a void, but the massive stockpile of stone ammunition prepared for it was another matter.

Li Chi said, “Their catapults are large — roughly the same size as the biggest ones Han Feibao’s army used.”

Xiahou Zhuo nodded. “So their catapults have a longer range than ours.”

It was like the old saying: stand higher, and you piss further. The Ning army’s catapults were on low ground, which meant they simply could not match the range of those firing from above.

“Build a giant’s arm.”

Li Chi turned to Zhuang Wudi. “Big Brother Zhuang, once we’re back, go personally to the auxiliary corps camp and discuss whether we can build something larger from local materials.”

Zhuang Wudi said, “A catapult’s throwing arm has a load limit. You can splice wood together to make a longer arm, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it can throw heavier stones — spliced together, it won’t hold.”

Li Chi nodded, and then something flashed through his mind.

“If a single-arm catapult won’t work — what about two arms?”

“Two arms?”

Everyone turned to look at Li Chi.

The mechanism would become far more complex. Both arms would have to release in perfect synchrony. If the two arms traveled at different speeds, the stone wouldn’t fly at all — it would just wreck itself and injure your own men. And a single mistimed release could snap both arms at once.

They all grasped what Li Chi had in mind: build more powerful catapults, use percussive force to collapse Mei Mountain’s defenses. If there were hollow chambers inside the mountain, the right impacts might bring sections of it crashing down.

But under the present conditions, constructing what Li Chi had just envisioned was beyond reach — virtually impossible.

“Let’s go back.”

Li Chi mounted up.

Everyone rode back to camp together. This matter would require gathering the best craftsmen and working through the details carefully.

Back at camp, Li Chi had his men bring out a large piece of tarpaulin. He took a brush and drew — trying to render the Mei Mountain Camp as faithfully as possible from what he had observed.

The scribes added markings to his drawing: catapult positions, arrow towers, every significant feature noted.

The map took the better part of two hours to complete and came close to a reconstruction.

Once finished, Li Chi had it hung up. Everyone stood before it and studied it intently.

“Ninth Brother.”

“Here.”

“Go find the craftsmen. Have them build a sand model — make it detailed. Set up a large awning outside the tent, and build the model beneath it. Make it big enough — five *zhang* across.”

“On it.”

Yu Jiuling gave his assent and ran off.

Li Chi exhaled slowly. “We can’t rush this. This is not a place that can be taken by sheer force. Once the model is ready, every officer of *jiàowèi* rank and above from all units is welcome to come look at it. Anyone with an idea can come to me directly.”

The generals in each division bowed in unison. “Yes, sir!”

At the same time, up on Mei Mountain.

Pei Jinglun, his expression cool and unreadable, stood at the heights watching through his spyglass as the Ning army established its camp.

From the scale and solidity of what they were building, he knew: the Ning army had no intention of attacking in haste.

If speed had been their aim — if they had meant to break the Mei Mountain Camp as quickly as possible — there would have been no need to raise perimeter walls around their own camp first.

“In over ten years of soldiering, this is the strongest force I have ever seen.”

Pei Jinglun spoke quietly to himself.

The men around him all fell silent. No one dared respond. The military discipline of the Mei Mountain Camp had always been the strictest in the Shu army.

But those generals were unconvinced.

Pei Jinglun said, “Have you noticed — not a single Ning company is in disarray. Every soldier, apart from those building the camp, is holding formation.”

The men nodded, though they still did not see what was remarkable about it. Their troops could do the same.

“Look at where the shield-bearers are. The spearmen. The archers.”

Pei Jinglun saw the skepticism on his subordinates’ faces and added another sentence.

Those generals raised their spyglasses — and then some of their faces shifted.

What appeared to be resting Ning soldiers were all seated on the ground, yet they were capable of completing a full formation change in the briefest possible moment.

“A formidable enemy.”

Pei Jinglun said to himself. “An enemy unlike any we have faced before.”

—