He Simu had wronged Duan Xu this time. He truly thought he would have difficulty falling asleep, but he slept very well, so well that it surprised even himself.
When Duan Xu opened his eyes and was stung by the bright morning sunlight, he was stunned for a moment and began to seriously consider how he had fallen asleep.
After much thought, perhaps it was because, for him, the dead were far more familiar than the living and more reassuring.
When he woke up in the morning, the pale and bewitching Ghost King was no longer by his side. Duan Xu stretched his arm and pressed it on the place where she had lain, which had already gained some warmth due to his body temperature. Later, her body wasn’t as cold as it had been initially; it seemed that even a body in deathly stillness could be warmed up.
Duan Xu remembered the first time he saw her, in Liangzhou Prefecture City. The morning sun broke through the clouds, rising from behind the pavilions at her back.
She stood in the middle of the long street, amidst corpses strewn everywhere, her body covered in blood, her face also bloodied, a patch of crimson red, holding a dead person’s head in her hand.
Crows, black crows, crying throughout the sky.
They surrounded her, densely perching on the bodies that filled the alleyways, landing on her shoulders, while her expression remained indifferent.
This was the first time he had seen death so vividly embodied in a living person. So much so that every time thereafter when he saw a flock of crows, he would think of this girl.
Light spread from behind her, and when the sunlight illuminated her face, this girl smiled.
She smiled, bright and enchanting, threw away the head in her hand, and ran toward him saying: “General, the Huqi people slaughtered the city before retreating, I was terrified. Have you come to save us?”
He knew then that this girl was extraordinary, and her acting wasn’t particularly skillful. But he hadn’t expected her to be a figure like the Ghost King.
Duan Xu smiled slightly and turned to sit up from the bed.
Recently, Chen Ying had been very worried about his Sister Xiaoxiao, because Sister Xiaoxiao seemed to love sleeping too much. The day after the Laba Festival, she even slept from noon until the next morning. No normal person would sleep that long!
He Simu returned to that borrowed body, and as soon as she opened her eyes, she saw Chen Ying crouched by her bed, looking like a frost-beaten eggplant with his head drooping.
He Simu thought, he hasn’t been short of good food these days, so why isn’t he happy?
“Sister Xiaoxiao, you need to tell me the truth.” Seeing her wake up, Chen Ying set his round, plump little face and said seriously: “Are you sick?”
After a pause, Chen Ying added: “The serious kind, the incurable kind.”
“…”
He Simu rubbed her forehead and got up, following his lead: “Yes, that’s right.”
Chen Ying was stunned, and his eyes were about to redden with tears when He Simu stopped him. She reached out to pinch his nose and said: “I’m suffering from lovesickness, the bitterness of yearning has no cure, it’s truly troubling.”
Chen Ying’s round eyes rolled about, and with his nose pinched, he excitedly asked in a muffled voice: “Is it Brother Duan Xu?”
See, he immediately became excited. This child truly had an unusual love for gossip.
“What do you think?” He Simu revealed a brilliant smile.
She met Duan Xu during her day off, turning the holiday into a Lantern Festival of riddles. This boy was still stubborn and unwilling to make a deal with her, playing a good game of tai chi. She didn’t believe he could smoothly defend this city.
As she got up to wash, Chen Ying ran out like a streak of smoke, and only returned after a good while, sweating profusely with eyes gleaming: “Sister Xiaoxiao, I heard them say that Brother General is going to hold a martial arts competition!”
He Simu raised her eyebrows while wiping her hands: “Oh?”
With the situation so urgent, internal troubles and external threats ahead, Duan Xu still had the leisure to hold a martial arts competition?
Chen Ying had gone to gather information about his sister’s beloved, for whom she had fallen lovesick. He ran all around the streets, collecting information that said, in a while it would be the New Year festival, and Duan Xu declared that it was especially difficult for the soldiers to defend Shuozhou Prefecture City, so he was specifically organizing a simple military martial arts competition as a celebration.
As He Simu listened to Chen Ying’s excited report, she thought that little Fox Duan’s martial arts competition couldn’t possibly be just a martial arts competition.
What devious plan was he hatching this time? He was probably orchestrating what he called “a good show.”
He Simu straightened her clothes, smiled, and took Chen Ying’s hand as she stepped out the door: “Let’s go eat breakfast.”
What tricks could Duan Xu come up with, whether he could truly avoid asking for her help—for now, she would wait and see.
Duan Xu, who had escaped death from the grain robbery ambush, quickly resumed his tactical exchanges with the Danzhi army outside the city. Fire oil, boiling water, and rolling stones were all used in rotation against the attacking army. The hanging leather curtains on the outside of the battlements received many enemy arrows every day, which were then converted into weapon reserves for the Great Liang army. He had also specially arranged “jar listeners,” people who listened at good openings for movements, to prevent the Danzhi army from digging tunnels to approach.
Although there was a spy in the military who had not yet been identified, and many of Duan Xu’s plans were hindered, fortunately, he was originally a commander who specialized in military affairs, accustomed to acting first and explaining later. Even his subordinates often couldn’t figure out his plans. Take these “jar listeners” for example—it was only after they burned to death the enemy attempting to dig tunnels that they learned their general had arranged such personnel.
Perhaps even the spy couldn’t guess what Duan Xu was planning to do.
Danzhi had thought that with such a small city and so few troops, defeating the Taibai army would be effortless. Now that they were hitting walls everywhere and getting rebuffed, they changed their attitude and came to persuade surrender.
Duan Xu politely received the envoy who came to persuade surrender. The envoy was a Han person, who was enjoying his service in Danzhi very much. He reasoned with emotions and appealed with logic, first greatly praising Duan Xu as a young talent, then carefully analyzing for Duan Xu the disparity in strength between the two sides, clarifying the various benefits of surrender.
Finally, the Danzhi envoy said: “General Duan, Shuozhou Prefecture City has persisted under Danzhi’s offensive for more than a month, you have already fulfilled your duty to Great Liang. If this continues, arrows and ammunition will be exhausted in a few days, and provisions will only last another month. The city will fall sooner or later. Do you know that when Danzhi destroyed the Great Sheng Dynasty, General Wu Nan in Yunzhou struggled to resist for three months? After provisions were exhausted, they boiled leather armor to eat, and even consumed people in the city, starting with the elderly, children, women, and eventually everyone. When the city fell, only a few hundred people remained, and General Wu Nan committed suicide. Even with such sacrifice, didn’t the Great Sheng Dynasty still perish? As they say, rise and fall are ordained by fate, General, you must not do such a foolish thing.”
Duan Xu looked at the envoy with a smile for a while, until the envoy became uneasy, and only then did he speak: “I’m very curious—you say people in the city were eating each other, why didn’t the common people rebel or flee, but instead obediently waited to be eaten? Can the esteemed envoy explain this to me?”
The envoy’s face did not look good, so Duan Xu continued directly: “Because the Huqi people would slaughter the entire city whenever they met resistance. The common people knew that if the city fell, they would certainly die, so they might as well use their lives to help defend the city and keep the enemy outside. You say what General Wu Nan did was foolish, but it was precisely because of the resistance in Yunzhou that the Huqi people curtailed their habit of city slaughter, allowing tens of millions of Han people to survive.”
“How long have you served Danzhi? Do you truly understand the Huqi people? Esteemed envoy, the Huqi people will never respect those who kneel before them. You must make them sweat, and bleed, you must bite their flesh, make them wish for death, you must stand to stay alive. Do you believe that if I cut off your head right now and throw it into the Danzhi camp outside the city, they would only feel offended and angry? No one would lament your death. Because you are nothing but a dog to them. And they absolutely will not spare me, because when I used strategies to capture Shuozhou Prefecture City, I desecrated their Cang God, and they want to tear me to pieces.”
He stood up, supporting himself on the table with his uninjured right hand, moving closer to the pale-faced envoy, smiling sincerely.
“Esteemed envoy, I understand the Huqi people far better than you do. But neither you nor Awuerqi understand me. As long as I am still alive in this city, the people here will not die from eating each other, and you will not be able to step past here toward Great Liang.”
Seeing that negotiations had broken down, the envoy began to worry about his own safety, forcing himself to remain calm and said: “If that’s the case, then I shall take my leave.”
He had just reached the door when he was stopped by Meng Wan. Meng Wan looked towards Duan Xu with an inquiring expression, and the envoy shouted: “In the war between two countries, envoys are not executed! You… you cannot…”
“I had that intention before you mentioned General Wu Nan, but now I think not executing envoys is a Han principle. When in Rome, do as the Romans do—I should follow the Huqi custom.” Duan Xu casually nodded to Meng Wan and said: “Kill him and throw him down from the city wall.”
Meng Wan, hugging her sword, said: “Yes.”
Four or five soldiers came up, led by Meng Wan, and took away the still-howling envoy. Duan Xu shook his head and asked with a smile: “He won’t become an evil ghost, will he?”
Slowly, a pale girl in red garments appeared beside him, and she said lazily: “Someone with such a small courage would definitely be reincarnated immediately, how could he become an evil ghost?”
After a pause, He Simu looked at Duan Xu in silver armor beside her and asked curiously: “How did you know I was here?”
“I didn’t know, I just asked casually, didn’t expect you to be here.”
He Simu slightly narrowed her eyes, and before she could speak, Duan Xu immediately smiled and bowed: “Ghost King, spare me, spare me.”
His bright, round eyes carried a smile, showing no trace of the fierceness he had just displayed when threatening the envoy.
Changing in an instant, Duan Xunxi.
The day after the envoy’s corpse was thrown to the Danzhi camp outside the city, He Simu was leisurely enjoying her breakfast that tasted like chewing wax, when she saw Lin Jun, the proprietor, hurriedly coming out from the main hall, not even having properly arranged his hat before rushing out on horseback. Looking at his receding figure, she asked the steward: “What’s wrong with Proprietor Lin?”
In all these days she had been staying at the Lin residence, this was the first time she cared about Lin Jun’s affairs.
The steward’s face showed concern as he replied: “I heard… the Huqi people have captured the master of the Lin family’s first branch and brought him to the foot of the city wall.”
The Lin family was a large clan in Shuozhou. Lin Jun was the only son of the second branch. After the second master of the Lin family died, he inherited the family business and settled in the prefecture city. The people of the Lin family’s first branch all lived in several cities in northern Shuozhou.
In other words, they were living in areas under Huqi rule.
Chen Ying tugged at He Simu’s dress, worriedly asking: “What should we do? Will Brother Lin Jun be in trouble?”
He had taken to calling everyone “brother” lately.
He Simu looked down at Chen Ying, pulled him to a secluded corner, and asked: “Do you want to go see?”
Chen Ying nodded.
So not long after, He Simu and Xue Chen Ying, wearing a veiled hat, were standing on the Shuozhou city wall, walking openly among the soldiers to the battlements to look outside.
Others on the city wall could not see He Simu and Xue Chen Ying, they only saw Lin Jun with reddened eyes, constantly trying to go to the battlements but being held back by Han Ling Qiu, who kept advising: “Proprietor Lin, it’s dangerous! Don’t go forward!”
Outside the city, in front of the Danzhi camp stood a row of people. Judging by their clothes, they were from wealthy families. Standing at the front was an elderly man with white hair and beard, but still spirited and vigorous. He wore a black fox fur coat, his hands bound behind his back, calmly looking up at the general, soldiers, and his nephew standing on the city wall.
Behind him stood both old and young, men and women, some were crying, but he seemed not to hear. A Huqi soldier kicked the small of his back, saying: “Master Lin, speak properly to the people on the city wall, your wife and family are still behind you.”
The old man stumbled from the kick but did not kneel.
He was silent for a moment, then called out loudly: “Jun’er.”
Lin Jun, with reddened eyes, responded in a trembling voice: “Uncle.”