The moment Gou Zi took to the sky, it dove — like a sword falling from the heavens, carrying the gold light the setting sun had bestowed upon it, plunging straight down.

That golden, gleaming bird gave the eagle owl — already long since frightened into fleeing — another cry of distress.

It sounded almost like pleading. Even its wingbeats seemed somehow misshapen with panic.

But Gou Zi’s target was not it. It wasn’t worth the bother.

Li Chi shielded Gao Xining at his back. Before him, the Yong Prefecture Army’s dead had piled beyond counting.

He was a wall. Behind the wall was the love of his life.

Blood ran from his body in what looked like a series of small waterfalls — yet not a single drop had splashed onto Gao Xining behind him.

His woman. His life.

From the side, a Yong Prefecture general tried to ambush him. Not daring to come close, the man picked up a bamboo pole over two zhang long from the ground and jabbed it toward Li Chi’s waist.

Gao Xining flicked her wrist. A throwing dart shot out.

The hidden weapons in her hand now were no longer clumps of dirt or pebbles.

They were tools forged specifically for her by the Long-Browed Daoist and Old Zhang Zhenren — like nails, but more precisely like jujube pits.

The jujube-pit dart drove straight into the enemy general’s eye. Blinded by searing pain, he screamed and dropped the bamboo pole.

He raised his hand to cover his eye — but his hand had only lifted halfway when the second jujube-pit dart arrived, striking his other eye.

Li Chi fought at the front, sword swinging. Gao Xining stood at his back, handling the enemies that crept in from either side.

It was the first time the two of them had fought together like this — yet it was as though they had a wordless understanding that could only come from a thousand fights shared.

But there were too many enemies. When the jujube-pit darts ran out, Gao Xining bent to pick up whatever weapons lay on the ground.

As she bent down, a Yong Prefecture Army captain came flying at her in a pounce.

Just as he was about to crash into her, a shadow arrived in an instant.

Two sets of sharp talons drove hard into both of the captain’s eyes. Blood immediately streamed down from the sockets.

The captain swatted wildly. Gou Zi had already released him and taken to the air, landing on the battlement beside Gao Xining.

It spread its wings, standing there, hunching its body low, neck stretched forward, and let out a cry.

A warning. A threat. *Come close and die.*

When Gao Xining saw Gou Zi, her eyes lit up.

On the horizon, the black mass of Ning Army cavalry rolled in like a flood from the rear of the Yong Prefecture Army.

That scene — exactly like a tidal surge.

When a flood comes, the crest leads the way, and everything on the ground is swept up and carried off.

When the Ning Army cavalry pressed forward, everything in their path was likewise carried away — every life.

At the very front of that cavalry was the heavy cavalry Tang Pidi had long desired but had spent years building — a force that had yet to see battle in any of the north or south campaigns.

The backbone of this heavy cavalry had been drawn from the former Youzhou heavy cavalry.

To defend against powerful enemies beyond the northern frontier, Tang Pidi and Li Chi had decided not to take the Youzhou heavy cavalry with them.

But they had taken a core of veteran soldiers, tasked with building the Ning Army’s heavy armored cavalry from the ground up.

Even so — this was the kind of venture that consumed money and effort without end. Even now that the Ning Army had grown so formidable, the heavy cavalry numbered fewer than four thousand.

Now, those four thousand had unleashed a force that could shatter the heavens and rend the earth.

*A great blade without edge can still split mountains and crack stone.*

Riding at the very front alongside the heavy cavalry — the man in the lead — was General Tang Pidi himself.

His expression was cold as ice that had not melted in ten thousand years as he looked at the Yong Prefecture Army ahead.

At this moment, Tang Pidi’s heart held only one voice.

*You dared to touch him?*

He had arrived at the formation.

Tang Pidi leveled his iron spear.

“Trample these insects into dust!”

With the order thundering out, the Ning Army heavy cavalry plowed into the Yong Prefecture infantry.

The Yong Prefecture soldiers’ blades could not cut through the heavy cavalry’s armor. They couldn’t even cut through the warhorses’ full-plate barding.

But the heavy cavalry’s long lances — they could cut through foot soldiers the way a scythe cuts wheat.

“Wedge!”

Tang Pidi let out a roar.

The heavy cavalry, riding shoulder to shoulder, extended their lances forward in unison, lance tips angling slightly downward, aimed at chest height.

A harvesting machine.

The lance tips quickly threaded a string of bodies. Some did not die immediately and continued to wail where they were skewered.

When a lance was laden with bodies, the rider swung it sharply backward in one practiced motion — like a synchronized rowing stroke — and the corpses fell clear. Then the lance was leveled forward again.

A true harvesting machine of human lives.

Some few might slip through the gaps, but the heavy cavalry was more than a single rank — those behind trampled whatever came through into the mud.

Behind the heavy cavalry came the great mass of light cavalry. They were tasked with widening the breach the heavy cavalry had punched open, wider and wider still.

The front was the harvester, the back was a massive plow, toppling whatever the front had missed one by one.

The light cavalry pressed from the rear, and the cavalry on both flanks fired arrows in every direction at the surrounding Yong Prefecture forces, forcing the opening ever wider.

In the Yong Prefecture front lines.

“Report!”

A cavalry soldier rushed to Han Feibao and said in a hoarse voice: “Ning Army reinforcements have arrived. They are heavy armored cavalry. Our rear cannot hold.”

Han Feibao’s expression changed. He turned to look behind him — but the depth of his own formation was too thick. He could not see what was happening in the rear.

“Who is it?!”

Han Feibao demanded.

“They fly the Tang banner.”

“Ah—!”

The Tang banner.

Those four words were like a crack of thunder, blasting open the fear buried deepest in Han Feibao’s heart.

No one could understand him. Everyone who could had already been killed.

Think about it: once an indomitable ruler of Yong Prefecture, feared throughout the northwest as a merciless and brutal overlord — then crushed to total annihilation by Tang Pidi, forced to disguise himself and flee. The shadow that left on a man’s soul — how immense would it be.

“What do I do… what do I do?”

Han Feibao looked frantically around him, no longer caring how he appeared, whether his fear of Tang Pidi was showing.

His terror came not only from the annihilation of his army. It came from the single exchange of blows with Tang Pidi — the fact that he had not died from it was already the greatest fortune imaginable.

“General Han!”

Yuan Zhen called loudly. “The Ning Army reinforcements cannot be many. Their cavalry numbers are limited — the bulk of their cavalry went back to the Nalan Grasslands!”

Han Feibao startled, then hastily said, “Yes… the Adviser is right. Their numbers are few. They must be few.”

Yuan Zhen continued: “Order the main force — hold the rear flank, then form spear formations and shield formations to resist the enemy!”

“Yes, we must do this.”

Han Feibao turned immediately. “Li Jin — go to the rear yourself. Steady the line!”

General Li Jin had been berated just two days prior, because of the failure to take the city. Han Feibao had raged at him furiously, then replaced him with Kuo Bielie.

Now, when Li Jin heard that it was Tang Pidi attacking from behind, he was not particularly afraid. On the contrary, it stirred something like fighting spirit in him.

He was not one of those who had gone up against Tang Pidi alongside Han Feibao back then. Right now, he had been stewing in grievance — probably thinking: *I’ll go cut down that Tang Pidi and see who dares look down on me.*

So without another word, he took his men and headed for the rear to reinforce.

The Yong Prefecture Army had many new recruits, but nearly half were veterans, and their response was far sharper than the untrained men.

Under Li Jin’s command, the main force rear quickly assembled into spear formations, row after row, waiting for Tang Pidi’s charge.

Li Jin stood in the spear formation and roared: “Pin them here! Not one gets through!”

He gripped his spear tight, eyes locked on the black-armored general at the very front of that cavalry.

“Come on!”

Li Jin bellowed: “Let me see what you’re made of — I want to see just how strong Tang Pidi really is. Your opponent is right here!”

*Thud!*

A javelin flew in and struck Li Jin squarely in the chest.

Tang Pidi, charging ahead of the heavy cavalry, reached behind him and drew a second javelin, hurling it forward again.

The man he had just skewered — he didn’t even give him a second look.

Though, it must be said: if that fellow hadn’t been shouting so loudly, Tang Pidi’s first javelin might not have found him as its target.

All the heavy cavalry, when they were still perhaps ten zhang from the spear formation, drew their javelins and began to throw.

After one volley, the spear formation was riddled with gaps.

The heavy cavalry moved relatively slowly, so they had time for a second throw — and Tang Pidi had already thrown his fifth.

Another sheet of dark projectiles tore through the air. The spear-bearing Yong Prefecture soldiers went down in a layer.

Tang Pidi gripped his iron lance again, pulled his visor down, and angled the lance tip slightly downward.

“Wedge!”

“Haaah!”

*Lances like a forest on the march.*

The Yong Prefecture long spears stabbed at the heavy cavalry, rocking men backward in their saddles — but could not kill them.

Yet the heavy cavalry’s lances punched through them one by one.

A brute, unreasonable charge — this was how Tang Pidi’s heavy armored cavalry, built over years at enormous cost and sacrifice, with fewer than four thousand riders to show for it, was supposed to look.

*Before the heavy lance, all are insects.*

The spear formation was shattered, a massive breach blown through it. The light cavalry behind moved up, suppressing with volley fire from their repeating crossbows. The spear soldiers fell in droves.

The light cavalry simply followed in the heavy cavalry’s wake — they had no intention of crashing into the spear formation themselves.

Their weapon was the arrow. As they swept past on horseback, every arrow was a fang that bit into their prey.

The scene was exactly like a pack of great tigers, followed by an even larger pack of leopards.

The hastily assembled spear formation was broken. Before Tang Pidi now lay Han Feibao’s main force.

From the opposing side, a boundless torrent of arrows flew over. The front rank of heavy cavalry sparked and flashed as the shafts struck armor.

Every arrow was deflected. The sparks were the last brilliance of a shaft’s death.

Tang Pidi leveled his iron lance at the tallest banner.

Without a word of command, the heavy cavalry began adjusting their direction in precise unison, pressing toward the main force camp.

“I need to go. Now.”

Han Feibao looked wildly around, though no one knew what he was looking for.

In the end he found nothing. He wheeled his horse and bolted to the side.

Yuan Zhen watched this, and his expression had already turned as dark as it could go.

He had no choice but to let out a long sigh, knowing it was no longer possible to kill the Prince of Ning Li Chi this day.

He had estimated the Ning Army reinforcements would not be numerous — just tens of thousands of cavalry, thirty or forty thousand at most.

With the Yong Prefecture Army’s numbers, it would have been entirely possible to hold off the Ning Army reinforcements on one side while breaking through the mountain town on the other.

Given the current situation, if they could hold Tang Pidi for just an hour or two, the mountain town would fall. No matter how strong the Prince of Ning Li Chi was, surrounded and assaulted from all sides, it would have been hard to escape with his life.

And yet — tens of thousands blocking Tang Pidi, nearly ten thousand of them at the rear — and he had simply carved straight through.

Understanding that the battle was lost, Yuan Zhen’s thoughts had shifted. No longer about whether the prey could be taken — but about how to preserve as much of the force as possible.

He called out to several Yong Prefecture generals: “Head northwest! Escort General Han in retreat!”

The main force began its flight northwest.

When the main force broke, the rear guard holding against Tang Pidi crumbled even faster — the numbers fleeing far exceeded those actually being killed.

The Yong Prefecture soldiers still assaulting the mountain town saw the main force pulling back and began to waver.

In that moment of hesitation, they looked back — and saw the Yong Prefecture Army behind them suddenly split apart.

Blood-soaked black-armored heavy cavalry appeared.

And beside Tang Pidi — a wild boar that appeared to weigh several hundred jin, its head raised. It saw Li Chi up on the heights.

In that instant, Shendiao went mad.

It lowered its head — and never mind anything else, it charged straight up the ramp.

With its speed and its mass — could humans stop it?

This blood-soaked behemoth, with two tusks trailing shreds of flesh, would have frightened men to death on sight.

The ramp erupted into chaos as riders and horses tumbled. Shendiao plowed straight up onto the city wall.

It charged all the way to Li Chi’s side. Shendiao rubbed its body against Li Chi’s leg, and kept looking back over its shoulder.

It seemed to be telling Li Chi — *get on. I’ll take you somewhere to vent your rage. Every last one of those bastards who dared bully you, not one gets away.*

A cry rang out above. Gou Zi launched into the sky.

The meaning was clear as could be — *follow me!*

—