Dantai Yajing had not entered Xiaoyao with the others.

He didn’t know what Li Chi and the rest had gone into that mountain valley to do. He had been trailing along behind them the entire time — nothing more.

Even in the fierce battle on the Nalan Steppe, he had made no effort to draw closer to Li Chi’s group, nor had he any desire to grow close to anyone.

A man like him had only one purpose: to walk three thousand li and prove himself unrivaled.

Throughout Liangzhou, inside and out — in countless bouts, on the training grounds, in round-robin battles — Dantai Yajing had met every challenger with serene ease.

And so he had gone to his father and asked: *I am unrivaled. May I now don armor and take up the spear?*

In this place, those who donned armor and took up the spear were Liangzhou’s vanguard.

His father replied with four words: *Frog at the bottom of a well.*

He asked again: *Then what must I do to don armor and take up the spear?*

His father said: *Walk three thousand li. Return when you are unrivaled.*

And so he took his father’s old yellow horse and set out eastward.

He had no fixed destination — only having heard that Jizhou had a fierce and spirited folk, many heroes, many formidable fighters, and so he had formed a thought: to make a thorough tour of Jizhou in battle.

Yet he never even made it into Jizhou before Tang Pidi made a thorough tour of him in battle.

And so Dantai Yajing had no more thoughts of three thousand li. What was the point of three thousand li if he hadn’t defeated Tang Pidi?

His father — and his grandfather, and his great-grandfather before him — had all served as generals of Liangzhou.

Though the rank was no more than Senior Fourth Grade in military terms, the great general Xu Qulu, upon hearing of his great-grandfather Dantai Huan’s great victory, had praised him with the words: “Dantai Huan could be a Champion Marquis.”

From that time on, Dantai Huan’s son Dantai Shouyi, and Dantai Shouyi’s son Dantai Qi, had both been honored by the people of Liangzhou with the title Champion Marquis.

Growing up in such an environment, Dantai Yajing had nurtured one consuming ambition: to stand supreme above every army.

When Li Chi and the others emerged from Xiaoyao, Dantai Yajing was waiting in the mountain valley — some hundred zhang distant from the group Li Chi had left behind.

Out in the open wilderness, he had still managed to make himself comfortable, his clothing remaining as white as freshly fallen snow.

Li Chi spotted Dantai Yajing and smiled, turning to Tang Pidi: “If he can’t beat you, I don’t think he really plans to go back to Liangzhou.”

Tang Pidi said: “A lifetime of wandering without roots — that’s pitiable enough.”

Li Chi let out a short laugh.

The column set off again. Dantai Yajing packed up his things — the fine velvet rug, the gold-hooked fishing rod — and gave a pat to the old yellow horse, who was busy eating fish.

This was the only horse Li Chi’s group had ever seen that ate meat.

Dantai Yajing had caught two fish, carefully roasted them both — one for himself, one for Old Yellow.

Tang Pidi deliberately fell back to the rear of the column and rode alongside Dantai Yajing. After a moment of silence, Dantai Yajing asked: “Did you come back here to say something to me, or to get a look at Old Yellow?”

Tang Pidi asked: “When did it start eating meat?”

“It was worse when it was younger,” Dantai Yajing said. “It even bit enemies to death once. Now it’s gotten particular — won’t eat anything that isn’t cooked.”

Tang Pidi blinked, then nodded slowly. “Good horse.”

Dantai Yajing explained: “My grandfather Dantai Shouyi trained two thousand light cavalry. He would pour blood over their feed and give it to the horses. At first the warhorses refused to eat. So my grandfather starved them.”

“Over time, eating feed with the taste of blood became habit. Two years later, when the cavalry engaged the enemy, as though they could smell the blood, those warhorses would bite men.”

“Over those two years, to cultivate the bloodlust in the warhorses, of the horses started with, two thousand emerged fit for use — but over six thousand were lost in the process.”

He looked at Tang Pidi. “That is what they call the Liangzhou Blood Cavalry. They are simply too fierce — when not in battle, they are never released from the paddock.”

He patted Old Yellow. “He was selected from the warhorses my father was training for the Blood Cavalry. He was my father’s second horse — followed my father from the age of three, riding for twenty years.”

“Which means this old fellow is now thirty years old. In human terms, that would be nearly a hundred — so I suppose not eating raw meat isn’t really being too particular.”

A flicker of sorrow crossed Tang Pidi’s eyes as his hand moved across Old Yellow’s mane.

Old Yellow was already thirty years. Heaven only knew when it would be time for him to go.

Dantai Yajing exhaled a long breath and said: “When I was ten I should have been choosing my own warhorse, but all I wanted was Old Yellow. My father wouldn’t give him to me, so I said I’d wait.”

Old Yellow snorted loudly, as though saying: *and in the end it was you who got the better deal.*

Dantai Yajing laughed and gave the horse’s neck a fond pat.

Tang Pidi, however, had fixed his mind on two words: *Blood Cavalry*. He had heard the name of the Liangzhou Blood Cavalry before — knowing only that they were undefeated in battle — he had never known it was trained by such methods.

Dantai Yajing glanced at Tang Pidi’s mount and smiled. “A man like you ought to have a fine steed.”

Tang Pidi said: “The day I lead troops to war — every horse I have ridden will be a fine steed.”

Dantai Yajing stared at him, his expression complex.

“Why would a man like you be willing to follow that person?”

He pointed ahead toward Li Chi.

“You should talk to him,” Tang Pidi said.

“Why?”

“In the arts of battle and the methods of command, I should be somewhat better than him. In a few more years of campaigning, I may well be unrivaled under heaven — but him…”

Tang Pidi glanced at Dantai Yajing. “But in everything beyond commanding troops, he is somewhat better than me. In every single thing.”

A thought suddenly occurred to Dantai Yajing.

“Then I’ll go beat him first.”

And so he spurred his horse forward.

Tang Pidi watched Dantai Yajing’s retreating figure, feeling a little like he’d done something wicked. *Anyone who talks with Li Chi long enough probably ends up persuaded somehow…*

—

At the foot of the Northern Branch Mountains.

The Northern Madman was sitting on a rock. A subordinate brought him a bowl of freshly boiled soup — still scalding hot — and he took it and drank a mouthful without hesitation, seeming thoroughly satisfied.

“When I was small, my body was frail and I was always ill. No treatment ever worked. My mother heard from someone that soup made from a boiled human heart could cure sickness.”

The Northern Madman seemed to be talking to himself. “I don’t know if drinking so much of it actually helped, or if I’m just hard to kill.”

He looked at Zheng Gongru kneeling before him and said: “I killed half of them and left the other half alive. Do you know why?”

Zheng Gongru was visibly trembling, shaking as he replied: “In reply to the Great King — yes, I know.”

The other half were kept to eat along the road — fresh.

“If I reach that place and find nothing as you described — no limitless gold and silver, no swarms of beauties — I’ll eat you first,” the Northern Madman said.

Zheng Gongru immediately began kowtowing, head after head striking the ground, insisting: “I have not deceived the Great King in the slightest. We were sent there on the orders of Heavenly King Yu himself.”

“Heavenly King Yu…”

The Northern Madman made a contemptuous sound. “I don’t even dare call myself a Heavenly King — and he calls himself one? One of these days I’ll go eat his heart too.”

He finished the hot soup, stood, and looked Zheng Gongru over. “I can see that you have some martial skill — you’ve been playing the part of a weakling, hoping for a chance to escape. Feel free to try.”

“I wouldn’t dare, I wouldn’t dare,” Zheng Gongru hastily said. “Great King, rest assured, I absolutely will not try to flee.”

The Northern Madman burst out laughing, pointing at Zheng Gongru and turning to his men. “Look at him — doesn’t he look just like a dog? My mother always told me, those who are kind get taken advantage of. I didn’t want to be a dog — so I can make others be the dogs. All of you remember: the fiercer you are, the more others fear you.”

“Understood!”

“Got it!”

The crowd roared their agreement, all of them looking wildly excited.

“We’ve rested enough — let’s move. We’ll go see this so-called Yunyinshan and its clouds of beauties.”

The crowd unleashed a volley of savage howls. Some shouted about having their way with the women; others shouted about eating them — a cacophony of voices, each more grotesque than the last, like a host of ravening demons.

Years ago, the Northern Madman had been traveling alone when he encountered a band of horse bandits who blocked his path and tried to rob him — only for him to kill their leader. Right in front of those bandits, he ate the leader’s heart raw.

Those few dozen bandits were so terrified they fell to their knees begging for mercy on the spot. He told them: follow me, and I’ll have others kneel before you.

In the years that followed, the Northern Madman led his men on raids through the scattered villages and tribes beyond the Northern Branch Mountains — killing and burning, savage and merciless without limit.

For a thousand li beyond the Northern Branch Mountains, there was no one who did not know his fearsome name.

Over those years he assembled over a thousand fighters, made that abandoned earthen fortress his home, and each day dispatched men in all directions to gather intelligence.

“I have a question for you.”

The Northern Madman rode his enormous and fearsome stallion, looking down at Zheng Gongru walking ahead.

A rope had been tied around Zheng Gongru’s neck, and the other end was in the Northern Madman’s hand — making Zheng Gongru look very much like a dog on a leash before him.

“Great King, please ask whatever you wish.”

Zheng Gongru replied promptly.

“This Yu Chaozong you speak of — is he as brave and fierce as me?”

“Not at all!” Zheng Gongru said at once. “He’s nothing but a man who got by on a mouthful of lies and tricks — and yet he managed to deceive quite a few people into serving him. He can’t compare to the Great King in the slightest.”

The Northern Madman roared with laughter. “If even Yu Chaozong dares call himself a Heavenly King, then couldn’t I be Emperor?”

“From the first moment I laid eyes on the Great King,” Zheng Gongru said, “I could see the bearing of a sacred dragon!”

The Northern Madman gave him a flick of the riding whip across the back and snorted: “The first moment you laid eyes on me, I imagine you thought you’d run into a wild man.”

Zheng Gongru visibly flinched again, not daring to respond.

The Northern Madman exhaled slowly, seeming again to talk to himself: “I’ve never heard of any Heavenly King Yu. What I know is this: those who aren’t fierce, no one fears. So when you say he only knows how to deceive people — I don’t believe it.”

He looked into the distance, then turned and called back: “Dog-Wolf!”

One of his lieutenants immediately spurred his horse forward. “Big Brother, what is it?”

The Northern Madman pointed ahead and said: “Looks like there’s a road coming from that direction. Take your men and go have a look — if there’s business, take care of it while you’re at it.”

Dog-Wolf immediately acknowledged the order, turned, and called out: “My little dogs, follow me — let’s go scout the road!”

Over a hundred fierce bandits fell in behind him at once, urging their horses in that direction.

This was a crossroads where the road they had come from and a road from the south converged and then continued northwest.

If anyone happened to be coming from the southern road, Dog-Wolf and his hundred-odd men would naturally let them pass no further.

On that southern road, some thirty-odd li from the Northern Madman’s column, Li Chi’s convoy continued its advance.

Inside the carriage, Li Chi glanced at Dantai Yajing — who was riding Old Yellow alongside in quiet contemplation. He had come over intending to challenge Li Chi to a bout, but after talking for a while he had found himself thinking that what Li Chi was saying made a great deal of sense.

So much so that he had already forgotten he had come to fight.

A true man of courage — if his ambitions were limited to holding Liangzhou alone, wouldn’t that seem rather narrow-minded?

But if he could lead an army across all under heaven — turning from defending Liangzhou to conquering the world, then from conquering the world to holding it…

Dantai Yajing looked at Li Chi. Li Chi’s expression was one of warm encouragement — as though his eyes were eagerly saying: *That’s right, exactly, keep thinking…*

After a moment, Dantai Yajing asked: “Why are you so confident you can pull this off? Two teenagers daring to scheme for all under heaven?”

Li Chi said: “There is only one Li Chi in all the world. There is only one Tang Pidi in all the world. And there is only one Dantai Yajing in all the world.”

He asked Dantai Yajing: “So why would it be impossible?”

Dantai Yajing thought it over — he was already remarkable enough, Tang Pidi seemed even more so, and the three of them together made for quite an interesting combination.

Li Chi said slowly: “Three hundred thousand li in every direction — no more than a single game of chess over the course of a lifetime. You and I hold the pieces. What does it matter who among us is the most unrivaled?”

Dantai Yajing’s eyes brightened a little more.

Li Chi’s expression grew even more encouraging: *That’s right, that’s right — keep thinking…*

—