To the left, a beautiful willow tree. To the right, a stream murmuring over stones. And here — right here — with the first young shoots of wild grass pushing up from the earth.
Dantai Qi stood before a mound of fresh-turned earth and said nothing.
He stood in silence for a long, long time.
When they had left Liangzhou, his father had said to Old Yellow: *Ahuang, bring Dantai Qi back safely.*
*Father. I couldn’t bring Old Yellow back.*
A little farther away, Li Chi and the others stood watching Dantai Qi. No one went forward. No one said anything.
They all understood that right now, Dantai Qi needed to be left alone.
Behind them lay a battlefield strewn with bodies. Of the thousand-odd brigands, roughly half had been killed; the rest had scattered and fled.
Li Chi’s force, too few in number and with arrows completely exhausted, had not attempted a reckless pursuit. Military principle says: do not chase a cornered enemy. But in truth, if numbers had allowed, there is no such thing as a cornered enemy you cannot chase.
It was simply that Li Chi’s people had no more strength for another engagement. To have killed five or six hundred brigands without losing a single man was already a miracle.
Giving chase without the advantage of terrain risked casualties.
“He—”
Yu Jiuling looked toward Dantai Qi, opened his mouth, and then discovered he had no idea what he had meant to say. He simply let out a long sigh.
Just then, a whinny broke the silence. The chestnut-red horse that had collapsed on the battlefield had struggled back to its feet. It looked around, paused for a moment, and then — walking with a limp — made its way to Dantai Qi’s side.
It lowered its head and touched Dantai Qi’s shoulder gently.
Dantai Qi looked back at it, then turned and wrapped his arms around its neck.
One man and one horse, like that, for a long, long time.
Li Chi and the others watched. At first their hearts ached — but then, quietly, it began to feel like something else. Like hope.
After a long while, Dantai Qi came walking back, leading the chestnut horse. He looked at Li Chi and before he could speak, Li Chi gave a small nod.
Dantai Qi returned the nod in thanks. He rested his hand lightly on the chestnut horse’s neck. The horse snorted in reply.
“Old Yellow was actually a very ordinary horse.”
Dantai Qi’s voice was low and rough.
“My father told me that when he first chose Old Yellow as his mount, it wasn’t because Old Yellow was the most outstanding among the Blood Cavalry’s horses. It was because Old Yellow seemed lonely.”
“That might sound foolish, but that’s how my father told it. He said Old Yellow was proud — and the proud ones were always the lonely ones.”
Dantai Qi looked at Li Chi, pausing before he continued: “It didn’t fit in. It was always getting picked on — the bigger, stronger horses would crowd it out and steal its feed.”
“But it never once backed down. Whoever took its feed, it fought. Even when it lost, it fought.”
“My father said — that was a good horse.”
Dantai Qi turned to look at the mound of earth, and after a moment said: “It was a good horse.”
He pointed at the chestnut: “This is a good horse too.”
Li Chi understood what Dantai Qi had been about to say — that he wanted to bring the chestnut with him. From the moment the chestnut had walked to Dantai Qi’s side, it would not take another rider.
“Let’s go,” said Dantai Qi.
He breathed out slowly and looked at Tang Pidi, standing nearby. After a moment he said: “I’m genuinely not invincible.”
Tang Pidi said: “Neither am I.”
Dantai Qi said: “You will be, one day.”
Tang Pidi said: “There will still be at least two opponents left.”
Dantai Qi looked at Li Chi, and after a pause said: “When your wounds are healed, I’d like to know who’s second.”
—
In the wagon.
The Hanging Blade Sect’s youngest disciple, Zhen Gen, looked at his senior disciple. The senior disciple had been hurt; a ring of purple bruising still circled his neck.
“Does it hurt?”
The youngest disciple asked.
The senior disciple shook his head: “It’s fine. Did we get all the flying blades back?”
The youngest disciple said yes: “Don’t worry, we got them all — and cleaned them. I collected yours too.”
The senior disciple smiled, lying in the wagon, looking up at the vivid blue sky. A single cloud drifted just overhead, as though traveling with them.
“Not bad,” the senior disciple suddenly murmured to himself.
The youngest disciple hadn’t caught it and asked right away: “What did you say, senior disciple?”
The senior disciple put on a stern face: “I said you’re not bad — that you’re all not bad, every last one of you.”
The youngest disciple laughed.
“Oh—”
He sat up and called back to the disciples behind: “Senior disciple says you’re all not bad! Each and every one of you!”
A chorus of protests came back from behind — some saying the senior disciple was the one who wasn’t bad, some saying he was the greatest at not being bad while they were only somewhat not bad.
Someone said the senior disciple’s level of not-being-bad was enough to be called not-bad-father to them all.
The senior disciple heard that last remark and curled his lip, muttering: “Nonsense… if anyone’s the not-bad-father it’s Master.”
The youngest disciple burst out laughing, and after a while he noticed the senior disciple had gone quiet. So he asked: “What are you thinking, senior disciple?”
After a pause, the senior disciple answered: “Thinking… whether we’ve started doing what Master said — from today, trying to live greatly.”
The youngest disciple said: “Did Master really say that?”
The senior disciple said: “You’d question Master’s last words? Of course he said it.”
The youngest disciple sighed: “I thought Master was going to say… Jia Ruan, help me up, I can still have two more drinks.”
Both of them burst out laughing — and then went quiet. Quiet for a very long time.
No one knew how much time passed before the senior disciple spoke again: “Actually… Master did say something like that too. I just thought it wasn’t the kind of thing to tell you all — didn’t want to diminish Master’s dignity.”
He continued: “Master also said… the wine in this world isn’t worth much, when it comes down to it. It can’t dissolve your sorrows, and it can’t really make you drunk. At best it makes you a little fuzzy — makes you think living is more or less all right.”
He let out a long breath, sat up, and looked toward the front of the column.
At the head of the column: Li Chi, Tang Pidi, and Dantai Qi — three abreast on horseback.
The injured chestnut horse followed behind them, stopping every so often to snatch a mouthful of the new wild grass growing at the road’s edge.
“Living is more or less all right.”
The senior disciple murmured it again to himself.
He lay back down; the youngest disciple followed his example, and there, directly overhead, was that spotless white cloud.
“Beautiful,” said the youngest disciple.
“Is that the cloud you mean?”
“Yes. Beautiful.”
“To my eye, it looks like the cloud of smoke that went up when you threw that firecracker into Master’s outhouse.”
The youngest disciple blinked at that, and then, involuntarily, rubbed his backside. He said: “Suddenly I’m in a lot of pain.”
Both of them burst into laughter again — a laughter that made it look like they hadn’t a care in the world.
The senior disciple said: “If Master saw you right now, he wouldn’t beat you — he wouldn’t even be angry. He’d think… even you, this little one, have already grown up.”
The youngest disciple asked: “Am I grown-up now?”
The senior disciple nodded: “Yes. When you take responsibility — you’re grown-up.”
—
In the mountain forest, Zheng Gongru had thrown off everyone. He had run in terror, run with everything he had, and finally even shaken off his own men.
Now, beside a large tree, he crouched — hands bound by rope that he was scraping against a stone.
After who knew how long, the rope frayed through. He dropped to the ground, sat there, and broke into wild laughter.
“How am I still not dead?!”
He muttered to himself — then suddenly shouted it at the sky.
“How am I still not dead?!”
He fell back and lay there gulping for air, and then he began to replay everything that had just happened.
He had no idea where that force had come from — not many of them, but absolutely formidable. From their weaponry and tactics, they had to be garrison troops. And certainly no green recruits — the coordination and ferocity with which they fought pointed to battle-hardened veterans.
“Pah!”
Zheng Gongru spat. *Bei Kuangtu, he thought, that’s just your misfortune — and my luck. Who could have foreseen running into a force like that?*
Well, clearly he was heaven’s chosen. Surviving two disasters like this — what fortune lay ahead? The old people always said: *survive a great disaster and blessings will follow.* Clearly he was the man in this world who had the greatest blessings coming.
He sat up and started thinking about what to do next. He had to go back to Yanshan Camp — his mother had staked nearly everything on this, and he couldn’t not return. But how would he explain himself to Yu Chaozong?
He had marched out with three or four hundred men, and now he was coming back alone. Even if he told the most magnificent story imaginable, Yu Chaozong would never believe he had been brave. Yu Chaozong would suspect desertion — abandoning his men to save himself. Why else had only he made it back alive?
At that thought, Zheng Gongru decided he should go back the way he’d come and look around. See if he could round up some survivors.
Even bringing back a few dozen would give him something to work with.
He retraced his steps, calling out as he went, and in the end managed to gather forty or fifty men. Of the three or four hundred who had marched out, perhaps these were all who were left alive.
“If we go back like this, the chief will surely blame us.”
Zheng Gongru gathered the men and addressed them: “Did any of you see, in the end — who won? Did Bei Kuangtu win, or did those government troops win?”
“The government troops won.”
One man answered: “I didn’t get far before I climbed up a tree and hid. I watched it myself — those soldiers killed Bei Kuangtu. The rest of the brigands scattered and ran.”
He told Zheng Gongru: “I didn’t dare make a move. I watched those government troops the whole time. They were something — looked like they hadn’t lost a single man.”
Zheng Gongru made a sound of acknowledgment: “From the look of it, yes, extremely capable. Who could have expected to run into a force like that?”
His man continued: “I saw — those government troops buried all the bodies, and then kept moving northwest.”
“Northwest?”
Zheng Gongru froze. Further northwest would be Yun’yin Mountain. Were those troops heading for Yun’yin Mountain too?
If so, there was no question of going there anymore. Those soldiers had killed Bei Kuangtu; they could just as easily kill them. After all, in the eyes of government troops, Bei Kuangtu’s people were bandits — and so were they, Yanshan Camp’s people.
Zheng Gongru thought for a moment, then said: “I’ve thought of a way. But it requires every one of you to cooperate. If we all hold together and keep quiet, the chief won’t just forgive us — he’ll reward us.”
His men pressed him eagerly: “What’s the plan, chief?”
Zheng Gongru said: “Those troops have already gone. We go back down now, dig up Bei Kuangtu’s body, and bring his head back to Yanshan Camp.”
He swept his gaze over the assembled men, and his voice hardened.
“When we get back, this is what everyone says: we ran into Bei Kuangtu’s brigands. They had over a thousand people; we had three or four hundred. The brigands wanted our horses, and came at us without warning.”
He paused, as if working out how to make the story hold together seamlessly.
“We were ambushed out of nowhere, but we didn’t just lie down and die. We fought hard. We lost more than three hundred brothers — but we killed five or six hundred brigands, and we took the head of the great bandit Bei Kuangtu!”
Zheng Gongru smiled: “That way, the chief won’t punish us at all — he’ll reward us handsomely.”
His men looked at one another, and one by one began to nod.
“We’ll do exactly what the chief says.”