Ten more days passed. Inside Yuzhou City, at the Tingwei Office.

Li Chi came in from outside. The people throughout the Tingwei Office bowed in greeting as he passed through the front courtyard and made his way to the interrogation chambers. A man Master Wu had brought back three days earlier was being held there.

What surprised even Li Chi was that three full days had passed, and not even Zhang Tang had managed to extract anything from this man.

Seeing Li Chi arrive, Zhang Tang hurried out of the chamber and bowed in salute.

Li Chi glanced inside. The prisoner had been strung up on the wall, looking utterly wretched — what three days of Zhang Tang’s work would look like was something one could easily imagine without needing to see it.

Which made this man’s endurance all the more remarkable.

“Your subordinate suspects this person may… be incapable of feeling pain by nature.”

Zhang Tang said to Li Chi: “Your subordinate is confident that any normal person would have confessed something by now.”

Li Chi felt a brief flicker of shock at these words, but it quickly passed and he let it go.

The world was vast and full of wonders. Even among animals of the same species there were anomalies — naturally people came in all varieties too.

If a person were born without any knowledge of what pain felt like, it didn’t seem entirely impossible.

“He said nothing at all?”

Li Chi asked.

Zhang Tang nodded. “Nothing. He’s still holding on. Though your subordinate suspects that where Zhuge Jingzhan has gone, this man simply doesn’t know.”

Li Chi gave a quiet sound of acknowledgment and gestured for the others to withdraw. He stepped into the interrogation chamber, with only Zhang Tang following him inside.

Li Chi sat down and swept a glance over Cheng Feifan. If this man were thrown back to Yang Xuanji, Yang Xuanji wouldn’t recognize him anymore.

Zhang Tang had truly used nearly every method available to him, yet all of it had been for nothing.

And once a person had endured to this point, there came a perverse kind of pride — *do what you will, cut me to pieces, I still won’t say a word.*

It was not loyalty to Yang Xuanji. It was a matter of temperament — or rather, of emotion.

“I know the only thing that could get you to talk right now would be a promise that I won’t kill you — perhaps even a promise of wealth and rank.”

Li Chi looked at Cheng Feifan and said: “But you also know perfectly well I have no intention of offering anything of the sort to a man like you. So you might as well just play the role of the loyal and righteous hero.”

Cheng Feifan looked at Li Chi and only sneered coldly.

He truly was different from ordinary people. He had discovered his own strangeness from childhood.

Other children fell down and cried from the pain. When he fell, he simply got back up and went on playing as if nothing had happened.

Only later did he discover that his leg had been cut by a piece of broken tile, that it had bled quite a lot — and he had felt nothing.

He didn’t know what to make of this particular gift, but it had done wonders for his martial training.

He felt no pain, so he trained harder and more ruthlessly than anyone.

Beyond that, he was not truly a person with exceptional natural talent in martial arts. He was simply persistent enough and fierce enough.

“Prince Ning, you needn’t say anything more.”

Cheng Feifan said: “That man.”

He indicated Zhang Tang with his eyes.

Then he continued: “He’s done everything that can be done. He’s said everything that can be said — including trying to drive a wedge between us, saying things like how Master Zhuge ran off and left me behind. It means nothing. I’m just tired of living. I simply don’t want to talk.”

Li Chi looked at Zhang Tang. “The others?”

Zhang Tang said: “Some have confessed that Yang Xuanji arranged a total of five thousand men to infiltrate Yuzhou this time, to carry out sabotage across various locations. If that’s accurate, then the people we’ve captured don’t even amount to two out of ten of them. No one knows where the man called Zhuge Jingzhan has gone. We have no leads whatsoever.”

Li Chi gave a nod, rose, and said: “No need to question him further.”

After saying this, Li Chi paused, then looked back at Cheng Feifan and said: “And don’t give him a quick death.”

Cheng Feifan’s eyes immediately widened, glaring at Li Chi — and because of those words, a trace of fear entered his gaze as well.

He felt no pain, yes — but he knew perfectly well what it meant to be afraid.

If he had to watch himself be killed over the course of several days before finally dying, that kind of torment might be even more terrible than knowing pain.

“Report!”

Just then, a soldier came rushing in from outside.

“My lord!”

The soldier said urgently: “Urgent news from Dingyuan County — the Luo River has burst its banks! The floodwaters have already inundated countless fields in Dingyuan County. The disaster zone is still expanding, and the number of civilian casualties is still unknown.”

The color drained from Li Chi’s face.

Now he understood. So that was what the man called Zhuge Jingzhan had gone to do.

It was now early summer, the rainy season was upon them, and over the past seven or eight days there had already been two heavy downpours.

The water levels in the waterways had already been running high. The slightest sabotage would be enough to cause an irreversible catastrophe.

Li Chi had previously ordered strict inspection of embankments throughout the area to guard against flooding, but it was impossible to guard against deliberate sabotage.

Li Chi turned and walked out of the interrogation chamber. In less than half an hour, he had already led a contingent out of Yuzhou City heading for Dingyuan County.

The greatest river within Yuzhou was the Luo River. Yuzhou’s fame as the great granary of the realm owed everything to the Luo River.

The fertile fields on both banks all relied on irrigation channels diverted from the Luo River.

The scale of the disaster a Luo River breach would cause was beyond imagining.

Two days later, at Dingyuan County.

Li Chi and his group couldn’t even reach Dingyuan County proper. Their column halted on high ground and looked out: the fertile fields had become a vast expanse of water.

The ditches below the ridge were filled with murky water, and on its surface floated the bloated carcasses of animals.

After about half an hour, a local official who had been coordinating disaster relief came riding up. He was the newly appointed county magistrate of Dingyuan County, only just arrived in his post. He hadn’t yet reached them when he suddenly dropped to his knees in the mud.

“My lord, your subordinate has failed in his duties!”

The newly appointed county magistrate of Dingyuan, Wu Wei’an, kowtowed repeatedly as he spoke, his voice thick with self-reproach and terror.

“Get up.”

Li Chi dismounted and helped Wu Wei’an to his feet. “You had only just arrived in your post. Most of the original county office staff had already been killed by the attackers. You had no one to rely on, and I know that the moment you took office you mobilized the civilian militia to patrol the embankments. This is not a failure of negligence on your part.”

Before the recent attack, the local officials of Dingyuan County, including the previous magistrate, had all been killed. Wu Wei’an was a newly transferred appointment who had not yet been in post for ten days.

“My lord.”

Wu Wei’an’s eyes reddened slightly as he spoke: “Your subordinate has already looked into the matter somewhat. People saw the men who sabotaged the embankments, and even questioned them about what they were doing. Those men said they had come from Yuzhou City and were under orders to inspect the Luo River embankments. The villagers had no reason to be suspicious. Who could have imagined that those men would…”

Wu Wei’an looked out over the vast expanse of water. When he spoke, his voice was trembling.

The entire county was submerged. There was still no way to know how many villagers had died or what losses had been suffered. Though most of the population had been evacuated, the floodwaters had burst the embankments so suddenly that many riverside villages had given their inhabitants no time to flee.

Yu Jiuling stood to one side, fists clenched tight, grinding his teeth until his jaw ached.

If it were two armies clashing on a battlefield, win or lose, nothing could be said against either side. Even releasing floodwaters against an enemy force would be defensible.

But this Zhuge Jingzhan was truly vicious — the flood he had unleashed had submerged civilian villages. And it wouldn’t stop at Dingyuan County alone.

All the counties downstream would suffer.

A breach of this severity left no possibility of repairing the embankments. One could only watch helplessly as the Luo River changed course entirely.

“Get word to…”

Li Chi let out a long, heavy breath.

“Get word to the front line. Inform Great General Tang Pidi, and ask him… ask him to use his own judgment about pulling back. The disaster areas need large numbers of troops for rescue operations.”

After saying this, Li Chi couldn’t bear to look any longer at the devastation before him.

“Zhuge Jingzhan…”

Li Chi spoke the name once.

Cao Lie, standing at Li Chi’s side, turned and mounted his horse in one motion. “I’m going after him. Even if I have to chase him all the way to Yang Xuanji’s door, I’ll skin that man alive.”

He struck his horse, and the warhorse let out a cry and burst forward at full gallop.

Li Chi looked at Yu Jiuling. “Go after him. Don’t let him do anything rash. If the trail leads somewhere dangerous, bring him back.”

Yu Jiuling responded at once and turned to ride after him.

Such scenes of human suffering — how could anyone’s heart remain calm in the face of them?

Some four or five hundred li away from Dingyuan County, on a main road, a merchant caravan was traveling south.

Inside a carriage, Zhuge Jingzhan’s expression was relaxed and pleased. Even though some time had passed since the deed, the flooding of the farmlands still filled him with satisfaction.

One of his men asked: “Master, should we not change routes? By now Yuzhou City will certainly have sent men in pursuit, and they’ll surely be searching for us along every main road.”

Zhuge Jingzhan gave a small nod. “I’ve already sent people ahead to make arrangements. You needn’t worry. Prince Ning’s men won’t catch up to us.”

The man felt somewhat reassured in his heart, and though he still felt it was a bit unsafe to be traveling openly on the main road, he thought that since Master Zhuge had already made arrangements, it wasn’t his place to say anything more.

After traveling for the better part of a day, the caravan stopped at a large market town to rest and replenish their supplies.

At a tavern, Zhuge Jingzhan looked at his men and gave an instruction: “I need to step out for a while, to arrange for other groups to act as cover for us. Stay here and wait for me for a day. I’ll be back tomorrow, and then we continue south.”

Everyone nodded in agreement. More than a few felt a quiet relief — traveling alongside Master Zhuge was at least far better than being one of the groups assigned to provide cover for them.

Some even thought to themselves: those groups assigned to act as decoys were truly to be pitied.

After Zhuge Jingzhan left the tavern, he boarded a carriage. Once outside the town, he stepped out of the carriage and gestured to the driver to keep going — all the way to a county town about thirty-plus li ahead, where he was to wait.

Alone, he entered the forest on the roadside. After walking about a li or so, many people emerged from within the trees to receive him.

“Master Zhuge!”

This sharp-looking group bowed toward him together in neat unison.

“How long have you been here?”

Zhuge Jingzhan asked.

The man at the front answered: “As per Master’s instructions, we have been waiting here for several days.”

This man had only pledged himself to Yang Xuanji’s service a little over a year earlier, coming over from the Yuzhou side.

He appeared to be around forty years of age, lean and tall, about half a head taller than Zhuge Jingzhan.

He was a native of Yuzhou City, born and raised there. About a year and a half ago he had gone to Yang Xuanji’s side, and thanks to his outstanding ability and talent, had risen rapidly in standing.

He was not one of Yang Xuanji’s retainers. Not long after arriving on Yang Xuanji’s side, he had been assigned to the most elite unit under Yang Xuanji’s command — the Armor-Breaking Army.

By rank he held only the position of a sixth-grade battalion commander, yet he occupied an exceptional status — even the generals of the Armor-Breaking Army treated him with a degree of deference.

For when he had come to Yang Xuanji’s side, he had brought Yang Xuanji a great gift.

This man’s surname was Xun. His name was Xun Youjiu.

“Greetings, Master Zhuge.”

Xun Youjiu bowed respectfully, his manner toward Zhuge Jingzhan exceptionally deferential.

Zhuge Jingzhan’s attitude toward him, however, was notably less than warm — perhaps connected to how swiftly this man had risen in standing under Yang Xuanji.

“Master Xun.”

Zhuge Jingzhan returned the greeting with a flat tone.

He reached out and took the reins a guard offered him, and swung up onto the horse. “Let’s go. I left the group that escorted me here back in the town. Unless something goes wrong, when they don’t see me return tomorrow, they’ll panic and scatter on their own — which will draw Prince Ning’s pursuing soldiers away.”

He gave the reins a flick: “We head home!”

—