The heavily armored formation moved far more slowly than lightly armed infantry, and the soft riverbank terrain only slowed them further.

Everything has its advantages and disadvantages — this is an eternal truth. Only sometimes the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, and the drawbacks are rarely seen.

To put it somewhat plainly, even crudely — the disadvantages of having too much money are always fewer than the advantages.

“Advantages” here needn’t refer solely to material benefit; there is also the benefit of convenience, and of things going smoothly.

Some people sigh, *I suppose this is all my life will ever amount to.* Others keep fighting, thinking, *My children cannot live this way.*

The advantage of heavy armor lay in its absolute dominance in close combat. The disadvantage lay in its cumbersome weight.

Just as the heavy armor was beginning to deploy outward to both flanks, Zhuang Wudi and Cheng Wujie arrived with their forces.

Dense upon dense bamboo poles flew forward horizontally — like a flat-traveling sea of bamboo.

“Release arrows!”

Yang Xuanji’s eyes went round as saucers aboard his warship. His voice cracked in an instant, and even his shouting carried a faint tremor.

The Tianming Army archers on the bank began madly sending arrow after arrow flying. The brave warriors charging with the Ning Army faced the arrows head-on.

They had abandoned their weapons to grip the poles. They had abandoned their armor for greater speed.

Men fell with arrows in them, one after another. Yet no one retreated.

These fierce Ning Army soldiers ran for their lives — and with their lives.

When those Black Cord heavy armored soldiers saw the Ning Army warriors charging like this, their expressions changed too.

Some seized their *modao* and screamed at the Ning Army like beasts — yet they couldn’t frighten those true men.

A forest of bamboo poles plunged into the heavy armor formation. Per Tang Pidi’s orders, the poles were aimed at the heavy armored soldiers’ legs.

The poles were long — sufficiently long. Yet length alone was enough. The formidable, razor-sharp *modao* blades were almost useless against such length.

The armor on their bodies couldn’t be broken by arrows or blades — yet Tang Pidi had never intended to break through their defenses.

He was breaking their formation.

The heavy armor’s greatest strength was advancing in formation.

The great poles struck their legs; the outer ranks of heavy armored soldiers fell in succession. Those who didn’t fall began retreating.

And at this moment, the opportunity to use a single point to overturn the entire line appeared.

That opportunity was the water barrels continuously fired by the Ning Army’s catapults.

The rear ranks of heavy armor were being pressed forward by those behind them. The ground, already soft and wet, had become mud where the water barrels had smashed down.

When one man slipped, in such a densely packed heavy armor formation, it was impossible for only one man to slip.

The front ranks of heavy armored soldiers hacked furiously with their *modao*, slicing through bamboo pole after pole — yet it couldn’t stop the Ning Army from continuing to press with this method.

Poles that long, pressed against the armored soldiers’ bodies, as Ning Army warriors gritted their teeth and drove forward with all their strength.

Like dominoes being toppled, more and more heavy armored soldiers fell.

The Ning Army drove more poles beneath the legs of the armored soldiers — men tripped up, men who slipped on the poles and fell — beyond counting.

And now the Ning Army warriors began snatching the *modao* from those who had gone down.

A person in full heavy armor struggled even to rise; their movements were slow. Once down, there was nothing to do but be beaten.

“Release arrows!”

Xun Youjiu’s voice had gone hoarse too, yet he was still screaming like a madman: “Release arrows! The Ning Army has no armor — don’t worry about hitting the Black Cord Army — just keep shooting!”

The Tianming Army’s rear archers had actually never stopped shooting. Yet once the Ning Army warriors mixed together with the heavy armored soldiers, the killing effectiveness of arrows against the Ning Army dropped a level.

Up on the high slope, Tang Pidi watched this scene unfold and slowly released a long breath.

North of this riverbank — this was what the Ning Army had won. Of everything they had won, not one inch would be given up lightly.

What hadn’t been won yet was waiting for the Ning Army’s boots to tread upon it. What had already been won would not allow a single foreign foot to set down.

Where the Ning Army’s boots had trod — that was Ning Army ground.

Where the Ning Army’s boots had trod — no one else could tread.

If you want to take land from the Ning Army, you had better be ready for the Ning Army to hold you down and beat you.

If you aren’t ready — then sorry, we won’t go easier on you just because you weren’t ready.

From start to finish, the grassland cavalry that Yang Xuanji and Xun Youjiu had guarded against was simply not here.

From start to finish, Tang Pidi had never intended to involve the Nalan cavalry in the defense. That was never work for cavalry to do.

Cavalry — born for offense.

Riding with the wind, born for battle.

Downstream.

More than half of Pei Fanglun’s forty thousand Tianming Army troops had already crossed. By now, Pei Fanglun couldn’t wait for all his forces to finish crossing before heading for the battlefield.

Half the force had already crossed — two ten-thousands — enough to threaten the Ning Army’s flank.

So Pei Fanglun summoned his deputy commander, ordered him to remain on the bank supervising the remaining troops’ crossing, and personally led twenty thousand men toward the battlefield.

Just then, a black line appeared on a distant high slope.

Someone raised a hand to point in that direction, yet fear had robbed his throat of its voice.

A moment later, the black line on that slope began moving downward — like a vast dark curtain being slowly drawn down, gradually covering the slope.

The cavalry came like surging waves, charging down the slope.

“Cavalry!”

“Enemy attack!”

Shouts rang out, voices filled with terror. Horn calls sounded too, and the sound itself trembled.

Nalan tribal leader Aisin Borte Chino leveled his curved saber at the Tianming Army troops — no words of command, only that pointing gesture — and the Nalan cavalry began accelerating in unison.

Pei Fanglun was shouting: “Form up! Form defensive positions! Form up!”

Yet in the chaos, his voice sounded so very small.

On the main battlefield, the Ning Army was steadily driving the Tianming Army back. Even the spearmen who had charged forward earlier seemed utterly powerless before the Ning Army’s great poles.

They had thought their weapons long enough — spearmen were supposed to be the soldiers with the longest reach of any unit.

Yet how could they have imagined that in addition to massive boulders raining from the sky, the Ning Army also had massive bamboo poles raining from the sky.

Bamboo poles over three zhang long, two or three men hauling one forward in a charge — by comparison, the weapons in those spearmen’s hands looked like toothpicks.

No other tactic. Just crash forward.

The rear ranks of the Tianming Army were being pushed in and falling into the water one after another. The ordinary lightly armed infantry could manage somewhat — once in the water, they could still try to save themselves.

But those in heavy armor who fell in the water — there was no saving them.

With all that weight, into the water meant sinking straight down, and the more they struggled the faster they sank.

Never mind the water — even on the muddy bank, they pressed one foot down into the muck and then could barely pull it back out.

Yang Xuanji’s eyes had gone red: “Quickly! Get the boats to the bank and take the Black Cord Army aboard!”

Yet as the boats approached shore, the ones climbing aboard fastest weren’t the Black Cord Army — they were the lightly armed infantry.

By now Yang Xuanji had no thought to spare for all that. If the heavy armor was completely wiped out, a loss of that magnitude was simply unbearable.

So Yang Xuanji gave orders like a madman: “Archers — release arrows!”

The archers on the rear fleet were all stunned. Were they supposed to shoot their own comrades?

To save the heavy armor, did everyone else’s lives simply not count?

While they hesitated, their officers had no choice but to scream the command — and so arrows flew into their own men, and those Tianming Army soldiers scrambling for the boats fell into the water in waves.

The heavy armored soldiers clambered clumsily aboard the boats. Quite a few arrows struck them too, sending showers of sparks striking off in streams.

Standing on the high slope, Tang Pidi knew — another victory had come.

He reached out and took hold of his iron spear, strode down the slope with great steps, his personal guard unit close behind. They descended the slope — from a walk to a run — and accelerated into the thick of battle.

Fight on, then. This is what a battlefield is supposed to look like.

In the mud, the heavy armored soldiers moved even more sluggishly. Their former pride had given way to the knowledge that if they fell, it meant death.

So even if they had to crawl, they would crawl out of this mud.

Less than half a shichen after the Ning Army’s counterattack began, the Tianming Army had already collapsed into a shambles.

The killing went from mid-afternoon to nightfall, and then into the night — with the Ning Army carrying torches along the riverbank, collecting heads.

No one could say when it had started, but the ground underfoot had turned entirely to mud — not the scattered patches of the beginning, but a continuous expanse.

And this mud was not from the catapult attack. It was blood.

Boots pressing down, the sound of blood-mud being compressed underfoot — a devil who heard it would find it exquisitely beautiful.

By the time Li Chi and Cao Lie reached the battlefield, it was already deep into the night. They had left the grain convoy behind somewhere on the seventy or eighty li road.

Otherwise, at the pace of grain carts, traveling seventy or eighty li would certainly have brought them here the following afternoon.

Li Chi had not seen the most brutal fighting. Nor had he seen what came after the great victory — his Ning Army warriors on the riverbank in clusters, tilting their heads back and roaring at the sky.

On the northern side of the river channel, large numbers of Ning Army soldiers were moving back and forth, checking and finishing off survivors, then taking heads.

A scene like this — if an ordinary person saw it, it would likely become a nightmare they could never shake for the rest of their lives.

“The Prince of Ning has arrived!”

Tang Pidi had his men shout it in the loudest voice they could.

After that shout, the northern riverbank suddenly fell silent. Then in the next breath, cheers rose like great ocean waves, surging up one after another.

“The Prince of Ning is mighty!”

“Long live the Prince of Ning!”

Li Chi walked through the crowd. Wherever he passed, the soldiers began beating their chest armor; those without armor beat their bare chests.

That sound grew louder and louder.

*Boom! Boom-boom!*

*Boom! Boom-boom!*

Just then, Borte Chino came riding back with his cavalry in tow. His tribe was the Ning Army’s most steadfast ally; he himself was the most sincere brother of both Li Chi and Tang Pidi.

As with the Ning Army’s own men, the returning Nalan grassland cavalry’s horses bore enemy heads hanging from their saddles.

Yang Xuanji’s battle, which he had been so certain of winning — had been lost.

Another half shichen passed, and the sky had begun to brighten. On a high slope beside the river, Li Chi and the others lit a fire and sat around it, toasting mantou.

Cao Lie sat to one side, not speaking at all — only silently watching the man called Tang Pidi.

They were both young men, yet in Tang Pidi, he saw what it truly meant to have presence.

That presence didn’t come from a prosperous background, didn’t come from an illustrious family name, and didn’t come from the flattery of others.

It was the presence of self-confidence — even in a faint smile, there was a certainty that said *if not me, then who in all this world?*

Tang Pidi seemed tired of sitting. He pointed at his own side, and Li Chi naturally stretched out one leg and rested it there. Tang Pidi used Li Chi’s leg as a pillow and lay down.

After the mantou was done toasting, Li Chi passed one to Tang Pidi. Tang Pidi shook his head: “Tired. Not eating.”

Li Chi said *mm* and said nothing more.

He stopped talking, and no one else spoke either. It all became quiet at once.

The rising sun scattered pale gold light over each of them. They silently ate their mantou, then sat silently in a daze.

Tang Pidi, lying there, fell asleep and began to snore.

Li Chi held his position the whole time — that leg, not moving.

Cao Lie watched the two of them and suddenly felt he’d grown rather fond of this feeling — a feeling that was no longer separate from him.

Somewhere in the distance, soldiers laughed — they had caught a big fish.

Cao Lie rose, looked toward Li Chi, and asked softly: “What was it you said first?”

The question was a bit abrupt, yet he knew Li Chi would understand.

Li Chi smiled, answering quietly: “The fish comes first.”

That day, Li Chi had been fishing with him by the river. Li Chi had stewed a potful for Cao Lie on the bank. Cao Lie had thought Li Chi’s fish stew was incredibly crude. Cao Lie had also thought — it was really good.

And so Cao Lie turned, grabbed a long spear, and went for his fish.

—