The night passed without incident. The Heaven’s Mandate Army did not launch a night assault. There was only a brief moment of unrest in the darkness.

In open-field battle on flat ground, a night raid can achieve remarkable effect — but crossing a river at night is itself enormously dangerous. A name general like Pei Fanglun would not take that risk again.

The next morning, horns sounded again and again from the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s camp, and squad after squad began assembling on the bank.

During the night, there had in fact been one small-scale engagement — both sides fought briefly before each withdrew.

In the night, Xiahou Zuo had dispatched men in small boats to try to burn what remained of the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s pontoon bridge, but the Heaven’s Mandate Army was guarding it in full force and the attempt failed.

The previous day’s fire attack had destroyed one section of the bridge, but most of it still stood, and the Heaven’s Mandate Army would naturally defend it at all costs.

There was nothing hidden now. Both sides had shown their hands. And so the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s second assault came without any special change — exactly the same as the day before.

They rebuilt the pontoon bridge, and the fishing boats again ferried soldiers across. Pei Fanglun’s confidence lay in the fact that his numbers far exceeded Xiahou Zuo’s.

His experience commanding large formations in battle far surpassed Xiahou Zuo’s.

Xiahou Zuo’s confidence lay in the fact that Ning Army’s weapons and equipment were without equal in the world.

There was no other ruler like Li Chi, who poured virtually every tael he had into augmenting his army’s weapons and equipment. And so there was no other army like this one, equipped so generously that its soldiers could afford to use supplies lavishly.

In Li Chi’s mind, no matter how much equipment was consumed, it was never worth grieving over — because lives were what mattered most.

And this was one of the reasons Ning Army’s soldiers were utterly devoted to Li Chi.

The leaders of other rebel forces wanted to trade lives for a kingdom; they did not care how many men died. In their eyes, their soldiers’ lives were as insignificant as insects, as worthless as ash.

There was a phrase — *at any cost.* In other armies, *at any cost* meant: fight regardless of how many men die.

But in Li Chi’s Ning Army, *at any cost* meant: open everything up and fight freely — do not spare the supplies.

So when the second Heaven’s Mandate Army assault came pushing up and saw two rows of heavy crossbow wagons rolled out in front of the Ning Army position, they all wore the same expression.

Eyes wide. Astonishment, and fear.

These two rows of crossbow wagons were staggered in placement, and could lay down near-total coverage fire across the width of the river.

Everyone knew what it meant to enter their effective range.

Xiahou Zuo stood on the bank, looking at those two rows of crossbow wagons, then looking at the volley crossbow arrays being brought up by the rear formation — and his eyes were full of envy.

“When I was on the Northern Frontier — if I’d had equipment like this… tsk tsk, I think I could have pushed all the way to the Black Wu’s Crimson City.”

Li Chi heard this and laughed. “Back then we were still relatively poor.”

Xiahou Zuo said, “Is every unit in the army equipped this lavishly now?”

Li Chi said, “More or less — quite well supplied across the board. Old Tang’s troops especially.”

Xiahou Zuo said, “When I eventually command my own independent force, I must have more equipment than Old Tang — absolutely, without question — understood?”

Li Chi said, “Absolutely absolutely, you say absolutely and it’s absolutely so…”

Xiahou Zuo laughed out loud.

This time the defense was different from the day before. Xiahou Zuo decided to fire the catapults and at the same time let the enemy come forward to fight at close range.

Draw out the enemy’s formation over a long depth — the rear still on the river while the front had already landed — so their superior numbers could never be brought fully to bear.

Battle is not a game. Flipping through a few stories, reading a couple of books on military strategy, or listening to someone else’s account — none of that makes a man a commander. Someone with no battle experience who truly arrived on a real battlefield and wasn’t terrified by the mountains of the dead would be doing well enough.

The catapults lobbed stones out; the positioning had already been calibrated, aimed continuously at the pontoon bridge — the question was simply one of speed: who was faster, the breaking or the patching.

The Heaven’s Mandate Army was betting on Ning Army’s catapults wearing out — betting on how long they could keep launching before breaking down. Ning Army was betting on time — on keeping control of time’s initiative.

Disrupt the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s rhythm and timing so that the pontoon soldiers and the boat soldiers could not coordinate — that would be victory.

Stones flew over the heads of the crowds and struck toward their designated points, though there was no guarantee that every stone hit so precisely. Even with the angles calibrated, each stone’s size and shape was different, and so each flew a slightly different distance.

The river was dense with people, pressing toward the northern bank.

Xiahou Zuo leveled his long blade toward the river. “Three volleys from the arrow formation, then fall back behind the crossbow wagon line.”

With a whoosh, the first volley of arrows flew.

Rising from below, arcing overhead, and falling down — that wretched and beautiful killing parabola.

One volley landed, and boats instantly sprouted a layer of white-fletched arrows.

Moments later, the second volley landed — arrows so thick on the decks there was no room to set a foot.

The casualties among the Heaven’s Mandate Army soldiers on the boats were beyond imagining. Those being towed behind the large fishing boats on planks dove into the water in droves, using it to shield themselves from the arrows.

After three volleys, Ning Army’s arrow formation began withdrawing as a whole, pulling back swiftly to the rear of the crossbow wagon line.

The crossbow wagon positions had been calculated — their effective range extended exactly to the edge of the shore.

“Wait for my order before loosing.”

Xiahou Zuo walked up onto a sandy rise and looked at the young signal runner. “When I shout, you blow.”

The young man nodded vigorously — compared to yesterday, his nervousness had faded, replaced by excitement and anticipation.

The fishing boats began approaching the bank. The bodies piled on every one of them were thick enough to make one’s scalp crawl.

On each large fishing boat, dozens of Heaven’s Mandate soldiers had been at the oars — but from the moment of departure to the approach of the northern bank, not a single soldier from the original crew was still alive. Each boat had changed hands at least once along the way.

The Heaven’s Mandate soldiers clinging behind the boats were mostly utterly exhausted. They struggled to rise, helping each other cut loose the horizontal blades strapped to their backs.

The commanding officers had already been urging them on; along the waterline, Heaven’s Mandate soldiers were massing in ever greater numbers.

Once enough of a number had gathered to form a charging formation, the generals of each battalion began shouting and pressing the attack.

Dripping wet, the crowds heaved their heavy legs forward in a charge. They all knew — the first wave to step ashore would likely see not a single man come back alive.

But this is what war is. This is a soldier’s fate.

Their deaths would expand the territory held for the soldiers coming behind, allowing more and more troops to concentrate and form an assault of greater scale.

When the Heaven’s Mandate Army broke into a ragged charging formation and pushed forward, Xiahou Zuo’s eyes narrowed slightly.

“Sound the horn!”

Xiahou Zuo gave the order. The young signal runner raised the horn at once and blew.

A deep, resonant blast!

The two staggered rows of crossbow wagons fired simultaneously. A great swath of black shapes flew out, parallel with the ground.

That sight — if you have not seen it with your own eyes, you cannot understand its grandeur, cannot understand its force.

Many people, as children, have played at taking a bamboo cane or wooden stick and leaping into a patch of weeds, or into a field of canola flowers, and sweeping it sideways — the wild grass cut at the waist, toppling in a neat, even row.

Those who have had that experience might be able to imagine, very roughly, what the battlefield looked like in that moment.

Picture it in your mind: replace the grass or the canola flowers, cut off at the waist in a clean, even sweep, with people.

Toppling in rows.

Those heavy crossbow bolts flying parallel with the ground were merciless harvesters.

Wherever they passed, in the entire zone of coverage, not a single person remained standing — the bodies lying on the sandy ground were not one of them intact.

This was the power that Li Chi was obsessed with.

Standing there, watching this, Li Chi felt a profound pride swell in his chest.

Arming his soldier brothers to the teeth, inflicting large-scale casualties on the enemy before they could even close to hand-to-hand range — this had always been Li Chi’s objective.

He had even imagined that in the future, there would certainly emerge the weapon he had in mind — the most perfect area-coverage strike weapon he could conceive.

Part of Dachu’s garrison army’s formidable combat strength came from the advancement of their weapons and equipment.

But the best that could be said of Dachu’s garrison army’s equipment was that it was standard issue. Ning Army’s equipment was top tier.

Every weapon and piece of armor that could be equipped in this world — Ning Army had it.

Li Chi was like a father entirely consumed by the drive to earn money, who took everything he earned and converted it all into unmatched equipment for his many sons.

Li Chi had not spent one single moment feeling anything other than poor. In the past, when he and his master wandered as vagrants, having even a handful of broken silver coins in his pocket counted as being rich.

Now, with several million taels of silver on hand, Li Chi still felt unbearably poor — because the things he wanted to build were too many, and his ambitions too great.

The night before, he and Xiahou Zuo had built a fire on the sandy bank and toasted steamed buns — but the army’s soldiers ate considerably better than the two of them.

Li Chi, stingy on himself in every regard, stood in sharp contrast to what he poured into the soldiers of Ning Army.

A man who had grown up in poverty had somehow built the most expensive army in the world.

After one round of volley fire, the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s fighting spirit was half-broken.

The soldiers behind began to hesitate — they dared not advance further. What they saw before them was not merely death, but *total* death.

Yet this was war, not a game; and the relentless horn signals told them that not advancing was also death.

Against crossbow wagons of this power, the infantry shields carried by the Heaven’s Mandate soldiers in the charge offered very little protection.

Better than nothing. Barely.

“Spread the formation further.”

Pei Fanglun, who had crossed to the northern bank in a small boat, called out in a hoarse voice.

With a sweep of his long blade toward the north, the Heaven’s Mandate Army’s second charge came.

*Boom!*

Ning Army’s crossbow wagons fired their second volley.

Exactly as before — where bolts of such density passed, there was only emptiness.

The standing crowd became fallen corpses; the sandy ground was already covered in a layer of the dead.

Xiahou Zuo’s tactical choice, like Tang Pidi’s in earlier engagements, was similar: leave the enemy a stretch of open ground — first, so that Ning Army’s superior equipment advantages could fully play out; and second, because the soft sandy ground would slow the enemy’s charge.

In the most favorable terrain, inflict the greatest possible slaughter on the enemy — this is the true essence of war.

Many people like to speak admiringly of *subduing the enemy without fighting* as the supreme art. But that is not all of war — not even a small fraction of it. Eighty percent of war is killing.

Death. Death. And more death.

The wounds left by heavy crossbow bolts were enough to make one’s scalp crawl. Unlucky soldiers struck by two bolts at once had their bodies torn apart.

Pei Fanglun knew he could not allow even a moment of mercy now — he had to press forward in one surging charge and force close-quarters combat. Only then would the Heaven’s Mandate Army have any chance of winning.

But the reinforcements were still landing, and his pontoon bridge kept failing to extend across — which meant his troop delivery could not be sustained.

That young man called Xiahou Zuo had pushed every advantage to its absolute limit, had calculated every calculation to its precise extreme.

Compared to Tang Pidi’s way of commanding — startling, unconventional, unpredictable, yet vast and imposing — Xiahou Zuo’s command could be summed up in one word.

*Steady.*

And that one word was enough to show the Heaven’s Mandate Army what despair felt like.