The envoy delegation representing the Dachu court had entered the city under the guise of a merchant convoy. Shortly after entering, they happened upon the preparations for the Lantern Festival being held throughout Yuzhou.

That old man, revered as the Martial God of Dachu, wandered through Yuzhou alone, taking in the sights at his leisure. What he saw was a Yuzhou unlike any he remembered — and perhaps a future unlike any he had imagined.

This trip to Yuzhou, what Prince Wu sought was different from what Hong Shirui sought. Hong Shirui had come to make sacrifices on Dachu’s behalf, while Prince Wu had come to prepare for the great battle yet to come.

The world already knew the Ning Army was invincible. Before meeting them in a decisive engagement, Prince Wu wanted to see for himself just what it was that made them invincible.

Censor-in-Chief Hong Shirui had gone to Prince Ning’s residence to seek an audience. What would await him there, no one could say.

But Prince Wu gave it no thought. Seeking peace, negotiating, dividing territory — every one of those words was an insult to him, an insult to the soldiers of Dachu.

He walked through the streets without a care, for there was no longer any need for disguise — no one would easily recognize him now.

Compared to when he had last left Yuzhou, he was like a different person entirely.

His hair had gone almost completely white. His face was lined with wrinkles. That once powerful, towering frame was now stooped and bent.

He wore the plain clothing of an ordinary commoner, a bamboo hat on his head, and on his feet a pair of cloth shoes caked with mud. Who could have told that this man, through his efforts alone, had kept Dachu alive for decades — the Martial God himself?

When his legs grew tired, he casually pulled a stick from a neighbor’s firewood pile on the roadside, using it as a walking staff.

He stood there and rested for a moment.

In front of this household’s gate, a small boy who looked about six or seven was crouched there, playing with a little wooden cart in his hands.

This wooden toy — a miniature single-wheeled pushcart barely a foot long — was clearly well-crafted, which suggested that the boy’s father must be a highly skilled carpenter.

The boy watched as the old man pulled a stick from the firewood pile and stood there, one hand leaning on the stick, the other rubbing the small of his back.

“Are you tired?” the boy asked in a voice still soft with childlike innocence.

Prince Wu looked at the boy and smiled: “A little tired, yes. When you get old, your legs give out.”

The boy let out a small “oh,” then ran back inside the courtyard. Before long, he came back out dragging a small wooden stool, which he placed not far from Prince Wu: “If you’re tired, sit down and rest a while.”

Prince Wu gave him a look of gratitude, then truly sat down on the stool. He was just about to say something to the boy when the little fellow turned and ran back inside again.

When he came back out, he was holding a bowl of water in both hands. The bowl was large and his hands were small — he carried it in both palms as he walked out, the water swaying side to side with every step.

The boy stared intently at the water, as though doing his utmost to keep the bowl steady. For him, this was already a challenge.

“Drink this.”

The boy held the bowl of water out to Prince Wu with both hands.

“Thank you.”

Prince Wu took it and drank it all in one go.

The water seemed to carry a faint sweetness, and with that single bowl, much of the heaviness and oppression Prince Wu had been carrying in his heart dissipated.

When he’d finished the water, Prince Wu noticed that the boy had been staring at the stick he was using as a walking staff.

Prince Wu smiled: “You think I stole your family’s firewood, don’t you? You want it back?”

The boy said: “You didn’t ask me first, so I suppose it does count as stealing. But you were tired, so I don’t blame you — though you… still should have said something to me.”

Prince Wu’s smile faded. He asked: “Did your father and mother teach you that?”

The boy shook his head: “No. Our teacher at the public school taught us. The teacher said that people living under Prince Ning’s governance should be like one family — if someone is in difficulty, those who can help should help. That way, when your family runs into difficulty, others will come and help you too.”

“The teacher also said, it’s nothing more than treating others as you’d wish to be treated. If others are good to you, you are good to others — so why can’t you take the first step and be good to others yourself? So I can give you the stick as a gift. When I can’t walk someday, you’ll give me a stick too.”

Prince Wu found it harder and harder to smile.

The boy looked at the stick: “I don’t blame you, but you still didn’t say anything to me.”

He looked Prince Wu in the eyes and said seriously: “Our teacher said, even if something belongs to someone’s household but they don’t want it anymore, if it’s been left out by the gate and you want it, you still have to go and ask the household first — you have to have their permission before you take it.”

Prince Wu sat there in a daze for quite a while, then picked up the stick: “May I borrow your family’s stick for a little while?”

The boy’s face immediately lit up with joy: “Of course! No need to borrow — it’s a gift.”

Prince Wu asked: “Your teacher shouldn’t just be teaching you to read and write — why is he teaching you all these things that have nothing to do with that?”

The boy didn’t know what “nothing to do with that” meant, and looked a little confused — after all, he was only six or seven years old.

Prince Wu explained: “I mean, he should be teaching you to read and write — he shouldn’t be giving you so many life lessons.”

The boy shook his head, very firmly: “The teacher said that Prince Ning has said, reading and writing are for the sake of understanding reason. If you don’t understand reason, no matter how much you read and write, it’s useless — you’d just be a scoundrel who happens to be literate.”

Prince Wu slowly let out a breath: “When you attend the public school, does it cost a lot of money?”

“It doesn’t cost anything.”

The boy said: “The teacher told us that under Prince Ning’s governance, all public schools are forbidden from charging fees.”

Prince Wu was stunned again.

Prince Wu asked: “Then do you think Prince Ning is a good person?”

The moment he asked, Prince Wu regretted it. Not because he feared it might expose him somehow, but because he had actually just asked a question like that of a six or seven year old child — how utterly childish it was. Not the child’s childishness — his own.

In his heart, he had actually been hoping to hear some denial of Prince Ning from a child’s mouth, just to satisfy that small, final scrap of his own pride.

“A good person! Prince Ning is the best person in the world — that’s what my father says.”

The boy said: “My father says Prince Ning has been in Yuzhou for less than two years, and our family’s life has already become so much better. Before, whenever my father went out to do work, he could never get his wages back. Now, if anyone refuses to pay, the government office sends people to arrest those bad characters.”

Prince Wu made a sound of acknowledgment. In this moment, he understood clearly just how childish and laughable he had been — even something of a fool.

He looked at the water bowl, then at the stick in his hand. He hadn’t thought that one day, he would be taught a lesson by a child — with nothing more than a bowl of water and a stick.

And it seemed he had benefitted greatly from it.

The new world, in this light, looked so beautiful.

The corners of Prince Wu’s mouth curved upward involuntarily. That heaviness, that oppression — swept away entirely.

But this did not mean he would give up the decisive battle against the Ning Army. He was a subject of Chu, a member of the imperial clan, the Martial God of Dachu.

Every identity he carried allowed him only one choice. His destiny had only one destination — to die in battle for Dachu.

“When you grow up…”

Prince Wu gave the boy a gentle pat on the shoulder: “You will surely be a remarkable person. Because someone is cultivating every child like you to become remarkable. The Central Plains of that future… what a proud and glorious Central Plains it will be. What a remarkable Central Plains it will be.”

Prince Wu rose, leaning on his stick, unsteady on his feet — not because he was truly so old and frail, but because the turmoil within his heart was simply too fierce.

He turned to leave: “Thank you for the walking stick. Thank you for the water.”

The boy smiled: “You’re welcome.”

His face carried a genuine pride — the quiet satisfaction of having helped another.

Just then, the boy’s mother came running out of the courtyard — she had only just heard voices.

She ran out just as the old man was about to leave.

“Honored elder.”

The woman called out.

Prince Wu turned: “Yes? Is something the matter?”

The woman walked over and placed her hands on the boy’s shoulders: “Honored elder, did you come from another town? Are you traveling alone? If walking is difficult for you, let me call my husband back — he can push the cart and take you where you need to go.”

Prince Wu was silent for a moment, then bowed deeply — solemnly, with great gravity — toward the mother and child.

This bow was for the two of them. It was also for the public school teacher who had taught the boy. And it was for Prince Ning.

He left. In this moment, his heart held none of the hatred he had once carried.

Having seen people like this, he had perhaps come to understand why the Ning Army was invincible.

He knew the training methods used by the Ning Army — they were largely derived from the garrison troops of the Chu Army. The drilling of battle formations, the coordination of soldiers, every variation — all of it was rooted in the same fundamentals.

So he had never been able to understand: where was the difference?

Could it be that the Ning Army soldiers had taken some medicine that made them fearless? Something that, once taken, let them face death without a tremor?

Now he understood. There is no medicine in this world that makes a man fearless of death — only a heart that is fearless of death.

Every Ning Army soldier carried a future inside them. They were invincible because they believed that future had been carved out, sword stroke by sword stroke, by their own hands.

Whoever stood in the way of the rivers and mountains in their hearts, whoever blocked their descendants from a life of strength and prosperity — they would cut through, sword stroke by sword stroke.

What remained after the cutting was boundless glory.

Walking along the street, Prince Wu saw a patrol of Ning Army soldiers coming toward him.

Prince Wu had led Dachu’s most elite troops, its most battle-hardened soldiers — the Left Martial Guard too was an invincible force.

Yet for a very long time now, he had not seen that kind of spirit radiating off the soldiers of the Left Martial Guard — the kind that struck you when they walked by.

Just as he instinctively moved to step aside, he noticed the soldiers had naturally and smoothly made way for him instead.

The patrol leader looked young, the face beneath the sun-darkened skin full of life — and in those eyes, a respect for an old man.

The soldiers had gone around an ordinary commoner.

It seemed like a perfectly ordinary thing. But in that moment, Prince Wu understood even more clearly why the Ning Army was undefeated.

In Dachu’s army, when soldiers walked down the street, if the civilians didn’t step aside, what followed was a tirade of curses — and sometimes the crack of a whip.

He walked a long way, watching many people, seeing countless smiling faces.

When he returned to the rear courtyard of the trading house, Prince Wu settled into the reclined chair there. He hadn’t even noticed that the wooden stick had been laid across his knees.

“Your Highness?”

A guard came over: “Are you tired? Shall I draw a bath?”

Prince Wu shook his head: “Go about your business, all of you. I’d like a moment to myself.”

The guard quickly withdrew.

Prince Wu lay there looking up at the sky, watching clouds drift past, watching birds pass even faster than the clouds.

Then he suddenly smiled — the smile of a child who has just been told that his parents will take him out to play tomorrow.

A child’s anticipation of tomorrow is the most pure of all, for in a child’s anticipation there is only goodness, and nothing else.

And only that kind of purity, when transplanted to someone who has already grown up, can be transformed into another phrase entirely.

A future worth looking forward to.

He had found the secret of the Ning Army’s invincibility.

But he knew that finding it was of no use — for it was not a flaw or weakness of the Ning Army. It was something no one else could ever replicate.

“Not bad at all.”

The old man murmured to himself, closed his eyes — and perhaps because he had truly walked too far and grown too weary, he drifted off to sleep right there in the chair.

Without knowing it, a faint snoring began to rise.

The guards were all quietly astonished. On enemy ground — how could Prince Wu sleep so soundly?

—