Shen Liangyu responded and followed beside Bai Qingyan. From the corner of his eye, he saw Bai Qingyan’s now-empty quiver and felt an irrepressible surge of admiration.

He had been staying close by Bai Qingyan’s side the entire time, so near to her, yet he couldn’t even see the afterimage of Bai Qingyan drawing and shooting arrows… and the quiver at Bai Qingyan’s waist was already empty.

Shen Liangyu was extremely shocked. Even the former Deputy Marshal Bai Qishan probably couldn’t have reached Little Marshal Bai’s current level!

He couldn’t help but clench his fists, remembering when Bai Qingyan had untied the sandbags from her arms, and the vibration felt underfoot when the sandbags hit the ground. Those iron sand weights must be quite heavy, yet they could bring such remarkable training effects. Shen Liangyu was already thinking of applying the training techniques that Little Marshal Bai used daily to the Tiger Eagle Battalion soldiers—it might produce miraculous results.

·

Lai’an Mountain.

In the deep forest where dark shadows loomed and snow fell heavily, firelight flickered in and out of view.

From afar, one could hear the sound of clashing weapons and screams of battle from the valley passage.

After round upon round of arrow rain, very few of the Fire Cloud Army remained. Tiger Eagle Army soldiers charged down from the high slopes to engage the Fire Cloud Army in bloody close combat.

Yun Poxing had already been shot down from his horse. He clutched his chest tightly, blood continuously seeping through his fingers. Fire Cloud Army soldiers dragged the severely wounded Yun Poxing backward while struggling to use their swords to cut down arrows shot at them.

Yun Poxing gritted his teeth, his mouth full of the taste of blood, his heart trembling. Where on earth had this Bai family army come from?!

Just now, after detecting the ambush, he had thought that perhaps these were Pingyang City’s garrison troops, whose fighting capacity would surely be inferior to his Fire Cloud Army. So he used himself as bait and had some of the Fire Cloud Army retreat first to rescue their Xiliang Emperor Li Tianjiao.

But who could have imagined that the one leading troops in this sudden attack would be the Bai family army’s Cheng Yuanzhi! After he divided his forces, it instead put Xiliang in a difficult position.

The fighting capacity of this Bai family army led by Cheng Yuanzhi… was even more formidable than the Fire Cloud Army.

They had all been lying in ambush on both sides of the valley, hidden in the trees, silent as death, not even making a sound of breathing… so much so that he had already walked into their encirclement with no escape route before he realized he had fallen into a trap!

At this moment, what worried Yun Poxing even more was his son and grandson!

If Cheng Yuanzhi was lying in ambush here, then the easy opening of Pingyang City’s gates was probably also a trap set by Bai Qingyan.

The terror of being trapped by Bai Qingyan with only a few men remaining at the Battle of Weng Mountain struck him again—this time… even more intensely than before!

Now, Yun Poxing had no way out. If he continued forward into the depths of Lai’an Mountain to rescue Li Tianjiao, he would not only encounter the Great Zhou forces that Bai Qingyan had sent to capture Li Tianjiao alive, but would also be pursued by the Bai family army led by Cheng Yuanzhi.

If he turned toward Pingyang City, the result would be the same!

But as Xiliang’s Great General who assisted the state, he couldn’t abandon the Xiliang Emperor.

Yun Poxing gritted his teeth and shouted: “Soldiers, charge back to rescue Her Majesty! Our Xiliang Emperor must not be captured alive by the Great Zhou! We have no retreat—spare no cost to cut a bloody path! Charge!”

Cheng Yuanzhi pulled his precious blade from the body of a Fire Cloud Army general, blood splattering immediately. He could no longer distinguish whether the blood on his body was his own or that of the Fire Cloud Army.

“Still won’t surrender?!” Cheng Yuanzhi’s voice was naturally rough, and his desperate shout made it seem as if even the trees were trembling, snow falling in cascades. “Yun Poxing, today, Xiliang’s defeat is certain. If you surrender… I’ll spare your life and can also preserve these soldiers of yours!”

But Yun Poxing was not a Bai family general and was even less willing to entrust his soldiers’ lives to the promise of an enemy general. He shook off the Fire Cloud Army soldier supporting him, broke off the arrow shaft in his chest, and drew his curved saber. He knew he could no longer retreat!

He clenched his teeth, ignoring how his arrow wound bled profusely, and led his soldiers in a forward charge, seemingly intending to face Cheng Yuanzhi head-on.

Seeing the disheveled, blood-covered Yun Poxing charging directly toward him, Cheng Yuanzhi’s fighting spirit became even more overwhelming. Gripping the great blade that Bai Qingmo had improved—one that could cut iron like mud and slice through hair—he killed one Fire Cloud Army soldier with each strike.

Hatred boiled within him as he remembered his Deputy Marshal’s head hanging in the Xiliang military camp, remembered the disemboweled Little Seventeen of the Bai family…

Cheng Yuanzhi’s eyes turned blood red. Today, he would use Yun Poxing’s blood to honor the Deputy Marshal… to honor the Seventeenth Young Master of the Bai family, to honor the fallen brothers of the Bai family army!

He gripped his great blade with both hands, let out a terrifying roar, and charged toward Yun Poxing with all his might.

The two blades clashed with the sound of metal friction accompanied by sparks. The curved saber in Yun Poxing’s hands had already broken in two. He desperately gripped the handle to block Cheng Yuanzhi, seeing he was no match and hurriedly retreating a step, grabbing a Fire Cloud Army soldier to block Cheng Yuanzhi’s deadly strike.

Breathing heavily, Yun Poxing retreated two more steps, dropped the broken blade in his hand, and pulled another from the corpse of a nearby Fire Cloud Army soldier, taking a stance to face Cheng Yuanzhi.

What Cheng Yuanzhi detested most was exactly this behavior of Yun Poxing using his comrades as shields. On the battlefield before, Yun Poxing had used his subordinate soldiers as human shields more than once!

Bai family generals all protected their soldiers—Cheng Yuanzhi had been saved by their Bai family army Deputy Marshal.

Cheng Yuanzhi acknowledged that a military commander was very important, and soldiers as subordinates should indeed sacrifice their lives to protect their general. Though the result was the same as Yun Poxing pulling his subordinates over to block blades and arrows whenever he encountered danger, it was simply disgusting!

With such a commander, Xiliang’s defeat was completely within reason.

Cheng Yuanzhi showed even less mercy toward Yun Poxing, using almost all his strength with every move being a deadly strike made with complete disregard for his own life. His fierce intensity made people’s hearts quail. He completely ignored what harm the surrounding Fire Cloud Army soldiers might bring him—his target was solely Yun Poxing.

Tiger Eagle Army soldiers protected Cheng Yuanzhi within their ranks, clearing obstacles for him…

Cheng Yuanzhi’s goal was clear. He looked at Yun Poxing, whose form swayed unsteadily from excessive blood loss, leaped up, stepped on the shoulders and heads of Fire Cloud Army soldiers, and lunged toward Yun Poxing with all his might.

Yun Poxing watched Cheng Yuanzhi descending from above with his blade gripped in both hands, striking directly at him, and retreated continuously…

“Clang—”

The two blades collided, and the saber in Yun Poxing’s hands broke in two again. The sharp blade in Cheng Yuanzhi’s hands penetrated Yun Poxing’s armor and stuck firmly in Yun Poxing’s shoulder. Had Yun Poxing not blocked with the hardest part of his elbow armor, his entire arm would have been severed.

Yun Poxing’s pupils trembled. He hadn’t expected that in such a short time since they’d last met, the blade in Cheng Yuanzhi’s hands had become so sharp—even sharper than Tianfeng’s blades! What was going on?

Cheng Yuanzhi’s reddened eyes stared fixedly at Yun Poxing as he used all his brute strength to force Yun Poxing to kneel on the ground.