The arrow attached to the cloth had not yet been removed. After Li Xun received it, he untied the rope, took down the blood letter, and shook it open to look. His expression changed dramatically in shock.
As if to confirm something, he asked the messenger soldier from before: “Have the Wei troops led by Yuan Fang returned to camp?”
That messenger soldier said: “We haven’t seen any trace of the Wei army. After the Chen army returned to camp, no one has come to report either.”
Their three forces were allied. According to the military regulations set by Fan Yuan, whenever troops returned to camp after deployment, they had to immediately send someone to report.
At present, the Chen camp’s troops had returned to their garrison, yet no one had come here to report. It was only when their own scouts saw movements on the Chen camp’s side that they learned they had returned to camp. Li Xun only felt a chill strike straight at his heart. He immediately ordered those around him: “Quickly send word to Commander Fan, inform him of this matter, and have him immediately withdraw troops and return to camp!”
The messenger soldier, having received the order, ran out of the main tent at full speed.
Li Xun then ordered another messenger soldier: “Keep close watch on the Chen camp side. If there are any unusual movements, report immediately!”
After the other messenger soldier also quickly left the main tent, seeing Li Xun’s expression so grave, the advisors all stepped forward asking: “Lord Li, what has happened?”
Li Xun passed the blood letter to them to circulate. He stepped back and supported himself against the table to steady his form. Southern Chen had committed such a great military taboo—regardless of whatever private friendship they had with Northern Wei, this alliance had already come to an end.
Those twenty thousand soldiers who were treacherously harmed ultimately required an accounting!
Li Xun barely maintained his mental clarity, strenuously sorting through the information mentioned in the blood letter: The Pei army troops who went to Guanmen Gorge to pursue the grain were fifty thousand men!
Twenty thousand troops had appeared out of thin air. This grain supply information had originally been discovered by scouts from the Chen army side.
Before formulating this grain interception plan, although their Liang camp and Wei camp had each also sent scouts to investigate the truth of this matter, combining it with the current circumstances, although they couldn’t confirm whether the Chen camp and Pei camp had joined hands to set a trap, the Chen camp was absolutely not innocent.
The more Li Xun thought about it, the more his heart hung in anxiety. To be safe, he immediately issued another order: “Everyone, first evacuate the camp with me. After Commander Fan returns, we’ll then question that scoundrel Dou Jianliang!”
After the advisors finished reading Yuan Fang’s blood letter, their faces were all deathly pale. With Li Xun saying this, they immediately thought—what if Southern Chen, fearing Fan Yuan would hold them accountable, simply became desperate and took them hostage to threaten Fan Yuan?
After all, after controlling the frontline Liang army, they could then unscrupulously demand money and grain from Chen Wei, who was responsible for the rear!
The advisors all broke out in a cold sweat. They didn’t dilly-dally, didn’t even take their valuables, and followed Li Xun’s urgently summoned two thousand garrison soldiers, first secretly leaving the camp.
–
When Dou Jianliang led people to attack, discovering the Liang camp’s defenses were unusually weak, an ominous premonition already rose in his heart. Charging into the main tent and indeed coming up empty made him even more furious to the extreme.
He grabbed the collar of a garrison junior officer, asking in a chillingly cold voice: “Where are Li Xun and the other ministers of your Liang camp?”
Yu Wenjing’s letter had demanded he cooperate from within to severely damage the Liang army. Otherwise, he would leak “evidence” to Fan Yuan, showing he had long been in collusion with their Pei camp.
With the solid evidence of burying the Wei army, plus Yu Wenjing as a witness, even if his original intention wasn’t to collude traitorously with the Pei clan, he still couldn’t wash himself clean even by jumping into the Yellow River.
Never mind that Fan Yuan wouldn’t spare him—even the Southern Chen side probably couldn’t tolerate him. To preserve himself, Dou Jianliang could only grit his teeth and walk this path to its dark end.
But that garrison junior officer had backbone. He spat fiercely directly at Dou Jianliang’s face: “Two-faced treacherous slave, ptui!”
“Seeking death!” Dou Jianliang’s face was savage. He flung aside the junior officer, drew his blade and struck. Blood splattered half the tent wall.
The Chen army commanders who had gone to search other tents rushed back. Seeing the junior officer dead in the tent, their expressions varied. When Dou Jianliang turned around, they said: “General! There’s no one anywhere—the entire Liang camp is empty!”
At this moment, Dou Jianliang’s heart was filled with both hatred and fury. The Liang camp being completely deserted meant they had received advance warning. He felt his entire head hanging on his shoulders was precarious.
After escaping from the Pei army, he had rushed back to the garrison without a moment’s rest. Exactly who had sent word to the Liang camp?
Dou Jianliang thought back again to the mountain fire in the forest. His heart sank even lower.
This matter was truly eerie!
Did Yuan Fang still have helpers, or was it a contingency plan Yuan Fang had left behind?
The junior officers below saw Dou Jianliang’s ugly expression. When he remained silent for a long time, they carefully inquired: “General, what do we do now?”
Dou Jianliang came back to his senses. With a wave of his hand, he gave that junior officer a slap, shouting savagely: “What to do? Go surround and kill that one surnamed Fan! If they won’t give this old man a way to live, this old man will carve out a path himself!”
–
On a mountain ridge several miles from the garrison, Li Xun looked with half-closed eyes at the warning smoke rising from the camp side. His expression became even uglier: “That scoundrel Dou Jianliang has indeed become desperate and attacked our camp!”
Before Li Xun fled with the advisors, he had instructed the junior officers remaining to guard the camp that if Dou Jianliang raided the camp, they should light warning smoke. Now that the warning smoke had been lit, Dou Jianliang must have attacked.
The advisors behind him, hearing this, all showed alarmed expressions, whispering among themselves saying “what can be done about this.”
Li Xun summoned another messenger soldier and ordered: “Go send another message to Commander Fan, saying that Dou Jianliang has already rebelled, and tell him to be extremely careful!”
The messenger soldier jogged away. Only then did Li Xun, supported by personal guards, sit down, looking with deep concern toward the direction where the sun was rising.
In the autumn weather, although midday was still sweltering, the early morning forest revealed a bone-penetrating chill. For a moment, Li Xun’s form seemed to stoop by a few degrees. Thinking of how an originally excellent situation had become this current mess, he was grief-stricken and nearly in tears.
A commander stepped forward to console him: “Lord need not worry too much. That Chen Kingdom traitor dares to be so perfidious and faithless—when Commander Fan returns and captures him, he certainly won’t spare him!”
Li Xun wiped tears in grief, saying: “I fear having no face to see the Princess in the future! Before the Princess went to Southern Chen, she single-handedly facilitated the great situation of the three-way alliance to attack Pei. Now the Wei army in the Southern Border has been treacherously killed—a grudge with Wei Qishan’s side has certainly been formed. When Dou Jianliang battles Commander Fan again, it will certainly be our Liang army’s vitality that suffers great damage. At that time, his Pei camp…”
Speaking to this point, Li Xun suddenly froze.
That’s right—no matter how one looked at this matter, it was his Pei camp that benefited the most!
Regardless of what reason Dou Jianliang had for turning against them, the Pei army would be more than happy to ultimately reap the benefits of their conflict!
Li Xun, thinking that Fan Yuan’s army would most likely end up being devoured by both the Pei and Chen forces, was so shocked he nearly jumped up. He forcefully slapped the back of his hand against his palm, exclaiming: “We’ve fallen into a trap!”
He quickly assigned more troops, pointing at that junior officer: “You quickly go to Wangliang Mountain, report this matter to Lord Ling, and also send word to Pingzhou!”
Then to all the civil officials: “All of you remain here in hiding and await orders. I’ll take men to rescue Commander Fan!”
–
Wangliang Mountain.
A yellow leaf leisurely floated down onto a chess board. Li Yao, who was playing chess with an old friend, made a puzzled “hmm” sound, raised his head to look at the sky and said: “This year, autumn in these mountains has also come quite early.”
The old friend sitting opposite him only smiled. Placing a piece on the board, he said: “The rhythm of the four seasons is the same every year—spring plowing, summer cultivating, autumn harvest, winter storage. I’ve been in seclusion for several decades and have grown accustomed to this peaceful pastoral life. I don’t want to struggle anymore. Old thing, your trip here was in vain—let’s just say you came to play this one game of chess with me.”
Li Yao’s wrinkled index and middle fingers held a white piece, placing it on the board, cutting off the breathing space of a cluster of black pieces. But his words had nothing to do with the chess game: “If you don’t want to struggle anymore, why did you go beyond the passes in recent years?”
The old friend smiled and continued placing pieces: “After seeing enough of the famous mountains and great rivers in the Central Plains heartland, seeing the frontier scenery beyond the passes is also good, isn’t it?”
Li Yao then shook his head. While placing a piece, he said: “You’re still unwilling to accept it!”
The old man’s face still bore a smile, only this time with a bit more vicissitude. “So what if I’m unwilling? I’m already this pile of old bones—I’m not contending with heaven anymore.”
He looked at Li Yao: “On the contrary, you—back then you insisted on staying by Emperor Mingcheng’s side and already saw that result. Why now again?”
Li Yao’s hands overlapped atop his cane handle. His gaze looked toward some unknown distance. His grizzled beard and hair were blown by the mountain wind. Clearly just a withered old man, yet at a certain moment he was as towering as a mountain: “Great Liang’s fate is not yet exhausted. The Wen clan still has a brilliant ruler.”
The old man clearly knew whom Li Yao was speaking of, saying: “That girl from Prince Changlian’s household?”
Without waiting for Li Yao to respond, he shook his head with a smile again, clearly not agreeing with Li Yao’s words.
Li Yao only looked seriously at his old friend: “I’ve taken her as my student.”
This time, the old man couldn’t help but become serious as well, asking in puzzlement: “Back then, you didn’t even approve of the highly praised Crown Prince Heng of Prince Changlian’s household. Now you’ve taken a fancy to such a little girl?”
But Li Yao said: “A little girl alone cannot shoulder this fragmented landscape.”
He met his old friend’s gaze, no lack of pride in his tone: “Why do you think the campaign against Pei has gone so smoothly? The three-way alliance in the Southern Border was facilitated single-handedly by her before she went to Southern Chen. Neither Empress Dowager Jiang of Southern Chen nor Wei Qishan of the Northern Border dare underestimate her.”
“I’m already over seventy years old. Originally, I also didn’t want to struggle anymore. But for that child, I still want to contend with heaven once more.”
The old man stroked the long beard before him, pondered for a moment, then smiled broadly: “Since you’ve said this much, then I’ll accompany you, old thing, in gambling once more!”
–
Jincheng.
Fan Yuan stood at the rear of the military formation. He glanced at the sky, estimating that in about another hour, the Chen and Wei armies should return to camp with the grain supplies. At that time, if they could launch a strong attack and take Jincheng in one move, that would naturally be best.
If they didn’t capture it, after the Pei army lost grain supplies this time and also lost troops, their morale would certainly suffer a great blow. After the grain supplies were exhausted and they’d been starved for a day or two, attacking the city again would be as easy as toppling a rotten building.
He was shouting at the signal officers below, about to launch a new round of siege attacks, when he saw a messenger soldier riding urgently toward them: “Commander! Commander! Lord Li Xun asks you to quickly return to camp—there’s unrest in the army!”
Hearing this, Fan Yuan’s expression changed. He summoned that messenger soldier forward: “What’s going on?”
The messenger soldier explained the blood letter matter. Fan Yuan was so angry that veins bulged at his temples. He immediately issued a military order in a deep voice: “Sound the gong to withdraw troops!”
The soldiers on the war chariots clang-clanged as they struck the bronze gongs. The Liang army spread out like black ants below the city tower began to withdraw.
Pei Song, seeing this scene from atop the city tower, narrowed his eyes and asked: “Why has the Liang army withdrawn troops early?”
Han Qi, standing beside him, was also somewhat puzzled. According to their plan, the Liang army should besiege them until the Chen and Wei armies returned to camp with grain supplies, after all, to “cut off” their troops going to recover the grain.
He said: “Could it be he already knows the news of Dou Jianliang returning to camp?”
Yu Wenjing, who was observing the battle together, said with certainty: “If Dou Jianliang has already read the letter this old one left behind, he certainly won’t let any word reach Fan Yuan’s ears.”
Since he couldn’t figure out the reason for the moment, Pei Song didn’t pursue it further, only saying: “How can we let the fish that’s taken the bait escape like this? Open the city gates—engage in battle.”