Wen Yu glanced at Xiao Li for two breaths before raising her hand to signal Zhaobai to take Yan Que out first. Zhaobai released the thumb pressing against her blade sheath and said to Yan Que, “Come with me.”

Yan Que gave Xiao Li another imperceptible glance before following Zhaobai out of the room. The door closed, and silence settled over the chamber.

“Rise.”

Wen Yu still wore the brocade ceremonial robes from the temple ceremony, not yet changed. On the black and red base of the garment, gold thread densely wove intricate embroidered patterns. Her gorgeous makeup made her already flawless countenance beautiful in an aggressive way—like a lotus blooming on the high cliffs of power, no longer something anyone could pluck at will.

She seemed unaware of why he had come in such haste. Taking a memorial from the desk to read, she asked calmly, “What happened in the military camp?”

Seeing with his own eyes that she was safe and unharmed, Xiao Li’s breathing gradually calmed. Her composure and tranquility made him suppress those burning emotions in his chest, saying only, “You said before that to consolidate the prefectures near Pingzhou and make them into a door bolt to cut off Southern Chen’s forces in the future—General Fan and I have discussed for many days which prefecture to take first, and now we have some leads.”

Wen Yu stared at him for a while and said, “This doesn’t count as urgent military affairs. Sending an express horse to report, or waiting until the next council when General Fan comes to report, would be the same.”

After these words, the room fell silent again for quite a while.

Wen Yu knew the real purpose of his visit. She chose to call it out because she wanted to tell him—there could not be a second time for such things. He had to conceal his thoughts. Rushing back impulsively this time, though he remembered to use military intelligence as a pretext, perceptive people could always detect the truth beneath. Living in this vortex of power, one had to cultivate a scheming nature. Exposing everything about oneself was foolish and dangerous behavior.

Wen Yu didn’t speak plainly, but Xiao Li could understand the meaning in her words. He also knew that upon hearing news of her assassination attempt, rushing back so urgently was too conspicuous. But from the moment he learned the news, his mind had already gone blank, with no capacity to consider so much else. All along the journey here, his mind held only one thought: he had protected her for those several hundred li to Pingzhou, and except for when they were surrounded by Pei Song’s hounds and she slit her throat to save him, the rest of the time he hadn’t let even a single hair on her head come to harm. Why, after reaching Pingzhou, with so many people guarding her, could she still be assassinated? Had a traitor appeared by her side? Or were those people unable to protect her properly?

He couldn’t spare the mental energy to think about what reason to use to see her. He only knew that if she was injured, he had to guard by her side, absolutely cutting off any possibility of her being harmed again—like following a beast’s instinct. What she was wary of, what she avoided—to him, none of it mattered. He had been born pressed into layers of shackles. He climbed up from the mire, breaking through each layer. He had never accepted those rules, nor cared about them, because being accustomed to having nothing, in his life, the most important things had only ever been those few people. It was because Wen Yu cared about those shackles, and because he saw the different things those shackles and rules bestowed upon nobles and commoners, that he followed along. But there was also unwillingness, constantly charging about, wanting to break through that most solid shackle, to challenge that rule of “Are kings, dukes, generals, and ministers born with their noble seed?”

What Prince Chen could give her, in the not-too-distant future he would present to her a hundred, a thousand times over. But he hadn’t yet broken through that layer of rules. Empty promises—he dared not speak them, and feared Wen Yu couldn’t wait. Facing Wen Yu’s questioning now, like a dull blade cutting flesh, he could only pretend to be carefree and laugh: “The method I thought of—if I don’t tell you personally, what if someone steals the credit?”

This tone made Wen Yu furrow her brow as she reappraised him. These days in the military camp seemed not to have worn down his sharp edges, but rather forced out more of his rebelliousness and roguish air. That suit of armor made his already fierce features even more striking, so that one couldn’t see at all that he’d been born in the marketplace—he seemed more like a scion of an illustrious family sent to the military for training since childhood. When his roguish nature emerged, his entire person emanated an indescribable wickedness and wildness.

Wen Yu looked at him seriously, her voice slightly deepening: “Xiao Li, I recommended you to the military camp. Perhaps you don’t value this position, but since you agreed to go, you should follow military regulations. You cannot act on impulse as you please.”

He was ultimately not her subordinate, and the two shared a bond of having survived life and death together. Wen Yu couldn’t put on airs to suppress him. She also knew his was a fabricated excuse, but this matter couldn’t just be brushed aside with jokes and evasions.

She said, “You should know that Pingzhou is still unstable now. Many people want to find fault with me. In others’ eyes, you are my confidant, naturally also a thorn in those people’s eyes that they want to remove. Your rash, hasty return today is giving ammunition to those with ulterior motives, putting yourself in danger. Do you understand?”

The carefree smile at the corner of Xiao Li’s mouth faded. Those emotions that had been constantly suppressed in the bottom of his heart seemed to find an outlet in this moment. After a silence, he spoke with some difficulty: “I was worried about you.”

Wen Yu froze, not expecting him to say it so directly. She had been treading on thin ice for too long, having to guess at people’s hearts in everything. Suddenly having someone cut open their sincere heart to show her directly—in this instant she felt somewhat at a loss instead. After a brief moment of shock, Wen Yu averted her gaze and said, “Hide it.”

“In the arena of power, never let people know what you’re thinking.”

But Xiao Li heard another layer of meaning in these words and asked, “So, what are you hiding in your heart?”

Wen Yu looked back, her gaze colliding with Xiao Li’s again. The two locked eyes for a while before she coolly dropped two words: “A lot.”

Xiao Li pressed further: “What is it?”

Or rather, what he wanted to ask was: is there him?

Wen Yu sat back down at the desk, the corner of her eye lifting slightly: “Didn’t I already say? One can never let others know.”

She ended the topic: “Tell me, which prefecture have you discussed taking first?”

Xiao Li felt a bit of frustration. He could sense some difference in how Wen Yu treated him, but it was elusive, always beyond his grasp, and whenever he tried to probe further, Wen Yu would block him. To pry open that answer, he had to become strong enough—strong enough that she would be willing to tell him. Beasts are restless, but at certain times, they also have sufficient patience.

Xiao Li suppressed the jumbled thoughts in his heart and returned his attention to business, asking, “Do you have a map?”

Wen Yu rose and took out a map from the bookshelf, spreading it open on the desk. Xiao Li approached, pointing at Pingzhou. “Pingzhou has well-connected trade routes. Relying on Bairen Pass to the south, it has become the bottleneck for all lands south of Great Liang, but to the north there are no natural barriers, so when dealing with other enemies, it’s especially difficult. To make this door bolt secure, Pingzhou must also build a defense line to the north.”

When he spoke of these matters, his expression became especially focused. In his dark eyes, it was as if to the north of Pingzhou, an iron wall was truly slowly rising. Without realizing it, Wen Yu also became absorbed in listening.

“Xinzhou is perfectly positioned directly north of Pingzhou, and the terrain is also precipitous—it should be the first choice.” Xiao Li’s slender finger, marked with small scars, pointed to another prefecture on the map. “But precisely because its territory has many mountains and precipitous terrain, taking Xinzhou in one fell swoop would inevitably be difficult. Moreover, you said before that the backing behind Xinzhou is very likely Wei Qishan. If we want the Southern Chen army to not get stuck in Pingzhou after entering the territory, and to quickly seize territory to settle in, we cannot choose Xinzhou, which is hardest to attack…”

“That leaves only Tao Commandery and Yizhou on either side of Xinzhou to take.” Wen Yu spoke up.

Xiao Li nodded. Leaning forward slightly, he pointed at Yizhou, preparing to explain the details to Wen Yu. Unfortunately, after saying those words, Wen Yu suddenly straightened up. Her forehead crashed directly into Xiao Li’s jaw.

Xiao Li let out a muffled grunt. Wen Yu felt as if her forehead had hit a rock. Shocked by the impact, she staggered back a step, also covering her forehead and emitting a low moan.

Zhaobai, returning after settling Yan Que, had just raised her hand to knock on the door when she heard those two strange sounds from inside. Her hand poised to knock froze, and her face went through several color changes like a painter’s palette. After a slight hesitation, she retreated to the courtyard gate and, like a cold-faced death god, prevented anyone from approaching the main chamber.

Inside the room, Wen Yu rubbed her throbbing temple. She felt even her eye sockets aching somewhat. She had risen urgently and collided particularly forcefully. Looking up, she saw Xiao Li hissing softly as he wiped away blood traces at the corner of his mouth—apparently his lip had been cut. Knowing the responsibility lay with herself, she frowned and asked, “Is it bleeding? How serious is it?”

Xiao Li wiped away the blood on his finger. His tongue tip touched the cut on his lower lip where his teeth had struck it, feeling that needle-like stinging pain. “Just broke the skin a bit. It’s nothing.”

Wen Yu felt somewhat annoyed at her own carelessness. She picked up a nearby water kettle, poured a cup of warm tea and handed it to Xiao Li, saying, “I apologize. Drink this tea to rinse your mouth.”

Xiao Li accepted it with thanks. As he was about to bring it to his lips, he noticed a faint lip rouge mark on the cup’s rim. He glanced at the wooden tray holding tea implements beside Wen Yu’s hand and saw that the teacup she’d given him was the one near her hand—she must have habitually taken it to pour tea.

Wen Yu hadn’t noticed anything amiss. A small area on her forehead had reddened, and her hand was still rubbing it. Seeing Xiao Li examining her desk, she couldn’t help but ask, “What’s wrong?”

Xiao Li said “Nothing” and tilted his head back to drink the water completely. Setting down the teacup, his thumb inconspicuously wiped away the bit of lip rouge mark still remaining on the cup’s rim, pulling the topic back to the map: “Neither Tao Commandery nor Yizhou has backing behind them. A single arm cannot support them. Whichever place the Southern Chen army takes, the remaining prefecture will ally with Xinzhou. But the worst situation would be if Xinzhou preemptively consolidates these two prefectures and jointly suppresses Pingzhou.”

All of Wen Yu’s attention was pulled back. Her hand pressed against her temple. “This is also what I’ve been worried about. The only thing to hope for is that Southern Chen moves with divine speed, completely annihilating one prefecture before Xinzhou can win over those two prefectures, then using both grace and威 to persuade the other prefecture to surrender, isolating Xinzhou.”

She looked at Xiao Li: “You said you have a method. What is it?”

Xiao Li also glanced at her: “I thought of how you previously disguised yourself to conscript troops in Tongcheng, diverting disaster eastward. Before you arrived at Pingzhou, Xinzhou and the several major prefectures beside it were also constantly clashing over territory. We can make Xinzhou and either Tao Commandery or Yizhou start fighting first.”

Wen Yu’s eyes flickered slightly: “Continue.”

Xiao Li’s index finger fell on a waterway in the map: “The military camp received intelligence that a fleet purchasing grain and medicinal herbs for Pei Song has recently appeared near Yizhou. What if we have our people disguise themselves as Yizhou troops, raid Pei Song’s cargo ships, and frame Xinzhou?”

It must be said that Xiao Li’s progress was unexpected to Wen Yu. She stared at Xiao Li for quite a while without speaking.

Xiao Li looked up at her and asked, “Is it unsuitable?”

Wen Yu said neither that it was good nor bad, only asking, “Did you come up with this yourself?”

Xiao Li couldn’t discern what Wen Yu truly meant and answered honestly, “I followed your line of thinking about using borrowed force against force, though perhaps it was too idealistic.”

Wen Yu asked again, “Have you discussed this with Fan Yuan?”

Xiao Li nodded. “General Fan said our people aren’t skilled in water combat, and raiding cargo ships is too risky. Wanting to frame Xinzhou isn’t easy either. If we can’t take the cargo from the ships, this diversion won’t succeed. But if we take the cargo and leave, before we exit Yizhou territory, we’ll be pursued and killed.”

Wen Yu’s fingertip lightly tapped the tabletop as she asked him, “Since General Fan has already explained all the pros and cons to you, why are you still telling me this is a feasible method?”

As soon as the words left her mouth, Wen Yu actually felt somewhat regretful. She naturally understood what his main purpose in rushing here was. She averted her gaze, about to brush past this topic, when she heard Xiao Li say, “Because I think it’s feasible.”

Wen Yu looked back, meeting his deep, dark eyes. “I’ll personally lead people to raid the ships. If we can’t transport the goods away, I can burn them before the Yizhou troops catch up.”

In that instant, Wen Yu couldn’t quite tell whether what she saw in his eyes was ambition or murderous intent. But either of these appearing in someone who had never led troops in battle was already enough to shock the heart.

She suppressed that inexplicable unease rising in her heart, only saying, “But wouldn’t the framing intent be too obvious then?”

Xiao Li seemed to follow her words in concentrated thought, then said, “Then indeed I was thinking too superficially.”

Wen Yu said, “If your thinking is shallow, then think deeper—how can we wash away suspicion of our framing?”

Xiao Li thought for a while but still shook his head.

In Wen Yu’s eyes seemed to be hidden a sea of stars as she guided patiently, “When setting up any scheme, you cannot look at only one aspect. You must observe the whole board.”

“I disguised myself to conscript troops in Tongcheng because I knew the Tongcheng county magistrate was an unprincipled rat who would forget righteousness at the sight of profit. I didn’t trust him, and Pei Song wouldn’t trust him either. That kind of person—whoever gains power, he attaches himself to them.”

“You want to provoke conflict between Yizhou and Xinzhou by raiding Pei Song’s cargo ships. The key here actually isn’t whether Yizhou believes it, but whether Pei Song believes it.”

Xiao Li couldn’t quite follow Wen Yu’s reasoning and said, “I don’t understand.”

Wen Yu explained, “You think Yizhou will be angry because Xinzhou disguised themselves as them to raid cargo ships. But ultimately, the reason is that Yizhou will fear Pei Song making trouble. What if Pei Song sees through this as our scheme and doesn’t make trouble?”

Xiao Li said, “Yizhou might become hostile with Xinzhou, but it wouldn’t go to war.”

“Exactly.” Wen Yu said, “Your method splashes dirty water on both Yizhou and Xinzhou. It’s useful, but not very effective. If they receive someone’s guidance and realize we’re framing them, it might even prompt them to form an alliance.”

Xiao Li’s hand resting on the desk clenched into a fist. “I apologize. I thought everything too simply and nearly bungled it.”

Wen Yu said, “This stratagem can be used, but you need to look one layer deeper—create a situation where even Pei Song doesn’t know who truly robbed his goods.”

Xiao Li felt that discussing these matters with Wen Yu taught him even more than reading books and reviewing Pingzhou’s historical battle formations. He unconsciously asked, “How do we make Pei Song believe it?”

Wen Yu’s fingertip lightly tapped the tabletop twice. “Who did we previously speculate was Xinzhou’s backing?”

Xiao Li answered, “Wei Qishan.”

Wen Yu said, “There you have it. We bring Xinzhou’s backing being Wei Qishan out into the open. Your scheme then becomes Wei Qishan robbing Pei Song’s goods.”

The tangled threads that had troubled Xiao Li’s mind for so long were all connected one by one through Wen Yu’s few words. Once again, through Wen Yu’s patient guidance, he saw with exceptional clarity the entire realm’s situation. His palms developed fine beads of sweat as he asked, “How do we expose it?”

Wen Yu looked at him. “Having them expose their own backing themselves should be the most effective method.”

—

When Xiao Li left Wen Yu’s room, he was still somewhat thoughtful. He had never expected that the fleet he had proposed raiding actually belonged to Wen Yu herself. There were still too many things about her he didn’t know.

Xiao Li wasn’t discouraged. This instead intensified the thought in his heart even more: become stronger.

With progress on seizing Pingzhou’s northern barrier, next came step-by-step deployment. Moreover, Wen Yu had thrown him a question he had to ponder deeply: if Southern Chen’s fifty thousand troops attacked Bairen Pass and Pingzhou only had ten thousand soldiers, how could they defend the pass?

Pingzhou’s current troop strength, at full count, was approximately fifteen thousand. When she envisioned going to war with Southern Chen, had she already made plans not to marry into Southern Chen? This thought made Xiao Li’s eyes uncontrollably deepen somewhat.

His footsteps involuntarily quickened, wanting nothing more than to return to the military camp instantly and memorize Pingzhou’s entire troop deployment and all strategic passes and barriers inside and out.

Passing through the courtyard gate, he noticed Wen Yu’s martial maidservant staring at him with especially hostile eyes. He had no time to think much of it, his gaze only glancing lightly past her as he strode away with large steps.

Zhaobai watched that lecher emerge from her Wengzhu’s room with a wound on his lip that hadn’t been there before. Both shocked and angry, her glaring eyes nearly wanted to flay a layer of skin from him. Yet he only glanced at her lightly before walking past her—like a demonstration.

Zhaobai stood frozen in place, then even more furiously stamped her foot. The blue brick beneath her foot cracked.

She turned and entered the room to find Wen Yu.

On Wen Yu’s end, she was still deep in thought about the current arrangements. She had too many matters to handle these past two days. She had left the northern campaign affairs entirely to the many strategists under Chen Wei and Li Xun to discuss, not thinking much of it herself. Today, the method Xiao Li proposed had suddenly opened up her thinking.

Only… though Xiao Li said the ship raid was inspired by her Tongcheng conscription, in order to intensify the conflict, he had almost instinctively thought of burning the cargo. Such vaguely fierce and ruthless methods truly worried her. Military people would only grow increasingly brutal in killing. She didn’t want Xiao Li to walk toward extremes.

Wen Yu stared at the map in a daze for a while. When preparing to pour herself some water to drink, she felt for the teacup and came up empty. Glancing sideways, she discovered that the teacup she habitually used wasn’t in its usual place.

She seemed to remember something. Her gaze swept toward where Xiao Li had just been standing and saw the teacup he’d placed at the corner of the desk.

Wen Yu froze, then felt somewhat annoyed with herself, thinking perhaps she truly had been worrying too much lately—why did she keep making such oversights? But fortunately, he shouldn’t have noticed, right?

Her thoughts drifted involuntarily far away. Often, she actually couldn’t sort out her own feelings toward Xiao Li anymore. Because he had once been her benefactor, and along the escape route he had protected her thoroughly everywhere, the two of them had never been able to establish a clear boundary when getting along.

She didn’t know whether what she felt toward Xiao Li was gratitude and being moved, or dependence born from sharing life and death. Or perhaps even earlier, when he always spoke coldly yet never treated her poorly even slightly, when he had glimpsed her secret yet pretended not to know—had he already become different to her?

But no matter what it was, that answer was no longer important. Continuing along the current path was the right thing to do.

A knock came from outside. Wen Yu called out, “Come in.”

It was Zhaobai. The anger in her heart hadn’t dissipated. She opened her mouth saying, “Wengzhu, that Xiao surnamed…”

Wen Yu interrupted her. “There was military business. He was somewhat discourteous. I’ve already reprimanded him. What did Yan Que say?”

Zhaobai had to swallow back the litany of complaints at her lips. But seeing Wen Yu’s calm expression, as if she hadn’t taken that person to heart at all, she immediately felt much more comfortable. Throughout history, royal and noble ladies who didn’t get along with their husbands often kept male favorites—this was not uncommon.

As long as her Wengzhu wouldn’t be distracted from grand plans because of that fellow, Zhaobai didn’t find anything wrong with keeping a guard or general as a male favorite. She would have plenty of opportunities in the future to bad-mouth that Xiao surnamed person. At this moment, she restrained her expression and said with some gravity, “Yan Que says Mianyue is the traitor!”