Gou Xi led his men in sudden turns left and right, successively ordering two more cavalry squads to cover the rear before barely shaking off the pursuing troops.
When they stopped, everyone was in a wretched state. The soldiers directly collapsed to the ground. Gou Xi was better off—after dismounting, he went forward to pull them up one by one, checking their bodies to confirm there were no undiscovered fatal wounds before having them take out food.
Each squad had soldiers responsible for logistics. They had to carry pots and bring more provisions than ordinary soldiers.
They had left in a hurry. Though each person brought some food, they didn’t bring many pots. Combined with losses on the road, only a few pots remained.
Everyone could only pool their grain together, using two pots to boil water and two pots to cook wheat porridge, eating it with the husks still on.
The soldiers had been hungry all day and didn’t mind that the wheat hadn’t been hulled. After all, they often ate wheat porridge normally. Though they heard Zhao’s army didn’t eat this—they would grind wheat into flour and mix it with wheat bran to make gray flour buns and gray cakes.
In any case, it was better than boiled wheat.
Going there, they would count as Zhao’s army too, right?
Because of this thought, everyone could persist in following Gou Xi.
Gou Xi also encouraged them: “Everyone rest tonight. When day breaks, we’ll set out. We’ve already bypassed Chengyang County. As long as we cross the Ji River, we’ll be near the Yuzhou border. Yuzhou troops are stationed there—the pursuing troops won’t dare intrude.”
Everyone’s spirits lifted with some hope.
But the next day, before dawn, Gou Xi woke them. Everyone made brief preparations and struggled to lift their legs to run forward, running for about half a shichen before the morning light rose behind them.
They felt their speed was already fast enough, but the pursuing troops were even faster.
Their horses were more numerous and fresher, their provisions more abundant, and reinforcements kept coming. Though they had been intercepted three times, they still pursued at maximum speed.
Finally, before sunset, they caught up with Gou Xi at the Ji River. The two armies were separated by less than a hundred meters.
Kong Qiang didn’t even approach. Seeing them trying to drive their horses across the river, he raised his hand for the archers to advance. With a wave of his hand, ten thousand arrows flew. Gou Xi looked back and, while shouting for people to ford the river by force, turned back to deflect arrows flying toward him.
Not to mention that he was already physically and mentally exhausted, at the end of his strength—even in his prime, it would be difficult to block so many flying arrows.
An arrow flew past the blade he had just turned away and plunged into his chest with a thud. His chest hurt sharply, and he immediately flew down from his horse, dodging to the horse’s side.
The horse was shot and neighed, rearing up and falling into the river. Gou Xi deflected arrows while trying to cross the Ji River. His gaze caught sight of over ten arrows shooting toward Gou Chun, who had his back turned while on horseback.
Gou Xi didn’t even have time to think. He took a large step to the right and reached out to pull Gou Chun down from the horse.
Gou Chun fell into the water with a splash, while Gou Xi was completely exposed under the arrows. In just that instant, five or six stray arrows struck his back from above, with two directly piercing through.
Gou Xi looked down at the arrowheads protruding from his chest. In this moment, he was incomparably calm and strangely felt no fear or unwillingness as he had imagined.
Instead, he very calmly accepted this outcome. In his mind flashed Yan Heng’s face—that was last year, wasn’t it? Gou Chun had forcibly requisitioned grain and intercepted people going to Yuncheng to file complaints. Yan Heng had angrily told him: “If the Grand General doesn’t restrain Gou Chun, one day you will die at his hands.”
At the time, he had dismissed it, even thinking Yan Heng was sowing discord, unable to stand seeing their brotherly closeness. Looking at it today, it was like a prophecy that came true.
If Gou Chun hadn’t lost Qingzhou due to cruelty, causing him to also greatly lose popular support, how could General Pei and the other three have switched allegiance to the Emperor, leaving him restricted at every turn when deploying troops…
If popular support hadn’t been lost, how could he have fought unsuccessfully and been forced to surrender to Shi Le?
Gou Xi thought of many things, but this was only an instant. He still hadn’t died—still had consciousness, just couldn’t support his body any longer, falling to his knees in the water with a splash.
Gou Chun burst out of the water with a splash, bracing against the riverbed to stand. Just as the pursuing troops charged into the river, a Jie barbarian didn’t even give him a chance to speak—directly slashing with a blade, cutting off the just-surfacing Gou Chun. The river water instantly turned red. He was quick-eyed and quick-handed, grabbing Gou Chun’s head and shouting happily: “Second merit, second merit! Gou Chun’s head is mine!”
Comrades who had fallen a step behind looked at him enviously, then waved their large blades to pursue the fleeing soldiers ahead.
Some had already stumbled ashore. They didn’t look back, didn’t even gather together, but scattered while stripping off their soaking wet clothes and running for their lives with bare feet.
Because they scattered so widely, the pursuing troops chased for a while and then stopped. After all, Gou Xi and Gou Chun were already dead—those who escaped were just small soldiers, not worth such great effort.
Gou Xi knelt in the river current, eyes wide open and unwilling to close. Kong Qiang tried twice to close them but couldn’t, so he simply stopped trying and had men carry him to shore.
Soldiers didn’t understand: “General, just bring the head back. Why bother moving the corpse? It’s too heavy.”
“This is a famous general. Though defeated, he deserves respect.” Moreover, bringing his corpse back to display in a circuit could also demonstrate his and the Grand General’s martial prowess. When facing Yuzhou in battle, they could even hang Gou Xi’s corpse out to strike the enemy’s morale.
Gou Xi was the War God of Jin—very formidable. Even if Yuzhou’s army wasn’t under his command, his prestige among the troops wasn’t low. At least the soldiers recognized his abilities.
Let Zhao Hanzhang and Zhao Ju see—even Gou Xi died at their hands. How long could they defend Yuzhou?
Kong Qiang had men move Gou Xi’s corpse back. As for other people’s remains, he didn’t manage them.
When they returned to the first ambush site, seeing Wang Zan’s body already beyond recognition, Kong Qiang thought about it and still had men bring him along.
Respecting him as a true man—better not to let wild beasts devour him.
When news of Gou Xi, Gou Chun, and Wang Zan’s rebellion and execution reached Pingyang City, Zhao Hanzhang had just captured the rebelling Liu Yi, Liu Qin, and others.
Unlike Gou Xi, Liu Yi and his group had prepared for quite some time, but before they could even leave the city, they were all arrested.
Most people were arrested inside the imperial city, hardly disturbing the common people outside. Zhao Hanzhang resolved everything within the palace and imperial city.
This gave Liu Yi the feeling he was playing house.
Because the failure came so suddenly and the battle time was so short, not many people died.
Zhao Hanzhang closed the letter, walked down from the steps, and stood before Liu Yi: “As you know, I’ve always been soft-hearted. You and I are not only friends—you’re also useful to me. So I won’t kill you.”
Liu Yi knelt on the ground, pinned down and unable to move. He could only raise his head to look at Zhao Hanzhang: “Then how will you deal with us?”
“Though I can’t kill you, I can kill him, and him, and him…” Zhao Hanzhang pointed at the Han officials beside him. Each person she pointed at trembled slightly, their faces turning pale.
Zhao Hanzhang gave them a slight smile and said softly: “However, I’m not one for indiscriminate killing, so this time I’ll only execute one person.”
Zhao Hanzhang’s gaze fell on Liu Qin.