“Wolf from the great desert.” A torch extended forward, bow to bow with their ship.
“Eagle surveys the south of the river.” Mo Zi roughened her voice and replied in Daqiu language.
“Is this a new ship?” Behind the torch, a Daqiu commander in his early thirties, short and stocky but sturdy, jumped aboard with over ten men.
“That’s right.” Mo Zi handed over the Ministry of War documents. “How should I address the general?”
“I dare not claim to be a general. I’m the deputy garrison commander of this fortress’s second garrison, Tie Lu, on watch duty tonight.” Tie Lu carefully examined the Ministry of War documents Mo Zi handed over, then returned them to her. “Why pick this time to enter the river? Why not rest in the fortress for the night and leave tomorrow morning?”
“Deputy Commander Tie, military orders are like mountains. Our superiors want us to arrive by dawn tomorrow—how dare we delay until afternoon?” Mo Zi naturally couldn’t possibly run into the enemy’s lair to sleep.
“True enough. You’re assigned to Longbei Ridge water fortress—if you don’t keep your head on your shoulders, life really won’t be easy.” Tie Lu’s face showed sympathetic color. “Though our water fortress is small, at least both the commander and deputy commander are reasonable people, not like your General Geba. I heard that recently one of his soldiers sneaked ashore to find a woman, and he chopped off his head with one blade.”
“Has Deputy Commander Tie perhaps made a mistake? We belong to General Sidan’s fortress, not Geba’s.” Yuan Cheng’s Daqiu speech was also extremely fluent.
Tie Lu slapped his forehead. “Yes, I remembered wrong. So many ships have come recently, I’ve gotten confused. My apologies, brother!”
Mo Zi patted her chest. “You gave me such a fright. General Geba has a famously explosive temper. If we were under him, wouldn’t it be even worse than being under General Sidan? Though General Sidan also maintains strict military discipline, he wouldn’t so easily drag someone off for execution.”
Tie Lu hadn’t truly forgotten—rather, he was following the fortress commander’s instructions to set one more test. Seeing them speak accurately and without error, he felt one hundred and twenty percent assured. However, he didn’t skip what he was supposed to inspect.
“Brother, by regulation I need to look things over. You don’t mind, do you?” Though he asked politely, his movements weren’t slow. With a wave of his hand, he led his men toward the cabin.
Mo Zi hurried ahead. “What kind of talk is that, Deputy Commander Tie? Though this ship and these people are all new, we couldn’t possibly not know the rules for passing fortresses. Look all you want, inspect all you want. But also by regulation, keep your mouth shut tight and don’t let word slip about the improved weaponry.”
Hearing this, Tie Lu became extremely interested. “Oh, from what you’re saying, brother, there are formidable items on this ship?”
“Of course. Otherwise, why would we be rushing day and night? Honestly speaking, General Sidan is eagerly waiting to see its power. Currently, it’s still top secret. However, I think Deputy Commander Tie should be trustworthy, along with these brothers of yours. If enemy spies collect this information, losing our heads would be a small matter, but delaying our great Daqiu’s unification of the world would be an offense from which even death couldn’t absolve us.” After speaking, Mo Zi ordered Chou Yu and the others beside her, “Go, open all the hatch covers to make it convenient for Deputy Commander Tie to inspect.”
Tie Lu considered that warships hadn’t been improved since the war against Yuling began last year. Though they had eye-opening performances in naval battles, over time they became less novel, and recently the Yuling resistance army’s warships also had similar construction and weapon configurations—they could no longer achieve one-sided victories. He couldn’t help but suspect Yuling spies had infiltrated the Daqiu military. If this ship had the latest improvements, that would be excellent. However, in that case, he needed to handle this carefully. Among tonight’s soldiers were quite a few Han people, and not all were his absolutely reliable confidants. If news leaked from his end, then as this black-clad, handsome brother before him said, losing his head would be a small matter.
“Wait!” He quickly made calculations in his mind, waving his hand to stop his men, and smiled at Mo Zi. “So brother has come bearing an important mission. Tie Lu was blind and nearly caused offense. Since you must rush on your way, I won’t delay you either. The inspection ends here.”
But Yuan Cheng stopped Tie Lu. “Deputy Commander Tie considers the overall situation so thoughtfully—we’ve truly met the right person tonight. Rules are rules. Though we find it difficult, we also can’t use these formidable items as an excuse and make things difficult for Deputy Commander Tie to explain to the general. How about this—forget the other brothers, but we’ll take Deputy Commander Tie below for a look. How does that sound?”
Tie Lu’s eyes brightened greatly. Not only did every trace of doubt vanish, but he was quite excited. “That’s a good plan.”
Yuan Cheng glanced at Mo Zi.
Mo Zi understood Yuan Cheng’s meaning. She nodded and said to Tie Lu, “Deputy Commander Tie, please follow me.”
When people take a step back, it doesn’t mean you can advance a step forward. Yuan Cheng’s approach had two purposes. First, to focus Tie Lu’s attention on the so-called formidable weapons while overlooking other places where they might reveal flaws. Second, to eliminate Tie Lu’s doubts so that after they entered the river surface, they would have no worries behind them.
Tie Lu followed Mo Zi down to the bottom hold. By the not-very-bright light, he saw a massive object towering before him. Though he couldn’t see it clearly, he couldn’t help but hold his breath. “Good heavens!”
Mo Zi seemed to casually use her body to block the view. “Deputy Commander Tie, my apologies—we’re afraid of fire, so we don’t dare light many lamps in the hold.”
“No matter, no matter.” Tie Lu didn’t detect Mo Zi’s little scheme in the slightest. “Dare I ask, brother, what is this used for?”
Mo Zi pretended to be in difficulty. “It’s not that I’m unwilling to tell you. It’s just that the capital has given repeated strict orders to keep it temporarily secret from outsiders. The same goes for checkpoint inspections. After all, Deputy Commander Tie has also seen the Ministry of War documents, and the passwords were correct too—there’s no reason not to let us through.”
Tie Lu no longer walked forward. He now had deep faith in this ship and had completely come to regard Mo Zi as an important figure. “Brother, Tie Lu has had his eyes opened. I’ll just wait for when we cross the river to use this big fellow.”
Mo Zi smiled awkwardly. “By then, we won’t fear Great Zhou’s broken ships—we’ll blast their backsides full of holes!”
Tie Lu climbed the ladder, laughing heartily. “That’s right, make them cry for their mothers!”
Yuan Cheng was waiting by the hatch opening. “Deputy Commander Tie, we didn’t deceive you, did we?”
Tie Lu laughed happily. “If I were General Sidan, my hands would be itching to try it out right now. Unfortunately, my rank is small and position lowly—it’s not my turn to enjoy it first.”
“There will definitely be an opportunity.” Mo Zi came up and said.
Tie Lu clasped his hands in salute. “I’ll be waiting! Everyone, farewell, smooth sailing.” Having said this, he shouted at his soldiers and jumped back to their ship, then quickly made way.
Mo Zi exhaled and looked at Yuan Cheng. “You’re really bold—he was about to leave and you invited him back.”
“Do you think he really intended to leave? Though this person is merely a small deputy garrison commander, he’s extremely skilled at psychological tactics and strategy.” Yuan Cheng looked at the increasingly distant lights. “Setting aside Daqiu’s cruel slaughter, they truly have many brave and skilled warriors—no wonder their arrogance knows no bounds.”
“No matter how formidable, they’re not as formidable as the two of us. Didn’t we still trick them silly? I guarantee he only saw the big fellow’s outline and probably doesn’t even know what it’s used for.” Under normal circumstances, she wouldn’t be smug, but in front of him, showing off a bit put her in a good mood.
Yuan Cheng naturally saw through this. Turning, he walked away. “You’re the most formidable. So when we reach the middle of the river with no one around, how about you laugh heartily three times toward the sky?”
Mo Zi laughed chaotically at his words, but grabbed hold of him. “Where is Minister Yuan going? Could it be you can’t stand to see me proud?”
“You’re rarely so proud you’ve forgotten yourself. I won’t disturb your enthusiasm—I’ll leave you to slowly savor it for a while.” Yuan Cheng could barely suppress his amusement. “However, don’t take too long. Though everyone on this deck is your people, at least don’t fall into their laughing eyes, making them think the ship’s captain also has episodes of madness.”
Pfft—Chou Yu covered his mouth, his eyes rolling wide and round, finally squinting shut.
Episodes of madness?
Mo Zi snorted twice. Just as she was about to explode, Old Guan shouted about rapids and headwinds. She immediately changed her grip on Yuan Cheng with both hands and shoved him toward the lower hold. “I’ll be as mad as I want—who am I afraid of! Down you go, down you go, don’t interfere with my work!”
Yuan Cheng turned back, looking at her deeply. “Be careful.”
“…Mm.” Mo Zi’s smiling face in the darkness was like a bright flower. “Compared to people’s fickleness, I can gauge Heaven’s temperament more accurately. I won’t lose here.”
Watching Yuan Cheng close the hatch cover, she crouched down and untied a sail rope. Bracing against the wind, she leaped across to a post on the other side and tied the rope tight. “Chou Yu, Old Guan, remove the large and small square sails, keep the triangular sail. Fei Xia, level the two wing rudders with the water flow. Tell Shui She to close the large tail rudder, open the small tail fan wheel, advance at full power…”
Half an hour later, they emerged from the rapids zone. Before they could catch their breath, ship shapes appeared ahead—lights were abundant, figures bustling about.
A voice shouted loudly, “We’re a patrol ship under Sidan’s command. Where are you from?”
Chou Yu complained softly, “Wave after wave, never ending.”
“I’m afraid the rapids just now threw off our bearings.” Old Guan’s judgment was precise.
Just as Mo Zi was silently cursing their bad luck, an extremely bold idea suddenly arose.
“Old Guan, go down and tell Yuan Cheng we’ve encountered Sidan’s forces. Rather than gamble on how likely they are to expose us, we should take this ship.” She very much wanted to see the inside of the ship—this was an excellent opportunity. “If he agrees, have Xiao Wei and Wei Jia come up to help.”
Old Guan responded quietly and hurriedly lifted the hatch and descended.
“Chou Yu, have our people prepare to board, await my signal.” She was certain Yuan Cheng would agree. According to the waterway and troop distribution maps, within this radius of several miles at this hour, there was only one patrol ship.
“Hey! Did you hear? Where are you from?” The voice held some impatience.
“New ship Chi under Sidan’s command, coming to prepare for battle under Ministry of War orders.” After considering back and forth, she decided to stick with the original lie. Because the ship’s name was on the hull. If she said they belonged to another water fortress and the other side knew about Chi’s arrival, they would be immediately exposed.
“Chi?” The other side’s voice remained guarded. “You should be going along the river to the general’s fortress. Why have you run into the middle of the river?”
As expected, they knew about it.
Mo Zi silently rejoiced at the close call. “We were already on our way when we unexpectedly encountered rapids and were carried here. Fortunately we’ve met people from the same fortress. Could we perhaps enter the fortress together with you?”
Wind rose behind her. She turned to see Xiao Wei leading his twenty-some personal guards, Wei Jia with his archers, and Hua Yi leading the inner guards, all silently walking onto the deck, crouching low to hide in the shadows.
At this moment the other side spoke again, but with disdain. “The ships the shipyard builds are truly worse than the last—can’t even handle rapids. How can they cross rivers and traverse waters?”
Zan Jin and Ding Gou, Luo Ying and Xiao Yi, four in a row, stood close on either side of Mo Zi.
The net bag for catching specimens was in hand, waiting to fall.