Dongping Prefecture, Yanggu County, Shandong.

Black columns of smoke rose into the sky as flames crackled and burned — golden stalks of rice, scorched grain filling the air with its acrid smell — and beneath it all, the sound of running feet and shouting voices blended together. Across the whole scene, the roads were filled with people fleeing in every direction, footsteps hurried, cries of every kind ringing out.

“…Hurry, go, the Jurchen cavalry are already upon us, get to the city! Several great cities in the north have already been put to the sword — did you hear, in Dizhou they killed every last soul, not even the chickens and dogs were spared…”

The shouts of the official ahead blended into the crowd, growing fragmented and broken. A woman with a basket on her back rushed down into the rice paddies with a sickle, weeping as she harvested desperately. An old woman in ragged clothes screamed as she charged at a runner by the roadside: “Kill me then! Kill me! I won’t go! Let the Jurchen come and eat these old bones of mine… you’re all committing a sin…”

Someone tried to hold the old woman back; she struggled, then finally fell to the ground, striking her head on a stone, blood pouring from the wound. Amid the chaotic din of voices, a small clash broke out between villagers and soldiers at the roadside. The county magistrate came running, shouting, “Don’t fight, don’t fight!” — only to be struck in the forehead by a flying stone, blood streaming down from the wound.

This brief clash sparked even greater chaos. The autumn wind howled through, and the fire, fed by the wind, spread rapidly across the fields — like a great red-and-black carpet unrolling over the rice stalks and grass, sweeping toward the distant forest…

Those caught in the chaos stared out in shock at that enormous blaze.

West of Yanggu County, most of Hedong West Circuit and Hebei Circuit lay stretched beneath a heavy, gloomy autumn rain. Rain poured down from the overcast sky in sheets; along the roads running north to south, travelers in straw rain cloaks, carrying bundles, pack horses laden with baggage, and carts crowded together heading south. Elderly people, unable to bear the cold rain, collapsed on the ground; children in their mothers’ arms, soaked through by the rain, wailed loudly. The waystations and inns along the road were packed full of displaced travelers.

Along the banks of the Yellow River in the autumn rain, every ferry crossing was filled beyond capacity, and amid the surging waves, boats moved ceaselessly back and forth.

In the middle of the eighth month of the thirteenth year of the Jinghan era, a massive scorched-earth campaign began.

“Ah, it’s good to be young…”

South of Dongping Prefecture, in a busy, bustling courtyard filled with the comings and goings of many people, Ning Yi emerged from his room after barely two hours of sleep. After washing his face, he let out this remark. In the distance, the sky blazed with fiery clouds.

Outside the courtyard, riders on horseback kept arriving, delivering all manner of reports. From west to east, the current conditions of nearly twenty prefectures and over a hundred counties across the five circuits of Hedong East, Hedong West, Jingdong East, Jingdong West, and Hebei were all being gathered and compiled here. Members of the Bamboo Chronicle’s advisory staff moved in and out constantly, summarizing this information, drafting countermeasures, and waiting for approval from either Ning Yi or Wenren Buer.

Qin Shaoqian strode in from outside the courtyard — the Wurui Army’s camp was nearby, and over the past several days, various actions had been underway, with Qin Shaoqian occasionally dropping by. Ning Yi laughed. “I just got up — I should be saying good morning, but look, it’s nearly dark already. Second Young Master, what good news brings you here…”

“Zonghan’s attack on Taiyuan began yesterday,” Qin Shaoqian said, holding a piece of intelligence in his hand.

Ning Yi’s expression froze for a moment, and he reached out to take the report. A staff member walking by handed over another sheet of paper, saying quietly, “We just received this ourselves as well.”

Ning Yi held both sheets and read them over. In truth, this was something already expected — for Ning Yi’s part, the arrival of the report mattered mostly just for confirmation. But the confirmation itself meant that the siege of Taiyuan was now a settled fact, and Qin Shaohe, Li Pin, Cheng Zhouhai, and the others were all now trapped within it. Because he knew them personally, the news landed with a certain weight.

“Something happening far away, an attack that started yesterday — by now it may well have already fallen. I only brought it to show you — it’s not really your business, Liheng, no need to trouble yourself over it.” Seeing Ning Yi’s brow furrow slightly, Qin Shaoqian’s expression turned all the more easygoing, and he reached out and took the report back.

Ning Yi looked at him. “Taiyuan is a fortified city — it shouldn’t fall as quickly as you’re suggesting.”

“My elder brother — usually seems even more old-fashioned than our father, but in truth he’s read more military texts than I have. He understands how to hold a city; he won’t give reckless orders. Your Bamboo Chronicle people are in the city too, along with Cheng Zhouhai — I know that man best of all, he’s a ruthless strategist. Working together with your people, if it really comes down to the wire, he’ll be able to get the entire city up on the walls to fight. I don’t think it’ll fall so easily either — and if it does fall even so, well, that would just be fate.” Qin Shaoqian, his beard thick and full, laughed simply. “Most important thing is, distant water can’t put out a nearby fire — worrying about Taiyuan does neither of us any good.”

“Good that you can see it so clearly.” Ning Yi smiled. “So what about your side, then.”

“That’s exactly what I came to tell you about,” Qin Shaoqian said. “We’re getting ready to march out.”

Ning Yi looked at him, then looked out at the sunset glow in the distance, and sighed.

This day was the fifteenth of the eighth month.

…

By the middle of the eighth month, the region north of the Yellow River had already fallen into tremendous chaos.

Following their conquest of Xinzhou and Daizhou, Wanyan Zonghan and Wanyan Loushi paused briefly to regroup before driving their forces toward the great city of Taiyuan, herding tens of thousands of civilians and captives along with them.

To the east, with Guo Yaoshi’s Ever-Victorious Army as vanguard, Wanyan Zongwang’s eastern army of nearly a hundred thousand men, after threatening Jinan, did not attempt to take the city — instead, under Guo Yaoshi’s lead, it cut straight southwest, the main force moving swiftly into the central region between Jinan, Daming, and Dongping.

The Jurchen advance rolled forward like an unstoppable force, sweeping all before it. Having broken through Yanjing and the three garrison towns of Hebei, the eastern army pressed on with almost no pause; along the way, the Martial Dynasty’s forces were either swiftly routed or left entirely behind before their defensive lines could even be formed. The situation had now entered an especially delicate and precarious phase.

At present, the militia garrisons defending Jinan, Daming, and Dongping, together with the three armies of Wuwei, Wusheng, and Wurui — more than two hundred thousand troops in total — had all been mobilized as the fighting began, moving now into a pincer formation around the Jurchen eastern army. The atmosphere was tense and grim, with a great battle seemingly on the verge of breaking out at any moment. Ning Yi had been with the Wurui camp at Dongping for barely three days, and the scorched-earth operations had only just begun to take shape, when the great battle was already bearing down upon them.

The rhythm of this looming battle was not being set by the Martial Dynasty but by the Jurchen. The moment these more than two hundred thousand troops hesitated even slightly longer, Wanyan Zongwang’s eastern army would break through the Daming–Dongping line and drive straight into the heartland of the Central Plains.

But for those actually caught up in it, this so-called “verge of breaking out” was, in truth, little more than self-deception dressed up in official language. From the moment Wanyan Zongwang’s eastern army, with Guo Yaoshi as vanguard, had begun its advance by merely threatening Jinan without attacking, the entire situation across this stretch of several hundred li had already fallen completely under Jurchen control. On paper, more than two hundred thousand Martial Dynasty troops were massed in three directions — but in reality, it was hard to say who would actually dare make the first move. The armies in all three directions were mostly hedging and stalling; after the massacre at Dizhou, no one had steeled themselves psychologically for an all-out fight — yet the Jurchen were about to march right through the encirclement as if strolling through an open gate.

Everything was happening far too fast. Even for Ning Yi, this held true.

“Fifty thousand men to hold Shouzhang County, and across from you are Zongwang and Guo Yaoshi’s hundred thousand men. However you look at it, Second Young Master, this time I can’t promise you a win.”

The sunset burned crimson. Ning Yi set aside the matters at hand and walked out of the courtyard with Qin Shaoqian, carrying wine and food, talking as they looked out at the distant military camp from the nearby grassy slope. Qin Shaoqian took a drink. “At least it’s over two hundred thousand men total.”

“What kind of people Liang Zhongshu at Daming or Zhang Youqing at Jinan really are, I won’t say — I don’t know the first thing about fighting wars either. But if you’re really counting on them, I’ll give you four words instead.”

“Oh? Liheng, please enlighten me.”

“Wind, forest, fire, mountain.”

“Sun Tzu’s Art of War, huh…”

“Retreat swift as the wind, encircle slow as the forest. Plunder like raging fire, stand unmoved as the mountain when a friendly army is in trouble…”

On the grassy slope, Qin Shaoqian stood stunned for a moment, then burst out laughing, laughing for quite a while before finally saying, “Then how am I supposed to fight?”

“…Indeed.” Ning Yi took a drink of wine and murmured the same thing under his breath.

Qin Shaoqian said, “But no matter what, someone has to go. Whatever happens, I do want to test myself against great commanders of this age like Wanyan Zongwang and Guo Yaoshi.”

The two Qin brothers, one a scholar and one a soldier, had always served as officials away from home, but because Qin Siyuan thought so highly of Ning Yi, the two of them had kept up contact whenever they returned. Qin Shaohe and Qin Shaoqian regarded Ning Yi almost as a fellow disciple, even something like an inheritor of their father’s legacy — in a sense, they were practically family or close political allies, and their relationship was genuinely close. But this time, with the Jurchen advancing so swiftly, Ning Yi having only just come north himself, Qin Shaohe trapped in Taiyuan, and now Qin Shaoqian about to head to Shouzhang to face Wanyan Zongwang directly — however one looked at it, the feeling was undeniably complicated.

Though Qin Shaoqian spoke lightly of it, with a certain heroic bravado about facing off against one of the great commanders of the age, Ning Yi knew he did have real ability — but the Martial Dynasty’s hold on its generals had always run deep. As Chief Military Commissioner of the Wurui Battalion, he could command troops in battle, but ultimate authority over the army belonged instead to the civil official above him — currently, the Military and Pacification Commissioner of Dongping Prefecture.

Qin Shaohe, though a civil official himself, held ultimate command over the army in Taiyuan precisely because he was the one defending it. Qin Shaoqian, on the other hand, not only answered to a civil official above him with real authority, but had also only truly commanded the Wurui Battalion for about a year — the soldiers didn’t know their general and the general didn’t know his soldiers, and he had no way of reaching deep into every aspect of managing this army. Even accounting for the fact that having a formidable father like Qin Siyuan meant the civil officials kept somewhat looser reins on him, to say that he could hold back a Jurchen army of a hundred thousand with the Wurui Battalion was something no one could possibly believe.

Qin Shaoqian himself, of course, did not necessarily feel confident either — but when the moment came, as a soldier, he simply stopped thinking too much about it. Ning Yi understood this well enough too; after saying those few words earlier, the two of them drank for a while, until Qin Shaoqian finally asked, “Liheng, what do you think the outcome of this great battle will be? If we lose, how much will we have to pay to settle things?”

“Does Second Young Master think it’ll just be a matter of paying money?”

“The Heishui Treaty was also just about paying money — the Jurchen, two hundred thousand strong, surely can’t take our whole realm, can they?”

“At the time of the Heishui Treaty, the Liao state was already in decline — they were satisfied once they got their annual tribute. The Jurchen have only just founded their state and are still on the path of conquest, so it’s very hard to say.” Ning Yi hesitated for a moment. “And besides, we’ve done far too many things these past few years that amounted to asking for trouble.”

Qin Shaoqian fell silent for a long moment, looking at Ning Yi. “I’m a military man, I just fight. You’re a scholar, Liheng, like my father — you understand the bigger picture. Do you really think it’s come to this?”

The distant mountains faded into dusk. The two of them, though on close terms in the past, had only just reunited these past few days, and with everything so busy, they hadn’t had much time to talk at leisure — but now, with the wine loosening their tongues and the autumn wind blowing past, they ended up talking a good deal longer than usual.

“I’m not certain.” Ning Yi passed the wine flask to Qin Shaoqian. “But there are some things that are just one man’s opinion — worth chatting about idly, at least. These past few days, all kinds of news have been coming in from every direction — not just about where the Jurchen have advanced to, not just about the scorched-earth campaign. Ever since the Jurchen began their advance south, resistance has sprung up everywhere without pause. First there was Grandmaster Zhou Tong, leading more than seventy people to assassinate Wanyan Zonghan. Then, in the three garrison towns of Hebei, there was a small county called Shuanghe, where the magistrate Du Yongnian, in order to cover the evacuation of more than five thousand people, led over three hundred men to draw the Jurchen’s attention. Using the terrain to their advantage, they fought bitterly against more than five hundred Jurchen cavalry for two hours; after his entire force was wiped out, Du Yongnian was captured and brought before Wanyan Zongwang. Impressed by his valor, Zongwang spoke a few words to him — but Du Yongnian cursed him without pause from beginning to end, and was finally beheaded and put on public display.”

Ning Yi took another sip of wine as he spoke. “Then there was Gushan Stronghold in Hebei… originally just a bandit den, but you know, many of the men there still had family living in the villages below. When the Jurchen passed through, they put those villages to the torch. There were over a hundred men in the stronghold; under the leadership of their chief, Wang Cheng, they ambushed the main Jurchen force, charging straight at their central formation — in a single charge, every last one of them died. After Wang Cheng, Yang Xiao, head escort of the Yangwei Security Agency, dismissed his agency’s staff and family and then went alone to assassinate Wanyan Zongwang — he was one of Zhou Tong’s disciples. At the same time, the greenwood hero He Wang led more than a dozen skilled fighters in a separate attempt to assassinate Zongwang as well… these past few days, this sort of news has come in one after another without a break — I’ve had my people turn them into stories to spread. What does Second Young Master make of it, hearing all this?”

“That’s wonderful — every one of them a hero,” Qin Shaoqian said, his expression turning solemn, slapping his thigh in a show of respect. “If our Martial Dynasty can produce men like these, there’s still hope for us yet!”

“No — it’s precisely because such men have appeared that it shows the vast majority of people in this nation have failed to do what they ought to have done,” Ning Yi said, already carrying a touch of drunkenness, gesturing in the air with one finger. “The appearance of these heroes means that whatever dividends the Martial Dynasty accumulated through its positive efforts since its founding have already been completely squandered by those who came before.”