In early March of the eleventh year of the Wu Dynasty’s Jianshuo era, Wanyan Zongfu’s eastern army main force, after more than two months of low-intensity fighting and siege preparation, gathered the surrounding Han troops and launched a full assault on Jiangning. Some Han troops were recalled, while large numbers of additional Han forces continued crossing the river; by mid-to-late March, the assembled attacking force had swelled at one point to as many as five hundred thousand men.

Meanwhile, the Wulie Battalion already garrisoned at Jiangning, Han Shizhong’s Zhenhai Army, and nearby Jiang-Huai forces had likewise been steadily converging on Jiangning throughout this period. As the scale of the fighting continued to expand, this spring at the start of the new year drew everyone’s attention.

Just before the great battle began, a small incident had already erupted in the moments before swords were truly drawn. Tracing this incident back to its roots, it began, more or less, in January of that year.

With the Huaxia Army’s traitor-purge declaration issued, the struggle over choosing sides had grown fierce, and public calls to execute traitors had grown louder. Some among the wavering stopped deliberating altogether, but as the pressure to choose sides intensified, Jurchen persuaders had also stepped up their covert activity, even deliberately staging “tragedies” to pressure those already wavering within the army into making a decision quickly.

An official in Jiangning surnamed Hou, responsible for the Ground-Listening Bureau, was turned in exactly this way. During the great battle, the Ground-Listening Bureau was tasked with monitoring underground activity, guarding against enemy tunnels being dug into the city. This official, named Hou Yuntong, was not himself an especially wicked man, but his family — father and elder brother — had long maintained ties with the Jurchen side, amassing considerable wealth and land and keeping servants for years with Jurchen assistance. Under these circumstances, the Jurchens seized his son and daughter, then used evidence of his collusion together with his children’s lives as leverage to force his cooperation regarding their tunneling plans.

In February, Han Shizhong’s side confirmed this twice — the first report coming from a mysterious informant (confirmed years later to have been Puyang Yi, then in charge of Jiangning’s affairs, whose deputy, a man named Liu Jing, had served as prefectural secretary in Jiangning for several years) — and the second confirmation coming from Hou Yuntong’s own surrender in mid-February.

Turning himself in under these circumstances all but guaranteed his children’s deaths, and likely would bring him little benefit either. But over the years of this war, such cases were, in truth, hardly isolated.

Between February and April of that year, the Wu Dynasty and the Huaxia Army made several attempts to rescue Hou Yuntong’s children, all ultimately failing; his children died on the third of April, his other family members having already been killed before that; on the seventh of April, after their dismembered bodies were found outside Jiangning, Hou Yuntong hanged himself in an open field. Amid this tide that had already claimed millions of lives, his fate was recorded afterward only because of the critical position he’d held — for him personally, it likely meant nothing at all.

In response to the Jurchen attempt to breach the city through tunnels, Han Shizhong’s side chose to turn the scheme against them. By mid-February, nearby forces had already begun converging on Jiangning; on the twenty-eighth, the Jurchen side launched their assault using the tunnel as their opening, and Han Shizhong, deploying both troops and naval forces, launched a surprise attack that same day on Mawenyuan, the eastern army’s sole remaining crossing point over the Yangtze — willing to pay almost any price to eliminate the Jurchen naval force stationed on the river.

Years earlier, during the Mountain-and-Sea Search campaign, the Jurchens, unfamiliar with naval warfare as a northern people, had ultimately trapped Wuzhu at Huangtian Marsh for over forty days — a humiliation that still stung to this day. Afterward, the Jurchens had pushed the southern Han troops near the Grand Canal to develop a navy of their own, with Jin forces overseeing the effort and considerable investment of both technicians and money. Last year’s naval battle on the Yangtze had gone in the Wu Dynasty’s favor overall, though without delivering a decisive blow; by year’s end, the Jurchens had taken advantage of the Yangtze’s low water levels to lash boats together into a floating bridge and force a crossing, finally opening a route through near Jiangning.

Now, with the Jurchen navy stationed near Mawenyuan west of Jiangning, maintaining the north-south crossing, this represented the greatest vulnerability in the Jurchen position. It was for this reason that Han Shizhong turned the enemy’s scheme against them, launching a surprise strike even as the Jurchens believed their own plan was succeeding.

Somewhat dramatically, Han Shizhong’s move was likewise detected by the Jurchens, and facing a prepared enemy force, he was ultimately forced to withdraw. Both sides traded blows at the end of February, and by March, the fighting had escalated into open, large-scale conflict on the battlefield proper.

The clash of arms on the battlefield concealed, like smoke, a great deal that went unseen — no one could say how many hidden currents churned beneath the surface. By March, the situation in Lin’an had grown even more chaotic. Outside the city, Wuzhu’s forces roamed freely, burning and killing everything around Lin’an, even breaking through and torching several county seats; within fifty li north of the Qiantang River, everything but the relief forces marching to the capital’s aid had been reduced to ruins. At times Wuzhu deliberately sent cavalry to harass the defenses, and when great columns of smoke rose outside the walls, half of Lin’an could see it plainly.

Rumors circulated privately, and the seemingly calm city of Lin’an was like a red-hot iron pan — though this heat could only truly be felt by those in the upper-middle tiers of Lin’an society.

In mid-March, in a garden courtyard on one side of Lin’an, the ornamental hills and waters had already taken on spring’s fresh green hue; the willows had put out new shoots, ducks paddled in the water, and in the afternoon sunlight, Qin Hui walked through the garden with an elderly man of dignified bearing.

“North of Solitary Hill Temple, west of Jia Pavilion, the water’s surface just level, the clouds hanging low. In several spots, early orioles compete for the warm trees; whose new swallows peck at the spring mud?… This year’s spring in Lin’an has been the poorest yet — last month’s cold snap, I thought all the flowers and trees would freeze to death… but even so, in the end, they still grew back. All living things striving to survive, so tenacious — it moves one to both sigh and take comfort…”

Stopping before a tree, the old man patted its trunk as he spoke this. Qin Hui stood beside him, hands clasped behind his back, smiling. “Master Mei speaks with great insight.”

The old man addressed as Master Mei smiled. “Brother Huizhi has been quite busy lately.”

“The real busy work is being done at the front lines fighting. My own daily errands are nothing but trivial matters.” Qin Hui spread his hands with a smile. “In any case, when Master Mei summoned me, I came right away.”

“Brother Huizhi is a pillar of the court, and at such a critical time besides — for an idle old fool like myself to summon you so abruptly is truly improper. But given the current state of affairs, I have some doubts in my heart, and wished to seek Brother Huizhi’s counsel — hence my presumptuous invitation…”

“Ah, setting aside the decades of friendship between Master Mei and myself, with your talents, if you wished to take office again, how simple it would be. The whole court has long hoped Master Mei would come out of retirement. Since you’ve brought it up, I ought to…”

“That matter can be set aside.” The other man waved his hand with a smile, then a complicated expression crossed his face. “The court these past years has fallen into the hands of the ignorant and unworthy; I am old now, without the strength to contend with them anymore. But you, Brother Huizhi, have risen and fallen several times these past years — quite something to sigh over. Ever since His Majesty fell out with the assembled officials, you’ve remained the one most often summoned into the palace for counsel, haven’t you?”

“Ah.” Qin Hui sighed. “His Majesty… it’s simply that his heart is troubled with anxiety.”

“What is Brother Huizhi’s own view of the current situation?”

“If we can hold on, our Wu Dynasty may yet enjoy a few years of peace.”

“And if we cannot hold on?” The old man fixed his gaze on Qin Hui’s face.

Qin Hui looked back at him. “Does Master Mei mean something particular by that?”

The old man spread his hands, and the two continued walking forward. “The situation in the capital has grown this chaotic; those who speak privately inevitably bring up such matters — hearts have already grown unsettled, that much is plain. Huizhi, you and I have known each other many years, so I won’t hold back with you. As I see this battle in Jiangnan, I’d say the odds of victory are barely fifty-fifty, if that — perhaps thirty-seventy at best, thirty in our favor, seventy for the Jurchens. As for what becomes of the Wu Dynasty then — His Majesty so often summons you for counsel, surely this must have come up.”

The old man came straight to the point. Qin Hui, hands behind his back, fell silent for a moment as they walked. “Hearts within the capital have grown chaotic, and that too is partly the work of Jurchen agents sowing confusion. On the other hand… Master Mei, since mid-February, there’s also been a rumor circulating throughout Lin’an that the Jin emperor Wuqimai’s illness has worsened considerably up north, and that his days may be numbered — perhaps, if our Wu Dynasty can just hold on a little longer, we may yet weather this.”

“Don’t try to deceive me, Huizhi. That news came from the Black Banner’s own people — the Princess Imperial’s estate is likely only too happy to let it spread, whether or not it’s true, is anyone’s guess… But the news the Jurchens themselves have put out may not be false either.”

“Master Mei, this is simply how people’s hearts work — what does it matter, true or false? Believe it true, and it’s true; believe it false, and it’s false. Subverting hearts and minds is, after all, that demon in the southwest’s specialty as well… If everyone can be deceived long enough to hold out a few more months, perhaps the Jurchens really will collapse without even needing to fight. That would be a fine thing indeed.”

Birds flew overhead in the courtyard; ducks glided across the pond, quacking as they departed. The two men walking in the sunlight both smiled without giving anything away. The old man sighed. “…I did in fact want to bring up the demon in the heart. Brother Huizhi, you have old ties to the southwest — can you truly set that matter aside so easily? Given your earlier proposal to strike the southwest first and defend against the Jurchens second, the southwest is unlikely to let you off easily.”

“Affairs of state are affairs of state; personal grudges are personal grudges.” Qin Hui turned his head aside. “Is Master Mei perhaps speaking on the Jurchens’ behalf?”

“Hardly that.” The old man’s expression remained unchanged. “This old body of mine has reached its final years — these bones could be thrown on the fire tomorrow for all it matters. But there are still unworthy children and grandchildren in my household, and there are certain things I’d like to ask Brother Huizhi about in advance. This is a small selfish concern of mine, and I hope Brother Huizhi will understand.” As he said this, he gave a light, respectful bow. “Setting aside the matter of surrendering to the Jin — if the overall situation truly cannot be sustained, what would be the way out? One would like to have some idea in advance. The Jurchens have made their position known: if we wish to negotiate peace, the court must cede a thousand li west of Xiangyang and Fancheng, to allow Nian Han to strike the southwest — this proposal may well not be false, and if matters truly become hopeless, it wouldn’t be a bad way out. But His Majesty’s own mind, these days, hangs largely on your counsel, Brother Huizhi. I won’t hide it from you — my second son died at the hands of Black Banner bandits during the Battle of Xiaocang River years ago. Should such a thing come to pass, I would welcome it.”

Having said this, the old man’s face was the very picture of heartfelt candor. Qin Hui hesitated a long while before finally speaking. “…The Jurchens are wolves with wild ambitions, Master Mei — how can they be trusted?”

By the time he left the old man’s residence that day, Qin Hui had revealed no further intentions or plans. He had always been a man of extremely tight lips; many things had long since been decided in his mind, but he simply never spoke of them. In truth, ever since Zhou Yong had begun seeking his counsel, many people had sought audiences with him each day, and amid all this, he watched quietly as sentiment within the capital continued to shift.

Since the Wu Dynasty’s move south, Qin Hui had gradually risen to the top of the court’s officialdom, though not without several reversals along the way — particularly the campaign against the southwest two years prior, which had nearly cost him the emperor’s favor entirely. On the court floor, men like Zhao Ding had seized the opportunity to attack him, and even opportunistic upstarts like Long Qifei had tried to trample him on their way up — that had been the most dangerous period of his career. Fortunately, by now, the emperor — his mind grown ever more extreme — had come to trust him more deeply, and Qin Hui had gradually recovered his standing.

But this restored prestige brought Qin Hui no real joy. With the state of the realm as it now stood, any minister worth his salt could only feel as though he stood over a boiling cauldron of oil.

If one spoke of ambitions in office, Qin Hui certainly wished to be the sort of capable minister who could single-handedly right a collapsing heaven. He had once admired Qin Siyuan, though he’d also warned him, back in his day, against his reckless, unyielding forward charge — while Qin Siyuan still held office in the capital, Qin Hui had repeatedly hinted, obliquely, that many matters were deeply interconnected and had to be handled with patience and care, but Qin Siyuan had never taken the advice to heart. After his death, Qin Hui had lamented it privately — but in the end, it only proved that he himself had understood the affairs of the world more clearly.

Had the rules of this world been otherwise, why would he have had to kill so outstanding a student as Luo Jinyan?

But his having stood aside when Qin Siyuan fell had, at the time, brought certain unfavorable consequences nonetheless. After Prince Kang ascended, his son and daughter had proven remarkably capable — with their father’s backing, Zhou Pei and Zhou Junwu had accomplished a great deal, drawing on the strength of the old Jiangning faction and deeply influenced by the late Qin Siyuan. Though they had never formally rehabilitated Qin Siyuan’s reputation once they came into power, the officials they most relied upon were, for the most part, former disciples of the Qin faction. Though Qin Hui shared a distant clan relationship with Qin Siyuan that might have opened some door, his having stood apart during Qin Siyuan’s downfall meant that Zhou Pei and her brother had never made any particular effort to draw close to him — and even when Qin Hui himself had tried to approach them, they had shown him no special warmth in return.

If given the choice, Qin Hui would have preferred, above all, to grow close to Crown Prince Jun Wu. The prince’s fearless, forward-charging character reminded Qin Hui of Luo Jinyan in his day — if only he had guided Luo Jinyan better back then, with better communication between them, perhaps things might have turned out differently. But Jun Wu disliked him, treating his careful, patient guidance as nothing more than the tedious moralizing of an old pedant, no different from anyone else’s — and in the years since, the young crown prince had spent most of his time in Jiangning, leaving Qin Hui little opportunity to draw closer even had he wished to. All he could do was sigh.

The young crown prince was different from Luo Jinyan — his rank and standing gave him the means to charge forward fearlessly, but sooner or later, he too would fall. Qin Hui understood this clearly, just as he had understood, from the very start, how Qin Siyuan’s story would end. The Wu Dynasty’s troubles ran deep and tangled, its accumulated ills already severe — like a patient gravely ill, whose condition had progressed too far. The young crown prince, fiery and impulsive by nature, was simply being pushed to exert himself, to draw out every last reserve of strength — something an ordinary healthy man might manage, but which would kill a man already this sick. If not for exactly this reason, why would he have had to kill Luo Jinyan back then?

Such was fate, such was destiny — in the end, he himself had missed his chance back then. A crown prince who might genuinely have become a wise and virtuous ruler had instead turned out, in this moment, less prudent and self-aware than his own father, the current emperor.

As for Master Mei, the Princess Imperial’s estate, and the Black Banner agents within the city working desperately to spread word and bolster morale — however fierce the fighting raged, the struggling masses could only see the small patch of ground immediately before them. If that demon-slayer Ning in the southwest were here, he might well understand what weighed on Qin Hui’s mind — at the very least, not far to the north, that Jurchen Valley Spirit, quietly orchestrating everything from the shadows, surely understood all of this with perfect clarity.

All Qin Hui could do was close his eyes and wait quietly for what was destined to come. When that moment arrived, if he held authority firmly in his own hands, perhaps he might yet secure some thread of survival for the Wu Dynasty.

Even if the situation proved truly hopeless…

These past many days, this thought — the one most often whispered privately in his own mind — kept flashing through his head. Even if the situation proved hopeless, at least he himself would stand on unassailable ground… This answer flickered through his thoughts, but he quickly drove the unseemly notion from his mind.

With a soft sigh, Qin Hui lifted the carriage curtain, watching the city pass by, alive with the stirrings of spring — Lin’an’s spring scenery as beautiful as a painting. Only, dusk was drawing near.

April brought rain. Riders wrapped in black straw rain-capes galloped across the low, rolling hills; in the distance lay untilled fields, abandoned villages, human corpses sprawled along the roadside, disheveled crows lifting their heads from the bodies to fix their ominous gazes on the passing riders.

In an ordinary year, the land of Jiangnan would already have turned lush and green by now.

The cavalry column crossed this ridge and pressed onward; before long, the outline of a military encampment came into view, and a patrol approached. Both sides exchanged passwords in the Jurchen tongue, and the patrol stood aside, watching this column of some three hundred riders pass through toward the camp.

The riders were a motley collection of striking figures, fierce of countenance, many bearing wounds. At their head rode Wanyan Qingjue, his face pale, his injured left arm wrapped in bandages and hung in a sling around his neck.

The camp stretched out in orderly rows, section by section; toward the middle lay a somewhat livelier area, where supplies were distributed, captured women kept, and Jurchen soldiers traded treasures looted from the south — a soldier’s paradise of sorts. Wanyan Qingjue raised a hand to halt the column, then smiled and told the others there was no need to follow further — the wounded should head to the infirmary first, while the rest could take his token and go enjoy themselves as they pleased.

This time, having crossed the Yangtze, the Jurchens had come not for slaves or captives, and so killed far more than they captured. Still, southern women of exceptional beauty were sometimes seized and brought into the camps to serve the soldiers’ leisure hours; such quarters within the camp were frequented mostly by officers, always in high demand. But Wanyan Qingjue’s men held considerably high status, carrying the young prince’s token, and so were given priority in all such matters — the men cheerfully praised the young prince’s generosity as they dispersed, laughing among themselves.

Wanyan Qingjue continued deeper into the camp as the light summer rain gradually let up. He entered the central command tent, first bowing in greeting; Wanyan Xiyin, who was cross-referencing several intelligence reports against the map spread on the table, looked up, glanced at him once, and said nothing about his injured arm.

“How did it go?”

“Reporting to my teacher, there are some results.”

As he spoke, Wanyan Qingjue drew two sealed letters from inside his robe and handed them to Xiyin. Xiyin opened them and read through silently, then put them away, his gaze returning to the map on the table, lips moving slightly as he worked through calculations in his mind. The tent remained silent for nearly a quarter hour; Wanyan Qingjue stood to one side, not daring to make a sound.

“What happened to your arm?” Xiyin finally spoke, after a long while.

“Ran into a Black Banner group near Changning. Someone ambushed me and I fell from my horse — nothing serious.” Wanyan Qingjue answered simply. He understood his teacher’s temperament well enough — though renowned for his scholarly reputation, Xiyin was, in truth, ruthlessly militant by nature, with no interest in hearing about a minor injury like a broken arm.

The skirmish near Changning had, in fact, been nothing of great consequence. The group he’d encountered, suspected to be Black Banner operatives, had proven poorly trained; the two sides had clashed briefly before going their separate ways. Wanyan Qingjue had wanted to pursue, but in the confusion had taken a hidden shot from a musket — a bullet fired from who-knew-where had grazed his thigh and thrown his warhorse to the ground, breaking his arm in the fall.

Xiyin nodded, hands clasped behind his back, acknowledging this.

“You’ve returned at just the right time. The rain has stopped — come walk with me.”

Wanyan Qingjue bowed and followed him out of the tent. Outside, with the light rain just ended, the early-summer sky revealed a bright streak of light. The old man walked forward. “Zongfu’s assault on Jiangning has already seized the Wu Dynasty’s attention. The young crown prince wanted to pin us down, but has now been repelled twice, his reserves running thin. But the surrounding areas have already been picked clean of food — he’s now guarding against us pushing south from Changzhou to forage among the people… As for Lin’an, sentiment there is anxious, and plenty are wavering — but to truly break their nerve, we’re still missing the single most crucial piece…”

Xiyin spoke more as if to himself, his tone flat and matter-of-fact, yet without any hint of confusion. Wanyan Qingjue followed close behind, listening, and finally asked, “Has my teacher settled on a plan?”

Xiyin shook his head without looking at him. “What’s happened recently reminds me of the world twenty or thirty years ago — when we followed the late emperor, followed the great marshal in rising up, fighting hundreds of thousands of Liao’s elite troops. Back then, we simply pressed forward without hesitation. The reputation of the Jurchens being ‘unbeatable at ten thousand strong’ was earned in those years. In the decade or two since, it’s only in these recent years that we’ve come to constantly speak of things like public sentiment, persuasion, rumor, secret dealings, deceiving others…”

A column of soldiers passed by; their leader saluted, and Xiyin waved a hand in acknowledgment, his gaze complicated and heavy. “Qingjue — have I told you about the Wu Dynasty before?”

“My teacher has told me many things.”

“Back then…” Xiyin recalled those years past. “Back when we had only just risen up, we often heard tell of a great nation to the south — wealthy and prosperous, its people refined and courteous, following the teachings of Confucian civilization, its scholarship profound and benefiting all under heaven. I studied Han learning from childhood, and like everyone around me, held it in reverent awe. When the Wu Dynasty sent envoys wishing to ally with us against Liao, both the late emperor and I were overjoyed beyond measure. Who could have known… later, seeing the Wu Dynasty’s many flaws up close, doubt crept into our hearts… doubt slowly turned to mockery, and mockery, gradually, into contempt. In reclaiming the Sixteen Prefectures of Yan-Yun, their forces proved feeble, yet they schemed endlessly, court officials scheming against one another, each believing himself unmatched in cunning. Later, they surrendered Zhang Jue to us for execution; Guo Yaoshi, a truly talented man, joined the Wu Dynasty only to grow disheartened in the end. As the late emperor lay dying, he said that with Liao’s conquest complete, taking the Wu Dynasty next was only natural…”

“Qingjue.” Xiyin walked along the camp road toward a small rise. “Now it’s our turn to play at scheming and cunning. Tell me — does this make us clever? Or does it make us weak and soft…”

“…It must be weakness.” Wanyan Qingjue answered. “Though, as my teacher has also said before, for the Jin state to grow strong, it could never rely on military force to suppress everything from the start. If our great Jin, over these twenty years, had ruled by force alone from beginning to end, I fear it would only collapse all the faster someday.”

Several years after the Mountain-and-Sea Search campaign, the Jin state had drifted into a carefree, pleasure-seeking decline; it was only the disastrous battle at Xiaocang River, with the deaths of Loushi and Cibushi, that had jolted the Jurchen leadership awake like a thunderclap. This was hardly the first time Xiyin and Zonghan had discussed such matters. Xiyin’s musing was not truly a question, and Wanyan Qingjue’s answer did not seem to fully register with him either. A breeze, still carrying the freshness of the recent rain, blew across the low rise; Jiangnan’s mountains were not tall, and from here, one could take in an entire valley filled from end to end with military encampments, rain-dampened banners scattered across the terrain. Xiyin gazed out over all of it, his expression grave.

After a long while, he finally spoke. “Have you heard about the situation in Yunzhong?”

Wanyan Qingjue hesitated slightly. “…I’ve heard that someone’s been spreading rumors privately, that the eastern and western factions… are about to come to blows?”

“Last year, someone killed Shi Li’ai’s grandson in Yunzhong Prefecture and tried to pin the blame on Zongfu — that made no sense from the start. This year, someone has been spreading rumors far and wide, that once the Wu Dynasty’s affairs are settled, conflict between east and west is inevitable, urging people below to prepare early — that if they don’t stay alert, the other side is already sharpening its blades. By the end of last year it was still just a few minor frictions at the lower levels; this year, some among the upper ranks have begun getting dragged into it as well.”

“Several of Dayuan Xi’s business dealings were intercepted — it was Wanyan Hongxin’s man, Shi Dong, who moved against him, claiming that henceforth the slave trade east and west needed to be divided into separate territories to avoid future disputes — but this too was the work of provocateurs, preparing both sides for a two-front war. The matter’s still being negotiated, but already the Xi and Han peoples under these two men’s command have clashed several times — once causing an uproar in Yunzhong itself, provoking Shi Li’ai to genuine fury… But so long as people actually believe these rumors, he’ll only exhaust himself running around trying to suppress it, and won’t be able to.”

The old man’s brow furrowed, his tone calm, yet already a killing intent had begun spreading outward from his words. Wanyan Qingjue could sense the danger in all this. “Someone is deliberately sowing discord…”

Xiyin’s gaze turned westward. “The Black Banner has made its move. Whoever they’ve sent to handle affairs in the north is no ordinary operative. Using the rumors of Zongfu pressuring Shi Li’ai as their opening, they’ve worked from the very bottom up… For matters like this, the upper ranks dare not, and will not, act rashly — even if Shi Li’ai lost a grandson, he would never make a great public fuss over it. But those below don’t know the full truth, and seeing others prepare for conflict, they all want to strike first before being struck. Once the lower ranks start fighting, the middle and upper ranks get dragged in too — as with Dayuan Xi and Shi Dong, already come to blows — who wants to be the one to back down now? If Shi Li’ai steps in personally, the matter will only grow larger still. You would do well to study these methods carefully, Qingjue…”

“…Yes.”

Xiyin continued walking forward, breathing in the crisp air after the rain, then exhaling slowly, his mind turning over the matter, his eyes losing none of their gravity.

“…The battle for Jiangning has already drawn away a great deal of our troops.” He seemed to be speaking to himself. “Zongfu, at my request, has already sent Alubao to bring us all the remaining ‘Heavenly Maiden Scattering Flowers’ rockets and the remaining trebuchet equipment. Our supplies have been badly depleted after several major engagements here; the Wu Dynasty believes I intend to strike Changzhou, break the city to replenish food and materiel before pushing south toward Lin’an. That would certainly be one viable path — and so the Wu Dynasty has stationed one hundred thirty thousand troops to defend Changzhou, while the young crown prince holds Zhenjiang with a hundred thousand men.”

Xiyin paused, looking down at his own aging hands. “Our army numbers fifty thousand, against their hundred thousand on one side and hundred thirty thousand on the other… Had this been ten years ago, I would not have hesitated for a moment. And besides…” he added, “among these fifty thousand, thirty thousand are Tushanwei.”

Before he finished speaking, Wanyan Qingjue behind him had already grasped what his teacher meant, and understood too the source of the old man’s sigh. A cool breeze drifted gently past, carrying Xiyin’s next words away on the wind, spoken as though it were nothing at all.

“In half a month’s time, Yinshuke, General Alubao, and I will take Zhenjiang, whatever the cost.”

The old man walked slowly onward, sighing softly. “After this battle, the fate of the Wu Dynasty… will finally be settled.”