Chapter 105: Carnage in the Valley

Jinyang, West City.

On the ramparts, the guards keeping watch over the city caught sight of faint, flickering lights far off in the east. Given the distance, the fact that they were visible from the West City walls left the guards convinced that it could only be a large fire.

"Quick!"
"Go and report this to the lord at once!"

Amidst the shouts, several soldiers scrambled down from the walls, mounting their horses to disperse throughout the streets of the West City to spread the news.

Inside the Wen family residence:

"What? A fire?!"

Upon hearing the report, Wen Dayou threw off his quilt, scrambled out of bed, grabbed a robe, and rushed out the door. The household servants had already prepared his warhorse, and seeing him arrive, they hurriedly handed him the reins.

Under the cover of night, escorted by his men, Wen Dayou hurried to the city gate and climbed up to the ramparts, gazing toward the east. When he saw the distant, flickering glow, a trace of anxiety clouded his expression.

Just then, he noticed Zhang Pinggao, Xu Shixu, and others arriving behind him.

Wen Dayou did not speak immediately; instead, suppressing his unease, he raised his hands to salute the two men. After Zhang Pinggao and Xu Shixu returned the gesture, they looked out at the night sky in the east with expressions of bewilderment. Wen Dayou contained his inner turmoil.

"Zhen Di'er has split his forces to head south. It is highly likely that Fu Zihou is leading a night raid on the rebels from the East City!" Wen Dayou said to Zhang and Xu.

Upon hearing this, Zhang Pinggao and Xu Shixu exchanged glances. Had it been earlier, they would have scoffed at such a conjecture. According to the intelligence they had received, there were ten thousand rebel troops outside the East City, along with three thousand elite reinforcements. For the garrison of the East City to launch a night raid was, in their view, akin to seeking death.

However, since learning of the events across the Fen River—that Fu Zihou had personally beheaded Tu Ye, led his troops out for a night raid, and captured Xiang Yifeng—neither Zhang nor Xu dared to dismiss Wen Dayou’s speculation with the same certainty. After those previous events, both men had come to understand one thing: that young man across the river in the East City was truly terrifyingly fierce!

It was entirely possible that it was indeed Fu Zihou leading the night raid.

"According to the reports we received, Fu Zihou in the East City should not have known that Zhen Di'er had set an ambush," Xu Shixu said softly, casting a calm, sidelong glance at Wen Dayou.

"Indeed," Wen Dayou nodded. That was his greatest concern.

Launching a night raid on the rebel camp with the smaller force from the East City was already at a disadvantage. Furthermore, Zhen Di'er had left behind three thousand elite troops. The reason elites were called elites was due to their ferocity and courage, which far exceeded that of ordinary soldiers; they were more aggressive and fearless in battle. If Fu Zihou was unaware of this, Wen Dayou feared that he might be surrounded by the rebels.

"The most important thing now is to prevent the rebels outside the West City from crossing the river to reinforce them!" Wen Dayou remarked, looking toward Zhang Pinggao.

The ramparts were lined with torches. Zhang Pinggao naturally caught his gaze. After a moment of contemplation, he nodded in response to Wen Dayou’s unspoken request.

"If we discover that the rebel army outside the city has any intention of crossing the river, we can take the opportunity to launch a surprise attack!"

Zhang Pinggao’s tone was no longer as rigid as before. In the past, he had not held the same dislike for Fu Zihou as Pan Changwen did. His later dissatisfaction arose because, after being ambushed and losing General Pan Changwen, he had returned to the West City only to find Fu Zihou—who had always favored cowering behind the walls—suddenly ordering a scorched-earth policy without warning. His anger had instinctively vented upon Fu Zihou. His previous opposition to Wen Dayou was driven by rational caution; he had felt that sortieing was a senseless waste of life that would leave the West City vulnerable.

Now, however, he had no objection to stopping the rebels outside the West City from crossing the river to the east. The rebel army had split its forces to go south, and now only ten thousand rebels remained outside the West City. If even half of them attempted to cross, the West City could easily send troops to engage the remainder, and once the crossing force returned, they could simply retreat back into the city.

For a task with so little risk, Zhang Pinggao had no desire to escalate his conflict with Wen Dayou. Though the Zhang family of Taiyuan was a prestigious clan, Zhang Pinggao was not arrogant enough to think they could rival the Wen family.

"Good!" Wen Dayou exhaled in deep relief, looking out toward the distance and the faint, glimmering lights in the east.

***

At the Guo family residence, Jiang Baoyi, smelling strongly of wine, felt his long beard itch. He stirred and opened his eyes, blearily finding a woman on either side of him. It was only then that he remembered he had been drinking at the Guo residence and had inadvertently overindulged. Feeling the soft bodies in his arms, he couldn't help but feel a mix of amusement and frustration.

Earlier in the evening, hearing the Guo and Di families talk about how General Pan Changwen had been killed by the rebels, he had mused that, given his understanding of Emperor Yang Guang, he would surely be appointed as the Eagle-Yang General of Taiyuan. Thinking of his own background in the Tianshui Jiang clan and the fact that Yang Guang had sent him to Taiyuan, he had felt confident in this outcome and drank too much in his joy.

"Never again," he lamented. Just as he was about to return to sleep, he heard a commotion outside his door. Two breaths later, there was a knock.

"My Lord! My Lord!"

Jiang Baoyi initially wanted to ignore it, but he recognized the voice of his servant and sensed an unusual urgency in his tone. He thought for a moment.

"What is it?" Jiang Baoyi asked. He felt the women in his arms stir, clearly awakened.

"My Lord, the guards on the city walls report that they have spotted lights in the rebel camp across the river!"

***

Outside the door, the servant continued. "Lights?"

Hearing this, Jiang Baoyi was stunned. He immediately realized what lights in the rebel camp implied. He abruptly pulled his arms from the women and scrambled out of bed in a hurry.

***

Deep within the canyons of the Taihang Mountains:

Having calculated the time and seeing that the forward camp had sent no one to report, Fu Zihou led Hu Jinyuan and the others to strike the rebel camp.

It was the middle of the night, and the rebel sentries were already drowsy. Before they could react, they were struck down by arrows. On the watchtower, a rebel soldier was struck in the neck by an arrow from Qi Lingyang, who was concealed in the darkness. Without a sound, the soldier retreated two steps and slowly slumped against the wooden railing.

"Kill!" Fu Zihou whispered. He drew his sword and led Hu Jinyuan and the others past the corpses at the gate, charging directly into the camp.

Patrolling rebels had no time to react before Fu Zihou and his men were upon them.

"Enemy attack!"
"Help! Enemy attack!!!"

The rebels shouted in panic. One rebel soldier swung a long halberd with all his might to drive them back, but Hu Jinyuan stepped forward, sword in both hands, to block the strike. Before the rebel could recover, Fu Zihou lunged forward and swung his sword with such force that he severed the soldier's entire arm.

"Ah!!!"

The rebel soldier’s eyes widened, his screams of agony mixing with his terror as he stared at his spurting stump. Fu Zihou’s face was splashed with blood, but he stepped forward and delivered a final strike to the soldier's neck, sending him collapsing to the ground.

Other soldiers had already swarmed into the tents, slaughtering the drunk and dreaming rebels inside.

"Enemy attack!!!"

Those rebels who remained clear-headed and resisted shouted frantically, but as they saw Sui soldiers surging out of the darkness from all sides, they realized the camp was surrounded. With no ties to bind them and no reason to fight to the death, and seeing that many of their own commanders were too drunk to wake, more and more rebels lost the will to fight. They either hid or fled.

"Enemy attack!"

In the command tent, Liang Dan was in the middle of a pleasant dream—a dream where the Liang family became one of the great clans of the realm. Suddenly, he heard the faint, distant shouts.

"Hmm?"

He opened his eyes, bleary and frowning. Having risen from a man of no power, he was finally experiencing the taste of status. He was currently fretting over how to establish his authority, having already courted the generals in the camp and preparing to test them. He remembered the instructions of his uncle, Xuan Mo—also known to the world as Liang Shidu—who had told him that one must possess both benevolence and might to control the army. He held his uncle in immense admiration, unaware that the latter's dismissal from office had been a calculated move.

"Ah!"
"Kill!!!"

Liang Dan noticed the flickering lights outside the tent. Hearing the sounds of slaughter, he finally shook off his drunkenness and realized something was terribly wrong.

Why was there fighting?

He jumped up, ignoring the woman on the bed, and rushed toward the entrance. Remembering something, he stopped to grab his sword from the wooden rack.

Inside the rebel camp, torches were being knocked over and tents set ablaze. Sui soldiers were everywhere, cutting down the unprepared rebels.

"Kill!"
"Kill!!!"

Even the elite rebels had not expected a night raid. Having drunk heavily, they found themselves without armor, scrambling to find weapons. But against the Sui soldiers—who were seasoned veterans of the Eagle-Yang Prefectures—the rebels were no match. Even those who found weapons were either killed or put to flight by the sheer ruthlessness of the Sui troops.

"Get out of my way!"

A burly rebel captain parried a strike from a Sui soldier and shoved him aside. He nearly fell himself; in other circumstances, his strength would have allowed him to throw the soldier down, but the heavy drinking had left him weak. Seeing the carnage around him, he dared not linger.

As he turned to flee, he saw a young man standing not far away, watching him. The boy slowly sheathed his sword and drew a saber.

Although the rebel captain did not know why the boy carried both a sword and a saber, he knew he had to kill him to escape. Gritting his teeth, he charged at the youth.

Fu Zihou watched the burly rebel rushing at him, recalling the saber techniques taught to him by the elderly blind man and the lessons of Old Liu. Both had taught him the same truth: there is no place better than the battlefield to improve. Any method of killing must be tempered through the act itself; years of repetition and thousands of strikes all lead to an epiphany in the moment of death.

Ten paces, five paces, three paces...

Seeing Fu Zihou standing motionless with his saber held in both hands, the captain, who had been on high alert, grew increasingly savage, a confident smile appearing in his eyes. Within three paces, he believed that a full-force strike would be impossible for the boy to dodge or block.

Under the captain's gaze, Fu Zihou slowly closed his eyes.

"You're courting death!"

Seeing this, the captain was incredulous, then ecstatic, thinking the boy had been frozen by fear. But the next moment, as he launched his full-force strike, he found that the boy had dodged to the side with his eyes still closed.

"How is this possible..."

The captain’s eyes were filled with shock. Before he could think further, he looked at the boy and prepared to swing his sword again, but a flash of light crossed his vision. A chilling sensation flooded his neck, and his mind went cold. The captain opened his mouth to breathe, but could not move. The world spun, and as he fell, his final sight was his own headless body a few paces away.

"Ah!"

The surrounding rebels watched this scene in horror. As the young man with the blood-stained saber slowly opened his eyes, the rebels trembled, gripped by the terror of his prowess.

"Don't kill me!"

As the first rebel dropped his weapon and knelt, others followed, begging for mercy. Some, hoping to escape, tried to flee, only to become targets for the pursuing Sui soldiers.

"Kill!"
"Kill!!!"

Fu Zihou walked forward, watching his men chase down the rebels and burn the tents to illuminate the camp. Before long, he reached the vicinity of the command tent, where twenty or so rebels were shielding a man holding a sword.

Though he had never seen the rebel commander, Fu Zihou guessed his identity. In the eyes of the rebels, he bent down, picked up three long halberds from the ground, and hurled them with all his might.

Under Old Liu’s guidance, Fu Zihou had long since mastered the throwing of long weapons. One halberd missed, but the other two struck the fire braziers, knocking them to the ground. As the light dimmed, Liang Dan and the remaining rebels saw Fu Zihou charging at them with his saber.

"Kill him!" Liang Dan ordered, pointing his sword at Fu Zihou.

The other rebels saw only three or four Sui soldiers behind Fu Zihou and, exchanging glances, charged at him with their weapons.

"Kill!!!"

In the heat of the clash, Fu Zihou dodged a thrust from the first rebel, leaped into the air, and brought his blade down. The rebel was cleaved to the ground, blood splashing everywhere. A second rebel tried to strike, but Fu Zihou had already followed up with a second strike, forcing him to block in panic.

The rebels had assumed that because Fu Zihou was not a burly man, his strength would be limited. But the moment they clashed, an irresistible force crushed down, driving the blade through their swords and into their shoulders.

Fu Zihou pulled his saber free, his hands moving with fluid precision.

"Kill!"

Three more rebels charged. Fu Zihou parried, dodged, and unleashed his power through his feet, ankles, waist, and arms. With a single-handed, spinning strike, he lopped off the arm and head of a rebel before their eyes.

"Ah!"

The surrounding rebels retreated instinctively in terror at the sight of the headless, armless corpse. Three rebels had charged; one was dead, another was cut down by a follow-up strike, and the last was so terrified he scrambled backward.

In the flickering, dim light, the rebels looked at the young warrior standing with his saber pointed at them. No one dared to step forward.

"Kill!!!"

As the shouts of the Sui army drew closer, the remaining rebels realized the rest of the camp was lost. They abandoned Liang Dan and fled into the darkness. Protecting Liang Dan had been a fantasy for wealth, but with the appearance of this young demon, they knew that saving their own lives was the priority. Wealth was worthless without a life to enjoy it.

Liang Dan watched in horror as his men fled. Having learned some martial arts to emulate his uncle, he steeled himself and swung his sword. He hoped for a surprise strike, but felt his blade clash against the saber. As sparks flew, he heard the sound of a sword being drawn.

The next moment, he felt a sharp pain in the back of his hand and instinctively dropped his sword. As the blade clattered to the ground, a cold edge was pressed against his throat.

Liang Dan clutched his bleeding hand, gasping for breath as he looked at the expressionless boy holding the sword to his neck.

"Captain!"
"Captain!!"

As the rebels scattered, the Sui soldiers ran to Fu Zihou's side.

"Captain!"

Liang Dan heard their shouts and looked at the young Sui warrior in shock. He was a captain? So young?

Suddenly, a realization struck him, and his pupils contracted in terror.

These were the defenders of the East City! This young Sui general was the one Zhen Di'er and Yang Boyue had spoken of—the Fenwu Lieutenant of the East City, Fu Zihou!