Chapter 152

Chapter 152

A silent purge swept through the counties and towns near the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion. The Vanguard Battalion infiltrated the hidden sentry posts, taking out the guards without a word. Some tried to release carrier pigeons to send word, but the Vanguard Battalion's mounted archers, already waiting outside, cut them off immediately.

Qi Hanzhou drew his bow and loosed an arrow, dropping a man trying to flee through the woods. After the hit, he spun his horse around and vanished into the forest. The Vanguard soldiers marveled at his sharp eyes—how he could spot a man hiding so deep in the dark.

"How does Junior General Qi know where their sentries pass messages..."

"Too dangerous—if we hadn't taken out two posts simultaneously, the message would have gotten out."

The Crown Prince's letter only mentioned a few key locations, but Ye Xuanjiu knew that often just those few points were enough. The Junior General had spent years in the capital, by imperial order dismantling countless court surveillance posts—those of top officials, of foreign invaders. In his years with the Embroidered Uniform Guard, the Junior General knew these covert networks better than anyone.

One sentry post connected to a whole web of scouts and spies.

To move in silence, both the posts and the scouts had to be eliminated simultaneously, so word wouldn't leak out.

"With this post cleared, all the sentry points mentioned in the Crown Prince's letter are taken care of." Ye Xuanjiu didn't know how the Crown Prince had obtained such intelligence—intel that would cripple the Secret Faction if even one post were lost. The Crown Prince had never shared any of this with them.

Qi Hanzhou knew Ying Fusheng had his own methods, as he always had.

He didn't pry further, instead gazing toward the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion. "We rest for an hour."

"Within three days, the mastermind behind this should have caught on."

Inside the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion, guards got word and hurried to the main hall. By the time they arrived, a bunch of advisors had already gathered. Two days earlier, they'd noticed that messengers from the mansion hadn't returned. The heir had immediately sent men out to investigate upon discovering the situation. The mansion's sentry network spanned the entire southern region, stretching from western Shu down through much of Jiangnan. Now that messages were delayed and not arriving, their posts were clearly compromised.

"The mansion's sentry posts are managed by dedicated personnel—how could they keep failing one after another at a time like this?" An advisor was shocked. In warfare and strategy, sentry posts were everything. Even if one got discovered by accident, another would take its place. Unless several posts disappeared within just two days, this situation was inexplicable.

The Prince of Pingnan's Heir merely glanced at the gathered intelligence and said coldly, "The posts are all blown."

"But—" The advisor tried to continue but was shut up by the heir's icy glare. The heir said, "But what? Sending more scouts when we're already exposed—do you want to expose even more?"

The mansion had a problem.

Or more precisely, his intelligence network did.

The Prince of Pingnan's Heir looked at the sand table toward Jiangcheng. In this game of chess and power, he wanted to capture the Crown Prince of Dayuan alive and tear apart Ying Fusheng's southern strategy. But the other side had countered with a move of their own—destroying the mansion's sentry posts without making a big show of it. The goal was to sow doubt among the scouts, inside and outside the mansion, about the reliability of their network.

"A fitting taste of his own medicine." The Prince of Pingnan's Heir narrowed his eyes.

Who would have thought that the sickly boy who nearly died at Consort Ning's hands could now spin such a vast web?

"Investigate every scout today—detain and handle all who passed through the sentry posts," the Prince of Pingnan's Heir ordered. With a whistle, all the hidden assassins in the mansion slipped out silently. "The posts are gone, but we still have people. Half of you, take my secret letters to Ningjiang and Jiangling—have One-Eye come back to defend."

Outside, everything seemed calm. An advisor ventured, "My lord, maybe the situation isn't that—"

"All of you get off the mountain within half an hour," the Prince of Pingnan's Heir said coldly, looking back at his advisors who still believed the imperial army was no great threat. "Court moles are being pulled out one by one, Jiangling is blocked. Since we know what kind of man we're dealing with, we should know—one step too late, and we lose the whole game."

The Prince of Pingnan's Mansion immediately went into high alert. All involved spies were detained, and related personnel were systematically questioned.

Within less than an hour, a scout outside the mansion reported: "My lord! The imperial Vanguard Battalion's been spotted in the woods!"

The news swept through the mansion, and the Secret Faction was shocked.

The imperial army had truly crept silently to the very doorstep of the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion—so many men, and not a single sound.

Their entire sentry network was wiped out.

In a remote side room of the mansion, several guards stood watch in the small courtyard. A servant delivering food set it down and whispered, "Something's happened in the mansion. Master Zhou, stay put and don't go out."

Zhou Qingyuan said nothing. The mansion's servants were accustomed to his silence.

If he hadn't saved the lady and proven himself capable, the heir wouldn't have treated him so well.

After the others left, Zhou Qingyuan cracked open the window and noticed one or two fewer guards than usual. Since escorting Concubine Xian back to the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion, he hadn't earned the heir's trust. Keeping him here served two purposes—observation and testing.

Such a commotion at the mansion meant the Crown Prince's hand had reached its very safety. He didn't know what strategy was being employed, but this upheaval was undoubtedly a signal to him. He murmured, "Moving fast—then I must too."

Seeing the area was safe, Zhou Qingyuan turned and walked to the inner chamber. Over the past few days, using his time outside, he'd drawn a simple map based on old Ministry of Works records and recent reconnaissance. One spot was heavily circled—the suspected location of the Prince of Pingnan himself.

After triple-checking, he carefully retrieved a black stone and placed it in a corner of the room.

The stone had been soaked in a special solution, releasing a long-lasting scent detectable by specially trained birds.

In Jiangnan, the Jiangling defenders raced east at full speed to encircle Marquis Cen'an. Their flanking maneuver caught him completely off guard. Already frustrated by the prolonged fight against the Chen Family Army and the Jiangnan garrison, Marquis Cen'an grew more anxious with each passing day he failed to take the city.

Now the Jiangling forces were closing in, and the Western Shu Army that had promised support hadn't shown for days. Marquis Cen'an trusted that lord, but with no reinforcements for so long, he couldn't help asking, "What does the lord say? Do we keep fighting in Jiangnan or fall back and wait?"

Marquis Cen'an's scout looked troubled: "My lord, we sent word to Western Shu days ago to confirm."

"But there's been no reply... I hear the imperial army has already pushed into southern Western Shu!"

Marquis Cen'an could no longer sit still. No reinforcements, no capture of the Crown Prince—everywhere he turned, there were reports of imperial victories. Even the Jiangling defenders were coming to surround them. Even if their forces could suppress the Chen Family Army, they couldn't sustain this prolonged attrition. "Send word again—ask the lord for his decision."

"My lord! Bad news!" A scout rushed in urgently. "The Yingtian authorities and the court jointly issued a proclamation claiming our forces are allied with remnants of the former dynasty. Some commoners were skeptical at first, but in the past few days, the people of the three Jiangnan prefectures have shifted—it's spreading everywhere!"

The former dynasty—Marquis Cen'an knew full well that the Fei faction had deep ties to it. Many Jiangnan gentry were the same. Compared to Western Shu, numerous Jiangnan elites had defected to Dayuan after the former dynasty's fall. Adapting to circumstances was second nature to them. For him, the Fei faction and the Prince of Pingnan's Mansion's influence in the south offered far greater convenience.

Rather than be ruled by Dayuan's authority, he'd naturally prefer to elevate a new master.

But while the elites thought this way, the common folk were different. Their resentment toward the former dynasty ran far deeper.

"Without evidence, how can—" Marquis Cen'an frowned.

The scout trembled: "It's the people. News of the fighting in Western Shu reached Jiangnan, and word of the Crown Prince being trapped in Jiangcheng spread somehow. People began whispering that the rebels include hands from the Former Dynasty Remnants."

The masses always believed what they heard. If they'd taken Jiangnan quickly, they could have controlled the narrative. But they hadn't taken the three prefectures, and both rebel forces were pinned at Ningjiang and Jiangling. The people sheltered from disaster by the imperial army weren't blind—they believed whoever protected them.

Another prince might not have had such an effect, but the Crown Prince had once been Prince Yan—the one who saved Jiangling and purged the Jiangnan officialdom.

Zhang Wuyong and Prince Jin were surely behind this—the Jiangnan officials using the Crown Prince's reputation. In the current situation, if the Crown Prince declared the rebels were former dynasty remnants, no evidence would be needed. The masses of Jiangnan would believe him.

"Bad news!" Another urgent report came.

Marquis Cen'an was already frantic: "Can't you see I'm overwhelmed?!"

"It's the Jiangling army—they've already pressed in!"

Weren't the Jiangling forces only ten thousand strong? How were there so many now?

Marquis Cen'an rushed out to see. Reports came from all directions, and he finally learned that the proclamation from Prince Jin's estate and the Yingtian authorities had made conscription remarkably smooth. Many commoners, led by Jiangling, had already joined. The Jiangling forces were no longer what they'd been—their numbers pressing in were incalculable.

Public sentiment—Marquis Cen'an had always scorned it, never understanding why that lord repeatedly used it as a primary tactic. But now he saw it: the people of Jiangnan and even Western Shu, never forcibly conscripted, watched their homelands invaded, their hatred of the former dynasty stoked. The surging public will had propped up the understaffed imperial army.

"What are you standing there for?! Push forward!" Marquis Cen'an roared. "It's just Ningjiang—how can we not break through!"

In the three Jiangnan prefectures, the Governor of Yingtian, along with Zhang Wuyong and the other officials, held the line. When word arrived that the Jiangling reinforcements were coming, the long-besieged Jiangnan garrison finally unleashed their full strength. Old General Chen was unaccustomed to southern river battles—as a veteran of the Northern Frontier Army, he'd gritted his teeth through defensive fighting to hold the three prefectures. But with reinforcements arriving and numbers sufficient, the Chen Family Army could finally fight without restraint.

The military payroll case, the former dynasty remnants... Old General Chen had heard countless court rumors in his years in the south.

It had been years since the Emperor returned from his northern campaign, when the Chen family was nearly wiped out because a Deposed Crown Prince and his Secret Faction delayed military pay, and the Chen Family Army was sent south to hold the river line. Back then, during the snow disaster, when Qi Hanzhou sent riders south in haste to beg for aid, he felt the sky over the capital was about to change—yet he never imagined that in his own lifetime, such a day would come.

The unresolved military pay case had wound its way to this very day.

The Secret Faction was now exposed before all, Jiangnan had been held through bitter days of defense, and his Chen family finally had the chance to exact bloody vengeance for their fallen kin.

"All troops, hear my command!" Old General Chen stood before the vast army, shouting in a hoarse voice: "Take back Xuzhou!"

In the summer of the 24th year of the Taiyuan Dynasty, the Chen Family Army in Jiangnan turned from defense to offense, joining the eastward-marching Jiangling Army to encircle Marquis Cen'an.

The battle raged for three days. On the morning of the third day, Marquis Cen'an's forces were defeated outside Ningjiang County and fell back to Xuzhou. The Chen Family Army did not relent. After regrouping and resupplying, Old General Chen personally led the campaign east to attack Xuzhou. It was a decisive victory.

Word of Jiangnan's triumph reached Jiangling. Across the river, the Lu Family Army—twenty thousand troops holding the line against the Western Shu rebels—heard the news from the east. That cry of victory from the three Jiangnan prefectures was like a steadying drumbeat, lifting the spirits of every weary soldier of the Lu Family Army. Their defense of the Jiangling line had been rewarded by success from afar.

"Old General Chen truly proves the old blade still cuts. Tell Vice Prefect Xu of Jiangling," General Lu said with a light chuckle as he bandaged his wounded arm, "that in a few days, he won't need to risk crossing the river to deliver us grain."

The situation in Western Shu's rear was still unknown, and there had been no word from the Crown Prince for days.

But they believed no news was good news—and now, they couldn't allow these Western Shu rebels any chance to turn back and reinforce.

"Since they came to Jiangling, their lives end right here!" General Lu rose to his feet.

When the Secret Faction tried to send word of the split forces—Marquis Cen'an and the Jiangling rebels—to the Prince of Pingnan's mansion, they found themselves stripped of their eyes and ears, having lost their former ability to read the winds. Even sending assassins to slip past the imperial army, human effort across the vast mountains of Western Shu couldn't match the speed of carrier pigeons and hidden watchposts. One by one, the watchposts were destroyed, leaving the Prince of Pingnan's mansion isolated—no pigeons to send messages, outside intelligence choked off, only scattered reports arriving, and those already days old.

In war, a step too late meant a delayed battle report.

The imperial Vanguard Battalion was running low on supplies. They were a fast-marching force, and the speed with which they'd wiped out the rebels' watchposts showed their baggage train was minimal. Five days had passed since the watchposts were found destroyed, and tens of thousands of Vanguard Battalion troops had spent that time surrounding the mountain, seizing the county town nearest to the Prince of Pingnan's mansion.

The Prince of Pingnan's forces had held off the imperial army for five days before suddenly launching their assault.

But when they struck, the imperial army was ready!

The Prince of Pingnan's mansion wasn't a city—though it bore the title of a prince's residence, it stood not within city walls, but deep in the mountains alongside the Western Shu garrison camp. This was the arrangement the Prince of Pingnan had made when he commanded the army. After being enfeoffed in Western Shu following his military service, he preferred to live among his soldiers. And precisely because of this, the mansion lay far from any prefectural seat, becoming a hidden lair for the Secret Faction's underhanded dealings.

But now, being outside a city meant there were no sturdy defenses to fall back on.

What the imperial army faced was a camp with limited troops—a launching point for offensives, not a defensive stronghold.

The Prince of Pingnan's forces had barely sallied forth when they collided with the Vanguard Battalion. The expected fatigue of a long march never appeared; in fact, the Vanguard Battalion fought even more fiercely.

"What's going on? Did Qi Hanzhou have the Embroidered Uniform Guard cache grain in southern Western Shu?!" A staff officer gasped.

The advisors frowned. They had received no word of the Light Garment Battalion in the north being mobilized—these troops were a genuine Vanguard Battalion assembled from a mix of imperial forces in Western Shu. Discord between soldiers and commanders was common in such camps, yet Qi Shen's son had applied the northern Light Garment Battalion's methods to the imperial army.

On the northern Gobi wastes, a shortage of grain was especially deadly.

But the south was mountains—lush with vegetation and teeming with game. In such terrain, if there was no need for long marches, the grain requirement could be controlled. The Western Shu men in the Vanguard Battalion, all skilled hunters, understood the importance of this. From the moment they abandoned their heavy baggage, Qi Hanzhou had arranged everything.

He had led the northern Light Garment Battalion in his youth, and his specialty was swift, aggressive strikes—he knew how to counter such fatigue.

"That idiot One-Eye—what's the situation at Jiangcheng now?!"

"If there were trouble, would Qi Hanzhou still be pressing his army down the mountain?!"

All eyes turned to the Prince of Pingnan's Heir. They could no longer seek outside aid, and their deployments had been thrown into chaos by the Crown Prince of Dayuan. The situation with Marquis Cen'an's forces was entirely unknown. It had been a long time since they'd felt this way—yet this very feeling heralded crisis. These Western Shu troops, once so firmly in their grasp, now saw their plans spiraling out of control.

The hidden watchposts they had once prided themselves on had become their fatal weakness.

And the Crown Prince of Dayuan had seen through that weakness.

"My lord! The Vanguard Battalion is closing in—this place is dangerous!" An urgent report came from outside the door.

Twenty thousand troops in the camp outside the Prince of Pingnan's mansion, and they couldn't hold against a single Vanguard Battalion led by Qi Hanzhou!?

"Western Shu's soldiers have never fought a real war—and those who have are mostly dead." The Prince of Pingnan's Heir rose, looking at the others. "The fact that no one has come to reinforce means the situation at Jiangling, and even Jiangnan, is beyond what Marquis Cen'an can handle."

Qi Hanzhou had been famous on the battlefield since his teens—he was Qi Shen's only son.

Had the Emperor not kept him in the capital, he would now be a renowned general of the northern deserts.

What a fine piece he had once been for the Prince of Pingnan's mansion—his mother had also wanted to use that piece for herself. But the Prince of Pingnan and his trusted subordinates held military power too tightly. Unable to obtain it any other way, he'd been forced to send those old fools to their graves before seizing the mansion's military authority for himself.

These rebel forces in the south—he had cultivated them for over a decade. He had known from the start that they could hardly shake Dayuan's military might, so after his mother's death, he had prepared multiple contingencies. Had nothing gone wrong, with a coup in the capital, these troops of Dayuan would now be his. But piece after piece had been exposed, and his soldiers hadn't even managed to set foot in the southern heartland. Truly, in the grand scheme of the realm, not a single step could be missed.

"The southern gambit is over." The Prince of Pingnan's Heir's gaze turned dark and vicious.

He walked to the window, looking down—just in time to see the flickering torchlight moving through the forest below.

The Vanguard Battalion was ascending the mountain and would soon reach the Prince of Pingnan's mansion. This was no place to make a stand.

Below the mountain, the Vanguard Battalion took a roundabout route up. The path of their assault had been scouted over the past few days—the best route for attack, identified by skilled scouts from the Light Garment Guard and the Liangzhou Army, precisely exploiting the terrain's weakness around the Prince of Pingnan's mansion. Added to that was a key insight from Qi Hanzhou: the landslides caused by the heavy rains days earlier had created the perfect opportunity to encircle the mansion.

"The rebels on the eastern flank have broken and retreated to their camp—the Prince of Pingnan's mansion has a gap!" A commander reported at speed.

This news was a boon to all in the Vanguard Battalion—it meant the Junior General's strategy was working, and these rebels, with no way out, were walking into their trap.

Qi Hanzhou looked up sharply, loosing an arrow that struck a fleeing rebel in the forest. Narrowing his eyes toward the Prince of Pingnan's mansion, he said, "Take a squad around the rear—he may try to flee."

Anyone this meticulous would surely have left an escape route.

What remained was the encirclement—the Prince of Pingnan's mansion was now within sight!

Qi Hanzhou pulled the reins, turning toward another mountain path. He needed to ascend quickly to complete the encirclement. The closer they got, the more careful they had to be. These twenty thousand rebels in the Western Shu camp today couldn't be allowed to become an unknown variable that might destabilize the southern Western Shu battlefield.

"Report—the Vanguard Battalion has reached the gates of the Prince of Pingnan's mansion; the rebel guards at the gate have been slain!"

"Large numbers of assassins discovered!"

If the assassins were here, then someone important was inside the mansion.

At that moment, hurried footsteps from behind broke the good news—"Junior General!"

Qi Hanzhou halted and saw a scout from the Light Garment Guard.

"Junior General, an urgent letter from Jiangcheng... it's Xuan Qi's eagle."

Ye Xuanqi's eagle was never sent except in dire emergencies.

The scout delivering the message was pale-faced. Qi Hanzhou's pupils shifted slightly. Jiangcheng had been silent for days—he knew that from the moment the watchposts were uprooted, those thirty thousand rebels outside the city would fight to the death. The defenders of Jiangcheng bore the heaviest burden of this entire encirclement.

"Give it to me..." He didn't notice his own voice trembling.

The scout handed it over. Qi Hanzhou's fingertips went white as he took it—the thrill of taking the Prince of Pingnan's mansion vanished entirely, leaving only two hasty, scrawled characters on the letter:

"Return now."