Ning Chen’s party rode fast and light, and still had time to stop along the way for a meal.
Three days later they were out of Wulin City.
Once past Wulin City, they were less than five days from Great Xuan’s frontier.
Ning Chen and the others slowed their pace.
Shen Min could hold it in no longer. “My lord marquis, are we simply leaving like this?”
“What else?”
Ning Chen returned the question.
“Then Lord Li Hongzhuo died for nothing?”
Ning Chen smiled. “He deserved worse than he got. Even if he had lived, he would have died on our return.”
“We went out to eat and drink, and he pretended to be unwell — and then turned up near the Prince Regent’s residence. Care to guess why?”
Shen Min shook his head.
“The Inspectorate has had its eye on him a long time. Li Hongzhuo was in league with the Wu Prince Regent.”
Shen Min was astonished. “He dared deal with the enemy and betray his country?”
Ning Chen nodded, and laid it out. “My guess is that with the two kingdoms about to talk peace, the two of them fell out over some interest or other, and the Prince Regent killed him for it.”
“If the Prince Regent dared kill Lord Li Hongzhuo, he’d dare kill us… So running was the right answer.”
Shen Min nodded slightly. “The Prince Regent has no regard for his sovereign at all. My guess is the woman emperor wanted the talks and the Prince Regent didn’t, so he killed Lord Li Hongzhuo to start a war between the two kingdoms.”
Ning Chen glanced at him and smiled. “Lord Shen’s reasoning is very sound!”
“Only this official’s poor opinion. I hope the marquis will forgive it!”
Ning Chen was about to speak when Feng Qizheng came galloping up.
“Ning Chen, the Wu Prince Regent is coming after us with several thousand men.”
Wulin City was Wu’s first line of defense, so the Divine Wolf Army was garrisoned there year-round.
But the Divine Wolf Army answered to the woman emperor, and Song Tiancheng could not move it. He had planted his own men in it, though, and so he had been able to move some five thousand troops.
Five thousand, against Ning Chen’s two hundred, was more than enough.
Shen Min’s face changed sharply. “The marquis guessed right after all. This Song Tiancheng really does mean to kill us.”
Ning Chen smiled faintly. “Musket battalion, escort Lord Shen ahead… Old Pan, Old Feng, Old Chen, stay with me and cover the retreat.”
Shen Min was alarmed. “My lord marquis, how can that be right?”
“You’re a civil official. Leave the marching and the fighting to us… Go, quickly!”
The musket battalion escorted Shen Min away ahead of them.
Ning Chen and the others stayed behind.
Before long the ground was trembling.
Song Tiancheng came charging up at the head of five thousand men, the dust flying.
Ning Chen smiled faintly. “Let’s be off too.”
The few of them put their horses to a gallop.
Song Tiancheng saw Ning Chen fleeing, and his eyes filled with blood. “Ning Chen, you brat, this prince will have you cut into ten thousand pieces!”
“After them, for this prince! Ten thousand in gold to the man who kills Ning Chen, and a marquisate of ten thousand households!”
Ning Chen and the others galloped hard.
Apart from Ning Chen’s Diaochan, Pan Yucheng and the rest were riding fine-bred warhorses.
Before coming to Wu, Ning Chen had made every preparation.
Song Tiancheng led his men in pursuit of Ning Chen for two full days.
“Ning Chen, Swallowtail Slope is ahead. Which way do we go?”
Pan Yucheng asked.
Swallowtail Slope had two roads, shaped like the tail of a swallow.
Ning Chen smiled. “Take the left-hand road!”
Song Tiancheng and his five thousand kept their teeth in him and would not let go.
But when they came charging up onto Swallowtail Slope, their faces changed utterly. They stood there stupefied.
Battle standards were flying.
As far as the eye could see there were soldiers of Great Xuan — more than twenty thousand of them.
Ning Chen looked at the dumbstruck Song Tiancheng with crinkled eyes, took down his water skin and drank a few mouthfuls.
The wretch had chased him too hard. These two days had worn him out.
Song Tiancheng realized he had walked into a trap.
He was an old campaigner, after all, and he gave the order at once. “Fall back!”
But the ground trembled and hooves rang out.
Yuan Long came charging down the slope on the right-hand side of Swallowtail Slope at the head of ten thousand armored horsemen, and sealed off Song Tiancheng’s line of retreat.
Song Tiancheng’s five thousand were thrown into a panic, their faces white.
“Ning Chen, so you were ready all along… You never came to talk peace at all.”
Song Tiancheng roared it, beside himself.
Ning Chen smiled. “You’re wrong. I came to talk peace — only not with you. With Her Majesty the woman emperor.”
Song Tiancheng screamed, “I am the Prince Regent of Wu. If you dare kill me, there will never be peace talks between Great Xuan and Wu again.”
Ning Chen laughed aloud.
“Song Tiancheng, you think far too much of yourself… Without you, the talks between Great Xuan and Wu will go a great deal more pleasantly.”
Song Tiancheng roared, “Ning Chen, you have wiped out my clan, and we cannot live under the same sky… If Song Tiancheng does not die today, then one day I will lead an army myself, trample your Great Xuan flat, and have you cut into ten thousand pieces.”
Ning Chen slowly raised a hand and said, laughing, “Song Tiancheng, today you die… Great Mighty Heavenly Dragon, Great Law of the Grand Canon, all the gods and buddhas of every heaven, hear my command and blast them to death for me.”
And Ning Chen’s hand came down hard.
Boom! Boom! Boom!!!
Beneath the feet of Song Tiancheng’s army, the ground blew open.
The terrible sound of the blasts was like the wrath of heaven.
The earth shook and the hills swayed.
Firelight rolled up into the sky, wrapped in gunsmoke.
Earth flew tens of meters into the air.
Flesh and blood scattered.
The screaming split the clouds.
Shen Min was so frightened he sat straight down on the ground, his eyes blank!
Ning Chen could work magic. He had truly called down all the gods and buddhas of heaven.
The soldiers of Great Xuan, on the other hand, looked perfectly calm. Even the horses were steadier than Shen Min.
Gods and buddhas of heaven, indeed… There was only gunpowder buried under that ground.
The blasts went on for a minute.
The earth was pitted with a thousand wounds!
More than half of Song Tiancheng’s men and horses were dead or wounded.
The powder had not covered the whole ground, after all, and only some of them had been caught.
But the scene was bloody and terrible.
Ning Chen rode forward and said sharply, “Put down your weapons! Those who surrender will not be killed. Otherwise you will be cut down where you stand!”
The Wu soldiers were frightened past the tearing of their livers and gall.
Without a moment’s hesitation they threw down the weapons in their hands and crouched on the ground with their arms over their heads.
The way they looked at Ning Chen was full of awe and terror.
This Ning Chen was no man at all. He was an immortal.
He recited a few words of a spell and the sky broke and the earth split.
How was anyone supposed to fight that?
How could a mortal ever beat an immortal?
“Yuan Long, clear the field!”
“Yes!”
Yuan Long took the order.
The surrendered troops were driven aside and put under guard, and their weapons and warhorses were taken from them.
“My lord marquis, the Prince Regent is still alive!”
Yuan Long shouted it.
Ning Chen was startled, and walked quickly over.
Song Tiancheng was indeed still alive. Only both his legs had been blown away.
“Get on with your work. I’ll have a talk with him.”
Ning Chen waved Yuan Long and the others away.
He crouched down and looked at Song Tiancheng. “Well, well… What a tough life you have. Even this couldn’t kill you?”
Song Tiancheng’s eyes were venomous, fixed on Ning Chen.
Ning Chen smiled. “Don’t look at me like that. You’re an old campaigner. You ought to understand that the winner is a king and the loser is a bandit.”
“Ning Chen, you brat. I have gone where I pleased all my life, and in the end I fall into your hands… It seems you had it all worked out long ago. Li Hongzhuo — that was you, wasn’t it?”
Ning Chen nodded slightly. “That’s right. I sent men to kill him.”
“He was dealing with you in secret. Don’t imagine I didn’t know… Coming to Wu this time, the first thing was to be rid of Li Hongzhuo, and the second was to help my woman be rid of you.”
Song Tiancheng stared hard at him. “You and she—”
“She and I love each other, and one thing led to another until we were man and wife in fact… She is carrying my child, and that child will be Wu’s sovereign one day. So you have to die.”
(End of Chapter 360)