"Your Highness..." Lü Wu gazed upward, her eyes tracing the chiselled contours of Ye Ling's countenance, perceiving an unfamiliar resolve in his demeanour—a blend of steely determination and commanding presence that transcended his former self.
"Be at ease," Ye Ling murmured, drawing her closer as his keen eyes dissected the Madao battalion's tactical formations. Though the Great Chu boasted cavalry, their reliance on brittle leather armour and crude weaponry—borne of scarce iron reserves—rendered them dependent on equestrian prowess. The Madao unit, engineered to cleave through mounted forces, would become his linchpin for victory in three days.
*Clangour!
Two attendants careened into Chaohua Hall, their faces ashen. "Your Highness! Calamity! The Eldest Prince approaches with the Ministry of War!"
"Brother," Ye Ling intoned, his fingers interlaced with Lü Wu's as he strode to the threshold, "what warrants such a retinue?"
"Feigned ignorance ill becomes you!" Ye Changfeng spat, his sneer lingering on the consort at Ye Ling's side.
Unfazed, Ye Ling met his brother's glare. The Eldest Prince's web of spies had undoubtedly reported his requisition of the ministry's resources—a gambit Ye Ling had anticipated.
"My memory falters," Ye Ling parried with deliberate nonchalance.
"Cease this charade!" Ye Changfeng's voice sharpened like honed steel. "Master Lu, the artificer refining the *Thousand-Armed Crossbow*, was wrested from my workshops. Dare you undermine years of labour?"
"A trifling loan of expertise," Ye Ling countered, his tone laconic yet edged with mockery, "to forge implements for the coming duel with Great Chu. Must you quiver like a startled hare?"
"Impudent whelp!" The elder prince's blade hissed from its scabbard. "That artificer's mind holds secrets worth armies!"
"Were I to decline?" Ye Ling's stance solidified, an unyielding monolith.
"Decline?" Ye Changfeng's pupils constricted. "Hoard iron within these walls? This reeks of treason!"
At his gesture, a phalanx of guards levelled blades at Ye Ling's throat.
"Treason?" A mirthless chuckle escaped Ye Ling. "Brother dearest, would a coup be hatched in daylight, with smelters yet cold?"
"Three promotions to whoever spills his traitor's blood!"
Ye Ling's smile remained glacial. "Slay the Crown Prince's heir in the Vermilion City? Pray, how will you placate the Son of Heaven when his wrath descends?"
"Take him!" Roared the enraged prince, steel flashing downward.
Clutching Lü Wu, Ye Ling recoiled—genuine shock piercing his composure at this brazen regicidal fury.
"**Desist!**"
The imperial decree froze combatants mid-motion. Emperor Shang materialised amidst a cordon of Golden Guards, his arrival scattering weapons like fallen leaves. Ye Changfeng's blade clattered against marble.
"Father! The Sixth Son pillages state arsenals, stockpiles—"
"Silence!" The monarch's gaze swung to Ye Ling. "Account for yourself."
"The ministry serves the realm, not princely fiefdoms," Ye Ling retorted, bowing with calculated deference. "When bureaucrats barred access for the kingdom's defence, what recourse remained but... creative procurement?" His voice dropped to a conspiratorial murmur. "Moreover, I've obtained schematics to shatter Chu's cavalry and reclaim Youzhou."
Interest kindled in the emperor's obsidian eyes.
"Sire! Let him prove these vaunted designs!" Ye Changfeng prostrated himself. "A duel of artisans—should his contraptions fail, Master Lu returns to my forge!"
Ye Ling's grin turned lupine. "With pleasure."
As Different as Heaven and Earth
"A contest?" The assembly swivelled toward Ye Changfeng, their faces etched with incredulity.
Had the Crown Prince lost all reason? Mere moments prior, he'd branded Ye Ling a traitor; now he proposed fair competition? Did his desperation to reclaim Master Lu strip him of even the pretence of propriety?
"Does the Sixth Prince lack courage?" Ye Changfeng's gaze flickered between Ye Ling and Emperor Shang, his tone oozing performative deference. "This humble son beseeches Your Majesty's sanction."
The emperor's scrutiny lingered on his youngest son—this indolent princeling pitted against the realm's celebrated polymath. Yet the Crown Prince's brazen overreach deepened imperial disappointment. After measured silence, the throne enquired, "Your proposed arena, Changfeng?"
"Since Master Lu's genius anchors this dispute, let us duel through mechanical arts!" The First Prince's declaration rang with theatrical flourish.
Lü Wu, Ye Ling's sword-maiden, fretted like a sparrow before hawks. "Your Highness, how can we contend against his engineering prowess?"
A vulpine grin played on Ye Ling's lips. "An equitable proposal, Elder Brother. Yet are you certain mechanical arts serve your advantage?"
The emperor's staff struck marble. "Ling'er! Your brother's repeating crossbow revolutionized border warfare. His curved-shaft plough feeds three provinces. What credentials do you bring?"
Ye Ling's eyebrow arched—a silent challenge to the plagiarist who'd stolen Mohist secrets and craftsmen alike. "Let the contest commence."
With magisterial smugness, Ye Changfeng unfurled his "Divine Boltcaster" schematic. The court gasped at nested torsion springs and gravity-fed quarrel chambers—a killing machine perfected through stolen genius.
"Magnificent!" The emperor breathed. "This shall break Chu's cavalry formations!"
The Crown Prince's bow oozed false humility... until Ye Ling's laughter shattered the moment.
"You name *this* a national treasure?" The Sixth Prince gestured dismissively. "Then behold cosmic revelation!"
At his signal, Lü Wu produced an inkstone and mulberry paper. Brushstrokes danced—arcane sigils and geometric impossibilities flowing like battle formations. The emperor frowned at what seemed like childish doodles; courtiers muffled derisive titters.
"Pathetic mimicry!" Ye Changfeng sneered with icy disdain. "You defile engineering's sacred art!"
The throne attempted mediation: "Both designs show... *promise*. Let Master Lu return to the armory within the week, and"—
"Preposterous!" The Crown Prince's composure cracked. "That crossbow is our dynastic sword! Summon Master Lu—let truth be carved in steel!"
When the aged artificer arrived, his calloused fingers trembled across both schematics. Where the repeating crossbow earned approving nods, Ye Ling's diagrams transformed him into a thunderstruck acolyte.
"The chasm between..." Master Lu whispered, tears etching trails through gunpowder stains, "...is vaster than mortal heavens from earthly clay
The Peril of Beauty
Ye Changfeng fixed an imperious gaze upon Ye Ling, his lips curling into a derisive sneer. "Sixth Brother, Master Lu shall accompany me henceforth! Attend me at once, Master Lu!"
The aged artisan stiffened, bewilderment etching his features. "Depart? To what end? By what mandate?"
His retort echoed like a thunderclap, leaving everyone except Ye Ling stunned.
"Recall your verdict, Master Lu," Ye Changfeng pressed, desperation threading his voice. "Did you not declare my schematics celestial compared to this wretch's scribbles? The wager stands concluded—you are mine to claim!"
A moment's silence preceded Master Lu's grave rebuttal. "Celestial indeed," he intoned, lifting Ye Ling's parchment aloft like sacred scripture, "but 'tis *this* design that ascends to the firmament—while yours, First Prince, wallows in terrestrial mediocrity."
"Your wits desert you!" Ye Changfeng blanched, regal composure fracturing.
"Desert me? Nay! Behold transcendent genius!" Master Lu's voice quivered with reverence. "Ten quarrels unleashed in seamless succession—this repeating crossbow redefines warfare! Your primitive contraption shrivels before its glory."
The emperor's astonishment pierced the tension. "Ling'er—this creation bears your hand?"
"Wisdom's fragments, gathered from scrolls and smiths' whispers," Ye Ling demurred, bowing with practiced humility. "I but stand upon giants' shoulders."
"Should this marvel take form," the emperor breathed, "our armies shall eclipse all realms!"
"Thievery!" Ye Changfeng's roar echoed through the chamber. "This parasite pilfers my intellect!"
Master Lu surged forward, a storm of indignation. "Dare you slander purity? *Your* parchments reek of stolen Mohist principles! The Sixth Prince transcends imitation—he *elevates*"!
"Sire, I merely..." The prince's protest died beneath imperial scrutiny.
"Enough!" The emperor's decree cleaved the air. "Three moons' seclusion shall temper your hubris. Let solitude instruct where courtly privilege failed."
Guards encircled the disgraced heir, and Ye Changfeng's parting glare promised unborn tempests.
---
**Within the Incense-Shrouded Sanctum**
The emperor traced the crossbow's intricate lines, his voice low as temple bells. "Kingship demands ascetic discipline. Beware beauty's honeyed venom—throughout history, empires crumble when sovereigns kneel to mortal Aphrodites."
His disapproval lingered on Lü Wu, causing the concubine to tremble as if she were in a cage.
"Must celestial dragons scorn earthly treasures?" Ye Ling countered, mischief dancing in his eyes.
"Temperance, Ling'er," the emperor warned, though approval softened his reproach. "Let not desire's flame consume wisdom's lantern."
The Unlikely Ascendant
Her modest beginnings rendered her especially susceptible. Should she incur imperial displeasure now, execution would be inevitable.
"Imperial Father," Ye Ling interposed urgently, "Lüwu has demonstrated exceptional dedication. These past days, she's assisted my studies of classical texts and technological innovations."
Naturally, he would defend her – this pliant creature now warmed his bed, her ministrations having barely begun to satisfy his appetites. How could he permit royal punishment to deprive him of such pleasures?
"Ever the silver-tongued advocate," Emperor Shang remarked acidly. "Since you emphasise her merits, we decree the Metropolitan Governor shall adopt her as a formal ward. Let her be invested as Third-Class Liangdi."
The prostrate Lüwu trembled – imperial recognition? Previously, despite her maidenhood, her base lineage had denied even palace maid status. Now elevated to third-rank consort? An inconceivable honour.
"Why hesitate? Offer proper gratitude!" Ye Ling prompted sharply.
"This unworthy servant kneels before Heaven's boundless mercy." Lüwu's forehead touched cold marble. Third-rank status! Should the Sixth Prince receive princedom, she might eclipse even noble-born concubines.
"See that you guide Ling'er wisely," the Emperor dismissed, already absorbed by schematics spread across the table. "Elucidate these designs, son. Their purpose?"
"Imperial Father, this mechanical loom processes fifty threads concurrently, tripling textile production. The hydraulic irrigation system could mitigate drought catastrophes..." Ye Ling's exposition flowed methodically.
The emperor's gaze kindled with comprehension. Should these innovations prove viable, they might clothe and nourish every subject – realising the ancient ideal of "no shivering paupers nor starving wretches."
As the sovereign examined diagrams, Ye Ling produced half-finished sketches from beneath the pile. "These firearm prototypes discovered in antique manuscripts... still requiring refinement..."
"Pursue them relentlessly! All resources shall be allocated," the emperor decreed solemnly. "Their realisation could herald Great Shang's renaissance."
Through nine reigns, the once-mighty empire had decayed into factionalism and rot. With Chu's ascending threat and Heaven's frequent calamities, the realm thirsted for renewal.
"By Your Imperial Will." Ye Ling bowed profoundly. Having assumed the Sixth Prince's identity, he aspired to forge an empire unparalleled in history. These blueprints merely prefaced darker technologies yet veiled.
The emperor lingered until midnight, captivated by metallurgical explanations and mechanical principles. Only exhausted attendants' entreaties finally persuaded his departure, though not without stern warnings of absolute secrecy.
"At last," Ye Ling sighed, stretching indolently when solitude returned.
"Does the design displease Your Highness?" Lüwu enquired timidly.
"Quite the contrary," the prince grinned wolfishly, drawing her onto his lap. "Night's proper occupation awaits..."
"But Your Highness..." Lüwu's cheeks burnt crimson as wandering hands disrobed her. "With imperial favour newly gained, should you not... mmph... prioritise statecraft..."
"Did Father not formalise your position?" Ye Ling chuckled against her throat, silk garments pooling like shed petals. "You are now Chaohua Hall's legitimate mistress."
Subsequent days echoed with carnal discoveries as the formerly ascetic prince indulged newfound appetites. Lüwu's willow-frame trembled perpetually, her steps increasingly unsteady.
Meanwhile, blacksmith Lu Yuan toiled relentlessly. Employing Ye Ling's metallurgical formulas and pattern-welding techniques, he forged fifteen gleaming zhanmadao within forty-eight hours – each capable of sundering armoured warhorses.
Dawn's third light revealed Zhao Linger, Chu emissaries, and Shang officials assembled at the military grounds. The emperor's countenance darkened as thunderous hooves announced Great Chu's approach – the same invincible cavalry that had slaughtered his favourite brother.
"Behold General Zhuge Yao's Heavenly Riders!" Crown Prince Ye Changfeng blanched. "All is lost! Sixth Brother must yield!"
Even Defence Minister Fang Yan counselled retreat: "No dishonour bends before Chu's elite."
"Yield?" Ye Ling's laughter rang scornful, her finger stabbing toward dust-choked fields. "To this rabble? Imperial Father, let my Thunder Warriors demonstrate true annihilation!"
Mere Trash Tactics
"Is this the extent of your prowess?!" Zhao Ling'er's visage flushed vermilion beneath Ye Ling's scornful scrutiny. Her mirth carried a serrated edge as she pivoted toward the alabaster-clad figure. "Grand Preceptor! Let this Shang cur taste the thunder of Chu's adamantine steeds!"
A polymath-warrior coalesced from the penumbra, his palm-fan undulating like war banners. "Before the celestial cavalry of Chu," his diction cleaved the chamber's air, "you Shang dregs are but chaff scattered by the tempest's wrath."
A susurrus of trepidation rippled through the courtiers:
"The Living Tacticum..."
"Zhuge Yao incarnate!"
"By what sorcery...?"
Even the battle-tempered minister Fang Yan paled. "Sixth Scion," he hissed urgently, "that is Chu's Imperial Strategos—architect of their sanguinary expansions. Your thirteenth patriarch succumbed to his deathly configurations. Prudence dictates your steps."
Ye Ling's gaze honed to twin stilettos. "Then I shall sculpt my uncle's requital from their marrow."
"Requital?" Zhuge Yao's fan snapped shut with metallurgical finality. "Countless sepulchres bear that vow. Their ossified remains now pave Chu's triumphal causeways."
The prince bridged the distance until their exhalations intertwined. "This dawn shall witness your cavalry's annihilation—corpse piled upon corpse. Not your sovereign's edict nor celestial mandate shall stay their slaughter. Thus I covenant."
"Enough of this bombast!" Zhao Ling'er's jade digit trembled toward the proving grounds. "Let steel's dialectic arbitrate this vainglorious theatre!"
"Eager, my exotic blossom?" Ye Ling's smirk distilled venomous nectar. "Does anticipation of my bedchamber fever your pulse... once I reduce your 'Living Tacticum' to ash?"
Tittering unease permeated the Shang court—vanquished men clinging to bravado's tattered mantle.
"You... honour-blighted hound!" The Chu princess' composure fractured like frosted crystal. "Grand Preceptor! Reduce this libertine to primordial dust!"
Zhuge Yao's fan resumed its mesmeric pavane. "Our destriers champ at destiny's bit. Where lurks Shang's rebuttal?"
"Verily," Ye Ling sneered, "how did this myopic mole rat crawl into Chu's strategists' pantheon?" His jaw jutted toward the arena. "My riposte manifested ere night's veil lifted."
All ocular orbs followed. A gasp-vortex whirled through the galleries—twelve foot-soldiers arrayed in phalanx formation, opposing Chu's centurion-mounted legion.
The Sabre's Dominion Over Steed
Both Chu and Shang military theorists concurred: numerical superiority constituted Shang's sole recourse against equestrian dominance. Yet herein lay the strategic genius of Zhuge Yao's formation—a tactical maelstrom where mounted legions dissolved like morning mist, rendering even the most relentless human tides impotent.
Commander Liu's modest contingent of twelve foot soldiers materialised like shadows amidst the cavalry's earth-shaking advance—a whisper against thunder. Their unassuming entrance escaped immediate notice, though none could ignore the Sixth Prince's brazen gambit.
Zhao Ling'er's lips curled in glacial amusement. "To pit infantry against our battle steeds? Does Shang's princeling court madness or deem us unworthy of steel?" Her wrath transmuted into crystalline contempt, refracted through prismatic scorn.
"Your perception serves you," Ye Ling countered, jawline lifted in regal defiance. "We scorn vermin who mistake rusted scrap for armour. Behold Shang's Thunderbolt Vanguard!" His declaration hung like unsheathed steel above murmuring courtiers.
Thunderbolt Vanguard? The assembly exchanged troubled glances. Equine supremacy—born of velocity, elevation, and endurance—had dictated battlefield hierarchies since antiquity. Yet here stood the disgraced prince, parading a prison warden-turned-commander as his champion. Even the Jade Emperor's resolve faltered, recognising Liu Ren's pedigree as Imperial Gaoler rather than war captain.
"Your Eminence..." Strategist Fang Yan's whisper carried the weight of impending disgrace. "Might celestial wisdom have... erred?"
"When Thunderbolts clash, Master Fang, no hoof shall trample Shang's standard." The prince's eyes burnt with boreal conviction.
"Buffoon!" Zhuge Yao's fan snapped shut like a beheaded serpent. The wintry gesture drew Ye Ling's derisive barb: "Behold the strategist who fans blizzards with paper wings!"
Laughter cascaded through Shang's ranks as crimson fury bloomed beneath Zhuge's jade complexion. "Let steel arbitrate this farce!" he hissed, his voice dripping venomous honey. "When your mongrel band lies gutted upon the field, let history record it as suicide by hubris!"
The trembling fan betrayed his rage. Tonight, he vowed, these pretenders' entrails would fertilise Chu's banners—their vaunted "Thunderbolts" reduced to ash upon the altar of shame.
Vengeance Unveiled
"Foreign wench, and all who bear witness—your Grand Tutor himself commanded restraint. Should blood spill today, let it stain *his* conscience, not ours," Ye Ling proclaimed, her voice slicing through the murmuring crowd like a blade.
Could this man be a fool?
Spectators traded uneasy glances. A mere dozen foot soldiers against a hundred armoured horsemen? Did he fancy his men divine avatars, smiting foes with celestial wrath? Even the annals of asymmetric warfare held no precedent for such madness.
"Insufferable hubris!" Zhuge Yao sneered, bowing with serpentine grace to Emperor Shang. "Your Majesty, shall we commence this farce?"
"Ling'er..." The emperor's fingers whitened on his throne's armrest, the unspoken plea hanging like mist before frost.
"Father." Ye Ling's tone crystallised the air. "Let justice take its course."
A gong's mournful cry split the arena.
---
The Chu cavalry stormed forth—a scarlet avalanche of muscle and steel. Hooves hammered the earth into trembling submission, reducing Liu Ren's battalion to specks before a roaring landslide.
"Behold true power, you mewling curs," Zhao Linger hissed, her smile curdling as dust devils danced beneath charging steeds.
Yet, as death's tide crested, Liu Ren's men stood as immovable as ancient monoliths. Eyes shuttered, their crescent-bladed halberds (*mòdāo*) kissed the ground—a serpent coiled to strike.
"Fear has petrified their souls," Zhao Linger crowed. "Too late for repentance. *The loosed arrow knows no recall.* Let their entrails paint the sand!"
The Shang officials averted their gaze, while Fu Hai's group sharpened their words. Across the pavilion, predator and tactician leaned into the spectacle, nostrils flared for copper-scented triumph.
---
**"Rrraaagh!"
**"Hrraaahh-whinny!"
A cacophony of anguish erupted—human throats and equine screams braiding into a chorus from hell's forge.
"By the Nine Hells—!" Zhao Linger's lacquered nails drew blood from her palms.
Emperor Shang's gaze snapped back to the fray.
Liu Ren's phalanx had become a silver tempest. Half-armoured torsos pivoted as one, their polearms tracing lethal arcs. Each downstroke parted horseflesh from spine with butcher's precision. Riders cascaded from headless mounts like overripe pomegranates bursting.
"Witchcraft!" Zhuge Yao's roar cracked mid-syllable. "Our steeds... Our undefeated..."
But the harvest continued. Blades flickered—dragonfly wings glinting before the storm—as Chu's pride dissolved into screaming meat and spilt viscera.
The Oath of Blades
Liu Ren and his cohort granted no quarter to their adversaries. Scores of Chu combatants scarcely attained their feet ere their craniums were lopped from shoulders by crescent sweeps of gleaming steel.
The *Madao* – those elongated polearm sabres wrought through alchemical metallurgical arts – sheared through bronze armour as through riverbed clay. These prodigious instruments of war, combining extraordinary reach, devastating heft, and the Herculean might of Liu's chosen warriors, sundered equine vertebrae and knightly collarbones with equal facility.
Though the Kingdom of Chu prided itself on peerless warhorses and revolutionary foot stirrups enhancing mounted manoeuvrability, one fatal deficiency persisted: an acute paucity of ferrous resources. Their crude ferric implements proved laughably primitive against the Great Shang's *high-carbon steel* alloys. Neither fully armoured riders nor barded destriers could withstand the onslaught – a chink in their martial panoply that Liu Ren exploited with surgical precision.
His vanguard wore articulated half-plate harnesses engineered by Ye Ling himself, interleaving hardened steel lamellae with *tiancan silk* articulation at limb joints. This masterful synthesis afforded maximum protection while permitting lethal dexterity. Countless dawn-to-dusk drilling sessions had forged these warriors into living engines of destruction.
*"By all celestial mandates... how can this be?!"* Strategist Zhuge Yao recoiled as if struck, his scholar's pallor acquiring corpse-like hues. Vermillion droplets spattered his silken sleeves as consumptive coughs wracked his frame.
"Grand Preceptor!" Princess Zhao Ling'er lunged to support his faltering form. "Summon the imperial physicians! Where is the royal apothecary?
Upon the observation dais, the Shang Emperor observed proceedings with awestruck bewilderment. "Daughter, what thaumaturgy is this? Since when do our pedestrian infantry command such preternatural might?"
"Sire," interposed Prince Ye Ling with contained triumph, "even the most superlative cavalry must yield before properly honed edges of steel."
Below, the formerly indomitable Chu riders lay diminished by half. Liu Ren and his dozen blood-drenched executioners moved with spectral precision – an inexorable force transforming the arena into charnel grounds where flesh parted from bone like rice paper beneath the calligrapher's blade.
"Stay... *cough*... stay this carnage!" Zhuge Yao implored through haemorrhagic gasps, clutching his embroidered lapels. "These youths... scions of Chu's noblest houses..."
His entreaty dissolved into the void. The sand-strewn floor now ran incarnadine with vital humours – an entire generation of Chu's martial aristocracy extinguished ere the noon bells tolled.
The Emperor's Marriage Decree
"Cease? Absurdity. A loosed arrow knows no retreat." Ye Ling's lips curled with glacial disdain as his gaze devoured the carnage below. His palms struck rhythmically, each clap a staccato mockery. "Magnificent! Let their entrails paint the arena!"
"Exquisite carnage!" Fang Yan's voice slithered through the hall, amplifying the macabre symphony.
The chamber thundered with the ecstatic applause of Da Shang's ministers. Decades of humiliation beneath Da Chu's iron heel now erupted in primal catharsis. *Let these preening jackals choke on their arrogance,* their pounding hearts roared. Every severed limb below became a votive offering to comrades slaughtered by Da Chu's crescent blades.
"Desist... urg—" Zhuge Yao's plea dissolved into crimson froth. The architect of this doomed stratagem now glimpsed his future—flayed alive by grieving Da Chu nobles, his lineage extinguished root and stem. His trembling fingers clawed at the viewing platform's rail as Liu Ren's warblades reduced his "invincible formation" to quivering meat.
"Recall your hounds!" Zhao Ling'er jammed a golden pill between Zhuge Yao's teeth while shrieking at Ye Ling. "This slaughter stains Heaven itself!"
"Recall?" Ye Ling's laughter dripped with honeyed venom. "Should the sun halt its course because a mayfly demands shade? Behold—" His jewelled finger swept across the abattoir below. "This *is* Da Shang's answer to your 'diplomacy'."
"The princess's memory falters," Fang Yan purred, his fan tracing lethal arcs through the incense smoke. "Were these not your own words? 'Let steel decide truth; let blood ink the contract.'
The mentor-disciple duo shared a smile sharper than gutting hooks. Their synchronised contempt hung heavier than the iron-scented air.
"Those were common soldiers!" Zhao Ling'er's coronet trembled as she gestured at the butchered nobles. "The blood now watering this field flows from imperial veins! When our war-galleys darken your shores, your name shall be cursed for millennia!"
"War-galleys?" Ye Ling's mirth cracked like ice under artillery. He kicked a severed Da Chu standard toward her. "Your 'invincibles' lie as mulch for our barley fields. Let your emperor come! We'll plant his skull atop the Western Gates as a bird feeder."
Below, Liu Ren's blade carved finality. The last Da Chu survivor—a princeling barely sixteen—fell to his knees, offering ancestral jade pendants in trembling surrender. The warblade's crescent arc severed both hands and hope. No quarter. No prisoners. No intact corpses.
Da Shang's sun blazed triumphant over the meat-grinder arena, its rays gilding the artistic sprawl of dismembered limbs. The flies will feast well tonight.
The Dragon's Vengeance
The Mo Dao sabres sheared through iron like silk through mist, their hunger for flesh unquenchable. A coppery reek of carnage rose from the training grounds to haunt the imperial gallery, where Great Chu's envoys alone blanched at the spectacle. Da Shang's courtiers inhaled the metallic perfume like aged wine—a catharsis for decades of northern blades harvesting their countrymen beyond the Wall.
"Let not a single cur draw breath!" Crown Prince Ye Ling's decree fell like a headsman's axe. "Blood demands blood for my Thirteenth Uncle. Let the world learn: those who dare bare fangs at Da Shang, though separated by mountains and seas, shall find their bones ground to dust!"
Though separated by mountains and seas.
The war cry stirred ancestral fires in rheumy eyes. Bureaucrats turned battlefield ghosts remembered the youth's fervour when imperial banners flew crimson over vanquished hordes. Years of decadence had banked those flames—until this reckoning.
Below, General Liu Ren's blade danced its final aria. The last Chu warrior crumpled as Zhuge Yao—architect of the royal line's unravelling—spat his life into the dust. Yet all knew the true death had come earlier, when his web of poison and whispers dissolved like morning fog.
"You'll drown in this crimson tide, Ye Ling!" Princess Zhao Ling'er's phoenix coronet trembled with fury, tears carving paths through rouge. "Great Chu's soil will sprout warriors from every grain you've bloodied today!"
"Fleeing already?" The prince's laughter bit colder than winter steel. "Shall our sanitation crews bill Your Highness for corpse disposal? Even carrion crows pay tolls at Da Shang's borders."
Her jade nails drew blood from pearl-white palms. "Your vulgar tongue proves what filth flows through your veins!"
"Vulgar?" Ye Ling captured a trembling hairpin, its gemstone catching sunlight like frozen fire. "Recall our wager, Princess. If your assassins had succeeded, I would bow down before you. Now that Heaven's scales tilt toward Da Shang... what treasure might balance them?"
The unspoken demand lingered like the smoke of an executioner. Ministers exchanged knowing glances—none forgot the Sixth Prince's legendary audacity. The man who'd dared covet his sister-in-law now eyed a warrior princess like a wolf appraising a lamb.
"Rot in the Nine Hells first!" Her dagger flashed free. "I'll carve my bridal vows on your entrails!"
The Collapse of Dignity
"Such fire from our foreign kitten!" Ye Ling sneered, his fingers closing around the phoenix hairpin in Zhao Ling'er's coiled tresses. With a vicious tug, he tore the jewelled ornament free, sending her midnight hair cascading like a defeated banner. "You presume I'd take spoilt goods? This trinket suits my new Liangdi better – at least she knows her place beneath royalty."
The insult cut deeper than the blade's edge. To strip a princess of her coronet before foreign courts wasn't mere humiliation – it was the vivisection of Chu's pride. Ye Ling dangled the captured hairpin like a battlefield trophy, its pearls catching light that no longer graced Ling'er's ashen face.
"Mark this day, barbarian envoy," the crown prince thundered, "when Great Chu returns our Youzhou territories seized by your wolf-father's fangs! Or shall we carve reminders into your northern plains with Da Shang steel?"
"HAH!" Emperor Shang's laughter shook the jade-inlaid throne. "Let the Stone Chronicles record – this was the hour my least son became a dragon!" Not once in decades had Da Shang prevailed against Chu's cavalry. Now they'd annihilated the infamous Black Mane battalion, their blood watering the training grounds where Zhuge Yao's broken form lay wheezing.
Zhao Ling'er's trembling fingers found the dishevelled ruin of her coiffure. Through gritted teeth came the desperate gambit: "Three trials were sworn! Two skirmishes prove nothing!"
"Three?" Ye Ling's barked laughter held winter's bite. "We count victories differently – one for each hundred Chu corpses fertilising our fields." The courtiers' guffaws swelled like war drums. "Run home, little pretender. Tell your Khan the Age of Kneeling begins at dawn."
Yet even as Zhuge Yao's bloodstained lips moved in counsel, the princess grasped her poisoned chalice. "Your first 'triumph' was the stolen verse! True warriors face the third trial!" Her eyes burnt with the madness of drowning climbers – knowing the cliff edge crumbles, yet clawing upward still.
"Let wolves dispute over dried bones." Ye Ling turned his back in consummate dismissal. "Refuse payment, and our blades will collect with interest." The threat hung like an executioner's axe above the diplomatic farce. For in that moment, every minister understood – this profligate prince had become war's architect, and Da Shang's battered pride would tolerate no further compromise.
The Art of Affectation
With ceremonial precision that dripped theatricality, Zhao Ling'er inclined her head toward the Dragon Throne, her gaze meticulously avoiding Ye Ling's smirking presence. "For our final wager, Your Celestial Majesty," her voice resonated like temple bells tuned to mock humility, "Great Chu proposes an artisans' duel. Let your craftsmen contend with our Thousand-Mile Siege Bovines, Ninefold Repeating Ballistae, and Enchanted Cypress Damsels. Should we falter, Youzhou's keys shall be returned, clasped to a three-year cessation of hostilities."
The imperial hall inhaled as one. Three winters of peace – time enough to mend fractured borders and replenish ravaged granaries. Emperor Shang's jade-ringed fingers whitened imperceptibly against vermilion-lacquered armrests carved with celestial dragons. His obsidian gaze found Sixth Prince Ye Ling, whose lounging posture against a vermilion pillar belied razor-sharp awareness.
"Terms accepted," Ye Ling drawled, plucking a candied plum from a passing eunuch's tray, "provided we first inscribe this pact in vermillion ink. No more shifting the goalposts with your 'best-of-nine' sophistries, Princess."
"Vermillion script?" The jewelled headdresses of the Chu delegation trembled, akin to wind chimes in a typhoon. Zhao Ling'er's composure fractured like Ming porcelain dashed on marble – she who'd arrived swaddled in invincible arrogance, never contemplating defeat's bitter draught.
"Reluctant to formalise humiliation?" Ye Ling's fingers danced, her phoenix hairpin materialising like a conjurer's trick between them. The gilded avian seemed to preen in the shafted sunlight. "Shall we add clauses about returning stolen tea blends? Or perhaps," his smile turned lupine, "the silken under-robes your cavalry looted from our border towns?"
The hall erupted in scandalised titters. Zhao Ling'er's rouge deepened to mortified carmine. "Enough!" Her brush slashed across mulberry paper like a general's sabre. The document unfurled – a silk banner of surrender etched in iron-gall ink. Youzhou's restitution. Three celestial cycles of truce. Ten dawns hence, the Armillary Square would host a craftsmen's duel. When her seal stamped the parchment, the wax's crimson drip might as well have been arterial spray from Chu's wounded pride.
"Thus binds the word of Chu," Ye Ling purred, tucking the hairpin into his sash where it glinted like a trophy. "No more honeyed lies from your silver-tongued envoys, little pretender princess."
"You'll gargle those words with your dying breath!" Zhao Ling'er's retreating entourage swirled autumn-storm violent, their embroidered hems kicking up eddies of incense ash.
As the vermilion gates thundered shut, the throne hall's tension dissolved into euphoric chaos. Ministers descended upon Ye Ling like starved koi swarming rice cakes – "Architect of Salvation!" "The Divine Strategist!" Their flattery hung thick as monsoon humidity, buzzing with speculation about jade seals and princely coronets.
The Emperor's voice cleaved through the adulation, mountainous and inevitable. "Claim your boon, Ling'er. Even the celestial vault must honour such service."
Ye Ling's bow flowed like calligraphy ink, his gaze lingering on Grand Preceptor Fu Hai – that ageing fox whose daughter's bedchamber he'd scandalously infiltrated during the Mooncake Festival. "This unworthy son merely performed his filial duty. Though..." A beat pregnant with implication. "Sixteen summers do weight a man's shoulders with... domestic considerations."
The unspoken request vibrated louder than war gongs – a marriage petition for Fu Hai's famously sharp-tongued heir, whose hairpin he still carried like a lover's token.
The Gravity of Whimsy
A viperous wrath writhed within Grand Tutor Fu Hai's breast as his gaze pierced Ye Ling—this profligate scion who dared eclipse First Prince Ye Changfeng's celestial brilliance. Yet beneath the gilded dome of the Dragon Throne, he preserved the marble countenance befitting his station.
Emperor Shang's jade-ringed fingers traced languid patterns across armrests sculpted with nine celestial serpents. "Sixteen celestial cycles indeed beckon matrimonial contemplation," he intoned, sunlight fracturing through his golden-threaded sleeves like divine benediction. "Declare your chosen jewel, Ling'er. Let imperial seals consecrate this youthful fervour."
The court's collective breath stilled as Ye Ling's obeisance unfolded with pantherine elegance. "This unworthy supplicant entreats the hand of Minister Fu's crystalline offspring, Fu Yuanyuan..." His hesitation resonated with the solemnity of bronze temple chimes. "...as my chamber's lotus blossom."
A seismic silence fractured into ministerial whispers—honeyed felicitations intertwining with silk-gloved derision. Fu Hai's visage darkened to bruised damson, ivory sceptre groaning beneath whitened knuckles as ancestral honour haemorrhaged.
"An...irregular petition," the emperor conceded, amusement glinting beneath imperial gravitas. "Does this jade maiden's virtue merit such...stratified elevation?"
Ye Ling's exhalation rippled with theatrical melancholy. "When phoenix-carved betrothal chests graced Fu Manor's threshold, the lady vowed to till monastic soil ere warming my bedchamber." His fingers fluttered like wounded swallowtails. "Shall heaven's will be thwarted? A concubine's silken pillow offers a pious compromise."
Fu Hai's ceremonial headpiece quivered like autumn's last persimmon. "Celestial Sovereign—"
"—shall be magnanimously elevated!" The emperor's decree sundered the air like ceremonial gongs. Vermilion-tipped fingers carved celestial edicts. "Let history chronicle: Fu Yuanyuan enters the prince's household as moonlit consort. As the waxing crescent sets, the nuptial procession departs.
As courtiers descended upon Fu Hai with asp-tongued condolences, Ye Ling's gaze pierced the minister across the gilded chasm. His lips sculpted soundless syllables discernible only to raptor-eyed observers: *The game concludes, venerable fox.*
To be continuous…