The Atmosphere of the Battlefield
After the military council for the Battle of Hanae concluded and the officers began to disperse, Lord Xinling called out to me. “Dan, hold on a moment.”
In an Alliance that prized equality, being singled out like that made me uncomfortable, so I instinctively glanced around. Yet the other generals didn’t seem particularly bothered; they already knew how close I was to Lord Xinling. They might have been schooling their expressions, but by now I had learned to read the room. Above all, it was Lord Xinling doing the calling. She would have calculated that no real trouble would come of it.
“If this concerns the Yan army, wouldn’t it be better for General Geuksin to join us?”
“It’s nothing important. We’ll speak briefly and part ways, so you can discuss it among the Yan forces later.”
When Lord Xinling deliberately downplayed the significance of our private conversation, the generals who had been lingering nearby with feigned slowness began to drift off as though nothing had happened.
Once the two of us were alone, the stern tone she had used throughout the meeting vanished. She spoke to me in the comfortable, familiar manner I knew well.
“So, what are your impressions after your first battle?”
“Impressions… To be honest, I was in the middle of the troops and couldn’t even see how the fighting was progressing.”
“That makes sense. The Qin side didn’t throw themselves at us in a desperate death match, and once Meng Ao arrived it ended almost immediately.”
Lord Xinling nodded in understanding, then asked again with a far more serious expression.
“But you must have felt it, yes? The atmosphere of the battlefield.”
“……Yes. It was unmistakably different.”
Even now the scene flickered hazily before my eyes, and the clamor refused to leave my ears, crackling like static on an old radio. People were dying. Far too easily. Not one or two, but dozens, hundreds. If the same number of people had died in peaceful daily life, the entire kingdom would have been thrown into uproar over a string of murders. On the battlefield, however, such slaughter was treated as the most natural thing in the world.
A philosopher once said that killing one man makes you a murderer, killing a million makes you a conqueror, and killing them all makes you a god.
Ordinary morality collapsed. Only the logic of raw power remained. My mind could not form a single coherent thought amid the carnage. The stench of blood and filth was so thick it seemed to numb the nose. The screams and shrieks were so piercing I wondered if my eardrums would rupture. Even the air brushing against my skin felt sticky and ominous, unbearably unpleasant.
A space that tricked the senses into believing they no longer belonged to me. That was what a battlefield was.
“Indeed,” Lord Xinling murmured bitterly. “A battlefield is exactly that—a place where the most precious thing of all, life, becomes cheaper than anything else. Perhaps that is why people call this era the desolate Warring States period, where neither the flowers of spring nor the bounty of autumn can be found.”
She continued in a heavier tone. “They say hearing something a hundred times cannot compare to seeing it once. Though you already understood the misery and cruelty of the Warring States, this must have been your first time witnessing it directly. If you have grasped that truth, then the battle held more than enough value for you.”
Had I stood on the front lines where war’s brutality showed itself most clearly, rather than in the relative safety of the rear, I doubt I could have kept my sanity intact. Although my thinking had changed greatly since reincarnating into the Warring States, my ethical sense and moral framework still belonged largely to a man of the twenty-first century. I had lived in a divided nation at truce, but war and slaughter had always been distant words to me.
I had told myself repeatedly that I would eventually have to face this after being reborn here, yet it seemed preparation alone was not enough. The horror of the battlefield I had witnessed firsthand continued to gnaw at my mind even from a distance.
Setting aside my complaints about being overwhelmed by war, I refocused on Lord Xinling.
“From now on, remain beside me whenever we take the field.”
As supreme commander, Lord Xinling climbed the watchtower to survey the entire battlefield and direct its flow. She read the tide of combat with her own eyes; once her mind reached a tactical decision, her hands and voice moved, issuing orders to every unit. Those commands were relayed across the field through flags, drums, messengers, and more, reshaping the course of battle. She was, in essence, the director of the greatest tragedy humanity performed: war itself.
And she was offering the seat beside her to me—the place from which one could witness the greatest number of deaths at a single glance.
So she hadn’t called me out during the opening clash as a kind of vaccine. Effective, yet painfully sharp.
Still, I could not retreat. The moment I resolved to preserve the system of the allied states, I had mounted a tiger’s back.
“I will do so.”
I would stand with Lord Xinling and watch the battlefield. I would learn how to read the pulse of combat, how to remain calm without being devoured by its madness. And above all, I would learn how to become the great adversary who stood against the Qin army—the mortal enemy of every allied state.
On the way back after my private meeting with Lord Xinling, I reflected on the command structure. In truth, General Geuksin had always shouldered the actual leadership of the Yan army, but because I was nominally her superior, she operated by seeking my approval. Of course, in practice it was closer to her imparting lessons than asking permission.
I needed to inform her that I would now remain at headquarters with Lord Xinling and transfer full command authority to her. Geuksin had been the one who first advised me to learn at Lord Xinling’s side; she must have guessed what our conversation would entail the moment Lord Xinling called for me.
When I told her, Geuksin showed no surprise whatsoever, just as I expected.
“That is excellent. Your Highness has no need to master every trivial detail of combat. For peripheral engagements it is enough to understand the fundamentals, recognize your shortcomings, and leave it at that. However, learning how to manage the Alliance army as a whole is an entirely different matter.”
Geuksin looked ready to launch into a lengthy explanation of everything I should absorb from Lord Xinling. During our journey from Yan to Wei we had spoken often, and I had learned through experience that she talked far more than her initial image suggested. The solemn great general I had first imagined had long since vanished.
Still, she was speaking for my benefit, so I endured and listened carefully. Just as I settled into an attentive posture, Geuksin suddenly stopped and changed the subject completely.
“You worked hard in your first real battle. Even among warriors by birth, many lose their minds after their first taste of true combat. Compared to them, Your Highness endured remarkably well. Yet the human spirit erodes like stone worn away by wind. For today, it would be best if you returned to your quarters and rested.”
I hadn’t expected such words from Geuksin. The conversation I was having with her now felt fresher than the one with Lord Xinling. Since she came from the scholarly traditions of the Hundred Schools rather than a purely military background, it was not strange for her to possess such sensitivity. Even among pure warriors there were those known as virtuous generals who showed gentle, caring sides.
Setting aside my discovery of this new facet of Geuksin’s character, I returned to my lodgings only to find an uninvited guest waiting. My half-relaxed mind snapped back to full alertness.
“Hmm? What brings the Grand General of Chu here?”
The uninvited guest—Xiang Yan—turned from Sima Shang and Yeo Hong-seong, with whom she had been speaking, and looked toward me.
“The master has arrived. Pardon my intrusion.”
Xiang Yan strode over and stood directly before me, looking down. Yes. She was taller than I was. At roughly 170 centimeters I already exceeded the average adult height, yet Xiang Yan stood a good half-span taller—likely around 180 centimeters. She was slightly shorter than Yeo Hong-seong, but still an exceptionally tall woman.
“Since you’ve come in the middle of the night, it must be important. Shall we continue inside?”
“No need. I’ll state my business briefly and leave.”
Strictly speaking, Xiang Yan’s behavior was rude, yet I chose not to press the point. I knew her name. Even if I did not recall her precise achievements, the name Xiang Yan was worth remembering for one reason alone: her granddaughter was none other than Xiang Yu.
I had only skimmed the relevant records, but I still remembered the rough characters of the two protagonists—Liu Bang and Xiang Yu. Xiang Yu, granddaughter of Xiang Yan, the last renowned general of Chu.
Who was Xiang Yu? If the West had Richard the Lionheart, the East had Xiang Yu, the Hegemon-King of Western Chu. Enemy of ten thousand. Strength to uproot mountains, spirit to overshadow the world. The Hegemon King. All those titles belonged to a single person.
Since Xiang Yan was roughly one generation above me, Xiang Yu would belong to the generation immediately following mine. From the perspective of the future, building a friendly relationship with Xiang Yan now would be greatly advantageous. Moreover, even setting Xiang Yu aside, the Xiang clan was a prestigious military family that had held the rank of general in Chu for generations.
There were more than enough reasons to overlook a small breach of etiquette and instead seek closer ties.
“Very well. Speak.”