Aglow in the Moonlight
Under the moonlit night, they moved as one.
"General Zhu Huan. Look there. Xin Tan's signal has gone up."
"Ah. So it has."
Following the direction Quan Cong indicated, Zhu Huan saw a single torch dancing atop the walls of Jiangling. It was unmistakably the signal they had arranged with Xin Tan.
"All of you, prepare. The gates will open shortly."
At Zhu Huan's word, the soldiers checked their weapons and readied themselves to enter the city.
"The gates are open."
"Good. Everyone in. Seize the city. There's only a handful of guards inside right now. Report once you've secured the key positions."
"Yes, sir."
On Zhu Huan's order, the Wu troops that had been crouched in the darkness poured through the open gates in a rush.
Done. Jiangling is ours now.
During the last campaign for Jingzhou they had fallen for Xu Shu's scheme, but this time Xu Shu himself had been drawn out by Zhou Fang's plan and was nowhere near the city.
The vanguard passed through the gates without resistance and vanished into the darkness beyond.
Excellent. Wait—is it excellent?
Just as he was about to breathe a sigh of relief, Zhu Huan felt something was wrong.
"General Quan Cong. Doesn't this lack of counterattack feel a little too complete?"
"Pardon? Now that you mention it…"
Even if collaborators inside had seized the gates, they had expected at least some garrison force on the walls. No matter how carefully one moved in the dark, a force of this size was bound to raise some noise. Yet not a single arrow had been loosed, and not a single torch had been lit.
Trying to peer through the open gates revealed nothing but impenetrable black.
"Commit the second and third waves. The second wave is to advance at once and link up with the first. The third wave will advance under full alert—there may be an enemy trap."
"Yes, sir."
Zhu Huan was cautious. Rather than throw every man in at once, he split his forces so they could support one another, and he kept a substantial reserve of his main body in place.
Following his orders, the second and third waves entered the city in turn. Still the interior remained utterly silent.
Can it really be this quiet? Could it be an enemy ruse? If so, ambush troops may be hidden somewhere.
No sooner had the thought formed than sudden turmoil erupted from the woods to the left of Jiangling's walls.
"Waaaaah!"
Crimson torches flared to life in every direction, and the clang of gongs rode the night air and struck their eardrums.
"An ambush?!"
Startled though he was, Zhu Huan did not panic.
Even if there are ambush troops, their numbers can't be large. Seize the city quickly and wait for Generals Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang to arrive from behind.
Having come this far, he judged it too early to abandon the operation, and issued his next command.
"Fourth wave, advance on the woods to the left and drive out the ambush. Fifth wave, cover the fourth's rear."
The fourth and fifth waves moved toward the left-hand woods.
Then, from the city interior that had been so quiet until now, a fresh uproar rose. The clash of spears and blades seemed mixed with screams, but the noise from the left-hand woods made it hard to hear clearly.
"What's going on? Send runners and find out the situation."
Several messengers spurred their horses forward. Before they could even enter the city, however, the soldiers who had already gone in came pouring back out in utter panic—clearly a force that had been broken and was fleeing the enemy.
Zhu Huan seized the foremost runner.
"What is it? What happened? Did the enemy set a trap?"
"Yes, sir. They had ambush troops hidden house by house and hit us all at once. And also…"
The soldier trailed off, hesitating.
"And also what?"
"W-well. A strange woman appeared out of nowhere and started cutting through our men…"
"What? A strange woman?"
"Yes, sir. She looked completely out of place for a battlefield, but her martial skill was extraordinary."
Zhu Huan's face tightened. An extraordinary female warrior brought only one person to mind—yet the adjective "strange" attached to her was odd.
If it were Jin Cheong, she should still be in Xinye. Our spies have been watching her constantly, and there was no report of her leaving the city. Unless…?
He turned to the soldiers arriving behind the first.
"You there! Has anyone identified the enemy commander?"
"We're in trouble! They say the enemy general Jin Cheong is inside Jiangling right now!"
"What? Damn it—! Is that true?"
"The Shu troops are shouting Jin Cheong's name at the top of their lungs as they drive our men back! Our momentum's completely broken because of it…"
Zhu Huan clenched his teeth.
How long has Jin Cheong been here? If she was already in place before our raid, does that mean she already knew Lord Zhou Fang's plan?
He had no leisure for such fretting. Quan Cong's shout snapped him back to the present.
"General! Look at the walls!"
"…!"
The battlements that moments before had been buried in darkness now seethed with countless torches.
That many? Did they really have that many troops hidden? Then what of the forces that already left the city? No—no. That's a ruse to make their numbers look large. The proof is that they're only making noise; there's no real movement to fight.
Zhu Huan saw through the Shu scheme.
Xu Shu and Feng Xi had taken most of the garrison out with them, and though Pan Jun had left a portion of troops concealed, the soldiers actually on the walls were few. They had bound several torches together and waved them about to feign a substantial force, while drums and gongs raised nothing but clamor.
Even so, recognizing the ruse himself was not enough to calm the Wu rank and file. The Shu operation was working perfectly on the soldiers. The will to fight was draining from eyes that rolled with unease.
Judging further combat impossible, Zhu Huan had no choice but to order a withdrawal.
"Sound the gongs! Tell our men to fall back! And order the troops that went into the left-hand woods to retreat as well! Pull back first and reorganize the units."
As Zhu Huan had predicted, the ambush on the left was also a Shu deception—a small force raising noise solely to draw off part of his army.
He meant to rejoin the units that had advanced leftward, then withdraw, meet Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang after they had crushed Xu Shu in the rear, and plan the next move. (At this point Zhu Huan still did not know that Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang had already fallen into a trap of their own.)
But the Shu forces did not wait for the Wu army to consolidate.
"General Zhu Huan! The enemy is coming out of the city!"
Zhu Huan could see her—the woman at the very front, spurring her horse and racing toward them like an arrow.
The moment he laid eyes on her, he understood why the word "strange" had been attached to her description.
She was still only a dark silhouette, yet the garments billowing wide about her were everyday clothes, not armor, and the ornaments draped all over her body caught the moonlight and glittered with gaudy brilliance.
As the attire of someone leading a charge, it was utterly inappropriate—and more than enough to fix every Wu eye upon her.
What in the world is that?
Whish! Whish! Whiiiish!
Three times in succession the air was split, and the three soldiers standing in front of Zhu Huan toppled one after another. Each had an arrow buried in his body.
"It's Jin Cheong!"
"Jin Cheong is coming!"
The Wu soldiers knew the female general well—the one who, in the last decisive battle, had shattered Sun Quan's main force with a flanking charge, and who not long ago had fought Zhang Liao to a draw.
"Don't panic—counterattack! The enemy is few!"
Even with his forces split, Wu still held the advantage in numbers. A few hundred Shu troops were a force that could be overwhelmed by sheer head count. Under ordinary circumstances.
But human beings, once crushed in spirit, could not muster even half their usual strength.
Proof of that was the way the Wu front lines collapsed every time Jin Cheong's spear flashed as she plunged into their ranks.
What is that outfit supposed to be?
Up close, her appearance was even more bizarre.
Garments painted in brilliant colors. Precious metals that swayed and clattered with every movement. She looked far more suited to a banquet than a battlefield—and somehow that very fact made her stand out all the more sharply to Wu eyes, especially in a darkness lit only by the moon.
Every time the blade of her spear scattered light, her ornaments seemed to answer in kind, casting a pale radiance of their own.
The man who faced her never even registered the attack before he hit the ground, and the Wu soldiers around her recoiled in terror from the halo of light that seemed to drift about her person.
Damn it! Does she think war is a game?
Uncharacteristically, Zhu Huan flared with rage. To swagger like that without even wearing armor!
He charged straight at her and swung his sword.
Clang!
Jin Cheong turned the blow aside with ease and answered at once. Zhu Huan parried her counter—but then,
Ugh?!
As if the rebound meant nothing, a second and third strike came flying in without pause. He managed to turn a few more aside, yet her spear never lost its balance, as though it were one flesh with her body, and poured on a continuous assault.
Hell. She's beyond what I can handle. I'd need the late General Gan Ning—or at least General Ding Feng—for this…!
Zhu Huan barely shook her off and wrenched himself free.
"General Quan Cong! What of the units that peeled off to the left?"
"They should be able to join us shortly!"
"Good. Hold on a little longer!"
Zhu Huan believed that once the forces separated at the start of the battle rejoined him, the situation would turn. Once again, events refused to match his expectations.
"General! A force is approaching from the rear."
"What? Are they ours?"
"We can't tell yet."
Just as the subordinate said, a vast black shadow like a bank of storm cloud was closing on the Wu rear.
Generals Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang? No. They couldn't possibly have arrived this soon…
Then a cry burst from within the black mass.
"Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang have already been dealt with!"
"Wu troops, expect no reinforcements!"
They were proclaiming that the army of Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang in the rear had been routed.
It was Xi Jin's unit. Stationed in Wuling, Xi Jin had marched out on Ma Liang's word, lain in wait a short distance from Jiangling, and now appeared at the Wu rear to sow chaos. His numbers were not large, but spreading baseless rumors was more than enough to throw the Wu army into confusion.
"W-what! Both generals already—?"
"It can't have gone that far so quickly. It may be nothing but a rumor meant to throw our ranks into disorder."
Zhu Huan and Quan Cong tried to steady their shaken men, but restoring morale that had already hit rock bottom looked hopeless.
In the end, the Wu army recorded one more defeat at Jiangling and quit the field.