Tiger of Jiangdong (3)
Liu Biao's army descended into chaos the moment the very arrows they had loosed came raining back down upon them.
His aide, seeing it, shouted with a stricken face.
"General! The soldiers are falling into confusion!"
"I can see that! Get them under control, and be quick about it!"
"Yes, sir!"
Huang Zu and his aide bellowed themselves hoarse, struggling to rein in the panicked ranks. Yet for all their efforts, the soldiers showed no sign of settling. With arrows streaming endlessly from the sky and comrades dropping beside them, no man on that field could find his composure again.
And all the while, Sun Jian's forces kept coming, rowing their boats forward at a leisurely pace even as they loosed volley after volley. In the end, Liu Biao's army, which had done nothing but absorb the punishment, failed to stop them from landing on the riverbank and turned tail.
A short while later, the instant the boats touched the shore, Sun Jian's troops poured ashore as though they had been waiting for precisely this moment. The columns under Huang Gai and Cheng Pu split to either side and swept along the road toward Huang Zu's camp.
Huang Zu, who had fallen back to await them there, issued his orders.
"Hold them! This ground must not be breached—absolutely not!"
"Yes, sir!"
Somehow rallied, his soldiers tightened their defenses, cold sweat trickling down their necks. Then the commanders at the head of Sun Jian's vanguard came into view and roared taunts across the field at Liu Biao's army.
"Huang Zu! Come and try to topple this Huang Gongfu, if you dare!"
"Step forward and match yourself against Cheng Demou, and let us see who walks away!"
Even at a distance, the two men baiting him looked well stricken in years, and being provoked by the likes of them made Huang Zu explode.
"What business have old men who ought to be dandling their grandchildren at home on a battlefield! Clear off, before I lose my patience!"
"Bwahahahaha!"
At Huang Zu's outburst, Huang Gai laughed heartily even as he urged his horse forward.
"Now, now, Huang Zu! This old body of mine is still hale and hearty, so spare me your worries!"
"What a barefaced lie! Very well! Today I'll see a grave dug—just for you!"
"Hmmm... And here I was telling the honest truth, too. Why won't anyone believe me..."
Did he really look that old? There was a man older than him standing right there, yet strangers invariably took Huang Gai for the eldest of the lot.
When a flicker of embarrassment crossed his face, that true eldest—a fact known only to those who knew him—chuckled cheerfully from nearby.
"Kwahahaha! Elder Gongfu! Isn't it about time you gave some thought to retirement!"
"Grrrhm..."
Wordless, Huang Gai rode out to the front himself.
"Left with no other choice, I'll simply have to prove it with strength!"
With that declaration, he whirled his weapon through the empty air with a deep, thrumming whoosh.
"Huang Zu! Come out here and cross weapons with me, won't you!"
"You blockhead! Who in his right mind would fight a man lugging around such a barbaric lump of iron!"
The club looked crushingly heavy at a single glance. Take the blunt weapon commonly called the Iron Whip and scale it up to absurd proportions, and you would get exactly that. Yet the mad old man swung that murderous thing like a mere tree branch, as though it weighed nothing at all.
Huang Gai let out a great laugh at the stream of curses.
"Haha! What a long-winded way of admitting you're too scared to fight!"
"Silence! What are you all standing around for! Man the defenses, now!"
Even as the commanders traded barbs, Sun Jian's army advanced at an unhurried pace until it was nearly upon Huang Zu's camp. When Huang Zu refused the offer of single combat, Huang Gai simply pressed the momentum and charged.
Split into two prongs around Huang Gai and Cheng Pu, Sun Jian's army hammered Huang Zu's camp from left and right.
"CHAAARGE!!"
When the elite veterans who had fought at Sun Jian's side since the old days crashed into them, a fresh wave of turmoil swept through Liu Biao's ranks.
Huang Zu shouted himself ragged, exhorting his soldiers with everything he had.
"Fight with everything you have! Do that much, and we will drive them off!"
"Haha! What a laughable notion!"
Huang Gai sneered, pointing at Huang Zu's soldiers.
"Look at your own men! See how they stagger, ready to collapse at the slightest push!"
With that, he swung his enormous iron whip and hammered the soldier barring his path. The blow caught the man's head and caved it in outright, spraying gore and fragments in every direction.
At that gruesome sight, Huang Zu's already frightened soldiers cowered back further still.
Spears clashed and war cries rang out on every side, yet somehow the old man's thunderous voice cut through it all with perfect clarity. Sun Jian was the same. It was enough to make a man wonder—what was with those people and their voices?
Deciding that answering would only leave him with a sore throat, Huang Zu ignored the taunts and kept exhorting his troops. But for all his efforts, Liu Biao's army could not best Sun Jian's and began to be pushed back, inch by inch.
A troubled look settled on Huang Zu's face.
"Ugh... What in the world am I to do about this..."
"General! Urgent report!"
At that moment, the aide at his side called out, his voice tight with alarm.
"What could possibly be the matter in the middle of all this madness!"
"Another army has shown itself behind our camp, sir!"
"What?! Whose army?!"
It seemed that all he had done today was be astonished, and never once in a pleasant way, Huang Zu thought bitterly as he pressed the question.
The aide hurried to answer.
"I cannot say for certain, sir, but they fly red war banners marked with the character Han!"
"Red banners? As if there were any army here besides Sun Jian's flying red banners!"
Huang Zu shouted back, correcting his aide's report then and there.
"This makes no sense. Do you mean to tell me they have every inch of this terrain memorized?"
"General! If we hold our ground, we will be encircled!"
"...!"
This time, his aide was right.
Huang Zu judged that he had no choice but to pull his army off this ground. With the enemy already gripping his rear, there could be no returning to Fancheng.
"Retreat! Retreat, I say! Any direction will do—fall back, and quickly!"
No sooner had the words left his mouth than Liu Biao's army turned its back and bolted.
At the sight, Huang Gai said with a laugh:
"Haha! It would seem Yigong has arrived!"
"So he saw through our design on their rear."
Judging the enemy commander to be a rather capable one, Cheng Pu set off in pursuit of the fleeing Liu Biao army.
Huang Gai bellowed:
"The enemy runs! Chase them down and cut them to pieces!"
"WAAAAAAGH—!"
With a roar of victory, Sun Jian's army surged after Liu Biao's rear guard.
"Nngh...! What on earth am I to do about this!"
Huang Zu, who had marched out on Liu Biao's orders to hold Fancheng, had in the end been defeated by Sun Jian. He had been left with no choice but to abandon the city and flee all the way to Dongcheng—and with him isolated out here, Xiangyang Castle, where the Governor of Jingzhou sat, had naturally been placed in jeopardy as well.
Before laying into Xiangyang Castle, Sun Jian would surely dispose of him first, clearing away the threat at his rear. Wringing his hands over it, Huang Zu could only agonize over whatever countermeasure he might yet devise.
This was no longer a question of whether he could or couldn't. If he wished to go on living, he had to conjure up a stratagem capable of beating Sun Jian's army. Nothing less would do.
"General!"
Just then his aide came bursting in yet again, looking frantic. By now Huang Zu could guess what was coming, but he asked anyway, just in case.
"What is it this time?"
"Sun Jian's army has crossed Fancheng and, hot on our heels, has pitched camp nearby!"
"Damn these cursed bastards."
They could have taken their sweet time coming, but no—they had to come charging like this. Spitting out his curses, Huang Zu led the officers who had escaped alongside him out to battle.
Hurrying from his hastily struck camp, he found Sun Jian's force encamped a short distance away, exactly as the aide had reported. And that man standing at the front of their battle line—that would be the famous Sun Jian himself.
Having spotted Huang Zu, Sun Jian called out in a voice like rolling thunder.
"General Huang Zu! What are you doing over there! From that haggard state of yours, you've clearly been through quite an ordeal!"
Anyone who thought about it for even a moment could read the intent behind the words. He was baiting him, angling to drag an already lopsided battle into even more favorable ground. But letting such a provocation pass unanswered would only grind down his army's morale, so Huang Zu opened his mouth and fired back at once.
"You rat of Jiangdong! What exactly is your intent in trespassing upon the lands of an imperial kinsman!"
"What's that? A rat, you say?"
Sun Jian's eyes went wide in mock astonishment. He held still for a beat—then burst into hearty laughter.
"That bold tongue of yours, at least, is to my liking! Let's see whether you fight half as well as you talk!"
"That is all I could ask for! Come, someone! Who will go and break those men's spirit for me!"
As he shouted, Huang Zu turned his head this way and that. After the earlier defeat he had half-feared that no one would step forward, but to his relief, an officer came forth.
"Leave it to me, General! I will strike down their vanguard with my own hands!"
"Ohh, yes! If it's you, I can entrust it with confidence!"
Huang Zu nodded and said:
"Go forth at once and crush their morale!"
"Yes, sir!"
The officer who received those orders, Zhang Hu, strode out with all the swagger he could muster and issued a challenge of single combat to Sun Jian's camp.
The battle between Sun Jian and Liu Biao was not yet over.