Xiangyang Castle (4)
Gan Ning had come raiding by night with a bare few hundred river pirates at Huang Zu's command — and Zhang Liao, who had arrived at the siege lines around Fancheng on the General-in-Chief's orders, showed herself the moment she felt the camp boil into uproar.
KRAK!
The two weapons met and wove together in midair.
"...Hah!"
Twisting away from the crescent blade as it curved in at her like something alive, Gan Ning laughed. So this is what it feels like to hammer on a castle wall with your bare fists. No matter what angle she charged from, Zhang Liao turned her aside without visible effort — and the sight wrung an unhidden delight out of her.
"You fight better than I gave you credit for?! Color me impressed!"
"I believe that's my line."
Zhang Liao thought to herself, ...So there was a reason she was so confident.
The enemy before her flung out threatening blows and, between them, kept angling her twin halberds to snatch the crescent blade from her grip. Zhang Liao's training had not been idle enough to fall for such a ploy easily — but were she dragged into it even once, her stance would crumble and the duel would tilt sharply against her. Worse, the woman wove lithe, acrobatic closes into her blade-work, and that alone was proving a mild headache.
But that was all it amounted to. Gan Ning could hurl herself into the attack without hesitation or restraint; Zhang Liao, refusing to be swept into her opponent's designs, locked down her defense and bided her time for a counter. Short of some unforeseen upset, this duel showed no sign of ever ending.
"...Tch."
Gan Ning clicked her tongue. She knew that any longer, and the General-in-Chief's reinforcements would come running. To think the enemy fielded a commander who could stand against her. Spinning on her heel, she sprang backward in a single bound.
"...!"
Zhang Liao moved to give chase — and flinched at the hidden daggers Gan Ning flung as she spun away.
Ting—!
The daggers, turned aside by the crescent blade, clattered to the ground. Watching them fall, Gan Ning scratched at her disheveled hair.
"Figured as much, but so that doesn't work either, huh."
So saying, she hollered, "Hey! Zhang Liao, was it? You'd best thank your lucky stars!"
"..."
"If I had my way, I'd cross blades with you till the sun came up, but I'd best be pulling out!"
Zhang Liao answered in an even voice. "I would not mind dueling you all night myself."
"Hah! And if we get surrounded doing that, we're the ones who die, aren't we?"
Gan Ning spat on the ground and counted the pirates still standing unharmed around her. A few of her men had died while she was tied up with that commander — she had confirmed as much.
"I'll be back to raid you again, so keep that neck of yours clean and wait!"
"...I wouldn't recommend it."
"What was that?"
At Gan Ning's flat echo, Zhang Liao flashed a smile. "You walk away in one piece because it was me you ran into. Had it been anyone else, you'd have been taken without a fight."
"...Go slick your lips with honey before you tell lies like that!"
With that cry, Gan Ning roared to the pirates under her: "We're pulling out! Run like your feet are on fire!"
"Got it!"
Gan Ning's night raid had been a success. True, she had been forced to withdraw after running into Zhang Liao in the heart of the camp — but put another way, that meant she had cut her way in as far as its very center. The General-in-Chief's soldiers, finding the men who had guarded the camp entrance lying dead, felt their morale drop like a stone. The defenders had cut down several of Gan Ning's pirates in driving them off, but weighed against what the General-in-Chief's side had lost, it was a paltry price.
"Hahahaha! Now that is glad news!"
Huang Zu laughed out loud at the report. If only the General-in-Chief's army were not busy besieging Fancheng, he would have thrown a feast and broken out the wine! He found it a genuine pity that he could not.
"And what is the General-in-Chief's army doing at this moment?"
At his question, his aide bowed and answered. "They are shoring up the camp, sir — reorganizing the soldiers, strengthening the watch, reinforcing the works!"
"Hmm..."
Huang Zu stroked his beard as he listened. "Reinforcing the camp means they have not yet finished putting their house in order, yes?"
"Yes, sir! They're still bustling about in there!"
"Good."
Huang Zu nodded and gave his order. "Strike them with another night raid before they finish reinforcing that camp."
"When are we to raid, sir?"
When his aide asked cautiously, Huang Zu guffawed. "Before dawn. Tonight."
"...You cannot be serious."
Not a single day had passed since the last strike at the General-in-Chief's camp. Anyone could predict that tonight's watch would be razor-tight — so why would Huang Zu issue such an order? To his aide's astonishment, he answered as though it were the simplest thing in the world.
"That is precisely my design."
"...?"
"They will never dream of a second night raid the very next day after the first." Huang Zu added, "It will keep gnawing at their nerves — and see to it they cannot give themselves wholly over to the siege."
The aide mulled something over for a moment, then spoke. "...Then General Gan Ning may well voice her displeasure."
Huang Zu's strategy was not a bad one — but to the one who would have to lead the raiders in person, the order would hardly sit well. To that concern, he replied with a face of perfect calm.
"And what of it?"
"..."
"Those wretches are nothing but river bandits. That I employ them this prominently is thanks enough — by what pretext do they presume to defy me?"
However disgruntled that pirate band grew over their treatment, they were in no position to betray Liu Biao. It went without saying. Who on earth would take in river pirates with a record of betrayal behind them? Unless they fancied going back to banditry, running wild until someone mustered a punitive expedition to stamp them out, those fools who knew no use for their strength but force had no choice but to bend to his word.
"They should have lived honestly, then." Why on earth had they gone about stripping other people of their property and their lives? Huang Zu knew as well as any man that hounding others over private spite was unseemly — but that pirate band had wrought their tyranny on far too many. Why else would even Liu Biao, their own lord, cold-shoulder them and pretend not to know them? Gan Ning and her crew belonged nowhere at all, drifting at the fringe of every power in the land — a gang of rogues not one of Jingzhou's magnates would take sides with.
"So set your worries aside and go deliver my orders."
"...As you command."
Huang Zu's aide, Su Fei, bowed and took the order upon himself.
Su Fei, arrived to relay Huang Zu's orders, laid the whole of it out before Gan Ning.
"...And that is where things stand."
"Ha. Unbelievable."
Unable to swallow her fury, Gan Ning muttered under her breath. "Half the boys are still nursing wounds from yesterday, and she's forcing them out to fight again?"
The raid had succeeded — but the General-in-Chief's army were elite troops whose name rang across the land. Few had died outright, yet just under half had taken wounds in the counterattack. Push those men out now, and every last scab would tear open, every man jack of them. And that damned bastard looked for all the world as though nothing that befell them could interest him less.
"I have long watched your talent with keen interest."
As Gan Ning fumed and puffed, Su Fei went on. "But it grieves me that under Liu Biao, that talent will never have room to spread its wings."
"..."
"I have found a stretch where the siege net runs comparatively thin. Cut your way through there, and you will be free to go seek yourself a new lord."
"Whew... I hear you. But not now."
At her refusal, Su Fei looked startled. "What do you mean?"
"However they treat me now — this is the outfit that took me in when I was nothing but a river pirate."
"...Mm."
"This order will be the last loyalty I pay them. A final debt of honor, nothing more."
Rising from her seat, Gan Ning smiled. "And after that? What becomes of a sorry outfit like this is no business of mine."
Hearing that her mind was unchanged, Su Fei nodded. "Have it your way, then."
Gan Ning trudged out and away, and Su Fei quietly watched her retreating back.
That night.
Gathering her men, Gan Ning spoke. "Anyone who thinks they can't manage it is free to drop out."
"Aigoo. How could we ever let you go in alone, Boss? I can't speak for the rest, but I'm coming."
"...Right."
Even swathed in bandages, her men swore to follow her — and at the sight, Gan Ning nodded.
A short while later, the pirate band under Gan Ning slipped into motion, as silent as they had been the night before.
"Whoa. Will you look at all of them."
Gan Ning gaped at the sentries, grown vastly more numerous than the night before. It was the moment Huang Zu's assumption — that the camp's reinforcement must still be unfinished — came apart at the seams.
"If that woman shows, we bolt on the spot. No stalling." Thinking of Zhang Liao, Gan Ning passed her orders down the line. "Tonight we charge in from the first step, kick up a racket, and run. Got it?"
"Got it."
"Good. Let's move."
The moment her man nodded, Gan Ning burst into the open and cut down a sentry. The instant their comrade fell, another guard nearby let out a tremendous roar:
"ENEMY RAID—!! ENEMY RAID—!!!"
"...Why is his voice so damn loud?"
Not even a gong could raise a din like that, she reckoned — clicking her tongue, Gan Ning swept her halberds and cut down the enemies rushing her in a single arc.
Having stalled things along that far, Gan Ning judged it about time for that woman to appear, and shouted: "That's enough! Now we kick up a racket and run—?!"
Whooom—!
Gan Ning flung herself backward, and the crescent blade hissed past. Had she tried to block it instead of dodging, she would have been maimed at the very least.
...That is not the strength of the woman I met yesterday. Gan Ning thought. And now that I look, the blade's shape seemed a touch different too...?
Just then, a voice came from dead ahead.
"Just as Wenyuan (Zhang Liao's courtesy name) said."
The voice was nothing like yesterday's — and the moment her feet touched earth, Gan Ning's head snapped up. Black hair, rare enough in itself, spilling all the way down to the ground. A commander with her hair bound in a high ponytail was watching Gan Ning through a pair of azure eyes.
...Aw, hell.
Facing that commander, the exchange she had shared with Zhang Liao flashed through Gan Ning's mind. —Had it been anyone else, you'd have been taken without a fight.—
That wasn't a bluff — it was the truth?!
Whether Gan Ning was dumbstruck or not, the commander before her settled into her stance.
"...Words would be needless, I expect."
"..."
"Your martial art — I, Guan Yunchang, shall measure it myself."
Bolting outright was a luxury afforded only to equals; as things stood, all Gan Ning could do was meet her head-on and fish for an opening. "Hey, you lot! Get yourselves clear, and make it quick!"
"Boss?!"
"Shut it and run!"
Bellowing that to the crew around her, Gan Ning crashed into Guan Yu.