The Battle of Life and Death
No one but Bai Qijing, the vanguard general of the Bai Family Army, could have raised warriors so fierce and savage.
On the eastern side of the valley, the thousand soldiers led by Bai Jingyan fought a desperate struggle against Xiliang troops several times their number, men whose morale had already begun to crumble.
"Bai Jinchi! Pass word along the runners. Tell Cheng Yuanzhi to lead the Bai Family Army and the great Jin army out of the gorge at once! Have them hold the Wudan Gorge entrance to Wengshan Canyon and wait there—then wipe out every last fleeing Xiliang straggler!"
"Yes!"
Bai Jinchi did not delay a single heartbeat. The message went straight down the line of runners.
Deep inside the valley, the Bai army's runner took in the order and sprinted toward Cheng Yuanzhi, who was in the thick of a bloody melee against the Xiliang host, broadsword in hand.
"General! Runner's message! You're ordered to lead the Bai Family Army and the soldiers of Great Jin out of the gorge quickly and hold the Wudan Gorge entrance to Wengshan Canyon. Wait there, then slaughter the fleeing Xiliang remnants!"
If it was an order from Xiao Baishu, Bai Jingyan, Cheng Yuanzhi would not question it for a heartbeat. He hefted his broadsword and roared.
"Fall back!"
"Fall back!"
"Fall back!"
The Bai army and Jin soldiers inside the valley received the command and began streaming out toward the gorge's mouth. The Xiliang host, mid-swing with blades and spears, could only stare in bewilderment.
"Disaster!"
Yun Paxing was the first to grasp it. On the eastern rim of the canyon sat the timber, stone, and oil that the Xiliang army itself had transported there just the day before. Xiao Baishu meant to turn all of it against them.
Yun Paxing's face went pale as he looked wildly about. He was still deep inside the protective ring of his own troops. Behind him lay the winding exit between Wengshan and Jiuqu Peak—but that passage was narrow, and most of the Xiliang force was jammed in behind him. Even if they fought their way through, they would be reduced to ash in a sea of fire before they cleared it.
The Wudan Gorge entrance was wide and open. That way alone meant survival. But the Bai Family Army and ten thousand of the Jin host were barring that very path.
Wolves before him, tigers behind—and yet Yun Paxing had no time to hesitate.
He bellowed at the top of his lungs.
"Withdraw! Fall back to the Wudan Gorge entrance!"
The Xiliang force inside the valley was simply too vast. By the time Yun Paxing's order reached the soldiers at the very front, an age had passed—and moving on a delayed order meant it was already too late.
Watching from above as the Xiliang army scrambled to relay the retreat, Bai Jingyan screamed down into the gorge.
"Pass the word! Cut the ropes binding the timber and the cords propping up the boulders! Have the men pour the oil and ready the fire! Bai Jinchi—go with Xiao Ruohai!"
With the order given, Bai Jingyan wheeled around and ran along the edge of the canyon cliff toward Wudan, snatching a torch from the hands of a Jin soldier who had readied the flames, and began to sprint.
The Haoying Battalion soldiers descending from the mountain cut the ropes and prop-cords on command and started hurling the oil down into the valley.
Agonized screams erupted from the depths of the gorge.
The Xiliang troops shielding Yun Paxing immediately raised their shields over him.
When Yun Paxing caught the reek of oil, panic seized him and he began cursing in a frenzy.
"Damn it all! Faster! Charge through! Get out—OUT!"
The Xiliang soldiers walled around Yun Paxing like an iron fortress could not move a single step. The Jin army had already poured the oil; one torch, and he would burn to death in a lake of fire.
Yun Paxing's eyes bulged. He tore his sword from his belt and roared.
"Clear the way! NOW!"
His bodyguards knew that to linger was to die inside this ring. They drew their longswords and skewered the Xiliang soldiers whose backs were left exposed as they held their shields up to protect him—then hoisted their shields high and began to run like madmen.
The Xiliang soldiers who died under their own comrades' blades went to their graves with eyes wide open and mouths agape, their faces frozen in disbelief.
On the western rim of the valley, Zhang Danyue saw the soldiers on the eastern cliffs pouring the oil and kindling the fire, and his eyes flashed. Heart swelling, he thundered his own command.
"Ready the fire!"
Dusk was creeping in. Against the darkening eastern cliff face, a figure was visible—a single torch in hand, whipping up the wind, running like one possessed.
Inside the wind-lashed gorge, the bone-chilling clamor of desperate close combat gave way to the wretched howls of men crushed by falling boulders and massive timbers slick with burning oil. The Xiliang army began to tremble with dread.
Bai Jingyan intended to ride to the Wudan entrance of Wengshan Canyon and rejoin the Bai Family Army. But to her astonishment, her gaze fell on the anti-cavalry barricades the Xiliang host had erected across the eastern rim of the gorge to block the great army's line of retreat.
The fierce wind carried the thick stench of oil into her nostrils—the barricades themselves were soaked in it.
Bai Jingyan looked down into the gorge. The banners of the Bai Family Army and of Great Jin had already advanced to the very line the barricades held. Without another moment's hesitation, she hurled her torch onto them. Flames roared skyward, dyeing the heavens above Wengshan Canyon blood-red.
Bai Jingyan stilled her heart and drew her arrows. Once, twice—again and again she loosed, severing every rope that lashed the barricades together.
Deafening booms rolled without pause. The timber barricades, bound fast with iron chains, began tumbling down the eastern cliff wall. Fire blazed on the sharpened stakes at both ends; they plunged into the earth, erecting a burning wall across the Xiliang host's escape route. Some of them dropped straight onto the bodies of Xiliang soldiers, cutting their screams—and their lives—short.
The Xiliang army fell into chaos, not knowing where to turn. Those near the winding exit between Wengshan and Jiuqu Peak flung themselves into a life-or-death melee against the Great Jin forces led by Zhen Zeping and Shi Panshan. They had to carve out a road, whatever the cost.
Zhen Zeping, who had been locked in bloody combat inside the valley only moments before, had withdrawn beyond the gorge mouth and now stood with Shi Panshan blocking the narrow exit. For the Xiliang army to escape alive would be harder than plucking stars from the sky.
"Light them! LOOSE!"
Flaming, barbed arrows came pouring down into the gorge.
The instant the arrows struck the oil, the fire raced outward with terrible speed, then surged upward as though it would tear the sky itself open.
Amid the scorching, furnace-like heat, the blaze devoured the Xiliang soldiers one after another, the way a hungry ghost swallows its prey. It was slaughter without a drop of spilled blood—merciful in appearance, cruel and swift in truth.
Sheltered at the center of the shield wall, Yun Paxing sprinted toward the gorge mouth. Through the barrier of shields he could see the roaring flames closing in on him from without.
With every wretched scream that echoed through the canyon, Yun Paxing's face hardened further. If he did not get out soon, the corpses strewn across the gorge would go on burning—and if he could not break through that wall of fire, he would be roasted alive right here.
The shields grew too hot to hold; the soldiers wrapped their sleeves around them and charged for the exit like men gone mad. Beyond the shield wall there was nothing but screaming and the hiss of arrows splitting the air, enough to shake anyone with terror and dread.
Yun Paxing refused to die here. His whole life he had wished for one thing only—to defeat Bai Weiting. And at last he had exterminated Bai Weiting's sons and grandsons, every last one of them. But damn it all—he could not die now, at the hand of Bai Weiting's granddaughter. Not in a battle where a mere handful had bested a host. If it ended this way, he would carry the brand to his grave: a man who could never beat the Bai Family Army.
At the mouth of Wengshan Canyon, the Jin general Wang Xiping gripped his knees with both hands, hauling in ragged breaths. His face was caked in mud and gore. Turning his head, he saw the dazed Jin troops and Bai soldiers spilling out of the gorge, filthy from head to toe, blood sticking in dark streaks to their armor.
In that instant, flames began stabbing at the sky inside the gorge. He hurried to the side of the Bai army's General Cheng Yuanzhi and offered a fist-and-palm salute.
"General Cheng—after the withdrawal, what then?"
"We fight the Xiliang remnants as they pour out of the Wengshan Canyon exit."
Cheng Yuanzhi tightened his grip on his broadsword. The fire burning in his eyes blazed hotter than any in the valley behind them.
The Bai soldiers who had not yet cleared the gorge cut down the first wave of fleeing enemies before scrambling out to report to Cheng Yuanzhi.
"Where is the general of the great Jin army?"
On the mountainside to the right of Wengshan Canyon, Bai Jingyan called out loudly from the saddle.
Wang Xiping, clutching his longsword with a chipped blade, shouted back.
"Who asks?"
Bai Jingyan suppressed her ragged breathing and raised the military tally high. Her answer came swift and sharp.
"The military tally! The soldiers of Jin are to hurry east at once and reinforce the thousand defenders of Wanping! The entire Xiliang host must be annihilated inside Wengshan—not one enemy soldier may leave alive. Any who defy this order will be put to the sword!"
Wang Xiping lowered his sword—but before he could answer, Cheng Yuanzhi's massive frame barreled past him unguarded, nearly knocking him off his feet.
General Cheng Yuanzhi, broadsword still resting in its sheath, dashed forward. Unable to contain himself, his shoulders trembled violently as he cried out in a choked voice.
"Xiao Baishu!"
"……"
Wang Xiping, shoved aside without ceremony, glared after Cheng Yuanzhi with resentful eyes. What in the world was this brute in such a hurry for!
He turned to Bai Jingyan on the mountainside and offered a fist-and-palm salute.
"Commander, I receive your orders!"
The moment Wang Xiping led the Jin host away, Bai Jingyan tucked away the military tally and looked out before her. The Bai Family Army, draped in mourning bands, bore wounds on every face, every body. Only moments ago, their cries of vengeance for grandfather, father, uncles, and brothers had rung out with soaring resolve. These were men who held death cheap as a feather down to their very marrow, whose blood ran hot.
A knot of tangled emotion rose in Bai Jingyan's throat, reddening the rims of her eyes. This was it—the Bai Family Army that the Bai family had led, generation after generation! Loyal and brave. Fearless. Bound together in life and death!
"Xiao Baishu!"
Tears streaming, Cheng Yuanzhi dropped to one knee and offered a fist-and-palm salute, then shouted in a voice thick with weeping.
"Xiao Baishu, lead us! Avenge the Marshal, the Vice Marshal, the Bai Family Army, and the brothers of the Bai family!"
"Xiao Baishu, lead us in vengeance!"
"Xiao Baishu, lead us in vengeance!"
The soldiers of the Bai Family Army dropped as one to their knees, saluting and roaring the words skyward. Their impassioned voices shook the ninth heaven.
Bai Jingyan could hold back her tears no longer. She gripped the reins hard, then dismounted and offered a fist-and-palm salute to the soldiers of the Bai Family Army.
"You are the true men of our Bai Family Army! Great and valiant soldiers, every one of you! Forgive me—I came too late!"
Bai Jingyan raised her voice in a long salute to her troops.
"Xiao Baishu!"
Cheng Yuanzhi, choked with weeping, could not get another word out.
Bai Jingyan came down from the mountainside and helped Cheng Yuanzhi to his feet.
"General Cheng, up! All of you, on your feet!"
Cheng Yuanzhi sobbed in a small voice, then clenched his teeth and forced himself to speak.
"Commander—I have failed. I could not protect the Vice Marshal! His head hangs in the Xiliang camp, and I have not yet been able to bring it home. The reason I have lived until now is not cowardice—it is so that I might cut off Yun Paxing's head and have my vengeance. Only then will I have the face to stand before the Vice Marshal again!"
"The soldiers of our Bai Family Army are brave men, every last one. Why do you speak of cowardice?"
Looking at the diminished ranks of Bai soldiers, Bai Jingyan could not contain the fury surging up from her chest. She raised her voice to the men.
"Our grandfather and father are gone—but the daughters of the Bai family still live. I, Bai Jingyan, still live! So long as even one of us draws breath, the Bai family will wage this war beside the soldiers of the Bai Family Army, sharing their life and death to the end!"
"We will follow Xiao Baishu until death!"
Cheng Yuanzhi raised his sword high and bellowed.
"We will follow Xiao Baishu until death!"
"We will follow Xiao Baishu until death!"
Xiao Ruohai and Bai Jinchi rode up. They had heard the Bai Family Army's impassioned cries from far off, and the shout—that they would follow Bai Jingyan even unto death—set their hearts blazing.
"Sister!"
Bai Jinchi dismounted.
"Yun Paxing made it out."
At those words, Bai Jingyan hefted the Sun-Shooting Bow high and gripped it tight. Gritting her teeth, she roared.
"Soldiers of the Bai Family Army, hear me! This war is our campaign to cleanse our name! Our war of vengeance! Men of true Bai blood—will you stand with me and crush the enemy?"
"Annihilate them all!"
"Annihilate them all!"
"Annihilate them all!"
The thunderous cry of the Bai Family Army—vowing to wipe the enemy from the earth—echoed from the very depths of their chests.