A War That Became Legend
Time had slipped by, and the tail end of the Yin hour was already upon them.
Once the Bai family army that General Wei Zhaonian had sent into ambush to strike the Xiliang forces returned, Bai Jingyan intended to lead her troops toward Tianmenguan.
Yun Paxing likely could never have imagined it — that Bai Jingyan would lead two hundred men to recover her father's head from the camp, return, and then come back again at the head of a great army to assault the Xiliang camp.
"Bring General Zhang Danyue to me!"
Bai Jingyan gave the order.
General Zhang Danyue, who had only just managed to close his eyes for a short rest, hurried to her side the moment he heard that Bai Jingyan had returned.
When he learned that she had led two hundred men to recover the head of Bai Qishan, Deputy Marshal of the Bai family army, his respect for her deepened all the more. The younger generation was surpassing their elders with astonishing ease — it was enough to inspire true awe.
After every man of the Bai family had perished in the Southern Border, the people of the capital had assumed that the century-old house of generals, the Zhenguo Duke Estate, would now wither away.
But the Bai family's eldest legitimate daughter, Bai Jingyan, had risen tall and unbroken. Her bearing and her strategic brilliance were the very image of what the Bai family stood for.
Bai Jingyan laid out the troop formations and the plan for Zhang Danyue, then continued.
"The Xiliang army will never have imagined it — that the Jin army would raid their camp twice! With over a hundred thousand of their troops lost to a sea of fire, and their commander defeated and fleeing the field like a coward, they must already be trembling with unease. What's more, when I struck their camp earlier tonight, I set it ablaze — so they are exhausted and terrified right now. In other words, this is the perfect moment for our army to attack Tianmenguan."
Zhang Danyue nodded.
"You speak truly, General Bai! After the great victory at Wengshan, the morale of the Jin army is soaring. When they hear the plan to reclaim Tianmenguan, they will surely cheer for joy! So let us reclaim Tianmenguan first, and regroup afterward!"
"I leave the morale of the Jin army in your hands, General Zhang."
Bai Jingyan bowed in salute.
"I will not fail your expectations, General Bai!"
Wei Zhaonian returned after wiping out every last one of the Xiliang cavalry that Yun Paxing had sent to pursue Bai Jingyan. And the moment he returned, he saw the soldiers making their preparations.
Beneath the fluttering banners stood Bai Jingyan and Zhang Danyue. High atop a tall pole hung with fire baskets, they seemed to be waiting for him to come back.
The atmosphere was so solemn that Wei Zhaonian felt his body go slightly numb. He rode forward and offered a clasped-fist salute.
"Marshal, I have annihilated the Xiliang pursuit cavalry to the last man at Huipingdu!"
"Well done, General Wei."
Bai Jingyan took a step forward, the Red-Tasseled Spear in her hand, and faced the Jin soldiers whose eyes burned like torchlight as she spoke.
"Soldiers! Only moments ago, I led two hundred of the Bai family army to reconnoiter the Xiliang camp! And those two hundred returned unharmed, without a single hair out of place!
The so-called fierce army of Xiliang was not as strong, not so fearless of death, as the rumors claimed! They are men, just like us. They have invaded another nation's territory and mercilessly slaughtered another nation's people — and they carry their own shame for it. They do not even dare to face battle with their lives on the line!
The reason the invincible legend of our Bai family army was ended at the hands of the Xiliang soldiers is that Grandfather's deputy general, Liu Huanzhang, colluded with the Nanyan and Xiliang invaders — and because King Xin forced the war upon us with his golden-token command! The Bai family army could hold the legend of invincibility because we never once committed the crime of invading another nation. From beginning to end…… we fought to guard our country's borders, and for nothing but the land beneath our own feet!"
Bai Jingyan's voice rose higher and higher.
"Today! Whether of the Bai family army or among the valiant soldiers of Jin! We all go to war for the people of Jin! We march to defend the land of Jin! We are the invincible soldiers who win every war we fight! The people of Jin — we shall protect them! The territory of Jin — we shall protect it! And every one who dares trespass upon our Jin — we shall slaughter them to the last!"
"Slaughter them all!"
"Slaughter them all!"
"Slaughter them all!"
The Bai family army and the great Jin army blazed with fervor, as if a fire had been set alight within them.
Bai Jingyan mounted her horse and raised the Red-Tasseled Spear high.
"Move out!"
The soldiers roared as one, all of them crying out that they would repel the enemy and protect their people.
Wei Zhaonian's blood boiled too. He gazed at Bai Jingyan astride her red horse. From this day forward, he thought, the ten thousand men of the Bai family army who remained would follow her — the woman who had led them out of Wengshan — until the day they died. They would become her weapons. They would become the shield at her back! Wherever the edge of her blade pointed, they would run at the very front, casting life and death aside!
That night, within the Wengshan gorge, the flames burned ever fiercer upon the tens of thousands of corpses.
The war in the Southern Border had burst into bloom on every front.
The five hundred thousand reinforcement troops of Great Jin, marching a great distance toward the Southern Border, first annihilated over a hundred thousand Xiliang soldiers in the Wengshan gorge, then immediately attacked Fengxian, and in cooperation with the Bai family army reclaimed Tianmenguan.
Just as Bai Jingyan had said, the Xiliang army that night had to face the fact that their commander was defeated and a hundred thousand troops had burned to death in the sea of fire at Wengshan — and Bai Jingyan's raid and arson had left even the surviving soldiers in tatters. General Fang Zhonghui, whom the commander had sent out with orders to slaughter the two hundred of the Bai family army, had failed to bring the Xiliang cavalry back into camp — and instead had drawn the Bai family army and the great Jin army right to their gates.
The Xiliang forces were worn to the bone, their army's spirit scattered to the wind. Could they ever have imagined that the Great Jin army, which had already raided them once, would strike again within the same night — two assaults in a row before dawn?
Though the Xiliang army had the numbers, they could not escape a crushing rout, and were forced to flee Tianmenguan.
With the Haoying Battalion joining the battle at Fengxian, the Nanyan army suffered total defeat and withdrew from Fengxian before daybreak. Along the way, word reached them that the great Xiliang army had likewise been defeated and was fleeing Tianmenguan. Having lost their grain supplies, the great Nanyan army began to tremble with unease. Nanyan's commander at once gave the order to withdraw slowly toward Yaoguan Pass, receive the grain shipments coming from Nanyan, and then assess Xiliang's situation.
History would remember this war as the Battle of Wengshan — and call it a legendary war, rare in any age.
The five hundred thousand reinforcement troops of Jin and the ten thousand of the Bai family army holding Wengcheng had, in a single evening, savagely crushed the great armies of Nanyan and Xiliang — forces that could have been called a million strong heroes.
The Battle of Wengshan gorge would stand as a quintessential example of the rarest kind of war — the few defeating the many.
In later years, according to the accounts of the people who remained in Wengcheng, the fires in the Wengshan gorge did not go out for a full fifteen days after that night, and for a long while the smell of burning flesh lingered in the air of Wengcheng and would not fade.
The great Jin army had reclaimed Tianmenguan, and the army's morale pierced the very heavens.
Bai Jingyan gave the order to hang the head of Yun Paxing's son high above the gates of Tianmenguan. She intended to repay, in exactly the same manner, the way the Xiliang army had defiled her father — the way they had defiled the Bai family army.
Someone suggested that this was the moment to run down the Xiliang stragglers and slaughter every last one of them.
But Bai Jingyan did not move. Instead, she arranged for the defenses at Tianmenguan to be rebuilt once more, and made certain that the soldiers of the Bai family army and the Jin army — who had fought a brutal battle for a full day and night — could finally rest properly.
The soldiers ate steamed buns and drank meat broth, buzzing with excitement as they talked over the battle. And every time the story came up — how Bai Jingyan had led two hundred soldiers into the Xiliang camp and cut off the head of Yun Paxing's son — it was as if hot blood surged up within them.
Had this war simply worn them all down too far? At the news that General Bai would spend today regrouping rather than marching out, the soldiers fell asleep leaning against one another before they could even finish their food.
Though dawn had already broken, Bai Jingyan had bonfires lit among the sleeping soldiers, and had padded quilts brought out and laid over them so that none would catch a chill.
Bai Jinchi's sleepless eyes were webbed red with burst vessels. Trailing after Bai Jingyan as she made her rounds here and there, she pleaded in a small voice.
"Sister, you're wounded — go rest. I'll take care of things here."
"Ah-chi, you're the one who should go rest. There's no need to follow me around."
Bai Jingyan turned her head to look at Bai Jinchi, worn down to the last of her strength.
Before she had followed Bai Jingyan to the Southern Border, Bai Jinchi too had been a child raised in pampered comfort in the capital. And Bai Jinchi had slept just as little this night as Bai Jingyan had. A body still growing — how could it possibly endure such exhaustion?
"Then you come rest with me, Sister. Otherwise I'm not going either!"
Bai Jinchi stood her ground and tugged at Bai Jingyan's arm to the very end, looking ready to drop off to sleep where she stood.
Xiao Ruogang, who had been trailing behind Bai Jingyan, spoke up.
"Fourth Young Miss, please go and rest. The Eldest Young Miss is doing as the Deputy Marshal always did — making her rounds of the camp after a battle. She won't rest until she has seen every corner of it."
"Go back and rest, now."
Bai Jingyan tucked Bai Jinchi's wind-torn collar close and said in a low voice.
"I need your help in close combat, time and again. Our war is not over yet. Do you mean to collapse before it is?"
Bai Jinchi shook her head helplessly.
"Then go, now. Once I've finished my rounds, I'll rest too."
Bai Jinchi hesitated a moment. But she could hold out no longer, and finally nodded. She had to conserve her strength to protect her sister in the battles to come.
After watching Bai Jinchi go, Bai Jingyan continued her circuit of the camp. By the time she had completed a full round, even the wounded had fallen asleep. Only then did Bai Jingyan climb the walls of Tianmenguan and gaze into the distance.
"Is there any word of my seventh and ninth brothers? And Shen Qingzhu?"
Bai Jingyan asked.
If, by the end of this war, she still could not learn what had become of them, she intended to take people into Xiliang territory herself and search.
"Eldest Young Miss, nothing yet."
Xiao Ruogang answered, his voice hesitant.
Bai Jingyan nodded, then spoke to him.
"Ruogang, send men to guard the camp. Once the Haoying Battalion learns that the Bai family army is at Tianmenguan, they will come straight to us. When they return, tell them to rest well. And you — go rest too."
"I will see you safely to your quarters, Eldest Young Miss."
Xiao Ruogang said.
By the time Bai Jingyan returned to her room in the camp, Bai Jinchi was already asleep. She tucked the quilt around her, lay down at her side, and sank into a deep sleep.
What the heart dwells on by day so often appears in the dreams of night. In Bai Jingyan's sleep at Tianmenguan, there was nothing but her younger brothers and the Bai family army.
Some reproached her — why had she come only now? And some begged her — avenge us, please, no matter what.
Voices rose from every direction, and her chest felt as though it were being torn apart. Bai Jingyan squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands hard over her ears. To hear those voices was agony.
"A'yan……."
At the sound of her father's voice, Bai Jingyan lifted her head. Darkness lay before her eyes.
"A'yan……."
Her chest tightened, and her heart ached. She bolted upright, searching in every direction for the source of her father's voice, and cried out.
"Father!"
"A'yan, your father is here. Do not be afraid."
Hearing his voice, Bai Jingyan found herself gathered into a wide, warm embrace. She looked up and saw her father's handsome, gentle features before her.
"Father!"
Bai Jingyan's nose stung with tears, and she wept openly against his chest.
"Father, I'm sorry! A'yan came too late! Father, you must have suffered so much!"
"You are not late, A'yan. Your father has seen everything — how hard you worked to take up the Sun-Shooting Bow again. You are no longer the frail child who loved to grumble and complain. The greater the pain you endure, A'yan, the greater the burden you will be able to bear. Your father is so very proud of you! The ancestors of the Bai family must be proud of you as well."
How could she be worthy of being her father's pride? How could she be worthy of the pride of the Bai ancestors?