The Black Serpent's Dance
Ee—ee-ee—ee.
Through the lingering, plaintive cry of an erhu, an imugi hid its body inside pale clouds of blade-qi and ravaged the empty air.
A serpent-dragon that dreamed of ascending the heavens uncoiled through the blizzard, claws and scales intercepting every screaming volley of Blood Death arrows.
Kaga-gaga-GANG!
The clusters of Blood Death arrows came shrieking in on tearing cracks of ruptured air — and the claws and scales of that ink-black imugi, straining toward the sky, turned them all aside.
Fat snow falling from heaven. Flurries blasted upward every time the imugi roared. The unbroken, mournful line of the erhu. The dance of Heaven's Inner Minister. All of it wove together into a spectacle rarely witnessed in this world, a scene so fluid and beautiful it seemed to belong to some opera rather than a place where men were living and dying.
The Jinyiwei guardsmen holding the northern face of the imperial tent lost their tongues. They stood slack-jawed, staring.
Then, at last—
"Indeed! Heaven's Inner Minister!"
The shout broke the hush that had settled over the Jinyiwei. A thousand guardsmen, hearts hammering on the back of Jin Myeong's display, emptied their lungs in a single breath and roared.
A thousand throats. One name.
Morale and momentum decide battles as surely as steel. The deaths of comrades had kindled their rage; the erhu unspooling, note by note, from inside the tent had plucked their heartstrings. Those two contrary feelings met the awe of Jin Myeong's martial display and transmuted into something like madness.
A thousand Jinyiwei, drunk on that madness before they even knew it, poured true qi into their golden sabers. Even the gravely wounded were forcing themselves to their feet.
And in that instant — in the instant the rising frenzy could no longer be contained—
Jin Myeong's voice rang out from within the domain of Isin hardened qi that Cheonyang Biyeon had woven around him, and the hour they had been waiting for arrived at last.
The hour to butcher the Blood Death Archery Corps to the last man.
They will not get out.
That was why he had held this long. To draw the Blood Death Archery Corps in deep. To give the Central Military Commission time to seal off the whole of Mount Baohua before the enemy could run. To erase them in this one stroke, without a single survivor.
Let's finish this, you slippery bow-rats.
The Blood Death Archery Corps was a byword for terror. One of the eighteen corps that stood for the unorthodox martial world — the Blood Death Archery Corps. Who in the jianghu could stand against a thousand Peak Realm archers loosing qi-forged arrows in a sudden rain? Any minor or mid-sized sect that found itself marked by them was wiped from the earth that same day.
Before Jin Myeong's regression, the Great Ming imperial house had not seen the Blood Death Archery Corps coming. Of the thousand Jinyiwei who had ridden escort that day, eight hundred had fallen. Gongsun Dajing's name had been among the dead.
While the Jinyiwei bought time with their lives, cavalry from the Central Military Commission and the Direct Imperial Guard had been rushed to Mount Baohua. When some of those riders pushed into the forest and the retreat looked about to be cut off, Gong Jeong-mun had withdrawn — and the Yongle Emperor had escaped with his life by a hair.
The Blood Tragedy of Mount Baohua, as it had stood before Jin Myeong's return, had ended as a humiliation for the Great Ming and for the Jinyiwei.
Not this time.
"Embroidered Imperial Guard Command!"
Gongsun Dajing, taking Jin Myeong's signal, raised high the golden saber whose blade was engraved with the words Qianhu of the Embroidered Imperial Guard Command.
A thousand Jinyiwei answered as one, golden battle-light dripping from their eyes — and the earth itself shook.
"Advance!"
"Advance!"
Gongsun Dajing's order came down against the returning echo, and the five hundred guardsmen who had been holding the northern face of the tent dressed their ranks and started forward into the trees. The five hundred who remained closed the gap they left behind at once.
"We go to tear out the traitors' hearts. Follow me!"
"Follow me!"
Bwoo—ooo—ooo!
A horn bellowed, signaling the allies hidden in the forest — and with every step Gongsun Dajing and his five hundred Jinyiwei took in lockstep, the world shuddered.
Boom. Boom.
A thousand Jinyiwei waiting in the woods would seal the Blood Death Archery Corps from the west. Gongsun Dajing and his five hundred would seal them from the south. The north and the outer slopes of Mount Baohua belonged to the Central Military Commission.
As for the east…
At the same hour, on the summit of Tangshan, twenty li southwest of Mount Baohua, five snowmen stood gazing northeast toward the mountain. Jeong Go was one of them.
"Ugh! It's freezing — sniffle! Supervisor Jeong."
"Yes, sir!"
One of the snowmen called to Jeong Go, snuffling back a running nose. A scout of the Central Military Commission.
"Let's get down from here already, yeah? The whole thing's kicked off."
"Shall we, then?"
"Those son-of-a-bitch bastards. Who the hell do they think they are, crawling in there. Haaack! Ptooey! Supervisor Jeong."
"Yes, sir!"
"But how'd you lot know they were gonna hit? That's some uncanny shit, I'll tell you. How'd the Directorate of Ceremonial figure it? They're goddamn ghosts, they are."
"That would be the business of my superiors, so I wouldn't know. This humble servant's rank is still too low. I merely carry out the orders I am given."
Jin Myeong had picked Jeong Go and a handful of eunuchs he could trust, then drawn specialist scouts from Zhang Fu of the Central Military Commission. He had bundled them in groups of five or six and sent them up to high ground chosen in advance.
"That so… Anyway, far as this officer's reconnaissance goes, it ain't the south and it ain't the east."
"I shall report it as such."
"Once we hear what they found on Mount Lao and Zhongshan, it'll sort itself. Gut says west. Three hundred, three hundred, four hundred. They came in from the northwest, the west, and the southwest."
"The west overlaps, then."
That was precisely why Jin Myeong had seeded scouts on Mount Lao northwest of the palace, on Zhongshan to the east, on Tangshan to the southeast, and on the summit of Mount Baohua itself.
The Blood Death Archery Corps' line of march. That was what he needed. Once he had a rough bearing and a route, he could turn the Jinyiwei and the eunuchs loose and work backward along it. Harmful weeds were to be pulled up by the root. A blight was to be cut off at the source.
"Right. Winter like this, they wouldn't have walked far. Bodies stiffen, sure — but worse, the bowstrings freeze and snap. A greatbow the length of a traveling pack is bound to be a steel bow, and you can't string one of those in this weather. They'd have brought them already strung."
The veteran scout, a man in his forties, seemed to carry a deep well of experience and knowledge. He was narrowing the field from a handful of clues, and in truth he was a master of the tracking arts.
"Meaning?"
"Meaning they put up somewhere near here for the night and gathered at this spot this morning. Confucian students hauling packs as tall as a man. That ain't a common look, now, is it? Snff! Ah, damn snot! Shit!"
"It is unusual, yes."
The reasoning, delivered in that offhand tone, was anything but ordinary. Jeong Go found himself drawn in before he knew it. It was genuinely persuasive.
"And there's a thousand of the bastards, no less. Whether they put up at an inn or a tavern or wherever the hell else — and whether they split up or all piled in together—"
"If one makes inquiries, it will all come out. That is what you are saying."
"That's it! Sharp, aren't you? Must be that Directorate of Ceremonial breeding."
This time it was the Scout Leader who marveled. An ordinary boy would have had no interest in talk like this, or else would have heard it and understood none of it. Yet here was a young eunuch who still looked well short of twenty, already seeing past the next turn — grasping exactly what the deduction was for.
"You flatter this humble servant."
"The way this officer figures it, there's an estate nearby that can take a crowd that size. I've never seen greatbows like those in my life."
"Nor has this humble one."
"Right? You look at archers dressed up like ink-stained scholars and you know they're the kind of bastards whose secrets would drive a man insane. Men like that don't use inns and taverns. Probably disguised the place as an academy — somewhere Confucian students come and go, yeah?"
"Magnificent, Scout Leader. Might this humble one know your honored name?"
Jeong Go was sincerely impressed. The wrinkled old soldier's wisdom and eye for the ground had reached a level that truly commanded admiration. The people who had ever made him feel this way, Jin Myeong included, could be counted on one hand.
"The name? Ah, forget it. No, no — it ain't that I dislike you or the Directorate. It's just… watching this whole business, I got a little scared, you know? Scary yamen, that Directorate of Ceremonial."
The Scout Leader meant it. He was the sort who reasoned from a thing already done. The Directorate of Ceremonial had predicted that today's events would happen at all. That was a different order of thing.
A yamen of eunuchs had foreseen this day, and to hunt down the traitors' whereabouts they had planted scouts on selected high ground — and not just any scouts. They had picked, himself included, the men the Central Military Commission ranked as its very best. How was that not astonishing?
"It is nothing of the sort. Have you heard of Yuwol Pavilion, by any chance? A pleasure house in Yingtianfu."
Jeong Go smiled faintly at the Scout Leader's reaction.
"Who doesn't know Yuwol Pavilion? Finest house in Yingtianfu, ain't it? Wicked expensive, too. What about it?"
The unexpected name of a famous pleasure house snapped the Scout Leader out of his unease at once. The man could not resist a drink to save his life.
"This humble servant's direct superior is as good as the owner. If this humble one may venture a guess, once His Honor hears of the Scout Leader's remarkable insight, he will likely stand you drinks on the house—"
"Jong Deok! The name's Jong Deok! You should've said so from the start! Where's your superior? Let's go, hurry! Yeah?"
Yuwol Pavilion plus free liquor — the combination struck Jong Deok's heart before Jeong Go had even finished the sentence. He was already moving.
"Scout Leader Jong, then."
Jeong Go answered with a quiet snort of laughter and fell in behind him.
I should introduce him to Elder Brother, and ask whether we might take him on as an Eastern Depot guardsman.
Back in the forest of Mount Baohua.
In the space of a single ke, the Blood Death Archery Corps and Gong Jeong-mun had closed the distance fast. Barely a hundred and twenty paces remained between them and the Yongle Emperor's tent.
Each man had brought sixty Blood Death arrows. Half were gone. They had closed to a hundred and twenty paces. It was time to smash in and finish it.
"Commander!"
Cheong Hak came flying in to Gong Jeong-mun's side. The old man had been watching the field from the center of the rear rank.
"What is it?"
"The hundreds of Jinyiwei who were holding the tent have begun advancing this way."
"I am aware. Once they close within eighty paces, they will not stop the Blood Death arrows even if they see them coming. It would be like leaping into a fire with kindling strapped to one's back."
Bow-force grew more terrible the nearer the range. The true qi sheathed in each killing point was likewise conserved the shorter the flight, and inside a certain distance even a man of equal realm could not turn aside the Blood Death Archery Art or its arrows.
"Hundreds have appeared to the west as well."
"The west?"
A strange light crossed Gong Jeong-mun's face at that. The Jinyiwei had not been gathered in one place?
He had seeded agents along every approach to Mount Baohua, so he had known from the first that the Jinyiwei numbered two thousand. The problem was that he had assumed they would naturally be clustered around the tent. They were not.
That was the cost of a forest thick with evergreens and a sky dumping heavy snow. With the sightlines ruined, they had lost the Jinyiwei's true positions.
These people — surely not.
His chest dropped.
They had split the Jinyiwei and planted them — and in the woods that opened onto clear ground, no less? The soldiers of the Central Military Commission were out on that clear ground. And still they had divided the Jinyiwei and set them down in front of it?
Of course it was for an assault like this one. But the heart of the matter was this: such a deployment was impossible unless they had expected the enemy to come this way.
Mount Baohua… the northwestern face… the cliff… the dispersed Jinyiwei…
A hunting ground that had not been used twice in ten years. The northwestern woods of Mount Baohua, which the imperial party had never once employed. The thin picket along the cliff. The Jinyiwei scattered in pieces.
These people knew this corps was coming…?
The truth of it landed in Gong Jeong-mun's mind — and in that same instant:
From the north, the west, and the south — a long, knifing whistle.
"Ah! Commander!"
Cheong Hak started and looked to Gong Jeong-mun.
The crash of Blood Death arrows meeting Jinyiwei golden sabers. The sound of their own men kicking off trunks and leaping. The shouts of the advancing Jinyiwei. Cutting through all of it came that whistle — the whistle of the agents they had planted on the mountain's outer slopes.
The sound that meant the retreat was being sealed. A warning that so many troops were being laid down the breakthrough would be hard.
Gong Jeong-mun understood at last. The imperial party had known the Blood Death Archery Corps was coming. Mount Baohua. The densely wooded northwestern face. The deliberately thin picket. The dispersed Jinyiwei. And the Central Military Commission, which had arrived early as if it had known all along and begun to encircle the mountain.
All of it had been a snare, built to drive the Blood Death Archery Corps onto this ground.
"Yes! Commander! Withdrawing! East!"
Cheong Hak's shout rolled through the trees — and then, abruptly:
It stopped.
The ripping flight-scream of the Blood Death arrows, the sound that had been raking Mount Baohua without mercy, cut off.
"The Jinyiwei will close. When they do, take the flesh off them."
Gong Jeong-mun and the Blood Death Archery Corps, now in danger of encirclement, flung themselves into motion at once. Their only road out was the single direction from which no whistle had come: the east of Mount Baohua.
But the situation was turning so fast that Gong Jeong-mun did not realize even that judgment had already been accounted for in Jin Myeong's expectations.
Tak! Tak! Ta-tak!
Gong Jeong-mun and the Blood Death Archery Corps wrung out the true force of a lifetime and unfurled their movement arts. They had to run. They had to live. They rode the trees, vaulted them, rode them again.
They had fled perhaps eighty paces when—
"And where might you be going?"
All at once, from every side, a thin but piercing voice arrived.
—Going. —Going. —Going.
The voice that came echoing back was not even particularly loud, yet it drove itself, clear as a needle, into the ears of Gong Jeong-mun and every man of the Blood Death Archery Corps.
Startled out of their skins, Gong Jeong-mun and his archers snapped their heads up by reflex.
Dark blue-black figures stood upon the slender topmost branches of the trees. Dozens of them — no, hundreds — looking down, their silhouettes so close in color to the evergreen needles that they had been nearly invisible.
Uncanny voices. Eyes burning with scarlet blood-light. Both hands raised, nails the color of fresh gore already unsheathed.
"Kkiyot!"
Those figures, with their grotesque cries and their blood-red nails, shot down through the fat white snow — straight at the Blood Death Archery Corps.
"Yooooot!"