Chapter 35: Strategic Defense and Magical Combat

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On the walls of Yongji Pass, during the afternoon truce after the first wave of attacks, there was no victory banquet. After removing his armor, Wu Fei went straight behind the walls to supervise the captains and battalion commanders as they temporarily reinforced the defensive equipment. Boulders and sharpened stakes, traditional essentials of siege defense, were naturally indispensable, but now they also needed to stockpile some new materials.

Once the work had been assigned, the squad leaders directed their soldiers to carry various supplies up to the walls.

From the main battlements to every last brick and tile...

In the shelter and rest area opened up behind the wall, Wen Si searched the crowded space for a patch of ground and lay down. He thumped his aching lower back, then heard his men grumbling.

“I thought that once we were freed from slavery, we wouldn’t have to do this sort of work anymore. But now that I look at it, this is hardly any different from being slaves.”

Wen Si immediately sprang to his feet. As the soldier who had spoken hurriedly prepared a fawning smile, Wen Si slapped him across the face.

“What are you talking about? How is this the same as slavery? Before, we worked beneath the lash, exhausting ourselves without any future. Today may be hard and tiring, but what we’re doing belongs to us.”

Wen Si then gave the soldiers a thorough lesson in ideology. There was no other reason for it: he wanted a future. If the unit was not united and failed to earn merit, they would ruin his prospects.

During the earlier battle outside the pass, he had witnessed the individual strength of those monsters from the Southern Border. He knew that, although the present work was exhausting, earning merit here offered far better returns than fighting in the open field. So what was there to complain about?

After delivering a round of instruction with his fists and feet, the kindly Wen Si carefully explained to the raw recruits the principles of sharing life and death, and rising to prosperity together.

After listening, they all went to sleep.

From the barracks, where snores rose and fell, the scene shifted to the brightly candlelit section within the walls...

Wu Fei was discussing the second wave of the Black Tide’s attack the following day with all the squad commanders.

Why tomorrow?

Because the Southern Border had been defeated during the day, and morale was low. Their leaders could not possibly issue effective orders now. The defeated troops needed to sleep through the night and reset themselves. By contrast, Wu Fei’s side had achieved a great victory during the day. His commands could be transmitted effectively to the soldiers below, who would obey them without question and thus retain sufficient organization to act at night.

Besides, Wu Fei’s scouts were still outside the walls, keeping the enemy surrounded on all sides.

In fact, one of Wu Fei’s commanders had proposed a night raid, confidently insisting that it would certainly succeed. Wu Fei also believed that such a raid could achieve considerable results.

Nevertheless, he suppressed their impulse.

Back inside the walls, Wu Fei first asked about the condition of the regular combat troops. They had not been the ones working atop the battlements during the day; they had spent the entire day resting and conserving their strength. When they saw Wu Fei, they all asked eagerly, “When do we get our turn?”

Wu Fei replied, “You’ll all have a chance. You’ll all have a chance.”

But inwardly, he said, If everything goes smoothly tomorrow, they still won’t be the ones fighting the defensive battle!

The soldiers defending the walls would still be those who had escaped slavery and become bricklayers and masons.

Because Wu Fei wanted to liberate the slaves.

...Was that noble? Ha.

After his previous attempt to grant the slaves human rights had failed, Xuan Chong had not simply concluded that “slaves ought to remain slaves.” Instead, he wondered whether there might be another way to approach the matter.

As a student, he had often glanced at a few key terms in other people’s solutions and tried to derive the answer from them himself. When his reasoning led into a dead end, there were two possibilities: either the answer was wrong, or his reasoning was wrong. Having spent many long years as a poor student, Xuan Chong instinctively assumed that the problem lay in his own reasoning.

In other words, in the course of social and historical development, liberating slaves ought to bring enormous benefits. But he could not simply copy the answer. He needed a rigorous process of deduction.

...System: You got the problem right. Here are two academic credits...

Regarding this war in the Southern Border, Wu Fei’s perspective was no longer limited to the victory immediately before him. He was already looking ahead to the rule that would follow.

War was the result of countless contradictions erupting into the open. At present, the conflict between Great Yao and the Southern Border arose from incompatible values between different systems of governance, leading to mutual plunder, oppression, and a lack of any authority capable of adjudication. In short, if Wu Fei wanted to begin resolving the contradiction, he would eventually have to push into the Southern Border and establish an order of his own.

And to establish his own order, he had to begin with the economy and the military.

On the economic front, Wu Fei had already done everything he could. The focus now was military strength.

He needed to maintain a formidable army capable of pressing down upon the hundred tribes of the Southern Border.

At this point, however, a poor student would become stuck if he did not know the proper method.

For years, the Wu family, serving as frontier generals, had spared no effort to maintain its military forces. Yet all they could do was periodically strike the tribes of the Southern Border. It was only the most rudimentary level of control, because their military strength was still insufficient.

The Wu family’s past solution to the Southern Border had been similar to the Jin dynasty’s method of controlling the Mongols: constantly divide the grasslands, weaken the strong, and attack the large. But in the end, the Wu family’s period of decline coincided with the Mongols’ rise, and then they encountered a fool. Seven thousand heavy cavalry were thrown away in the Battle of Yehuling, and the whole structure collapsed.

Wu Fei had decided to make the Southern Border completely “peaceful and prosperous.” To do that, he had to maintain a military force one level stronger than the Wu family’s current method of mass recruitment and deployment, keeping it permanently stationed over the Southern Border.

But building a military force required money. The regular soldiers of the Wu family were simply too expensive to maintain and therefore could not be used for this purpose.

He needed to find an “economical and practical” army that could do the job.

In the end, after searching again and again, Wu Fei found the answer in the colonial history of the Age of Exploration.

At that time, both the Ming Empire and the West explored the oceans. Zheng He’s voyages to the Western Seas had begun far earlier than the Western expeditions. Yet the Ming Empire eventually withdrew. Later historians analyzed why the East had fallen behind the West at this stage. Some claimed that Confucianism was backward and self-confining, although the imperial examination system was far superior to Europe’s contemporary method of selecting officials. Others blamed the monsoon winds, but the monsoons could not reach the West. That argument was hardly convincing when the Ming could not even secure the lands at its own doorstep in the Southern Seas.

From a military perspective, Wu Fei had another answer.

The troops the Ming had brought with it were simply too expensive.

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Take artillery and cavalry, for example. These were among the finest troops in the world at the time—armies that had just accompanied the Yongle Emperor in conquering his realm and had earned immense merit. Such an army could be used to display imperial power, but to control a region and establish order?

That would be like deploying sixth-generation fighter jets in the mountains to compete with drones for the job of bombing tents, or sending a combined-arms brigade to push aside local proxies and personally conduct counterinsurgency operations.

Without question, after the Taizong Emperor died, the Ming withdrew its military presence from the Southern Seas, just as a lighthouse retreats from a graveyard of empires.

Europe, by contrast, found an economical and practical armed force of its own.

If one asked how capable the musketeers stationed in European colonies actually were, the answer would be: mediocre among the mediocre.

If they returned to continental Europe and faced musketeers formed from the noble sons trained by the lords, or faced the knightly orders, they would collapse at the first clash. As for confronting the Guan-Ning Army or the Eight Banners—when those forces had not yet decayed, of course—if the Spanish colonial troops had truly been able to withstand even one charge, Spain would have recalled them to Europe and swept straight through England and France.

In truth, both Europe and the Ming relied on knightly-order-style forces led by commanders and their personal retainers. Such forces possessed first-rate fighting spirit, but they were expensive.

The more than one thousand elite troops Wu Fei had rotated into the pass during this battle were exactly such soldiers. They could fight in the open field and dared to be the first to scale enemy walls. Wu Fei essentially supported each of them through the taxes of twenty households, maintaining them for life, arranging marriage leave, and providing their children with fixed opportunities for promotion.

After all, their sons were willing to become soldiers as well. They were important assets of the Wu family. If those descendants showed even a little promise, squad commanders and other military officers would be selected from among them.

If Wu Fei grew powerful in the future, this core would not be replaced. They would rise together with him, their relatives and retainers benefiting as well.

These soldiers were Wu Fei’s stake in battles that would determine life or death.

But in the battle before him, Wu Fei wanted to send his “economical and practical” troops into action.

The key to such troops, however, was the word practical. They had to be usable.

Looking to the course of the Age of Exploration, colonial armies had entered the South Asian sphere and were capable of suppressing local armed resistance.

People in the East, having entered the industrial age without pursuing colonization, held a mistaken belief: that the most important assets of a maritime civilization were powerful ships and heavy guns. This was merely the aftereffect of having foreign fleets bombard their gates.

In reality, during the early Age of Exploration, the most important assets of the colonizers were fortified strongholds and bases.

A fortress system held the high ground, allowing its defenders to stand against ten times their number.

Several years earlier, when Wu Fei opened the trade route to the Southern Border, he had clearly understood that he was engaging in a morally dubious colonial enterprise. Trouble was bound to arise sooner or later, so he had already begun selecting certain locations in the Southern Border where fortified bases could be built.

Fortresses alone were not enough. There also had to be people capable of defending them.

At present, the three thousand conscripted farmer-soldiers stationed at Yongji Pass had been specially taught a set of defensive tactics more than ten days before the war began.

Now came the practical examination.

Wu Fei hoped that, on this battlefield classroom, they would integrate the preparations they had learned half a month earlier for defending a fortress with the training on how to calmly inflict casualties when the enemy began climbing the walls.

After all, people teaching people often failed to make them learn, but events teaching people made them understand at once.

In the future, if a fortress somewhere in the Southern Border came under siege, and its defenders could hold out for several days until the Wu family’s field army arrived, then this economical and practical army would be considered a success.

...The candles went out. The moon sank, and the sun rose...

After enduring a difficult night of sleep beneath all kinds of harassment from the surrounding enemy, the Black Tide began its second assault under the crushing pressure of its camp.

At Ang Ri’s suggestion, Jiamude arranged for the true siege elites to join the attack on the second day, accompanied by large numbers of expendable troops capable of climbing the walls.

Ang Ri said, “Without the strength to smash through the gates or break down the walls, the enemy’s firepower will pour without restraint onto the smaller ones if everyone advances together. And once the smaller ones see no possibility of the walls being breached, they will not even have the morale to reach the foot of the wall.”

Jiamude understood perfectly well that the smaller ones, lacking morale, were practically incapable of taking the walls. His hesitation lay elsewhere.

Was it worth paying the necessary price to suppress the larger ones and force them to attack together?

In the end, he had no choice but to summon all the leaders of the larger ones and issue his order. The next day, they were to rush to the gate passage at the first opportunity and smash the gate.

Clearly, the dozens of monster races—including serpent-men, mountain ogres, and ape demons—shook their heads.

Jiamude looked at them and pushed open the bronze coffin.

Ang Ri, standing nearby, felt his blood run cold.

As a melodious voice emerged from the bronze coffin, a pale hand reached out. All the leaders of the larger ones tried to flee, but strands of silk pierced through their skulls. Beneath the red threads, their bodies withered first. Then the threads turned black, and the shrunken bodies swelled as though inflated, their skin becoming deathly pale.

The red threads absorbed fresh blood.

The black threads injected some unknown dark substance from inside the coffin into the victims.

When the lid of the bronze coffin closed, a satisfied belch came from within.

All the larger ones had been transformed into eerie figures with translucent skin and completely black pupils. Their leaders then obediently returned to their respective camps and began conveying the command of the Sacred Flame.

Ang Ri stammered, “What... what is that?”

Jiamude replied, “My ancestor’s consort.”

“You...”

“The order to attack is no longer a problem.”

Neither of them noticed that the light atop the bronze coffin flickered once.

Inside Yongji Pass, Third Aunt smiled and resumed drawing the talismans required for battle.

...The horns of war sounded across the battlefield...

The Southern Border’s second assault did not begin at dawn. It was not until a bank of dark clouds rose from nowhere that the Black Tide began moving again.

The clouds were extremely strange. When they reached the sky above Yongji Pass, they stopped, leaving the heavens above the pass clear and blue.

Wu Fei looked at the great mass of smaller bodies charging toward them, along with the larger ones carrying enormous hammers. It was obvious that the attack differed from the previous day’s.

Their formation was even more disorderly than yesterday’s, yet they were far more violent.

Wu Fei saw that the creature at the very front had clearly twisted its ankle. It walked unnaturally, yet still charged forward with its body contorted into an abnormal posture.

“That thing’s a zombie, isn’t it?” he muttered.

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Although Wu Fei could not determine what method the Black Tide had used, the coincidence was almost amusing. His own side also had a practitioner of unorthodox arts—or rather, a cultivator of “yin-aligned spells.”

Wu Fei pointed toward the battlefield and asked Third Aunt what was happening.

“Parasitic sorcery,” Third Aunt replied.

“Hm?”

“The shamans of the Southern Border use parasitic curses to enslave people and extort wealth. It is only that...”

“Say it all at once.”

“For most parasitic curses, even a finished product produces only one or two parasites. Different species of parasite counteract one another. When different people are controlled by different parasites and lose their sense of self, they will attack and devour one another, just as the parasites once did inside the jar. But these creatures have clearly all been fed the same parasite—hundreds of them, at the very least. That means the enemy possesses some extraordinary treasure capable of cultivating hundreds or even thousands of parasitic curses at once.”

Wu Fei thought for a moment. “You want that thing?”

Third Aunt smiled faintly.

Wu Fei glanced at the creatures below. “If you obtain it, will you use it against me or my people?”

As he spoke, his hand had already settled on his sword.

“Never against the bloodline of the Wu family,” Third Aunt said.

“And you will not use it against anyone who serves me.”

“That is acceptable.”

Wu Fei stared at her until Third Aunt swore a poisonous oath.

Wu Fei agreed that, after the battle, he would help her obtain the treasure. For now, she was to assist him.

When the first wave of cursed parasites crawled onto the walls, they had already been thrown nearly two hundred paces ahead of the lines behind them.

Third Aunt said to Wu Fei, “This is what it looks like when someone has been cursed.”

Wu Fei stared at the zombified soldiers and nodded. “But they cannot obey commands, and they have no ability to coordinate tactically.”

...

When the Great Yao crossbowmen atop the walls had nocked their weapons and aimed at the zombified cannon fodder charging at the front, orders came down from the battlements for them to hold their fire.

At that moment, a swirling disk of cloud, five zhang tall, appeared above the gate tower.

Yao Sangu—who, in the eyes of everyone present, was now an immortal maiden—stood upon the cloud disk floating in the middle of the pass.

She brought her palms together and gathered power. Then she aimed at the zombified vanguard beneath the walls, who were attempting to climb, spread her hands, and pushed out a wave of energy.

The cursed soldiers, who had been charging in a frenzy, suddenly showed pain and struggle in their eyes.

Then their souls began to separate from their bodies. Their spirits became purple-black skeletons, writhing inside their skulls, while their own heads trembled violently.

Third Aunt’s spell directly transformed the souls trapped within the brow centers of those Southern Border cannon fodder into dead spirits. Once they became dead spirits, they controlled the parasites in the victims’ heads and caused them to turn upon their hosts.

Before long, the creatures stood dazed beneath the wall. Then, under the watchful eyes of both the defenders above and the Black Tide tribesmen rushing over below, they collapsed where they stood.

After casting her spell and annihilating the assault formation, Third Aunt returned leisurely to the gate tower.

Ang Ri, watching the “mage” drift back to the walls, spoke one word at a time.

“Death-soul sorcery.”

He turned to look at Jiamude. Jiamude’s expression froze. Clearly, he had not expected his spell to be countered with such precision.

But there was no time for them to think further.

The siege had begun.

On the battlements, ballistae were aimed at the larger ones racing toward the gate. Their long shafts were inscribed with wind-deflecting runes. Each bolt had a tip the size of an egg and a shaft nearly a meter long.

When they were fired from the walls into the clustered mountain ogres, severed limbs and shattered bodies erupted across the field.

The smaller ones charging alongside them were also struck by the bolts. As the shafts pierced diagonally through their bodies, they fell one after another, as though singled out for execution.

Compared with the first charge, the larger ones, who bore the brunt of the ballista fire, did not break formation. After suffering forty percent casualties, they reached the gate and began hammering it with their iron mauls, the blows resounding again and again.

Amid the thunderous pounding, the smaller ones paid the price of more than five hundred corpses before finally reaching the base of the walls and beginning to climb.

Once the climbing began, there was no retreat.

The siege had officially commenced.

Then all manner of objects came crashing down from the battlements.

Ang Ri could also see that the walls seemed to be coated with a layer of abnormal liquid. The smaller ones who managed to climb onto the wall often slipped before they could even find their footing.