Chapter 38: "The Supernatural" and "The Human Heart"

With the return of the Wufei Legion and their five hundred and twenty prisoners, the "Barbarian Rebellion" was effectively "hushed up." Oh, "hushed up" was the term used by the bureaucrats of Nanling; in their official reports, as long as the Yongji Pass had not fallen, no matter how many barbarians had gathered, it was merely a "minor disturbance."

This "minor disturbance" was the narrative presented to the Imperial Court, as the realm was currently in a period of great unrest. The lords of the court were in no mood to see any trouble in other border regions, as it might distract from their troop movements in the north. If the events at Yongji Pass were reported as a major crisis, the court would only respond by sternly berating the border forces to resolve it immediately, then ruthlessly kicking the local officials and launching investigations into their dirty laundry.

In truth, the prefects of the three Lingnan commanderies were quite concerned about the clash before Yongji Pass. Once the fighting eased slightly and the defenders needed supplies, these prefects dispatched their own servants—under the guise of merchants selling military provisions—to scout the situation. If the pass had appeared on the verge of collapse, they would have prepared to shift the blame. The high-minded excuse would have been, "The court’s previous conscription of southern troops left Lingnan vulnerable, giving the barbarians an opening," while the sycophantic excuse would have been, "The commander of Yongji Pass was greedy and provoked this catastrophe."

Of course, the aforementioned "unfavorable situation" did not occur. The reports currently being written by the local offices stated: "Barbarians harassed the border, but the garrison fought valiantly, manifesting the heavenly might of our Great Yao!" Publicly and privately, they touted the combat prowess of the Lingnan troops to the court, subtly reminding the authorities to value the army heading north and to use them wisely.

After this affair, the ambitious men of Lingnan suddenly realized the truth of the saying: "One only regrets having too few soldiers when chaos comes." The army now heading north, which had been stripped from Wu Hanluan, consisted of three thousand veteran soldiers raised by the Wu family, while the remaining ten thousand conscripts were all young, able-bodied men from Lingnan! They were truly precious.

…A line of separation from home…

Meanwhile, Wu Hanluan, currently marching north, was encountering his own troubles. These were certainly not caused by Wu Fei.

The emergency dispatch regarding the barbarian siege of Yongji Pass had been unsealed and lay discarded beside a heavy sword. The letter had sat on his desk for two days, serving as a comforting piece of news that helped him sleep well.

Regarding the rebellion at Lingjiang, Wu Hanluan was not worried in the slightest. He told the anxious Wu Hengyu, "Five years ago, I suppressed the Serpent-Men in the southern frontier. There are no major tribes left at Lingjiang capable of suppressing the other lesser clans. No matter how many are gathered before Yongji Pass, they are merely a scattered mob. With his skill, it is more than enough for him to handle."

Wu Hanluan once again felt it was only "natural" to acknowledge Wu Fei’s solid foundational training. Had anyone else been left to guard the pass, they would not have had the chance to gain such steady experience. Consequently, Wu Hanluan replied to his home with a letter, clearly stating: He was away on a long campaign and could not attend to domestic affairs; all matters, large and small, were to be handled by Yuanchang (Wu Fei).

Unlike the previous emergency dispatch, Wu Hanluan formally stamped this letter with the central command seal, sending it back with his personal guards and soldiers. The guards understood their duty and set off to carry out his orders.

(Sidebar: The initial letter sent when Yongji Pass was attacked had been a secret missive, known only to a few like Wu Hanluan and Wu Hengyu, to prevent the morale of the army from wavering. But now, with Wu Fei having resolved the situation at the pass so brilliantly, Wu Hengyu allowed his guards to spread the news during idle chatter, ensuring that the army he led abroad had no worries about their home front.)

Of course, by doing this, Wu Hanluan was officially confirming seventeen-year-old Wu Fei as the next head of the Wu family’s military affairs. Wu Hanluan knew that Wu Fei’s abilities were sufficient; the only deficiency had been his youth, which in the rear would have invited doubts about his leadership. Now that Wu Fei had proven he could hold the line, he had earned his place as the Wu family’s "Master of Arms."

Returning to the present, the Wu family army had been having a rough time on the road. On the map of silk upon Wu Hanluan’s desk, the place known as Jija Well was heavily marked in red ink!

"Jija Well" was a town. Three days ago, Wu Hengyu had led the vanguard to station there, and subsequently, things went wrong. It seemed someone had forcibly seized the local dwellings and granaries. That night, while the cavalry was digging wells to fetch water for their rations, soldiers began to develop sores on their bodies. Within a day, these sores transformed into grotesque, smiling human faces.

Clearly, this was a case of "demonic suppression" sorcery.

The first to notice this was Wu Hengyu, who had studied at a Daoist temple in his youth. Hot-blooded and impulsive, he grabbed an elder from the village and demanded to know what was going on.

The elder replied, "Twenty miles from Jija Well lies Yangyue Mountain. Legend has it that this is the tomb of the seventh son of the Great Yao’s founding emperor. Because he was debauched in life, he died at twenty-four, and even in death, he remained dissatisfied. He often rides the night wind, kidnapping women and young boys, wreaking havoc. Eventually, a master came here to perform rites and suppress him, but every spring and autumn, we must still offer a great sacrifice of cattle and sheep."

The elder then added, "We were supposed to perform the sacrifice this year, but you, sirs, arrived. So~"

Wu Hengyu, of course, did not believe in such superstitions. The Great Yao’s founding emperor had only three legitimate sons; where would a seventh come from? Wu Hengyu believed the townspeople were secretly poisoning the well water to intimidate travelers and extort money for "disaster relief."

Wu Hengyu thought: *Good grief, it’s one thing to swindle small merchants, but to try and swindle a grand army?*

Wu Hengyu immediately had the entire town’s population detained and brought to the so-called Yangyue Mountain. He told them to go and appease the "evil spirit" they spoke of themselves.

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That very night, strange things happened. The soldiers who had accompanied Wu Hengyu to that deceptive village returned with sores on their backs, and even more severely, human-headed insects began to grow from these sores!

Only Wu Hengyu, due to his extremely high martial cultivation and vibrant, yang-filled blood, remained untouched by the evil energy.

However, rumors spread everywhere that the Wu family army was conducting blood sacrifices, because the young general named Wu Hengyu had captured all the people of a village and slaughtered them.

…Like Wu Fei, who had previously led the prohibition on alcohol, Wu Hengyu was a man who focused on the task at hand without overthinking…

Now, Wu Hanluan was furious. There were two reasons: First, it was obvious the army had run into a "supernatural" event, yet Wu Hengyu’s handling of it was too flippant. To dare to blackmail a grand army with "sorcery"—was this an ordinary spirit?! Second, in broad daylight, such yin-yang arts dared to obstruct the army; it was truly a sign that the world was in chaos and monsters were beginning to emerge.

In the Great Yao, "supernatural" phenomena were common. There were minor "ghosts," such as travelers encountering a ghost wall at night, or the souls of the deceased in villages being sucked away by cats or dogs, causing them to speak in human tongues.

More formidable "supernatural" events included ghost kings holding weddings at the witching hour, ghost soldiers crossing the border, or a ghost city appearing in a graveyard.

Of course, all the oddities created by the "supernatural" had limits. Just as earthen walls and broken tiles might force ordinary people to submit, they would be pulverized when faced with the bulldozer of a grand army.

The appearance of such "supernatural" entities stems from a lack of harmony between "Heaven, Earth, and Man," caused by great disasters or human folly, leading to lingering regrets—like corpses that do not decay and persist in the world. A high frequency of such events reflected poor local governance, frequent miscarriages of justice, and powerful clans bullying the common folk.

Ordinary people avoid the "supernatural," and for those that cannot be avoided, the Great Yao’s local government offices have specialized agents to monitor them and grasp their patterns. These agents include watchmen and the Yin-Monitoring Division. It is worth mentioning that in the Great Yao, there are some under the Legalist school who act as "Yin Agents," using the "supernatural" to extort money.

However, for an army of ten thousand, the idea of giving way to a spirit did not exist! Since Wu Hanluan’s army had encountered this, it was certain that local powers were causing trouble. To break the "curse," one must first deal with the people behind it.

Wu Hanluan called Wu Hengyu into his tent and scolded him for being led by the nose without realizing it. Upon learning he had fallen into a trap set by the very local elites who were now mocking him, rage flared in Wu Hengyu’s eyes.

…Two days later…

On the streets, Wu Hengyu and a group of men in plain clothes, aided by local wanderers hired with the silver Wu Hanluan had provided, identified several individuals in taverns and gambling dens who had let their tongues slip while boasting.

At dusk, Wu Hengyu’s operation easily rounded up these thugs and dragged them out of the city to Wu Hanluan’s camp.

Wearing a mask, Wu Hanluan looked at the thugs dumped from the sacks. After a bout of intimidation, these small-time figures confessed everything: the water source the army had occupied happened to be the fields used for irrigation by the local prefect’s in-laws.

Wu Hengyu was immediately enraged: "This is a military camp designated by the Imperial Court; how did the water source become your master’s private property?"

However, Wu Hanluan stopped Wu Hengyu from resorting to violence, instead asking the critical question: exactly how had the prefect’s in-laws performed this "curse"?

When these wretches revealed how they had gathered large amounts of "bones of women who died in injustice during the yin hour" and deliberately used human blood to construct a great screen on silk, burying it in an underground palace, Wu Hengyu was stunned: these local clans were more ruthless and harmful to the world than any evil sect.

…The way of man is to diminish the insufficient to serve the abundant, but one cannot be too destructive…

Wu Hanluan immediately marched the army to the so-called Yangyue Mountain and invited the local prefect to attend. The thousand-man formation set up the "Nine-Bend Yellow River Array," with flags fluttering in the four directions.

Then, they brought out golden oxen and began to plow the mountain directly! As trenches a yard wide were dug, cracks appeared in the mountain, and it collapsed with a roar. From the cross-section of the collapsed mountain, blood and snakes and insects gushed out. This was the place where the "curse" against the entire army had been anchored.

The malevolent energy made the watching townspeople fall to their knees.

Yet, Wu Hanluan merely scoffed, "Trifling tricks!" The expression of the prefect standing nearby stiffened.

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The Confucian, Legalist, Military, and Mohist schools were the top-ranking "Upper Nine" among the various schools of thought in the Great Yao. The Yin-Yang school, which dealt with supernatural matters, was among the "Lower Nine." This ranking had its reasons.

The arts of the Military school—whether they failed through lack of courage on the battlefield, through lack of benevolence and being reviled by the world, or through chaotic laws that made orders impossible to execute—never involved retreating in the face of demons and evil spirits.

Iron cannons pulled by oxen opened fire on the bleeding mountaintop. Amidst the sparks, the "evil souls" were blasted out, attempting to escape as a haze of yellow smoke, but as they flew into the air, they were trapped by the Nine-Bend Yellow River Array.

As the nine hundred burly soldiers of the array danced their flags, the flags pointed and shifted into a vortex formation. A manure bucket in the center of the array was opened. Immediately, the evil smoke driven out by the artillery fire was sucked directly inside.

After removing the evil spirits, Wu Hanluan poured wine and drank a cup with the prefect. Wu Hanluan said, "The army has caused much disturbance to your lands upon arrival. It is a great honor to be able to remove a plague for the local people today." After the prefect raised his golden goblet and drank, he spat out superficial pleasantries, promising to erect a monument here to record this fine tale.

A few days later, the soldiers infected with sores recovered after taking medicine, and the army broke camp to move to the next station designated by the prefect.

As the army departed, the prefect came personally to "comfort the troops," delivering a large amount of grain and over a hundred pigs and sheep. Wu Hengyu remained cautious, carefully inspecting all the grain and supplies.

Watching the army move away, the smile on the prefect’s face slowly faded, revealing a touch of cruelty and malice. Little did the prefect know, however, a tiny insect was swimming within the white of his eye.

…Golden goblets, golden measures…

In the camp, Wu Hengyu asked his father with great dissatisfaction, "Why did we still have to give up our base camp?"

Wu Hanluan replied, "We are a guest army here. Open spears are easy to block, but hidden arrows are hard to guard against. It is better to avoid trouble when we can. You couldn't very well have just drawn your sword and killed him then and there."

Wu Hengyu’s face was stiff as he squeezed words through his teeth, "If I were not part of a grand army, shouldering important responsibilities, I would have certainly drawn my sword, charged into his mansion, and severed his head."

Wu Hanluan patted the Winged Tiger he was riding, which also seemed to express agreement, and said to Wu Hengyu, "His head is too foul; do not dirty your own hands."

Wu Hengyu turned to his father; he could hear the hidden meaning in his father’s words.

Wu Hanluan changed the subject: "Tell me, if Yuanchang were here, perhaps this kind of thing wouldn't have happened, would it?"

Wu Hengyu paused slightly: "Him? He has a bit of cleverness. But regarding today’s events, even if he were here, he would be powerless, wouldn't he?"

Wu Hanluan shook his head: "If it were him, he would have made these wealthy families understand what it means to have bandits everywhere and why they need us, rather than the current situation where they think all is well and try to drive us away. The bureaucrats in Lingnan are now going in great circles to curry favor with him and expand their paths, sending their letters to me first."

Wu Hengyu thought for a moment and had to nod in admission. In such a situation where an army was a guest, Wu Fei, besides being an expert at scraping the land bare, also ensured that local powers only dared to curse in the dark and never dared to oppose him to his face.

Thus, Wu Hengyu could not help but fall into memories. It seemed that a long, long time ago, he too had a helper by his side, but he had been unaware of it until they were gone, only then missing the person who had helped manage his path to hegemony.

Just as Wu Hengyu was lost in nostalgia, he suddenly felt an evil aura erupt from the path ahead. A messenger soon came to report that a sudden gale had swept through the road ahead, causing chaos, though there were no casualties.

Wu Hengyu said to Wu Hanluan, "I will go and scout."

After receiving Wu Hanluan’s consent, he drove his divine steed, which instantly transformed into a three-zhang-long divine beast, treading on wind and thunder, galloping over the army formation toward the front.

Wu Hanluan watched his son dash ahead, nodded slowly, then stopped and asked behind him, "Daoist, does the path ahead bode fortune or misfortune?"

From several hundred meters behind the column, a voice sounded from a carriage. The Daoist Xian pinched his fingers to calculate and replied, "Our army will turn misfortune into fortune!"

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