The air itself trembled beneath the relentless clash of steel and the harrowing screams of the dying. What had once been Luo Wen's steadfast lines—unyielding, solid as walls of iron—were now crumbling like brittle reeds in the face of a merciless storm of swords and arrows. The militias of An Lu and Yuan Guo advanced in relentless, unending waves, their blood-soaked banners whipping through the air like the claws of ravenous beasts. The sun, obscured behind a thick shroud of dust and acrid smoke, cast a sickly crimson hue over the battlefield, as though the heavens themselves were bleeding onto the trampled earth below.
Zhao Qing, his armor dented and scarred, his face encrusted in a grotesque mask of mud and dried blood, struggled to maintain the cohesion of his formation. Every limping step of his wounded horse echoed against the mound of corpses beneath them—some of which still clutched their weapons with fingers locked in rigor mortis. The terrain, riddled with hidden traps—pits disguised by rotting branches, stakes driven deep into the mud—had turned retreat into a macabre and lethal dance. A young soldier, no older than sixteen at most, collapsed beside him, a lance piercing clean through his chest. His eyes, glassy and wide with terror, searched desperately for Zhao Qing's before the light within them faded away forever.
"Retreat!" the general bellowed, ripping a shaft from his shield with a dull, splintering snap. His voice, hoarse and frayed after hours of barking orders, was barely audible over the thunderous pounding of enemy war drums. "To the forest! Now, go!"
But the forest was already ablaze. Someone—was it a panicked deserter, acting on instinct? Or had it been an act of deliberate sabotage, planned with cold precision?—had set fire to the ancient pines, and now the flames licked greedily at the sky with tongues of feral hunger. The thick smoke, laden with ash and the stench of burning resin, stung the eyes and choked the lungs of those few survivors who still stood. A cluster of Luo Wen archers, trapped between the raging inferno and the advancing enemy spears, hurled themselves over a nearby ravine, their cries vanishing into the depths like stones into a well. Amid the chaos, a teenage soldier with his left arm hanging by a grotesque thread of flesh clutched at Zhao Qing's torn cloak.
"General—the flanks are collapsing!" he shouted, blood bubbling from his lips. "Yuan Guo's forces have severed the supply lines!"
Zhao Qing gave no reply. His jaw clenched so tightly it seemed it might shatter, he dug his spurs into his horse's flanks. The beast, its body riddled with festering wounds and snapped-off arrows, neighed with a sound more like a man's cry of anguish than a horse's call. Together they pressed westward, weaving through the broken bodies of the fallen, their vacant eyes staring up from the dirt like silent accusations. In the distance, the triumphant laughter of the militias blended with the agonized moans of tortured prisoners.
An Lu surveyed the carnage from atop his armored chariot. Around him, generals, intoxicated by the sweetness of early victory, laughed boisterously as they tossed copper coins toward shackled prisoners.
"Do you see how your so-called 'master strategist' flees?" he sneered at a Luo Wen soldier bound at his feet. "He's not even fit to polish my boots."
A breathless messenger arrived, gasping for air:
"Your Excellency! Their forces are retreating southward, toward the mountains!"
"Pursue them," Yuan Guo commanded, though a shadow of hesitation flickered across his expression. "Let not a single officer of Luo Wen live to speak of this defeat."
An Lu added with a smirk, dripping with cruelty:
"And sever their hands. Let them be nailed to the gates of their capital for all to see."
The riders departed, raising great clouds of dust that momentarily blotted out the sun.
"How many remain?" Luo Wen asked, extending his hands toward the fire. The flames illuminated the blue-tinged veins beneath his pale skin, marked by the toll of decades of warfare.
Kang, grunting as he tightened the bloodied bandage around his torso, replied:
"Fewer than a thousand. They're being chased toward Ling Gorge. Scouts report An Lu has dispatched three companies of light cavalry."
Luo Wen nodded slowly. For the first time in many hours, a thin smile crept across his cracked lips—subtle as the edge of a hidden dagger.
"Good," he murmured, pulling a tarnished bronze medallion from within his breastplate. The chain that held it gleamed faintly in the firelight. As he held it up, the carved symbol—of a dragon devouring its own tail—seemed to writhe in the shadows, alive with ancient menace.
Wei, the young general, struck the ground with his bandaged fist. The scar that slashed across his right cheek flushed red, as though remembering the blade that had carved it there.
"'Good'? We've lost everything! The granaries, the weapons, the men—we even lost the breeding horses in that trap!"
Luo Wen said nothing. Instead, he gently placed the medallion atop a flat stone near the flames. Under the fire's glow, the runes etched into its surface shimmered. Min, the strategist, gasped softly. He recognized that mark: it was the forbidden crest of the House of Luo—banned since the Great Purge, two decades past.
"Prepare the horses," Luo Wen ordered, his gaze fixed on the medallion's flickering form. "We ride before dawn."
Ming bowed his head slightly, his voice a breath of ice:
"To where?"
Luo Wen's smile widened, just enough to cast a shadow across his face that, for a fleeting second, seemed to sprout fangs.
"To where they least expect us."
Back in the captured encampment, An Lu and Yuan Guo reveled in their improvised feast. The command tents of Luo Wen's officers—now plundered and defiled—sheltered long tables laden with stolen rice wine and charred meat. A masked jester danced across burning embers to amuse the drunken victors, while the prisoners, chained to wooden stakes, groaned under the weight of their wounds and humiliation.
Meanwhile, in the mountains, Luo Wen mounted his chestnut horse—a lean creature, its muscles taut and its eyes sharp as daggers. Behind him, his remaining generals waited in silence, their silhouettes etched against the rising crescent moon. Far below, in the valley, the enemy's campfires twinkled like fireflies caught in a spider's web.
"Remember this day," Luo Wen said, tightening the worn black leather gloves that had seen countless battles. "It is the seed of what is yet to come."
Without another word, he spurred his horse forward. Its hooves struck the bare rock with a cadence that echoed like a heartbeat deep within the bones of the earth. Behind him, the generals melted into the shadows, and the wind carried with it an ancient whisper—one that sounded eerily like the wings of dragons brushing against the stars.