In the rear courtyard of the military redoubt, Liao Jingwu had laid out a banquet and was drinking with several officers until their faces were flushed and warm.
"Allow me to toast the general first!" Commandant Wang Delu was not in the county seat at the moment, but here in the redoubt. He drained his cup in one gulp, then asked, "General Liao, are we really not going to rescue General Li?"
"Who goes? You?" Liao Jingwu glared with wide eyes.
Wang Delu shrank his neck and gave a sheepish laugh. "I don't know how to lead cavalry. If we ran into a large force of Liao cavalry, wouldn't that just be throwing our lives away?"
"Then that settles it! If you don't dare go, shut your mouth!" Liao Jingwu emptied his cup in a single swallow, exhaled a breath of wine fumes, and said, "The dukes of Southern Qi have no authority over us out here! These scions of the immortal sects just come here to get a veneer of gold and win some fame, and in the end they'll go right back where they came from. I didn't have many men to begin with. These troops are my capital for the future—if they're wiped out, who's going to compensate me?"
Another commandant chimed in, "The general speaks absolute truth! We already have military merits in hand, so why risk our lives? If you ask me, let's just hold out peacefully until winter, and the Liao barbarians will naturally withdraw. If we force a sally and happen to bump into a massive horde, heads will truly roll! Besides, Sun Chao'en isn't an idiot; Quyang County seat can definitely hold out. As for those outside the walls, if they die, they die. The Liao barbarians won't retreat without getting a sweet taste of something anyway."
Wang Delu said nothing more. Although he wanted to curry favor with Li Zhi, leading troops into a sally himself was utterly out of the question.
Yet another commandant spoke up: "General, the court's military pay has arrived, but the shortfall is still huge. What should we do?"
"How much is missing?"
"Thirty thousand taels actually arrived. By the old rules, you take half, and the officers take half of what's left. Right now, the unpaid wages and bereavement pensions total seventy thousand taels, so we're still short over sixty thousand."
Liao Jingwu grew irritated. "Shoo, shoo! Stop bringing up such buzzkills! Do whatever was done in the past! Hand out whatever little we have first, and owe the rest. If anyone makes trouble, arrest them, and behead the ringleaders! Drink!"
The officers exchanged cups again, and the drinking session dragged on from afternoon until dark.
***
After Wei Yuan and Li Zhi returned to Shayang Village, reinforcements from various quarters arrived one after another. Over the next few hours, people continued trickling in, the farthest having rushed from two hundred li away. In the end, a total of nine relief forces gathered in tiny Shayang Village, numbering over eight hundred men. Li Zhi finally regained his confidence.
However, Shayang Village was far too small, and the reinforcements had their own territories to guard. After exchanging courtesies and favors, they dispersed—those nearby returned to their defense zones, while those from farther away spent the night in Quyang County before departing.
Inside the Shayang Village ancestral hall.
Wei Yuan sat bare-chested with wound medicines, bandages, and other supplies laid out beside him. Li Zhi was personally treating his injuries.
Wei Yuan had been struck by three arrows. At the time, he had simply severed the shafts with Dao arts to keep fighting, but now that they were back, the wounds had to be tended to. Many kinds of Northern Liao arrows had serrated barbs that could not be pulled out carelessly.
Wei Yuan's physique was practically flawless—broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted, his skin faintly suffused with a treasure-like sheen. Originally without a single blemish, the three arrowheads lodged in his flesh now stood out starkly like three unsightly stains.
Li Zhi first used his spiritual sense to examine the shapes of the arrowheads, then channeled dharmic power to reshape the metal, smoothing away the barbs and serrations. Then, gripping the exposed shaft, he used a jolt of dharmic power to separate flesh from metal before gingerly drawing the arrowhead out.
Once the arrowhead was removed, a cavity the size of a teacup was left in Wei Yuan's body, and blood instantly welled up.
White light flared on Li Zhi's other hand as he prepared to cast a Spring Rejuvenation Art on the wound, followed by a healing talisman unique to Four Sages Academy. Working in tandem, such flesh wounds would normally heal in two days.
Just as the Spring Rejuvenation Art was about to be unleashed, the blood flowing from Wei Yuan's wound turned a pale pink hue, resembling a mass of jelly, and actually wriggled as it crawled back into the wound! Immediately afterward, Wei Yuan's muscles rippled, sealing the wound shut until only a tiny pale pink dot remained. Moments later, even the dot vanished.
Li Zhi silently dispelled the Spring Rejuvenation Art, then reached down to extract the remaining two arrowheads directly, not even bothering to smooth the serrations. When both arrows were pulled out, the same thing occurred: the blood flowed back, and the wounds sealed themselves.
Li Zhi held an arrowhead and inspected it for a long while. Still refusing to believe his eyes, he extended his tongue and gave it a lick. Instantly, his mouth went numb, his head spun, his Dao Foundation dimmed, and his breath turned unsteady. He hurriedly gulped down a large mouthful of antidote before finally stabilizing.
Li Zhi was finally certain that the Liao barbarians had indeed not cut any corners on these three arrows; every single one was laced with venom potent enough that even a Dao Foundation cultivator could not endure it. Li Zhi had also been struck by an arrow, but his armor was of such high quality that the arrow had merely grazed his skin after piercing the plate, and all the poison had been cleansed by the armor's intrinsic powers upon penetration, leaving him unfazed at the time. Only now, after courting death by licking it himself, did he realize how terrifying the Liao barbarians' poison truly was.
Li Zhi tossed the arrowhead aside, draped a robe over Wei Yuan's shoulders, and could not help asking, "Brother Wei, just how many supreme body-refining medicines have you consumed?"
Wei Yuan listed them one by one: "The Origin-Nourishing Pill, Blood Splendor Pill, Bone-Forging Pill, and Spirit Gathering Pill."
Having gone through a bloody battle together, their bond was now far from ordinary. Wei Yuan hid nothing and told Li Zhi everything. However, as for what medicines Eldest Senior Sister had used for his cleansing and tempering, Wei Yuan had no idea. Moreover, that cleansing process had been somewhat ambiguous and indiscreet, making it unsuitable to speak of to outsiders.
Upon hearing the names of the pills, Li Zhi's expression turned peculiar. "Those are merely ordinary pills meant to replenish spiritual qi and speed up cultivation progress. Brother Wei only took these?"
Wei Yuan nodded.
Li Zhi reached out a finger, placed it against the skin of Wei Yuan's back, and slid it down slowly. Feeling the texture against his fingertip, Li Zhi tried channeling a wisp of dharmic power inward, but it was completely bounced back.
Li Zhi sighed. "These common pills do almost nothing to elevate the grade of the physical body. Brother Wei must have suffered many grievances in the Palace of Grand Beginning, and reaching where you are today is entirely by your own efforts. To say nothing of what my family prepared for me, the academy alone provided two handwritten scrolls by sages to accompany my cultivation, and precious medicines to enhance my constitution were never lacking. My foundation was originally only eight chi, and it was stretched little by little to over nine chi. Yet even with external aids, my physical body is still far inferior to Brother Wei's. Losing to you all those years ago was truly no injustice!"
Wei Yuan had thought Li Zhi was about to launch into another recruitment pitch like in the past. To his surprise, after marveling for a moment, Li Zhi said, "With Brother Wei's immense talent today, you will soar to the heavens no matter where you are, even in the Palace of Grand Beginning. The Palace of Grand Beginning is an immortal sect after all; no matter how blind they were in the past, they will surely provide you with all the resources you deserve now. I won't waste words asking you to transfer to Four Sages Academy. But seeing Brother Wei again has indeed given me an idea."
Li Zhi looked at Wei Yuan and said earnestly, "Once Brother Wei casts your Dao Foundation, according to the rules of the Palace of Grand Beginning, it will be time to make a name and build achievements. When it comes to merits, none surpasses expanding territory. I was fortunate enough to take a step ahead in cultivation and have trained in the army for several years, so I have acquired some understanding of expanding frontiers. Once Brother Wei achieves your Dao Foundation, if you are interested, we can fight shoulder to shoulder once again, just like today!"
Wei Yuan still possessed the fiery spirit of youth. Hearing this made his blood surge, and he said, "Good!"
"Then it's a promise!" Li Zhi reached out and clapped palms with Wei Yuan, sealing their pact.
Throughout their shared battle, Wei Yuan had been observing Li Zhi.
Li Zhi was capable of leading from the front, and when facing formidable foes, he could fight a bloody battle to the death without a shred of fear. Wei Yuan had taken three arrows, but Li Zhi had also taken an arrow and a saber slash, suffering injuries that were far from light. When the Northern Liao reinforcements appeared, Li Zhi had remained composed in the face of crisis, making a swift, decisive call to pull back toward Quyang County in accordance with Wei Yuan's intentions. Back during the martial test, one could tell Li Zhi favored military strategy. Now, ten years later, Li Zhi was no longer that boy who only fought wars on paper; he had truly commanded troops through bloody combat, and his conduct already showed the makings of a renowned general.
Yet for some reason, Wei Yuan always felt that Li Zhi's battlefield command still fell a bit short. Exactly where it fell short, Wei Yuan could not say. After all, his own talent as a military grandmaster had only been displayed during the martial test all those years ago; in the decade of cultivation that followed, he had never had the chance to use it, and it had gradually grown rusty from neglect.
At this moment, Li Zhi was daydreaming about leading grand armies together in the future, campaigning east and west, and cutting through boundless enemy hosts. Caught up in the romantic vision, he asked with a touch of pride, "Brother Wei, what do you think of my command of troops?"
*I always feel something's lacking; if I were the one in command, it'd probably go a lot better.* Wei Yuan nearly blurted it out. Fortunately, he had not been in Sky Azure Hall for very long, so he merely thought it to himself and did not actually speak the words aloud.
Wei Yuan put on a thoughtful look, then said, "Brother Li can lead from the front and remain calm in the face of danger. You can truly be called a famed general!"
Li Zhi was overjoyed. Amid his delight, he felt a bit bashful and quickly replied, "Brother Wei overpraises me! I merely possess a rough understanding of warfare."
Li Zhi had no idea that when Zhang Sheng taught Wei Yuan in the past, he had explained that in history books, phrases like "can be called" or "comparable to" actually meant "still far from it."
Given Wei Yuan's grasp of military strategy, even if he could not articulate where Li Zhi fell short, it did not stop him from believing that if he took the field himself, he would definitely do better than Li Zhi.
Chapter 80