Li Qingge felt something was very wrong.
Su Luo Yan had noticed something was off long ago.
Lu Yaoniang, though fuming, had also caught on—they'd fallen for one of Wang Chong's dirty tricks. They had chased after Sun Mingke the whole way, and though Sun Mingke hadn't gone far beyond the city, they simply couldn't catch up to him.
Wang Chong, thoroughly pleased with himself, had brought along three great beauties, and thought inwardly: "As a young talent of the martial world, taking a leisurely stroll with jianghu heroines is the proper thing to do!"
He had no idea where Sun Mingke had run off to, either. But did that matter? It didn't matter one bit.
Lu Yaoniang leaped down from her horse in a fury, drew her short blade, and shouted, "You with the surname Wen—you owe me an explanation."
Wang Chong wiped his face and said, "Do not be hasty, Lady Lu."
Lu Yaoniang cursed, "If you wanted someone to scout for news from Bazhou, you could have sent just anyone—how could you send my junior martial brother?"
Wang Chong gave a sheepish laugh and scratched his head, at a loss for words. Egging Sun Mingke on to go scout Bazhou hadn't been some spur-of-the-moment whim, done as carelessly as a web novelist without an outline—no, there was a serious reason for it.
"Prince of Yan Wen Zhengchun," though he had nearly been framed to death, was not Song Jiang, who penned a seditious poem and was thrown in prison; not some eunuch in whose house a dragon robe was found; not Zhao Da, who was draped in the yellow cloak; and still less Zhu Di, whose own brothers were hounded to madness and death while he faced the stripping of his fief. He was the Heavenly Empress's own son—her only beloved son—and someone had nearly framed him to death. Was he not entitled to a little temper?
The first thing to do was to lodge a complaint.
Yep—he'd really dug up a pile of dirt.
The second thing was to put on the appearance of heading off to the Yan lands to take up his fief.
To "return to Yanzhou and take up his fief," he first had to take Bazhou. Had Sun Mingke not gone, he might have set out leading the troops himself. But these words he could not say to Lu Yaoniang, nor to anyone—after all, this was a scheme that disguised rebellion as taking up a fief.
Lu Yaoniang was utterly furious. The short blade in her hand flashed like lightning, like a driving rainstorm, chopping straight down at his head, ferociously sharp.
Wang Chong, still seated on his horse, extended a single finger, tapping and flicking lightly, waving it about with casual ease, his bearing utterly composed, and dissolved Lu Yaoniang's bladework.
Lu Yaoniang was too worked up to notice anything amiss, but Li Qingge and Su Luo Yan were both struck with astonishment. Su Luo Yan hurriedly called out, "Brother Wang Chong, have you already advanced to master?"
Wang Chong laughed and said, "That day when I killed Yaglakar Yehu, I made a breakthrough in passing."
Lu Yaoniang struck more than ten blows in a row, yet she could never break through the defense of Wang Chong's single finger. Knowing she could do nothing to this man, she lowered her short blade. She had meant to keep pressing him, but on hearing such words from him, she couldn't help saying, "Is that even human speech? What do you mean, you killed the Yaglakar clan and just casually broke through?"
"Advancing to master—how could it ever be so easy?"
Wang Chong laughed and said, "Very true, very true!"
Lu Yaoniang was still fretting over her junior martial brother and shouted, "Advance to master, my foot! You still owe me my junior martial brother. Our Taiyi Temple—never mind masters; we have one or two grandmasters, and even a pinnacle."
Lu Yaoniang's bosom heaved and fell. She, Wu-Hook Frost-Snow, had weathered who knew how many great storms in her time—never had she been driven this frantic!
She said resentfully, "If you can't find my junior martial brother, I'll have my teacher come demand him from you."
Wang Chong was startled—he didn't dare face a pinnacle of the age—and hurriedly said, "I'll certainly help you, Lady Lu, find little brother Sun."
Su Luo Yan gazed at Wang Chong and all at once thought of Chu Qiuzi, and suddenly felt a faint stir of envy. She pressed down the sourness welling up in her heart and said, "Little brother Sun hasn't been out long, and he brought two or three hundred men with him, so he can't be traveling fast. We've chased this long without catching him—most likely we've taken the wrong road."
Wang Chong said, "Pity I'm no good at tracking. Had I known, I'd have brought a hound along."
Li Qingge cleared her throat softly and said, "I'm skilled at tracking. The hoofprints on the ground are plain enough—we haven't taken a wrong road."
"It's just that the hoofprints look a little hurried. Little brother Sun seems to have been chasing something, so he kept his horses at a full gallop the whole way rather than going slowly."
Only then did Lu Yaoniang, still fuming, mount her horse again. The four of them drove their mounts hard. This time they had run seven or eight li when Wang Chong heard the sounds of fighting ahead.
He pressed a hand to the saddle and vaulted more than five zhang into the air, and saw that up ahead two bands of men were locked in battle.
One side was Sun Mingke and the men he had brought. Sun Mingke had snatched a long spear from who-knows-where, and with a sword in his left hand and a spear in his right, he looked down on all who faced him, felling the foes before him from their saddles one after another. The other side Wang Chong also happened to recognize—it was precisely the Yaglakar clan's cavalry, though Lichiluo of the Afugan clan was nowhere to be seen.
The Yaglakar cavalry, without a leader and having suffered defeat after defeat, were low in spirit. Sun Mingke, leading his men, actually fought without losing ground.
He dropped back down and settled onto his saddle again. Thinking of how, when he had first transmigrated over, he could only spring three or four zhang high, he couldn't help feeling gratified at the progress of his lightness skill. At the same time, he did not forget to give a great shout: "Little brother Sun has run into the Yaglakar clan's routed troops—quick, let's go to his rescue!"
Hearing that her junior martial brother was in danger, Lu Yaoniang took the lead at a full gallop and charged headlong into the midst of the two forces.
Li Qingge followed close behind, and Su Luo Yan joined the fray as well. This band of steppe elite cavalry could not hold out a moment longer.
When Wang Chong appeared, someone suddenly cried out at the top of his voice, "Your Highness the Prince of Yan—we're willing to surrender!"
Wang Chong had no idea how such a turn of events had come about, and shouted, "Those who surrender shall not be killed!" At once several dozen men rolled from their saddles and threw down their weapons.
When Sun Mingke saw that it was Wang Chong and his own senior martial sister and the others, he was overjoyed and called out, "Brother Wang Chong, I ran into these routed troops on the way. I fought a duel with that fellow—the one called Lichiluo—and killed him within ten exchanges. I was just about to wipe out the rest of these villains."
Wang Chong quickly said, "Those who surrender may be spared."
The Yaglakar cavalry had long since lost any will to fight and dismounted one after another. In the end only a dozen or so riders broke through the encirclement and fled west.
Wang Chong rode his horse into the midst of the surrendered troops and asked, "Why are you willing to surrender?"
A Yaglakar knight shouted, "Lichiluo was monstrous! He said that we, defeated and crawling home, were no longer fit to be called warriors. And with the Yaglakar clan's chief dead, along with his two sons Pishaluo and Wen Ducheng, once we returned to the Jiuqu League he meant to hand us over to his brothers as slaves."
Wang Chong gave an "oh" to show he understood. When Lichiluo had withdrawn with the remnant troops, Wang Chong had even pictured it in his mind—this man, upon returning to the Jiuqu League, would surely see his strength grow greatly, and might in a few years rise up to become a figure of note on the great steppe. Who would have thought the world could be so cruel?
Lichiluo had meant to break up this Yaglakar cavalry and swallow it whole—by all rights, a man of great ambition and vision.
Too bad he had run into Sun Mingke, the newborn calf that fears no tiger, and was actually killed by this junior disciple of the Dragon-Crowning Daoist.
The whole thing was absurd!
Wang Chong stroked his chin and mused inwardly, "Most likely Lichiluo couldn't keep these remnant troops in check, and that's what held him up on the road. Had he not been so impatient—had he taken the men back first—the outcome might well have been entirely different."
Wang Chong saw that Sun Mingke was still wearing a marten-fur cap, and kept casually twirling the long spear into little flourishes, clearly well pleased with the fight. He couldn't help laughing and said, "Little brother Sun, your Senior Sister Lu gave me quite the tongue-lashing—blaming me for letting you out."
Chapter 84