Dawn had not yet arrived, and the sky was pitch black.
The old soldier Shitou huddled at the base of a battered battlement, coarse hands cupping a piece of multigrain flatbread.
The flatbread was still warm, carrying the smoky sweetness of a hearth fire and the white steam rising from it.
Shitou took a bite with his cracked lips, and for a moment, he froze in thought.
In years past, around this time, the night-watch soldiers would have nothing to gnaw on but hard, frozen dry biscuits, each bite making their gums seep blood.
Back then, Zhenbei City was a dead town forsaken by the Great Qian Empire.
In the bitter cold of winter, brothers who froze or starved to death were simply piled up against the sunless walls, without even a tattered straw mat to cover their faces.
When a festering wound opened on a man’s body, the army doctor would only cauterize the flesh with a red-hot iron plate, and the wretched screams would drift for half a league.
The camp drank muddy water mixed with horse dung year-round, and when a plague swept through, half the camp’s soldiers would soon be covered with burial cloths.
As for the pensions the court had promised: even seeing a few copper coins within three years was a luxury.
But now, everything had changed.
Shitou raised his head. Below the city wall, the encampment was already lit with firelight.
Before the first glimmer of dawn, women from the Land Management Bureau stretched hemp ropes in the open ground, briskly hanging dehydrated vegetables to dry.
In front of the army doctor's tent, a young medicine boy, following the new protocols set by the imperial envoy, mixed strong liquor with boiling water to cool it before cleansing the rotting flesh of wounded soldiers.
By several deep wells in the city stood three-foot-high wooden plaques, painted with glaring red characters: "Let sediment settle before drawing water."
Near the stables, Old Man Jin, the horse doctor, led his apprentices as they ladled warm salt water into troughs, watching the warhorses drink deeply.
There were no shouted commands—only countless calloused hands working in silence.
"Old Guai, lame leg and all, why are you up so early delivering vegetables? Not afraid of being press-ganged?"
A laborer pushing a one-wheeled wooden cart wiped the frost from his forehead.
The other man set down the cart’s handles firmly and spat:
"Nonsense. In the old days, dodging the draft was like dodging a plague—go, and you'd die. Now? Are you blind? The army brothers eat the vegetables we grow, and they’re risking their lives to protect this patch of skin we call our own! The Imperial Envoy said it plainly: the walls of Zhenbei City were built, brick by brick, for war. The people living within those walls were born to fight for it!"
Thump—!
Thump—!
Thump—!
Three dull beats of the drum calling troops to assembly echoed through the frosty dawn wind.
The great training ground of Zhenbei City surged with figures.
Armored infantry and light cavalry, grain-cart-pushing laborers from the Land Management Bureau, and vest-wearing army doctors, all gathered in one place.
On the edges of the training ground, the women who did the washing and cooking crowded together in a dark mass.
Thousands had assembled, yet there was no clamor—only the sound of heavy breathing rising and falling over the frost- and snow-covered, muddy ground.
On the command platform, General Tie Lanshan, clad in shining armor and with a broadsword at his waist, strode heavily to the front.
Tie Lanshan wasted no words. His sharp eyes swept the crowd, and he began with a command that shook the entire army:
"Seven thousand elite cavalry from Helian are already moving south! The civil officials fear death and have ordered us to hold the city. But I tell you today: holding the city means handing the bolts of Zhenbei’s gates to the barbarians!"
He slapped the hilt of his sword, and the clang of metal rang across the plain:
"I have decided—we will take the initiative and attack! Where is Xu Zhan?"
"Here, Marshal!"
From below the platform, a burley, one-armed black-armored general stepped forward, a single meteor hammer resting in his hand.
"I charge you with three hundred assault riders. Your mission is not to cut down generals or take banners, but to start a single blaze—burn the barbarians’ supply line to the ground! Cut off their lifeline!"
Tie Lanshan’s voice boomed,
"All other companies, prepare for battle. Anyone who takes a single step back will face my military law—no exceptions!"
The three forces stood in rigid silence, weapons bristling like a forest, no one daring to dissent. The general’s authority in this deployment had thoroughly dominated the entire assembly.
After issuing his orders, Tie Lanshan drew a sharp breath of cold air, then turned and, with solemn respect, yielded the central position to the side.
"The Imperial Envoy, representing His Majesty, inspects the border."
Tie Lanshan raised his voice, deliberately emphasizing each word,
"Today, as the army prepares to march, the Envoy has a few words to deliver to our brothers on behalf of the capital."
Xu Qinghuan walked slowly onto the platform.
Draped in a crow-colored cloak, her figure seemed slender against the gathered soldiers, but the cold, commanding aura she exuded silenced the crowd of thousands.
After taking her position, Xu Qinghuan met the eyes of those bloodshot men below with a steady gaze.
"I am not here to give orders,"
Xu Qinghuan’s clear voice cut through the morning cold, reaching every ear with precision.
"The command lies with Marshal Tie. The swords at your waists also rest in Marshal Tie’s hands."
Her tone was calm but emphatic,
"The only thing I hold is twofold: the word of the capital—and your lives."
In just those few sentences, Xu Qinghuan dispelled any suspicion of her seeking power, drawing a clear boundary around military authority.
"I won’t talk to you about hollow philosophies of state and destiny. Let’s only talk about real accounts."
Her voice was steady and firm,
"In these past six months, the number of brothers who have fallen to injury, disease, cold, or starvation has dropped from hundreds per month to single digits. Those kiln-dried vegetables you grew kept two thousand men in the wounded camp alive through the harsh winter. It saved their lives."
"The method of digging sand and sinking into the water ensured that this city never again suffered a single plague. The compensation silver for your families was also paid in full to the widows and orphans."
The breathing of the crowd below grew rapid.
These tangible acts of kindness were the life-and-death cycles they had personally endured.
But at that very moment, Xu Qinghuan's tone shifted sharply.
"But all of this,"
Her voice suddenly rose, her eyes sharp and piercing,
"Is not my achievement, Xu Qinghuan!"
"This was the imperial treasury's money, allocated to save your lives! It was the authority Marshal Tie vigorously fought to grant! And above all, it was your own lives, forced out from piles of the dead!"
Xu Qinghuan looked at the countless swarthy faces below, speaking each word deliberately:
"I am nothing more than a messenger who delivers the words for you."
Grace belonged to the sovereign, authority to the commander, and hardship to the soldiers.
This act of deflecting credit did not diminish Xu Qinghuan's authority; instead, it made her slender figure appear even more imposing in the eyes of the troops.
On the edge of the crowd, the old soldier Shitou bit his cracked lips tightly.
He looked down at his feet, standing in the frosty mud—those feet, sore for three years and nearly amputated with a saw, had been saved by the Imperial Envoy's prescribed method of applying medicated wine.
Shitou’s eyes grew hot, a scalding surge rushing straight to the bridge of his nose. He clenched his molars desperately, tasting the blood in his mouth, but refused to let a single tear fall.
"Every single blue brick in this town of Zhenbei was laid with the bones of your brothers-in-arms!"
Xu Qinghuan shouted sternly against the cold wind,
"Those who live in this city were born for this very battle!"
She raised her arm abruptly, pointing toward the vast, desolate desert in the far north.
"Today, the imperial court has placed grain, water, and medicine in your hands—not for you to cower back, not for you to survive in disgrace!"
"It is for you to live! And to win this battle, thoroughly, for our Great Qian, and for the hundred thousand ancestors buried in the icy waters of the White Wolf River a century ago!"
The century-old blood grudge instantly ignited the murderous fury that had been suppressed in the training ground for decades.
Xu Qinghuan turned around, directing the crowd's gaze to the side of the platform.
Xu Zhan, clad in black armor with an empty right sleeve, stood to the side, his left hand gripping a single meteoric iron mace, his stance as steady as a rock.
"You fear He Lian's hundred thousand iron cavalry? You think the barbarians of the desert are invincible?"
Xu Qinghuan's voice reached a fever pitch.
"Look at him!"
"With one arm, he smashed twenty heavy-armored iron pagodas outright!"
"If he can do it—you men of Great Qian, who eat and live together in this very city—why can't you?"
Heavy breathing quickly gathered within the training ground, the sound waves deafening.
Having stirred the crowd’s emotions, Xu Qinghuan did not pause for a moment. She stepped back half a step, crisp and decisive.
"The fighting, Marshal Tie will handle."
She stared straight into the countless red-rimmed eyes below,
"I will stay in the city and guard your grain, your water, your medicine. When you return..."
With these words, Xu Qinghuan faced Tie Lanshan and gave a deep bow, performing the greeting of equals.
This half-step back handed the command of the formation back to the marshal.
After a brief silence.
"Marshal Tie--!"
Someone roared the first cry at the top of their lungs.
Then followed the crowd's earth-shaking:
"General Xu, mighty!"
The armored soldiers, field laborers, and camp followers in the training ground roared with all their might, the sound waves echoing along the city walls.
"Fight--! Fight--! Fight--!"
