Chapter 91: The Loyal and the Righteous

Xin'an County, together with Dongguan County and Xiangshan County, belonged to Guangzhou Prefecture.

Within its borders stood Qiniang Mountain, a place of towering peaks and deep valleys, where ancient forests grew dense as a canopy and the air among the trees was fresh and pleasant.

Whenever a mountain breeze swept through, waves of rustling rose from the woods, a sight that gladdened the heart.

The mountain also held plunging ravines and tumbling streams, cascading waterfalls and flowing springs, the water now slow, now swift, and the sound that reached the ear was as lovely as immortal music.

Yet this paradise on earth was stained today with killing intent. What flowed in those streams was not water but blood; what came from those woods was not the sound of wind but the hopeless weeping of women.

Below the peak, more than six hundred Ming soldiers in tattered clothes and incomplete armor were surrounded by over a thousand Green Standard troops, each with a small queue hanging behind his head, blade or spear in hand, and wearing a tunic with the large character "Bravery" printed on the chest.

The earth was already dyed red by the blood of the war dead, and by the little stream not far away, the corpses of more than a thousand old people, women, and children had piled so thick that they blocked the stream's flow entirely.

Upstream was blood, downstream was blood as well — the blood of Han people, the blood of the old, the blood of women, the blood of children.

The pebbles along the stream were dyed red too, gleaming a deep, dark crimson under the sunlight.

Among the heaps of corpses, some not yet dead let out the agonized sounds of their final moments, and there was also an infant who understood nothing, still at the age of babbling, lying unknowing atop his dead mother's body, ceaselessly pushing at her with his little hands, wanting her to rise and soothe him.

Yet no matter how he pushed, his mother would never wake again.

"Wah—wah—wah—"

The infant's wailing echoed through the valley, enough to break the heart of any who heard it.

The Green Standard troops attacking from all sides were elite soldiers drawn from Xiangshan, Shunde, Xinhui, Lianshan, Dongguan, and other counties of Guangzhou Prefecture, with a total strength of three thousand men, and the target of their assault was Li Wanrong, the great general under the late Grand Guardian of the Heir Apparent of the Great Ming, Zhang Jiayu.

After Zhang Jiayu died a martyr's death at Zengcheng in Guangdong, Li Wanrong led his remaining troops in battle across Xiangshan and Xin'an, holding out against the Qing in the mountains of Qiniang and Wutong.

The year before, he had answered the call of the Guangdong Governor-General Lian Chengbi and led his forces toward Guangzhou to coordinate with Li Dingguo's great army, posing a real threat to the Qing forces in Guangzhou.

Early that year, after Li Dingguo's great army retreated in defeat from Xinhui, the Qing army in Guangzhou, determined to root out this threat at their very heart, mobilized the Green Standard forces of all the counties under Guangzhou to encircle and destroy Li Wanrong's command.

After two months of bitter fighting, Li Wanrong's force had been reduced from five thousand to fewer than a thousand men, and their area of operations had been compressed from the counties of Xin'an, Xiangshan, and Dongguan to the confines of Qiniang Mountain in Xin'an County.

Three days earlier, guided by a traitor, the Qing army had slipped into Qiniang Mountain. The Ming troops, caught utterly unprepared, suffered a crushing defeat.

Shen Yizhong, an officer under Li Wanrong, led two hundred deathsworn soldiers in a desperate stand to cover Li Wanrong's retreat into the depths of Qiniang Mountain with the old, the weak, the women, and the children.

But the desperate resistance of Shen Yizhong and his two hundred deathsworn could not save the situation, and this very morning, the Qing army finally caught up with the Ming troops here in Fengjian Valley.

In close combat, the well-equipped Qing troops gradually surrounded the several hundred ragged Ming survivors, who lacked food and clothing. The more than two thousand family members who had retreated with the Ming troops were slaughtered to the last by the Qing, not even the children spared.

With the battle at this point, facing Qing troops attacking from every direction, Li Wanrong knew the cause was lost. This Great Ming — he could not save it.

The Ming soldiers, who had not closed their eyes for two days and two nights, could hold out no longer. Under the fierce assault of the Green Standard troops, soldier after soldier fell.

Yet even knowing they would all die here today, the Ming troops did not break, and not one man threw down his weapon in terror and surrendered to the Qing. They clenched their teeth, huddled together, and fought the Qing before them to the death with what little strength remained.

Though the Green Standard troops were numerous, the mountain terrain limited them, and for the moment they could not wipe out the Ming troops entirely.

This made Tong Erhan, a company captain of the Bordered Blue Banner Han troops who had come from Guangzhou to oversee the battle, somewhat impatient.

They could not even swallow a few hundred ragged Ming soldiers who had not eaten for days and could barely hold their weapons — these Green Standard troops were truly useless. It seemed the bannermen would have to take the field after all!

"Loose arrows! Shoot them dead!"

At the company captain's order, two hundred Bordered Blue Banner Han troops immediately brought out their bows, stepped to the front of the line, and shot at the Ming soldiers.

The Ming soldiers, who wore no armor at all and lacked even the strength to raise their blades, had no way to evade the Qing arrows. After several volleys, half the Ming troops had been struck and fallen.

The arrow-struck Ming soldiers did not need to see the looks of their comrades or their enemies to know what their end would be. They felt no resentment, but lay calmly on the ground, closed their eyes, and waited for death.

Before a man dies, what he thinks of most is his family.

The faces and voices of his parents, the images of his wife and children, every blade of grass and every tree of his homeland — all of it, bit by bit, flickered unceasingly through the minds of the dying, until at last everything sank into boundless darkness.

"Brothers! The Qing curs have killed our wives and children — there's no point in us living either! Fight the Qing curs to the death!"

Qing troops were on every side, and the remaining Ming soldiers knew they could not escape. But no one shrank back, no one fell to his knees crying for mercy.

They fought on desperately, back to back, locked together against the Qing. When blades shattered, they smashed with the hilts; when spearheads broke off, they thrust with the shafts; when weapons were gone, they picked up stones and hurled them.

"General!"

Amid the flash of blades and shadows of swords, Li Wanrong's personal guard threw his arms around him. The guard said nothing, but Li Wanrong resolutely pushed him away, then with a roar charged at the Qing troops.

"General!"

The guard's eyes turned blood-red. He was no coward — he was a man too!

"You ****ing Qing curs! I'll take you all with me!"

"Charge! Charge!"

"Any man who retreats will be executed under military law! Any man who retreats will be executed under military law!"

No matter how desperately Tong Erhan urged the Green Standard troops to finish the fight quickly, Li Wanrong and the remaining two hundred-odd Ming soldiers stood immovable as Mount Tai. Using the terrain and the surrounding trees, they beat back the Green Standard assaults again and again.

Seeing that night was about to fall, and worried about complications, Tong Erhan had no choice but to commit the bannermen he had been so reluctant to send.

Under the watchful eyes of the Han Banners, the Green Standard troops once more steeled themselves and charged the Ming soldiers. To their astonishment, this time they met no desperate resistance.

The Ming soldiers facing their charge made no move at all, but simply stood there, silently watching them.

The Ming soldiers were utterly spent.

………

Seeing that the Ming troops had completely lost the ability to resist, Yan Guozhen, the Green Standard Assistant Regional Commander directing the assault at the front, ran over to ask Tong Erhan for instructions: "Sir, the Ming troops have no strength left. Shall we take them alive?"

Remembering the Prince of Jingnan's instructions before he set out, Tong Erhan said coldly: "We want only Li Wanrong. Kill all the others without exception!"

"Zha!"

Yan Guozhen nodded in acknowledgment and waved for his men to follow him and seize Li Wanrong. At that moment, Li Wanrong was covered in blood, his robes slashed to rags, and he bore no fewer than several blade wounds on his body.

"Take Li Wanrong alive! Take Li Wanrong alive!"

"Take me alive?"

Hearing the shouts of the Green Standard troops, Li Wanrong gave a bleak, piercing laugh. Suddenly he reversed his long blade and set it against his own neck, then cried to the heavens: "Grand Guardian! Your humble general has failed you. I come to beg your forgiveness!"

At the sight, Yan Guozhen's face changed and he shouted urgently: "Stop him! Stop him!"

Before the words had faded, the Green Standard soldiers at the very front saw that great Ming officer draw the long blade across his own throat.

With a "squelch," the blade bit into flesh, the windpipe severed at once, the heart clenching sharply. The blood did not gush out, but trickled down the blade, little by little, down into the palm of Li Wanrong's hand that gripped the sword.

My wife — you must get our son out!

In the instant he fell, Li Wanrong murmured to himself, and the Green Standard soldiers before him clearly saw that as this great Ming officer died, his eyes were fixed on the peak to the west.

"The general is dead — how can we cling to life!"

Witnessing Li Wanrong's suicide, the remaining Ming soldiers were shaken. A young Ming soldier gritted his teeth and drove the blade in his hand into his own chest.

"Let us all follow the general!"

"Long live the Great Ming!"

"The Great Ming will not perish!"

Not one of the two hundred-odd Ming soldiers hesitated. Without a moment's doubt, they chose to follow their general in death.

In an instant, more than two hundred corpses lay upon the ground. Looking out across the field, of the six hundred-odd Ming soldiers, not one remained alive — every man had either died in battle or taken his own life.

The sight moved Yan Guozhen and all the Green Standard troops, and left Tong Erhan and the two hundred Bordered Blue Banner Han troops staring in a daze.

On the peak toward which Li Wanrong had gazed as he died, a woman was laboriously climbing upward, an infant strapped to her back in swaddling cloth. Every step was a struggle. The baby on her back slept soundly, the mother's jolting like a cradle to him.

Suddenly, the woman's body trembled. As if moved by some unspoken bond, she turned around and strained to gaze into the distance, but the dense forest blocked her view, and she could see nothing.

My husband!

When the woman turned back, two streams of tears were already flowing from her eyes. From somewhere, strength came to her, and her pace suddenly quickened. She no longer paid any heed to the branches and thorns, but only climbed upward with all her might.

At last the woman reached the top of the peak. Her face and hands were covered in blood, and gashes an inch or more long made her look like a ghost.

Below the peak, a pool of water lay still and unruffled, the setting sun striking its surface with a dazzling glare.

The woman slumped to the ground, gasping for breath. A moment later, the baby on her back suddenly stirred. Her heart trembled. She gently untied the cloth sash at her waist and brought the swaddled infant from her back into her arms, gazing at her son with boundless tenderness.

The peak, the sunlight, the dense forest, the sighing of the woods, the pool...

No one knew how long passed before the woman, clutching her son tightly, rose from the ground. Her face stayed pressed to her son's, and his warmth made her heart ache.

After standing there alone for a while, the woman looked at her still-sleeping son and suddenly said softly, "Since ancient times, the loyal and righteous have left no heirs. Jing'er, your father was a loyal servant of the Great Ming, so you too shall be loyal and righteous, just like your father!"

With those words, the woman leaped from the cliff.

In bitter despair, she had once refused to take that step,

Yet she followed her husband across the river's edge.

Together they entered the peach-blossom waters,

And even as mandarin ducks, they are immortals still!