Chapter 383: Reputation and Military Morale

Xu Zengyi's face looked somewhat dark.

"Commandant, inducing surrender is not the proper way; it would harm your reputation later. For the sake of Li Run, you would sacrifice your reputation, making it so that no one would ever surrender to you again—what a loss."

"Since you have no intention of accepting Li Run's surrender, why not simply refuse him and fight an open battle, annihilating his army?"

Chen Wuji actually knew this would not look good; he said softly, "This is not because our forces are limited and we can afford to lose fewer men; the lives of the soldiers matter more than my reputation."

"Commandant, you have this backwards," Xu Zengyi advised.

His expression was rare in its solemnity: "One general's success is built on countless bones; how can you place the soldiers' sacrifice above your own reputation? You treat the soldiers as your own children; they have already obtained what they wanted, and each soldier, upon enlisting, has already seen his own path home."

"They enlisted for the very word you often speak: gamble—gamble for fame and achievement, or be wrapped in horsehide and die on the battlefield. Please do not let your reputation weigh upon the soldiers' lives, and because of their lives, do not tarnish your own reputation."

Xu Zengyi rarely spoke so much at once.

But whenever he spoke like this, it proved he was truly serious.

Chen Wuji was also seriously considering what Xu Zengyi had said.

Reputation and the soldiers' lives—this truly is a difficult proposition to decide.

"Mr. Xu, do you think reputation is more important now, or the soldiers' lives, or put another way, is military morale more important?" Chen Wuji asked.

"Military morale!" Xu Zengyi said decisively.

"At present, you are in the Qian hexagram's third line, meaning constant vigilance, cultivating virtue and industry, being diligent day and night, cautious in conduct, strengthening your strength and virtue; therefore, military morale is now more important."

"Then bury them!" Chen Wuji said in a deep voice.

"This time, I choose military morale, not popular acclaim. Mr. Xu, if you still feel it's a loss, you might let the soldiers know what we just discussed—between reputation and them, I choose them!"

Xu Zengyi stared, speechless for a long while.

After a long time, he shook his head, smiled, and replied with one word: "... Good."

Chen Wuji's words left him with nothing to say.

In the afternoon, Qin Feng brought Chen Wuji good news from Yunan City.

He recruited two thousand new soldiers.

More than half of these new soldiers came from the civilians Chen Wuji had recently sent to Yunan City.

Chen Wuji rescued them from under the butcher's knives of the Gu, Li, and Xue families.

They chose to become Chen Wuji's soldiers and fight for him.

The cause Chen Wuji planted bore fruit almost immediately.

Naturally, the Gu, Li, and Xue families also played a role; their brutality left the civilians with a simmering resentment.

Never underestimate the power of the common people.

Looking at the five-thousand-year history of Huaxia, the knees of the common people are actually the hardest.

They may not know all the literary nuances, but they understand why family and country matter, know where righteousness lies, and will unhesitatingly sacrifice their heads and shed their blood for the nation's flame.

Qin Feng asked Chen Wuji in his letter whether to send these new soldiers to him or keep them in the city for initial training.

Chen Wuji considered and replied, asking Qin Feng to send the new soldiers over.

Chen Wuji naturally would not send them to the battlefield right away, but on the battlefield, learning should be faster, and the life-and-death scenes should give them a sense of immediacy.

Hezhou's troops are stationed in Qing County; it's uncertain when they might march on Yunan City, and Chen Wuji does not have that much time to send them to the New Soldier Camp for training.

We can only use combat as training, observe battles, and then join them as quickly as possible.

In these days, the one who had been pressuring Chen Wuji, and also urging Xiao Yuji to do the same, Qin Zan Hong, finally began doing proper work.

What Chen Wuji did not expect was that the first thing she started training was the girls who chose to stay.

After Baiquan Village, Chen Wuji encountered more girls sharing the same fate as those twenty-odd girls; altogether they numbered about fifty.

Most had relatives they could rely on, so Chen Wuji gave them some money and let them leave.

A few chose to stay, willing to follow Chen Wuji's arrangements to find work in the city, but somehow they were persuaded by Qin Zan Hong.

Those lively, delicate girls quickly took up killing techniques under Qin Zan Hong, and Chen Wuji got them started on intelligence work.

Although Qin Zan Hong suffered a setback in Chen Wuji's hands and has not shown great strength, seeming a bit dull.

Nevertheless, she came from the Imperial City Department and is still a minor official there.

The Dayu Court's selection is strict; few slackers get in, and those who do must have passed the test.

When Chen Wuji learned of this and saw those girls gathered in a courtyard studying under Qin Zan Hong, he was actually dazed.

He wanted a precise and swift intelligence-gathering organization, not a Daughter Army.

This somewhat deviates from his imagination.

But based on Qin Zan Hong's professional ability, Chen Wuji finally said nothing, merely understood briefly and then let her proceed.

In this situation, aside from Qin Zan Hong, no one around Chen Wuji is a professional in intelligence gathering.

As an outsider, his saying more useless things would be less effective than simply handing full authority to Qin Zan Hong.

……

On the third day after Chen Wuji met Li Run's envoy, Li Run arrived with his mighty troops and camped on a gentle grassy slope where Chen Wuji's temporary base was.

Chen Wuji chose this place to set up camp, and this time he indeed acted a little willfully.

Only because this shallow grass could cover horse hooves on the slope, which reminded him of the lovers' hill at his school.

The curve was gentle, the turf soft; the moment Chen Wuji saw it, he did not consider other factors and immediately decided to camp there.

He never told anyone this reason.

"Commandant, Li Run has arrived, but he seems not entirely at ease," Xu Zengyi said hurriedly as he came from outside, speaking softly beside Chen Wuji.

Chen Wuji also saw the mighty troops, "It's natural for them to be cautious; after all, I now seem to have a reputation abroad, and I heard a soldier say that outside they're spreading rumors that I eat people."

"That's probably just a petty trick of the Gu, Li, and Xue families; such rumors wouldn't spread among the common people," Xu Zengyi said.

Chen Wuji smiled and waved his hand, "Let them talk; after all, I don't care."