Chapter 468: Mount Qi

In the first ten days of the eleventh month of the first year of Wude (AD 25).

Over the past half-month, the Wei army, following Diwu Lun's strategy of "rooting out evil completely," had already suffered enormous casualties.

Advancing south from Shanggui, they pursued the enemy through the narrow Iron Tang Gorge and the Mumen Road. Unable to deploy their formations, they were repeatedly ambushed. The Wei army stretched into a long column in the valley paths; for every step forward, five lives were paid, and both roads stretched for a hundred li.

The Battle of Lucheng in Xi County was also a bitter fight. The two sides deployed grand formations and clashed fiercely; the blood of Wei and Long soldiers splattered across the grey, dusty halite mines.

Having finally taken Lucheng with great difficulty, Wan Xiu cast his gaze southward.

"Is that Mount Qi?"

Mount Qi was merely an obscure spur of the thousand-li Min Mountains, more a series of rolling ridges than a place of towering, solitary peaks. Yet it was also the dividing line between northern and southern climates. To the north lay the Loess Plateau, where the mountains were all bare and the view still relatively open, but from here southward, the terrain grew steep, and the coniferous forests thickened, dyeing the winter landscape of Longnan with a layer of green.

Wan Xiu remembered that during the military conference at Shanggui, Diwu Lun had paid considerable attention to this small place, constantly muttering something about "six campaigns from Mount Qi."

Wan Xiu had not understood at first, but after deeply studying the topography of Long and Shu, he was filled with boundless admiration for Diwu Lun.

"His Majesty truly received the true teachings of Yan Erudite's art of war. Mount Qi is indeed the throat of Long and Shu!"

Going northeast from Mount Qi, following the road the Wei army had fought through with bloody battles, one could reach Shanggui and Tianshui directly, entering the heartland of Longshang.

Entering Mount Qi and heading southwest led to the open basin of the Western Han River, a passage straight into Qiang territory, connecting with Lintao and Didao at the other end of Longxi.

Going directly south from Mount Qi, one could reach Wudu Commandery, controlled by the Cheng regime, gripping the throat of Liang and Yi provinces.

In short, the Cheng regime's northern support operation this time all unfolded with Mount Qi as its base. Coming from Wudu, although the Western Han River was full of rocks and wood, some sections of the waterway were navigable by boat. Moreover, a large army encamped needed a water source, so the foot of Mount Qi served as a place for gathering provisions and resting the troops.

Wan Xiu wanted to go further ahead to see for himself. Yuan Chu, son of the Maoling hero Yuan She who now served as a colonel under his command, admonished him: "General, you should not have come here."

"When His Majesty left Shanggui, he gave repeated and earnest instructions, making you promise to properly care for your back injury and not to personally go to the front lines. Matters like attacking cities and seizing territory can be left to the colonels."

Wan Xiu now independently commanded an army in the Long region, with Anding and Tianshui both entrusted to him. His total forces exceeded fifty thousand, with several assistant generals and dozens of colonels under his command.

But Wan Xiu insisted: "In this battle, I won't be at ease unless I see it with my own eyes."

He admitted to himself that he could not, like His Majesty, devise strategies from afar to win victory a thousand li away. He had to watch closely, controlling matters from the front line.

Five li south of Lucheng, a massive structure loomed before Wan Xiu's eyes. To call it a mountain would be slightly too small; to call it a hill would be somewhat too tall. It stood solitary and upright amidst the fields, its geological style utterly different from its surroundings, as if it had flown in from mid-air, making it exceptionally conspicuous.

The locals said it had not existed at all in the past. This Qishan Fort was not a natural formation, but built upon the foundation of a low earthen mound by the allied Long and Shu armies, layer by layer, pounded firm with hammers. Atop the earthen summit, a ring of battlements had been constructed.

"A lock and key."

Qishan Fort was the key to the gates leading east, south, and west. Whoever seized it would hold the initiative over Long and Shu!

Then Wan Xiu saw the great dragon-rising banner of the Cheng regime erected atop it. Gongsun Shu styled himself the White Emperor, so his banners were white. Wan Xiu laughed and said: "Gentlemen, does this not look like mourning cloth announcing a death?"

"Exactly!" the colonels all chorused in agreement. Wan Xiu rallied their spirits:

"This foretells that the defeat of Long and Shu is already sealed. Before long, we shall plant our five-colored banner up there!"

As Wan Xiu gazed upon Qishan Fort, there were also people atop the fort watching the Wei army scouts drawing near.

The Longyou general Yang Guang, his face full of sorrow, said: "Defeat after defeat, from Mount Long to Tianshui, from Xiao Pass to Didao, and finally Lucheng and Xi County."

"If Qishan Fort cannot be held, we will truly have to leave Longyou, leave our homeland."

The Shu general Jing Han, standing shoulder to shoulder with him, said: "This means the Long army can retreat no further, not even half a step."

Within the Cheng regime, there were initially two factions, one advocating defense and the other offense. The former felt that Emperor Gongsun was fine ruling a single province and need not expand outward. Within the pro-war faction, there was a further split between those favoring a southern advance and those favoring a northern advance. The southern faction was led by Chancellor Li Xiong, who was fixated on controlling both Jing and Yi provinces. The northern faction was led by Jing Han, the Grand Director of Assassin Training.

Often, the northern faction denounced the southern faction as "weak," while the southern faction blasted the northern faction as "reckless, gambling with the nation's fate."

Gongsun Shu wavered, but as the Long region suffered successive defeats, he leaned toward the southern faction, dispatching Jing Han, who had initially proposed seizing Yong and Liang, to Qishan Fort to salvage the situation.

After repeated defeats, Yang Guang was quite dejected. Hearing Jing Han's words, he grew somewhat irritated: "Retreat? Was it not Emperor Gongsun's intention to abandon Shanggui?"

"Had we remained in Shanggui, we would likely have been trapped and destroyed by the Wei army by now." Jing Han spoke the truth. He had proposed dredging the Western Han River waterway to transport grain by water, which would save vast amounts of manpower and animal power, but this could not be completed in three to five months. The Mount Qi road was still difficult to traverse, and sending supplies another two hundred li to Shanggui placed too great a strain on them.

Falling back to Xi County and Lucheng at the foot of Mount Qi was far more convenient.

But after abandoning Shanggui, what followed were waves of deserters from the Long army. They had lost all faith in Wei Ao and Yang Guang, preferring to surrender to the Wei army rather than go to Shu.

This led to the demoralized Long army suffering a string of defeats during the retreat. By the time they fell back to Qishan Fort, only a few thousand remained.

Combined with Jing Han's ten thousand-plus Shu troops, the total was fifteen thousand. Across from them, Wan Xiu had at least twenty thousand men with him.

"More soldiers are not necessarily better."

Jing Han consoled the despondent Yang Guang: "Before abandoning Lucheng, the grain we could not carry away was burned. Wan Xiu's grain depot is at Shanggui, and in this freezing season, transport is not easy."

"I reckon that even if the Wei army has that 'fried flour' for food, they can only sustain themselves for a dozen or so days before they must withdraw."

Holding Qishan Fort would be victory!

This was Gongsun Shu's verbal decree to Jing Han. As the "frog at the bottom of the well" Ma Yuan spoke of, this emperor's actions were indeed vigorous at the start but feeble at the finish.

"How do we hold it?" Yang Guang countered Jing Han. "Qishan Fort was built in haste, begun in the seventh month. Only the main structure has been pounded firm; there are no troop-hiding tunnels. Our army has fifteen thousand men and cannot possibly all be stationed on the fort."

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As for marching out entirely to fight the Wei army in the field? The Long people had now lost that kind of courage.

Jing Han was somewhat embarrassed. After all, when he supervised the construction, he had prioritized Qishan Fort as an offensive base for the Shu army to advance into Longyou. He had not expected his allies to collapse so quickly. When they adopted a defensive strategy, it was too small and unsuitable for a determined defense.

"We can only do this." Jing Han said: "General Yang, take the Long troops and half the Shu troops, ten thousand men in total, and form ranks behind the fort. I will personally lead five thousand men to defend the fort itself. In this way, we can support each other like horns. The terrain around Qishan Fort is not wide. If the Wei army does not approach closely, they cannot strike you, General. But once they draw near, the great yellow crossbows and other mechanical bows on the fort have a range that can cover the road, and the Wei army will surely suffer heavy losses!"

After thinking it over, Yang Guang had no objections, and the two tentatively settled on a defensive strategy. But beyond these arrangements, Jing Han still harbored a faint hope in his heart.

"As I expected, Wan Xiu, who has long garrisoned You Fufeng, has indeed become one of the chief commanders attacking Long. A'Yun infiltrated the Wei army; I wonder how she is faring now. If she could assassinate Wan Xiu when he attacks the fort, that would be perfect!"

Jing Han was clearly indulging in wishful thinking. He did not know that, through a series of mishaps, A'Yun had already been sent off to Wu Han's side and had nearly been drowned by Jia Fu's water attack.

However, twenty li north of Qishan Fort, at the Lucheng township, Wan Xiu was also discussing strategies to capture Qishan Fort with his assistant generals and colonels.

"Qishan Fort is not large and cannot hold over ten thousand men. The enemy will certainly set up separate defenses on the fort and behind it."

"As long as we defeat the enemy outside the fort, we can advance and besiege Qishan Fort."

But how to attack? The Mount Qi range and the Qinling foothills pinched together here, leaving a valley only a few li wide in between, not to mention it was further split in two by the Western Han River flowing through. Qishan Fort sat just over a hundred paces north of the river, making it completely impossible for a large formation to deploy.

The enemy's arrangement was meant to force the Wei army into a frontal assault, so they could defend from the fort.

"If our main army advances to attack the enemy camp, it will inevitably be blocked by Qishan Fort. Pushing further forward, we would then suffer a pincer attack from front and rear."

The Shu region's powerful crossbows are no weaker than the Wei army's, and compared to Wan Xiu, who has come from afar, they have been entrenched here for months, and the fort is also fitted with plenty of heavy, large-scale pieces.

The group still gathered around the brazier to discuss, with some flatbread toasting on top and clay pots of water warming, so they could eat while they talked; the meeting went from morning until high noon.

Under Wan Xiu, every man had the right to speak; they pooled their ideas and raised many proposals, such as ignoring Qishan Fort altogether and marching southwest directly along the far side of the Western Han River to raid the enemy's "rear."

But beyond Qishan Fort, there was no rear worth attacking. The next city to the west was Lintao, several hundred li away — too remote for even Wu Han to reach, let alone them. To the south, they would have to cross the Wudu mountains, where Shu troops also held the narrow passes.

"Are we left with no choice but a frontal assault?"

Just as everyone was reaching an impasse, Wan Xiu, supporting his injured back, walked to the camp gate and looked out at the overcast sky.

"It's snowing."

Wan Xiu said this, and when the colonels looked, they indeed saw white flakes of snow falling from the sky, landing in Wan Xiu's palm, piercingly cold.

But Wan Xiu instead broke into a smile. "The moment to strike has come!"

The snow would certainly make things uncomfortable for the Wei army, which lacked sufficient supplies; fortunately, when they marched south, Wan Xiu had the soldiers bring their winter clothes, and with plenty of wood still around, keeping warm would not be a problem.

But he believed the snow would be far more agonizing for the Shu army!

"A few years ago, it was by seizing a snowy day that Cen Peng marched out of Lantian and routed the Greenwood Army, which could not endure the harsh winter."

Today, this snow likewise signaled a turning point in the campaign.

"The Shu troops mostly hail from the warm, humid lands of Ba and Shu in the south and cannot bear bitter cold. Long is frigid in the extreme — at a time like this, when their crossbowmen draw their strings, two or three out of every ten will likely lose fingers to frostbite!"

Under Diwu Lun's promotion, the Wei army, when drawing bows or fighting in winter, had already begun issuing hempen gloves to its crossbowmen. It affected the feel a little, but in a major battle it was all volley fire, and individual precision was not required.

The colonels' worry turned to delight. "When it snows, the Shu army's bamboo bows easily absorb damp, and their accuracy will plummet!"

"Exactly. The horn bows we use are rather more resistant to the cold."

Yet someone also pointed out that convincing the Wei troops to march out on a snowy day would take enormous effort — in this weather, who wouldn't rather huddle inside city walls and barracks to warm themselves by the fire? Even among the colonels, not every man was willing to go to war at such a time.

Before persuading the soldiers, they must first persuade the colonels.

Wan Xiu nodded, returned to the barracks, stretched his hands over the brazier to warm them, then shook his head. "Not warm enough."

The colonels moved to add fuel, but Wan Xiu refused. He also did not don his furs, but instead led the men outside. In the snow, he said to the colonels, "A heavy snow. Cold, isn't it?"

Of course it was cold, but Wan Xiu's next words set every man's heart ablaze!

Wan Xiu pointed south toward Qishan Fort, which under the snow had also been coated in a layer of silver, making the white Chengjia White Emperor banners of Gongsun Shu on its summit all the whiter.

"The Chengjia white banners on Qishan Fort — burn them for a fire, and they drive off the cold best of all!"

"Gentlemen, let us urge one another on. This is the final battle to settle Longyou!"

……

PS: The map is below.

Tomorrow, the Longyou arc will conclude, and the "Great War for the Central Plains" will begin.