Chapter 83: The Gap Between Ideal and Reality

On the northern hill of the battlefield, several figures stood among withered branches and fallen leaves, using the tangled weeds as cover to observe the fighting.

The man they clustered around was a tall, burly fellow with a Daoist topknot, draped in a surcoat, arms folded as he gazed out at the battlefield beyond the north gate.

After a moment, he raised an arm and pointed toward the center. "Guo Tianxing, who's that charging the formation?"

Beside him stood Zhang Tianlin, who had spent a few days lodging at Liu Family Village.

"I already told you — the great philanthropist of Yan'an Prefecture, the Tiger General."

Zhang Tianlin looked toward the riverbank and said, "Covering the commoners' retreat. This isn't the first time he's done this — earlier, when they raided Prince Qin's estate, he gave the grain out to the people."

"Oh, you did mention him... former Elite Vanguard of Yansui Garrison. His older brother took over your Company Commander post."

The man speaking with Zhang Tianlin had a sudden flash of understanding, then looked puzzled. "But didn't you say that family had no intention of rebelling?

They wouldn't supply us with grain or fodder, wouldn't join forces with us — at most they'd let us pass through without a fight.

How is it that not even two months later, here he is charging a government army formation?"

Zhang Tianlin was wondering the same thing. He sighed and said, "You're asking me? Who am I supposed to ask?

The Liu family patriarch is a Provincial Graduate, and both brothers are Licensed Scholars — they were set to take the military exams. If Old Master Liu hadn't been imprisoned over that case, they might both be Brigade Commanders by now. Why would they rebel?

Besides, look at this scene — they've clearly sacked Yan'an Prefecture city itself."

The man caught on belatedly and slapped his thigh in alarm. "If he's taken the prefectural city, then what did we come here for?"

This man's name was Wang Ziyong, from Yanchuan, known as Monk Wang.

Unlike most of the chieftains in northern Shaanxi, he had no military background.

Wang Ziyong had grown up in a Daoist temple.

His master was highly skilled — quite accomplished in geomancy and burials, healing the sick and wounded, funeral rites and deliverance, ghost-catching and talisman-drawing, rain-praying and ritual workings.

But in times like these, the dead might not even get buried, let alone need a gravesite chosen. The sick had no need of treatment — when death came, whole families died clean out, and no one had money to hire him for deliverance. Besides, in broad daylight, men and ghosts walked side by side.

And his rain-prayers had never once succeeded.

The temple's reputation dwindled and dwindled, until his master starved to death.

The Daoist's path led nowhere.

Wang Ziyong had a huge appetite and could only turn to crooked schemes to fill his belly. When people needed a Buddhist monk, he chanted Amitabha; when they needed a Daoist priest, he intoned the Celestial Venerable of the Limitless.

Later he discovered the monk's path led nowhere either.

A vague realization dawned on him — all that hoodwinking stuff was useless now. If he wanted to scrape a living, he had to step out from among the gods and ghosts and produce something tangible for the faithful.

As it happened, in those couple of years, several fugitives from the east were begging alongside him, and through them he came into contact with a doctrine far better suited to chaotic times: the Incense-Smelling Sect.

That is, the White Lotus Sect.

Of course, "suited to chaotic times" didn't mean the White Lotus Sect spread quickly.

No matter how fast a teaching spread, in the great drought of northern Shaanxi, he'd starve to death long before he found any followers to support him.

Rather, as veterans of the old rebel cults, Wang Ziyong's beggar colleagues from the east had ample experience in insurrection.

Retrieving his ritual sword from the pawnshop where it had been gathering dust, and relying on the martial skills he'd picked up, Wang Ziyong launched his own great rebellion in Yanchuan.

From linking up bankrupted village farmers to resist taxes, to leading starving mobs to breach city walls — he even joined forces with a chieftain called Hun Tianwang to sweep the Yanchuan government troops clean.

Everything went smoothly — until this summer, when Wang Ziyong, on the march to plunder a wealthy household, met the greatest calamity of his life.

It rained in Yanchuan.

The rain his master had begged three years for without success — Wang Ziyong rebelled for one year, and it came.

Several thousand followers, half a shichen — in a single light shower, they were overjoyed, and fell utterly apart.

Monk Wang could not restrain them, nor did he want to.

He simply stood quietly in the rain, watching them all, and said, "Commit no evil, practice all good.

If you don't go home now, once the rain stops and the soil moisture passes, it'll be too late to sow."

He watched as people kowtowed to him full of apology, then joyfully hoisted his army rations onto their backs and dashed off without a backward glance.

He was both very happy and very troubled.

A long drought broken by sweet rain — one of life's four great joys.

But the authorities weren't hunting down several thousand people, only him alone.

Later, Wang Ziyong merged camps with Zhang Tianlin, who was equally anxious over the light rain.

After sending word north to Wang Jiayin to explain the situation, the two decided to migrate toward regions still stricken by drought.

They had advanced almost at the same time as Li Bei, just barely missing each other — but because they had to hide and skulk along the way, they reached Yan'an a full ten-odd days late.

Now, the last battle outside the city had ended, and a new one was about to begin.

The Banner Army's battle line had been impregnable before it was breached — once broken through, it collapsed in an instant.

Commander Wu, at the end of his rope, faced Liu Chengzong charging into his formation with perfect composure.

He had long since thought through every possible way out.

And among all those ways out, not a single one allowed him to live with dignity, like a true man.

So he ordered the Banner Army to lay down their weapons and surrender.

Liu Chengzong breached the battle line, now separated from the government army's commander by only three men.

The exhausted soldiers nearby clattered their weapons to the ground and cowered, hands over their heads.

The government commander, in full helmet and armor, gave him a wretched, miserable smile through the wall of men, then turned away.

A short sword rested before him; he drove it downward through his throat from above, the tip pushing out against the backplate of his lamellar armor between the ribs from behind — facing his comrades, eyes open in death.

He could not choose how to live, but he could still choose how to die.

Several dozen Banner Army soldiers were taken in surrender. The squad leaders of Lion Camp used their equipment to further strengthen the combat troops and auxiliaries.

Battalion Commander Zhang, stationed to the west, was thoroughly satisfied with this outcome. He rose to his feet and gave the order: "Advance! Smash the bandit soldiers — tonight, everyone eats their fill!"

Lion Camp did not form ranks to meet the enemy. The grain had already been transported to the far bank during the fighting; they had no need to hold this ground.

"Get into position — no time to strip his armor. Carry him as he is. That armor is yours now."

Liu Chengzong then gave the order for all ten companies to withdraw toward the riverbank: "Each company crosses the river in sequence. If a soldier retreats without orders, the auxiliaries will behead him; if an auxiliary retreats without orders, the combat troops will fight him; if a combat soldier retreats without orders, the squad leader will behead him."

The plan was sound, and at first it was carried out well enough.

Four companies crossed the river in orderly succession, until the two forces stood three hundred paces apart on the river shoal.

Liu Chengzong kept his eyes locked on that Ming army.

Zhang Xiong's soldiers were still on the march when, for no apparent reason, men at the rear set up three small Crouching Tiger cannons and began driving anchoring spikes into the river shoal.

The artillerymen were promptly cursed out, pried up the spikes, and hoisted the thirty-six-jin Crouching Tiger cannons back onto their shoulders to keep advancing.

At two hundred fifty paces, the whole process repeated itself, and this time many of the infantry halted as well.

Zhang Xiong executed one of his own men in front of the formation. Only then did the banner troops push forward another hundred paces.

Cao Yao, steadying the troops' morale, shouted to Liu Chengzong: "Tiger General, those cannons are the small-bore type — meant to be lined up by the dozens at fifty paces for volley fire. They don't dare fight at close quarters!"

Liu Chengzong believed him. Lion Camp believed him. The newly surrendered guard battalion banner troops believed him too.

They stiffened their necks and held formation, facing the government troops head-on.

But the famine refugees did not believe him.

Three Crouching Tiger cannons were spiked into the river shoal. Bang, bang, bang — three thunderous reports, and enemy lines were shrouded in gunpowder smoke.

A pelting rain of shot tore through the smoke. Three large balls landed at sixty or seventy paces; hundreds of small stone pellets scattered between fifty and a hundred paces.

Liu Chengzong could guarantee that not a single piece of shot fell among the ranks behind him.

But the formation broke anyway.

The auxiliaries still remembered the order, but just as they moved to kill the ones fleeing left to enforce martial law, the men on the right fled too. They chased after the right, and the whole unit ran.

Five companies of famine refugees threw down their weapons, plunged into the shallow river, and fled in utter disarray.

A force thrown together on the spot could never carry out an order like that.

Everyone began retreating into the river in chaos. The government troops advanced in formation, pressing in with bows and firelances to begin the slaughter.