Ling Xue stood alone in the moonlit meadow, the White River whispering at her back like it was mocking her.

A raw sound tore out of her throat-half scream, half sob. She spun once, blade raised, searching for an enemy that wasn't there. Then the rage cracked open and something colder flooded in.

Shame.

Deep, bone-deep shame that tasted like iron and bile.

She could ride south and die trying to take Qingshui by herself. Or she could walk north and face Liu Dai with the truth: her entire command had vanished like smoke.

Ling Xue sheathed her sword with a sharp click.

She chose north.

She would tell Liu Dai exactly what had happened. And then she would beg him to let her lead the next army that burned that cursed city to the ground.

Ten kilometers south, General Han Feng had already made his decision.

No word had come from Ling Xue's column. Not one scout, not one raven. The silence gnawed at him. He knew that woman-knew the hungry ambition in her eyes.

If she reached Qingshui first, she would claim every scrap of glory and leave him standing in her dust.

Not this time.

"Up!" he roared before dawn. "Break camp. We march now."

His five thousand Mount Tai disciples rose like one iron beast. No complaints. These were not conscripts; they were fanatics raised inside the sect's walls, trained to kill since they could walk.

Armor clinked. Banners snapped. Hooves thundered as the column surged south along the imperial road, eating the miles while the sky was still dark.

By early morning the scouts galloped back, faces tight.

"General! Enemy force ahead-five thousand strong. They're waiting on the plain outside Qingshui. White robes. Wudang markings. They look like they've been there all night."

Han Feng's scarred jaw tightened. Wudang. The name carried weight even here. But five thousand against his five thousand? He had the numbers, the discipline, and decades of battlefield formations that had never failed the Mount Tai sect.

He allowed himself a thin smile.

"Form battle lines. We end this today."

Two armies confronted one another on a sweeping golden plain bordered by low hills. Dust clouded the air like smoke. Sunlight sparked across spear tips and helmets. Ten thousand soldiers stood in perfect ranks, only a hundred meters apart close enough to count the faces of the men they had come to kill.

Then a single rider broke from the Wudang lines.

He rode straight down the center without guards, without banners, without fear. Hair stirred in the wind. Simple clothes. A sword at his hip that looked more like a tool than a treasure.

Alex reined in halfway between the armies and sat tall in the saddle.

Every eye locked on him.

He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted across the plain, voice carrying clean and calm.

"I am Bai Xiaochun, City Lord of Qingshui! I want to speak with General Han Feng!"

He let the words settle, then added, "Tell me how you want this done. One man against one man until one side has no champions left? Or full armies, steel against steel, winner takes all?"

Behind him the five thousand Wudang disciples erupted.

"One-on-one!" they roared, fists pumping, voices rolling like thunder. "One-on-one! One-on-one!"

The chant crashed across the plain. Their eyes burned with hunger. They wanted the duels. They wanted to prove something.

Han Feng nudged his warhorse forward, flanked by two elders whose qi crackled like heat haze. He stopped twenty paces from Alex and studied the younger man with cold, calculating eyes.

Sly. Old. Battle-smart.

He had seen plenty of traps in his sixty years. This smelled like one. Why would an enemy beg for single combat unless they had some hidden advantage poisoned blades, hidden formations, or worse?

Han Feng's voice rolled out, deep and steady.

"I am General Han Feng of the Mount Tai sect. I have fought more wars than you have years, boy. I choose the army. Steel against steel. Formations against formations. Let the best general win."

A stunned silence fell over the Wudang lines.

Then quiet murmurs rippled through them. Shoulders slumped. Heads turned. A few disciples exchanged bitter glances, disappointment plain on their faces.

Alex sat motionless for a beat, letting the moment stretch.

Then he shrugged-one casual lift of the shoulder-and gave a short nod.

“Army against army it is," he called back, loud enough for both sides to hear. "May the best side win."

He wheeled his horse around without another word.

No dramatic speech. No flourish. Just a man turning his back on five thousand killers like he was leaving a boring meeting.

Han Feng's eyes narrowed. Something cold crawled up his spine. The boy hadn't argued. Hadn't looked surprised. Hadn't even looked disappointed. He simply rode back toward his lines as if the decision meant nothing.

The disciplined Wudang ranks parted with practiced precision to allow their lord passage.

General Han Feng observed with a shcoked as the so-called City Lord hurried past his own men. He didn't stop at the rear — he kept going, faster and faster.

Running.

The boy was actually running away.

A savage grin carved deep into the old general's battle-scarred face. He had called the coward's bluff. The enemy lines now rippled with confusion and bitter disappointment. Perfect.

"Sound the drums!" Han Feng thundered, his voice carrying across the golden plain. He thrust his sword toward the sky. "Mount Tai — advance! Crush them!"

Five thousand disciples surged forward in perfect formation, boots hammering the dry plain, banners snapping, spears lowered like a steel tide.

The ground shook beneath them. Han Feng rode at their head, heart pounding with the old, familiar joy of battle. This was war the way it was meant to be fought-man against man, formation against formation.

No tricks. No mercy.

Then the sky changed.

Five thousand black shapes rose from behind the Wudang ranks in perfect silence. No camouflage. No warning. Just drones-sleek, angular machines-lifting into plain view against the bright blue sky. They hovered there for one impossible heartbeat, sunlight glinting off their metallic bodies.

Every soldier on the plain froze mid-step.

"What in the hells is that?" someone shouted.

The warhorse reared slightly as Han Feng pulled it to an abrupt stop. Shock ripped through the old general.

Prussian technology? Foreign sorcery? Some hellish device from outside the provinces?

He remembered the descriptions and diagrams from the forbidden book - the one that spoke of Prussia's terrifying high-tech wonders. But never had he expected to see such a thing with his own eyes here in the heart of the Xia Country.

Before he could bark an order, the drones moved.

They swept forward in a single, coordinated wave, engines humming low and deadly. From their underbellies, dozens of canisters dropped at once—small, precise, falling like deadly rain. The moment they hit the ground they burst open with soft pops.

Thick yellow gas erupted outward.

It rolled across the plain faster than any natural fog, heavy and choking, driven exactly where the wind needed it to go. The drones had already calculated every gust, every thermal, every shift in the breeze. The yellow cloud spread like a living thing, swallowing the front ranks in seconds.

"Poison!" a sergeant screamed.

Men clawed at their eyes. They coughed, gagged, dropped to their knees. Spears clattered to the dirt Entire companies staggered, then collapsed in heaps-five hundred, a thousand, two thousand-bodies twitching once before going stiff. The gas burned throats and lungs, turned vision to stinging fire, and dragged even the strongest soldiers into unconsciousness.

“Don't breathe!” Han Feng bellowed. He clamped a gauntleted hand over his mouth and nose, eyes watering. "It's poison! Push through it! Outrun the mist! Forward!"

Han Feng slammed his heels into his horse's flanks and charged directly into the thick yellow wall of gas. His elite disciples surged after him, expressions locked in grim determination. Qi exploded around their bodies as they held their breath and sprinted through the toxic haze.

But the drones were everywhere.

They darted overhead like angry hornets, predicting every move. Whenever Han Feng veered left, a fresh cluster of canisters slammed down exactly where his column was headed.

When he wheeled right, more gas bloomed in his path. The machines never needed to see the blue sky themselves—they simply adjusted, calculated, and struck. The yellow cloud thickened, swirled, and refused to let them escape.

No matter how fast they ran, the gas was faster.

Ten agonizing minutes crawled by.

The wind finally shifted. The yellow haze thinned, drifting away in ragged sheets.

Sunlight cut through again.

Han Feng lowered his hand, chest heaving, eyes raw and streaming. His once-mighty army lay scattered across the plain like broken toys. Four thousand five hundred

men seasoned Mount Tai

over

disciples lay unconscious in th

–

grass, chests rising and falling in drugged sleep. Weapons, banners, even horses had been left where

they fell.

Fewer than five hundred soldiers still stood around him, the strongest cultivators in

his force, their higher realms barely keeping the gas at bay. Their faces were pale, furious, and stunned.

A single figure stepped out from the Wudang lines.

Liu Piao walked forward alone, white robes spotless, hands clasped casually behind

his back. A faint, almost pitying smile touched his lips.

"Old Han Feng," he called, voice carrying easily across the quiet field, "you should have chosen one-on-one combat. We could have traded fists,

tested our skills, gained real experience. Instead..." He gestured at the sleeping thousands with an open palm. "Now we have five thousand fresh fighters against your five hundred exhausted ones. Doesn't that feel just a little... disappointing?"

Han Feng's face went bone-white. Rage and humiliation burned through him hotter

than any battlefield wound.

“Retreat!” he roared, voice cracking. “Fall back! Now!”

But the Wudang had already moved.

While the gas did its work, the white-robed disciples had flowed around both flanks

in perfect silence. They formed a wide, unbroken ring-five thousand strong— cutting off every escape route. Spears lowered. Qi hummed in the air like a drawn bowstring. There was no gap. No weakness.

Han Feng looked left, right, then straight ahead. The trap had closed with surgical precision.

He was surrounded.

Trapped on the very plain he had chosen to fight on.

Now Han Feng knew the truth. The City Lord of Qingshui hadn't run because he

was scared.

He had simply expected the battle to be boring, so he walked away. A fight like this wasn't going to entertain him.