Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
Dugu Xian was in his early 30s. He was a tall man with a masculine face and had all the fine qualities of a military man. He had an abundant amount of military experience, which enabled him to become a commander of an army at such a young age.
When he had been a young nobleman of the Xiaowan Kingdom, he traveled widely and served in the armies of the Central Plain and Norland respectively. Although he did not read many military books, he gained a lot of experience from real battles.
Unfortunately, when he returned to the Xiaowan Kingdom, he found out that his expertise was useless in his country.
The Xiaowan Kingdom was the most loyal vassal of Norland, and the great power controlled all major and even minor matters in the kingdom. The king of Xiaowan did not even have the right to appoint the guards at the gate of his own royal palace, and the whole country’s standing army only had less than 300 soldiers. The most probable reason Xiaowan still existed as an independent country was that Norland wanted to prove that it had no ambition to annex all the territory north of Tianshan.
When the Golden Roc Fort expressed its intent to hire Dugu Xian to secretly train an army in the country, he readily agreed.
Like most people in Western Region, he did not have a strong sense of national identity and just wanted to get a chance to use his talents. That was why he did not mind serving the Golden Roc Fort.
When the Supreme King resolved to wipe out the Great Snowmountain troops, it was a natural progression for him to serve as commander-in-chief of the army. He returned to the battlefield, full of expectation that he would establish his reputation as a talented military commander, but soon he was disappointed.
During the entire process of the siege, Dugu Xian and the Golden Roc Fort were riven by contradictions.
Dugu Xian planned to amass a large army, which had three or even five times as many soldiers as the Great Snowmoutnain troops, before launching the first siege battle. Nevertheless, the Supreme King sent a messenger to him before he was fully prepared, asking him to wage war against the Great Snowmountain and overrun their military camp as soon as possible.
Dugu Xian had no choice but to execute the Supreme King’s order. As a result, both sides suffered heavy losses in that battle, but the Great Snowmountain’s military camp still stood intact.
Not long after the battle, when the Dragon King was seeking opportunities for peace talks in Jade City, Dugu Xian wanted to grasp this chance to trap the Great Snowmountain swordsmen to death by completely blocking all roads linking the camp to the outside world. The Supreme King, however, vetoed this suggestion.
He had another plan, which he could not divulge to a hired general.
As such, Dugu Xian halted the troops and waited. When the winter was about to be over, the Supreme King suddenly sent 5,000 soldiers to merge with the 5,000 men under Dugu Xian’s command, asking him to conquer the Great Snowmountain’s camp within half a month.
It was not a good season to start a siege, as the weather was cold and the roads were muddy. Given this situation, Dugu Xian had planned to lure the Great Snowmountain troops out of their camp by sending a small troop to feinting to attack the swordsmen’s homeland. Nevertheless, as the Supreme King refused to give him ample time to carry out his original plan, he ended up having to give up the plan and gave orders to take the Great Snowmountain’s camp by force.
During the siege, the Golden Roc Fort’s army only managed to break through two unimportant defense lines at great cost. The deeper they went into the valley, the more difficult it would be for them to advance further.
Displeased with the result, the Supreme King, who had always maintained a modest attitude in front of Dugu Xian before, revealed another side of himself to the commander. He threatened to fire or even kill the general if he failed to seize the Great Snowmountain camp during the next battle.
There were many Golden Roc Fort killers in the army. They were under direct command of a blademaster trusted by the Supreme King and would never take orders from Dugu Xian.
Their presence made the commander-in-chief feel worried about his own life. Under such pressure, he decided to take the risk to buy over a hidden traitor inside the Great Snowmountain’s army and then asked this traitor to encourage the swordsmen to leave the camp.
People in Western Region all considered swordsmen from the Great Snowmountain to be inflexible and tough-minded. Being involved in a scheme obviously did not conform to this stereotype, but Dugu Xian found out that they could also be bought over as long as the offer was lucrative enough.
He just had never expected that the Dragon King would have suddenly appeared during the battle and brought the remaining soldiers of the Great Snowswordsman back to the camp.
Dugu Xian felt that the young man known as the Dragon King always brought him back luck, but he never expected that several hours after the battle, another two young men would make his life even worse.
When first meeting with Shangguan Fei and Shangguan Hong, Dugu Xian was not alert at all. He was very excited and received them warmly, for he believed that finding these two sons of the Supreme King would make up for his failure to capture the Great Snowmountain’s camp.
He had never expected that these two young masters would have broken into his tent with a group of black-clothed killers in the middle of the night. They tied him up and publicly announced that he colluded with the Great Snowmountain Gang.
Since the Supreme King had repeatedly expressed his dissatisfaction with Dugu Xian before, everyone in the Golden Roc Fort’s camp firmly believed that the Ninth Young Master was executing his father’s order. Even Dugu Xian himself had never anticipated the Shangguan brothers doing this for the Dragon King.
Even when Shangguan Fei and Shangguan Hong, who had claimed to bring him back to the Golden Roc Fort, suddenly changed their route after leaving the camp, he still did not doubt their behavior.
When he discovered that he was brought to meet the Dragon King, he finally came to understand the whole situation.
He ruefully admitted that he was such a fool.
At this moment, when he was faced with the Dragon King, who was more than 10 years his junior, he lowered his head dejectedly without saying a word, as a way of admitting his defeat.
Outside the Dragon King’s tent, a crowd of swordsmen blocked the entrance, planning to bite a piece of meat from Dugu Xian when he came out. They hated this man’s guts, since it was under his command that the Golden Roc Fort’s army had slaughtered numerous soldiers from the Great Snowmountain.
As for the sons of the Supreme King, who had caught Dugu Xian and sent him here, they were quickly forgiven by the swordsmen and even made friends with some of them.
Gu Shenwei was pleasantly surprised when seeing this important captive. After ordering the other people to leave the tent, he personally interrogated Dugu Xian.
In the beginning, the commander just kept his head down quietly, and Gu Shenwei also remained silent while staring at him.
They faced each other like this for a while and then Dugu Xian could no longer stand the silence. Despite the fact that he had already been ‘demoted’ to a captive, he still managed to maintain his dignity. He lifted up his head and said, “I was not killed in the battle. What a pity.”
“I’m pretty sure that I’ve never seen you during any previous battle,” Gu Shenwei mocked coldly, while sounding perfectly calm and rational.
“Humph.” Dugu Xian snorted and then retorted, “Battles of professional soldiers are different from street fights of machetemen. A general has his own duties. The one always leading the charge is not necessarily a good general.”
Gu Shenwei did not want to waste time bickering over military affairs. He wanted to get straight to the point as long as Dugu Xian began to speak. “That’s right. A general must stick to his duties, and killing a general won’t destroy his army. Given that, I decide to release you,” said Gu Shenwei.
Dugu Xian was shocked into silence. He had heard many tales about the Dragon King’s hideous brutality. Although he did not believe all of those lurid stories, he never expected to walk out of this tent alive. After a while, he realized something and asked, “What do you want from me?”
“Who’s the hidden traitor of the Great Snowmountain? Let me know,” replied Gu Shenwei.
Dugu Xian looked the young man over with an appraising eye for the first time, while thinking, “I used to think that this guy just relied on luck or someone else’s help to spoil my plans, but now it seems that he’s quite smart himself. I’ve kept my liaison with the hidden traitor a top secret all this while. Most of my subordinates in the Golden Roc Fort’s army have no idea about it, let alone the soldiers of the Great Snowmountain. Should I expose the hidden traitor to save myself or stick to my principle of trustworthiness?”
After pondering the question for a moment, Dugu Xian made a decision and said, “You’ll never get even half a word out of me.”
“Are you willing to sacrifice your own life to save a traitor?” asked Gu Shenwei.
“I don’t care about him. It’s just that I can’t break my promise,” replied Dugu Xian. He also told this to himself.
Upon hearing this unexpected answer, Gu Shenwei snorted contemptuously. He knew that once he placed his Five Peaks Saber against the general’s throat, he would quickly change that stance, but on second thought, Gu Shenwei changed his mind. He had a better way to deal with Dugu Xian.
“Anyway, I’ll still release you,” said Gu Shenwei.
“Why?” Dugu Xian asked, feeling even more astonished. After a minute, he realized how stupid he had sounded just now. “What… What do you want?” he stuttered.
“Well, I’ll send you away and then tell everyone that you’re going to give the traitor away when you’re released outside the camp. I guess that the traitor will want to escape upon hearing this news. I’ll only need to send some people to lie in wait around the camp to catch him,” said Gu Shenwei.
Dugu Xian felt embarrassed at having behaved in such a childish way. He blushed with shame like an inexperienced young man while saying, “You’re doing this to undermine my reputation.”
Gu Shenwei shook his head and said, “I’m just like you. You don’t care about the traitor, and I don’t care about you, a lapdog of the Golden Roc Fort. I’ll try all means to find out the traitor.”
With these words, he stopped conversing with Dugu Xian and stuffed the commander’s mouth up to keep him silent. After that, he called two swordsmen and two machetemen into his tent and asked them to take the captive out and release him when they were at least 5 kilometers away from the camp.
The Dragon King’s order was totally beyond the four soldiers’ expectations, but they still carried it out without a question. Unlike them, the other people in the camp were agitated about this decision of the Dragon King, and the five wounded tribal chiefs even immediately got out of their beds to question the Dragon King. Tuo Nengya also sent one of his confidants to inquire about the situation.
Gu Shenwei had expected this to happen and replied with a question. “The Golden Roc Fort’s army has already caught up with us and blocked the road leading to the Xiaoyao Lake. Are you ready for the upcoming battle?” This was not a lie, and he just wanted to take this chance to inform them of his strategy against the enemies.
The tribal chiefs were stunned by the Dragon King’s question, and then Long Xiaoshi, chief of the Luoshen tribe, said, “Please rest assured, Dragon King. We’re actively preparing for it. Men from the Great Snowmountain are always ready for a battle. All of us will go to the battleground, even if we’re badly injured and have to walk on all fours.”
“Good. I deliberately let Dugu Xian see us preparing for the battle. This will make him concentrate his forces in the road when he returns to his army. However, we won’t battle against them. Nor will we take that road. I’ll lead you to advance southward, avoiding confronting the enemies,” said Gu Shenwei.
The chiefs’ mouths were agape. Fleeing the battlefield to avoid enemies did not conform to the tradition of the Great Snowmountain at all.
“We can’t let our enemies pick the battlefield. Really brave warriors always pick the time and sites of their battles by themselves.” Gu Shenwei explained further to persuade the chiefs.
Upon hearing that, the chiefs were struck speechless and took their leave embarrassedly, while still feeling reluctant to accept such a military decision.
The hidden traitor dared not insist on confronting the enemy head-on in front of the Dragon King, thus he did not give himself away during this meeting.
Gu Shenwei had a plan and thus was in no hurry to find out the traitor at this moment. After quite a long time, when he estimated that Dugu Xian was at least a few kilometers away from the camp, he summoned Shangguan Fei and Shangguan Hong and gave them a simple task.
Due to their great efforts, a rumor quickly began circulating among a small group of people, which said that Dugu Xian had admitted that there was a hidden traitor in the Great Snowmountain’s army and had promised to offer this traitor’s name to the Dragon King in exchange for his own freedom.
The brothers successfully deluded the soldiers into believing that the swordsmen and machetemen, who were in charge of escorting Dugu Xian, would bring back the commander’s words within less than 4 hours.
The soldiers in the camp were loyal to the Dragon King, but they also venerated their leaders of their respective peaks. Soon enough, Tuo Nengya and all the five tribal chiefs of the Great Snowmountain knew the rumor. Most of them did not take it seriously, but one of them was alarmed at receiving this news.
Gu Shenwei secretly sent out a mixed team, which consisted of 10 swordsmen and 10 machetemen, to complete a confidential mission. They would patrol around the camp and report back to him once they noticed something unusual.
He never expected that the hidden traitor would turn himself in instead of escaping this place.
