“There isn’t a single capable fighter!”

The rebel general shouted arrogantly. As he raised his second hammer to strike, a length of rope suddenly flew from nowhere and looped steadily around his neck. With a hard pull, the rebel commander braced his feet in the stirrups, discarded one hammer, and grabbed the rope to engage in a tug-of-war, narrowly avoiding being pulled from his horse.

He glanced toward the rope’s source and found a thin, weak Yan soldier pulling on the rope.

Li Lian seized the opportunity and lunged with his lance. The rebel commander raised his hammer in his right hand to block, and Li Lian’s blade was nearly knocked away.

Failing in that blow, Li Lian no longer lingered in battle and hurriedly retreated on horseback.

The rebel commander—like a small mountain—pressed down on his horse, his face swollen with ferocity as he looked at Fan Changyu. Grasping the rope with both hands, he pulled hard, attempting to drag that thin Yan soldier toward him.

Fan Changyu was caught off guard and stumbled from the tug. She then planted both feet and stamped down hard as if rooting herself to the earth; she could not be pulled a single step.

The rebel commander refused to believe it. He gathered his strength and pulled savagely. A rebel soldier seized the moment and thrust a long spear at Fan Changyu. She timed it, loosened the rope, and kicked that soldier away.

With no anchor at the other end, the rebel commander lost balance and was flipped from his horse.

The sharp-eyed Yan soldiers quickly thrust spears at him. The rebel commander—fat but surprisingly agile—rolled on the ground, felt along, and cut the rope that had been looped around his neck. Then, grabbing a soldier’s long spear, he hoisted both man and spear and swung him like a huge pendulum. Driving back the Yan soldiers attacking him, he hurled the man toward the denser ranks of the Yan army, and a heap fell.

Yan forces suffered heavy losses. The soldiers no longer had the suicidal bravado they had at the start; their courage visibly faltered.

The rebel commander picked up his dropped pair of spiked hammers, crushing soldiers like ants as he swung them, and strode straight toward Fan Changyu with a feral grin. “You scrawny monkey, you’ve still got a bit of strength, do you? Let grandpa have a look, see if you can take a few of my blows!”

Xie Wu slashed off a rebel soldier’s neck and shouted hoarsely to Fan Changyu, “Run!”

Fan Changyu wanted to run—but the sight of that rebel general’s hammers swinging, smashing Yan soldiers’ heads open so that blood and brain matter burst forth and bodies flew like torn sacks, made her feet refuse to move.

Xie Wu, rushing forward to shield her, charged at the rebel general without hesitation—and seeing that, she could no longer retreat.

She threw aside the ring-hilted saber she had picked up, drew the black-iron bone-cleaver and bloodletting knife from her belt, one long and one short, and clashed the two blades together with a screech of metal before darting toward the rebel general—her gaze cold as lightning flashing through storm.

Xie Wu, relying on his agility, cut a gash across the rebel general’s side, but the man smashed him to the ground with a blow. Half his body went numb. As the hammer came down toward his face, he thought his head would soon explode in red and white; instinctively he shut his eyes—yet the expected deathblow never came.

Instead there rang a teeth-aching crash of metal on metal.

Opening his eyes weakly, he saw Fan Changyu kneeling on one knee, both black-iron slaughter knives crossed above her head, forcibly catching the rebel general’s descending hammer.

Her teeth were clenched so hard her jaw trembled, and one knee was already sunk deep into the ground.

Heat flooded Xie Wu’s eyes. From between her teeth Fan Changyu forced out a single word: “Go!”

Xie Wu didn’t hesitate. Rolling clear of the hammer’s reach, he hurled a dagger toward the rebel general.

The general, about to swing his other hammer at Fan Changyu, was forced to bat aside the dagger instead.

Fan Changyu seized the opening, twisting free. Both her knives flashed upward—the edges bit into the back of the rebel general’s hand, cutting a gash so deep the bone showed.

The general roared in pain and swept a hammer sideways; Fan Changyu leapt back to dodge it.

Glancing at his bleeding hand, the rebel general’s face knotted with fury. “Courting death!”

With that, he ignored his wound and swung all the harder, hammer-wind howling to crush her.

His weapons were solid iron, weighing over eighty catties each. When Fan Changyu had blocked a blow earlier to save Xie Wu, the shock had torn her palms; the slaughter knives were too short, too light—no match for his sledgehammers.

Now she no longer tried to block, dodging instead. When she couldn’t avoid in time, she took the hits with numbed arms; the blood from her palms soaked the knife handles. Forced once again into a dead corner, she met a blow head-on—the short bloodletting knife was struck away, flying from her grasp.

Seeing her lose one weapon, the rebel general grew only more frenzied. “I’ll pound you into mince!”

Fan Changyu flicked her toe, hooking up a fallen broadsword from the ground to replace her lost knife—but the moment it met the hammer, the military blade snapped clean in two.

The Commander of the Left Guard, struck earlier by the rebel’s hammer, could no longer mount his horse. His guards dragged him to safety. Watching Fan Changyu and the rebel general exchange several rounds, he said in surprise, “Which battalion is that soldier from?”

None of the guards knew.

Looking closely, the Commander said, “If he had a weapon suited to him, he might hold his own against that rebel. Someone, bring my mo dao¹Mo Dao (陌刀) — A Tang-Dynasty long saber used by infantry, with a broad, curved blade attached to a long handle. It combined the reach of a polearm with the cutting power of a saber and was designed to strike down charging cavalry. The weapon was heavy, usually over two meters in total length, and required considerable strength and technique to wield. to him!”

A guard fetched the long-hafted, carved mo dao, intending to deliver it to Fan Changyu—but Xie Wu, frantic, had already rushed forward shouting, “Where is the Commander of the Left Guard Army, Yan Yi!”

Recognizing him as one of Xie Zheng’s personal guards, the Commander hurriedly stepped out despite his wounds. “I am here.”

Xie Wu’s eyes were blood-red. Pointing toward Fan Changyu, he cried, “Send troops, save the Madam!”

The Commander froze in place. “Madam?”

Xie Wu no longer cared about anything else and shouted, “The one fighting that rebel general—that’s the Marquis’s wife!”

The Left Guard Commander felt as though several heads were not enough to chop off in frustration. His own wounds were so bad he could not even lift a weapon, so he hastily ordered several junior officers to lead troops to assist.

Xie Wu took a horse from him, intending to ride back to aid Fan Changyu. The Commander shoved his mo dao into his hands. “You might need this!”

Without another word, Xie Wu spurred the horse forward, sweeping aside rebel soldiers with the mo dao as he charged toward Fan Changyu.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

On the other side, Fan Changyu had picked up several broadswords, only for each one to snap in half. When another hammer blow came and she failed to dodge in time, the head of her helmet was struck off by the rebel general’s hammer. Though her hair bun didn’t come loose, it was now clear at a glance that she was a woman.

The rebel general hadn’t expected that the opponent who had fought him through so many rounds was a woman. Even battered and bloodied, she was still strikingly beautiful. He threw his head back and laughed. “A woman? Take her alive! The soldiers of Chongzhou can all be bridegrooms tonight!”

The rebel troops roared and jeered, their fighting spirit burning hotter.

The rebel general seemed to have lost interest in killing her, wanting only to capture her alive; his hammer strikes grew less deadly, but all the harder to counter.

Fan Changyu’s face was cold as frost. With a quick snatch she seized a long spear from a rebel soldier’s hands. With a longer weapon, her attack became fierce and sweeping; her movements opened wide and bold, forcing the rebel general back several steps. Yet when he exerted his brute strength, the spear in her hand snapped cleanly in two.

The rebel general laughed mockingly, throwing back his head.

A blood streak marked Fan Changyu’s cheek. She tossed aside the broken spear and fixed her gaze on the hammer in the rebel’s right hand—she had cut that hand deeply before, bone visible; to seize that hammer would be easier.

Suddenly a shout came from behind: “Catch the blade!”

Fan Changyu turned and saw a long-handled mo dao arcing through the air toward her.

She reached out to catch it, but the rebel general swung his hammer straight at her. If she extended her hand, it would be smashed to pulp.

So she feigned reaching for the mo dao, but in truth tightened her toes against the ground and kicked hard upward into the rebel’s armpit beneath the hammer arm. The general screamed in pain, and at that instant Fan Changyu’s outstretched hand diverted—snatching his hammer instead. Without a pause, she swung it back at him with all her strength.

The general quickly raised his other hammer to block. The two heavy weapons met with a deafening clang that made nearby ears ring and go numb.

The hammer’s iron spikes flattened under the impact. The rebel general staggered back, nearly dropping his weapon.

The flesh on his face twitched; now he realized the danger—give this woman a weapon equal to his own, and she might not lose at all.

Fan Changyu didn’t stop. She swung again; the second blow split the web of flesh between his thumb and forefinger. Blood spattered. In his stunned gaze, she grinned savagely and taunted, “Let me show you how to make meat paste!”

With both blood-slick hands gripping the haft, she brought the hammer down with a thunderous crash. The rebel general tried to block, but hammer and man alike were flung backward. One of his hammers embedded deep in his abdomen, literally driven into the flesh.

He struggled to sit up, but only managed to vomit a mouthful of blood before his eyes glazed over and he fell completely still.

The vast battlefield seemed to fall silent all at once.

The rebel soldiers who had been leering at Fan Changyu a moment ago now scattered in terror, faces white as ghosts.

Not only the rebels, even her own troops looked at Fan Changyu with unease.

The surviving foot soldiers gathered at a distance, none daring to approach her.

Several badly wounded generals lay sprawled on a low slope in the distance, swallowing hard.

One of them muttered, “Worthy indeed of being our Marquis’s wife.”

Another asked in a low voice, “They were both using tiger-tooth flanged hammers, how did Madam manage to send that mountain-sized brute flying?”

The question left them all in silence.

Their Madam… was she even stronger than the rebel general himself?

After confirming the rebel commander was dead, Xie Wu ran to Fan Changyu’s side. “Miss Fan, are you all right?”

Fan Changyu glanced at him; everything in her vision seemed veiled in red. Her stomach churned, her head spun so violently she thought the sky and earth were swapping places, yet she couldn’t even faint.

She braced both hands on her knees and dry-heaved for a while before forcing out, “I’m fine.”

Xie Wu quickly pulled a water flask from his saddle, uncapped it, and handed it to her. “Miss Fan, rinse your mouth. New recruits who see their first battle, most end up having nightmares for half a month after.”

Fan Changyu rinsed, then swallowed several gulps. The nausea slowly eased.

She had never before witnessed killing on such a massive, brutal scale. It felt as though the blades and weapons in her hands were no longer striking human beings.

But on the battlefield, if you do not kill, you will be killed.

A short distance away the rebel soldiers were still in chaos. Xie Wu looked over, picked up a blade, and strode toward the corpse of the rebel general.

Fan Changyu asked, “What are you doing?”

Xie Wu said, “Cut off the enemy general’s head—to frighten the others into surrendering.”

Fan Changyu looked at her slaughter knife lying a few paces off, thinking of how many times her weapon had been knocked away, how she had been insulted, and said, “Let me.”

Xie Wu was already about to bring down his blade, but at her words he stepped aside.

Fan Changyu had killed before, yet this was the first time she had ever severed a head.

The black-iron bone cleaver was razor-sharp; with one stroke the head came free.

Since the man had been dead a while, there was no spray of blood.

Xie Wu lifted the enemy general’s head high and shouted toward the still-unsettled rebels in the distance: “Your commander is dead! Those who lay down your weapons and surrender shall be spared!”

The rebels looked at one another, then one by one began dropping their weapons.

In the distance, the low thunder of hooves rolled nearer. The Yanzhou army, weary after the battle, tensed instinctively for another fight.

Fortunately, a scout climbed the slope, saw the banners the approaching troops carried, and shouted down, “They’re allies!”

From commanders to common soldiers, everyone let out a long breath of relief.

Were it not for the corpses and blood all over the battlefield, Fan Changyu would have liked nothing more than to collapse right there.

She was exhausted—truly, for the first time in her life, she understood what it meant to be completely spent. She didn’t even want to lift a finger.

The hoofbeats drew closer. The setting sun burned like blood; wild geese cried in the crimson sky.

Fan Changyu looked toward the friendly forces galloping through clouds of yellow dust. They too seemed to have just come from a fierce battle—horse legs, armor, and weapons were all stained with fresh blood, and even the wind blowing from their direction carried the smell of it.

Her gaze swept past the leading rider, a commander astride a dark stallion at the very front. It was a casual glance at first, but then her eyes darted back sharply. Narrowing them, she tugged Xie Wu close and asked, “That general in the qilin-shouldered, swallowing-mingguang armor—riding the tall warhorse in the lead—why does he look so much like my husband?”

Xie Wu froze. His mouth opened, but no words came out.

Footnotes

• 1
  Mo Dao (陌刀) — A Tang-Dynasty long saber used by infantry, with a broad, curved blade attached to a long handle. It combined the reach of a polearm with the cutting power of a saber and was designed to strike down charging cavalry. The weapon was heavy, usually over two meters in total length, and required considerable strength and technique to wield.