Jiang Wan leaned against the cold stone parapet and squinted. Below, the Jiangdong camp outside Jiangling looked like an anthill some bored god had kicked over. Soldiers sprinted in every direction while officers shouted themselves hoarse, and banners leaned at such odd angles that they seemed ready to collapse alongside the men carrying them.
The entire camp had dissolved into chaos.
And honestly? Jiang Wan felt remarkably calm. His shoulders had loosened. His jaw had unclenched. He drew a slow breath of river air thick with mud and woodsmoke, then let it drift back into the morning.
Because back when Guan Yunchang first fortified this place, the man hadn't messed around. Not even slightly. Those legendary Eight-Ox Crossbows were bolted to every crenellation like the old general expected the heavens themselves to send down infantry. And when they'd decided to abandon Gong'an and pull back to Jiangling, they hadn't left so much as a bent nail behind. Every single water-powered ballista had been carefully unbolted, wrapped in oiled cloth, packed onto carts, and shipped north.
Half of those beauties now sat along Jiangling's walls, aimed lovingly at any poor soul stupid enough to approach on foot. The other half were strapped to the decks of Jingzhou's naval warships, because why settle for one method of ruining your enemies' day when you could have two?
Then Huang Yueying, bless her terrifyingly brilliant, perpetually grease-stained soul, had paid them a visit. She'd circled the crossbow mounts three times, clicked her tongue, muttered something unflattering about the original engineering, and rigged up a heavy foot-pedal system.
The result? Cranking those massive bowstrings now felt like stomping grapes at harvest. A regular squad of infantry could load and fire fast enough to make the old operators weep.
Lu Meng had no idea what was waiting for him.
The poor bastard had marched his army straight from Gong'an to Jiangling, probably humming a little tune, expecting a nice, boring siege. Ladders. Rams. Maybe a few flaming arrows to keep things exciting. Classic, dignified warfare.
Then he'd ordered the vanguard to charge.
And that was the moment he learned that "overwhelming firepower" wasn't merely a phrase tossed around in strategy meetings. It was a philosophy. A way of life.
Jiangling sat pretty with water lapping at three of its sides, which was wonderful for trade and absolutely dreadful for surprise attacks. Lu Meng, being the clever fox he fancied himself, tried a textbook diversion. He sent a cluster of warships downriver to bang drums and make a tremendous racket, hoping to draw eyes and attention. Meanwhile, he snuck his elite infantry around to the drier western flank for a quiet amphibious landing.
Smart plan. Genuinely. On paper, it was beautiful.
In practice?
Well. Lu Meng had prepared himself for a headache. He had not prepared himself for a massacre.
At that point, Lu Meng probably started asking himself the three fundamental questions of existence: Who am I? Where is my enemy? And what the hell just hit me?
---
Now, normally, one ballista is frightening. It's big, it's loud, and it can turn a charging formation into a very bad afternoon.
But Jiangling didn't have one ballista.
They had dozens. Upgraded, rapid-fire, monster-sized turrets that didn't merely break morale. They physically erased entire squads from the world. One volley and suddenly the battlefield had considerably more open space and considerably fewer screaming men. The air filled with the wet, awful thwack of iron-tipped bolts punching through flesh and cheap lamellar.
And the diversionary fleet on the river? Oh, they received the same generous welcome. The defenders simply swiveled their deck-mounted turrets, aimed at the waterline, and let fly. Giant bolts punched through wooden hulls like they were made of wet parchment. These weren't little arrow holes a man could plug with his thumb and a wad of hemp. These were craters wide enough to swim through.
After a few volleys, the Jiangdong captains collectively decided they'd had quite enough. They pulled back to maximum safe distance and kept banging their drums from afar, technically following orders, but absolutely refusing to sail a single inch closer to that kill zone.
Meanwhile, on the beach, the surviving infantry made a collective, unspoken decision. They'd rather take their chances with the overseer's blade than face another round of flying ship masts.
So they sat down in the mud. Crossed their arms. Dared the overseer to do his worst.
That's how bad it was.
---
Down in the sucking mud of the riverbank, Zhou Hei stumbled off his transport skiff and immediately sank to his ankles. Cold, grey, foul-smelling mud. The kind that seeped through the thin leather of his boots and made his toes go numb within seconds.
He stood there, blinking. Trying to remember why he'd signed up for this particular circle of hell.
Oh, right. He hadn't.
Some fat landlord back in Wu County, a man whose chin had three chins and whose breath smelled like fermented cabbage, had pointed a sausage finger at him during the harvest levy and said, "You. Go stab people for me. Chop chop. And if you die, your family owes me three seasons of grain rent."
Three seasons. For the privilege of being stabbed.
"Brilliant," Zhou Hei had muttered. "Truly the opportunity of a lifetime, my lord. Shall I thank you on my knees?"
The landlord had not appreciated the sarcasm. Zhou Hei got a beating with a bamboo cane for it. Then a sword. Then a boat. Then this. Standing ankle-deep in Jiangling mud, staring up at walls that could kill him a hundred different ways before he even reached them.
His armor was junk. Thin iron plates, poorly riveted, chafing his collarbone raw with every step. The leather straps dug into his shoulders like a mule's harness. His standard-issue ring-pommel sword hung at his hip, rattling against his thigh, and felt like it would snap clean in half if he swung it too hard at a stiff reed.
And his morale?
Somewhere between "rock bottom" and "digging a hole to find a deeper, more personal rock bottom."
Around him, the other conscripts were in much the same state. A scrawny boy named A'Gen, couldn't have been more than sixteen, was quietly vomiting into the shallows. An older man with a missing ear was muttering prayers to his ancestors, asking them to intervene, or at least send a mild stomach illness that would get him sent back to the boats.
General Lu Meng had made a speech that morning. A long speech. Something about grand visions. Dividing the empire. Forging a paradise for Jiangdong. The sacred duty of every son of the south.
Blah, blah, bloody blah. Who cared? Not Zhou Hei. Not A'Gen. Not the man with the missing ear. They were standing ankle-deep in river muck with swords that couldn't cut butter, staring up at walls that could kill them a hundred different ways. Paradise could wait. They just wanted to survive long enough to see tomorrow's sunrise.
He just wanted to go back to his farm. Hell, he'd take the dirt. The dust. The aching in his lower back after twelve hours bent over the paddy field. The sun burning the back of his neck. The smell of wet earth and buffalo dung. At least the dirt didn't try to stab him. At least the buffalo had the decency to only kick him on Tuesdays.
His only goal for this entire wretched, gods-forsaken war: survive. Not heroism. Not glory. Not some bloody paradise. Just survive. Go home. Plant his turnips. Die in his own bed at seventy, fat and boring.
Then he looked up at the walls of Jiangling.
That goal?
Gone. Evaporated. Dust scattered on a cold wind.
The walls were massive. Not just tall, tall was manageable, tall was climbable. These were thick. Ancient. Reinforced with iron-banded stone and layered with something that looked suspiciously like fresh mortar. And along the top, along every crenellation and parapet, bristled the dark shapes of machines. Big ones. The kind with arms wider than a man's full stretch. The kind that went thwack and then people stopped existing.
Zhou Hei swallowed. His throat clicked.
"Oi," he whispered to the man beside him, the older one with the missing ear. "Those things up there. Those are the Eight-Ox Crossbows, yeah?"
The man glanced up. His face went grey. "Aye."
"The ones they say can punch a bolt through three men and a city gate?"
"They say through four men, actually. And a gate."
Zhou Hei closed his eyes. Breathed in. Breathed out. "Right. Lovely. Wonderful morning for it."
He remembered those villagers who'd fled north to Jingzhou a year ago. Whole families. Carts piled with chickens and grandparents. At the time, he'd pointed and laughed. Paranoid fools. Running from shadows.
Now? He wished he'd gone with them. Those lucky bastards were probably up on that wall right now, pointing down at him and laughing. Serving tea. Feeding chickens. Alive.
CRACK.
The military enforcer behind him swung his executioner's blade through the air, close enough to ruffle the hair on Zhou Hei's scalp. He felt the wind of it. The cold kiss of steel passing an inch from his ear.
"MOVE!" Li Buqu bellowed. Spittle hit Zhou Hei's neck. Warm. Disgusting. "You think I brought you here to admire the scenery? FORWARD! ALL OF YOU! FORWARD OR I START KICKING SOME ASS!"
A'Gen scrambled upright, wiping his mouth with a shaking hand. "I, I can't, sir, my legs..."
"THEN CRAWL, BOY!" Li Buqu raised the flat of his blade. "CRAWL OR I'LL CARRY YOUR HEAD BACK TO YOUR MOTHER!"
Zhou Hei grabbed the kid's collar and hauled him forward. "Walk," he hissed through his teeth. "Just walk. Don't look up. Don't look at the bloody walls. Look at my back. Look at the mud. Look at your own damn feet. Just walk."
"But those things up there..."
"SHUT UP AND WALK, YOU LITTLE SHIT, OR I'LL KILL YOU MYSELF AND SAVE THEM THE BOLT."
It was, Zhou Hei reflected, a terrible threat to make to a sixteen-year-old. But it worked. A'Gen walked. They all walked. Forward. Into the grey morning. Into the kill zone.
The mud sucked at their boots with every step. Schlorp. Schlorp. Schlorp. A hundred men, trudging in miserable unison. The smell of the river was everywhere, rotten weeds, fish guts, the metallic tang of cold iron. Someone ahead was praying. Someone behind was crying. Zhou Hei couldn't tell which was worse.
Fifty yards from the wall.
Forty.
He could see the crossbow operators now. Little figures behind the parapet, cranking those monstrous arms back with foot pedals. Smooth. Rhythmic. Like they were pumping water from a well.
Thirty yards.
"Steady," Zhou Hei muttered to himself. To the boy. To anyone. "Steady. Maybe they'll miss. Maybe the bloody strings will snap. Maybe a god will..."
The lead operator raised a flag. Red. Bright red against the grey sky.
Zhou Hei's stomach dropped into his boots.
"Oh," he said softly. "Oh, fuck."
The flag came down.
The sound wasn't a twang. It wasn't a snap. It was a CRACK, deep, resonant, like a giant splitting a mountain in half. Then another. And another. Dozens of them, rippling along the wall in a wave of mechanical fury. The air itself seemed to shudder.
Then the bolts arrived.
They weren't arrows. They weren't spears. They were tree trunks with iron heads, screaming through the air with a sound like tearing canvas. The first one hit the ground ten paces ahead of Zhou Hei and punched a hole in the earth deep enough to bury a man standing up. The spray of mud hit him in the face. Warm. Wet.
The second volley hit the formation.
Not into the formation. Through it. Through men, through shields, through the thin iron armor that might as well have been paper. Zhou Hei watched the bolt take three men in a line, just through them, like a needle through cheap cloth, and keep going, embedding itself in the mud twenty yards behind them.
A'Gen screamed. Not a word. Just a sound. High and thin and broken.
"DOWN!" Zhou Hei roared, grabbing the kid's shoulders and slamming him face-first into the mud. "GET DOWN, YOU STUPID LITTLE..."
Another volley. CRACK. CRACK. CRACK. The ground shook. Men dropped around him like puppets with cut strings. The smell hit him then, copper and bowels and something sweet he didn't want to identify.
Li Buqu was still screaming. "FORWARD! FORWARD, YOU COWARDS! THE GENERAL'S EYES ARE ON YOU!"
Zhou Hei raised his head from the mud. Looked at the overseer. Looked at the wall. Looked at the bolt sticking out of the ground three feet from his left hand, still vibrating, still humming.
He looked back at Li Buqu.
"YOU GO FORWARD, YOU BALD-HEADED SON OF A TORTOISE!" Zhou Hei screamed, all dignity abandoned. "YOU GO CHARGE THE BLOODY WALL! I'LL WATCH! I'LL CHEER! I'LL BRING YOU WATER!"
Li Buqu's face went purple. He raised his blade.
But before he could swing, another volley hit. The overseer simply was not there anymore. Just a red mist and a pair of boots standing in the mud.
Zhou Hei stared at the boots.
Then he looked at A'Gen, who was shaking so hard his teeth rattled.
"Right," Zhou Hei said, his voice very calm. Very, very calm. The calm of a man whose soul had temporarily left his body and was filing a formal complaint with the heavens. "New plan. We sit down."
"S-sit down?"
"We sit down. In the mud. And we wait. Because I would rather take my chances with a court-martial than get turned into a bloody kebab by those flying tree trunks."
He sat. Cross-legged. In the sucking grey mud. Crossed his arms over his chest. Dared the wall to do its worst.
A'Gen sat too. The man with the missing ear followed. Then another. And another. Within seconds, half the surviving infantry were sitting in the mud, arms folded, staring at the wall with the hollow, furious defiance of men who had collectively decided that no. Absolutely not. Not today. Not for Lu Meng. Not for Jiangdong. Not for any bloody paradise.
Up on the wall, Zhou Hei could have sworn he saw one of the crossbow operators pause, lean over the parapet, and look down at them with an expression that might have been confusion.
Might have been respect.
Zhou Hei spat mud from his lips and flipped the man a rude gesture with two fingers.
"GO ON THEN!" he bellowed up at the wall, his voice cracking. "COME DOWN HERE AND MAKE US, YOU OVERGROWN TOOTHLESS BASTARDS! I'LL FIGHT YOU WITH MY BARE HANDS! I'LL FIGHT YOU WITH MY TEETH!"
A bolt the size of a ship mast thudded into the ground six inches from his knee.
Zhou Hei looked at it. Looked at the wall. Swallowed.
"...On second thought," he said quietly, uncrossing his arms and lying flat in the mud, "I'll just be over here. In the dirt. Not bothering anyone. Lovely morning. Beautiful weather. I'll just be here."
He closed his eyes. Pressed his face into the cold, wet earth.
And prayed to every ancestor he could remember. Even the ones he didn't like. Even Uncle Bao, who'd cheated him out of a goat in the spring.
Just let me go home. I'll plant the turnips. I'll feed the bloody goat. I'll never complain about the dirt again.
Another volley cracked overhead.
Zhou Hei pressed himself deeper into the mud and whispered, very softly, "I hate this war. I hate this war. I hate this bloody war."
---
At that point, Lu Meng's brilliant tactical plans evaporated like morning frost.
His only remaining move was to surround the city, block the river, cut the roads, and pray to the heavens they starved before he went mad.
So he positioned his core forces between Gong'an and Jiangling to keep the blockade tight. Then he sent the rest of his troops to raid the surrounding territories like a swarm of angry locusts.
Jiang Wan watched all this from the wall and felt absolutely nothing. The chaos below didn't bother him. Not a flicker of concern crossed his face.
Southern Jingzhou had never been densely populated anyway. As Jiangling and Gong'an grew into trade hubs, most folk had naturally gravitated toward the cities. When the war kicked off, Jiang Wan simply signed a stack of papers, sealed them with red wax, and told the remaining rural families to pack up and head north to Xiangfan.
After Guan Yu launched his northern campaign, Xiangyang and Fancheng were basically ghost towns. No military garrisons. No administrators. Just empty streets and wind blowing through shuttered windows.
Historically, Liu Biao had chosen Xiangyang as his capital for good reason. The land was fertile, the rivers provided natural defenses, and the scenery was enough to make poets weep. Prime real estate, really. By sending the southern civilians up there, Jiang Wan killed two birds with one stone. He got the vulnerable population out of harm's way and gave Xiangfan its first batch of new residents.
It was clean. Efficient. Slightly ruthless, but clean.
Because of that single administrative stroke, defending Jiangling felt like a holiday. Sure, they had to shut down the markets, but that was about the extent of it. Jiang Wan actually found himself with less paperwork to file and so much free time that he started taking daily strolls along the battlements with Zhou Qun, bird-watching the enemy camp as though they were on a leisurely nature hike rather than in the middle of a siege.
That was how Jiang Wan immediately noticed something was off with Lu Meng's encampment.
"The enemy looks like they're preparing to pull back," Zhou Qun observed, shading his eyes against the afternoon glare. He had gotten rather close to Jiang Wan during their little walks. "Maybe the mountain tribes finally hit the Jiangdong borders?"
Jiang Wan chuckled. "Doubt it."
Zhou Qun grinned. "Then our navy must've sailed south and hit Jiangxia hard. That'd break the siege, wouldn't it? If that's true... congratulations, Gongyan.
Jiang Wan leaned against the cold stone, staring at the hazy horizon. His gaze remained on the horizon, but his thoughts were already far away. The commanders up north. That reckless, swaggering, absolutely unhinged young bastard, Gan Gui. His brow relaxed. A slow, knowing smile spread across his face.
"I'd bet my life, Zhongzhi," Jiang Wan said quietly, "that our navy bypassed Jiangxia entirely and sailed straight into the heart of Jiangdong."
Zhou Qun's eyes went wide. He had learned that when Jiang Wan spoke with such certainty, the answer usually arrived a few days later.
But striking the heart of Jiangdong? That was insane. Audacious. Absolutely, certifiably mad.
The Jingzhou navy had superior ships. Wasting that mobility by holing up in Jiangxia would've been foolish.
But completely ignoring the siege to launch a suicide run at the enemy capital? Zhou Qun could only applaud the sheer, breathtaking madness of it.
Jiang Wan running through the intel in his head. If Gan Gui was going for a decapitation strike, then he needed to do his part. Every extra hour Lu Meng remained before Jiangling was another hour Gan Gui gained on the river.
A moment later, he smiled. Then he locked it in.
Throwing his head back, he let out a booming, theatrical laugh that echoed off the stonework. He grabbed Zhou Qun by the sleeve, his face flushed with exaggerated ecstasy.
"The enemy is retreating! Heaven blesses our Lord Liu Bei! Zhongzhi, we must throw a massive banquet to celebrate!"
Zhou Qun blinked. Then, because the man was a sharp politician with survival instincts sharpened by three regime changes, he caught on instantly.
"This is truly a miraculous occasion, Gongyan," Zhou Qun announced loudly, pitching his voice for the nearby guards. "A grand feast! We'll announce the good news to comfort the citizens!"
Jiang Wan beamed. "You always understand me perfectly! Join me at the governor's mansion for the festivities!"
"Gladly," Zhou Qun said, with a deep bow.
And just like that, the rumor spread like a brushfire in dry season.
One whispered conversation bled into another, and within hours, the whole city was buzzing with restless, disbelieving excitement.
The banquet at the governor's mansion wasn't exactly a secret. The officials watched in open-mouthed shock as Jiang Wan, a man famous for never touching the stuff, who once lectured a subordinate for twenty minutes about the moral failings of rice wine, downed cup after cup of the strong stuff like it was spring water. Within an hour, he was a stumbling, slurring, red-faced mess.
"The enemy is running away!" Jiang Wan shouted, slamming his bronze cup on the table hard enough to crack the lacquer. "And the highest merit goes to..." He hiccupped loudly, a wet, undignified sound. "...the brave guards at the south gate!"
The guests exchanged amused, slightly concerned glances. The governor was clearly three sheets to the wind. The artillery crews on the west wall had done all the heavy lifting, and here he was crediting the south gate. Classic drunk logic.
But Jiang Wan wasn't done. His face had gone the color of a ripe tomato. He let out another obnoxious hiccup and pointed a wavering finger at the ceiling.
"Listen up! I'm issuing an official decree! Send ten barrels of fine wine to the south gate! Those heroes deserve to drink and celebrate!"
Several officers immediately stepped forward, waving their hands. "You can't do that, sir! Serving alcohol to frontline troops during an active siege is..."
Jiang Wan kicked out drunkenly, nearly sending an advisor sprawling into a tureen of broth.
Then Liu Zhang, the former warlord of Yizhou, waddled over to defuse the situation. He threw a heavy arm around Jiang Wan's shoulders, swaying dramatically, pretending to be just as wasted.
"Come on, relax!" Liu Zhang slurred, his eyes half-lidded. "The enemy's already packing! They're not attacking tonight! Let the boys have a little fun. No need to panic, you stiff-necked bureaucrats!"
With Jiang Wan's inner circle silently allowing it, and Liu Zhang cheerfully enabling the madness, the completely inappropriate order was officially dispatched.
A few minutes later, Jiang Wan collapsed onto the table, snoring like a timber saw. Liu Zhang followed suit, face-planting directly into a plate of cold roast duck, grease smearing his beard.
Since the hosts were unconscious, the banquet naturally wound down. The guests filed out, shaking their heads, and the scandalous story of the drunken Jiang Wan spread through every elite circle in the city before midnight.
Most people understood. It was an open secret that Sun Quan and Cao Cao had formed a dark alliance. General Guan Yu was trapped up north, unable to send reinforcements. The pressure on Jiang Wan must've been crushing. Hearing that the siege was broken would naturally trigger a drunken collapse.
But for a specific group of traitors deeply rooted in Jingnan, this drunken negligence was the perfect opportunity.
Thanks to Jiang Wan's "generous gift," the south gate garrison grew sloppy and sluggish. Patrols grew lazy. Torches went unlit. The timing was immaculate.
With practiced efficiency, the traitors made their move. A woven basket was quietly lowered into the darkness beyond the wall. A courier, carrying a sealed wax cylinder packed with stolen military intelligence, slipped into the freezing black river and started swimming toward the Gong'an encampment.
The river smoothed over. The empty basket sank slowly into the murky depths.
The traitors gathered in a hidden courtyard behind a shuttered dye shop in the eastern quarter. The kind of courtyard with moss between the flagstones and a single gnarled plum tree dropping half-rotten fruit into a stone basin. Forgettable. The sort of place where a man could pour tea and discuss the fall of a dynasty without the neighbors catching wind of it.
There were seven of them. All men of standing. Minor officials, granary keepers, a former cavalry captain with a scarred lip, two merchants who'd been funnelling silver south for months. And Pan Jun, sitting at the head of the low table, pouring tea with the careful, steady hand of a man who believed he'd just won the game.
"To the courier," Pan Jun said, lifting his cup. The steam curled off the surface, carrying the faint smell of roasted barley. "May the river treat him kindly."
"To the courier," the others echoed, clinking cups. The former cavalry captain, Deng Wei, downed his in one gulp and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Three days," Deng Wei muttered, refilling his own cup. "Three days we've been feeding that drunk bastard false patrol schedules. Three days of smiling at that wretched Commissioner while he slurred his way through dinner like a pig at a trough."
"And it worked," said one of the merchants, a plump man named Xu Fu whose fingers were stained permanently blue from indigo dye. He was grinning. Actually grinning. "Did you see him tonight? Face-down in a plate of roast duck. The great Jiang Gongyan. Defender of Jiangling. Snoring like a gutted ox."
Laughter. Low, relieved, slightly hysterical laughter. The kind that came after weeks of terror finally broke.
Pan Jun allowed himself a small smile. He set his cup down carefully. "The intel is good. Every troop rotation. Every supply manifest. Every reinforcement schedule General Lu Meng could want. When he reads it, he'll pull half his forces back to reinforce the western flank. The siege thins. Our position strengthens."
"And our payment?" Xu Fu pressed, leaning forward. " Lord Sun Quan's people promised—"
" Lord Sun Quan's people will pay what they promised," Pan Jun cut in, his tone sharpening. "We held up our end. The courier is in the water. By dawn, he'll be in Gong'an. By nightfall, General Lu Meng will have the letter in his hands." He paused. Sipped his tea. "We are heroes of the southern cause. Let us not sully the moment by haggling over silver like fishwives."
Deng Wei snorted. "Easy to say when your family estate isn't being taxed into the ground."
"My family estate," Pan Jun said coldly, "is the reason I'm sitting in this wretched courtyard drinking barley water instead of sleeping in my own bed. So forgive me if I'd prefer to enjoy this single moment before we scatter to the winds."
The plum tree dripped. Somewhere beyond the courtyard wall, a dog barked twice and went still.
Xu Fu poured another round. His hands were steadier now. The fear was draining out of all of them, replaced by the warm, golden glow of survival. Of victory.
"So what now?" asked the youngest of them, a clerk barely twenty named Zhao Min, who'd been copying supply ledgers for three weeks with shaking hands. "Do we run? Tonight? Before anyone notices the courier's gone?"
Pan Jun shook his head slowly. "No. We stay. We grieve publicly. We wring our hands. We say, oh, how terrible, Jiang Wan has lost his mind to drink, what shall we do? We become concerned citizens. Loyal servants, worried for their leader's health." He smiled. Thin. Practiced. "By the time anyone thinks to check the patrol logs, the letter will already be in General Lu Meng's hands. Irreversible."
"Brilliant," Xu Fu breathed.
"Genuinely brilliant," Deng Wei agreed, and for once, there was no sarcasm in it.
Pan Jun lifted his cup again. "To Jiangnan. To the south. To Lord....."
The courtyard doors exploded inward.
Not opened. Not pushed. Exploded. The wooden panels shattered off their iron hinges and cartwheeled across the flagstones, spraying splinters into the plum tree. A cloud of dust and old varnish billowed into the evening air.
Pan Jun's cup slipped from his fingers. Barley tea splashed across the table, across the documents, across his lap. He didn't feel the heat.
Through the dust, a squad of enforcers poured in. Eight men. Maybe ten. Hard to count. They moved like a single organism, spreading, flanking, cutting off the two exits, the side gate, the window. Armored. Armed. Hands on sword pommels with the easy familiarity of men who'd drawn steel a thousand times.
At their head stood a captain named Chen Bao. Broad-shouldered. Square jaw. A scar bisecting his left eyebrow. He didn't shout. Didn't posture. He simply stood in the ruined doorway, looked at the seven men frozen around their little tea table, and smiled.
It was not a kind smile.
"By order of Commissioner Jiang Wan," Chen Bao said. His voice was low and gravelly, the kind of voice that suggested he'd been shouting for years and had simply run out of volume. "Pan Jun. And the rest of you rats."
He let the words hang in the air.
"You're coming with us."
Nobody moved. Nobody breathed. The plum tree dripped.
Then Xu Fu made a sound. A small, wet, strangled sound, like a man being slowly throttled by his own collar. His blue-stained fingers were gripping the edge of the table so hard his knuckles had gone white.
"No," Xu Fu whispered. "No, no, no, this is, there's been a mistake. We're loyal. We've been..."
"Shut up, Xu Fu," Pan Jun said. His voice was flat. Controlled. But his hands were shaking. He pressed them flat against his thighs to stop it. His mind was racing. Spinning. Slotting pieces together with the horrible, grinding speed of a man watching his own execution assemble itself in real time.
The drunken guards. Too drunk. Too convenient.
The sloppy patrol. The south gate, left practically unguarded. As if someone had wanted them to see it. Wanted them to think, ah, what an opportunity.
The easy escape route. The basket already rigged. The river current perfect for a southbound swimmer.
His blood went cold. The kind of cold that started in the stomach and spread outward until your fingertips went numb.
The courier didn't sneak out. He was allowed to leave.
Fuck.
The thought hit him like a physical blow. We've been set up. Every bloody step. Every smile. Every hiccup. The roast duck. The wine. The south gate. All of it. A fucking play.
Pan Jun's jaw tightened. He looked at Chen Bao. The captain looked back, still smiling that awful, patient smile.
How long? How long had Jiang Wan known? A day? A week? Had he been laughing at them this entire time, slurring his words and swaying on his feet while his cold, sober mind catalogued every traitor in the room?
That smug, tea-sipping, glass-collecting bastard.
"Captain Chen Bao," Pan Jun said. His voice came out steady. He was proud of that. Small, stupid pride, but it was all he had left. "I believe there's been a misunderstanding. We were gathered here for a private..."
"For a private what, Lord Pan?" Chen Bao tilted his head. "A private tea ceremony? At midnight? In a shuttered dye shop? With a sealed wax cylinder of military dispatches hidden in your sleeve?"
Pan Jun's hand twitched. Instinctively. Toward his left sleeve, where the cylinder was not, because it was already in the courier's pack, already in the river. But the twitch was enough. Chen Bao's eyes tracked it. His smile widened.
"Ah," Chen Bao said softly. "There it is."
Deng Wei moved.
The former cavalry captain surged to his feet, hand going for the short blade tucked behind his belt. "I'm not going in chains!" he snarled. "I've killed better men than..."
The nearest enforcer backhanded him across the face with a gauntleted fist. Hard. Deng Wei's head snapped sideways. Blood sprayed from his split lip onto the flagstones. He stumbled, caught the table edge, went down.
"Stay down," the enforcer said, bored, like he was telling a dog off the furniture.
Zhao Min was crying. Actual tears tracking down his pale cheeks. "I just copied numbers," he kept whispering. "I just copied the bloody numbers. They told me it was harmless. They told me..."
"Nobody asked you," Chen Bao said, without looking at him. His eyes stayed on Pan Jun. "On your feet, Lord Pan. All of you. Hands where I can see them."
Pan Jun didn't stand. Not yet. He sat very still, his hands flat on the table, his tea-soaked robes clinging to his thighs. His mind was still turning. Still searching for an angle. A word. A name he could drop. A connection that might save him.
"Jiang Gongyan and I are blood," Pan Jun said, his voice low and careful. "Cousins. My mother's sister married his father's brother. He cannot simply..."
"Sir Jiang Gongyan," Chen Bao interrupted, his tone shifting to something flat and final, "has made his position abundantly clear. You are to be bound, escorted to the main hall, and held until further notice. Those were his exact words." He paused. "He also said, and I quote: If my cousin gives you any trouble about the family connection, remind him that he chose his side the moment he dipped his brush in stolen ink."
Pan Jun's face went pale. His mouth opened, then closed. No words came out. He had been outplayed. Completely. Thoroughly. And now he was going to pay for it. He stared at his hands, still flat on the table, his knuckles white, and let out a long, slow breath. When he spoke again, his voice was hollow, stripped of all defiance.
"...Where are you taking us?"
Chen Bao's smile didn't waver. "You'll find out soon enough." He gestured to his men. "Bind them. Move out."
Pan Jun flinched. Actually flinched. As if the words had been a slap.
Xu Fu was still babbling. "This is insane. We'll appeal. We'll go before the council. Lord Sun Quan's people will intervene, they promised..."
"Bah, Sun Quan's rats," Chen Bao said, turning those cold eyes on the merchant, "are about four hundred li south of here. And right now they've got a fleet bearing down on their capital." He smiled again. "But by all means. Write them a letter. I'll make sure it's delivered."
Xu Fu's mouth opened. Closed. He sat back down slowly, as if his legs had simply given up.
Deng Wei, still on the floor, spat blood and looked up at Chen Bao with murder in his eyes. "You'll hang for this. When General Lu Meng takes this city, every one of you will swing from the walls."
Chen Bao looked down at him. Considered this. Shrugged.
"Then we'd best make sure Lu Meng doesn't take the city, hadn't we?" He gestured to his men. "Bind them. All seven. And check the courtyard. I want every scrap of paper, every brush, every drop of ink. Commissioner Jiang Wan wants this place scrubbed."
When the prisoners were dragged into the main hall, Pan Jun's suspicion was confirmed.
Jiang Wan sat rigidly behind his massive oak desk. His face was calm. His eyes were cold and sharp as a honed blade. No trace of alcohol. Not a hint. Not even the faintest flush of wine on his cheeks.
Sitting beside him was Liu Zhang, looking incredibly serene, staring at the ceiling with feigned disinterest, picking at a piece of duck fat stuck in his beard.
Before Jiang Wan could speak, Pan Jun stepped forward, chains rattling, voice trembling with desperate anger.
"For the past month, I personally reviewed the official military dispatches..."
"And exactly half of those documents were complete fabrications," Jiang Wan interrupted smoothly. His tone was flat. Bored....
Nothing left to discuss. Pan Jun let out a hollow, twisted laugh. He glared at his distant relative.
"Jiang Gongyan! Are you truly willing to sever all ties with your homeland and your family just to win this war?"
Jiang Wan didn't answer. He just stared down at his cousin, eyes reflecting a deep, exhausted ocean of disappointment. He sighed heavily and waved his hand.
The guards grabbed the traitors by their collars and dragged them out, boots scraping against stone.
Jiang Wan ruthlessly crushed the lingering guilt in his chest.
"When Lu Meng reads the fabricated intelligence in that letter, he'll be forced to split his forces. Troops to reinforce the capital. A garrison to maintain the blockade at Jiangling. And a preemptive strike on Hanshou to secure his flank."
He took a deep breath. "By dividing his army, the siege is broken. And that means we finally have an opening."
The dry analysis echoed through the empty hall.
Liu Zhang stayed silent.
Then Jiang Wan softened his tone, reaching into a wooden box on his desk. "The glassblowers produced a brilliant new batch of colored ornaments. General Zhenwei, I'd be honored if you..."
Liu Zhang dropped the act instantly and burst into laughter, slapping his knee.
"Gongyan is too generous! How could I possibly refuse such a magnificent gift?"
As Liu Zhang waddled happily out, cradling a wrapped bundle of colored glass, Jiang Wan rubbed his aching temples, replaying his deception for any flaws.
As for his traitorous cousin? Best to hand him over to Yunchang for sentencing. That was above his pay grade.
Pan Jun was a brilliant administrator. Jiang Wan simply couldn't understand why his cousin's loyalty was limited to a tiny patch of ancestral farmland. But understanding wasn't required. Only results.
---
Meanwhile, far down the wide, muddy expanse of the Yangtze, Gan Gui was blissfully, magnificently, catastrophically unaware of the political espionage unfolding behind him.
Punching through the barricade at Jiangxia had cost them all their small scouting boats. But honestly? That was a blessing. Those wretched little rowboats were dead weight, useless unless they were actively in a skirmish. Without them dragging behind, the floating fortresses caught the tailwind and practically flew down the river, hulls cutting the current like a cleaver through silk.
Gan Gui stood at the prow, legs spread wide, coat flapping, hair a disaster. He squinted at the horizon, then at his crew, then back at the horizon.
"Right then, you miserable lot," he announced, his voice carrying the particular rasp of a man who'd been shouting over wind for three days straight. "Hoist every bloody flag we've got. The Han banners. The Liu banners. The Guan banners. All of them. I want every sorry bastard on this river to know exactly who's coming to ruin their bloody afternoon."
A junior officer hesitated. "Sir, we don't technically have a command flag for..."
"I don't give a rat's arse," Gan Gui snapped, waving a dismissive hand. "Hoist the biggest Guan flag we've got. Pin it to the mainmast if you have to. Nail it. Sew it. I don't care how you attach it, just make sure it's visible from the bloody moon."
The floating fortresses were terrifying enough on their own, but Gan Gui wanted style. He'd bolted a massive, polished silver bell to the front prow, stolen from some unfortunate temple, probably. Then he'd replaced the standard salt-stained canvas sail with a flashy, eye-searing brocade one, woven with gold thread and dyed in colors that had no business existing on a warship.
A clear, unapologetic nod to his father's legendary pirate days.
The eight hundred grizzled veteran pirates on board absolutely lost their minds. The sight of the brocade made them feel young again, raiding the treacherous waterways of Ba and Shu without a care in the world. They whooped. They hollered. A few of the older ones actually wept into their scarves.
Some cautious veterans raised concerns, pulling Gan Gui aside by the elbow. "Young master, what if Sun Quan gets furious and executes the old general? Your father's still in their territory, after all."
Gan Gui blinked. Then he let out a sharp, barking laugh.
"Me old man? That slippery, foul-mouthed, unkillable bastard?" He shook his head, grinning. "Sun Quan could throw him in a pit of vipers and Gan Ning'd come out wearing a new hat and drinking the bastard's wine. The man's survived worse than a tantrum from a spoiled little lordling. He'll be fine. Probably already shagging the man's wife."
The veterans exchanged glances. Then shrugged. Fair enough....
They lined up on deck, taking turns yanking the thick hemp rope to ring the giant silver bell. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! The sound rolled across the water, echoing off the riverbanks, feeding Gan Gui's already astronomical ego.
He leaned against the prow rail, watching the bell swing, and muttered to no one in particular, "Shame the old man isn't here. He'd have wept. Then he'd have hit me for not making it bigger. Then he'd have wept again."
Behind them, absolute chaos rippled through Jiangdong territory.
From Chaisang to Pengze, from Nanling to Wuhu, every river city watched in mounting horror as a massive fleet flying General Guan Yu's flags sailed past, bells ringing, brocade catching the sun.
The commoners assumed the worst.
General Guan Yu annihilated the Jiangxia blockade! He's sailing to the capital to personally take Sun Quan's head!
Where's our navy? Dead at the bottom of the river, probably!
General Guan Yu is a literal god of war! We're all going to die!
Gan Gui, leaning over the railing and picking his teeth with a sliver of wood, was too busy enjoying the wind in his hair to care.
"Listen to them scream," he murmured fondly. "Music. Absolute bloody music."
Three days later, the towering slate-grey walls of Jianye appeared through the morning mist.
Gan Gui laughed. Not a dignified laugh. Not a commander's laugh. A full, unhinged, slightly-too-loud cackle that made his helmsman edge away nervously. He ordered the floating fortresses to pull into the shallow waters near the capital, grinning like a man who'd just been handed the keys to the imperial treasury.
He leaned against the railing, watching civilian dockworkers and fishermen drop their crates and nets, screaming, scrambling, tripping over each other to get away from the waterline.
He waited patiently for them to clear out. Tapped his fingers on the rail. Hummed a little tune.
Then he looked up. The city walls were swarming with panicked soldiers, grabbing weapons, pointing down at the ships, visibly shaking in their boots.
Gan Gui's grin stretched. Wider. Meaner. A predator baring its teeth.
He drew his sword. The steel sang in the damp river air.
"Right, you miserable, trembling, piss-soaked lot!" he roared over the wind, his voice carrying across the water with theatrical glee. "Load every single ballista! Every last bloody one! Aim dead center for the city gates! I want to see those fancy gates splinter like dry twigs!"
He paused. Flourished his sword in a wide, unnecessary arc.
"Let's properly introduce ourselves to Lord Sun, shall we? And do try to make it memorable. I've gone to an awful lot of trouble with this stupid sail, and I'll be damned if I let that prick ignore me."