Chapter 285: Mandate of Heaven, May You Prosper

Ended? Ended.

Li Xuan panted, looking around. Blood mixed with the yellow soil, and corpse after corpse made it seem like a human purgatory.

Trap array, first ascend, seize flag, behead general. The trap array was easiest, beheading the general the most difficult.

When the main general is dead, the ten thousand-strong army will be defeated.

When Li Xuan stepped onto this bloody road with a heart determined to die, he hadn't actually thought he could truly reach Yuan Zhen. At this moment, he only felt a sense of unreality.

It was as if he had a dream, and he didn't know if he should wake up.

At this time, Chen Ji struggled up from the ground, his expression a mix of shock and disbelief!

Seeing Li Xuan in a daze, he immediately tore off the hem of his clothes and rushed forward, wrapping Yuan Zhen's head and delivering it to Li Xuan's hand!

Li Xuan came back to his senses and took the head!

He subconsciously wanted to untie the black cloth wrapping the head, but was stopped by Chen Ji's firm grip!

Li Xuan looked at Chen Ji doubtfully, but Chen Ji didn't explain, only saying: "Quick, don't let the border army suffer any more casualties."

Li Xuan immediately raised the black cloth wrapping Yuan Zhen's head high and roared angrily: "Yuan Zhen is dead!"

The battlefield was silent for an instant, then a mountain-like roar rose, and the border army infantry one after another excitedly shouted: "Yuan Zhen is dead!"

"Yuan Zhen is dead!"

"Yuan Zhen is dead!"

The sound spread from nearby to far away, like a rolling tide!

In an instant, the morale of the Tian Ce army completely vanished, except for the guard camp near Wu Zhen, all slowly put down their weapons, no longer having any will to fight!

The Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry quickly interspersed among them, driving the Tian Ce army soldiers to one place, seizing their weapons, removing their armor, leading away their warhorses, and even throwing down hemp ropes, ordering the Tian Ce army to bind each other!

This war really ended!

In the dark night, the border army infantry sat down on the ground!

Chen Ji had originally thought they would hold their heads and cry, or cheer, but they didn't. There was only endless bewilderment and silence on the battlefield!

Just at this moment, the Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry unexpectedly raised their iron halberds again and spurred their horses to charge back and forth among the Tian Ce army captives.

This change surprised the border army infantry, who stood up again, looking at the Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry slaughtering the Tian Ce army with shock and doubt!

Li Xuan roared angrily: "What are you doing? Not killing surrendered generals in front of the array is not my womanly benevolence, but opening this precedent means that no one will be willing to surrender to our dynasty in the future, and our dynasty's soldiers who surrender to the Jing dynasty will also be slaughtered."

But the iron halberds in the hands of the Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry did not stop, as if they hadn't heard anything!

The sound of horse hooves came from a distance. Li Xuan turned his head and saw only Mister Feng urging his horse to come!

Mister Feng said from afar: "After Gu Yuan offers the city, can the Tian Ce army keep their promise? Between the Jing and Ning dynasties, it is always our dynasty that surrenders to Jing more, and the Jing dynasty that surrenders to us less. We are already in a state of not resting until death. This time, we want to completely disabuse those weaklings in our dynasty of their ideas!"

Having said that, the Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry continued to kill the captives, leaving none behind!

The Tian Ce army wanted to resist, but it was already too late!

After they finished slaughtering the Tian Ce army, Li Xuan, in his anger, saw the Tiger Armor Iron Cavalry and the Elephant Armor Guard simultaneously raise knives to their own necks, their movements as neat as if they were one person!

The next moment, the Liu family elites simultaneously slit their throats, fell from their horses, and lay in pools of blood.

This scene shocked the border army infantry, causing them to repeatedly retreat. Even they, veterans of a hundred battles, had never seen such a sight.

Li Xuan's anger turned to shock, and for a moment he couldn't speak!

Only Chen Ji guessed that these Liu family elites had always been suppressed by Mister Feng using Yan Sheng Zhi Shu. Their urgent actions of opening the city and offering it, burning the granary, and selling the prince were probably because they could no longer be suppressed soon!

So the Tian Ce army had to die, otherwise, after the Liu family elites lost control, the remnants of the border army infantry would not be able to clean up the mess!

Chen Ji looked around but saw no abnormality on the faces of Hu Junxian and Zhou You, seemingly they already knew about this matter!

Mister Feng no longer paid attention to them, but pointed at the ground full of corpses and weapons, smiling and saying to Hu Junxian: "General Hu, the Inner Minister adult promised you five thousand four warhorses, ten thousand sets of armor, bows, halberds, and forces, all here. Take them yourself! With these weapons, presumably Gu Yuan city can again guard the border for the Ning dynasty for fifty years!"

Mister Feng didn't mind his attitude, and said with a sigh: "These are weapons forged by the Liu family at great expense, especially the leather armors of the Elephant Armor Camp. I'm still a bit reluctant to give them to you... Consider it a small compensation to the Gu Yuan border army."

Armor isn't better the heavier it is!

The leather armors of the Elephant Armor Camp were all made from rhinoceros hide, toughened for several months, then treated with large lacquer and iron sand to harden the surface. Even an open-mountain axe couldn't chop through them!

Light, sturdy, most suitable for elite troops to assault and infiltrate!

Throughout the entire history of war, only the elites among elites were qualified to wear leather armor!

Mister Feng was not being polite, he truly wanted to keep the leather armor for the Jie Fan Guard!

At this time, Li Xuan propped himself up with his sword and angrily asked: "Is this all Si Li Jian's doing? Truly a poison minister, actually disregarding the lives of half the people of Gu Yuan to carry out this vicious scheme."

Mister Feng didn't take it to heart, just said casually: "Lord Li, it's fine for you to call me vicious, but if you casually discuss the Inner Minister adult, be careful your life is not safe. This time, considering your merit in beheading the general, I'll spare your life! As the saying goes, righteousness does not manage wealth, benevolence does not command the army. You should know that Gu Yuan, through this battle, has completely annihilated the main force of the Tian Ce army and killed their old enemy Yuan Zhen, which can bring peace to Gu Yuan for how many years and save the lives of how many border army soldiers."

Having said that, he raised his head to look at Hu Junxian, pointed at Li Xuan and said: "General Hu, he actually has some similarities with you in the past, but I don't know when he can be tempered!"

Temper that soft heart of his hard and coarse like the stones of Gu Yuan, then he can be of great use!

Li Xuan couldn't accept Mister Feng's words and immediately threw Yuan Zhen's head in his hand to the ground: "If beheading the general, earned with tens of thousands of lives, is not wanted, that's fine too."

Thump!

The head was thrown to the ground, but there was no sound of flesh and blood. Li Xuan was startled and immediately squatted down to lift open the black cloth. Inside was unexpectedly only a section of wood stake, and Yuan Zhen's head had disappeared without a trace.

Li Xuan turned his head to look at Chen Ji, recalling the other party's action of stopping him from tearing open the black cloth just now, presumably he had already discovered it at that time!

Only for the sake of the overall situation, he used the black cloth to cover it and endured not exposing it!

Chen Ji was silent!

He could discover it because when Yuan Zhen's head was chopped off, he didn't receive the ice flow!

How could a second-rank official of the Jing dynasty not have ice flow after death?

Mister Feng looked at that section of wood stake, his eyes slightly narrowed!

He lightly floated down from his horse, and with a kick of his foot, he kicked open Yuan Zhen's clothes, revealing several sections of wood, a sealed imperial edict, and yellow paper talismans stuck on the wood inside his clothes!

He clasped his hands in his sleeves, not angry, only sighing lightly: "Truly hard to kill... However, the same sect of this Yan Sheng Zhi Shu has finally left traces!"

Li Xuan suddenly thought of something: "That's not right, if the Tian Ce army's Yuan Zhen was a grass and wood puppet earlier, why could all evils avoid him easily?"

Mister Feng thought for a moment and said: "Presumably, the problem lies with that sealed imperial edict!"

Having said that, he bent down to pick up the imperial edict and unfolded it. It was unexpectedly written in fresh blood!

In the imperial edict, there was no "Feng Tian Cheng Yun Emperor Zhao Ri", only eight large characters: Receive Mandate from Heaven, Both Life Forever Prosperous.

At the end, there was a vermilion red seal.

"Emperor's blood book." Mister Feng sighed lightly: "I was just wondering why he carried a sealed imperial edict with him, it was originally meant to deceive people!"

He turned his head to look at Hu Junxian: "Commander-in-chief Hu, if this person is not eliminated, Gu Yuan will be difficult to pacify!"

Hu Junxian didn't speak!

On a cliff, Yuan Zhen stood silently, calmly overlooking the mountain below!

Inside Gu Yuan city was already in ruins, outside Gu Yuan city the Tian Ce army camp was still burning, creatures were in utter misery!

An attendant came over to put a cloak on him and said in a low voice: "Great Commander, let's go! Gu Yuan's setback this time will definitely be used by Lu Jin to blame you. We might as well slaughter several villages, and it will be good to take the heads of these people back to make up for it!"

After a long silence, Yuan Zhen slowly said: "I started dealing with Gu Yuan when I was seventeen. At that time, I was just following my father on an expedition, serving as a small deputy general by his side. Later, my father became seriously ill, and on his sickbed, he told me that if one day I broke Gu Yuan, I must write a sacrificial text and burn it in front of his grave! At that time, I thought, Gu Yuan city is full of old and weak remnants, they can only wear rattan armor, use blunt knives, open soft bows, they don't even have firearms. What's difficult about attacking Gu Yuan? If I were the Great Commander, Gu Yuan would be within reach!"

"At that time, I looked down on my father!" Yuan Zhen said absently: "But later I inherited his title and rose all the way from deputy general to Great Commander. In twenty-three years, I fought Gu Yuan seven times and was defeated seven times. Only then did I understand that my father was actually more capable than me!"

Saying that, he pointed at the ruined Gu Yuan city below the mountain and said mockingly: "When I was young, I thought I could fight to the prosperous capital of the Ning dynasty. As a result, this broken and old small city has been fought for twenty-plus years! That group of stubborn stones and I have to waste our whole lives here!"

The attendant dared not speak!

Yuan Zhen turned and went down the mountain: "Let's go!"

However, just at this moment, the sound of miserable cries came from below the mountain!

Under the night sky, he stood in his original place, looking at the swaying human figures on the bare earth mountain below, more than ten attendants blocking in front of him with vigilance!

After an unknown period of time, twenty-plus people came up the mountain in the biting cold wind, carrying short knives dripping with blood!

Yuan Zhen narrowed his eyes and looked. After seeing clearly who had come, he revealed an expression of sudden realization: "So it's you, I still thought you would never return to Gu Yuan!"

Hu San Ye shook the blood on his knife and grinned: "I promised the general to offer your head in front of his grave, how can I break faith with him? These years, I think about how to kill you day and night."

Yuan Zhen looked at the men behind Hu San Ye, one by one like wolves and tigers, his tense body suddenly slowly relaxed again: "Original, each has their own obsessions!"

Hu San Ye walked up step by step: "In the sixth year of Jia Ning, three thousand two hundred and fourteen border army soldiers of Gu Yuan died in battle; in the ninth year of Jia Ning, two thousand nine hundred and thirty-two border army soldiers of Gu Yuan died in battle; in the fourteenth year of Jia Ning..."

He counted them one by one, not missing a single life! Blood debt must be repaid with blood!

Xiao Wu said in a low voice behind Hu San Ye: "And Shopkeeper!"

Hu San Ye's expression darkened!

Yuan Zhen shook his head: "The fallen soldiers of my Tian Ce army, how can they compare to the fewer in your Gu Yuan."

Hu San Ye said solemnly: "Knowing this so early, why must you make a comeback and be unable to live in peace?"

Yuan Zhen suddenly said: "Hu Jun Yuan, I am luckier than you!"

Hu San Ye was startled: "You are going to die, what nonsense are you talking about!"

Yuan Zhen laughed: "I am about to be liberated, but you are still trapped here and not liberated, naturally I am luckier than you!"

"Hu San Ye was silent!"

Seeing his appearance, Yuan Zhen suddenly laughed heartily: "Do you regret coming to Gu Yuan?"

The more than twenty men behind Hu San Ye worked together, chopping down Yuan Zhen's attendants one by one!

He strode forward and stabbed a knife into Yuan Zhen's abdomen, letting the warm fresh blood flow down the blade!

Hu San Ye stared into Yuan Zhen's eyes: "Do you have any last words?"

The light in Yuan Zhen's eyes gradually dimmed: "This Gu Yuan, I will not come to in the next life!"