Chapter Ninety-Three: Who Ambushes Whom?

Cao Yao led the men eastward with Liu Chengzong, and when they had gone as far as Stone Slab Mountain, he could no longer hold back.

“Lion, if we keep heading east, we’ll be at Yanshui Pass for real. You’re not seriously planning to bluff your way through it in those soldiers’ coats and armor, are you?”

As he spoke, Cao Yao yawned long and hard, then lifted his eyes to the night and shook his head.

“You need to think this through. The garrison commander may not take the bait. The brothers have followed you all day and are worn out to the bone. We’ve no strength left for another fight.”

Under the moonlight, Liu Chengzong wore a smiling expression that looked, to Cao Yao, faintly strange.

“That’s how you see it?”

“Of course. We really are exhausted. Look, even my mule’s nodding off, let alone the wounded.”

Cao Yao sighed, then fixed Liu Chengzong with a serious look.

“No, I mean, aren’t you tired at all? Look at how fired up you are.”

Liu Chengzong paused, then said earnestly, “Tired. But you’ve already said your piece, and I’ve already sent Wei Qian’er and his men to Yanshui Pass.”

“I…”

Cao Yao slapped himself hard across the face. Then he grew anxious.

“You’re insane! What if the government troops behind us give chase, and the defenders up ahead come out of the pass? It’s pitch-dark. They could trap us here. From Yanchuan to Yanshui Pass, this is the only road!”

“Don’t panic. Why hit yourself? It’s the middle of the night. Do you really think they’ll chase us? Or that they’ll really come out of the pass?”

Liu Chengzong still looked eager and bright-eyed.

“Take the men up the mountain. Don’t light any torches. Go up Stone Slab Mountain.”

The two men and their two horses stood in the middle of the road talking, and the rest of the column, moving by moonlight behind them, could not proceed.

Before long, Gao Xian and Feng Rang each sent men ahead, then came themselves to see what was happening.

The others gathered around, and Cao Yao grew even more agitated.

“What are you thinking? If we get caught between two fronts, we’re finished for sure. We might not even beat them in an ambush.”

“I didn’t really want to say it, but you insisted on asking.”

Liu Chengzong sighed, glanced back at the column, and said to them, “I was afraid if I told you and then it didn’t work, I’d end up making a fool of myself. Brother Cao, do you think that guerrilla commander from Yanchuan will come after us?”

Not only did Cao Yao nod, but Gao Xian and Feng Rang slowly nodded as well.

Everyone felt the guerrilla commander would give chase—but that depended on his already knowing that they were indeed heading for Yanshui Pass.

“If he chases us, he’ll be wary of us making a feint in one direction and striking in another. He’ll send mounted scouts down the other roads. If we go anywhere else, we’ll be spotted. So there’s only one road we can take.”

Cao Yao said nothing. Feng Rang could not hold back and leaned in.

“But even if we take this road, it’s still meaningless. The government troops can still catch up, and we might even get blocked in the mountains.”

Liu Chengzong lifted a hand and waved it.

“I can’t be sure whether the guerrilla commander will chase us. But what if he doesn’t?”

He continued, “What if he decides to rest for the night at Jingjia Valley before pursuing us? That’s entirely possible. Do you remember how starved we were at Fish River Fort? Would we have dared launch a night attack like that?

“If he doesn’t come after us, aren’t we missing a perfect chance?”

Cao Yao paced a few steps, frowning.

“What chance?”

“The chance to beat up the garrison commander at Yanshui Pass! Don’t be impatient. Listen to me.”

Liu Chengzong raised a hand.

“Here’s the plan. First, send men and troops up Stone Slab Mountain. Once they’re up there, they can rest on the spot. No one will spot them in the dark. I’ll explain my thinking properly.”

The order was quickly passed down. The men of the three detachments, the postal-station troops, and the relay horsemen all moved cautiously up the mountain path toward Stone Slab Mountain.

Liu Chengzong, along with a few detachment leaders and a troop of riders, remained by the official road at the foot of the mountain.

By then the road had quieted, and Liu Chengzong cleared his throat before smiling at the others.

“I’ve sent Wei Qian’er and a few of the postal-station troops to Yanshui Pass to ask for reinforcements.

“The station men are posing as farmers. They’re locals, so they’ll first say the western villages have been attacked. Then Wei Qian’er, pretending to be a mounted scout under Wang Bai-zong, will go to request aid. If they refuse, he’ll warn them instead.

“He’ll tell them that if Wang Bai-hu is defeated, I’ll attack Yanshui Pass.”

As he spoke, Liu Chengzong spread his hands apart, then slowly brought them together.

“The guerrilla commander will chase me, and Yanshui Pass will block me. On a night road, both sides will send out mounted scouts. As long as I shoot down those scouts here, what do you think will happen?”

Moonlight reflected in Cao Yao’s eyes.

“You want them to turn on each other?”

Liu Chengzong nodded eagerly, then flopped back down with a sigh.

“But I don’t know whether the guerrilla commander will attack, and I don’t know whether the Yanshui Pass commander will come out.”

Cao Yao nodded.

“Exactly. For this plan to work, both sides would have to be bold, shrewd heroes. If the guerrilla commander doesn’t dare pursue us, then there’s no point.”

“No, no. It doesn’t matter if he doesn’t dare pursue us.”

Liu Chengzong shook his head quickly.

“If he doesn’t come after us, then as long as the defenders at Yanshui Pass dare to come out, we’ll see them when they pass this way. By the time they return, they’ll be dead on their feet, and by then we’ll have slept enough and eaten our fill. Then we can give them a proper beating and break Yanshui Pass.

“If both sides come, then we let them fight. We can join in or head south depending on how the battle goes. Either way, we’ll have a chance.

“What I’m afraid of is that the garrison commander at Yanshui Pass is a coward.”

Liu Chengzong laid out the whole plan and told Cao Yao, “Let’s be clear first: if he doesn’t come out, don’t laugh at me for making you all wait here the whole night for nothing.

“If he does come out, then let’s make a backup plan now. If we’re scattered, we’ll meet again at Yanchang County.”

By then, the others were all staring.

Looking at Liu Chengzong, who was still carefully repeating his instructions, Cao Yao’s heart suddenly filled with an indescribable and immense sorrow.

He did not know how to put the feeling into words.

He only knew that if, in the great collapse at Sarhu that year, the one leading the troops had not been him but this little lion before him—this Liu Chengzong, who could think of eating the house above and then the house below, of using the enemy to block the enemy—perhaps many more people would have survived the road of flight.

He had never before realized that this little lion possessed such boundless force, able to make men follow him through a whole day on the edge of life and death, over and over again, without ever seeming weary.

With that, everyone understood Liu Chengzong’s idea and all nodded in agreement.

They divided their tasks, set an ambush along the main road, left men lying in wait at the foot of the mountain, and let the others take turns going up to sleep.

And so they waited until deep into the night.

Liu Chengzong woke several times, but still no reinforcements appeared from the northwest or southeast. Instead, Wei Qian’er returned.

He had not brought especially good news: the commander at Yanshui Pass enforced strict discipline and would let no one enter the pass after dark, so they had not even seen him.

They had only passed the message along. Whether it had any effect at all, no one knew.

In the second half of the night, the temperature dropped sharply.

Sleeping rough on the mountain top, the leaders of the mule caravan had worries on their minds and could not sleep. Wrapped in their clothes, they lay with eyes open, staring at the stars.

Then, suddenly, a proud horse gave a piercing scream from below.

The fish had taken the bait.

Several men who had been lying motionless on the ground all at once sprang up and ran madly down the mountain.

Even before reaching the slope, Liu Chengzong saw countless torches gathering from the northwest into a dragon of fire, racing this way.

Yet, in a turn no one had expected, to the due north—across only the width of the official road—the summit of the mountain suddenly burst open with a violent flash and a thunderous roar.

It was the light of a cannon shot leaving the barrel.

Firelight flickered across the mountain ridges as the cannon thundered.

Then the guns below answered with fire of their own.

The artillerymen of Yanshui Pass, lying hidden and silent on the northern ridge, and the troops of the guerrilla commander Lu Cheng, racing in to reinforce them, began to trade cannon fire in the blackness of the night.