In a clash between masters, victory was often decided in an instant. Huyan Xi’s attack could only immobilize Xiao Jinyi for a few seconds, but during these brief seconds, Huyan Xi dashed away, abandoning the herding tribes’ army still holding formation and vanishing without a trace.

His soldiers didn’t even have time to react. The King of the Northern Frontier, whom they revered as a god, had actually abandoned them!

Their general had fled and the enemy’s main force had arrived. The herding tribes couldn’t stay here to be overwhelmed. With no general to coordinate their movements, their army ran in haste.

“Running away? Think again!” Xiao Jinshu was just about to give the order to fire. Seeing the great change in the situation below, he immediately sent the army out of the city in pursuit of the enemy.

What followed was a one-sided battle; the long-suppressed troops of Mobei City were completely ruthless toward the herding tribes. They caught and cut down every man they could get their hands on. Lacking a rear guard to cover their retreat, the herding tribes’ soldiers had no way to fend off the orderly Army of the North. Soon their forces were scattered and not a single important commander remained; those who could escape ran for their lives, and those who could not escape knelt and begged for mercy.

In a mere two hours, the herding tribes’ forces, a hundred thousand strong, had died or surrendered; less than a thousand in all escaped.

When the Army of the North cleared the battlefield, Xiao Jinyi was found and brought back.

At the last moment, in order to keep Huyan Xi from running away, he had allowed his whip to strike him. Huyan Xi had plentiful internal force, and his blows had bitten through Xiao Jinyi’s flesh. He didn’t have a scrap of uninjured flesh. On top of that, he had a belt knife and a dagger sticking out of him and four ribs broken by the force of the belt knife. He was a bloody mess, a horrifying sight.

When he was carried back to the city, Emperor Jingren and Xiao Jinshu rushed to question the army medic about the condition of his injuries. Emperor Jingren had brought many imperial physicians with him; there was no shortage of medical personnel.

But when they arrived, an imperial physician was standing over Xiao Jinyi with a look of frustration. Whatever anyone said, the General of the North wouldn’t let himself be examined, and he wouldn’t let his wounds be bandaged.

After the imperial physician reported this to Emperor Jingren, Xiao Jinshu said at once, “O-oh, yes! My sis…our General Xiao… Well, I know some medicine. I will examine General Xiao.”

How could he let just anyone touch his sister? He would treat his sister himself.

Xiao Jinshu was just about to take Xiao Jinyi’s wrist when he heard the latter say, “Third Brother, I’m all right. Leave the medical supplies and let me bandage the wounds myself.”

“Nonsense!” Emperor Jingren stood before Xiao Jinyi, ashen-faced. After watching the empress being injured again and again, his endurance had reached its limit.

“Then you can bandage them for me. If you don’t know how, I’ll instruct you,” Xiao Jinyi said to Emperor Jingren with a smile. The blood hadn’t been wiped off his face yet. His smile was ghastly.

“But…” The army doctor, the soldiers, the Embroidered Guardsmen, and the bodyguards in the room, along with Xiao Jinshu, were all shocked. No one had expected such insubordination from the General of the North. He wanted the emperor to treat his injuries?

Even more shocking, after a brief silence, Emperor Jingren said, “The General of the North frustrated Huyan Xi, demoralized the herding tribes’ forces, and rescued Mobei City in its time of need. As emperor, naturally we must personally treat the wounds of a subject who has rendered extraordinary service. This is the only thing we can do. All of you withdraw. We will see to the General of the North’s wounds alone.”

This high-sounding reason ameliorated the general shock somewhat. They withdrew one after another. Only Jing Xixian, who knew the truth, remained outside the door to guard it with a few of his trusted subordinates, not letting anyone hear the voices inside the room.

Xiao Jinshu glanced at Emperor Jingren, looked at the obscured features of his sister’s face, and at last relaxed. He nodded to Xiao Jinyi and also left.

Once everyone was gone, Xiao Jinyi seized Emperor Jingren’s hand and kissed the back of it, smiling happily.

“Let go!” Emperor Jingren’s anger had yet to dissipate. He brought over a towel and a basin of water, intending to clean Xiao Jinyi’s wounds.

“I really am all right.” Struggling, Xiao Jinyi raised a wound-riddled arm and snatched the towel away from Emperor Jingren and wiped his own wounds bit by bit. “I wanted them all to leave so they wouldn’t see that I was a man. If I’m this obvious about avoiding suspicion, and Your Majesty is so good to me, people will start to suspect. If rumors get out one day that the empress is the General of the North, Your Majesty can say that I have amazing natural talents, that I dressed as a man. Anyone who wants to censure the empress for leading troops into battle won’t get very far. I was only forced to lead the troops because there was no one else at court to do it. If they dare to impeach me, they will only be admitting their own uselessness. So this way, the whole thing can be passed over.”

“You have thought it through comprehensively, Jinyi.” The furrows in Emperor Jingren’s brow hadn’t eased since he had come to Mobei.

“Your Majesty surpasses me,” said Xiao Jinyi. “Your Majesty’s explanation just now shut the mouths of all future censors. Otherwise, many of them would have wanted to censure me for showing Your Majesty disrespect, for being insubordinate.”

Seeing him clean away the blood surrounding his wounds and reveal them in all their hideousness, Emperor Jingren’s heart trembled. Huyan Xi’s whip was covered in barbs. Xiao Jinyi had not only been sliced up, he also had barbs sticking out of his flesh. Just looking at them was painful.

But Xiao Jinyi was unperturbed. He took the army medic’s tools, doused them in strong spirits and passed them through flame, then finally extracted barbs one by one. After removing them all, he applied salve and bandaged the wound. This ought to have been done by an army medic; what kind of soldier could be so ruthless toward himself? Emperor Jingren had thought that he could at least help Xiao Jinyi by extracting the barbs, but he wouldn’t even let him lend a hand.

This campaign was being led by Xiao Jinyi alone; Emperor Jingren’s presence had become ridiculous.

Of course, he had known all along that, since he had never led troops before, he was in fact only coming to Mobei as a good luck charm to rally the spirits of the army and the citizenry. He ought to put his trust entirely in Mobei’s officers rather than attempting to interfere. What he needed to do was to go where Mobei’s people went and deliver some high-sounding speeches so everyone could exclaim at His Majesty’s great wisdom.

Though he had known this before, now that he couldn’t even help treat Xiao Jinyi’s wounds and had to stand there and watch as he dealt with them himself—and such dreadful wounds they were—Emperor Jingren still felt wretched.

After watching Xiao Jinyi handle one wound, Emperor Jingren picked up the towel and wiped another one. He snatched away the pincers and wanted to pull out the barbs for Xiao Jinyi.

Xiao Jinyi picked up a clean towel and wiped the blood off his face, kissed Emperor Jingren, then said, “It’s lucky that he didn’t get my face. Wouldn’t you have cast off a disfigured empress?”

His smile was very joyful, as if all his worries had been swept away. When his face had been covered in blood, Emperor Jingren had been unable to see his expression clearly. Now he saw it.

Emperor Jingren closely examined Xiao Jinyi’s face and saw that he was looking at him with eyes full of tenderness. Suddenly, Emperor Jingren reached out and swiftly pulled out a barb; Xiao Jinyi didn’t even frown.

“It seems our technique is sound,” Emperor Jingren said. For some reason, there was a faint chill in his voice.

Xiao Jinyi sensed that Emperor Jingren was displeased, but he only thought he was still angry about him getting injured and didn’t worry too much about it. His young emperor always carried all responsibility on his own shoulders, as if all the deaths and injuries in the land were the emperor’s fault. This temperament made him ache for Emperor Jingren, and it also made him respect him.

Emperor Jingren was a fast study. Soon he had grasped the technique of bandaging wounds. He cleaned and bandaged the majority of Xiao Jinyi’s wounds. Finally, all wrapped up in bandages, Xiao Jinyi was in a presentable state. Only the knives in his ribs and acupoint remained.

Pulling out a knife wasn’t a simple matter. The knife kept too much blood from leaving the wound; once it was pulled, there would be a great deal of blood loss. If the bleeding couldn’t be staunched quickly, it might easily prove fatal.

“Several ribs are broken. What’s to be done? Can they heal?” Emperor Jingren asked.

“It’s fine,” Xiao Jinyi said carelessly. “Huyan Xi is very strong, so the breaks are clean. If they’re set and stabilized, clean breaks like this will heal easily and correctly.”

“How should it be done?”

“You pull the knife out, and I’ll tap the acupoints to stop the bleeding. Once I’ve reset the bones, you just have to bandage them in place,” Xiao Jinyi said.

“Tapping acupoints can stop bleeding? It seems the army medics ought to learn this skill,” Emperor Jingren said thoughtfully.

“The average person can’t learn this,” Xiao Jinyi explained. “Actually, it’s using internal force to temporarily seal off a portion of your blood vessels and stop the blood from moving. This will eventually cause death—it’s only done to make it more convenient to treat the wound. And not everyone who practices martial arts has internal force to rely on. It’s possible to stop bleeding with acupuncture needles, but that isn’t easily learned either.”

“It’s only temporary?” Emperor Jingren asked. “With your internal force, how long can you hold out?”

“My internal force can last as long as necessary, but sealing off any acupoint for too long will cause harm. For this, a quarter of an hour at most.” Xiao Jinyi didn’t know where Emperor Jingren’s sudden interest in this subject came from, but he explained patiently.

After he stopped the bleeding, it was easy to treat the wound. Emperor Jingren watched as Xiao Jinyi set his own bones, reaching into the wound as if he couldn’t feel pain. Emperor Jingren’s face spasmed, but Xiao Jinyi remained unperturbed, like the legendary Guan Yu maintaining his poise as a physician scraped poison off his bone.

The final knife stuck into his acupoint wasn’t a problem; it hadn’t touched bone. The knife just needed to be pulled out so the wound could be bandaged. It was lighter than the wounds from the whip. Huyan Xi had only been trying to give himself a chance to escape, so the main purpose of the attack had been to use his internal force to immobilize Xiao Jinyi. The wound itself wasn’t serious.

When all the wounds had been treated, beads of sweat stood on Emperor Jingren’s forehead, but Xiao Jinyi was unaffected. He hugged Emperor Jingren to comfort him.

“When I gave the order to shoot, I was confident that I would be able to block the arrows. You know my skills. I would have been fine. And a hail of arrows could have stopped Huyan Xi from moving, so I could have taken him alive. I want to be your empress for a lifetime. How could I willingly go to my death?”

Then he kissed Emperor Jingren’s forehead tenderly.

But the icy resolve in Emperor Jingren’s eyes didn’t melt. His hand crept gently along Xiao Jinyi’s chest. When he reached a relatively serious whip wound, he suddenly pressed down hard.

As he did this, Emperor Jingren stared into Xiao Jinyi’s face. At last, he withdrew his hand in disappointment.

“A quarter of an hour has passed. Even if you had sealed off your acupoints to stop the pain, it would have worn off by now.” Emperor Jingren’s eyes were full of inexpressible disappointment. “Xiao Jinyi, you’re as immune to pain as Yan Xu. Isn’t that so?”