Huyan Xi didn’t care about the fate of those three heads. He had anticipated that the trick he had just pulled would work once or at most twice and no more. It was enough that he had succeeded in injuring the General of the North. But Xiao Jinyi saw Xiao Jinshu’s resolve and anguish.

He had lived in this world nearly four years. Though his sense of the passage of time was different here from the real world, he had indeed perceived four years of this world. For people here, an incomplete corpse meant that a person could not be peacefully laid to rest, and their soul would be shattered after death. An incomplete soul would drift eternally through the beyond, unable to enter the underworld, unable to reincarnate. The determination it had taken for Xiao Jinshu to give the order to destroy his brothers’ heads was something they were incapable of understanding as outsiders.

Huyan Xi didn’t care, but Xiao Jinyi did.

Huyan Xi’s abilities were on a par with his, but Huyan Xi’s injury had yet to heal. If Xiao Jinyi fought with all his strength, he could kill Huyan Xi. But he couldn’t use all his strength, because he had to take Huyan Xi alive and awaken the doctor. To others it appeared that he and Huyan Xi were fighting with equal desperation, but Xiao Jinyi knew that he was holding back.

He was a soldier, and coming here to awaken the doctor was his mission. Just as for the warriors here, an order was a fixed point to him. He had to protect the doctor. It was extremely likely now that Huyan Xi was the doctor, so he couldn’t kill Huyan Xi.

But his mission was causing him to injure the people here.

Yes, they were people.

Since falling in love with Shen Junrui, Xiao Jinyi had been unable to keep thinking of the people here as simple data, as ordinary NPCs. Just as the contract they had signed upon coming here said, this world’s “people” had their own thoughts and feelings. The system had perfected their personalities and their ideas to the greatest extent possible. They were so realistic.

Xiao Jinyi did not want to think of the man he loved as data. He would rather see Shen Junrui and all the people here as humans like himself.

This world had been created by the doctor, which made it even more impossible for him to injure a person who probably was the doctor. If something went wrong with the system, the one who could safeguard this world to the last was the doctor.

For all these reasons, he couldn’t harm Huyan Xi.

But as he saw those three bamboo poles lapped by the flames, Xiao Jinyi felt his heart ache. All these people, flesh and blood and spirit, had been created by the doctor; how could the doctor allow himself to become a callous person like Huyan Xi?

He hoped that Huyan Xi was not the doctor, but he couldn’t confirm it until he took Huyan Xi alive.

A sound came to Xiao Jinyi’s ear: the sound of the army arriving. Amid the firelight, he raised his saber high and cried out, “Xiao Jinshu, your reinforcements are here! Do not let them leave the city! Send everyone onto the walls to shoot! Shoot as many as you can, don’t worry about me!”

His voice was carried by his internal force. Xiao Jinshu and Emperor Jingren heard it, and the arriving army heard the General of the North’s voice as well.

However powerful Huyan Xi and Xiao Jinyi might be, they still couldn’t emerge unscathed amid a hail of arrows. This was a battle of near certain death, and Xiao Jinyi had decided to end it at any cost.

From the tower in the city walls, Emperor Jingren shouted, “Xiao Jinyi, don’t you dare!”

But without internal force, his voice couldn’t go far. It was drowned by the noise of the army mounting the wall. The only one who heard it was Xiao Jinshu, who was next to Emperor Jingren.

“Your Majesty.” Counsellor Xiao’s voice was like crushed ice covering the ground in the utter north. “In the field, the army is not bound by the sovereign’s orders. It was the General of the North, personally appointed by Your Majesty, who gave that order just now. Everyone in Mobei will obey the general’s orders.”

“Xiao Jinshu!” Emperor Jingren looked wrathfully at Counselor Xiao.

Xiao Jinshu took a deep breath, forced down all his feelings, and said steadily, “Your Majesty, I have refused a direct order. When the war is over and Huyan Xi has been beheaded, Your Majesty can punish the whole Xiao family as you like.”

“The whole Xiao family? When the war is over, who will remain of the Xiao family but you?” Emperor Jingren seized Xiao Jinshu’s hand.

Xiao Jinshu said calmly, “Your Majesty, my sister has always been lively and charming. The whole family adored him. Our mother told us many times not to bring him near the army, but none of us, not my father or my brothers, not even I myself, could withstand his pleas. We could never resist taking him with us when we went to the barracks. I don’t care whether he is a woman dressing as a man or…let us say a woman dressing as a man, then. There is one thing I know for certain. He is a descendant of the Xiao family through and through. I am very pleased to have seen my beloved little sister as I face my death.”

Then he pushed himself from his wheelchair and rested against the city wall to better direct the army mounting the wall as they spoke.

Face my death? Emperor Jingren clenched his fists. Was Xiao Jinshu planning to wait until Xiao Jinyi died, then deprive Mobei of its only military strategist as well?

He closed his eyes silently, then opened them after a few beats. When his eyes opened, they were filled with unshakeable resolve. Emperor Jingren strode out onto the wall and stood beside Xiao Jinshu. The deputy general of the army had climbed to the tower now. When he saw Emperor Jingren, he knelt at once.

“You all heard General Xiao just now?” Emperor Jingren said mildly.

“Yes, but…” The deputy general had found Xiao Jinyi’s presence objectionable in a number of ways on the road, but he also wasn’t in a great hurry to obey this order.

“We have appointed General Xiao General of the North and given him the seal of commander in chief. His word must be obeyed,” said Emperor Jingren in a loud voice.

Xiao Jinshu’s head shot up to look at Emperor Jingren. He heard him say, “By our order we transferred full authority and responsibility over Mobei’s military affairs to General Xiao. Even we cannot countermand his orders.

“We mean what we say,” said Emperor Jingren emphatically.

The deputy general bowed his head low. “I understand.”

After kowtowing heavily, the deputy general leapt to his feet and went to deploy the archers. Everyone had their own tasks. No one remained beside Emperor Jingren save the Embroidered Guardsmen protecting him and Xiao Jinshu.

Emperor Jingren said to Xiao Jinshu, “You have no need to bear responsibility for the decisions of a general personally appointed by us.”

Against the bright yellow of his robe, Emperor Jingren’s face became whiter and whiter. His lips were bloodless. He seemed ready to collapse at any moment. But he still kept his footing, as if he held all of Xia in place; as long as he didn’t fall, neither would Mobei City. Each day he lived was a day the herding tribes could not invade.

Xiao Jinshu gazed at Emperor Jingren. He had lived at the border for so many years that now, five years after Emperor Jingren had inherited the throne, was the first time he had beheld the emperor’s countenance. Today he understood at last that the young sovereign before him was worthy of being protected by everyone with their lives.

He raised his hands in a salute. “I hear and obey.”

After handing out assignments, Emperor Jingren returned to the tower, sheltered by the Embroidered Guardsmen. Though in the dark it would be difficult for the herding tribes’ archers to aim at the wall, his gold armor was far too eye-catching. To avoid becoming a target, it was safer for him to oversee the situation from the tower.

Of the Embroidered Guardsmen accompanying him, a portion entered the tower as well, and a portion remained on guard outside of it. Jing Xixian had kept his hand over a small and slender guardsman’s mouth the whole time, only letting go when Emperor Jingren had gone into the tower.

“What was that for?!” Su Huailing said angrily.

Without expression, Jing Xixian answered, “I was worried you’d say something.”

He wasn’t making a fuss over nothing. Su Huailing might say something that caused trouble at any moment. He had truly been worried that under these circumstances Su Huailing would burst out with something like, “You’re the emperor, you can’t just let people die, those arrows will hit the General of the North.” If she said that, Su Huailing was certain to die. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust her; it was that she seemed to lack any sense of the wider circumstances. Her heart was full of her own limited sense of righteousness, and now and again she would pipe up against some perceived injustice. All her time at the prison hadn’t improved her, and since she had joined the Embroidered Guard, she had learned to rely on power to achieve her…benevolent ends. She had offended quite a number of important people in the capital; the Embroidered Guard was tired from running after her to clean up her messes.

Of course, each time she spoke out against injustice, Emperor Jingren had an opportunity to deal with one of the capital’s notables. This was the reason that Su Huailing had lived this long.

But if she dared talk back to Emperor Jingren on this occasion, no one would be able to protect her.

“You think I’m stupid?” Su Huailing said, glaring. “I heard General Xiao. The Embroidered Guard gets good intelligence, I know that Huyan Xi is so strong that no one can defeat him. There’s no room for me to get involved even if I wanted to. This is something General Xiao is willing to do for the sake of Mobei’s people…”

As she glared, tears began to flow from her large eyes, trickling down her face. Su Huailing pressed her lips together. “I’ll hide in a dark corner crying to myself if I have to, but I won’t let General Xiao’s hard work go to waste!”

Jing Xixian was silent awhile, then picked Su Huailing up and dropped her in an overlooked dark corner behind the tower. Heartlessly, he said, “Here’s your little corner. Cry all you like, as long as you don’t make a sound. If someone hears you, it might demoralize them.”

Su Huailing was speechless.

—

Beneath the city walls, Huyan Xi tried to run when he heard Xiao Jinyi’s voice. Had he been in perfect condition, he wouldn’t have been afraid of a hail of arrows. Marquis Zhenbei had also thought of using this method against him, but Huyan Xi had been able to escape his encirclement, taking at most a few minor injuries in the process.

Now, however, he was not only still injured, he also had a powerful foe nearby. He would certainly have no chance to ward off stray arrows. The best thing to do was to leave here as soon as possible with his forces. The people of Xia had an old saying—while the green hills last, there’ll be wood to burn; where there’s life, there’s hope.

But how could Xiao Jinyi let him escape? His heavy saber danced as though it were a slim sword. In the blink of an eye, hundreds upon thousands of strokes hemmed Huyan Xi in, wrapping him up so tightly that he had nowhere to run.

Huyan Xi cracked his whip, but Xiao Jinyi didn’t even try to dodge, allowing the whip to bite into him as long as he could stop Huyan Xi. Even when the whip hit the knife still protruding from his body and made it jerk, cutting further into Xiao Jinyi—even when the knife broke his ribs—he didn’t make a sound, still holding Huyan Xi in place.

“General Xiao, are you trying to die?” Huyan Xi roared. “Your whole family is eager to go to their deaths. Your father was like that, and so were your brothers!”

“For the Xiao family, there is something more important than even life or filial piety. For me, there are orders loftier than anything. I must capture you!” Xiao Jinyi said firmly.

“For the doctor’s sake?” Huyan Xi said suddenly. “Wake up. The doctor is dead. I killed him.”

These words came out of nowhere and stunned Xiao Jinyi. In that instant, Huyan Xi drew another knife from his sleeve and plunged it into one of Xiao Jinyi’s acupoints. Right away, pain and numbness spread throughout his body. Xiao Jinyi found that he couldn’t move!