Chapter 41: Loyalty

"Platoon leader?!"
"What happened to the platoon leader?"
"Wang Ling, what is the meaning of this!"
In the plaza at dawn, the various officers crowded around Wang Ling, demanding answers.
When they had come to report their victory to their superior after capturing the fortress, they were shocked to find that Su Yao was lying motionless on a stone bench, unresponsive no matter how loudly they called him.
"How have you the nerve to ask me?"
Wang Ling's face was as pale as paper, filled with extreme grievance.
As a non-combatant swept up in the chaos, he had experienced far too much today. Even though he had already witnessed plenty of death, the sight of that pool of blood still caused him to vomit again and again.
Wang Ling wiped the corner of his mouth and said with bitter hatred:
"If it weren't for you bunch of good-for-nothings, why would our benefactor have to burn himself out like this?!"
At these words, all the officers fell silent.
They had a vague understanding of the truth, but simply dared not believe it.
That superior of theirs, who seemed to possess infinite energy, actually had a moment where he exhausted his strength and collapsed.
What supported Su Yao's explosive burst was the advanced talent of the combat-class player from the Dynasty Warriors world, a skill mockingly nicknamed [Musou Awakening].
And Su Yao's awakening skill, [Overlord's Descent], instantly restored all status values to maximum while multiplying his baseline stamina bonus by three, granting him the highest level of super-armor in combat.
However, the price was also very obvious. As a supreme ultimate move with such powerful buffs, the duration of the awakening skill was only three minutes. Upon ending, not only would he suffer the highest level of fatigue penalty, but the cooldown period also lasted a full twenty-four hours.
Therefore, the timing of using the skill was exceptionally crucial, and Su Yao was never willing to use it lightly.
And sure enough, just a moment ago, right after Su Yao unleashed his ultimate and issued the F2A command, his vision went completely black and he fainted from exhaustion.
"We are incompetent and have implicated the platoon leader..." Cheng Lian said with shame.
They knew very well that if it weren't for Su Yao's sudden final outburst in the face of the Royal Tent Guards blocking the gates, their only outcome would have been annihilation.
"If you want to reflect, save it for later," Wang Ling said with a trembling voice.
"I shall look after our benefactor. Do not forget your own missions."
Indeed, their mission this trip was to blockade the Xiangyang Pass, holding it for at least a full day until Zhang Yang's reinforcements arrived.
Recapturing Yellow Reed Castle was merely completing the baseline; next, they had to repair the city defenses while simultaneously sealing off the road.
"I'll take men to fetch water."
"I'll get to work sealing the road."
"I'll go check what supplies are still usable."
"Then I'll clean up the battlefield. We cannot let our brothers just lie by the roadside."
After confirming that Su Yao had merely fainted from exhaustion and was in no mortal danger, Cheng Lian and the others spontaneously sprang into action.
"First of all, though, let the surviving fellows rest for a couple of hours."
Song Xian grabbed Cheng Lian and Hou Cheng by the collars.
The two turned back to look, and under the morning light, every soldier's face was written with exhaustion.
After a whole day of forced march followed by mountain climbing, they had participated in a massive siege battle with barely any rest.
This was only because they were the hundred-battle-hardened elite of Bingzhou; aside from their physical fitness, they were sustaining themselves purely through an extraordinary and resilient willpower.
Had they been ordinary miscellaneous soldiers, even if they hadn't scattered in a panic, they would have long collapsed onto the ground, unable to get up.
Cheng Lian sighed softly, knowing that rest was imperative:
"We'll listen to you then, let's rest for two hours first. Fortunately, thanks to the platoon leader, our progress has been smooth. Once everyone has had a brief rest and we handle the urgent matters, we can properly recuperate."
Based on the positions of Huyan Jun's and Bu Ye's forces yesterday, they would arrive at the foot of the city tomorrow, giving them relatively ample time.
"Provided they continue to amble along at their previous leisurely pace."
Beneath the tree shade, Jin Fangyan hid alone in the shadows, neither participating in the Han army's celebration nor paying attention to their discussion, only letting out a cold hum in his heart.
And the development of the situation truly unfolded just as Jin Fangyan had anticipated.
Having received no scout reports yesterday, Bu Ye's force drastically increased their marching speed, and several hundred vanguard horse archers arrived in the Xiangyang Pass by noon today.
Meanwhile, Song Xian's unit, having just finished placing logs, roadblocks, and other devices, almost collided head-on with the enemy scouts.
"Damn it, am I cursed by the Grand Duke of Jupiter this year? Why am I so unlucky?!"
Hiding in the woods on the western slope along the road, Song Xian watched a group of ten barbarian scouts spread out cautiously across the path to inspect the roadblocks they had newly set up, his face full of resentment.
He could no longer return to the city now, and furthermore, if these barbarians expanded their search radius and dismounted to climb the mountain, they would be exposed within minutes.
"Squad leader, what do we do now?" a soldier asked.
"Wait!"
Song Xian had no other choice.
"We can only hope the brothers up top realize something is wrong quickly."
He slowly raised his head, tracing the sheer cliff adjacent to the eastern side of the road all the way up to the rear mountain precipice of the fortress. As long as someone on the mountain spotted the situation and fired down from the heights, the barbarian cavalry below would only be able to scurry away in panic.
The question now was, was anyone up there observing this area?
The answer was yes.
"Barbarian, how does it look down there?"
The Han soldier Li Hei stood far back from the cliff edge and asked Jin Fangyan, who was staring down the mountain.
"Squad Leader Song has set everything up properly. Barring any accidents, he should be back by evening."
Jin Fangyan did not lie, yet he did not tell the whole truth either, because he had fallen into hesitation.
"Good, then keep watching. I'm going to take a little nap. Report to me immediately if you notice anything."
As the saying goes, coincidences make a book. How could Li Hei know? Driven purely by a matter of face, he had placed his comrades below into a perilous dead end.
Yes, it was merely a matter of pride, not dereliction of duty.
During the previous siege battle, Li Hei had injured his arm and was temporarily unable to perform physical labor.
Consequently, Li Hei was assigned to this rear mountain cliff to monitor the Xiangyang Pass below alongside Jin Fangyan, an eagle-eyed mountain scout.
However, upon arriving here, Li Hei discovered that looking down from the mountain peak was such a terrifying thing.
Clearly, Li Hei could face countless blades and swords on the battlefield without flinching, but right here on this hilltop, he was terrified out of his wits, feeling dizzy at a mere glance.
At a time when manpower was scarce and everyone was doing their utmost, was Li Hei supposed to go back and tell everyone that he couldn't do his job simply because he was afraid of heights?
Li Hei could not swallow his pride, and thinking that the barbarian had already exposed his identity and had no turning back anyway, he handed all the work over to Jin Fangyan, intending only to supervise and report news, figuring nothing would go wrong.
Yet this very gamble dragged Jin Fangyan beside him into a vortex of moral dilemma.
Jin Fangyan hesitated concerning the matter of helping the Hans and acting as a traitor to his own people.
In this era, people's national concepts were still very simple and primitive.
There were both Han border dwellers fleeing to the grasslands in droves to escape intolerable taxes and corvee labor, and large numbers of grassland nomads serving the Han imperial court upon conscription, acting fiercely ruthless when slaughtering their fellow grasslanders.
Compared to the ethereal concepts of nation and state, people of this time valued personal and familial ties, as well as close relationships with fellow villagers, friends, and relatives.
Those who could manage to "eat the ruler's food and be loyal to the ruler's affairs" already possessed extraordinary awareness.
Jin Fangyan was such a man; he believed he was a mountain scout personally appointed by the Great Chanyu, and he had an obligation to stop these tribesmen who sought to betray the Chanyu.
Yet after witnessing the night battle, Jin Fangyan irresistibly began to doubt his own actions. This was war; even with just two hundred people it was already like this, if later on, over two thousand people lost their lives in a foreign land because of a single choice he made right now...
Perhaps if he had been coerced, Jin Fangyan could have convinced himself to obey.
But now, possessing the power of independent choice, Jin Fangyan fell into deep confusion over where his path should lead.