Chapter 27: No One Dared to Object
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“Where has all that arrogance gone? Where is that righteous courage you showed just moments ago, condemning me as a mere young pup in the name of the nation and its people?”
Xiao Zhan walked up to Liu Yong and looked down at the Ministry of War grandee, whose face had gone utterly pale.
“Now, I’ll say it again.”
“You are nothing but a bunch of useless fools.”
This time, no one contradicted him.
The military officers who had been so indignant moments earlier all lowered their heads. They no longer even had the courage to look Xiao Zhan in the eye. Their pride, their seniority, their battle achievements—all of it was as fragile as a joke before absolute power.
“Thud!”
A younger official could no longer withstand the terrifying pressure. His legs gave way, and he fell to his knees, his whole body trembling like a sieve.
“Y-Your humble servant… Your humble servant failed to recognize Mount Tai! I beg Your Excellency Xiao… to forgive me!”
Once one had knelt, a second soon followed.
“Thud!” “Thud!”
In an instant, more than a dozen officials of the Ministry of War, civil and military alike, regardless of rank, had all dropped to their knees inside and outside the great hall!
They were not kneeling before Xiao Zhan, the Left Vice Minister of War.
They were kneeling before the terrifying power represented by those two weapons—power capable of overturning the entire age!
Only Liu Yong remained standing.
It was not that he did not want to kneel. His legs had already gone weak with fear, and only the corridor pillar behind him kept him from collapsing. His old face shifted from green to white before finally turning ashen.
It was over.
He knew that from this day onward, the Ministry of War would be turned upside down.
“Forgive you?” Xiao Zhan gave a scornful laugh without even sparing the kneeling men a glance. “I cannot forgive your crimes. You should seek forgiveness from the soldiers of the Northern Frontier who died unjustly. You should seek forgiveness from the millions in military provisions squandered for nothing from the imperial treasury!”
He turned his head, his gaze once again locking onto Liu Yong.
“Vice Minister Liu, you still haven’t answered my wager. Do you dare, or don’t you?”
Liu Yong’s throat bobbed with difficulty. He opened his mouth, his voice hoarse as a cracked gong.
“Vice… Vice Minister Xiao… I… I…”
“I what?” Xiao Zhan pressed forward relentlessly.
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“I… accept!” Liu Yong seemed to have been drained of every last ounce of strength as he forced the words through clenched teeth.
Accept?
Xiao Zhan smiled.
“No. You are not yet qualified to say you accept my terms.” He shook his head, his smile cold and sinister. “I said it already—this is a wager. A wager concerning every one of your official caps. Now, I need you to put it in writing.”
“What?!”
Liu Yong abruptly raised his head.
“Black ink on white paper, with your fingerprints affixed.” Xiao Zhan’s tone allowed no argument. “Write this: Liu Yong, Right Vice Minister of War, together with all the senior officials of the Ministry of War, acknowledge their own incompetence and their inability to resist the northern barbarians. Therefore, we enter into a military pledge with Xiao Zhan, Left Vice Minister of War. If Xiao Zhan can, with three thousand troops, annihilate the barbarians within three months and return with their khan’s head, then we shall petition His Majesty to strip us of our official robes and allow us to retire to our native villages!”
“You! You’ve gone too far!”
Liu Yong trembled with rage.
This was no longer mere humiliation. Xiao Zhan intended to seal off every possible escape for all of them and nail them forever to a pillar of disgrace!
“Gone too far?” The smile vanished from Xiao Zhan’s face, replaced by a chill that pierced to the bone. “If I fail, then I, Xiao Zhan, will be the only one to die! But if we follow your worthless plan, it will be thirty thousand soldiers of Great Ming who die! It will be the dignity of the entire Ming dynasty! Tell me—who is the one going too far?”
He suddenly kicked the wooden human-shaped target beside him.
“Bang!”
The target, protected by heavy black-iron armor yet still torn apart by bullets, toppled with a crash and slammed heavily onto the ground.
“Will you sign, or won’t you?!”
Xiao Zhan’s roar shook the hall.
Liu Yong looked at the black-iron armor reduced to scrap metal. He looked at the artificial hillock, half of which had been blasted apart. Then he looked at his colleagues kneeling all around him, silent as frightened cicadas.
He knew he had no choice.
If he refused to sign, the madman before him truly might riddle them all with bullets on the spot! The emperor’s authority to execute first and report afterward was no empty threat.
If he signed, there would still be a sliver of hope. What if… what if this madman failed?
After witnessing those godlike weapons, the possibility was vanishingly small, but at least it left him something to cling to.
“Very well…” Liu Yong closed his eyes, seeming to age ten years in an instant. “I’ll sign.”
“Bring ink and brush!”
Xiao Zhan’s barked command rang out.
At once, a terrified minor clerk came crawling and rolling back with the four treasures of the scholar’s studio.
Without even looking at the document, Xiao Zhan dictated its contents. The clerk’s hand shook like someone suffering from palsy, and only after great difficulty did he finish writing what could be called the most humiliating military pledge in the history of the Ministry of War.
“Vice Minister Liu, if you please.”
Xiao Zhan held out the sheet, still carrying the fragrance of fresh ink, before Liu Yong.
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With a trembling hand, Liu Yong picked up the brush and wrote his name. Then he dipped his finger into the vermilion ink and pressed his fingerprint firmly onto the page.
The vivid red mark was like an unhealing wound, branded upon the paper—and upon the honors of his entire life.
“And you?”
Xiao Zhan’s gaze swept over the men kneeling on the floor.
The officials seemed to awaken from a dream. One by one, their faces ashen, they lined up and stepped forward, signing their names after Liu Yong’s and pressing their fingerprints onto the document.
A single thin sheet of paper now bore the future and fate of every member of the Ministry of War’s inner circle.
Xiao Zhan lifted the military pledge with satisfaction, blew gently on the ink, then carefully folded it and tucked it into his robes.
“Excellent.” He nodded. “Now that the pledge has been made, we can discuss the real business.”
He surveyed the assembly. His voice had returned to its calmness, but the authority brooking no dissent was stronger than before.
“First, I want three thousand men. But I will not choose them from the Ministry of War’s registers. I will personally select them from the capital garrison. Whoever catches my eye, regardless of whose personal guard or retainer he is, you will release him without condition!”
“Second, I want an independent military camp to serve as the station and training ground for these three thousand men. I alone will have complete authority over all defense and logistical matters. No one from the Ministry of War is to interfere!”
“Third, I want money! Five hundred thousand silver taels! This will cover the pay, equipment, and logistical supplies of my new army. The funds must be allocated to me within three days!”
“Fourth, I want craftsmen! From all the master artisans under the Ministry of War’s Armaments Bureau and Gunpowder Office, I want one hundred men! I will select them personally as well!”
With every demand Xiao Zhan announced, Liu Yong and the other officials grew paler.
How were these requests?
He was plainly carving the flesh from their bodies and drinking their blood!
The capital garrison was the emperor’s personal army. Which soldier within it did not have powerful connections? If Xiao Zhan chose anyone he pleased, how many people would he offend?
An independent camp under his complete control? That amounted to establishing an independent kingdom in the capital, subject to no one’s authority!
Five hundred thousand silver taels! That was an outrageous demand. Their recently approved campaign of eighty thousand troops had required only one million seven hundred thousand taels in military expenditure. Yet Xiao Zhan wanted five hundred thousand for three thousand men?
And those master craftsmen were each precious treasures, the Ministry of War’s final reserve of strength. He had simply opened his mouth and demanded a hundred of them!
“Vice… Vice Minister Xiao…” Liu Yong’s voice was unbearably dry. “This… this does not conform to regulations…”
“Regulations?”
Xiao Zhan let out a cold laugh and patted the military pledge inside his robes.
“From this moment on, I am the regulations.”
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