NOVEL NEXT Ch. 3
Chapter 3: Entering the City to Kill the Enemy
Jiang Zhaoming took a deep breath and shouted at the female general: “How do the rebels compare to our forces?”
The female general reined her horse to a sudden halt. Her armor was splattered with blood, and her chest rose and fell violently.
“The enemy has over ten thousand Flesh Refining Realm soldiers, and two regular armies that have mastered battle formations! Our army… has only a thousand remaining crippled soldiers of the Tempering Bones Realm!”
Jiang Zhaoming’s vision went black.
A thousand against more than ten thousand?
This was not a fiefdom—it was a deathtrap!
The red-armored female general spurred her horse forward and galloped wildly to Jiang Zhaoming’s side.
When she saw that this so-called “reinforcement” was only a few hundred personal guards, the light of hope in her eyes instantly extinguished.
“It’s over...” she whispered in despair. “His Highness actually came without a single soldier...”
Qin Wei’s brows furrowed like chiseled blades. In a deep voice, he said: “Your Highness, allow this humble general to enter the city to aid them, while you lead the guards here to respond!”
“Wait!”
Jiang Zhaoming suddenly lifted the carriage curtain and stepped outside. With a “clang,” he drew the dragon-patterned sword at his waist, its edge reflecting a blinding cold light under the scorching sun.
“All guards, follow me into the city to kill the enemy!”
At these words, all the guards’ expressions changed.
They were all death-sworn soldiers willing to charge through fire and water, but if even a single hair on the Prince was harmed...
“Your Highness, you must not!” Qin Wei’s voice cracked in urgency. “Your noble body is worth more than gold...”
Jiang Zhaoming’s gaze swept across them like lightning, and the pressure of imperial authority froze everyone’s breath.
“Father the Emperor decreed me as the Prince of Anxi. This city is my fiefdom! How can a sovereign cower from battle and send his soldiers to their deaths in his stead?”
The guards’ hands trembled slightly as they gripped their blades.
Who would have thought that this seemingly frail prince would have such courage!
But Jiang Zhaoming knew well in his heart—he would not truly be marching to his death.
He still had his trump card.
“Whole army, hear my command!” He pointed his sword at the city gates. “Follow me into the city to kill the enemy!”
As they charged through the city gates, a hellish scene greeted them.
Amidst shattered walls and broken ruins, corpses of commoners and severed limbs of defenders were piled together.
From the thick smoke came the wails of women and children, while the clash of metal resounded endlessly in the distance.
“Where are the main rebel forces?” Jiang Zhaoming barked in a harsh voice.
The red-armored female general thrust her spear forward: “In the inner city! The rebels are assaulting it!”
Qin Wei, like a towering iron wall, shielded Jiang Zhaoming’s side.
On his crescent blade, arcs of lightning flickered faintly.
“Your Highness, remember—should danger arise, retreat behind me at once!”
As they charged into the inner city passage, deafening shouts of battle surged like a tidal wave.
Thousands of rebels surged like a black tide, sealing the inner city gates completely.
The remaining defenders formed a wall of flesh and blood at the gate’s opening, with soldiers falling every passing breath.
“It’s reinforcements from the court!” A shrill cry rose among the rebels.
In an instant, hundreds of rebels turned their blades and pounced like a pack of wolves!
“Protect His Highness!”
The guards were just about to form their battle formation, when suddenly Qin Wei stepped forward.
“Boom!”
The stone-paved ground exploded beneath his feet!
The mighty general in dark robes crashed into the enemy ranks like a falling star, his crescent blade carving a luminous half-moon arc.
“Break!”
A blinding arc of bloody blade energy swept in all directions, and dozens of rebels were cleaved cleanly in half!
Innards and blood splattered onto the city walls, forming a ghastly mural.
“Qi and blood released externally… a Divine Power Realm expert!” The red-armored female general felt her heart steady slightly.
Jiang Zhaoming turned to the others and said: “You all, go forward and fight as well.”
With this god of slaughter opening the way, the group soon hacked their way through the encirclement.
At the inner city gate, the blood-drenched captain of the defenders dropped to his knees to give a hurried report: “The west and south gates have fallen! The rebels are flooding into the inner city!”
“What?” The female general’s face turned ashen as she quickly looked toward Jiang Zhaoming and Qin Wei.
Yet Jiang Zhaoming remained unshakably calm. He looked at the defenders and said: “You all continue to hold this place. Now tell me—where is the main rebel army?”
The defender immediately replied: “Two of the rebel regular armies, each about 2000 strong, have entered the inner city from the west and south sides.”
“A fine case of catching turtles in a jar.” Jiang Zhaoming sneered. “Uncle, follow me to reinforce the south gate!”
Qin Wei nodded and immediately led the guards to charge toward the inner city’s south gate.
After advancing barely ten miles, Jiang Zhaoming could already see the high-flying banners of the rebels in the distance.
His eyes grew solemn as he turned to Qin Wei: “Uncle, please lead the guards forward to break the enemy!”
Qin Wei immediately refused: “Your Highness must not. Your safety is of utmost importance.”
Jiang Zhaoming shook his head firmly: “There are not many strong enemies inside the city. Leave a few to protect me, and the rest must go kill the enemy swiftly.”
Seeing his insistence, Qin Wei looked at two men behind Jiang Zhaoming: “Xu Xian, Chen Kang, you two stay behind to protect His Highness. The rest, follow me!”
Xu Xian and Chen Kang were among the strongest in the guard, second only to Qin Wei himself.
Their strength was at the eighth and seventh layer of the Blood Refining Realm respectively.
At his words, the two immediately led Jiang Zhaoming to hide, while the other guards went forth to battle.
The three found a civilian house and sheltered Jiang Zhaoming inside.
At this moment, Jiang Zhaoming finally had the chance to play his trump card—the Black-Armored Army’s military camp.
His consciousness sank into his mind, opening his Divine Artifact storage.
A card depicting a military encampment lay within.
With a thought, Jiang Zhaoming activated the card.
In the next instant, his vision shifted, becoming an overhead view of Anxi City.
Everything within the scene seemed slowed countless times over—whether it was the deafening soldiers’ cries of battle or even a Divine Power Realm expert like Qin Wei.
Then, the illusory image of a military camp spanning 400 acres appeared in the scene, and Jiang Zhaoming could freely move its position.
He quickly found a secluded place in the outer city and placed the camp there.
Once the camp was set, his vision returned to normal—but in his heart, a mysterious new sense of connection arose.
It was as if with his will alone, he could communicate with the soldiers of the Black-Armored Army.
At the same time, the frozen world around him resumed.
Yet now, in the outer city’s southwestern outskirts, a massive new military camp had inexplicably appeared.
Soon, residents nearby saw a fully armed army, clad in black armor, marching out of the camp.
The neat formations and uniform black armor struck fear into all who beheld them.
“Mother, let’s run… with rebels like these, even if the lord returns with his troops, he might not withstand them...”
At the front of the Black-Armored Army, the commanding general glanced once at the trembling child, then swept his eyes over the unfamiliar surroundings with no expression.
He merely carried out Jiang Zhaoming’s plan—dividing the army into two groups, advancing from the west and south gates of the inner city, slaughtering rebels all the way inside.
Meanwhile, within the inner city, Qin Wei and the guards were locked in fierce battle with the southern rebel army, yet had failed to gain the upper hand.
The rebels’ regular army had formed a battle formation, and the Blood Refining Realm expert leading them drew upon the formation’s power to fight Qin Wei, a Divine Power Realm, to a standstill.
Such formation-enhanced pseudo-Divine Power experts lacked the true techniques of real Divine Power experts, yet their endurance and defense far exceeded normal ones.
“Damn it, these rebels are stronger than I thought.”
Qin Wei looked toward the enemy general’s rear—there were not just 2000 regulars, but 3000, along with another 3000 irregular troops.
The formation of these 3000 regulars continuously poured blood energy into their commander, allowing him to fight Qin Wei evenly.
The only way to break this was to kill soldiers within the formation, disrupting the flow of blood energy.
Only then was there hope of breaking through.
But the problem was this—with fewer than 300 defenders left, plus 500 guards, dealing with those 3000 irregulars would take considerable time.