Legend of The Young Master

Chapter 186: Day Ten

Liwei put her chin as high as she could manage. "I do not choose to be your woman, Young Master. I don't even know your name. Girls like me don't get to know the names of the great lords who try to put their knees between our legs, do we? But I am choosing to say no. You are not afraid of the Heavens, and you are not afraid of the Pavilion Mistress.

So I cannot appeal to you along those lines. But by my sake, I can protect myself. If you lay a hand on me again, I will hit you hard."

He stared at her.

He sighed, and she hesitated. But she'd made her decision, and she carried it through. She walked away and didn't look back.

It was difficult for her to decide why she was so angry. It was difficult for her to say—even to herself—why she was choosing to walk away. But he was not for her, despite the feeling that her very soul was screaming as she walked down the steps. When she was away, there were tears in her eyes. The truth was she was in love with him.What he felt was not love.

Somehow she had understood he liked her but not loved her in true sense, he needed her not because he truly desired her but for her bloodline she was valuable to him. This bloodline of hers she did not know if it was demonic or righteous. She was hurt and she wanted to hurt his feelings, but by being so ruthless to him, she felt she had hurt herself more.

✶ ✶ ✶

Jia sat with details of the war. The young master had given him the duty to pen down everything daily and then share the notes with him of what transpired. Jia wrote:

The Siege of Yushan Fortress. Day Ten.

Yesterday the enemy destroyed all the villages by fire and sword. We were forced to watch. Today, the enemy fills his siege lines with monsters, and overhead his foul creatures fill the air with their cries. When more than two of them are over the fortress, it is as if they darken the sky. And it has disheartened many of the people to see how many our enemies really are. They are literally uncountable.

All our efforts to kill them now seem like the efforts of a man with a shovel to move a mountain.

The young master was tireless today, moving from point to point around the fortress. Our people began to build a ballista platform in the ruins of the ballista tower. Old man Xilai helped the workmen lay stones in new material and then worked the material so that it dried faster—a great miracle, and one that did much to encourage the people.

Now it is the middle of the afternoon. The enemy had brought big stone throwers to work, but their stones could not even reach the fortress, and we watched them sail uselessly through the air and land well short of our walls—indeed, one killed a creature of the demonic Wild out in the fields. The young master says that the spirit of resistance can be fueled by things as small as this.

But an hour ago, using his thousands of slaves, the enemy rebuilt his stone thrower closer to us.

✶ ✶ ✶

"You are going to have a go at the Lower Town?," Yun Ming asked.

Wuyi nodded, he was staring out, watching the distant stone throwers built by the enemy to attack the fort as they were cranked back. The enemy had two of those built about fifty Li from the Lower Town's walls, on a timber and earth mound almost forty feet tall. The speed with which they had built the siege mound had been, for Wuyi, the most horrifying moment of the siege.

Perhaps not quite the most horrifying.

Her walking away, he felt it. This was the first time he could not capture a subordinate he wanted to.

On the outside, he was as calm as a lake, giving the illusion that everything was under control and that he knew how to tackle the enemy. It was ironic that Xilai was training him to use illusions, divide himself, rule himself, wall off dangerous elements of Qi spells that unmanage the mind, and counter them. Xilai had started considering Wuyi as apprentice.

He had issued his new apprentice an absolute injunction. "Never use this power on your emotions, boy. Our humanity is all we have," the old man had told him that morning, as if it was a matter of great moment.

Wuyi tried this new skill to wall off his emotions almost the moment Xilai left. His emotions were always in control because of the statue; he wanted to see how effective this skill was compared to the statue. The conclusion was that the skill was a drop of water, whereas the statue was an ocean, but at some point, this skill could become an ocean too.

But clearly, his control needed work.

He settled back into the crenellations as a large rock from enemy camp struck one of the Lower Town gate-towers squarely. The tower shrugged off the hit.

Wuyi breathed.

"We have men down there," Yun Ming said. "We can't hold it."

"We have to," Wuyi said. "If we lose the Lower Town, he's cut us off from the Bridge Castle. Then he shifts his attacks south. It's like Xiangqi, Yun Ming. He is playing for the ground just there," Wuyi pointed at a set of sheepfolds to the south and to the west. "If he can build a siege mound there, and put his stone throwers there, he can destroy the Bridge Castle one tower at a time."

Yun Ming shook his head. It was not like he was a novice; he was a servant of Yuanjin and had read about many sieges, and he clearly hated it when Wuyi talked down to him. "He can build there any time he likes," Yun Ming snarled.

Wuyi sighed. "No, Yun Ming. He cannot. Because he fears our warrior groups. Despite his immense power and force, we've stung him. If he places them there without killing the Lower Town, we can send a group of warriors out and burn his siege stone throwers that he plans to rely on."

"He can build more. In a day," Yun Ming was dismissive. Wuyi considered this.

Yun Ming bored in. "He has limitless muscle power and wood. Probably metal, as well. He can build a hundred stone throwers in ten different places."

Wuyi nodded. "Yes, he can, but not if his creatures desert him," he said. "He doesn't want us to win any more victories."

"Why should he care?" Yun Ming said bitterly.

Wuyi was watching a party of novices going into the healing hall to take their turn at duty.

"Why, Yun Ming! Why you argue and doubt?" Wuyi said. His eyes flashed, and his sigh was evident. "I thought that you believed the heavens were on our side."

He noticed her. She hadn't so much as glanced at him as she passed.

Yun Ming made a fist. "Your blasphemy is an offense," he said quietly.

Wuyi whirled at his lead warrior. "Make of it what you will."

Wuyi had to give this to his warrior, Yun Ming, who truly knew Wuyi's nature deeply. The girl did not know even half of him and wanted nothing to do with him. Yun Ming knew all his evils and never thought of revolting or running away. Granted, the statue had added loyalty deep in him. Maybe all of his subordinates would leave if it wasn't for the statue of harmony.

They were standing, their eyes locked, when a third stone thrower went into action, and they heard the sound of the northern gate tower in the Lower Town collapsing.

"You need to pull those men out of the Lower Town," Yun Ming said.

"No. I will reinforce them. And I'll lead them myself. Who has the Lower Town today? Xueqin Yang?"

"Xueqin Yang is still injured. It's Qingyu Ni." Yun Ming looked out over the walls. "We're losing too many men," he said.

"We're stronger than when we started the siege." Wuyi was bottling his sigh and storing it out of reach.

"It's time you looked around," Yun Ming said. "We have bitten off far more than we can chew. We cannot win this."

Wuyi turned back to his warrior. "Yes, we can."

Yun Ming shook his head. "This isn't a time for boyish enthusiasm—"

Wuyi nodded. "You overstep yourself, my dear Yun Ming. Go to your duty."

Yun Ming continued, "—or warrior's pride. There are two realistic options—"

"And when you are the leader, you can act that way," Wuyi went on. "But let me be as blunt as you seem to be, Yun Ming. You can't see the simplest tactical consequence. You play favorites among the archers and the warriors. You favor those who worship the heavens and despise those who visit pleasure houses. You lack the birth to command men who prize such things.

Most of all, you don't have power, and I do. So I'm bored with explaining everything to you. Obey. That is all I ask of you. If you cannot, then I will dismiss you."

Yun Ming crossed his arms. "In the middle of a desperate siege."

Wuyi's mouth formed a line. "Yes."

They stared at each other.

By nightfall, the enemy had six mounds built for throwing rocks into the Lower Town.