Three Kingdoms: A Million Soldiers Grown from the Fields

Chapter 107 Ding Jianyang was very happy (an extra 4k words were added because someone called him handsome when he went out).

The soldiers of Bingzhou were all in an uproar.

Who is the person in the arena?

Lü Bu of Bingzhou!

The wolf cavalry general Lü Bu, who slaughtered so many that the Hu people dared not utter a sound, and they wholeheartedly submitted to his command!
He lost just like that?

Defeated in less than one round?

Moreover, it was a crushing defeat where his weapon was knocked out of his hand!
Bingzhou has seen all sorts of ups and downs over the years; they've witnessed it all.

But they had never even dreamed of seeing a scene like this today.

Not to mention the Bingzhou army, even Ding Yuan's jaw was slightly agape.

His son, Lü Bu, was a warrior of unparalleled bravery. He joined the army from Jiuyuan and never lost a battle, but today he suffered a crushing defeat!
This is amazing!
Ding Yuan retreated a few more paces on his horse. He could have taken the saying "to catch the thief, first catch the king" as a joke before, but now he really had to think about it carefully.

The red horse pawed restlessly, its breath steaming out white mist, as if it could also sense its master's trembling.

Lu Bu looked down at his hands—his tiger's mouth was torn, and blood dripped from between his fingers, creating dark red craters on the frozen ground.

He suddenly remembered the snow in Jiuyuan, which was also a mix of red and white.

Memory is like a knife, tearing open flesh and blood.

He was twelve years old when he committed his first murder.

The Xianbei cavalry raided the village. The boy grabbed a shepherd's pitchfork and stabbed the throat of the barbarian who was tearing at his sister's clothes. Warm blood sprayed onto his face, tasting bitter and foul.

The wide-open eyes of that person before they died bear a striking resemblance to my own now.

My first year in the army, at the Bingzhou training ground.

With a single wooden spear, he felled seven veteran border soldiers. Ding Yuan personally placed an iron helmet on his head, saying, "Your name is Fengxian, and you shall be the courage of Bingzhou!" That day, he received a warhorse with a new saddle, and as he ran, his heart felt like it was burning with fire.

In the autumn hunt, he rode alone to chase after the Hu people.

He single-handedly routed a group of Xianbei cavalry, and when he returned to camp with the chieftain's head on his spear, the Bingzhou army knelt on the ground, shouting "Flying General!"

"We lost..."

Lu Bu suddenly burst into laughter, a laugh colder than the wind at Yanmen Pass.

Do you know why you lost?

A voice rang out, like a thunderclap in the snow.

Lu Bu suddenly looked up and saw Zhang Xian already shouldering the heavy black halberd.

"Why!" he demanded, his eyes yearning for an answer!
Zhang Xian exhaled a breath of stale air, the white mist turning into a wisp of smoke at the corner of his mouth.

"You are not pure enough, and you do not have a goal that you would do even if it meant being crushed to ashes. Therefore, you do not know why you fight or why you take up arms. Your strength is only the talent that your body has given you innately, but not your will."

"not enough!"

"And what about you!"

Lu Bu stared intently into the eyes of the person in front of him.

"Me?" Zhang Xian was taken aback, then laughed.

"Want to know?" He raised an eyebrow.

Lu Bu nodded subconsciously: "Mm."

"Haha, Lü Bu, you're quite amusing. Come visit me in Lüchi sometime!"

Zhang Xian rode forward, picked up the spear stuck in the frozen soil, and flung it back into Lü Bu's hand.

He spoke softly, in a tone only the two of them could hear: "If you can't find a reason to fight, then I can give you one!"

After saying this, he bowed to Ding Yuan, who had already entered the Bingzhou army formation.

"Prefect Ding, I fear that Magistrate Zhang Xian of Luqi County has come to pay his respects by imperial decree! Now that he has been received, is there any further order?"

The drill ground fell silent for a moment.

After a long pause, a voice finally echoed from within the army ranks: "Without orders, retreat."

Zhang Xian cupped his hands again and said, "Yes, sir!"

He turned and smiled at Lü Bu, then immediately rode back.

"Peach Blossom Riding!"

"exist!"

"Back to the city!"

"promise!"

Fifty riders marched out from the gate again, and on the training ground, the generals were still immersed in Zhang Xian's unparalleled fighting prowess.

Lu Bu gazed wistfully at the departing figures of the Peach Blossom Cavalry, muttering to himself.

"will."

Zhang Zixu

Zhang Xian's last few words swirled in his mind, he couldn't quite grasp them or explain them, and he felt restless and agitated.

"How is my son, Fengxian?"

Seeing Zhang Xian and the others leave, Ding Yuan then rode out of the army camp.

Approaching Lü Bu's side, he asked with apparent concern.

"Godfather!" A hint of resentment flashed in Lü Bu's eyes.

He clasped his hands in a fist and said, "I've embarrassed you today!"

“Victory and defeat are common occurrences in war, Fengxian, there’s no need to worry about it. It’s just that Zhang Xian’s behavior is eccentric and domineering. Fengxian, you still have a hand injury, you should go and get it treated quickly.”

Lü Bu nodded silently: "Then I'll take my leave."

Ding Yuan narrowed his eyes as he watched Lu Bu's retreating figure.
-
Outside Yinguan County.

The fifty-odd riders did not stop for the slightest.

They arrived with about fifty horses, but returned with two hundred.

This is very much like Bingzhou.

"Brother Xian, what did you say to that guy at the end?"

Standing beside Zhang Xian, Zhao Yun asked curiously.

"How strong is Lü Bu?" Zhang Xian didn't answer, but asked instead.

Zhao Yun pondered for a moment: "He's stronger than me."

"Go back and practice more."

"promise!"

Zhang Xian withdrew his gaze.

He silently apologized to Zhao Yun a few times.

'If you can't hang up, then you'll just have to sweat, Brother Yun.'

Recalling the last few words he said to Lü Bu at the training ground, his face flushed.

How could someone who's cheating have the nerve to say something like that?
It's not pure enough; the will and the body are not in harmony.

Several times I wanted to sigh and rub my forehead. I thought that once I got to university, I would have graduated from my teenage years. I never thought that coming here would make me feel like I had returned to my teenage years.

However, a slight smile still appeared at the corners of his mouth.

What he said to Lü Bu in the end was not important; what was important was that Ding Jianyang saw him whispering to Lü Bu.

He was a suspicious person to begin with; otherwise, he wouldn't have forced a military officer into the position of chief clerk.

It's called tempering one's character, but who would temper a good person while simultaneously being beaten to death by others?

Oh, I'll step in whenever you need me, but after I'm done, I get no benefit from it, and in the end, I still have to hear you say it's for my own good.

Pull it down.

Ultimately, it was because they were worried that the other party's prestige in the army was too great and would affect their control over the Bingzhou army.

Otherwise, if you truly regarded him as your adopted son, he wouldn't have killed you on the spot over a horse.

Zhang Xian made no attempt to hide the fact that he was after Lü Bu.

This age is the best time for Lü Bu.

There's still hope for Lü Bu at this age!
The horse trod slowly through the snow into the city of Yinguan.

Lu Bu looked down at the torn wound on his tiger's mouth, the blood had congealed into a dark red scab, but the restlessness in his heart was surging even more.

"You're not pure enough..."

Zhang Xian's words were like a dull knife, repeatedly scraping at his thoughts.

My thoughts were churning, and they kept drifting back to the snowy night in Jiuyuan.

I was twelve years old that year. In my memory, my mother would always be under the window mending my old coat by the moonlight.

"Bu'er, are you hungry?" A withered hand pulled half a millet cake from his pocket, the cake still warm from his body. He shook his head and pushed the cake back: "I'm not hungry, Mother eats."

Suddenly, the wind and snow howled outside, and the sound of Xianbei horses' hooves came and went. His mother abruptly shoved him into the cellar: "No matter what you hear, don't make a sound!"

Through the cracks in the wooden planks, he saw his mother raise her wood-chopping knife—

It turns out that the first person to teach me how to hold a knife was my mother.

That night, my mother died.

Fourteen years old.

On the grassy slope, the old shepherd who had adopted them pointed to the flock of sheep grazing: "See the lead sheep? The scars on its horns and neck are from three wolves last year."

What did I say in response? Oh, it was, "What's so interesting about animals fighting?"

"Foolish boy," the old shepherd tapped his forehead, "a man must live like a sheep—fight or die, there's no way to wag your tail and beg!"

That year, the old shepherd also died, in the forest where he roamed with wolves.

Sixteen years old.

He knelt before his mother's grave and placed the Xianbei skull next to the rough pottery bowl.

"My son will go to serve Commandant Ding tomorrow." The wine soaked the new grass on the grave. "I'll make sure the barbarians remember the name Lü Bu!"

The wild wind swirled up grass ash, like a sigh.

The red horse suddenly stopped, and only then did Lü Bu realize that they had arrived at the camp gate.

A bodyguard carrying a medicine box greeted him: "General, I'll bandage you up..."

"roll!"

He roared, startling his personal guards who staggered backward.

--wrong.

Lu Bu gripped the reins tightly, and Zhang Xian's voice rang in his ears again:

"If you can't find a reason to fight, then I can give you one!"

The campfire crackled and popped, casting flickering light in his eyes.

"Give it to me, let me have some peace and quiet."

".only."

Deep inside the stable, Lü Bu, his hands bandaged, led his red horse back to the stable. The horse nibbled on the trough and snorted a few times.

Lu Bu removed the saddle and bridle, his fingertips tracing an old scar—a wound from long ago. It turned out his old buddy had truly aged.

"Seven years ago, when I first joined the army, I was rewarded with this gift for killing a barbarian."

Now, you're old too.

He stroked the horse's back tenderly, now that its saddle and bridle had been removed.

The marks left by the saddle on it have become part of the red horse's body.

Hiss!
Chi Ma stomped his feet on the ground in frustration, as if protesting Lu Bu's words.

"Alright, alright, you're in your prime, aren't you?" Lu Bu laughed, gently soothing the red horse, "My temper is partly due to you, aren't you?"

"Yes! I disagree!"

"Old buddy, keep me company a little longer. We'll fight Zhang Zixu again next time!"

Hiss!
Yanmen Plank Road.

Fifty riders sped past, amidst the swirling snow and wind.

"Brother Xian, we've offended Ding Jianyang today. What will we do if he targets us in the future?"

On horseback, Zhao Yun kept thinking about the consequences of his brother Xian's actions that day.

But perhaps his master was right; he really wasn't cut out for thinking about these kinds of things. After thinking for a long time, he still had no clue and could only ask Brother Xian.

"Targeting us?"

As the warhorses galloped, Zhang Xian's voice sounded somewhat ethereal.

"Why is he targeting us? He's probably overjoyed!"

"Happy?"

Zhao Yun was stunned. What was all this about? Was he talking about the same topic as Xian Ge?

"But how can he be happy after we humiliated him like this today?"

Zhang Xian glanced at Zhao Yun, revealing a helpless look in his eyes that said the child was too stupid and he couldn't teach him no matter what.

However, considering that this was his younger brother Yun, he carefully instructed him: "What is Ding Jianyang's greatest asset?"

Zhao Yun pondered for a moment, then hesitated before asking, "The governor's status?"

If they weren't riding horses, Zhang Xian would have loved to give his younger brother Yun a good whack on the head.

"Think about it carefully, your brother Xian also holds the position of county magistrate, so why didn't Ding Jianyang dare to force me to stay?"

Zhao Yun scratched his head: "Strength?"

Zhang Xian was relieved: "You're half right."

"The strength of an ordinary person is at most on par with that of Lü Bu or Xiang Yu, the Hegemon-King of Chu."

"But these two still have ways to be surrounded and killed, so individual strength has its limits. What Ding Jianyang really cares about is the Bingzhou army."

"This is his essence."

"The reason I say he would be happy is that there is someone in the Bingzhou army who is more popular with the soldiers than he is. Who do you think that person is?"

Without the slightest hesitation, Zhao Yun replied, "Lü Bu."

“That’s right!” Zhang Xian spurred his horse, controlling its speed so it wouldn’t exceed that of a normal warhorse, otherwise his fifty-odd riders wouldn’t be able to handle it.

"When I went there, I had already inquired about the news of Ding Jianyang, the cavalry commander of Yanmen. I found that there was another commander in the Bingzhou wolf cavalry under his command, and that person was Lü Bu."

"You have experience commanding troops. What would you do if someone under your command had a voice as loud as yours?"

"Let's have a contest with him and completely solidify our command over the troops!"

Zhang Xian chuckled and shook his head: "You're right, but what if that person were me? No, I mean, what if that person could make you cry just like I am now?"

Zhao Yun curled his lip: "I wonder who was the one who cried after being beaten like that before."

"I can hear you!"

Zhang Xian glared at him irritably.

Zhao Yun chuckled awkwardly and said, "Then why should I fight? I'll just listen to him."

Zhang Xian nodded: "But Ding Jianyang is not you, and Bingzhou is not a very mountainous place. In the border region, the army holds the most important power, far exceeding status. Therefore, today I knocked Lü Bu's weapon away, and he was actually happy."

"The decline in Lü Bu's prestige represents the rise in Ding Jianyang's prestige, which is beneficial for him to consolidate his control over the Bingzhou army."

"Lu Bu's military achievements are too great, earning him the title of Flying General. He has become too powerful to be controlled. After today's crushing defeat, Ding Yuan can even legitimately let him recuperate first, and then let other trusted confidants take over the military affairs."

"That's why I said Ding Jianyang would thank me."

"But that doesn't stop him from targeting his lord, does it?"

Zhao Yun remained puzzled.

Zhang Xian shook his head: "That's why Brother Yun needs to learn the skill of understanding people's hearts."

"As I said before, in Bingzhou, the military is more important than one's status. Ding Jianyang understands this well, so he would never dare to confront me directly!"

"The tougher I am in front of him today, the less he will dare to confront me head-on!"

Zhang Xian looked at Zhao Yun and said succinctly, "Because he has only just taken up the position of governor, he dares not gamble!"

"Brother Yun."

"what?"

"If Ding Jianyang doesn't dare to target us openly, are we afraid of being targeted behind our backs?"

The young man on the white horse with the silver spear finally understood.

He stroked the spear behind him and laughed loudly: "What's there to be afraid of! If there are no open attacks, as many hidden arrows as come, we'll all die!"

"That's the truth."

Zhang Xian smiled with satisfaction, saying that his brother Yun's combat skills surpassed those of everyone else, but his interpersonal skills... sigh.

"Speed ​​up by twenty li! After passing the Yanmen Plank Road, set up camp and rest!"

"promise!"
-
Lüqi County.

An old horse carrying a thin young man slowly entered the city.

At the street corner, the man looked up at the stone pavement not far away, where the bloodstains had not yet been wiped clean.

He chuckled lightly: "Indeed brutal. Of the 237 members of the family and the more than 600 people from both families, not a single one survived."

"Zhang Zixu, Zhang Zixu, I really look forward to meeting you!"

(End of this chapter)