Take control of Wei Zhongxian at the start and confiscate 100 million from him!

Chapter 206 Surprise Attack
As noon approached, the sun grew increasingly intense.

Beside the official road in Henan Province, there was a relatively open flat area.

Prince Fu Zhu Changxun's "army" stopped here to rest and prepare for a belated breakfast.

But this really can't be called an army.

Leaving Luoyang City, after traveling no more than thirty li, many soldiers of the so-called "Imperial Guards," who had been temporarily armed and composed of household servants and guards, were already exhausted, like lazy dogs in the summer. They threw down their weapons and sat down on the ground, unwilling to move an inch.

As for the tens of thousands of refugees behind them, stretching as far as the eye could see, they had long since fallen apart, like grains of sand scattered by the wind, sprawling haphazardly on the ground, their groans weak and feeble.

Soldiers lacked formation, generals lacked fighting spirit, and refugees thronged, each fending for their own survival.

The entire camp was less a camp and more a stinking garbage dump. It stretched haphazardly for miles along the main road.

Outside, tens of thousands of emaciated refugees fought fiercely over a single pot of thin rice porridge so watery you could see your reflection in it. The cacophony of shouts, curses, children's cries, and the wails of the wounded created an echoing scene of hell on earth.

In the very center of this hellish landscape lies a diametrically opposed paradise.

The main force of Prince Fu's "Imperial Guard" occupied the best-located woodland beside the official road.

Although their tents were simple, the air around them was filled with an incongruous aroma of meat and strong liquor.

Several cooks were sweating profusely as they roasted several plump whole lambs, the golden fat dripping onto the charcoal fire and making an enticing sizzling sound.

……

At the heart of this chaos, the source of ugliness and absurdity is an extremely luxurious eight-horse carriage.

The carriage was spacious enough to accommodate a table of food and drink.

Its scale was even more luxurious than that of the emperor's carriage in Texas.

Prince Fu, Zhu Changxun, was like a lump of melted fat, reclining on a couch covered with gold-threaded cushions.

His magnificent princely robes were stretched taut by his plump body, almost bursting open. His mouth was slightly open as two stunningly beautiful maids fed him peeled, glistening grapes one by one.

He chewed with relish, his thick lips glistening with juice, mumbling a complaint indistinctly:

"Ugh... This awful weather, so muggy and hot, it's made my skin rough. That emperor is such a worry! Why can't he just stay in the capital and enjoy himself? Why does he have to come out and cause trouble? And with all this trouble, I have to suffer too..."

His voice held no reverence for the emperor, only resentment towards a junior who had disturbed his peaceful life.

In his view, this so-called "pacification of the capital" was nothing more than a large-scale armed parade, a performance to put pressure on his ignorant nephew emperor.

Their ultimate goal was nothing more than to force the young emperor to rescind the "new policies" that harmed his interests, and to extort more rewards and land from the court.

Just then, the curtain of the carriage was lifted, and a leader of the family guards cautiously entered, kneeling on one knee to report:

"Your Highness, it's getting late. But... none of the scouts we sent out this morning have returned yet."

The leader, who was somewhat knowledgeable among the household guards, spoke with a hint of barely perceptible worry. Scouts are the eyes and ears of the army, and the complete loss of contact with them is the most dangerous sign in any military treatise.

However, Zhu Changxun clearly had no concept of military strategy in his mind.

He simply waved his fat, bear-paw-like hand impatiently, without even opening his eyes.

"What are we coming back for? What could we possibly want?" he muttered, swallowing another grape. "Within a hundred miles of us, whose troops are there besides us? A bunch of peasants, what can they possibly do?"

He seemed to have thought of something, and a greasy smile appeared on his lips.

"Perhaps those bastards spotted some game on the road and went off hunting for fun. Pass down the order to the others: if they don't come back soon, they won't get any of my roasted whole lamb!"

Upon hearing this, the head of the guards opened his mouth as if to say something, but seeing the Prince of Fu's matter-of-fact expression, he swallowed his words and bowed to accept the order: "Yes, Your Highness."

As he left, the worry in his heart did not dissipate, but instead grew stronger. He felt that beneath the calm surface, something unseen was growing wildly.

Inside the carriage, Zhu Changxun was already agonizing over whether to eat the lamb leg or the lamb chops first.

……

In a small grove of trees about ten miles away from the chaotic camp of Prince Fu.

A faint smell of blood filled the air.

Several burly Mongol cavalrymen with fierce eyes were roughly dragging the last of Prince Fu's scouts off their horses with lassoes.

The scout was thrown about, his helmet rolled to the side, and ignoring the pain, he crawled on all fours toward the lead knight, his face filled with terror, begging for mercy incoherently:
"Hero, spare my life! Spare my life! I... I was forced into this! I'll tell you everything! Don't kill me..."

However, he was met not with questions, but with a cold saber. The blade flashed.

The begging for mercy stopped abruptly.

The leading Mongol centurion casually wiped the blood off his knife with a rag, his movements as practiced as if he were just slaughtering a troublesome chicken.

He mounted his horse and respectfully clasped his hands in greeting to a figure under the shade of a tree not far away.

Hu Tingbao stood in the shadows, his face beneath the mask revealing no expression. He calmly observed everything, as if it were commonplace.

In the past two hours, his two thousand iron cavalry, like a group of the most efficient ghost hunters, have silently hunted down a total of more than thirty scouts sent by Prince Fu in seven batches across this vast plain.

Not a single one escaped.

……

The wind seemed to have stopped.

On a high slope, a full twenty miles away from the camp of Prince Fu.

This is the apex of the field of vision, and also the starting point of the carnage.

Qin Liangyu and Hu Tingbao finalized their tactics, then stood side by side on the hilltop, reining in their horses like two silent killing gods.

Behind them, and across the vast plains within their sight, an army of nearly ten thousand had quietly completed its final deployment, each taking its place, entering a deathly silence before the battle.

On the left wing, Hu Tingbao personally led a thousand elite Xuanda cavalry, like a peerless sword sheathed in its sheath, both men and horses were still, waiting only for the moment to be drawn and drink blood.

On the right flank, another thousand cavalrymen split into two groups, like the two front paws of a wolf pack, ready to infiltrate and harass.

In the center, seven thousand infantrymen, personally commanded by Qin Liangyu, formed a huge and silent square formation.

Until the sun reached its highest point, the scorching sunlight shrank everyone's shadow to its shortest length.

Qin Liangyu slowly, very slowly, raised the white-handled spear that she had never parted with since childhood.

The spearhead points straight to the sky.

In an instant, all was silent.

All eyes were focused on the long spear held high.

The next moment.

Qin Liangyu's wrist suddenly pressed down!
The spear, like a black lightning bolt, carried a resolute will and swung forward... fiercely!
"Thump! Thump! Thump thump thump—!"

The languor and tranquility of midday were utterly shattered at this moment!

Next!

"Waaaaah—waaaah—!"

The drumbeats are like a heartbeat, the horns are like a roar!
The sudden, enormous sound, which seemed to shake the entire sky, instantly reached the Prince of Fu's camp.

The refugees scrambling for food, the servants dividing the meat, the soldiers dozing off, and even Zhu Changxun, who was agonizing over the lamb chops and legs in the luxurious carriage, were all startled by the sudden thunder!
"what happened?!"

"It's thundering?"

Countless people looked up blankly at the cloudless blue sky, their faces filled with confusion and unease.

However, they soon found the answer.

"kill--!"

A shout, which started as a single point, quickly spread out and eventually became a torrent powerful enough to change the landscape!
Especially those four thousand new recruits from Shaanxi, who had been suppressing their anger for far too long and had accumulated far too much hatred, all erupted at this moment!

With the earth-shattering sound of drums and horns, and with that earth-shattering cry of "Kill!", two thousand iron cavalrymen transformed into two torrents of water reflecting a blinding cold light in the sunlight, rushing towards the chaotic camp!

The once bustling Prince Fu's camp fell into a brief, deathly silence the moment the drums and horns sounded.

When they saw the billowing smoke and dust on the horizon, obscuring the sky, and the countless weapons gleaming with deathly light within the smoke and dust, the deathly silence instantly turned into hysterical panic!
“Enemy attack—!!”

"It's the government troops! The government troops are attacking!!"

Countless people threw down their bowls and chopsticks, dropped their wine pouches, and scattered in panic like ants whose nest had been disturbed.

(End of this chapter)