The Tyrant of the Great Qian Dynasty: Not only will I refuse to arrange a marriage alliance, but I w

Outside Chengqian Palace, a chill rises from the bluestone paving stones.

Princess Su Yunxi, dressed in a plain white palace gown, was slender and knelt upright.

The cold autumn wind whipped up her skirt, making her face even paler.

Her body trembled slightly from the cold, but her clear eyes stubbornly gazed at the palace gate.

The palace maids and eunuchs around were anxious and kept trying to persuade him, but they dared not step forward to help him up.

"Princess, you are of noble birth, please get up, the ground is cold!"

"Yes, Princess, His Highness is just temporarily unavailable. What if you kneel like this and harm your health?"

Su Yunxi ignored all the advice and stubbornly stared in the direction of the palace gate.

After finishing his business at the armory, Su Zhe rushed over upon hearing the news.

He walked slowly towards them and saw the white figure kneeling in the wind from afar.

His brows furrowed slightly.

Before he could speak, Su Yunxi had already raised her head.

Seeing Su Zhe's blood-stained armor, which he hadn't yet changed out of, her eyes reddened, and her voice trembled with tears as she questioned him:

"Ninth Brother! How many more people are you going to kill?"

"Prime Minister Zhao Kang is dead, Minister of War Li Quan is dead, and now even Minister Wang, a veteran of three reigns... Are you going to kill off the entire court before you're satisfied?"

"Are you trying to incite the whole world to rebel against you by doing this?"

Her words were filled with fear and confusion.

In her view, Su Zhe's behavior was too radical and too bloody, and he was digging his own grave.

"Your Highness, you are wrong."

Su Zhe's voice was calm, without the slightest fluctuation due to her questioning.

He walked up to Su Yunxi, squatted down, and brought his line of sight to hers.

"The people I killed were not civil and military officials, but traitors to the country."

He looked into Su Yunxi's eyes and said earnestly, "It was them who wanted to send you to the Northern Barbarians as a commodity for a marriage alliance; it was them who wanted to hand over the land of the Sixteen Prefectures of Yan and Yun; it was them who wanted to use your innocence and the dignity of the country to exchange for their own meager wealth and longevity."

"Royal sister, tell me, shouldn't someone like this be killed?"

Su Zhe's words were like daggers to the heart. Su Yunxi's lips moved as she was questioned, but she couldn't utter a single word.

She knew that what Su Zhe said was true.

She had seen the faces of those pro-peace ministers in the main hall before.

But the thought of the northern barbarian army pressing in from outside the city filled her with uncontrollable fear.

"But...but there are 400,000 Northern Barbarian troops outside the city!"

She grabbed Su Zhe's sleeve, her voice filled with despair, "You killed their envoy, and so many pro-peace ministers. This completely destroys any possibility of peace negotiations. What... what do we have to hold off that army of 400,000 wolves and tigers?"

"If the capital falls, it will be a total annihilation! You, me, and all the people of this city will be doomed!"

"Peace talks?"

Su Zhe let out a cold sneer.

"Elder sister, do you really think that negotiating peace will save your life?"

He patiently explained, "What the Northern Barbarians want has never been just one province or one prefecture. What they want is the entire Great Qian, to turn our rich lands into their pastures and our people into their slaves."

"Today we cede a province, tomorrow a prefecture; when we have nowhere left to retreat, that will be the day our country perishes and our race is wiped out."

"The so-called peace talks are nothing but a desperate measure, a way for us to choose a more dignified way to die."

"And I, Su Zhe, choose to live an undignified life."

Su Yunxi looked at him with teary eyes and shook her head.

"But I don't want to see you go to your death! You only have three thousand cavalry. Even if you manage to defeat those thirty thousand vanguard soldiers, how will you face those four hundred thousand barbarian troops?"

"I heard from the palace servants that you've invested all the confiscated money and grain into military supplies. Are you... are you going to gamble everything?"

"Yes, risk everything."

Su Zhe's answer was resolute.

He stood up, reached out his hands, and forcibly helped Su Yunxi, who was kneeling on the ground, to her feet.

Ignoring the chill emanating from her, he pulled her into his arms, using his broad and strong chest to shield her from the autumn wind.

He gently patted her back and said in a tone of unprecedented tenderness:

"Elder sister, it was my incompetence as your younger brother that caused you so much fear and even the humiliation of being sent away for a political marriage."

"But from now on, that won't happen again."

"As long as I, Su Zhe, stand here, no one will be able to make you suffer the slightest injustice. Neither the treacherous villains in the court nor the barbarian wolves outside the city."

His words were not heavy, yet they carried a convincing power.

In his arms, Su Yunxi no longer felt the somewhat cowardly Ninth Brother she remembered, the one who needed her protection.

It was a stranger, yet an incredibly reliable arm.

A man who stands tall and upright.

She slowly stopped crying, but stared blankly at Su Zhe's well-defined profile.

She suddenly realized that, without her noticing, her younger brother had grown into a towering tree that could shelter her from the wind and rain.

Su Zhe took off his cloak and carefully draped it over Su Yunxi, wrapping her petite body up tightly.

"Go back to the palace, have the imperial physician examine you, and then get some rest." His voice softened.

"What happens next is a bit gory, so it's not suitable for you to watch anymore."

He held her shoulders, looked directly into her eyes, and said, word by word, "Trust me. We will win this battle."

He didn't elaborate on his trump cards, such as the Divine Arm Crossbow and the Mystic Iron Armor.

But that certainty dispelled most of the gloom in Su Yunxi's heart.

After seeing Su Yunxi off, the gentleness on Su Zhe's face faded, and his expression returned to its cold and stern state.

The old eunuch Wei An stepped forward at the opportune moment, bowed, and whispered:

"Your Highness, we have just received a report from our spies."

"Xu Liang, the city defense commander, is the same general who deserted from the west gate earlier. He didn't go far."

"This person is lurking in a house in the south of the city. Judging from the movements there, he is probably waiting for news from someone."