In this realistic war game, only I understand the course of the battle.

Shen Du guarded the city wall for five days. For five days, he watched the sun rise from Mount Li in the east and set behind the Wei River in the west. The winter sun had no warmth; it was just a pale disc hanging in the gray sky, turning dark red as it sank below the horizon at dusk, staining the Wei River a dark band of blood. The scene outside the city grew more chaotic each day. Xianbei cavalry had set up camp north of the city, and the number of tents increased daily. Qiang scouts occasionally appeared on the earthen ridges west of the city, gazing at the walls of Chang'an as if they were looking at a dying behemoth.

The situation inside the city wasn't much better. Food rations had been reduced to their absolute limit; the soldiers defending the city received only a bowl of thin porridge each day, the grains of rice in which could be counted. The number of wounded soldiers in the wounded camp was increasing, and Zhou Jing was busy from morning till night, washing and reusing bandages until they were so worn out that they could no longer be held up, so he had to use torn strips of old clothes to make new ones. Zhou Jing said that if they didn't replenish their medical supplies, the infection from their wounds alone would kill them all. But Fu Jian had run out of medical supplies. His messengers set out from Chang'an to request aid in all directions, but most of them were intercepted and killed by the fleeing soldiers before they even left Guanzhong, and the few who reached their destinations couldn't bring back reinforcements—no one was willing to come. Everyone could see that Chang'an couldn't be defended, and no one would risk their troops for a dying city.

That evening, after Lao Wei returned from inspecting the granaries, Shen Du pulled him aside to a corner of the city wall. The news Lao Wei brought back confirmed his premonition—several people had come from the north of the Wei River in the past few days; they were neither defeated soldiers nor refugees. After entering the city, they didn't report to the drill ground but went directly towards Fu Jian's temporary palace. The gatekeeper recognized one of them, saying he was a former subordinate of Yao Chang, but no one knew why they had come. Then, something unexpected happened in the city—Fu Jian summoned several Xianbei generals who had escaped from the Fei River to the palace and executed them in public.

Old Wei heard the news of the executions from the city gate guards. He ran back to the city wall and told Shen Du, his voice low but his words rapid: "Last night, His Majesty summoned several Xianbei generals to the palace, saying they 'deserted in battle, causing the entire army to collapse.' He had them dragged out and executed on the spot. I've inquired; those killed were indeed fast runners at the Fei River, but they weren't the only ones who ran fast. Murong Chui's entire cavalry fled. His Majesty didn't pursue Murong Chui, but instead targeted these few scattered generals without tribal backgrounds. Clearly—" He didn't finish his sentence. But Shen Du understood. Clearly, it was venting his anger. Clearly, Fu Jian no longer had the power to deal with Murong Chui, and could only use a few Xianbei generals without backing to vent his pent-up rage of the past few months.

That night, Chang'an was blanketed by its heaviest snowfall of the winter. Snowflakes fell densely from the leaden sky, landing on the city walls, the crenellations, and the shacks at the base of the walls, transforming the entire city into a white wonderland. Shen Du stood atop the city tower, gazing outwards. In the snow-covered landscape, the lights of the distant Wei River region flickered. He suddenly thought of Zhu Di—in Yumu River, Zhu Di was still arranging military affairs in his final moments. His hands were stained with the blood of countless loyal ministers, but that iron-fisted control at least kept the army from disintegrating in crucial moments. As for Fu Jian—he unified the north through tolerance, through the magnanimity of "unifying the six kingdoms into one family," but when disaster struck, this tolerance became synonymous with weakness.

He took the bamboo slips from his robes and, by the dim light of the oil lamp on the ramparts, flipped through them again. The records of tribal conflicts on the slips appeared exceptionally clear in the flickering lamplight. After finishing the slips, he remained silent for a long time, then rolled them up again and tucked them back into his robes. This intelligence was originally intended as leverage to gain prestige and survival capital, but now its value was more than just leverage—it was prophecy. It prophesied the collapse of the Former Qin, the division of the north, and the tribal leaders who had once groveled at Fu Jian's feet rising one by one to tear the Former Qin to pieces.

At the same moment, on the north bank of the Wei River, Yao Chang stood outside his tent, facing the direction of Chang'an. A thin layer of snow had accumulated on his shoulder armor, which he did not brush away. Behind him stood several Qiang generals, all their eyes fixed on the large white city across the river. A scout rode back from the direction of Chang'an, his horse's hooves leaving a trail of deep and shallow craters in the snow. He dismounted before Yao Chang and whispered a few words of report.

Yao Chang listened in silence for a moment. Then he spoke to his adjutant beside him, his voice low but each word carefully chosen. "Your Majesty killed the Xianbei," he said. The statement itself carried no inclination, but upon hearing it, all the generals in front of the tent simultaneously looked up at him, their eyes filled with a tacit expectation. Yao Chang said nothing more, simply turning and walking back into the tent. Before the tent flap closed, he added to his adjutant, "Continue to wait." He didn't specify what they were waiting for, but everyone who heard it understood—it wasn't for reinforcements, provisions, or opportune moments. They were waiting for a signal.

On the drill ground west of the city, the reorganized defeated soldiers were training in the snow. In the past few days, new defeated soldiers had joined, gradually increasing their numbers from less than two thousand to nearly three thousand. Shen Du led his men in daily drills, but he didn't follow the traditional Qin army drill manuals—those manuals were too rigid and unsuitable for these demoralized and physically exhausted soldiers. He had Lao Wei tie broken crossbow arms and tattered shields salvaged from the city walls to wooden stakes at the edge of the drill ground as targets, practicing close-range thrusts and shield parries in groups. The training wasn't about formations, but about reaction time. He told Lao Wei that the problem with the defeated soldiers wasn't that they didn't know how to fight—they all did—the problem was that they were afraid. Those who are afraid hesitate on the battlefield, and hesitation leads to death. What needed to be done now wasn't to teach them new things, but to reactivate their instincts.

A few days later, Fu Jian urgently convened another court meeting in the main hall of his temporary palace in Chang'an. Few people attended—the ministers who could have fled had already done so, and those remaining were either nowhere to run or too useless to do so anyway. Fu Jian sat behind his desk, noticeably thinner, his eyes sunken, his cheekbones prominent, wearing a faded everyday robe with frayed cuffs. On his desk lay a letter from Weibei—a personal letter from Yao Chang, written with respectful language, stating that the Qiang tribes were willing to continue their loyalty to Qin, but that Weibei lacked provisions and they hoped a batch of grain could be transferred from Chang'an to alleviate their immediate crisis. Fu Jian read the letter several times, then picked up his brush and wrote four characters—"Provisions immediately."

"Your Majesty!" An old minister knelt down with a thud. "Yao Chang is a wolf in sheep's clothing. His claim of insufficient grain supplies in Weibei is a pretense; he's testing the court's strength! If we allocate grain to him, wouldn't that be feeding a tiger with meat?"

"How could I not know?" Fu Jian put down his pen, rubbed his temples hard, and spoke in a hoarse voice that didn't sound like an emperor. "But if we don't give it to him, he'll rebel immediately. If we do, he'll at least have to wait until the supplies run out before he rebels. What I lack now is time—even if it's just to delay for another month, until spring, until reinforcements arrive from all over the country—"

He didn't finish his sentence. He himself couldn't say for sure where the reinforcements were from various places, or whether any more would arrive.

The grain convoy departed from Chang'an three days later. Thirty carts, carrying 1,000 shi (a unit of dry measure) of millet, were escorted by a troop of infantry out of the city, heading north along the Wei River. The convoy had barely traveled ten li (about 5 kilometers) from the city gates when it was attacked—not by Yao Chang's men, but by a band of defeated soldiers and bandits roaming the Wei River. The escorting infantry were scattered, most of the grain carts were looted, and the rest overturned in the Wei River, spilling millet across the riverbank. When the news reached Chang'an, Fu Jian sat behind his desk for a long time without speaking. Then he stood up, walked to the palace gate, looked at the snow falling heavier and heavier outside, and muttered to himself, "Heaven is going to destroy me."

No one bothered to investigate the real reason for the robbery of the grain carts—whether it was bandits, men sent by Yao Chang in disguise, or the infantrymen escorting the carts who stole the grain and ran away—none of that mattered anymore. What mattered was that the last thousand shi of grain stored in Chang'an was gone.

That night, Yao Chang received news of the hijacking of the grain carts in Weibei. He stood outside his tent, facing the direction of Chang'an, a thick layer of snow accumulating on his shoulder armor, yet he didn't brush it away. His adjutant leaned in and whispered a few words, but Yao Chang didn't speak, only slowly nodded. His eyes appeared exceptionally calm in the snowy night—not the calm of confidence, but the calm of having made a firm decision. He turned and walked back into the tent, saying something to his adjutant before the tent flap fell, something that thrilled all the Qiang generals.

"Pass down the order—reorganize the troops."

The next morning, the snow finally stopped. The snow outside Chang'an reflected a blinding white light. Old Wei, who had been guarding the city walls all night, rubbed his eyes and looked down, then froze. A black line appeared on the snow-covered plain north of the Wei River—not deserters, not refugees, but an army. Banners unfurled in the morning breeze, embroidered with Qiang totems. The ranks were in neat marching formations; the vanguard had already crossed the frozen Wei River, the central army was crossing, and the rear guard continued to pour in from the north bank. Yao Chang had rebelled. He hadn't waited for spring, hadn't waited for the provisions to run out, he hadn't even used up the little time Fu Jian had given him. He was just waiting for the snow to stop—when the snow stopped and the roads were passable, he would come.

Old Wei rushed down from the city wall to the barracks. Shen Du was squatting by the stove changing Amu's bandages when he heard Old Wei's footsteps; he knew something was wrong. "On the north bank of the Wei River—Yao Chang's troops, at least twenty or thirty thousand, are crossing!" Old Wei's voice startled everyone in the barracks. Zhou Jing stood up, Amu put down his bowl of porridge, and several retreating soldiers who were still sleeping sprang from their bunks and grabbed their weapons.

Shen Du tied the last bandage around Amu's leg, then stood up and picked up the iron spear shaft leaning against the wall. "I'm going to the city wall. Old Wei, gather everyone on the wall. Be quick." As he walked out of the barracks, he glanced back at Zhou Jing, who was also looking at him. Their eyes met for a moment, and Zhou Jing saw no panic in Shen Du's eyes, only an extremely calm decisiveness. Zhou Jing nodded and turned to go to the wounded soldiers' camp. He knew what Shen Du was going to do—not to kill the enemy, but to gather the routed soldiers who had just been reorganized by Fu Jian. If these people weren't led by anyone, their first reaction upon hearing that Yao Chang was attacking would be to run. Shen Du's task was to keep them calm before they ran away.

On the city wall, the defending soldiers were in complete chaos. Some were piling sandbags behind the crenellations, others were frantically searching for arrows, and still others stood on the tower, gazing at the dark mass of troops outside, oblivious to the weapons falling to the ground. This was the scene Shen Du witnessed when he reached the tower. He slammed his iron spear shaft against a brick, producing a dull thud, and the chaotic city wall fell silent for a moment. All the routed soldiers turned to look at him.

"Listen carefully." Shen Du's voice wasn't loud, but it pierced through the howling wind on the city walls, each word enunciated with extreme clarity. "Yao Chang's troops outside the city number between twenty and thirty thousand. We have less than three thousand. A tenfold difference in strength. But I've traveled from the south bank of the Fei River to here, and I've seen far worse situations. A tenfold difference in strength doesn't necessarily mean defeat on the battlefield—as long as you hold your position. Yao Chang comes from the north of the Wei River. His troops are numerous, but most are newly surrendered tribal forces, and their coordination won't be any better than yours. Moreover, his rear is the vast Wei River Plain, without any support. We are defending the city; he is attacking. Attacking a city requires more than three times the strength to be successful—he doesn't have three times, he only has ten. Ten times sounds like a lot, but the casualty ratio in an attack is the opposite. As long as we can withstand his first wave of attacks, his losses will make him hesitate. Hesitation will lead to unpredictable changes."

Not everything he said was true—he knew the disparity in troop strength was too great, Yao Chang's rear wasn't entirely undefended, and the defenses of Chang'an were far inferior to those of the brick cities he had defended in the past—but these words could stop his hand from trembling. They could calm his eyes, shifting them from the dark lines outside the city to the crenellations in front of him, and slow his heartbeat. He was already very familiar with this scene: panicked crowds, scattered gazes, and a defensive line on the verge of collapse. He knew the first step wasn't to deploy troops, but to steady his breathing.

Old Wei led a squad of infantry to carry sandbags up the crenellations and pile them up. Amu followed behind, while Zhou Jing carried a stretcher along the base of the city wall to the section where the wounded were most concentrated. Shen Du walked around the city wall, observing the damage on the outer side, and finally arrived at the most dilapidated section of the eastern crenellation. The bricks and stones here had already loosened the summer before last, and now, with the snow pressing down, they looked even more precarious. He had several more layers of sandbags piled up, and arranged for braziers to be concentrated in this section—not for lighting, but for use in case of fire to block the attack. If Yao Chang chose this as the main direction of attack, fire barriers and rammed earth stones would need to be prepared in advance.

Shen Du inserted a torch into the iron ring beside the crenellation and looked down. Below the city, the Xianbei cavalry camp was also ablaze with fire. They were also regrouping, but neither advanced towards the city walls nor retreated towards the Wei River. Murong Chui was waiting—waiting for Yao Chang to strike first, waiting for Chang'an to fall, waiting for Fu Jian to die. Then he would decide his side. This was the nature of chaotic times. There were no permanent friends, no permanent enemies, only permanent interests and perpetually observing third parties. Shen Du turned away, his back to the firelight outside the city, his voice soft but extremely steady. "They will attack the city at daybreak tomorrow."