Border Soldier: My fiancée snatched credit and broke off the engagement, so I promptly became a marq

When Blacktooth arrived at Iron Horse Fortress, the last rays of dawn were still visible outside the city.

Eight hundred black horses, eight hundred suits of black armor.

The cavalrymen's faceplates were painted with two white animal teeth, and short crossbows hung on the left side of their saddles, while curved swords hung on the right. The commander, Han Jiu Kui, was Han Wan Shan's adopted son, and for the past ten years had been dedicated to hunting down deserters and bandits for Bai Lang Pass.

He never attacked Iron Horse Fortress.

Because this fortress was his former armory.

He knew better than many of the guards how high the east wall was, how wide the ash channel was, and which section of the city bricks had been baked crisp by the furnace fire.

Han Jiukui did not surrender.

The first thing they did upon arriving at the city was to push more than thirty deserters to the front lines.

"Open the door!"

"Don't open it, kill one every ten breaths!"

Many people on the city wall recognized those military households.

Some were the blacksmith's brothers, others were the brothers-in-law of surrendered soldiers. The blacksmith, his face covered in burn scars, lay crouching behind the wall, his hands almost bending the fire tongs.

Chen Mu had just returned from Crow's Neck.

One of the warhorses died from exhaustion, and his leg wound reopened. Lin Qinghe's stitched right shoulder didn't bleed, because her entire right arm had been bound tightly to her chest.

He glanced down at the city walls.

"Open the east gate."

Lu Shuangyi asked, "Now?"

"Now."

The iron gate slowly opened.

The more than thirty soldiers who had been pushed to the front lines remained kneeling in the snow.

Han Jiu Kui told them to walk towards the gate, and that anyone who dared to turn back would be shot. The woman at the front was holding a two-year-old child in her arms. The child was so cold that he didn't cry, but just buried his face in his mother's chest.

Ten elderly men without armor walked out of the gate.

They carried two long wooden ladders, as if preparing to fetch someone. Han Jiu Kui's archers stared at the old man, not in a hurry to fire their arrows. Only when the wooden ladders fell sideways on the snow, and the old man rolled to both sides at the same time, did more than thirty short spears attached to thin ropes suddenly shoot out from the city wall.

The spears didn't hit anyone; they all stuck around the soldiers.

The soldiers grabbed the thin ropes, and hundreds of people inside the gate were pulled back together. Women, the elderly, and children all clung to the two wooden ladders, sliding along the snow towards the city gate. Han Jiu-kui ordered arrows to be fired, and the shields on the city wall had already slid down the ropes, blocking the soldiers' backs.

More than 30 people were dragged into the door, but only four died.

The woman carrying the child didn't run away after entering the room. She picked up a spear from the ground and stood by the door. Her husband was still forging armor in the furnace, and she couldn't let Blacktooth Rider go in again.

Han Jiu Kui clearly hadn't expected things to move so quickly. He ordered his men to cut the soldiers' ropes, but instead of letting them into the city, he sent a hundred Black Tooth Cavalrymen to storm the gate.

All one hundred riders lowered their face armor and flattened their spears.

When they rushed into the doorway, there were no guards inside.

The ground was covered with black coal that had just been pushed out of the furnace.

The first horse stumbled on the coal and lost its footing; the horses behind couldn't stop and crashed into each other. Simultaneously, the wooden planks on both sides of the doorway were lifted, and forty furnace workers rushed out from the hidden channel, carrying no knives, only red-hot tongs and long-handled iron hammers.

Use fire tongs to clamp the horse's leg.

Hammer smashes faceplate.

The Blacktooth Cavalry's armor could withstand swords, but not the heavy hammers weighing dozens of kilograms. One cavalryman, armor and all, was smashed into a coal pile, his face armor dented half an inch, and blood spurted from between his teeth.

Han Jiukui ordered the rear guard to rush the goal.

The second batch of two hundred cavalrymen pressed forward.

This time, they didn't take the coalfield route. The vanguard dismounted and laid out felt, while the rearguard charged straight into the inner street on the felt. The furnace workers couldn't stop the truly well-organized Blacktooth cavalry; more than twenty fell upon contact.

Han Jiu Kui entered the doorway himself.

"Iron Horse Fortress still belongs to the Han family!"

Suddenly, all the doors on both sides of the inner street opened.

The 170 garrison soldiers who surrendered last night charged out, carrying their old shields. They used to kneel before the Blacktooth Cavalry, but now they had their own houses, rice, wives, and children behind them.

If we take a step back, the Blacktooth Knights will take everything back.

No one was willing to back down.

One hundred and seventy shields blocked the long street. The first rank was knocked down by warhorses, and the second rank immediately took their place. Some people with broken legs sat on the ground, clinging to their horses' hooves. Women on the rooftops poured boiling porridge down, while children picked up stones and threw them at the faceplates.

Blacktooth Riders charged through the gate, only to be trapped among the crowd in the fortress.

Chen Mu was waiting for them to squeeze in.

"close the door!"

The noose behind the east gate was cut by the furnace axe at the same time.

The heavy iron gate slammed down, blocking the more than two hundred cavalrymen entering the fortress and the main force outside the city. A dozen or so cavalrymen were trapped under the gate, their bodies and horses crushed and torn apart.

The archers on the city wall began firing arrows into the inner street.

It wasn't a shot.

All horses shot.

More than two hundred black horses went berserk after being hit by arrows in the narrow streets, and even the most skilled Black Tooth Cavalry could not form a battle formation. Lu Shuangyi appeared from the west street with seventy-five Black Pot Heavy Cavalrymen.

They had just killed nine of their companions at Crow's Neck, and the blood on their armor was still wet.

Lu Shuangyi did not speak.

The white horse charges first.

Seventy-five riders followed behind her, lined up in a single file, ramming into each other along the long street. The eaves of the houses on both sides almost brushed against her shoulder armor; whoever fell from their horse would be trampled to death by their own men behind them.

Han Jiu Kui also saw her.

He abandoned the scattered horses beside him and summoned forty personal guards to meet the charge. The two heavy cavalry forces collided in the middle of the street, their lances breaking simultaneously, and the breastbones of more than a dozen horses in the front ranks shattered.

Lu Shuangyi flew off the horse and her shoulder crashed through a wooden window.

Han Jiu Kui's mount also knelt down. He rolled onto the ground, drew his curved sword, and rushed into the house.

The house was occupied by a military household that had just moved in.

The woman, clutching her child, hid under the bed, while the old man stood in front of her with a kitchen knife. Han Jiu Kui cleaved the old man's shoulder with a single blow, but before he could land the second, Lu Shuang Yi rose from the splintered wood and kicked over the wooden table.

The desktop hit Han Jiu-kui's knee.

Lu Shuangyi gripped the broken spear and thrust it straight at his throat.

Han Jiu Kui dodged to the side, his curved blade slashing her left ribs. The armor plates split open, and blood immediately gushed out. But she did not retreat; letting the blade remain embedded in her armor, she grabbed the broken spear with both hands and pressed it down.

The spearhead pierced Han Jiu Kui's collarbone.

Han Jiu Kui punched her in the face and dragged the broken gun back into the street.

Chen Mu jumped off the roof.

Unable to use his right hand, he nearly fell to his knees upon landing. Seeing that he was even more seriously injured, Han Jiu Kui pulled out the broken spear from his shoulder and rushed over.

Chen Mu did not have a long sword in his hand.

There was only one coal shovel brought from the furnace.

The scimitar fell, and he blocked it with the flat of his shovel, sparks flying all over his face. The second strike cracked the wooden handle, and the third grazed just past his ear.

Just as Han Jiukui was about to deliver the fourth blow, Lu Shuangyi grabbed his knife-wielding hand from behind.

"Shove him!"

Chen Mu did not cut off his head.

The coal shovel slammed between Han Jiu Kui's legs.

The iron edge smashed the bones.

Han Jiu Kui's face turned pale instantly, and his scimitar fell to the ground. Chen Mu gripped the broken hilt in reverse, shoved the sharp, cracked piece of wood into Han's mouth, and then pushed him away with his shoulder.

The wooden handle protrudes from the back of the neck.

When Han Jiu Kui collapsed, Lu Shuang Yi also sat down by the wall.

Chen Mu reached out his left hand and pulled her.

"Can they still fight?"

Lu Shuangyi wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth.

"You didn't die, so why can't I?"

The two returned to the street.

The Blacktooth Cavalry entering the fortress had been divided into more than a dozen groups. The forge workers were hammering away from the rooftops, the surrendered soldiers were poking at the horses from the alleyways, and the Blackpot Heavy Cavalry were pressing forward street by street.

More than 500 riders outside the city began to ram the gate.

Seeing that there was still no signal from inside the gate, Han Jiu Kui's deputy ordered one hundred riders to dismount and carry a battering ram, while the other two hundred riders dispersed along the east wall. The Black Tooth Cavalry knew the location of the brittle bricks and used special iron pickaxes to smash the base of the wall that had been cracked by the furnace fire.

The newly surrendered soldiers on the wall were truly defending the city for the first time.

The furnace worker, his face covered in burn scars, pushed three slag-refining pots against the wall. The pots contained no boiling oil, only hot iron slag freshly pulled from the furnace.

The moment the first pot was poured in, the snow at the base of the wall instantly began to smoke.

Hot slag seeped into the Blacktooth Cavalry's armor, burning them so badly they rolled on the ground. The second pot struck the battering ram, and the dry bark immediately ignited. The men carrying the ram loosened their grip and fled, but the ram ended up pinning down their own men's feet.

The third pot was hit by a crossbow bolt, striking the boiler operator.

The stove worker was struck twice in the chest, but he still clung to the edge of the pot and flipped outwards. He and the pot fell off the city wall together, crashing into the middle of the cavalry attacking the wall.

The city wall was quiet for a moment.

Then all the furnace workers went berserk and threw down all the coal they could burn and all the iron they could smash.

Every time the East Gate trembles, a layer of plaster falls from the wall.

Just as the door hinge was about to crack, the White Spring Wolf Whistle sounded from the north.

Anato arrived with 150 herder riders. She didn't charge at Blacktooth from the front, but instead drove over 600 cattle and sheep down the north slope. Torches were tied to the cattle's horns, and thick smoke trailed from the sheep's tails, making them look like an endless army of fire beasts in the night.

Black Tooth's warhorse was startled.

The formation of over five hundred riders was broken by cattle and sheep, and the herdsmen's lassos flew in afterward. Some were lassoed off their horses, while others were busy controlling their mounts. The group that had been ramming the gate just moments before was now in complete chaos.

The west gate of Iron Horse Fort was opened at the same time.

Zhou Tie led the remaining Black Pot Heavy Cavalry out of the fortress and crashed into the enemy ranks from the side.

Without Han Jiu Kui, the Black Tooth Cavalry had no idea whether the two hundred men who had entered the fortress were alive or dead. They only held out for two rounds before retreating towards White Wolf Pass.

The herdsmen chased after him for fifteen miles, then seized the horse and returned.

At dawn, more than three hundred Blacktooth Rider corpses lay inside and outside Iron Horse Fortress, one hundred and sixty surrendered, and fewer than three hundred and forty escaped back to White Wolf Pass.

One hundred and thirteen people also died inside the fort.

Among them were 21 heavy cavalrymen, 37 furnace workers, 46 newly surrendered garrison soldiers, and 9 soldiers who followed along to smash stones.

Of the military households rescued and brought in, twelve had relatives who died among the 113.

The woman holding her child found her husband among the corpses, but she didn't cry. She made the child call out "Dad" three times, then took off her husband's leather apron and tied it around her own waist.

"Are you still short-staffed in the furnace room?"

The furnace worker, his face covered in burn scars, nodded.

"lack."

The woman went into the furnace the next day to operate the bellows. She didn't know how to make bellows, but she could start a fire; the child slept in a coal basket far from the furnace door.

Those who were newly assigned houses did not escape either.

They nailed the cracked east gate back on overnight, using the good wood left over from dismantling the training shed during the day. Before the bodies at the base of the wall were even buried, smoke was already rising again from the new house on the south wall.

Han Jiu Kui wanted to use eight hundred cavalry to scare Iron Horse Fort back into the hands of the Han family.

After this battle, the people in the fort truly considered this place their own.

Chen Mu dragged Han Jiu Kui's body outside the East Gate.

No head was cut off.

They stripped off the black armor and put it on a fallen Black Pot Heavy Cavalryman. The rest of the spoils were also taken: 307 intact black horses, 260 suits of heavy armor, more than 400 short crossbows, and 3,000 taels of silver notes from Han Jiu Kui's waist.

The deceased's family members first chose the house, then the horse.

The iron furnace was shut down for half a day, only to make iron plaques and coffin nails for the dead. After half a day, the furnace was reignited, and all 260 suits of black armor had their white teeth removed and their chests smeared with soot.

By evening, one hundred and forty new cavalrymen clad in black armor had appeared on the city wall.

They don't know how to charge into battle yet.

But behind them were their own houses, their own grain, and the people they had just buried.

On the distant north slope, an even longer line of people was slowly approaching.

Women, children, tents, horses, and cattle crowded the snowy road.

Anato rode at the very front.

She brought along the elderly and infirm families from Baiquan Ranch.