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Behind him, Meng Da walked with the swagger of a victor, while Zhang Ren and Yan Yan flanked them, their veteran gazes constantly scanning for threat even in surrender. Meng Huo, Li Yan, Wu Lan, and Zhang Ni fanned out, a physical manifestation of the new order's martial might.
At the center of the hall, standing alone before the empty dais where the governor's chair had been, was Deng Liang. He had cleaned himself up, but the shadow of what he had done clung to him like a shroud.
His eyes were red rimmed, his posture stiff, a man holding himself together by sheer will. As the Hengyuan commanders approached, he cupped his hands and bowed deeply, the gesture one of profound, weary respect, not subservience.
"Lord Fa Zheng, Lord Meng Da, Generals. Welcome to Tianshui."
Fa Zheng stepped forward, his demeanor not one of a conqueror gloating, but of a senior administrator accepting a report. "Colonel Deng Liang. Your decision has saved countless lives, those of your soldiers, your people, and our own. For that, you have our thanks. A city taken without being reduced to ashes is a treasure for the empire."
Deng Liang's bow deepened slightly. He was a man caught between relief and a guilt so profound it threatened to buckle his knees. "I merely… did what logic and a heavy heart dictated was necessary."
He straightened, his throat working as he gathered himself. "Regarding the… arrangements that were made. For my family's safety, and for the family of General Hao…" His voice faltered, the name of his murdered friend sticking in his throat.
Fa Zheng raised a hand, cutting him off gently but firmly. "The details of your arrangement are yours, and those who treated with you. They are not our concern. An agreement was made under the auspices of the imperial will. It will be honored in full. You have my word, and more importantly, the word of the one who sent the offer. That is all you need to know."
The relief that washed over Deng Liang was palpable, a slight sag in his shoulders. It was the confirmation he desperately needed, that his terrible act had not been in vain, that the bridge he burned behind him led to a safe shore for those he loved. He nodded, swallowing hard. "I understand. Thank you."
"Now," Fa Zheng continued, his tone shifting to that of a man with work to do, "we must speak of the city's present. You know its bones, Colonel. I wish to know every corner, every hidden passage, every storeroom, and every weakness. We must secure it, and swiftly. I am certain you are aware," he added, a knowing, almost imperceptible smile touching his lips, "that significant elements of the Wei western army are currently en route, intending to pass through or around Tianshui on their way to answer their emperor's call."
Deng Liang's eyes widened in genuine shock. The order for the western withdrawal had been a closely guarded secret, transmitted by the fastest means. For Fa Zheng to know of it… it spoke of an intelligence network of terrifying reach and speed. He stammered, "You… you know of the garrisons from Xiping? Wuwei? And the others?"
Fa Zheng's smile did not reach his eyes. He offered no explanation, no source. His silence was more eloquent than any boast. It was a demonstration of power far more unnerving than any display of martial force.
The message was clear, there are no secrets from us. Your betrayal was not an opportunity we stumbled upon, it was an eventuality we facilitated.
"Tell me everything," Fa Zheng repeated, gesturing towards a large map of the city and its surroundings that had been unrolled on a side table. "The strength we must prepare to meet depends on the fortifications we can wield."
And so, in the hall that had witnessed the death of loyalty, Deng Liang began to talk. He pointed out secret postern gates used for couriers, hidden cisterns, weak points in the outer wall where the mortar was poor, granary locations, and the mustering points for the city militia.
He poured out Tianshui's secrets, not as a traitor gleefully selling his homeland, but as a pragmatic man ensuring the city's new masters could defend it effectively and by extension, protect the inhabitants and himself. It was a clinical, heartbreaking dissection of a city's soul.
The fall of Tianshui was complete. Not just its gates, but its knowledge, its defensive essence, now belonged to Hengyuan.
The news traveled on swift wings, carried by messenger ravens bred for distance and urgency. Two identical scrolls, sealed with wax, flew east. One descended into the smoke choked, crumbling nightmare of Tong Pass. The other found its way to the bustling, victorious order of the Hengyuan encampment siege.
In the underground command post of Wei, the air was already foul with despair and the dust of near constant collapse. Cao Cao, his face etched with lines of fatigue and strain, took the small tube from a mud spattered messenger. A flicker of desperate hope might have crossed his mind, news from the west? Reinforcement timetables?
He broke the seal and read. His face, usually a masterclass in controlled expression, went utterly still. Then, a tremor began in his hands. He read the words aloud, his voice starting flat but rising with each damning phrase. "…city of Tianshui has capitulated. Not to assault. Garrison commander Hao Zhao slain by deputy Deng Liang, who then surrendered the city. Minimal Hengyuan casualties. Strategic corridor now severed…"
The silence that followed was absolute, more terrible than any bombardment. The advisors, Xun Yu, Guo Jia, Xi Zhicai, Jia Kui, Cheng Yu, Tian Feng, and Xu You, all stood frozen, the implications crashing down upon them. Tianshui was not just lost, it was given away.
The meticulously planned scorched earth withdrawal, the gathering of the western spine of the hedgehog, was now impossible. The direct path for his own army from the western corridor now have it's own block. And it was done not by the enemy's valor, but by the poison of betrayal, the very rot he feared most.
The control Cao Cao had maintained through the cannonades, through the breach, through the agonizing attrition, finally shattered.
With a raw, inarticulate roar of pure fury and anguish, he swept his arm across the heavy oak table. Maps, scrolls, inkwells, and teacups flew through the air, crashing against the stone wall in a cacophony of splintering wood and shattering porcelain.
"TRAITOR!" he bellowed, the word tearing from his throat. "A KNIFE IN THE BACK FROM A FRIEND! THEY BUY OUR CITIES WITH WHISPERS AND COIN! IS THERE NO LOYALTY LEFT? IS THERE NOTHING BUT THE PRICE OF A MAN'S SOUL?!"
He gripped the edges of the overturned table, his knuckles white, his entire body trembling with the force of his rage. The headaches that had plagued him for years throbbed behind his eyes, a familiar demon awakened by stress.
"Your Majesty! Please, calm yourself!" Xun Yu rushed forward, his own face ashen with concern. Guo Jia on the other hand seized by a fit of coughing due to the dust that was causes by the overturn table, his body convulsing with the effort. The others gathered around, voices a worried clamor. "Your health! The men need your guidance!"
Cao Cao shook them off, his breath coming in ragged gasps. The anger was a fire, but beneath it was a yawning cold, the cold of strategic ruin. Tong Pass was falling. Tianshui was gone. The western army was now a scattered flock with no coop to return to. The hedgehog of Chang'an was being plucked of its spines before it could even curl into a ball.
It took several long minutes, the advisors speaking in low, urgent tones, before the violent tremors subsided. Cao Cao sank into a chair, brought by Jia Kui, and pressed his palms to his temples.
The rage was spent, leaving behind the grim, gritty residue of catastrophe. "Betrayal…" he muttered, the word now hollow. "It is the final weapon. And he wields it as well as his thunder."
Meanwhile outside of Tong Pass, the news arrived to a different world. The day's fighting was in a lull, a temporary halt as Hengyuan forces consolidated the new, smaller breaches that had been punched open beside the original monstrous one.
Lie Fan was still on the front line, a figure of dark energy moving among his troops, shoring up defenses, directing the flow of men and material into the captured sections of the fortress.
The raven found Sima Yi on the command platform. The chief strategist took the scroll, noting the urgent markings. He recognized the seal of the Southern Army command. His fingers itched to break it, to devour the information within, a strategist's lifeblood. But discipline held. This was not his news to read first. It was the Emperor's.
He held the slender tube, feeling the weight of the message within. He watched Lie Fan below, directing the clearing of a barricade with effortless sweeps of his halberd. There was a time for immediate interruption, and a time for protocol. The battle here was in a stable, victorious phase. The news, whatever it was, could wait until the Emperor returned to the command nexus.
Sima Yi stood, a picture of calm amidst the organized chaos of the platform, the unopened scroll a silent promise of a shifting strategic landscape.
He knew, with a cold certainty, that whatever the message contained, it would be leveraged with the same ruthless efficiency that had shattered the walls before them. The hunter's net, it seemed, was closing from another direction entirely.
Meanwhile, on the battlefield, on the left courtyard of Tong Pass was no longer a place, it was a state of being, a churning, roaring vortex of steel, blood, and raw determination.
The initial, monstrous breach had birthed smaller siblings as the focused bombardment weakened adjacent sections. .
Now, instead of a single funnel, the Hengyuan army flowed into the fortress through several jagged mouths, turning the once orderly defensive space into a sprawling, chaotic arena.
At the heart of this storm, Lie Fan was an anchor of terrifying calm and motion. His halberd was less a weapon and more a force of nature, a sweeping scythe that harvested Wei soldiers with an efficiency that bordered on the mundane.
There was no flourish, no wasted movement, just the relentless application of overwhelming power. Each swing cleared space, each thrust ended a life. Thanks to the expanded breaches, a constant stream of Hengyuan soldiers poured in behind him, solidifying the gains, turning captured ground into fortified positions.
Lie Fan's mind, even in the heat of slaughter, worked with a commander's cold precision. The courtyard was theirs, but holding it against the desperate, massed counter attacks of the Wei was the real task. He had stationed his marshals like unmovable stones in a river.
Zhang Liao holding a choke point leading to the inner keep's stairs, Huang Zhong commanding a raised platform that served as a killing field for archers, and Taishi Ci guarding the entrance to a barracks complex that could serve as a staging ground for Wei reserves.
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Name: Lie Fan
Title: Founding Emperor Of Hengyuan Dynasty
Age: 36 (203 AD)
Level: 16
Next Level: 462,000
Renown: 2325
Cultivation: Yin Yang Separation (level 11)
SP: 1,121,700
ATTRIBUTE POINTS
STR: 1,010 (+20)
VIT: 659 (+20)
AGI: 653 (+10)
INT: 691
CHR: 98
WIS: 569
WILL: 436
ATR Points: 0