"SCREECH... BOOM!!!"
The southern gates of Thang Long, which had remained bolted shut for an entire month—scarred by countless blade marks and scorched by the residue of spirit-cannons—finally ground open. The sound of the massive mechanisms grinding against each other was like the low growl of a primordial beast awakening from an aeon-long slumber.
Immediately following, the very earth began to tremble. From within the city gates, a torrent of iron and steel erupted, carrying a momentum akin to a catastrophic flood breaching a dam. Leading the charge was Duke Dinh Quoc, the silver-haired veteran general. Clad in resplendent golden armor and wielding a massive, heavy Crescent Moon Blade, his tiger-like eyes blazed with an unquenchable battle-will. Behind him followed tens of thousands of soldiers from the Duke's Estate and the Imperial Guard—warriors who had endured humiliation for the past month. Now, that suppression had transmuted into a heaven-shaking fury.
"KILL!!!"
A unified roar erupted, shaking the foundations of Heaven and Earth.
If the imperial army was an unstoppable deluge capable of sweeping away all creation, then the hundred-thousand-strong rebel army outside was now nothing more than a collapsing quagmire. Their morale had utterly disintegrated. News of their burned provisions, the nonsensical orders to defend to the death, and their internal chaos had transformed them from an army into a leaderless pack of starving beasts, frantically tearing at one another for the last scraps of food.
When they saw the gates flung wide and the tidal wave of imperial steel crashing toward them, their first instinct was not resistance. It was terror.
"The imperial army is counter-attacking! Flee for your lives!" "No food! No commanders! What is there left to fight for?!"
Their formations, already fractured, now shattered into ruin. Some cast aside their weapons and bolted. Others lunged madly at their own comrades, seeking to plunder horses and wealth for their escape. In a mere heartbeat, the colossal encampment had turned into a chaotic marketplace of death.
The two Foundation Establishment experts—the only remaining commanders—were desperately trying to quell the internal riot when they witnessed this scene. Their complexions turned as ashen as death. They knew the grand situation was lost.
"Regroup! Regroup! Break through the encirclement and retreat!" one bellowed.
But in a battlefield that had spiraled completely out of control, their commands carried not a shred of weight.
And in that moment, in a place where no eyes wandered, within the darkest corners of the chaotic battlefield, a phantom moved in silence.
Tran Kien did not partake in the frontal assault. That was Duke Dinh Quoc's stage. His stage lay within the shadows. Like the sharpest of daggers, he glided through the chaos, his objective singular and absolute.
The two Foundation Establishment commanders.
He knew that as long as these two alpha wolves lived, the rebel army might still regroup and inflict heavy casualties upon the imperial forces. To sweep the chessboard clean in the shortest time, one had to eliminate the opponent's strongest pieces first.
The first commander, a man with a scarred face who was frantically slaughtering his own disobedient subordinates, suddenly felt a bone-chilling cold at the back of his neck. Terror seized him, and he attempted to spin around.
But it was already too late.
The Lac Hong Saber appeared as if from nowhere, silent as a falling leaf, and glided across his throat.
A line of vivid crimson appeared. The scarred man's eyes bulged, his great-saber clattered to the ground, and his hands flew to his neck—but he could not stem the flow of his departing life force.
The remaining commander, witnessing this, felt his soul nearly scatter in fright. He no longer had the heart to command and turned to flee into the darkness.
But the moment he turned, he saw a scholarly silhouette standing there, observing him in silence. Those eyes were as profound as an abyss, terrifyingly tranquil.
"You..."
He only managed to utter a single word. A streak of blade-light, carrying a hammered, tempered intent, swept upward in a reverse slash.
His heart was cleaved in two.
With the fall of the final commanders, the rebel army collapsed entirely. The battle was no longer a battle. It had become a slaughter, a pursuit, and a mass surrender.
As the first rays of dawn broke, dyeing the land in the hue of blood, the struggle concluded.
Duke Dinh Quoc, drenched in the blood of his enemies, stood atop a mound of corpses. He surveyed the ruined battlefield, his tiger-eyes holding both weariness and the exhilaration of a victor. He was searching.
At that moment, a figure—unsullied by a single drop of blood, his robes perfectly clean—appeared silently beside him.
"Duke," Tran Kien said, his voice placid.
Duke Dinh Quoc turned, looking at the youth before him, an indescribable emotion surging in his chest. "Good! Truly excellent!"
"This is merely severing the limbs of the octopus," Tran Kien shook his head. His gaze did not linger on the battlefield; instead, he looked toward the soaring city walls and the distant imperial palace.
"Its head," he said, "is still within the capital."