He had arrived.
A white steed leaped over countless people, and a sharp long spear pierced through layers of obstruction, pointing straight at Cao Cao.
Death was right before him, and then... it was stopped.
"Zhao Yun, you aren't getting away today."
A tall figure wielding a greatblade blocked Fujimaru Kyoya's thrust. Since Dian Wei's death, this man had taken over the duty of guarding Cao Cao—Xu Chu.
His body was Cao Cao's finest shield. Before he fell, he would never allow anyone to harm Cao Cao.
Fujimaru Kyoya's attack had been stopped, and that was fatal, because Xu Chu was not the only fierce general here.
Xiahou Yuan, Xiahou Dun, and Zhang Liao attacked almost simultaneously. Three attacks from different directions came at him at nearly the same time.
[You sensed a lethal threat. You understood that if this continued, this would be your limit. You would be unable to advance any further.]
[Your other hand gripped the sword hilt. It was not merely a sword, but a principle you had once set for yourself.]
[Will you break your principle?]
A principle? Did I have one?
To keep the simulation interesting, Fujimaru Kyoya naturally had not used the Flowing Water Sword that had already reached its end point. But this time was different.
This time, his identity was different. This land was different. His "selfish" principle had already been broken once in this simulation, so why not break it once more?
"Ding~"
It was like the cry of a hatchling breaking from its shell. Three clear notes rang out at once and merged into one. With a single sword strike, Fujimaru Kyoya deflected attacks from all three directions. At the same time, his mount sensed its master's intent and did not let him down. It exerted force in an instant, amplifying Fujimaru Kyoya's strength and knocking Xu Chu back some distance.
That could not hurt Xu Chu, but it was no different from killing him.
Because that blow directly exposed Cao Cao before Fujimaru Kyoya.
"Yo~ Boss Cao, I'm here to kill you."
Fujimaru Kyoya suddenly recalled what Zhuge Liang had once said about Humanity's Foundation. If the future division of the realm into three was an established fact, could he kill Boss Cao with one thrust?
Why not try?
Before those generals could react, amid their horrified gazes, Fujimaru Kyoya brought his spear down.
"Bang~"
It hit.
There was no mistaking that sensation, but the one he had struck was not Cao Cao. It was someone Fujimaru Kyoya did not recognize.
"My lord, retreat!"
Xiahou En endured the agonizing pain of his shattered bones and used the Azure Cyan Sword to block Fujimaru Kyoya's strike. That roar jolted Cao Cao awake.
He had thought this was merely a brother greedy for merit, yet now...
There was no time to think. No time to think carefully. Cao Cao spurred his steed and fled in the direction opposite Fujimaru Kyoya.
He could not let his good brother die in vain like this.
If he died, then everything would be over.
"Your loyalty is admirable."
"Zhao Yun, I'll kill you!"
Xiahou En seemed to have squeezed out his very life force as he knocked Fujimaru Kyoya's spear aside. The Azure Cyan Sword in his hand slashed toward Fujimaru Kyoya, but he had forgotten one thing...
"Silly child, spears are longer than swords."
Fujimaru Kyoya said it calmly, and his spear was not slow in proving that truth.
Eight Gates Lock Formation
A spear being longer than a sword was sound reasoning under normal circumstances.
Even if the Azure Cyan Sword could cut through iron like mud, it was still shorter than Fujimaru Kyoya's spear. But that was Xiahou En's goal.
Xiahou En's body was pierced by the long spear. As a member of the Xiahou family, he did not possess the strength of Xiahou Dun or Xiahou Yuan, but he did not believe his loyalty to Cao Cao was inferior to theirs.
Even if it cost him his life, he would deal a severe blow to the formidable enemy before him.
"Clang~"
A flash of sword light came at him. Fujimaru Kyoya drew his sword to block it, but his blade could not match the Azure Cyan Sword and was cut in half. The strike even sliced through Fujimaru Kyoya's armor, drawing blood.
"I have already felt your resolve."
As though he felt no pain, Fujimaru Kyoya merely watched Xiahou En's desperate strike calmly. Then he swung his broken sword and severed Xiahou En's arm.
"Goodbye."
Fujimaru Kyoya discarded the shortened blade, caught the Azure Cyan Sword, and used the sword Cao Cao had bestowed to behead Xiahou En.
[You watched the headless corpse fall. He was not particularly powerful, but he was the first person to injure you.]
[You could feel Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan's fury. You could see Cao Cao vaguely sensing something and looking back. You could feel the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry's murderous intent. You understood that you could not stay.]
[You had your mission, and they had theirs. With opposing positions, only blades and weapons could speak.]
"Don't let him leave. Don't let the sacrifice be in vain."
Mercy had no place in commanding an army.
Even with his brother dead before his eyes, Xiahou Dun suppressed his grief. Xiahou En's death had inflicted Fujimaru Kyoya's first wound. This was their chance.
Xu Chu came charging with his blade dragging behind him, while Zhang Liao moved in to strike from the side.
Fujimaru Kyoya used spear and sword to block them both, but discovered that Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan had not taken the opportunity to attack.
That was highly unusual.
"Zhao Yun, your strength has truly exceeded our expectations. We thought that after Lu Bu, no one else would be worth mobilizing the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry on such a grand scale. You have proven yourself."
Xiahou Dun watched Fujimaru Kyoya battle Zhang Liao and Xu Chu fiercely. He had not expected there to be a second Lu Bu in this world.
"Back when Lu Bu was at the end of his road, Chen Gong turned him into that neither-human-nor-ghost thing. In the end, we still trapped him. How do you compare to Lu Bu back then?"
Though Guo Jia was gone, he had still left Cao Cao many things, such as this Eight Gates Lock Formation.
Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan directed the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry, using Fujimaru Kyoya as the center to construct eight gates and trap him within them.
This formation had originally been meant for clashes between armies. Yet even against a single person, they did not dare lower their guard.
[You noticed changes in your surroundings. It was a shift in "momentum." You felt yourself inexplicably fall into a suppressed state.]
More critically, once the formation had been constructed, Fujimaru Kyoya's connection with Zhuge Liang was cut off. That was clearly unfavorable for breaking out.
Seeing that the formation had taken shape, Xu Chu and Zhang Liao did not continue fighting. They charged directly into the formation to join the other two, avoiding the risk of being defeated separately.
"Eight paths?"
Fujimaru Kyoya stood at the center of the Eight Gates Lock Formation. Watching the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry slowly close in, he understood that he had to make a choice—and he had only one choice.
He began riding in the direction Cao Cao had fled.
Just as expected.
Watching Fujimaru Kyoya's reaction, Xiahou Dun thought, Just as expected.
If the Eight Gates Lock Formation faced a general proficient in the mysteries of the Eight Trigrams, all they had to do was see through which of the Eight Gates corresponded to those eight paths, and they could escape safely.
Rest, Life, Injury, Obstruction, View, Death, Fear, Opening. Of the Eight Gates, entering through the Gates of Life, View, or Opening brought fortune. Entering through Injury, Fear, or Rest brought harm. Entering through Obstruction or Death meant death.
Xiahou Dun had deliberately placed the Gates of Obstruction and Death in the direction Cao Cao had fled. Fujimaru Kyoya was now heading straight for the Gate of Death.
The instant Fujimaru Kyoya stepped toward the Gate of Death, the entire Eight Gates Lock Formation began to move.
Xiahou Dun commanded from the rear, shifting the formation. Xiahou Yuan, Xu Chu, and Zhang Liao hid among the countless Tiger and Leopard Cavalry soldiers. Boundless malice and murderous intent began to descend upon Fujimaru Kyoya.
[You began to notice obvious changes. The ground beneath your feet became muddy, moisture in the air gradually diminished, and your body grew heavy, as though gravity itself had changed.]
[You sensed the "world" changing. Like Alice wandering through Wonderland, you realized this was no longer the world from before.]
[You knew this was the prototype of a Reality Marble.]
Just as expected.
Having once possessed a Reality Marble, Fujimaru Kyoya recognized that familiar sensation and saw through the true core of the Eight Gates Lock Formation—a Reality Marble.
Trapped within White Gate Tower, Lu Bu had agreed to Chen Gong's suggestion in order to turn the situation around. He had completely chosen to stop being human.
Yet even so, the Eight Gates Lock Formation had still trapped Mechanical Lu Bu in Xiapi. What Lu Bu had faced back then was what Fujimaru Kyoya faced now.
Using the methods of Qimen Dunjia, it redefined Earth Water Fire Wind within a small area. While it lacked the distinct individuality of a Reality Marble and could not completely sever the inner world from the outer one, it was already enough.
A Reality Marble required one's personal will to erode reality. That pressure was shared among five thousand Tiger and Leopard Cavalry soldiers, and there was no need to transform this entire area into a complete Otherworld.
The massive mana consumption was also divided among five thousand people, solving the most critical problem of sustaining a Reality Marble.
Fujimaru Kyoya had now entered the most fatal Gate of Death. He would face the full power of the Eight Gates Lock Formation.
Space seemed to have been folded. No matter how far Fujimaru Kyoya rode, he could not reach the edge of the military formation. At the same time, the murderous intent that had reached its limit could finally no longer be restrained.
The Tiger and Leopard Cavalry swarmed forward. Within the Eight Gates Lock Formation, they were no longer what they had been before. Their strength was now far beyond what Fujimaru Kyoya could easily handle.
It was the same theory of three men: use three people to restrain Fujimaru Kyoya and prevent him from leaving the Eight Gates Lock Formation, then continuously rotate fresh fighters in to wear down his strength.
Perhaps they could even capture the enemy alive. But no one would choose that option, because they all understood that it was merely a theoretically viable strategy.
They had come.
Fujimaru Kyoya swung his spear back to block Xu Chu's blade, then turned and used his sword to parry Zhang Liao's spear, but that was already his limit.
"Whoosh~"
The arrow was as fast as lightning. It was no less formidable than Tristan's arrows, and it had been fired by Xiahou Dun from far within the military formation.
Losing one eye had not earned him a Giant Jet, but his archery had become even more exquisite.
Although Fujimaru Kyoya possessed the Protection of the Arrow-Avoiding, Xiahou Dun's archery was clearly beyond ordinary human skill. With his body restricted, he could only alter his posture as much as possible so that the arrow piercing his body would not strike his vital organs.
At that moment, Xiahou Yuan charged in as well.
Lime Martial Saint
[You understood that victory or defeat in battle did not depend solely on one person's strength. The importance of timing, terrain, and unity could not be ignored, yet all of them were slipping away from you.]
The simulator had not been wrong.
Though Reality Marbles could indeed approach a "Miracle" in the field of Magecraft, their raw destructive power was difficult to quantify. Even so, they had an exceptionally high baseline.
They created timing and terrain absolutely suited to their user's combat. Aside from the somewhat high mana cost, they had almost no drawbacks.
Now, Guo Jia had used his intelligence not only to distribute the mana consumption, but also to seize the element of unity.
On the battlefield, losing both timing and terrain meant losing more than half the battle. It was no longer hard to understand how Lu Bu had been trapped.
Fujimaru Kyoya kept moving, avoiding the loss of his mobility. Once Xu Chu, Zhang Liao, and Xiahou Yuan caught him in a pincer, defeat would not be far away.
Each time, Fujimaru Kyoya tried to engage no more than two enemies at once, but even that was extremely difficult.
Everything here seemed to oppose him. Several times normal gravity affected only Fujimaru Kyoya, while Zhang Liao and the others received enhancements instead. As one side weakened and the other grew stronger, Fujimaru Kyoya gradually fell into a disadvantage.
[You understood just how simple this mission had originally been. You could have acted as in the legends and taken only one person away. You would not have fallen into such a military formation, and escaping would have been much easier.]
Yes. If he had simply abandoned Lady Gan and the heavily wounded Lady Mi, using those soldiers utterly loyal to Liu Bei as a rearguard, then no matter how he looked at it, his chances of escaping would have been higher than they were now.
[You recognized your own greed, but you did not regret your decision.]
Since he had made the decision, why regret it?
I once told that person that even if we only changed things a little, those little changes would accumulate and prove that we had once been here.
The people I saved today still had longer lives ahead of them. I used my own life to give other people's lives a little more "possibility."
[You understood that dripping water could pierce stone and gathered sand could form a tower, but how long could you endure?]
Of course... until death.
[You... should break your principle.]
"Zhao Yun, you can't escape."
Xiahou Dun's arrow descended once more. That arrow halted Fujimaru Kyoya's path for a moment, and more pursuers quickly caught up.
Before you continue