This was a slaughter without visible flames of war, a duel fought in the shadows, its participants almost never able to see the light of day.
The victors dared not make a name for themselves. They could not say what they had done, nor could they say how many enemies they had killed.
The dead, too, could not have monuments erected or biographies written for them like soldiers on a battlefield. They could not even reveal why they had died.
The reason was the same in every case—otherwise, someone could easily follow the vine and dig up the roots.
The living had no names; the dead passed in silence.
Seeing the long list of sacrifices after the intelligence agencies of the two kingdoms had fought each other to the death, Tao Lüe, the chief eunuch of the Jin Kingdom's inner palace, sat beneath bright lamps with his eyes closed, tears glistening at their corners.
He wept, but no tears fell. The losses had been too grievous. This was the painstaking legacy Blackwater Bureau had built over generations. Every one of these dead would have called him "Old Ancestor." He knew he had failed them.
"Old Ancestor, we can't keep fighting like this. Qi Kingdom is on their home ground. The brothers' losses are far too great. There's no point in continuing. We should immediately withdraw the people on the relevant lines. That way, we can at least preserve a few sparks over there!" The man reporting to him was weeping bitterly. It had been too brutal!
"Alas!" Tao Lüe let out a long sigh toward the heavens, opened his eyes, wiped away his tears with his sleeve, and shook his head. "Whether it has meaning or not is not for you and me to decide. You'll understand its meaning soon