"Zhanjun? How could it be Zhanjun?"
Duke of England Zhang Fu was the first to voice his disbelief. His face was full of incredulity. "Isn't His Highness Prince Zheng supposed to be in the capital?"
"How could he have appeared here?"
"And brought troops with him?"
"That was his voice! I couldn't have mistaken it!"
An unprecedented light blazed in Zhu Di's eyes. He clenched his fists tightly, his whole body trembling slightly with excitement.
"It's that brat! It has to be him!"
Though reason told him it was utterly impossible, that familiar "Grandpa," that same brazen, swaggering attitude that feared neither Heaven nor Earth—who else could it be but his precious grandson?
"But... Your Majesty, even if His Highness Prince Zheng has come, what difference can he make?"
The veteran general Xue Lu said anxiously, "From the sounds coming from the east, fierce fighting seems to have broken out. But Arutai's right-wing camp has a full thirty thousand elite cavalry!"
"How many men could His Highness Prince Zheng have brought?"
"Three thousand? Five thousand?"
"With so few troops, charging in would be suicide!"
Xue Lu's words were like a basin of cold water poured over the fire of hope that had just begun to burn in everyone's hearts.
That was true. Even if Zhu Zhanjun really had descended from the heavens like Divine Soldiers, what could he change against an enemy several times his number?
This battlefield was a gigantic meat grinder. No matter how elite the troops, throwing them in wouldn't make much of a splash.
"No..."
Zhu Di shook his head, his gaze piercing through the wind and snow, as if he could see the battlefield shrouded in blood and fire. "You don't understand... That brat never does anything unless he's sure he can pull it off."
Though he said so, worry and confusion filled his heart as well.
What kind of troops had Zhanjun brought?
And how had he appeared here without anyone noticing?
Just then, a scout tasked with observing the enemy came tumbling down the slope ahead. His face was alight with a wild mixture of joy and terror, as if he'd seen a ghost.
"Your Majesty! A great victory! A great victory!"
"What great victory?"
Zhang Fu grabbed him and asked urgently.
"To the east... That army of ours to the east! They... they pierced right through Arutai's right-wing camp!"
The scout was so excited that he could barely get the words out.
"What?!"
At that moment, Zhu Di and every general beneath his command turned to stone.
Pierced right through?
That was a Mongol camp of thirty thousand men!
Not three thousand!
Even the most elite Iron Cavalry of Prince Yan during the Jingnan Campaign wouldn't dare claim they could pierce through a thirty-thousand-man enemy camp in a single charge!
"Did you see it clearly?!"
Zhu Di shoved Zhang Fu aside, seized the scout by the collar himself, and roared at him, his eyes bloodshot.
"Every word is true, Your Majesty!"
The scout was so terrified he was on the verge of tears, but he still shouted with all his strength, "That army... They're terrifying!"
"They're like a black wall of iron, rolling straight through the middle of the enemy camp!"
"The Mongols' arrows hit them like a tickle!"
"Their blades... With one swing, they can split a Mongol and his horse in two!"
"That wasn't a battle. It was... it was a slaughter!"
A slaughter!
That word sent a chill across the scalps of every battle-hardened veteran present.
What kind of overwhelming rout would it take for one of their own scouts to describe the fighting against the enemy as a "slaughter"?
"Come! You're coming with Me to see!"
Zhu Di could no longer hold back. He left the scout behind, swung onto the warhorse his nearby bodyguard had brought, and charged without hesitation toward the high ground on the eastern side of the valley.
"Your Majesty! It's dangerous!"
Zhang Fu and the others were horrified. They hurried after him with the Imperial Guard Camp.
When Zhu Di and his party reached the high ground and looked down at the battlefield, everyone was so stunned by the sight before them that they lost the power of speech.
Several miles away, on the Snowfield, Arutai's once orderly right-wing camp had descended into utter chaos.
And the ones responsible were a force of black-clad cavalry.
There weren't many of them—no more than three thousand at most.
Yet they had charged in from the southern side of the camp and burst out the northern side, plowing a hundred-zhang-wide path of death through tens of thousands of enemy troops, paved with corpses and blood!
The Black Army showed no sign of stopping. Led by a mighty general at their head, they wheeled their horses around and swept along a vast arc outside the enemy camp. They were actually preparing to launch a second charge from the camp's flank!
The Mongol cavalry, who had been so arrogant before, now didn't dare face them at all. They could only fire arrows from the outskirts to no avail. Quite a few had even turned their horses and fled in panic.
Their Military Morale had completely collapsed!
"Th-this really is an army?"
Zhu Yong muttered. His throat was so dry it felt like it was about to smoke.
"What kind of troops are those? Heavy cavalry... How can they have such terrifying impact and mobility?"
Confusion was written all over Zhang Fu's face.
Zhu Di said nothing. His eyes were fixed on the very front of the Black Army, on that figure wielding a Horse Spear and leading the charge.
Though they were several miles away, and the figure was drenched in blood, he still recognized him at a glance.
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