Linzi in the Dao Calendar year 3920 was a city beset by wind and rain.
After the timeline entered December, matters grew more fiercely intense than ever before!
First, the great army invading Xia was stalled before Tongyang City.
After its initial irresistible advance, it swiftly entered a prolonged tug-of-war.
The Qi Army arrived beneath Tongyang City on the twentieth day of the eleventh month.
That same day, Xie Huaian led three hundred thousand troops from the allied nations of the Eastern Domain toward Linwu. Chen Fu led three hundred thousand provincial soldiers toward Youping.
After that, they made no further progress.
It had taken four days at first to make the entire Fengjie Prefecture change banners.
Yet after fighting for half a month afterward, they still failed to fully take either Linwu or Youping!
As everyone knew, Qi's campaign against Xia was for strategic space amid the world's shifting situation, seizing the unprecedented opportunity created by the Jing-Mu war. It had to be fast!
Even the common people chatting in streets and alleyways shared this understanding.
Yet after Cao Jie reached Xiangyou Prefecture in Xia, he actually began to dawdle. It was said that every day he merely drilled troops outside Tongyang City, and had repeatedly ridden across the Jiangyin Plain, leisurely taking in the scenery, while asking nothing at all about the fighting on the northern and eastern fronts.
Gradually, certain voices began to rise both in court and among the people.
Qi's million-strong army reached Xia in eight days. In just one day, it smashed Sword Peak Mountain; three days later, it had occupied all of Fengjie Prefecture! In less than another day, it broke the Nine Dragons Blazing Fire Array and forced out Xia's Nation-Protecting Array!
This showed just how strong the Qi Army was, and