New Festival City.
After two days of rest and recuperation, Victory Camp assembled once more.
They gathered before two banners flying high.
This time, Chongxuan Sheng made no attempt to conceal them.
Of the two banners raised, one was the exceptionally flamboyant Victory in Sight Banner, while the other was the Qi State longitude-and-latitude banner—the alternate name of the Ziwei Central Supreme Emperor Banner.
One was the general's banner; the other, the national banner.
Here in New Festival City of Huiming Prefecture, behind the Xia army's lines, they brazenly raised the national banner of Great Qi!
More than four thousand New Festival City defenders whose weapons had been confiscated squatted on the other side of the parade ground, watching them with complicated expressions.
This time, Chongxuan Sheng made no attempt to recruit anyone, because the battles to come could not be won with surrendered soldiers.
As usual, he destroyed the city's defensive system and sabotaged its war supplies, taking only hard currency such as Dao Essence Stones.
For example, all the weapons of New Festival City's defenders had been piled together and melted by Jiang Wang with Daoist arts into an enormous iron ball, which now stood in the middle of the city.
Jiang Wang stood to Chongxuan Sheng's left, while Shi Si stood behind him.
Facing them were all the soldiers of Victory Camp, numbering two thousand four hundred and fifty-three in total.
They had crossed Linwu Prefecture, outmaneuvered Ximing City, passed Huyang Pass, raided Grand Fort City, and breached New Festival City...
Though Chongxuan Sheng's thorough preparations and exceptional vision of war, coupled with Jiang Wang leading from the front and repeatedly slaying enemy generals before all others, had meant they had scarcely encountered any truly hard opposition, casualties were still unavoidable. Five hundred and forty-seven men had