Time rewound slightly, to just before nine o'clock. Halfway up a sparsely wooded mountain, a faint shadow flashed past, swift as lightning, drifting like a ghost. That shadow was Wang Yue. Like a venomous snake locked onto its prey, he followed wherever it went, waiting only for the right moment to strike and sink his fangs in!
At the foot of the mountain, a large mass of soldiers advanced at an unhurried pace, stretching out in a long column with little regard for head or tail. Infantry and cavalry alike wore armor and carried sabers, spears, bows, and halberds. The night was already cold and bleak, yet the baleful aura radiating from these soldiers was even gloomier and colder than the night wind. Wherever they passed, it was as though an icy gale swept through. At the center of these fierce soldiers stood a carriage drawn by sixteen tall Ferghana horses—though calling it a carriage was less fitting than calling it a house. The "sixteen-horse carriage" was brightly lit, with decadent strings and flutes drifting from within. Amid the lavish music came the coquettish cries and seductive moans of women, along with a rough, hearty laugh.
A ring of black-armored cavalry surrounded the sixteen-horse carriage. There were not many of them, only thirty-six riders, barely enough to encircle it. Thirty-six men, with thirty-six pairs of eyes, watched everything around them in every direction, as though not even an ant would escape their notice. Yet they somehow failed to spot a living man many times larger than an ant following them all along.
Needless to say, this group was Dong Zhuo's personal force. And who else could be laughing so loudly inside that carriage but Dong Zhuo?
In the forest, Wang Yue withdrew his gaze from Dong Zhuo and looked at