Zhao Yun led the surviving troops on a long, headlong flight. Only after confirming that no pursuers remained behind them did he stop beside a river to rest and regroup.
Jia Xu still had not recovered from his fright.
He could not even remember the last time he had come so close to death. He truly had never expected to come out alive after facing Yuan Shao's army of over ten thousand.
"Sir, are you all right?"
Zhao Yun came over to ask.
Jia Xu shook his head at the question and said with a bitter smile, "I'm unharmed... Were it not for your valor, General, I fear I really would have died at Yuan Shao's hands this time."
"Still, facing Yuan Shao's tens of thousands of troops head-on and fighting our way out alive has given me something else to boast about."
"I can tell people that I once followed General Zilong into the midst of ten thousand soldiers and fought my way back out."
Jia Xu's words were steeped in self-mockery.
Zhao Yun was just about to say something when a soldier suddenly came to report, "We found the general's remains on the battlefield over there!"
Not far from this little river lay the plain where Gongsun Zan had fought Yuan Shao's army. Some soldiers had just gone to investigate and discovered Gongsun Zan's body on the battlefield.
Upon hearing this, Zhao Yun hurried over with Jia Xu.
Then he saw Gongsun Zan's headless corpse.
"General!"
Zhao Yun wept in anguish and fell to his knees before Gongsun Zan's remains. The many White Horse Volunteers behind him also knelt, tears in their eyes.
Jia Xu sighed at the sight. "General Zilong, the dead cannot return to life. This defeat was not your fault. The Yuan Thief was simply