As Wang Chong committed his troops, the Prince of Yan Army's campaign to take An Dushan's eight provinces beyond the pass blazed like a raging fire. Many of An Dushan's generals, hearing that he was dead and that the troops within the pass had already fallen into disarray, had no heart left to resist.
In particular, Wang Chong had recalled Sun Mingke and Mo Zhenxing. Sun Mingke swept forward in triumph, taking more than a hundred cities in fifteen days. His fame thundered throughout the realm, and he could already almost stand alongside the Four Braves and Five Tigers, yielding nothing to the Four Heavenly Prodigies.
Wang Chong held Copper Pass, receiving good news every day, until two generals formerly under An Dushan came to surrender and brought him devastating news: An Dushan's remaining forces had joined the allied army of the Eight Grasslands Tribes.
The troops An Dushan had brought on this rebellion had all been his finest. Although they had suffered losses in battle, Xun Ba had taken tens of thousands away, and Gao Chongxing had led tens of thousands to join Wang Chong, a hundred thousand still remained. All were veterans of a hundred battles and fierce, valiant officers. Their joining the Great Grassland's allied army immediately turned the situation around.
Wang Chong regretted it considerably. He should have led his troops out to attack and taken another great risk, trying to see whether he could bring An Dushan's former forces into the fold before the grasslanders reacted. Although that might have left Copper Pass vulnerable, and anyone slipping into that opening would have cut off his retreat, it could also have brought this war straight to a close.
Yet even as he sighed, Wang Chong knew that, having reached this point, he should take no more