Jaw Reset, the Foolish Girl Laughed Wildly; Poison Smoke Released, the Imperial Envoy Crawled Between Legs

The sun climbed to the top of the treetops, and the hooves of the Great Yan Iron Cavalry crushed the Iwami Silver Mine.

Three towering, grayish-brown peaks enclose a narrow, gravelly valley. A hundred paces from the valley entrance lies the main mine shaft of the Iwami Silver Mine.

The main mine shaft was originally more than two zhang wide, but now it has been completely blocked by several granite blocks weighing tens of thousands of jin, leaving only a drainage ditch half a person high underground, from which grayish sewage is flowing out.

Pu Yunshan, leading three thousand light cavalry, guarded the pine-lined slopes on both sides. Upon seeing the central army banner approaching, he dismounted and went to meet them.

"Your Highness, that old codger Shōni Sukemoto is hiding inside with over ten thousand remnants of his army, acting like a turtle. They've blown up all the paths on the mountain ridge themselves."

Our men tried to feel their way towards the cave entrance, but it was riddled with arrows.

Gu Moran in his black horse and looked up at the wooden watchtower, which was thirty feet high, above the mine.

The wooden window of the watchtower was pushed open halfway, and a Western telescope covered with copper was sticking out of the window crack, swaying towards the Great Yan Army formation at the bottom of the valley.

"Tens of thousands of mouths were crammed into a dark, sunless cave; the smell of them defecating and urinating was enough to kill them."

Gu Moran hung the riding whip on the saddle and turned his head to look at Kim Seon-a, who was riding beside him.

After traveling for two hours along the mountain path, a fine layer of sweat appeared on Kim Seon-a's forehead, which slid down her fair cheeks and into the collar of her silver-scaled soft armor.

Because of the bumpy mountain road, the collar of her white silk dress had come undone two inches, revealing a large, dazzling patch of her full chest beneath a silk vest that clung tightly to her breasts. The vest swayed and bounced with the movement of the horse's back.

Gu Moran up close, his boots brushing against her stirrups, and reached into the neckline of her plain dress to pull up the silk shoulder strap that had slipped down to her shoulder.

Warm fingertips brushed against the soft flesh below her collarbone, and Kim Seon-a's body went limp, almost losing her grip on the reins. Her ears turned red all the way to the roots of her neck.

"Your Highness, thousands of eyes are watching..."

"What's there to be afraid of? I'm just helping my own woman with her clothes; who dares to say a word?"

Gu Moran pinched her collarbone with his fingers, the smooth texture making him pause for a couple of breaths before slowly withdrawing his hand.

He gave instructions to Pu Yunshan behind him.

" General Pu, have someone cut down the bamboo pipe that draws the mountain spring into the cave on the eastern mountainside, and then seal off all the surrounding wild fruit groves."

"I won't waste time with them. If I cut off their water and food and trap them for three days, those tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers inside will have to draw their swords and fight each other."

"Understood!"

Pu Yunshan clasped his hands in acceptance of the order, then turned and led two hundred cavalrymen toward the eastern side of the mountain.

Gu Moran turned his horse around and looked at the two four-wheeled flatbed carriages that had been pushed ten steps away from the front of the formation.

In the rough wooden cage on the right, which had once held rotten salted fish, Eunuch Shuangxi and Zhou Yanru, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, were crammed in a corner, their bodies covered in stinking fish scales.

Takaichi Nanako lay sprawled on the wooden railing, her hair disheveled, her jaw dislocated and unable to close, long strands of drool hanging from the corners of her mouth, only able to utter rough "hoarse" sounds from her throat.

" Tuoba Mang." Gu Moran raised his chin.

"Go, lift this princess's chin back up and make her shout a couple of times at the watchtower up there, asking if Shōni Sukemoto still cares about his master's life or death."

"Okay!"

Tuoba Mang slammed the large iron hammer into the ground and strode to the flatbed cart.

Zhou Yanru, inside the cage, shrank back in fright, covering his head with his hands and shouting:

Don't kill me!

Shōni Sukemoto is watching from above. I am an official appointed by the imperial court; he will definitely use silver to ransom me!

Tuoba Mang ignored him completely, and his large, fan-like hand reached through the gap in the wooden railing and grabbed Takaichi Nanako's cheek, which was full of fishy smell.

Takaichi Nanako's eyes widened, and she grabbed wildly with both hands, but Tuoba Mang twisted her wrist.

Click!

A crisp sound rang out, Takaichi Nanako convulsed in pain as her jaw snapped back into place.

"Go ahead and shout, you little wench."

Tuoba Mang patted the sticky substance off his hands, took two steps back,

"If you dare to bite your tongue again, I'll knock all your teeth out and soak them in alcohol."

Takaichi Nanako, clutching her aching cheek, leaned against the edge of the wooden cage, panting heavily, and looked up at the watchtower above the mine.

Inside the thirty-foot-high watchtower, Shōni Sukemoto of the Dazaifu Bureau, was holding a bronze telescope in both hands.

Through the lens, Zhou Yanru, Eunuch Shuangxi, and Gao Shi Nanako, dressed in a tattered green silk dress, were clearly visible in the wooden Takaichi Nanako.

The adjutant standing nearby craned his neck to take a look and said anxiously:

"My lord, the Great Yan army has pushed Nanako and Vice Minister Zhou from the capital to the front lines!"

Gu Moran is definitely trying to use them as hostages to force us to open the tunnel and surrender. Should we send someone out to negotiate and exchange His Highness for them first?

Shōni Sukemoto put down his binoculars, stroked his short beard, and instead of being in a hurry, let out two low laughs:

"Switch it back? Why switch it back?"

The lieutenant was stunned. "That's a prince sent from the Capital, and the Vice Minister of Ministry of War of Great Yan who signed a spoils-sharing agreement with us..."

"Idiot!"

Shōni Sukemoto slapped the deputy general across the face.

" Zhou Yanru has the evidence that we have been colluding with the Ministry of War of Great Yan. That bitch, Takaichi Nanako, no longer seems to be stupid. She knows the location of the secret door to the treasury of the Iwami Silver Mine lord!"

Gu Moran had her jaw reattached, clearly intending to interrogate her in public and dig up our secrets!

The lieutenant covered his face, not daring to breathe:

"So, what does my lord mean...?"

Shōni Sukemoto walked to the wooden window and reached out.

The temperature in the valley rose in the afternoon, and gusts of mountain wind blew down the slope to the bottom of the valley.

"Heaven is on my side! A mountain wind is rising."

Shōni Sukemoto withdrew his hand and grabbed the command flag hanging at his waist.

"Only the dead can keep secrets. Give the order to the foreman in the middle mine shaft to lift up all the stone slabs covering those twelve ventilation holes!"

"Burn all the cinnabar and mercury vapors that have been smelted underground for three years, along with those three hundred bundles of 'heartbreak grass,' and release them out!"

The lieutenant's expression changed drastically:

"My lord, that Yamata Mercury Smoke is extremely poisonous. Once it's released, Princess Nanako and Vice Minister Zhou, Nanako are at the front of the cage, will be the first to die from their lungs rotting open!"

"Then let them serve His Majesty the Emperor faithfully!"

Shōni Sukemoto swung the command flag downwards.

"They, along with Gu Moran and his army, will all turn into purplish-black rotten flesh at the bottom of the valley! Go now!"

At the bottom of the valley, just as Takaichi Nanako stood up, leaning on the wooden railing, before she could even open her mouth, a series of rumbling sounds came from the rock wall halfway up the mountain in the mine.

Twelve dark stone caves were revealed on the rock wall.

Immediately afterwards, plumes of pale white smoke billowed out from the twelve stone caves.

The white smoke was completely different from ordinary firewood smoke; it was as heavy as if it were filled with lead. As soon as it emerged from the cave, it did not float into the sky, but instead slid down the steep mountain wall. With the help of the afternoon downhill wind, it swept over the vanguard of the Great Yan Army at the bottom of the valley.

Wherever the white smoke passed, the wild grass growing in the crevices of the rock face turned black and withered at a visible speed, and several sparrows perched on the treetops fell straight down before they even had a chance to flap their wings.

A pungent, fishy stench mixed with the acrid smell of sulfur hit me.

What does it taste like?

The two tall horses pulling the flatbed cart had just taken a puff of the drifting smoke when their forelegs buckled, and they spat out large amounts of white foam mixed with blood. Without even uttering a mournful cry, they crashed heavily onto the gravel ground, their four legs twitching twice before falling still.

"It's poisonous! It's poisonous fumes!"

The Great Yan at the front of the line broke into disarray. Several soldiers choked on the water, their eyes watering, and hurriedly tore off their clothes to soak up the water from their water bags and cover their mouths and noses, retreating step by step.