Chapter 25: Amidst the Quaking Clouds (Part Four)

Within the city of Clouds, Xu Le rode astride his horse, halberd in hand. Sunlight poured down, and though his robe was short and coarse, to the eyes of the crowd, this valiant youth seemed clad in snowy white.

Amid Yuan Junwei’s furious roar, he had already spurred his horse forward at the head of the charge! Among the ranks of the Soaring Eagle soldiers, those squad captains—the elite warriors of the army—likewise surged ahead, bellowing their battle cries. These hardened fighters knew talent when they saw it: Xu Le, with a single move, not only protected Song Bao with ease, but in one blow left Yuan Junwei’s defenses utterly shattered.

A mounted warrior’s weapon was like an extension of his own arm, always ready to shield him from harm. Yet Xu Le, with a deft opening and pressing advance, forced an opening where none should have existed. The cavalry spear that, in Yuan Junwei’s hands, usually danced like a living dragon now seemed a lifeless fish, plunging uselessly toward the earth. Such skill was beyond what their Captain Yuan could ever counter on his own!

Hooves thundered as two or three dozen riders charged, raising clouds of dust, reins snapping, horses whinnying. Seven or eight riders surged forward together, then quickly fanned out, wings spread to encircle Xu Le in the blink of an eye.

These battle-hardened men had experience; all attacking head-on would only let Xu Le defeat them piecemeal, so they spread out and surrounded him, determined to find a weakness he could not cover.

As the circle closed, spearpoints, lance tips, and gleaming blades flashed coldly, all aiming to tear Xu Le to pieces.

Xu Le responded with a sweeping arc of his single-axe halberd, whistling through the air and carving a cold, shining circle around him! Countless weapons clanged against it, but his weapon, every time it touched an opponent’s, slipped away without sticking. All the spears and swords, whether rising or falling, were knocked aside.

With one sweep clearing his space, Xu Le’s long halberd plunged forward, swinging left and right with lightning speed, striking two squad captains beneath their ribs—yet just before contact, he flicked the axe aside to spare them a mortal blow. With a muffled thud, the two men toppled from their horses, curling up on the ground in pain.

Yuan Junwei’s spear, knocked aside, circled back to strike again with a furious roar. But Xu Le, sensing his attack as if he had eyes on his side, twisted his waist and avoided the thrust. Yuan Junwei tried to twist his wrist and sweep the spear toward Xu Le’s flank, but Xu Le trapped the spear under his arm, retracted his halberd, and smashed its butt toward Yuan Junwei’s face. With a sharp shout—“Let go!”—Xu Le’s weapon loomed large in Yuan Junwei’s vision.

Yuan Junwei tried to yank his spear free but failed; forced to obey, he released his grip and, using the strength of his waist and abdomen, leaned back flat against his horse to narrowly avoid the blow.

Xu Le pulled back his halberd, swept another chilling circle to drive back several weapons, loosened his grip, and with his left hand seized Yuan Junwei’s spear. A swing of the spear smashed into the nose of a Soaring Eagle squad captain’s horse, making it rear with a shrill cry. The captain clung desperately to his mount, unable to continue his attack.

Armed with both halberd and spear, Xu Le used the halberd for defense, the spear to probe and strike. In a few spiraling moves, two more squad captains were unseated. As Yuan Junwei sat up in the saddle, half of the seven or eight riders who had charged in had already been thrown to the ground; some remained atop panicked horses, flailing helplessly, their hands empty. In just a few exchanges, seven or eight of Heng’an’s elite Soaring Eagle warriors, including Yuan Junwei, attacking Xu Le together, had been utterly routed!

Xu Le calmly retrieved his weapons, swung them left and right, and flashed a smile of eight white teeth at Yuan Junwei.

The onlookers—Soaring Eagle soldiers and citizens alike—stood dumbstruck, silent as the grave.

Yuan Junwei and these captains were renowned Heng’an warriors, the kind who, armored and mounted, could charge straight into enemy lines and shatter formations. But now, they were no match for Xu Le alone!

Earlier, the crowd had felt sympathy for the merchant group, thinking Yuan Junwei’s men relentless and unreasonable, chasing them from outside the city to within, indifferent to local sentiment and excessively bullying outsiders. Now, witnessing Xu Le’s prowess, it seemed Yuan Junwei and his men must have suffered a grievous loss at the merchants’ hands, and were pursuing them in a desperate bid to reclaim their honor.

Looking at it, the ferocious Heng’an Soaring Eagle soldiers seemed the more pitiable ones!

Who was this handsome, sharp-eyed youth, to possess such skill? Was he not the very embodiment of the fabled “one rider worth a thousand”?

A black-faced military officer among the spectators watched with a face as dark as water, gripping his long whip tightly, his muscles tensed like a drawn bow, ready to spring into the fray at any moment. It was the natural reaction upon seeing a worthy opponent; crossing weapons with such a man would be the height of life’s pleasure!

Yuan Junwei glared bloodshot-eyed at Xu Le, who smiled back: “Not enough. Send more!”

Under the autumn sun, Xu Le’s white teeth flashed with a subtle gleam—a look both dashing and arresting, though at this moment, Yuan Junwei wanted nothing more than to smash every one of those beautiful teeth.

Behind Yuan Junwei, another angry roar erupted from the Soaring Eagle soldiers, as a dozen more horsemen surged forward, with seven or eight more advancing on foot. By now, these soldiers cared for nothing but felling Xu Le, even if it meant suffering severe punishment from Liu Wuzhou later.

With so many men charging, the arena was soon engulfed in dust and chaos, hooves pounding, blades flashing, shouts and cries resounding.

In the thick of this turmoil, Xu Le wielded his single-axe halberd in his right hand and Yuan Junwei’s spear in his left, darting and spinning, always using the halberd for defense and the spear to seize openings for attack. Weapons flew, some knocked spinning overhead. Mounted soldiers groaned as they were unhorsed and crashed to the ground, while those advancing on foot found themselves unable to get near; if they forced their way in, the spear struck like a viper, slamming them to the head or ribs and felling them instantly.

Xu Le, lightly pressing his stirrups, let his horse circle unhurriedly, his halberd and spear whirling, scattering the Soaring Eagle soldiers left and right, until the ground was littered with groaning men and fallen mounts.

Yet Yuan Junwei’s men kept pouring in; Yuan Junwei himself made several desperate attempts to close in, losing his weapon or narrowly avoiding blows each time. Retreating and advancing, he could do nothing to Xu Le—in the end, his eyes were bloodshot, caring for nothing else but either killing Xu Le or dying by his hand.

All around, several thousand people had gathered to witness the scene. They watched the whirlwind of weapons in the dust, but not a sound came from the crowd. This frontier city, hardened by war and famed for its martial spirit, had treated even the approach of the Turkic army with calm, yet today, the lone figure of Xu Le had left them all speechless.

Watching the Soaring Eagle soldiers being trounced by a single man, the citizens of Cloud City could only stare in stunned silence at the humiliation of their local heroes. The black-faced officer took a deep breath, unhooked the iron whip from his belt, beckoned for a subordinate to hand him a cavalry spear, then vaulted onto his horse with a thunderous shout: “Yuan Si, stand aside! Leave this to Yuchi Gong!”