(Extra Story) Grand General 019

With a loud slap, a hand slammed onto the table, and he completely broke down. "Send men after them!"

"Your Majesty, the priority right now is to crush Fang Zhiyi's rebels!"

"I said, dispatch the Imperial Guard to chase after Wei An!" The emperor's eyes were bloodshot. Not only had he been played for a fool by Fang Zhiyi, but his wife had also been spirited away by the Marquis of Ding'an. In the future, when historians wrote about this, who knew how they would mock him!

"...Understood!" Prince Min could only comply.

The Capital Garrison resisted the ferocious attacks of the border troops, puzzled as to why these rebels seemed to have no regard for their own lives, charging forward desperately with shaved heads.

For three days, they had beaten back the rebels' repeated assaults, and they were already exhausted both physically and mentally.

"Report! The Four Directions Army — the Four Directions Army has arrived!" The sudden good news lifted the morale of the Capital Garrison.

The reinforcements were here — the rebels' good days were over!

"Quick! Rally the men and follow me out to strike, coordinating with the Four Directions Army to wipe out the traitors!" The general of the Capital Garrison coiled his queue around his neck, his expression fervent.

"Bad news, General!" Another soldier stumbled in frantically.

"What's the bad news?"

"It's not the Four Directions Army! It's not! Though the armor and banners are theirs, there's a big character 'Liu' on the battle flag!"

"Liu?"

"It's Liu Xigui, Fang Zhiyi's former subordinate! Nicknamed Fatty Liu!"

The general was struck dumb on the spot.

"Under the guise of reinforcement, they've already broken into our defensive line! Our brothers couldn't react in time — they've routed!"

"It's... over." After a moment of thought, the general said, "Hurry back to the city and ask His Majesty to send the Imperial Guard for support! There's still a chance!"

"General, the Imperial Guard was already sent out long ago... Don't forget, His Majesty sent them to find Consort He and the Marquis of Ding'an..."

"That foolish emperor! At a time like this, he's still thinking about his green hat!" Even as a fellow Jurchen, the General of the Capital Garrison couldn't hold back his frustration.

"Report! Scouts have spotted traces of the Xining Army!" Someone else rushed in.

The general looked at the soldier with hope, but the soldier's ashen face made him understand immediately: the Xining Army wasn't coming to reinforce either — they were coming to attack the city!

What was wrong with these people? They had all been disbanded and distributed to various armies, so how could they still stir up trouble? Were they all so loyal to Fang Zhiyi?

"General, give the order to counterattack, now!"

"General!"

The general raised his hand, then slowly lowered it.

"Surrender."

He knew that the Capital Garrison had already done well to hold out against the fierce border troops for this long, and now with enemy reinforcements arriving — there was no hope.

Only after entering the capital did Fang Zhiyi realize that the emperor had already fled, along with most of his ministers, heading south, where they still had nearly three hundred thousand troops.

But he wasn't concerned. As long as he had torn a rip in the Jurchen state, that would naturally draw the other wolves in.

"Spread the word: in the territories we occupy, anyone who wants to keep their queue will be rounded up as forced labor."

"Also, notify the political commissars of each battalion to begin ideological guidance work among the lower ranks. Tell the people: this world belongs to the common folk, and we are the army that can snatch fairness for them — the people's army!"

"Yes!"

Fang Zhiyi stood with his hands behind his back, looking at the dragon throne not far away. It felt like he hadn't seen this thing in ages — catching sight of it again, he found it almost familiar.

"Um, Chief." Fang Yunlan, dressed in plain cloth, trotted in cheerfully. "Well then — shall I go do my job now?"

Fang Zhiyi turned to look at her and nodded.

This girl had some brains, knowing how to direct things remotely. Even after leaving the capital, she had kept spies in the palace, and at the right moment, she'd instigated Wei An to elope with He Yinqing.

Fang Yunlan rubbed her hands together. "Heh heh — they can't find the pair of them, but I know exactly where they are. I'll bury one in the grasslands and one in the capital! Let them flaunt their love!"

Little Hei shook his head. "Now there's definitely a lonely singleton."

This internal turmoil lasted nearly twenty years. After seizing the capital, Fang Zhiyi began pushing reforms with bold strokes. Because he held military power, his methods were simple: dissenters were cut down directly. Bloody, perhaps, but the results were surprisingly effective.

He never marched south, nor did he even block travel between north and south.

Meanwhile, because imperial authority had been shaken, various resistance groups sprang up in the south, keeping the newly established government frantically busy.

Still, they clung to their dreams — the Four Directions Army and the Xining Army had only been partially taken by the rebel generals. Their core strength remained; given time, they could certainly counterattack.

But as Fang Zhiyi issued decree after decree — first opening maritime trade routes, then negotiating with the steppe tribes for commerce, encouraging farming, reducing taxes, and so on — the north he controlled grew increasingly prosperous, attracting even merchants and commoners from the south to defect.

No sooner had the court finally suppressed internal unrest and gathered three hundred thousand troops for a counteroffensive than the other side produced metal tubes that roared.

The imagined war of restoration ended before it even truly began.

The Jurchen cavalry, once famed, were mowed down in droves before they could even reach the enemy lines.

Fatty Liu peered through a telescope gifted by the foreigners, smacking his lips. "Say what you will, the general's vision — we just can't wrap our heads around it..."

"Commander Liu, why doesn't the general become emperor himself? Why all this talk of a parliament?"

"You wouldn't understand. The general isn't one for empty words — he said it himself, the world belongs to the people. Our general — he's a truly great man..."

A hand slammed onto a table, nearly splitting it in two.

Fang Zhiyi and Little Hei both flinched.

"You were supposed to help a novice complete her mission, and you ended up toppling the entire Jurchen state?" Yue Anyao was furious. "When the original host returned, she was nearly in tears! She wanted revenge — not for you to change the whole world!"

Fang Zhiyi looked away guiltily. "I couldn't help myself..."

"Couldn't help yourself?" Fine. Now tell me — where are the male and female leads? The emperor? The princess? The prince?"

"After the Great Jin fell, the emperor was paraded through the streets... He couldn't take the humiliation and killed himself. The princess — she was beaten to death by her own maids for abusing them. As for the prince and the main leads... weren't they handed over to the novice to handle?"

"Handle? And what exactly did you teach her? She sent the female lead off to marry into the Western Regions — married to some kingdom nobody even knows the name of! She had Wei An castrated, then forced him to doll himself up and fall in love with the prince! And when the original host went back, she found herself demoted from noble consort to common citizen, forced to register for an ID card! Do you have any idea how devastated she was?! You two... the both of you!" Yue Anyao closed her eyes and took a deep breath, but when she opened them again, Fang Zhiyi and Little Hei were gone.

"Get back here!"

Only a few staff members looked up at her in confusion.

Yue Anyao stood there fuming for a moment — then suddenly burst out laughing.

"Just like I said. You're always more fun like this."