Chong Province, Shunning City.

Yuwen Shuo had been besieged by Empress Su Mingyue for ten full days.

After the three southern commanderies of Chong Province surrendered without a fight, his outer defensive lines were peeled away layer by layer like an onion, leaving his remaining force of over one hundred thousand soldiers huddled within Shunning City.

Rations for the garrison on the city walls were reduced from two meals a day to one, and then from one meal a day to one every two days.

Once the mules were all slaughtered, they began killing the warhorses; once the warhorses were gone, they began boiling leather belts and bowstrings.

The common people in the city had eaten everything edible, even catching and consuming every last rat.

The envoy emerged from the east gate of Shunning City.

He rode a white horse, carried no weapons, and held a letter of surrender high above his head with both hands.

The horse was so thin that its ribs protruded, its hooves leaving uneven imprints in the mud outside the moat.

The Youzhou Army scouts intercepted him, searched him, blindfolded him, and brought him to Empress Su Mingyue's command tent.

Empress Su Mingyue was sitting in front of a map, discussing matters with several generals.

She was still wearing her black armor, with her silver spear leaning against the armrest of her chair.

The envoy was brought in, prostrated himself on the ground, and held the letter of surrender high with both hands.

The content of the surrender letter was brief, with wording that was extremely humble.

Yuwen Shuo confessed that his sins were grave and stated his willingness to bear all the blame himself, asking only that Empress Su Mingyue spare the lives of the over one hundred members of the Yuwen Family.

Once Empress Su Mingyue promised, he would throw open the city gates, lead his entire Family out to surrender in bonds, and head to Yuyang Commandery in Youzhou to live out the rest of his life as a wealthy man, never again concerning himself with the affairs of the world.

Everyone in the command tent turned their gaze toward Empress Su Mingyue.

She did not answer immediately.

Her knuckles turned slightly white as she gripped the letter of surrender, her expression remaining as calm as ever, yet all the generals in the tent could feel it.

The hand with which the Young Miss held the letter was gripping it so tightly that the veins began to bulge.

The conditions Yuwen Shuo proposed were actually not harsh.

Accepting the surrender would allow them to take Shunning City without losing a single soldier, avoiding a brutal siege and ensuring that thousands of Youzhou Army troops would not have to die beneath the high walls of Shunning City.

As a commander, this was the most rational choice.

However, it was not only her father, Old Marquis Su Yongning, who had died in battle at Wild Wolf Slope, but also two hundred thousand Northern Frontier troops.

They had been besieged on the barren mountain by hundreds of thousands of Zongsheng Sect followers while running out of food and reinforcements.

The allied forces of Yuwen Shuo and Zhao Chongyuan had been right outside the mountain, yet they withdrew their flank defenses, sealing off the supply routes and retreat paths.

Two hundred thousand men, along with the Marquis, had all died in battle.

Empress Su Mingyue placed the surrender letter on the desk and looked up at the envoy.

Her voice was very calm, so calm that the envoy shivered: "Go back and tell Yuwen Shuo to wash his neck clean and wait; my father and the two hundred thousand Northern Frontier troops have been waiting for him at Wild Wolf Slope for a long time."

The envoy's legs were weak when he was led out, and it took two Youzhou Army soldiers, one on each side, to support him so he would not collapse to the ground.

That same night, Empress Su Mingyue ordered an all-out assault on Shunning City.

Shunning City was the lair that Yuwen Shuo had managed for many years. The city walls were about three zhang high, encased in blue bricks on the outside, and filled with solid, rammed earth mixed with sticky rice mortar on the inside.

The city walls were densely packed with arrow towers and catapults, and the moat was both wide and deep.

The siege began at nightfall. The Youzhou Army's catapults struck first, hurling burning pots of oil onto the city walls, exploding into blinding balls of fire upon the arrow towers.

The garrison on the city walls fought back desperately, pouring down boiling oil, hurling stones, and raining arrows like a downpour.

Empress Su Mingyue sent the surrendered King-Protecting Army troops to charge in the first wave.

These men needed to prove their stance with blood. She would not let them die in vain, so she provided them with the thickest shields, the sturdiest scaling ladders, and two Northern Frontier veterans in each squad to oversee the battle.

The surrendered soldiers set up the scaling ladders and charged up under a hail of arrows, one wave falling only for another to take its place.

Corpses piled up higher and higher at the base of the city wall. They climbed up by stepping on the piles of their companions' bodies, their blades striking sparks as they hacked against the city bricks.

The battle raged from late night until dawn, and from dawn until noon the next day.

The garrison on the city walls was exhausted to the extreme; arrows began to run short, and the boiling oil was nearly depleted.

Empress Su Mingyue stood on the high ground in the rear, observing the frequency of the garrison's troop movements, and seized a gap in the guard rotation to order the entire army to press forward.

All reserves were committed at once. Dozens of scaling ladders were set against the ramparts simultaneously, and the elite troops of the Youzhou Army climbed the city walls amidst a sky full of arrows.

The first soldier to reach the top of the wall had his chest pierced by three blades simultaneously; the second was also cut down, but the third, fourth, and fifth leapt onto the ramparts one after another.

Blades flashed in the afternoon sun, and they finally secured a Breakthrough point over a zhang wide.

Subsequent troops poured onto the city wall endlessly along this Breakthrough point, pushing the garrison toward both sides of the wall.

The city gates were smashed open from the inside, the drawbridge crashed down, and the army outside the city surged into Shunning City like a tide.

The city had fallen.

The army advanced along the main street of Shunning City toward Yuwen Shuo's residence.

The sporadic resistance encountered along the way was quickly crushed; the retreating soldiers threw down their weapons and knelt by the roadside, surrendering with their heads in their hands, while the common people hid behind doors and windows, not daring to let out a breath.

By the time the vanguard reached Yuwen Shuo's residence, the vermilion-lacquered gates were wide open, and the stone lions in front of the gate were splattered with blood of unknown origin.

The soldiers charged into the residence in formation with shields, searching the front hall, back hall, study, and storehouse, finally discovering a strip of white silk hanging from the rafters of the main hall.

Hanging beneath the white silk was a person wearing purple python robes, his cap worn straight on his head, his face blue and purple, and he had been dead for some time.

When Empress Su Mingyue arrived, the soldiers had already taken Yuwen Shuo's body down from the rafters and laid it flat on the blue brick floor of the main hall.

Empress Su Mingyue stood at the entrance, not walking inside.

She just stood there, quietly watching Yuwen Shuo's corpse.

She had forced him into a dead end with the destruction of her two hundred thousand troops, disintegrated his morale with proclamations and rumors, and uprooted his outer cities one by one with layer upon layer of encirclement.

Finally, she had smashed open his city gates with an all-out assault that lasted a day and a night. Yet, before the city fell, he had used a strip of white silk to end his own life a step ahead of her.

He had killed her father, humiliated her Family, colluded to massacre the two hundred thousand Northern Frontier troops of Youzhou, and then hanged himself from his own rafters.

In the end, she had not been able to avenge her father with her own hands.

Empress Su Mingyue stood outside the door of the main hall for a long time.

Dongmei followed behind her, initially wanting to say something, but seeing the lines of her profile tensed like iron, she swallowed the words of comfort that had been on the tip of her tongue.

Finally, Empress Su Mingyue withdrew her gaze and coldly ordered that Yuwen Shuo's body be buried with the rites of a Duke, while all members of the Yuwen Family, regardless of age or gender, were to be executed on the spot.

Empress Su Mingyue knew her order was cruel, but she felt that not being able to avenge her father with her own hands, and not being able to avenge the two hundred thousand Northern Frontier troops with her own hands, was even crueler.

After taking Shunning City, Empress Su Mingyue ordered Ren Yunjie to lead the main force of the Yinyun Valley troops to garrison Chong Province, reorganize the surrendered soldiers, and stabilize the situation.

As for herself, she only rested in Shunning City for one night before organizing her army to head south the next morning, leading one hundred and fifty thousand elite troops straight toward Cang Prefecture.