Vol 8 Chapter 22 (2/2)

“Wu.” Gan Ning was speechless, and closed her eyes probably because she wasn’t able to process all this under such short notice.

I too was surprised as I didn’t expect my guess to be on the mark.

Good thing I was already prepared for it.

“My lord, the east and west are–”

“Yes.” I nodded, “Lord Gan Ning need not worry. Both sides are defended by Chen Gong and Liu Qi so all you need to do are to deploy additional help when there is need for it and we can hold out against the enemy.”

“… Un, I understand.” Gan Ning recovered when she heard what I said and nodded.

“Lord Gan Ning! The Administrator is approaching the city!”

When she heard this, Gan Ning put down her right hand with no hesitation, “Alright, fire.”

With a single orderly wave of humming bowstrings, more than a hundred arrows pierced the sky and flew out towards the distance.

I looked out, and saw that Zhu Ran’s troops were hit by the arrows as expected, with the bulk of the damage inflicted on the leading cavalry troops. The troops behind however, were unperturbed and continued to charge at the city.

“The Administrator and all the troops that left the city are back in!”

“Good. Close the city gates and fire again.”

*Sou* *Sou* *Sou* Another wave of arrows rained down, and another cohort of casualties resulted.

“Lord Gan Ning, can this gate hold?”

“We can hold. There are 3,000 men here.” She nodded.

So 3,000 against 3,000, looks like we hold the upper hand at this gate.

“Half of you, keep your bows.” Gan Ning lowered her head and gave more orders as Zhu Ran’s troops got closer and closer.

“Everyone! Get the siege defence tools ready and be ready to engage the enemy in close quarters.” Gan Ning drew her chopper when she finished.

“My lord, if you get in danger later, you must call for me. Protecting my lord is my top priority.”

“Alright, but please protect yourself first before protecting me.”

“Haha, my lord is so kind.”

Wu… Don’t you feel that saying these words at this time is a little mushy?

“Imperial Uncle, get ready.” Gan Ning reminded me, to which I wordlessly nodded and got into a stance as I waited for Zhu Ran’s troops to attack.

But in the next moment, Zhu Ran yelled out, “Change!”

What does that mean?

Gan Ning and I raised our heads and looked down.

“…”

“What!”

This!

All of us were shocked.

About 100 paces away from the city, Zhu Ran and Zhu Zhi split their troops into 2 and ran off in opposite directions from each other.

This means that–

“It’s over,” Gan Ning closed her eyes and softly said, “They’re not here to attack the main gate. They’re here to reinforce the troops attacking the east and west gates.”

“Then, that means that–” I was in disbelief, while Gan Ning nodded and tidied her scarf.

“Yes, the troops here at the main gate were the bait, and the real targets were the side gates.” Gan Ning said as she flung her scarf back and tied a knot with it so that it wouldn’t fly about.

But this is really bad. There are only a thousand odd troops defending each side gate so it will be difficult for them to hold out against the attacking troops now that the enemies at the main gate have gone to bolster them.

“Lord Gan Ning, let’s split. 1 of us will reinforce Liu Qi while the other will reinforce Chen Gong.”

“Un–”

“Gan Ning! Are you up there!”

While Gan Ning was still considering who to go where, a loud holler came from the ground. We hurriedly went to the other side of the walls and saw Huang Zu with her thousand odd troops.

“I’m here, Administrator.”

“Good! Bring 2,000 men and go reinforce the Young Mistress with Liu Bei. I’ll go reinforce Liu Bei’s strategist.”

“Understood.” Gan Ning nodded, and Huang Zu roared out as she rushed to the east with her cavalry troops.

“Imperial Uncle will be following me then.”

“Alright.”

“I’ll follow my lord.”

When she finished, Gan Ning began running across the coty walls while we closely followed. Because our troops were all infantry, we will not be able to make it there in a short time, and will take at least 10 minutes or so.

Though I’m still quite worried about Chen Gong and Zhou Cang, these were Huang Zu’s orders and I had to obery them. She was the Administrator after all and I believe in Chen Gong and Zhou Cang?

On top of the city tower, all of the troops defending the city were moving along with us. Some moved along the city tower and the city walls while the others moved in the city.

“I wonder if the other side has set up their cloud ladders.” Gan Ning muttered as she ran

(TL: Cloud ladders are a kind of scaling ladders. Imagine something like a fire engine but manually powered by humans.)

“I doubt it given that not much time has pa.s.sed.”

“No, this depends on how many there are in the force attacking the west side. If there are many, they can very quickly stack up the cloud ladders and charge into the city. If that happens, then it’s over.” Gan Ning said as she continued to accelerate, leaving us behind in no time at all.

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