Vol 9 Chapter 152 (2/2)

Finally, under pressure from multiple sides, I managed to spit out my answer. After that, another 20 minutes or so went by as we engaged in an intense discussion. When it finally concluded, Shen Pei finally got up to leave for Fan city. She seemed rather exhausted, perhaps because of the intense discussion where we both attacked her over and over. It cannot be helped. She is an administrative official after all.

“Umm, Lord Shen Pei.” Cao Ren immediately got up and saluted Shen Pei when she saw that Shen Pei was about to leave, “I hope that you can transfer all the troops from the city before tomorrow evening.”

“… I know.” Shen Pei replied lackl.u.s.terly as she stopped before looking weakly at Cao Ren and I with a frown, “You better think this through. I will not accept any responsibility for this.”

“Alright, I’ll take responsibility for this.” Cao Ren said as she smiled and nodded at us, “If that will help make you feel better.”

Wu…

I have begun to notice that Cao Ren is not the kindly girl I initially thought she was. She would always say things that really hit the other party where it hurt at times like these. Even though Cao Ren had said that she would take responsibility, the soldiers’ lives were in Shen Pei’s hands and if any mishap were to occur, Shen Pei would still feel the weight of responsibility nonetheless.

“Lord Shen Pei, hope for good things to come out of this.” I smiled and patted Shen Pei’s shoulders, “If we win, it will be good for all of us.”

“Un…” Shen Pei merely grunted in response.

Yes, 20 minutes ago, at the very end, I chose to believe in Guan Yu. Normally, I would not have chosen to do so and would have chosen the more conservative option of rejecting their defection. But it is impossible to resist the allure of an opportunity to overturn the status quo of a stalemate. I cannot deny that I am falling prey to my desires.

Of course, there are also other considerations involved. As a fellow warrior, I am actually rather sympathetic towards Guan Yu who lost her elder brother and lord. Yet at the very end, I detected an abnormal strength in her eyes.

Where did this strength come from? Could it be from her resolve she made when she chose to defect?

… And of course, we have to be careful and take precautionary measures where possible.

“Lord Cao Ren, we better not send our troops to the front on that day.”

“Ah, I understand.” Cao Ren said as she rubbed her thigh.

“We will deploy our troops to just outside the city whereupon they will proceed with creating havoc inside the city. After that, we will see how it goes before entering the city.” I continued softly, “If there are no enemies in the tower, and there is a racket in the city, then we should charge in immediately.”

“Ah I understand~~~” Cao Ren replied as her teeth chattered. She then got up and made her way to the main seat where she opened a bamboo scroll and began writing on it.

“Un? This is?” I uttered as I went over to look and found that Cao Ren had begun to write a letter to my lor, “Are you going to tell her now?”

“Un, I want to make her happy.”

“Un… I suppose that’s fine.” I replied. Though I still felt apprehensive about this whole thing, our chances of success were pretty good. If we happened to sense that something was amiss, we could just pull back then.

“Hu…” I sighed as I held my hips and looked in the direction of Xinye city.

The final battle will be in 3 days.

Liu Bei POV

“Big brother, we’re back.” A voice came from outside the room just as I was getting exhausted with paperwork. I looked up and saw the 3 who had left about 4-6 hours ago. The one at the head was dressed from head to toe in torn and tattered clothing and her face was covered in dirt as she beamed at me.

Yun Chang is back, along with Wen Yuan and Chen Gong.

My heart has not been feeling well the entire time. It is true that the paperwork I have had to deal with has contributed in no small part to my irritation but I was also concerned with Yun Chang and the rest as well.

Compared to me, it seemed like Yuan Zhi was not particularly concerned. After the 3 of them had left, she merely sat there and drank her sugar water. She was closing her eyes as well just now. I thought that she was concentrating on something but after some time, I saw her nodding off which meant that she had just dozed off.

But all that does not matter. Yun Chang is back after all.

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