Chapter 33: Absolute Obedience
Page 1 of 3
Xiao Zhan glanced at Liu Monkey, who was still twitching on the ground, uncertain whether he was alive or dead, and said flatly, “Take him away and throw him outside the camp. Whether he lives or dies is up to his own fortune.”
“Yes!”
Two household guards immediately stepped forward and dragged Liu Monkey away like a dead dog, leaving a long trail of blood behind him.
The sight chilled every soldier’s heart to the bottom.
“From today onward, there is only one rule here!” Xiao Zhan swept his gaze across the entire field, his voice suddenly rising like a thunderclap.
“Obedience!”
“Unconditional, absolute obedience!”
“My orders are the law of Heaven! My words are imperial edicts!”
“No matter what I order you to do—even if I tell you to eat shit or kill your own father—there is only one thing you are to do!”
“Carry it out!”
“Anyone who objects, anyone who hesitates, anyone who pays lip service while secretly resisting…” Xiao Zhan’s gaze scraped across every soldier’s face like a blade. “That pool of blood on the ground is what awaits you!”
“Is that understood?!” he roared.
“Understood!”
Several thousand soldiers bellowed with all the strength in their bodies, their cries shaking the heavens!
This time, there was no trace of their earlier defiance. All that remained was a bone-deep terror and submission, born after they had been utterly crushed.
On the command platform, Zhang Wei’s face had gone white as paper.
Beside him, Qin Cang clenched his fists so tightly that his fingernails sank deep into his flesh, yet he did not feel it.
“He… is this what he calls training soldiers?” Zhang Wei’s voice trembled. “He’s raising venomous insects! Using human lives and the most brutal bloodshed to create a horde of monsters who know nothing but killing and obedience!”
Qin Cang said nothing, but his expression was even more complicated than Zhang Wei’s. He saw fear. He saw madness. But he also saw something he had never witnessed before—an efficiency so terrifying that it made him shudder.
Yes, monsters.
But what if this was precisely the kind of monster the Great Ming Dynasty needed to deal with the even more savage tribes beyond the northern frontier?
The thought took root in Qin Cang’s heart like poisonous weeds, spreading wildly.
On the drill grounds, Xiao Zhan was highly satisfied with the effect he had produced.
He did not want men.
He wanted a host of war machines stripped of emotion, retaining only the instinct to kill and the will to obey.
He walked up to Wang Ba, drew a silver ingot weighing at least ten ounces from his robes, and casually tossed it over.
“You did well. This is your reward.”
Wang Ba fumbled as he caught the heavy ingot and stared at it in a daze.
Page 1 of 3
Page 2 of 3
“Remember this. Every one of you, remember it!” Xiao Zhan’s voice rang out again. “Here, the harsher the punishment, the richer the reward!”
“Whoever carries out orders most decisively, kills the enemy most fiercely, and trains the hardest—I will reward him with gold and silver, women, and official rank! I can turn you from a pack of despised camp thugs into men whom everyone envies!”
“But anyone who dares disobey my orders…” He pointed at the trail of blood left behind by Liu Monkey. “This is the example!”
A carrot and a stick.
The most primitive method—and the most effective.
Every soldier’s breathing grew heavy. They stared at the silver in Wang Ba’s hands, greed gleaming green in their eyes. Then they looked at the blood on the ground and shuddered in terror.
They were afraid, yet they wanted what was being offered.
That contradiction seized their hearts like two invisible hands, turning them completely into puppets dangling from Xiao Zhan’s strings.
“Very good.” Xiao Zhan nodded. “Training continues! The thousand strikes you failed to complete just now are doubled. Two thousand strikes! Anyone who cannot finish will go without supper tonight!”
“Yes!”
This time, the response was a unified roar.
Not a single person dared voice the slightest complaint.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The dull thuds of fists striking the wooden posts once again resounded across the drill grounds—only now, the blows were more forceful and more frenzied than before.
Xiao Zhan watched the beasts he had begun to tame, a cold curve touching the corners of his mouth.
He walked to the front of the formation and stood on high ground, looking down upon these future gods of slaughter.
“From today onward, you are no longer the camp thugs of the capital garrison, nor the hardened nuisances despised by the imperial court!”
“You have been given a new designation!”
His voice carried throughout the entire military camp.
“From today onward, your name is Ghosts!”
“Because your mission is to appear like ghosts, silently and without warning, in the places where the enemy least expects you—and reap their lives with the greatest possible efficiency!”
“You will become the sharpest sickle from Hell, hanging over the heads of every enemy of the Great Ming!”
“Ghosts! Ghosts! Ghosts!”
Someone began the chant, and at once all the soldiers joined in, howling like mad. They mechanically swung their fists and feet while shouting themselves hoarse over this unfamiliar, terrifying, yet inexplicably exhilarating new name.
Xiao Zhan watched with satisfaction, then turned to leave.
When he reached the edge of the drill grounds, he paused slightly. Without looking back, he left them with a sentence that made everyone’s blood run cold.
Page 2 of 3
Page 3 of 3
“That is all for today! Go back and write your wills!”
“Because starting tomorrow, your training opponents…”
“Will no longer be wooden posts!”
Xiao Zhan’s words were like a freezing wind blowing from the depths of the underworld, instantly extinguishing the feverish flames that had only just ignited across the drill grounds.
Write their wills?
Starting tomorrow, their opponents would no longer be wooden posts?
Those two pieces of information combined, leaving every soldier present in a prolonged state of mental paralysis.
Gulp.
Someone swallowed with difficulty, the sound unnaturally clear in the deathly silent drill grounds.
The soldiers who had been exhilarated by their new designation and envious of the silver now watched the color drain visibly from their faces, replaced by ghastly pallor.
At last, they belatedly realized that every word Xiao Zhan had spoken earlier had been serious.
He had crippled Wang Mang deliberately.
He had truly ordered Wang Ba to beat Liu Monkey half to death.
Then when he said that, beginning tomorrow, their training opponents would no longer be wooden posts, he had certainly meant that as well.
If not wooden posts, then what?
Living people!
The instant that thought occurred to them, a chill surged madly from the base of their spines to the crowns of their heads.
They might be camp thugs, hardened troublemakers, and men with blood on their hands. But that blood had been spilled on battlefields, in street brawls, and in situations where one either killed or was killed.
Now this mad vice minister actually intended to make killing part of their daily training?
“He… he… he’s insane… He must be completely insane…” One soldier’s lips trembled, his teeth chattering as he struggled to remain standing.
“A devil… He’s a devil…”
Fear spread through the ranks like a plague.
On the command platform, Zhang Wei and Qin Cang looked equally dreadful.