Splash.
Water splashed as Ian Song stepped into the wooden tub.
The hot water felt amazing against his skin. Ian let out a satisfied sigh, closed his eyes, and leaned back comfortably against the tub.
He heard a soft rustle, followed by two gentle splashes. The water swirled—Lily and Autumn had joined him in the tub.
Ian opened his eyes and openly admired the two women, dressed only in dudous and thin underpants. His bold gaze made both Lily and Autumn blush.
"General, let me scrub your back."
Autumn, too shy to meet Ian's eyes, lowered her head and moved behind him. She gently helped him lean back against her and started rubbing his back with her small hands.
"General, allow me to massage your legs."
Lily, her cheeks flushed, gave Ian a shy smile, then lifted his foot and began to massage it.
With Lily and Autumn attending to him, Ian felt completely at ease. Suddenly, a saying came to mind: 'Drunk, I rest on beauties' knees; awake, I command the world.'
Wasn't this his exact situation?
Wasn't this exactly his life right now?
The next morning, Ian emerged from his room looking completely refreshed—after last night with Lily and Autumn, he felt like he was floating on air.
After more than a year without a woman, Ian had left both girls utterly spent. Even with their cultivation, they couldn't handle his intensity and were still sound asleep.
Today, Victor Zhao and Gu Min were leading the troops to attack Longan and Shunhe Prefectures.
As Grand General, Ian naturally had to see them off and rally the troops.
As soon as Ian showed up, tens of thousands of soldiers erupted in a chant: "Mighty Grand General!"
The roar echoed through the city, shaking it to its core.
After seeing Victor Zhao and Gu Min off, Ian returned to the War Ministry. After a year of stockpiling, the treasury was overflowing with money and grain—more than enough to start a major war. Qi's restoration was within reach.
Once the kingdom was restored, he'd help Prince Daniel Jiang ascend the throne and complete his first mission.
As for his second mission, Ian had been working on it in secret. Now, with Empire Tavern branches across the Shenzhou Continent, nothing escaped his notice.
The only thing that troubled him was the Four Great Beauties: except for Lyra Hale in Chu and Vivian Gee in Qin, Lady Lila Pearce and Serena Hart had vanished without a trace.
According to the latest intel, Lady Lila Pearce had disappeared after Qi's capital fell—she hadn't shown up in over a year.
Serena Hart was an assassin, always moving in the shadows, making her even harder to track down.
As for Lyra Hale, Ian knew she was in Chu, but he couldn't just leave Qi with so much going on. He still kept tabs on Vivian Gee, too.
With Vivian Gee as chancellor, Qin was growing stronger by the day—training troops, stockpiling weapons, and just waiting for the right moment to make a move.
............
As soon as Qi mobilized its troops, countless spies rushed to relay the news to every other kingdom.
However, communication in this world was slow; by the time the other kingdoms received word, Zhao Yan and Gu Min would already be at the gates of Longan and Shunhe prefectural cities.
Two days later.
Victor Zhao led twenty thousand troops to the gates of Longan Prefecture's capital.
Within an hour of arrival, he launched an assault on Longan Prefecture.
The defenders of Longan numbered only a little over six thousand. With a single deafening blast, the city gate was blown apart.
Victor Zhao drove his troops inside, and in less than five hours, Longan Prefecture was captured.
That's right—the city gate was blasted open by black gunpowder made by Ian Song. It was an epoch-making invention, so after it was developed, only a handful of people knew the secret. It stayed top secret until this campaign...
After taking Longan, Victor didn't rush to attack the subordinate counties. Instead, he sent envoys to persuade them to surrender.
On the other front, Gu Min's fighting style was different from Victor Zhao's. He split his forces into four columns, surrounding the four counties under Shunhe Prefecture with overwhelming force.
But when surrounding those four cities, he deliberately left a gap so people could escape and beg the prefectural capital for help.
When he heard that all four counties were surrounded by Qi's army, the Shunhe prefectural governor panicked.
In the end, he sent five thousand troops to rescue the nearest county, leaving only two thousand soldiers in the prefectural capital.
But those five thousand troops had barely left the city for ten li before they were surrounded by a force of ten thousand.
It turned out that most of the troops Gu Min sent to surround the four county seats were just auxiliaries and laborers in disguise. The real force—ten thousand elite soldiers—lay in ambush near the prefectural capital.
After more than a year of training, these soldiers were itching for a fight.
Plus, they had twice the numbers.
So, in just two hours, the battle was over: of Shunhe's five thousand troops, three thousand were captured, fifteen hundred killed, and the remaining five hundred threw down their weapons and armor and fled. Qi's losses totaled less than two hundred, with only eight dead and twenty-two seriously wounded; the rest suffered only minor injuries.
Shunhe Prefecture had only seven thousand troops in total, and Gu Min wiped out five thousand of them.
That same night, Gu Min dispatched one hundred Wolf Cavalry to infiltrate Shunhe, open the drawbridge and city gates, and lead the troops inside. By dawn, the Qi banner was flying over Shunhe.
Two days later, Victor Zhao had secured all of Longan Prefecture, while Gu Min had turned all of Shunhe Prefecture into Qi territory.
Before Qi was destroyed, it had only nine prefectures and thirty-three counties.
Now, with five prefectures, more than half the kingdom's land had returned to Qi's embrace.
After Victor Zhao and Gu Min took these two prefectures, both the Zhao and Yan Kingdoms received news of Qi's attack.
But before they could send reinforcements, news arrived that both prefectures had already fallen.
The fall of the two prefectures sent shockwaves through both the Zhao and Yan Kingdoms.
Upon hearing the news, Ian's first reaction was to expand the army.
After a year of recovery and Ian's tax reduction policies, the commoners of Lingshui, Yian, and Fan Prefectures were able to eat their fill. With Ian's vigorous promotion of commerce, some even became wealthy.
Soon, the Grand General's recruitment notice spread throughout the three prefectures.
Recruitment requirements:
1. Healthy male.
2. Age between eighteen and twenty-five.
3. Must have brothers at home.
Recruitment benefits:
1. Monthly salary of fifty coins.
2. Settlement allowance of five hundred coins.
3. Families with a soldier can have their farm tax waived.
4. If killed in battle, the family receives a compensation of ten thousand coins.
With these four major benefits, volunteers flooded in. In the Zhao and Yan Kingdoms, ordinary soldiers' monthly pay rarely exceeded twenty coins, and that's if their superiors didn't deduct from it.
Moreover, there was no settlement allowance, no farm tax exemption, and certainly no death compensation.
A soldier here received pay, a settlement allowance, tax relief for his family, and most importantly, even if he died on the battlefield, his family would get ten thousand coins in compensation.
So, in just three days, eighty thousand troops were recruited.
Even Ian himself hadn't expected such a number.