Big Moon Ballad

Chapter 2690 Perilous Pass
It was early morning, just as dawn was breaking.

When the personal guard lifted the curtain, Ying Baoyue was fast asleep in Li Ji's arms.

Li Ji gently covered her ears and gestured for silence to the female guards standing frozen at the door.

He also opened the barrier while covering Ying Baoyue's ears to make sure there would be no noise to disturb her.

"You are... Lord Zhaohua?"

Li Ji nodded. "Are you getting up?"

The female guard was completely frozen in fright. Fortunately, when Li Jinniang sent her to be Ying Baoyue's personal guard, she was told not to be alarmed if a dark-eyed man suddenly appeared in Ying Baoyue's tent one day.

“It’s me,” Li Ji looked down at Ying Baoyue in his arms. “I will wake your general. You can go out now. Don’t worry.”

“Alright…” The guard stiffly lowered the curtain.

"Baoyue," Li Ji called softly, "it's time to get up."

"Hug the moon?"

After calling him several times, Ying Baoyue finally opened her eyes and looked up at him.

Her eyes still held a hazy, newly awakened look, unlike her usual guarded demeanor whenever she fell asleep.

Li Ji smoothed the stray strands of hair around her ear and suddenly felt a sense of relief that he had returned.

They did nothing last night, just slept. Ying Baoyue slept very soundly, and just looking at her sleeping face, Li Ji felt an indescribable joy.

“It’s time to break camp,” Li Ji patted her head. “My great general, you need to get up.”

"You're so disrespectful," Ying Baoyue pushed his hand away. "You wouldn't have dared to do that before. I'm your older sister."

Last night, when Li Ji first got into Ying Baoyue's bed, he felt extremely uncomfortable, embarrassed, and stiff and awkward.

Eventually, Ying Baoyue couldn't take it anymore and said, "Why don't you just pretend you're still in the woods? You weren't so thin-skinned when you were little."

That's true. When he was little, he shamelessly wanted to get into Li Zhao's bed, but now that he's older, he's become arrogant.

Li Ji quickly adjusted his mindset. After putting himself in the shoes of the younger Li Ji, he immediately knew how to deal with the situation and was no longer stiff and embarrassed.

“I’m older than you now,” Li Ji said with a smile, touching her face. “And taller than you too.”

Although it was her suggestion, Ying Baoyue found it hard to adjust to Li Ji's sudden transformation from his previous icy demeanor to his childhood self.

"Alright, alright, I'm up," Ying Baoyue said, grasping his hand that was resting on her face. "Call the guards; I need to put on my armor."

Li Ji nodded and got out of bed.

A bodyguard came in to help Ying Baoyue change her clothes and put on her armor, while Li Ji sat and watched the whole process.

Under his gaze, the little girl who was helping Ying Baoyue put on the armor stiffened so much that she could barely straighten her arms.

“Ru Niang,” Ying Baoyue turned around helplessly, “Just pretend he doesn’t exist.”

"Zhaohua is our newly arrived adjutant general."

With Li Ji's imposing presence, who would believe he was just a military officer?

In the end, it was Ji Jiashu who pushed open the curtain and came in to relieve the guards' siege.

Ji Jiashu was fully armed, his silver armor gleaming coldly. "Baoyue, are you ready?"

Li Ji frowned as he looked at his attire. "Are you going to play too?"

Given his status, he should have remained in command of the central army.

"Just in case, after all, the other side has high-level cultivators," Ji Jiashu said solemnly. "If the other side sends out high-level assassins, I might have to go out and fight too."

If something like the last time the Zen temple used high-level cultivators to hunt down Meng Shi happened, none of them, these Heavenly Realm cultivators, could hide in the back.

"Have you found out where the troops stationed at the city gate came from?" Ying Baoyue asked.

The scout team set off yesterday, specifically to gather intelligence on the situation at the front.

Although the attack on the Eternal Night Great Wall was scheduled for today, Ying Baoyue did not choose to attack Shanhaiguan at the outset.

The Qin army chose Juyong Pass, a few dozen miles away from Shanhaiguan, as the location for its first battle.

Juyong Pass is an important pass among the eight passes of Taihang Mountain, and is known as one of the "Nine Passes of the World". It has a strategic location that is easy to defend and difficult to attack.

For this reason, Ying Baoyue judged that the number of troops stationed at Juyong Pass by the Western Rong army should not be large, which would be a breakthrough point.

“A message came by carrier pigeon at dawn that the garrison at Juyong Pass is only about eight hundred men,” Ji Jiashu said with a furrowed brow. “It’s mainly the cavalry of the two Di kings, and about a hundred people from the Zen temple.”

"A hundred or so?" Ying Baoyue frowned. "So many?"

One hundred people may not sound like much, but how can a Zen temple still have so many people these days?
“The scouts have detected the presence of a large number of cultivators,” Ji Jiashu said. “They’re probably using a small group of elite troops to guard the area.”

“Baoyue,” he said seriously, “should we change locations?”

Changing the attack location on the eve of battle is a major taboo in military strategy, but Ji Jiashu really felt that this was very bad.

Although they outnumbered their troops, the narrow terrain of Juyong Pass prevented their main force from advancing, forcing them to send only small groups to attack. If the enemy had indeed deployed a large number of cultivators at Juyong Pass, then this location would be far too dangerous as the initial battleground.

Ying Baoyue closed her eyes briefly. "There's nowhere else to go."

It would be pointless to capture ordinary cities, as Lingbi is located between Shanhaiguan and Juyongguan. Juyongguan is already heavily guarded, let alone Shanhaiguan.

We will have to overcome this tough nut of Juyong Pass sooner or later.

“We’ll fight right here. I’ll personally take command,” Ying Baoyue glanced at Li Ji. “Inform Li Jinniang that she will be the vanguard in this battle.”

"The left and right armies will cover the rear, while the main force of the central army will set off first."

According to the original plan, Meng Shi was originally designated as the vanguard for this battle. Ying Baoyue originally intended for Li Jinniang to personally go and recapture Shanhaiguan.

But given the current situation, they can no longer afford to preserve their strength.

"Understood," Ji Jiashu obeyed and left.

Ying Baoyue and Li Ji exchanged a glance. Li Ji walked to Ying Baoyue's side and took her hand.

"let's go."

……

……

The army set off, with the vanguard in front, the main force in the center behind, followed by the left and right wings.

After marching for most of the day, the group finally saw the fortress nestled among the mountains in the distance.

The mountains on both sides of Juyongguan Pass rise into the clouds, with only a narrow road running through the middle, which is Guankou.

In this place, the originally spread-out army had to be reduced to five or six people in a row, and in the narrowest places, only two or three people or a horse-drawn carriage could pass through.

The valley is filled with piled-up rocks, towering walls and steep cliffs, deep mountain caves, narrow side paths, and treacherous forest barriers.

The treacherous terrain made everyone's hearts leap into their throats.

Li Jinniang led the Silver Cicada Guards and vanguard, about four hundred men, at the front, followed by the main force of about eight hundred men, and then Ying Baoyue's royal carriage. The guards on both sides of the carriage vigilantly watched the canyon on both sides.

The canyon was extremely quiet.

"Cuckoo, cuckoo."

Suddenly, birdsong filled the woods.