I, Kangxi, am here to overthrow the Qing and restore the Ming!

despair.

A deep sense of despair.

Bamburshan looked at the Green Standard Army generals around him who had begun to whisper and whose eyes were darting around, and knew that the situation was hopeless.

These Han Chinese are opportunists; they followed Ao Bai while he was alive, but they turned against him the moment he died.

"No! I can't lose! I still have a chance!"

Gamblers at their wits' end often do the most reckless things.

Bamburshan suddenly remembered his last trump card, the earth-shattering secret about Kangxi's origins!

Once this secret is revealed, the Manchu nobility will be in uproar, and then it will be uncertain who will sit on the throne!

He whirled around, facing the more than ten thousand Green Standard Army soldiers behind him and the defenders on the city wall, and roared at the top of his lungs:

"Soldiers! Don't listen to Gabula! The current emperor is a complete imposter! He's not the late emperor's son at all! He's the offspring of that old witch Empress Dowager Xiaozhuang and the traitor Hong Chengchou..."

"Pfft!"

A dull thud as a sharp blade pierced flesh abruptly interrupted his roar.

Bamburshan's voice abruptly stopped.

His eyes widened, and he looked down in disbelief at the blood-stained tip of a knife protruding from his chest.

"you……"

Bamburshan turned around with difficulty and looked behind him.

Lin Xingzhu, the Green Standard Army admiral who had been following him, was gripping the hilt of his knife with a cold expression, his eyes looking at a pig or dog waiting to be slaughtered.

"Traitorous officials and villains deserve to die!"

Lin Xingzhu delivered a merciless verdict.

"You...you actually..."

Banbursan never expected that this Fujianese barbarian, who usually obeyed him without question, would deliver a fatal blow at this crucial moment.

Little did he know that Lin Xingzhu was not only a fellow townsman of Hong Chengchou, but also his most trusted confidant.

Hong Xiguan had already summoned him long ago; this fierce general of the Fujian rattan shield soldiers was already one of the emperor's men.

How can we get that Tartar, Bamburshan, to reveal the secret that "Kangxi was Hong Chengchou's son"?

dream!

Lin Xingzhu suddenly drew his long knife, creating a cloud of blood mist.

Bambursan fell off his horse like a tattered sack, twitched twice, and then lay still.

This descendant of the Aisin Gioro clan, who dreamed of becoming emperor, was killed by his own people before he could even finish his last words.

"The traitor Banburshan, who plotted rebellion and spread false rumors, has been executed on the spot by this general!"

Lin Xingzhu raised his blood-dripping longsword high and shouted at the soldiers behind him:

"All troops, listen to my command! Return to camp immediately! Anyone who dares to move will be considered a traitor!"

With the commander-in-chief killed, what's the point of fighting this battle?

The Green Standard Army soldiers had only come to join in the fun, but upon seeing this, they immediately backed down, turned their horses around, and obediently followed Lin Xingzhu back to the main camp.

On the city wall.

Gabula watched the retreating Green Standard Army and breathed a long sigh of relief, feeling his back soaked in cold sweat.

so close!

If the Green Standard Army really rebels, and the troops of the Bordered Yellow Banner join forces to attack the city, there could be a major upheaval!

"His Majesty is truly... incredibly resourceful!"

Gabula wiped the sweat from his brow, his awe for the young emperor growing even stronger.

Even the Han general Lin Xingzhu's hidden move was foreseen. What else does this emperor not know?

……

Northwest of the capital, outside Juyong Pass.

The earth was trembling.

It wasn't an earthquake, but rather the resonance caused by thousands of iron hooves striking the ground simultaneously.

On the once quiet official road, dust obscured the sky, and a giant yellow dragon made of steel and flesh was rapidly crawling towards the capital with a suffocating sense of oppression.

This is the Bordered Yellow Banner, the head of the Manchu Eight Banners.

This army was the vanguard of the Qing army when they entered the pass. Countless bright yellow flags with red borders fluttered in the wind, exuding a murderous aura.

The cavalrymen were clad in heavy armor, their faces were stern, and even their warhorses wore leather face shields.

Apart from the sound of horses' hooves and the clanging of armor, there was not a single other noise from the entire column.

This silence is more terrifying than clamor; it is a deathly stillness possessed only by battle-hardened elites.

In the center of the procession, the Bordered Yellow Banner Commander-in-Chief Ananda and his deputy Commander-in-Chief Nemo rode side by side.

"How much longer until we reach the capital?" Nemo asked with a gloomy face.

He was Ao Bai's nephew, and his personality was just like his appearance—rough and irritable.

"At our current pace, once we pass Juyong Pass, we'll be at the city gates in another two hours."

Commander-in-Chief Ananda glanced at the sky and frowned slightly: "However, the letter from the Grand Secretary came too quickly. It only said that there had been a change in the capital and that we should return to the capital immediately, but it did not say what had happened."

"What does it matter to him!"

Nemo cracked his whip, a fierce glint in his eyes: "As soon as our Bordered Yellow Banner army arrives, even if the sky falls, we can hold it back with our swords! I want to see if those empty-headed civil officials in the capital will go weak in the knees when they see our sabers!"

In their view, the country was won through war, and whoever has troops has the authority to speak.

And now, the toughest soldiers are in their hands.

……

Juyong Pass guards the northwest gateway to the capital.

The majestic city gate stands guard among the mountains like a giant beast.

Normally, this place is bustling with business travelers and vehicles, but today, it is eerily quiet.

Two riders stood alone on the open ground in front of the pass.

The man on the left is tall and has a refined yet dignified appearance; he is none other than the emperor's brother-in-law, Tong Guowei.

The man on the right is thin and has sharp eyes. He has a long sword hanging at his waist. He is Cao Yin, an imperial bodyguard.

Two people facing an army of ten thousand fierce warriors.

This scene, no matter how you look at it, has a tragic feel to it, like a mantis trying to stop a chariot.

"They're here."

Cao Yin squinted at the billowing dust in the distance, his hand unconsciously resting on the hilt of his sword.

Tong Guowei appeared calm. He straightened his court robes slightly and said indifferently, "Don't be nervous. We're not here to fight today; we're here to persuade."

Moments later, the vanguard of the Bordered Yellow Banner was already a hundred paces away.

"Whoa!"

With a series of synchronized reins, the torrent of steel came to an abrupt halt in front of the two men.

The overwhelming aura emanating from them was enough to terrify an ordinary person, but Tong Guowei didn't even blink. Instead, he spurred his horse forward a few steps and called out loudly, "Commander Ananda and Deputy Commander Nemo of the Bordered Yellow Banner, step forward and answer!"

The army parted, and Ananda and Nemo rode out.

Upon seeing that it was Tong Guowei, Ananda was startled. The Tong family was a noble Manchu clan, and Tong Guowei was the emperor's maternal uncle, which carried considerable weight.

"So it's Lord Tong Guowei."

Ananda bowed slightly from his horse, his tone still relatively polite: "May I ask what Lord Tong's intention is in blocking our army's path?"

"By imperial decree!"

Tong Guowei pulled a bright yellow imperial edict from his robes and held it high: "By imperial decree, the Bordered Yellow Banner is to be stationed outside the Great Wall and none of them are to enter the Great Wall without authorization! Summon Ananda and Nemo to the capital for an audience immediately!"

"Stationed outside the Great Wall? Entering the capital alone?"

Nemo, standing nearby, suddenly sneered, his face full of disdain: "Tong Guowei, are you still asleep? We are returning to the capital to defend the emperor on orders from Ao Zhongtang! The military situation is urgent, who dares to stop us?!"

He didn't take the so-called "imperial edict" seriously at all. In the past few years, Ao Bai's words were like imperial edicts, even more effective than imperial edicts.