The Prodigal Son

That night, Qin Yu and Monk Dong hid in the room.

Drinking is one thing, but both men are high-ranking officers and certainly cannot openly break military regulations.

If you do something bad, as long as you're not caught, then you haven't done it.

Looking at the whole roasted chicken in front of him, Qin Yu couldn't help but give Monk Dong a thumbs up.

Reliable!

"Pour the wine! Pour the wine!"

Monk Dong urged impatiently, pointing to the earthenware bowl in front of him.

"OK!"

Qin Yu immediately grabbed a wine jar, poured a bowl for Monk Dong, and then poured one for himself.

Monk Dong immediately grabbed the wine bowl and gulped it down his throat.

"Take it easy!"

Qin Yu quickly grabbed Dong Heshang's hand, "Drinking is fine, but don't get drunk! Be careful not to make mistakes!"

This is a genuine distilled spirit, but the brewing time must have been very short; it's spicy enough but not fragrant enough.

At this rate of drinking, even if he were a ninth-level expert, he would probably get drunk.

"Okay, okay!"

Monk Dong put down his wine bowl and looked Qin Yu up and down: "Why do I feel like something's off about you?"

"You noticed it too?"

Qin Yu was surprised.

Is it really that obvious?

"Nonsense, who wouldn't see that?"

Monk Dong frowned and said, "We clearly won the battle and even got rid of Zong Bi, that big troublemaker! Why do you seem unhappy? It sounds like you're forcing a smile."

"It's not that I'm unhappy."

Qin Yu shook his head and said, "The problem must be with my mindset!"

"Oh? What's wrong?"

Monk Dong seemed to have discovered a new continent and even wanted to interview him.

"I can't really say for sure."

Qin Yu picked up his wine bowl and took a sip of strong liquor before slowly saying, "It's just that I suddenly feel like I don't like the battlefield anymore, or rather, it seems like I've never liked the battlefield at all..."

Qin Yu couldn't really explain his problem.

Qin Yu himself found it laughable when he said these things.

He was a ruthless killer.

Logically speaking, even if he doesn't disregard death, he should at least be able to face any death with equanimity.

Especially the deaths of enemy soldiers!

But now?

He seemed to have suddenly become compassionate and empathetic.

"this one?"

Monk Dong immediately lost interest.

"Isn't this a problem?"

Qin Yu glanced at him.

This is a very serious problem!

The key issue is that he knows his mindset is wrong, but he can't change how he feels.

This made him feel very depressed.

"This is a ridiculous problem!"

Monk Dong didn't take it seriously at all. "Even if you slept with women all day, you'd get tired of it, let alone looking at dead people?"

"..."

Qin Yu remained silent.

What a damn simple truth!

But you know what, it actually makes a bit of a difference.

Is it that I'm just getting tired of it?

Tired of it?

"That's how most people get through it."

Dong Heshang chuckled nonchalantly and added, "Of course, people like Ning Huang and Da Chui are an exception!"

Ning Huang is someone who truly enjoys killing; his temperament is not affected by killing!

Qi Dachui, however, was limited by his temperament.

These two types of people are extremely rare in the world!

There is another exception: those who completely lose their humanity in pursuit of fame and fortune.

But the vast majority of good generals are people like them.

From the fear of first entering the battlefield, to the desire to make meritorious contributions, and then to the high spirits of achieving success.

When a good general reaches a certain level, he faces the real test.

At this point, your decision can easily determine the life and death of thousands of people, and can also affect the outcome of a war.

Therefore, your sense of responsibility and conscience will drive you to become exceptionally cautious.

Caution, then, evolves into reverence!

Respect war, respect the enemy, respect life!

But this reverence can be expressed in many ways.

For example, you, who used to be bold and aggressive, suddenly become timid.

A person who was once confident may suddenly become less confident, and a person who was once decisive may become hesitant.

Or perhaps they loathe war, are weary of killing, or even loathe and hate themselves.

This is probably Qin Yu's current state.

This is a stage that many generals and commanders go through.

Qin Yu had had too smooth a journey before, and his temperament had not been tempered enough, so his reaction at this stage would be particularly severe.

Monk Dong took a swig of wine and continued, "Think about it carefully. Did you start showing this tendency after you were appointed as the commander of a detachment?"

Qin Yu pondered for a moment and replied, "Not really. It seems to have started when we broke through Wangzhou Prefecture and marched towards Xing. At that time, Xing was clearly poorly defended, but I was worried about falling into a trap, so I became cautious..."

Before this, he had always been very confident.

He even boasted, "I'm going to beat up famous generals."

However, after successfully breaking through Wangzhou Prefecture as planned, he became more cautious.

"That's right."

Monk Dong smiled and said, "Because you weren't in a truly desperate situation before, even if you lost, you at least had a way out! But you've crossed Wangzhou Prefecture without even basic supplies. If you misjudge the situation, your 20,000-plus men will be in dire straits. You must be cautious..."

However, Qin Yu's journey from caution to reverence was too rapid.

This was largely due to Qin Fumeng's efforts.

Qin Yu held his wine bowl and thought about it carefully, then nodded and said, "It seems that's really the case!"

"Knowing how to respect is a good thing."

Monk Dong continued, "But reverence is not about being overly compassionate; it's about choosing the lesser of two evils and the greater of two benefits! Only those who understand reverence know how to gain the greatest advantage with the least cost on the battlefield!"

Qin Yu pondered Dong Heshang's words carefully.

After a long while, Qin Yu joked, "You know what, you really do look like a master right now!"

"That's right!"

Monk Dong laughed heartily, "You think I've been a monk for over twenty years for nothing?"

Qin Yuchong gave him a thumbs up and asked curiously, "By the way, did you get here this way too?"

"I?"

Monk Dong was slightly taken aback, then immediately mocked himself: "I haven't even had a chance to get to where you are before I became a monk!"

"Really?"

Qin Yu casually joked, "I thought you were tired of killing and had become a monk!"

He knew, of course, that the reason Dong became a monk was most likely related to his shameful past.

"Get lost!"

Monk Dong laughed and scolded, grabbing his wine bowl and taking a big gulp. He casually said, "Don't think so much! Even a knife will become dull from cutting people too many times, let alone a person with flesh and blood. If you can face mountains of corpses and seas of blood and not feel any ripples in your heart, then you are basically no different from a beast."

"That's really true!"

Qin Yu nodded in deep agreement.

Monk Dong glanced at him and asked again, "Did your grandfather tell you what Emperor Xiaowu said back then?"

"Um!"

Qin Yu nodded slightly, "Standing calmly amidst the corpses, obeying orders upon hearing the soldiers' cries! My will is to bring peace to the people, and my deep affection for my comrades compels me to lead them to their deaths!"

"Yes, that's it!"

Monk Dong nodded and said, "But he certainly didn't tell you that Emperor Xiaowu knelt on the ground and wailed as he said those words..."

Emperor Xiaowu said this during the most devastating battle since the founding of the Daming Kingdom.

The Battle of Luoan!

Da Ning assembled an army of 100,000, while Bei Qi assembled an army of 120,000.

The two sides engaged in a bloody and brutal battle over Luo'an in Lizhou, disregarding costs and casualties.

In the end, Da Ning suffered a pyrrhic victory, with its 100,000-strong army reduced to less than 10,000.

Of the 120,000 troops of Beiqi, only a little over 5,000 survived.

After that battle, Emperor Xiaowu wept bitterly and left behind that famous saying amidst the corpses scattered everywhere.

Xiao Jinggong, the famous general of Northern Qi who fought against Emperor Xiaowu, never led troops again until his death.

"Respect for war is different from compassion for humanity; similarly, decisive killing is not the same as the annihilation of humanity!"

Monk Dong continued, "Take Zong Bi for example, do you think he was inhuman?"

Qin Yu thought for a moment and replied, "That old bastard set fire to his own city, causing countless people to be displaced. Shouldn't that be considered inhumane?"

"Nonsense!"

Monk Dong scoffed, "What's so strange about that? If Zong Bi were truly devoid of humanity, even if he couldn't stop us from capturing Wangzhou Prefecture, he could still cause us enormous trouble!"

"Really?" Qin Yu was somewhat skeptical.

Monk Dong took another sip of wine and asked, "If Zong Bi allows his troops to slaughter his own city, won't it take us time to clean up these corpses? Won't that further delay our advance? If we don't clean up the corpses everywhere, do you think a large-scale plague will break out?"

Seeing that Qin Yu remained silent, Monk Dong asked again, "What do you think is our biggest problem right now?"

"food!"

Qin Yu spoke again, "The army needs supplies, and we also need to find ways to provide relief to the disaster victims."

"right!"

Monk Dong nodded in agreement, "But this problem is very easy to solve!"