Chapter 77 – An unbelievable cooperation
The young lady suddenly turned her head toward Tie Long Cheng, her gaze sharp as a sword and cold as ice. But as the pensiveness in her eyes increased, that sharpness also slowly disappeared.
“Three years ago, the emperor suddenly got hit by a poisoned arrow. His life was like a candle in the wind. At the time, the prince was only ten. And even though he was brilliant, it would have been difficult for people to accept his rule. Iron Cloud was at the verge of crumbling down. All the officials were thinking for themselves. It was a dangerous situation like a thousand pound weight hanging by a hair.”
Tie Long Cheng said slowly. It made Chu Yang feel as if he was explaining himself! This was the first time they met. Even if he had the status, this man still shouldn’t have to explain to him like this… this was really curious.
Tie Long Cheng continued, “After that, Diwu Qing Rou suddenly made some mistakes in the battlefield. Unexplainable situations that made seasoned generals of Great Zhao leave their bodies in the battlefield. These three battles were essentially inconsequential to Great Zhao, and certainly did not have to be so costly to them!”
“Because, at that time, they only had to simultaneously attack, and all of Iron Cloud would have gone up in a puff of smoke in about half a year! Our Iron Cloud was basically powerless at that point! However, at that key moment, the enemy’s generals suddenly went to their deaths due to erroneous intelligence reports! As a result, we were able to easily wipe them out! Those decisive battles were the surviving chance that Iron Cloud needed!”
“Afterwards, we sat down and went over everything. In looking at those three battles, we discovered that no matter how we tried, we never had the ability to push them into such trap! In another word, they were looking for their own deaths; they wanted death. This made us surprised and puzzled.”
“After these incident, Great Zhao Nation’s military took a month to rest and regroup. However, they did not need to rest or regroup at all; it seemed as if they were giving us time to regain our strength and strategize our plans on purpose…”
Tie Long Cheng took in a deep breath and said, “It was not until we brought back information from Great Zhao and carefully analyzed many times that we discovered it was Diwu Qing Rou’s conspiracy! Unfortunately, we could do nothing but cooperate with this conspiracy! We could not avoid allowing him to lead us by the nose!”
“Diwu Qing Rou needed a prolonged war to gather its exploits, eliminate his dissidents, increase his following, and bring the military under his control. And, at that period, our Iron Cloud needed time much more than Diwu Qing Rou did. Moreover, we needed to gather the country’s military, because that period was key to the survival of Iron Cloud!”
“If we did not cooperate then Iron Cloud Nation would have fallen in only a few months. And even if we did not cooperate, Diwu Qing Rou still had other opportunities. Limitless Nation for example! We had a no choice. It was a humiliation, but we had to swallow our pride and live!”
When Tie Long Cheng got to this, he let out a very long sigh.
Even though he did not continue, Chu Yang and the others understood.
At that time, the two sides cooperated to eliminate dissidents and unify their respective nations! Without an actual agreement, you achieve your battle accomplishments, I take back my territories, you get rid of opposition, I eliminate my enemies, and everything quietly happened that way!”
In short, their goals were the same: Unify all of their respective nation’s power to realize their own strength!
If Diwu Qing Rou went to war at that time, Great Zhao would, without a doubt, have had complete victory. However, after that victory, he would have to face the doubt and opposition among some officials as well as soldiers. At that time, his foundation was not yet stable. In the worst case scenario, he could end up without a place to bury his dead body! Even if he could keep his life and his position at the time, he would have absolutely lost any opportunity to advance to the peak of power!
With Diwu Qing Rou’s ambition and the wonderful opportunity in front of him, how could he have let it pass?
Of course he could not.
At the time, the entire Iron Cloud Nation was held by Tie Long Cheng. In such a precarious situation, the nation seemed as if it could fall apart by itself. Tie Long Cheng, naturally, did not want to battle either!
The commanders of two countries never met each other even once. And even though they were separated by tens of thousands of miles their tacit cooperation was terrifyingly perfect! The two sides controlled each other, restrained each other. Today, you beat me and kill a general opposing me. Tomorrow, I beat you and kill your opposition…
Millions of soldiers killing each other at the border of the two countries was no more than a game between two people! Millions of souls to create worldly fame for Diwu Qing Rou. On the other hand, those millions of souls also helped unify Iron Cloud!
The only thing was… This game was for the two sides to buy some time and to gain status, but, for both sides, the underlying motives were completely different.
Diwu Qing Rou was working for Great Zhao, but, even more so, he was working for himself. As for Tie Long Cheng, after a long period of battle, he had managed to successfully unify a fragmented Iron Cloud. That separated nation had now turned into a powerful force!
Without such precise cooperation between Tie Long Cheng and Diwu Qing Rou, Iron Cloud Nation would absolutely not be able to hang on until now. Not to mention prince Tie Bu Tian ever having the chance to take control and standing at the same level as Diwu Qing Rou!
All the changes in this was unimaginable even if one racked their brain. Moreover, with each move, the commander had to put out some underlying intentions that only his counterpart could understand. That was how they each achieved their goals. Such underlying intentions were definitely not recognized by outsiders!
As an outsider, how much thought would you need to put into this? This was really unthinkable! Chu Yang really had no way of imagining how this general Tie Long Cheng got this current result.
Under Diwu Qing Rou’s direction, he cooperated fully, but did not allowed his opposition achieve his full goal. Moreover, under the sky net that the enemy threw out, he still managed to step-by-step build up resistant strength for Iron Cloud. Up to this point, the border between the two countries had become like a fortified wall!
This person’s ability to calculate, govern and control in both political and military front, while not equal to that of Diwu Qing Rou, it was not that far behind!
Two enemies that could never be under one sky fought with each other while helping each other amass power. These two were truly terrifying!
But there was one thing that was really chilling to Chu Yang: In Tie Long Cheng and Diwu Qing Rou’s fighting, they had looked at millions of soldiers on both sides as no more than something that could be thrown away. These were millions of lives!
Chu Yang had never understood the phrase “A general build his success on ten thousands dry bones” as he did now!
“You’re regretting it?”
The person that said this was Gu Du Xing. His gaze was like two icy swords aiming at Tie Long Cheng, “Millions of soldiers left their bodies in the battlefield because of the cooperation between the two of you!”
“Not millions, the actual number is two millions seven hundred ninety-three thousand seven hundred ninety-six people!”
Tie Long Cheng’s face was like that of a statue, emotionless, “This is the number up to now. This is only the number of the ones that laid down their lives. This number does not include the injured, the handicapped, unable to battle any longer, the missing…! This was the great price paid for Iron Cloud’s current state!”