Zhongjing had not seen siege in generations.
Its walls were not made to be tested.
They were made to be admired.
High, thick, ancient — built in an age when enemies came with ladders and courage, not cannons and men who had marched across an empire with nothing left to lose.
Wu An does not surround the city completely.
He does not have enough men for a perfect siege.
So he does something else.
He strangles it from one side and hammers it from another.
Liang artillery is dragged into position day and night. Cannons are placed on raised earthworks built by farmers, surrendered soldiers, and Black Tiger engineers working without rest. Zhou had not expected heavy guns to arrive so quickly — they had expected a starving army, not an army that had gathered half a province behind it.
The first bombardment begins before dawn.
The sound shocks Zhongjing more than the damage.
The walls shake.
Stone cracks.
Citizens wake to a sound they have never heard before — not thunder, not earthquake, but something man-made and relentless.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
By the third day, a section of the outer wall begins to crumble.
Not collapse yet.
But crumble.
Inside the palace, the Emperor of Zhou finally understands that this is not a rebellion.
This is not a raid.
This is a war that has arrived at his door.
And he is not ready.
The court is chaos now.
Ministers shout over each other.
"Close the inner markets!"
"Ration grain!"
"Execute the traitors in the outer districts!"
"Send for reinforcements!"
"There are no reinforcements close enough!"
Another explosion shakes dust from the ceiling beams.
The Emperor sits on the throne, pale, furious, and afraid.
"You told me he would starve!" the Emperor shouts.
No one answers.
"You told me he would never reach Zhongjing!"
Still no answer.
Finally, an older minister kneels and says the thing no one wants to say.
"Your Majesty… we must ask General Pei to return."
The Emperor's face turns red with rage.
"He failed me!"
"He warned us," the minister says quietly.
Silence fills the hall.
Outside, another cannon strike hits the wall.
The Emperor looks around at his court — men who write poetry, men who calculate taxes, men who have never seen a battlefield — and for the first time he realizes something terrifying.
He does not have a general.
Not one who can stop Wu An.
He speaks slowly, each word like it hurts to say:
"Send for Pei."
The messenger finds General Pei far from the capital.
Not in a grand command tent.
Not with an army.
In a regional training ground, drilling new recruits, repairing irrigation canals, and living in a modest residence with his family.
When the imperial eunuch arrives with a full escort and golden decree, everyone in the camp kneels.
Pei does not look surprised.
He reads the decree slowly.
"By order of the Emperor, General Pei is hereby reinstated as Supreme Commander of All Armies.
Upon successful defeat of the Liang invader, he will be granted the title of Prince and adopted into the Imperial Clan."
It is the highest honor a common-born general could ever receive.
Prince.
Imperial blood in name.
Power beyond any general in generations.
The eunuch smiles.
"General Pei, His Majesty recognizes your loyalty and talent. The empire needs you. Zhongjing needs you."
Pei folds the decree carefully.
For a long moment, he says nothing.
Then he smirks.
Not a big smile.
Just a small one.
"I am just a regional general," Pei says calmly. "Please inform His Majesty that my troops are busy dealing with rebels in the north."
The eunuch blinks, thinking he misheard.
"General… this is an imperial decree."
Pei nods.
"Yes."
"You would refuse promotion to Prince?"
Pei looks at the training field, where young soldiers are practicing spear formations.
Then he looks back at the eunuch.
"When I warned the court, I was a dog that barked too loudly," Pei says calmly. "Now the wolves are at the gate, and suddenly the dog is important again."
The eunuch's face turns pale.
"General, Zhongjing may fall."
Pei's expression does not change.
"Yes," he says. "It might."
"Then why—"
Pei interrupts him quietly.
"Because if I return now, I save the Emperor."
He looks directly at the eunuch.
"And if I do not return, I save the empire."
The eunuch does not understand.
But he also knows he cannot argue with the man who is now the only general who might be able to stop Wu An.
All he can do is bow and leave with the unanswered decree.
Pei watches him go, then turns back to the training field.
"Again," he tells the recruits.
They raise their spears and charge again.
As if the fate of the empire is not being decided a few hundred miles away.
Back at Zhongjing, the siege gets worse.
Wu An does not waste men on full assaults.
He uses cannons to break sections of wall, then sends in small, brutal assault teams — Black Tigers and veteran units — to take gatehouses, towers, and wall sections piece by piece.
Street by street fighting begins in the outer districts.
Zhou soldiers fight hard — this is their capital, their homes, their families — but the Liang army fights like men who have already accepted death.
Hungry men are very dangerous men.
Wu An walks through a captured outer district, stepping over broken tiles and bodies. Civilians kneel when they see him. Some cry. Some stare at him like he is a demon. Some stare at him like he is salvation.
Shen Yue walks beside him.
"You're almost there," she says.
Wu An looks toward the inner city walls — the palace district rising above everything else like a second fortress inside the first.
"Almost," he says.
"But not yet."
Behind those walls is the Emperor.
And the end of the war.
But also something else.
Because men like Wu An do not march across an empire just to knock on a gate.
They march to change the world on the other side of it.
And inside Zhongjing, the Emperor finally receives the eunuch's report.
"General Pei… refused?" he says slowly.
"Yes, Your Majesty."
The Emperor's hands begin to shake.
Outside, another section of wall collapses under cannon fire.
Wu An is getting closer to the heart of the capital.
And the one man who might have stopped him—
Has decided not to come.