Chapter Twenty-Four: The Will Is Strong, but the Strength Falls Short

Yang Jun spurred his horse and rode off. As he watched Yang’s receding figure and then glanced at the hostile Xuanfu soldiers surrounding him, Eunuch Guo was on the verge of tears. Despairing, he ceased his futile struggles and let himself be bound hand and foot, all the while muttering, “Yang, you can’t arrest me, you can’t arrest me. I must see His Majesty, I must see His Majesty…” His hat, knocked askew when he fell earlier, now revealed his disheveled hair, making him resemble a crazed old woman—could his misery be any more complete?

Utterly hopeless, Eunuch Guo was not alone in his despair; Lu Qing felt little better. His heart had sunk to rock bottom. News of Datong’s defeat had already arrived—surely the imperial camp would receive urgent dispatches soon. Yet now, both he and Eunuch Guo had been captured by Yang Jun, and there was no way to use the opportunity of reporting military news to offer advice to Wang Zhen.

Convincing Guo Jing to speak to Wang Zhen was the only way Lu Qing could think of to alter the fate of Tumu Fortress. If this path was blocked, he truly did not know what else to do. He was merely a minor captain of the Embroidered Guard, powerless and insignificant, a pawn in a game that would decide the fate of the Ming dynasty. How could such a small pawn hope to overturn the board?

If he wished to change this tragedy, he could only rely on the players themselves. Wang Zhen was undoubtedly one of the contenders in this grand game. Though history would judge Wang Zhen as a poor player, none could deny that, until the calamity arrived, it was Wang Zhen who truly controlled the flow of the war—at least, more so than the man who, for now, remained hidden in the shadows. Otherwise, that shadowy figure would not have to wait so anxiously for his opponents to make mistakes, but would instead have seized the initiative himself.

Yet Wang Zhen, the Grand Eunuch who called himself “scholar” before the emperor, was far too distant and lofty for a mere captain like Lu Qing to ever approach. Without Guo Jing as an intermediary, Lu Qing could spend a lifetime and never see Wang Zhen.

When he first discovered and rescued Eunuch Guo, Lu Qing had been overjoyed, for he had finally found a path that led to the heavens. But with a single order from Yang Jun, that path was instantly blocked. His sorrow and frustration now taught him what it truly meant to have the will but not the power.

What did it mean to have the will but not the power? This was Lu Qing’s predicament exactly. Put kindly, he was striving for the impossible, giving his all until death; put bluntly, he was overestimating himself, for he simply did not possess the means or ability to overturn the chessboard.

Compared to the protagonists of later travel novels, Lu Qing’s starting point was far too low, and the time left to him much too short. If he remembered correctly, the Tumu Crisis would erupt in mid-August—less than a month away.

In less than a month, what could a lowly captain, who could not even meet his own commander, hope to accomplish? Without Eunuch Guo to bridge the gap, what could he do?

What could I possibly do? What is left that I can do!

As the ropes tightened around his wrists, Lu Qing asked himself this question again and again. He was lost; he no longer knew what to do.

...

“We’re doomed, doomed…”

The deranged Eunuch Guo, dragged to his feet by Yang Jun’s soldiers, finally regained his senses. Yet, upon coming to, he did not hurl curses at Yang Jun or protest his own fate. Instead, he rec