When Li Tianyuan heard Jiang Kai threaten Hu Hao’s family, he was shocked and immediately tried to speak up in Hu Hao’s defense.
“You don’t need to say anything!” Jiang Kai cut him off. “Just tell Hu Hao this: I have over two hundred thousand troops trapped here. If Hu Hao leaves them to die, does he really think I, Jiang Kai, don’t have the means to deal with him?
And don’t tell me that targeting his family is beneath me! I have over two hundred thousand men here! Two hundred thousand! Are two hundred thousand lives worth less than the lives of his family?! I have dozens of Generals trapped here with me!” Jiang Kai roared.
“Commander, you’re demanding answers from Hu Hao—he’s just a Major! Tell me, Commander, isn’t this incredibly unfair to him? He’s just a Major, and you’re treating him like this?” Li Tianyuan pleaded.
“Tell me the truth right now. Your forces taking a different retreat route… that was Hu Hao’s idea, wasn’t it?” Jiang Kai demanded abruptly.
“Yes! It was Hu Hao’s idea. We planned the route yesterday. And Hu Hao predicted yesterday that your column would be intercepted!” Li Tianyuan admitted quickly.
“Then why didn’t you say anything?!” Jiang Kai shouted.
“I did! Didn’t I call you yesterday?” Li Tianyuan retorted.
“Oh… right. I forgot in the panic. Tell me this: if he could predict we would be ambushed, does he have a plan to help us break out?
Old brother… I have two hundred thousand men here. They are the last remaining forces of our Southwest Combat Zone! Our Zone started with eight corps—over half a million men. Now we have less than half of that left, and out of these two hundred thousand, over a hundred thousand are wounded!
The enemy bombers are still raining hell on us. Tell me, can I afford not to be desperate? I don’t care who Hu Hao is, what capabilities he has, or who his political backers are! For the sake of these two hundred thousand men, I will do absolutely anything. Anything.
Find him immediately. Put him on the phone. And bring your forces here! I can’t even break out, and you think you can just run away? Try to run! I will have the Grand Marshal arrest every single one of you and execute you by firing squad! You want to run? Let’s see how far you get!” Jiang Kai shouted through the phone.
Li Tianyuan stood there in stunned silence.
“That’s the final word. Issue the orders immediately. You have ten minutes to get Hu Hao on the line. I know for a fact he is with you! Don’t try to tell me he isn’t. You aren’t stupid, and neither am I! You told me earlier it was Hu Hao’s idea to take a different route, and suddenly he just vanished a few hours later? Is that plausible?
Would he really abandon his men and let them run wild? That’s all. Ten minutes!” Jiang Kai finished, then slammed the phone down.
“Motherfucker!” Li Tianyuan cursed as the line went dead. He handed the phone back to his staff officer.
“What did he say?” Li Jingsong asked urgently.
“We have to change our route. We have to march to the Commander’s position. He said that if we don’t go, even if their entire army is annihilated, we won’t live to see another day. He’s ordering us to reinforce them. He says he has two hundred thousand men trapped.
And if Hu Hao refuses to come, he said he will go after Hu Hao’s family. To save those two hundred thousand lives, he said he is willing to do absolutely anything, because these are his last remaining troops. He will not abandon them easily.”
“FUCK!” Li Jingsong cursed, staring at his father in disbelief.
“Contact Hu Hao now. No, wait… I’ll contact Hu Hao. You get on the horn with the other units. Tell them Zone Command just issued a direct order: we must move to reinforce them immediately. We have to go. If we don’t, even if we escape the Allies, we’re dead men walking!” Li Tianyuan ordered his son.
“Are we really going back in?” Li Jingsong asked, looking at his father in shock.
“Yes. We really are. The Commander issued a death order. Honestly, we’re just like the soldiers—we don’t want to go back either. But we have no choice,” Li Tianyuan nodded helplessly.
“Alright. I’ll tell the men. But whether they actually agree to go… I don’t know. They only listen to Hu Hao,” Li Jingsong nodded, picking up the radio to contact the Regimental Commanders and the 28th Army brass, who were all part of their convoy.
Meanwhile, Li Tianyuan dialed Hu Hao.
“Good afternoon, Corps Commander,” Hu Hao answered promptly.
“Hu Hao… I really didn’t want to make this call. I just spoke to the Zone Commander. He ordered our forces to march to his position immediately. He said we are Southwest Combat Zone troops, and we have no choice but to deploy. If we refuse, even if we escape, he will have the Grand Marshal execute us all!” Li Tianyuan explained quickly.
“Bullshit! Is he out of his mind?! He can’t just let us live? He insists on dragging us to our deaths?! Marching to his position right now is pure suicide!” Hu Hao roared in anger.
“I know! But we have no choice. We are Southwest Combat Zone troops. Zone Command is pinned down, and we cannot simply refuse to reinforce them. Also… the Commander guessed you were with us. He knew you didn’t want to speak with him, so he said… if you refuse to help, he will go after your family!” Li Tianyuan relayed the threat.
“He said what?!”
Hu Hao immediately stood up in the moving bus. A terrifying, suffocating killing intent erupted from his body, flooding the entire vehicle. The soldiers around him instantly felt a bone-deep chill. It was the middle of summer, yet they shivered involuntarily.
“Hu Hao, listen to me!” Li Tianyuan pleaded, sensing the explosive silence on the line. “He said that to save two hundred thousand lives, he would do anything! He only said that because he’s desperate to get you on the phone!”
“He is using my family to threaten me?” Hu Hao asked, his voice deathly quiet, grinding his teeth.
“I know, I know! But Hu Hao, the Commander is in a desperate situation. He needs you, and you refused to speak with him. I’m sure he was just talking! He wouldn’t actually do something like that!” Li Tianyuan tried to de-escalate.
“But he still used my family to threaten me,” Hu Hao repeated, his tone icy.
“Sigh. Hu Hao, what do we do? We have to go reinforce them anyway. My thought is… since we have to go regardless, why don’t you just talk to him and see what he has to say?” Li Tianyuan urged.
Hu Hao took a deep breath, forcing himself to suppress his blazing fury.
“Fine. Give him my number. I will speak with him. But you pass this message to him first: As long as I am breathing, if he tries to touch my family, I will deal with his. Let’s see who dies first,” Hu Hao said coldly.
“Understood!” Li Tianyuan agreed quickly and hung up. There was absolutely no way he was going to repeat that threat to Jiang Kai.
A few minutes later, Hu Hao’s satellite phone rang.
“Yes?” Hu Hao answered.
“You are a very difficult man to find. If I hadn’t resorted to threats, I doubt you ever would have taken my call,” Jiang Kai’s voice came through the line.
Hu Hao remained completely silent.
“The threats I made regarding your family through Li Tianyuan… my only goal was to force you to speak with me. You can rest assured, I, Jiang Kai, am not so vile as to vent my military frustrations on your innocent family.
Hu Hao, I know you understand how to fight. I need your tactical insight. Look at our current situation. How do we break out?” Jiang Kai asked, knowing Hu Hao was listening.
Hu Hao still didn’t say a word.
“Hu Hao? Hu Hao?” Jiang Kai called out, hearing nothing but silence.
“I don’t know,” Hu Hao finally spoke. “I am a Major. How am I supposed to know how to fight a battle of this scale? You ordered us to reinforce you, so we will reinforce you. As for how you break out? I have no idea. I’m not a god!” Hu Hao’s voice dripped with barely contained anger.
“Hu Hao, I apologize to you. I shouldn’t have made those threats. But it was the only way to get you on the line. I need to know how we fight our way out of this!” Jiang Kai pleaded, immediately sensing that Hu Hao was still furious.
“I am speaking with you now. I don’t know how to fight this. Is there anything else? You ordered us to come, so we are coming!” Hu Hao replied rigidly.
“Uh…” Jiang Kai was momentarily speechless, unsure of how to steer the conversation back on track.
“Is there anything else? Because if you’re done, I have something to say. Jiang Kai. I know you are the Zone Commander. I know you hold the lives of hundreds of thousands of troops in your hands. But in my eyes, you are nothing.
If you ever try to touch my family… as long as I am not dead, I will ensure not a single member of your family survives. Including you. Don’t think your army can protect you. If I want you dead, even if the entire population of the Empire stood between us, if I decide you die tomorrow, you will not live to see midnight!” Hu Hao’s voice was a lethal, quiet promise.
“Hu Hao, I just told you, I have no intention of harming your family! I only wanted to speak with you! I want to save these two hundred thousand men!
Hu Hao, you have to understand—these men are the absolute last remnants of the Southwest Combat Zone! If they die here, how am I supposed to face their families? Two hundred thousand lives, Hu Hao!” Jiang Kai pleaded earnestly.
“You are the Commander. I am a Major. That is not my burden to consider,” Hu Hao replied coldly.
“Fine. Hu Hao, I was wrong. I apologize to you. I swear on my honor, I will never touch your family. But please… help us,” Jiang Kai begged.
“There is nothing I can do. You are completely blocked in. When your columns were ambushed last night, you should have realized their ultimate objective was to annihilate you!
And yet, after surviving that initial ambush, you didn’t immediately deploy vanguards to secure the critical bridges and intersections ahead of you! You just kept marching blindly! You brought this on yourself!” Hu Hao reprimanded him sharply.
“Yes! I know! But pointing out my failures now is useless! I need to know what to do next! Right now, I need a solution!” Jiang Kai shouted in frustration.
“Why the hell are you yelling at me?! I’m not your Chief of Staff! I’m not even a General! Why are you screaming at me?! Are we done here?!” Hu Hao snapped back, deeply annoyed.