In the final years of the Yan Mingzong era, the people revered the gods. Yet when the Northern Barbarians invaded, the gods seemed to offer no protection to their pious followers. The Yan army was defeated, and the city fell.
The barbarians loved to eat human flesh, especially unborn fetuses still in their mothers’ wombs, followed by young children and women.
The mighty Grand General had a son named Cen Yiduo, courtesy name Xingzhi. Exceptionally clever, he was a spirited, ambitious young man whose fame spread throughout the Great Yan Empire.
Wan Laiyi, a girl from Guancheng, was born at an inopportune time and endured one misfortune after another. After the barbarians slaughtered everyone in Guancheng, she was sent to live with her maternal uncle’s family in Jiangnan.
After the Mingzong Emperor passed away and a new emperor took the throne, disaster struck Jiangnan. To avoid marrying the foolish son of Officer Song, Wan Laiyi fled amid the chaos, hoping to travel to the capital and seek help from her father’s close friend. When she passed through Jizhou, she couldn’t stand by while the Liu family abused their power, so she testified on someone’s behalf and was brutally retaliated against. Just as her life hung by a thread, Yunxiu rescued her. After learning more, she discovered that the commander leading the army back to the capital was the son of her father’s close friend!
The new emperor was incompetent and deeply suspicious. Wary that the Cen family’s achievements might overshadow his own, he wanted them eliminated as soon as possible. Officials inside and outside the court conspired to have Cen’s father killed in battle, then sent the nineteen-year-old Cen Yiduo to lead troops against the invading Ning Kingdom. Wan Laiyi went with him. Everyone thought she was nothing but a delicate flower in a vase, but she repeatedly came up with ingenious strategies.
She simply said, “Does patriotism have anything to do with whether you’re a man or a woman?”
“Though my body is more delicate than a man’s, my heart is just as steadfast. Though I am a woman, I too have lofty ambitions.”
But no matter how hard they tried or how clever they were, they still couldn’t turn the tide or save the collapsing empire.
