In the fourteenth year of Kaiyuan, the iron gate was closed.
Chen Changge, an eighteen-year-old military boy, squatted under a dilapidated rammed wall, eating overnight bread. Half of the armor left by his father was sewn on his chest. During the Battle of Stone Castle three years ago, my father's body was incomplete and his name was not included in the army roll. What the dead people in the border areas fear most is not death, but not being able to keep a name after death.
An old case of his father's generation that was "not officially registered" brought out thirty-year-old black accounts of the Anxi Army, the dark network of the old warehouses of the ancient roads, and the old alliance of Yikou and Dikou - one layer was exposed and another layer of blood was shed.
The Anshi Rebellion suddenly broke out, and the prosperous Tang Dynasty was like a sea of lanterns extinguished overnight. Tongguan, Mawei, Lingwu, and Suiyang are surrounded by many battlefields. The Chang'an court, the remnants of the border towns, the dark network of trade routes, the old oaths of the grassland, and the great food of Tubo are all fighting against each other. No one can stay out of the situation. Iron and fire, food and roads, rosters and bronze seals, old debts and new hatreds, every transaction has to be filled with human life.
There is no destiny protagonist, no one is destined to live to the end. Some people died after being cut off, some were left standing guarding wells, some used themselves as bargaining chips in exchange for reinforcements, and some never returned to Chang'an for the rest of their lives.
The Tianshan Mountains are covered with wind and snow, but Anxi is still alive but even more lonely. After all, someone survived - each found a new home on the ruins, guarding a well, a fire, and a barrier.
The wind is not yet gone. People are still there.
This is both the end and the end.
