On the second day of the ninth month of the eighteenth year of Jianye, only half a month after the execution of Bai Mingxi, the Marquis of Dingyuan, the heavy troops of the Xia State took advantage of the dark and windy night of a month to attack Baiyuguan and launched the famous Northwest Battle.

The garrisoned Northwest Army heard about the Marquis of Dingyuan and Xiao Qingyun more than ten days ago, and they were panicking, but the person sent by Emperor Wei to take over was still on the way, and at this time, the Baiyuguan group of dragons was leaderless.

Among the sergeants, there were a large number of people who were still loyal to the Marquis of Dingyuan, believing that the crime given by Emperor Ling to the Marquis of Yuan was a crime to be added, and the Marquis of Dingyuan would not be a traitor to the enemy in any case. It must have been Emperor Wei who was afraid of the power of the Marquis of Dingyuan and his son, so he transferred him to the imperial capital alone, and found an excuse to kill him, in an attempt to seize his military power.

There are also many people in the army who think that Xiao Qingyun is the one who belongs to the destiny of heaven, and what Dingyuan Marquis did is just a good thought and conforms to the time of day. Marquis Dingyuan is not only a loyal and patriotic general, but also a humane father. Moreover, Xiao Qingyun, as a senior general, has never done anything unfavorable to Dayong, but is brave and good at fighting, leading them to defeat the attacks of the Xia Kingdom many times, and is a real young hero. When Xiao Qingyun led the troops, he had strict military discipline, but he treated the soldiers with great care, and he could always ensure that his subordinates were well fed and clothed, and he could be described as one of the few virtuous generals in Dayong. If Xiao Qingyun returns, they are still willing to follow him to the death. It's just that his life and death are unknown now, and many people rumor that he has died in the Yongjiang River.

There are also some people who agree with Emperor Wei's decision, and many of these people are moths of the army themselves. Therefore, he was convinced that the Marquis of Dingyuan collaborated with the enemy and betrayed the country and resold military rations. There are also some people who think that their talents were buried by Dingyuan Hou before, and now they finally have a bright future.

When the soldiers of the Xia Kingdom began to attack the city, even though the chaotic Northwest Army had stationed 100,000 people near Baiyu Pass, they could not coordinate it at the first time and rush to the rescue. Only the descendants of the Marquis of Dingyuan, the 30,000-strong iron cavalry, under the leadership of Zhang Liang, the deputy general of the Marquis of Dingyuan, rushed to protect Baiyu Pass.

In the face of the 300,000-strong army sent by the Xia State, no matter how powerful the deadly iron cavalry was, it could not resist ten times the strength of its own side. After desperate resistance, more than 10,000 brave soldiers who killed the iron cavalry died on the battlefield of Baiyuguan, and the main general Zhang Liang died in battle. The remaining remnants, under the leadership of Yan Chong and Jiang Shaoheng, retreated to Suzhou City, two hundred miles away from Baiyu Pass.

As the most important line of defense of Dayong, Baiyu broke the city on September 25, the 20,000 soldiers defending the city died, and Baiyuguan fell into the hands of the Xia State.

The breaking of Baiyuguan was an important turning point in the Battle of the Northwest, and since then, the Northwest army has been defeated. Emperor Wei was furious, dispatched a number of generals to command the Northwest Campaign, and mobilized 100,000 troops from Xianren Pass to help. However, all kinds of efforts failed to reverse the decline of the northwest battlefield. In just three months, a number of important checkpoints were overcome, important border towns were lost one after another, and Yangguan, Jiayuguan, and Suzhou all fell.

By the time the Northwest Army retreated to Ganzhou, which was 600 miles away from Baiyu Pass, there were less than 100,000 men left. As the backbone of this battle, the Deadly Iron Cavalry has lost two-thirds of its troops, and only 10,000 sergeants have survived. And the 10,000 sergeants who survived were also wounded, and their combat effectiveness was greatly affected.

By the winter of the eighteenth year of Jianye, the Xia State had annexed a territory of 600 li northwest of Dayong. In the middle of winter, the two countries made a temporary truce to recuperate.

In the northwest in winter, the scorched earth of 600 miles has turned into a dead silence. The vast snow covered the battlefield fiercely, and countless bones were buried under the heavy snow. The people in the northwest really felt the pain of the destruction of their homes. Even though some of the people fled to the southeast in advance, there were many more who stayed in the area because they believed in the Northwest Army. As a result, when the Northwest Army was losing and retreating, he became the first to be impacted. Coupled with the heavy snow in winter, a large number of innocent people in the northwest who were robbed of their clothing and food froze to death on the way to escape. After the south, the northwest became the second place full of displaced people.

At this time, Yan Chong and Jiang Shaoheng, the current generals of the deadly iron cavalry, were braving the wind and snow and rushed all the way south from Ganzhou. Wu Wei sent a message to them, saying that Xiao Qingyun had woken up in Jinling City three days ago, and quickly summoned them to Jinling to rendezvous.

At the same time, Wan Mingde, the former prince of Funan, who was in Jincheng, also received the news and sent his second son Wan Yu and his eldest daughter Wan Ping to Jinling as soon as possible.

The winter days in Jinling are not as heavy as the snow in the northwest or Yonghua City, but there is a special coldness. Xiao Qingyun, who had been in a coma for more than four months, miraculously woke up, and everyone who was worried and afraid of him could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

He leaned weakly on the bed and listened to Shen Rongzhi tell him what had happened during this time.

Due to Shen Rongzhi's accurate judgment, Qiu Shaoze led the shadow guard one step ahead of the Praetorian Guards, and found Xiao Qingyun floating in the shallows in the lower reaches of the river bank opposite the Yanbo Pavilion. At that time, he was hit by three arrows, and the person also had a slight drowning symptom, only an extremely weak pulse remained, and he was about to die.

Fortunately, Wu Wei and the others caught up with Jiang Yutang's father and son, who had already gone south with the ship, and sent Xiao Qingyun onto the ship. Doctor Jiang's father and son teamed up, and after a long and difficult treatment, Xiao Qingyun's life was finally saved, but after that, he remained unconscious. The crowd refused to give up hope and waited for him to wake up. Unexpectedly, after Xiao Qingyun fell into the water for more than four months, he finally had mercy and came to his senses again.

The first thing Xiao Qingyun did after waking up was to ask Lan Jing'an where she was. Shen Rongzhi was afraid of irritating him, so he didn't tell the truth for the first time, but just told him that she was recuperating in another place. After Doctor Jiang confirmed that Xiao Qingyun was in a safe state, Shen Rongzhi hesitated for a long time, but decided to tell Xiao Qingyun the truth: "Since Xiao Si Ming fell into the water, we have searched for both sides of the strait many times, but we have not found it. At present, Qiu Shaoze and all the shadow guards are still searching on both sides of the Yongjiang River. At the same time, the people who were looking for her, in addition to the Praetorian Guards and Yuwen Moyuan's personal guards, no one found her traces. I'm afraid it's already..."

Xiao Qingyun couldn't accept Shen Rongzhi's words. Vaguely, he still remembered Ahri desperately supporting himself in the boiling river, calling his name. He was able to make his way to the shallows before he drowned, and Ahri must have swam him there. How could she be gone?

Xiao Qingyun refused to believe that his Ahri would not die, definitely not! The life she promised herself hadn't even begun, and they said they would go to Baitou together! She said that she wanted to live together and die together, how could she be willing to leave him alone to live in this cold world?! He had sworn since he was a child that he would protect her for the rest of his life, that he could not leave her alone in danger, that his Ahri must be waiting for him to save her, it must be! Xiao Qingyun ignored the weakness of his body, and struggled to roll over from the bed to the ground, he was going to find Ahri, go now!

Shen Rongzhi and the others stopped him in grief, and they didn't want to believe that Lan Jing'an was no longer alive. The people of Qianguo have waited for so many years, and they have been looking forward to it for so many years, before they can see the only descendant of the priestess again. She is the most important person to Qianguo, and her life is the greatest hope for Qianguo's recovery. But now, no matter how painful it was, they had to accept the fact that she was gone.

And except for Xiao Qingyun, the most painful thing is Biluan, she doesn't know how many places she has walked on both sides of the Yongjiang River for Lan Jing'an. Until a month ago, Wu Wei begged her to go to Jinling Mansion to take good care of Xiao Qingyun, and let her talk to the young master about Xiao Si Ming, hoping to wake him up. She struggled in her heart for a long time before she got up and came to Jinling. Now that she sees Xiao Qingyun like this, her heart is about to break. She knelt directly on the ground and cried at Xiao Qingyun. She begged him bitterly not to be impulsive, take good care of his body, and only in the future can he avenge Lan Jing'an.

Xiao Qingyun was stopped by everyone, but he still failed to go to Yongjiang to search for Lan Jing'an's whereabouts in person. He asked Shen Rongzhi to send a message to Qiu Shaoze, asking him to continue searching, and he couldn't give up hope no matter what. At the same time, he also asked Shen Rongzhi to command some of the Qianguo people near Yonghua City to join the search team. And Doctor Jiang returned to Yonghua City and went to the major medical halls and pharmacies to find out if there was a girl in the water similar to Lan Jing'an to seek treatment.