While the plains before Isahaya roared with the sound of cannons and machine guns, the mountains to the south were filled with a tense, unnatural silence. Here, a different kind of war was being fought—a war against terrain, exhaustion, and time. Three thousand men, the Emperor's hammer, were making a grueling forced march through a landscape that was never meant for an army. Meng Tian's Imperial Guard moved with a silent, predatory grace, but even their superhuman endurance was being tested. Behind them, the Penal Vanguard, the disgraced officers and soldiers of the Gongzi Army, staggered onward, their faces grim masks of determination.
They were a strange and disparate force, bound by a shared, unspoken purpose. The Imperial Guard, driven by absolute loyalty to their Emperor, and the Penal Vanguard, driven by a desperate, all-consuming need to redeem their shattered honor. An Imperial Guard sergeant, a young man with a hard-bitten face, paused to let a panting, older soldier from the Penal Vanguard catch up.
"Keep up, old man," the guard grunted, offering his water skin. "The Emperor expects us at the crossroads by dusk. The Japanese won't wait for you to catch your breath."
The older soldier, who had once been a major, took a short, grateful sip before handing the skin back. "I may be old," he wheezed, his voice raw, "but I will get there. I have a debt of blood to pay. For my men who died at Pyongyang because of my foolishness."
A new, grudging respect was forming between the two groups. The Imperial Guard, who had initially viewed the Penal Vanguard with contempt, now saw their dogged, almost suicidal determination. The disgraced soldiers, in turn, saw in the Guard the ideal of what they should have been: disciplined, efficient, and utterly devoted.
As they descended from the highest passes, following the old smugglers' trails that their new governor had mapped for them, they encountered resistance. It was not the Japanese regular army, but something far more phantom-like. A sudden volley of rifle fire from a wooded ridge would kill a man or two at the rear of the column, only for the shooters to vanish before a patrol could be sent after them. A crudely made deadfall trap would crush a pack mule. They were being harassed, bled, and slowed down by ghosts.
It was the work of Lieutenant Tanaka's guerillas. From their hidden positions, they watched the massive Qing column snake through the forest.
"We cannot stop them!" Kenji, the young guerilla, whispered to his commander, his face pale. He had been rescued by Kuroda's men after his capture, but the Emperor's words had left a permanent scar on his soul. "There are too many! Thousands!"
"We are not trying to stop them, Kenji," Tanaka replied, his eyes cold and focused. "We are trying to slow them down. To make them bleed for every step. Harass their flanks. Kill their stragglers. Make them fear every shadow."
Aboard his horse, Meng Tian was receiving reports of these pinprick attacks. His officers urged him to send out patrols to sweep the woods and eliminate the threat.
"Ignore them," Meng Tian commanded, his voice a low growl of controlled frustration. "They are flies. Annoying, but harmless to an elephant. Do not break formation to chase them. Every minute we waste hunting ghosts is a minute General Nogi is not trapped. Our objective is the town. The Imperial Guard will screen our flanks and our rear. The Penal Vanguard… will have the honor of leading the main assault."
He knew it was a death sentence for many of them, but it was also the only path to the redemption they so desperately craved.
By late afternoon, they emerged from the forests and saw their objective below them: the town of Isahaya. It was a peaceful-looking collection of houses and shops, nestled at the convergence of two major roads. The sounds of the main battle to the north were a low, continuous thunder, a world away. The town's small garrison of reservists and citizen militia, believing the fighting to be miles away, were caught in a state of relaxed unpreparedness.
The attack came with a shocking, brutal speed. The Penal Vanguard, given their chance to wash away their shame in blood, charged down the final hill with a collective roar of desperate fury. They did not shout for glory or for the Emperor. They shouted the names of their fallen comrades from Pyongyang. They fought with a suicidal bravery that stunned the unprepared Japanese defenders. They were not trying to survive; they were trying to die well, and in doing so, they became an unstoppable force.
Colonel Feng, his rank stripped but his authority as a leader undiminished, was at their very head. He led a charge across the main bridge into the town, a Mauser pistol in one hand and a sword in the other. He moved not with the caution of a modern officer, but with the berserker rage of a warrior from a forgotten age. A Japanese rifleman on a rooftop took aim and fired, the bullet tearing through Feng's leg. He staggered but did not fall. He screamed in defiance and continued to lead the charge, limping heavily, firing his pistol at the windows of the houses.
"Forward!" he bellowed, his voice raw. "For the honor we lost! Forward!"
His men, inspired by his sacrifice, surged across the bridge and into the town. The fighting was fierce but brief. The Japanese reservists, outnumbered and outmatched by men fighting with the strength of fanatics, broke and fled. As his men secured the far side of the bridge, Colonel Feng finally collapsed from blood loss. A young soldier, one who had served under him in the Gongzi Army, rushed to his side.
Feng looked up at him, a bloody, triumphant smile on his face. "Tell the Emperor…" he coughed, blood flecking his lips. "Tell him… Colonel Feng died… facing the enemy." He closed his eyes, his debt finally paid.
Within the hour, the town of Isahaya was secure. The crossroads belonged to the Qing. Meng Tian's forces immediately set to work, not celebrating, but building barricades and establishing blocking positions on the road leading north, the road that was General Nogi's only line of supply and retreat.
Meng Tian stood in the center of the captured town square, looking north toward the continuous, distant thunder of the main battle. He could feel the ground tremble beneath his feet. "The anvil has held," he said to his lieutenant. "The hammer has fallen." He drew his greatsword, its blackened steel seeming to drink the last light of the setting sun. "The trap is now shut."
Miles away, in his command bunker in the hills, General Nogi Marasuke was trying to make sense of the battle. His men had repelled the foolish Banzai charge and were holding firm against the relentless Qing artillery, but something felt wrong. The main Qing army was not committing to a full assault. They were content to sit and shell his positions. It was a battle of attrition he could not win.
An officer, his face white with terror, burst into the bunker, tripping over the threshold.
"General!" he cried. "A telegraph message from the garrison at Isahaya! They reported an attack from the south! From the mountains! Then the line went dead!"
Before Nogi could even process this impossible information, a second man, a runner from the rear guard, staggered in, covered in dust and bleeding from a shrapnel wound.
"General, the Chinese… the Chinese are in Isahaya!" he gasped. "Thousands of them! They came out of the mountains! They hold the crossroads! They hold the bridge! We are… we are surrounded!"
General Nogi stared at the battle map on his table, the full, horrifying truth of the Qing strategy dawning on him like a black sun. The frontal assault was a feint. The artillery was a distraction. His glorious defensive stand had been a colossal mistake. He had held his army in place while the enemy slipped a noose around his neck. He had been utterly, completely outmaneuvered.
His army was doomed. He slowly looked down at the service pistol lying on his desk. His only choice now was not how to win, but how to die.