The Witch in the Woods: The Transmigration of Hazel-Anne Davis
Chapter 69: Red Runs South

Chapter 69: Red Runs South

The mountain bled louder than it screamed.

Somewhere down the slope, a soldier cried out as the medics lifted what remained of his leg onto a makeshift litter. It was the fourth amputation that day. The trap had been buried beneath a false patch of moss, so cleverly disguised that even their sharpest scouts missed it. The blades hadn’t been dipped in poison this time—small mercies.

Sun Longzi stood still as the blood soaked into the hem of his uniform. It wasn’t his. It rarely was. That was the curse of command: to watch others bleed so you didn’t have to.

He didn’t flinch as another shout echoed from the lower ridge. He didn’t turn his head.

It had been like this for days—slow death by a thousand clever hands.

The trees stood like silent witnesses around them, tall and cold, their leaves whispering things only ghosts understood. Fog clung low to the forest floor, curling around boots and horses’ legs like smoke. Nothing natural lived here anymore. The birds had long since gone quiet. Even the wolves had learned to stay away.

A soldier staggered past him, clothes torn, face pale, carrying half a trap—one of Xinying’s designs. Metal jaws like a flower’s bloom, serrated edges glinting with dried blood. Beautiful and cruel. Like the woman who made it.

Sun Longzi exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck. He hadn’t slept more than two hours in the past five days. No one had. Not when every step could be your last.

"General," a voice called quietly behind him.

He didn’t turn.

The captain came to stand beside him, breathing heavily. "The search teams have returned. Another six traps cleared. We lost two men. One more may not make it through the night."

Sun Longzi didn’t answer.

The captain shifted uneasily, waiting.

Eventually, he asked, "How many does that bring us to?"

"Thirty-nine cleared," the man said. "Seven dead. Fourteen wounded. Five crippled."

Still too many.

And not enough.

Sun Longzi finally turned toward camp. Smoke curled above the trees—cooking fires and wet cloth burning to keep the insects at bay. His soldiers looked hollow-eyed, shoulders hunched, hands never far from their weapons.

Red Demon banners fluttered limply against the grey sky. The once-proud sigils were damp, faded, and stained.

"Tell the men to rest," he said. "Shift the wounded higher on the ridge. If the fog thickens again, I want visibility by torches every ten paces."

"Yes, sir."

The captain turned and left, boots crunching over loose gravel.

Sun Longzi stood alone again.

He didn’t move for a long time.

Then, finally, he did.

He moved toward the clearing—toward the perimeter where the wounded had been lined up on rough pallets. He checked each man in silence. Some were unconscious. Some were dying. All bore marks from her traps—cruel, elegant devices made not just to kill, but to humiliate.

He understood now why the Yelan troops had turned back years ago.

This wasn’t a border.

It was a graveyard.

And then he heard it—steady footsteps on the path behind him. He didn’t need to turn. He knew who it was.

Zhu Deming emerged through the trees like mist, cloak trailing behind him, silver glinting where his half-mask caught the light. He moved with that same quiet strength—unshakable, unreadable.

"General Sun," he grunted, saluting the other man.

Sun Longzi didn’t respond at first. He knelt by a soldier who was still breathing and pressed two fingers to the man’s throat. Still a pulse.

He rose to his feet and looked at his second in command. "You came alone?"

"Yes."

"Risky."

"You’re not the one I worry about."

Sun Longzi almost smiled.

Zhu Deming handed him a scroll tube. "From the Crown Prince."

Sun Longzi accepted it without a word. He opened it with calloused fingers, unrolling the map.

It was her work.

He didn’t need a signature to know.

Every line was familiar. The curvature of the gorge. The old streambed that had dried up ten years ago. The false trail that looped into a nest of spike pits. It was all there. The entire layout of the mountain border—and the deadly web Zhao Xinying had woven into it.

Four hundred and seventy-six traps and webs, to be exact.

His jaw tensed as he looked at the number of traps written on the bottom right hand corner with some weird drawing of two dots and a half circle under them.

"As much as I want to leave this cursed place," he muttered, eyes never leaving the parchment, "we can’t. Not until we confirm that this map is right. I doubt that the Crown Princess gave us the location of each and every trap. If we leave any behind, they’ll haunt our own lines for the next ten years."

"How many traps were you able to find on your own?" asked Zhu Deming, his tone innocent as he looked at the forest around him.

"Thirty-nine," the Demon Lord sighed, closing his eyes.

"And how many are marked on her map? The one that you don’t believe has all of them on it?"

"A lot more," snarled Sun Longzi as he continued to stare at the symbol beside the number of traps. Those two dots... were they eyes? He had no idea what they meant, but he was afraid to ask.

"Then give the Emperor that map and call it a day. Besides, if you get rid of all the traps, you are opening up the Western border to invasion," smirked Zhu Deming as yet another soldier let out a bone-chilling scream. "There is another reason why I am here. The Red Demons need to move."

"Where to?"

"South."

Sun Longzi looked up.

"To Xueshan," Deming continued. "Yelan and Chixia crossed the river four days ago. They’ve taken the town. The villagers are gone."

Sun Longzi’s mouth thinned. "Has the Emperor ordered us there?"

"No."

"Then it’s treason."

"Only if you fail to stop the invasion," Deming said. "Only if Daiyu falls. If you manage to protect the borders, it’s because the Emperor was wise and sent you there as soon as possible."

For a long time, neither man spoke.

Sun Longzi looked down at the map again. Then at his men. The ones too tired to stand. The ones too angry to sleep. The ones who would follow him into hell if he told them to.

"We’re not ready," he said.

"You’re never ready for war," Zhu Deming answered. "You just decide whether to bleed now or later."

That got a dry, quiet laugh out of Sun Longzi. Zhu Deming was using his own words against him.

He rolled the map back up, slow and deliberate.

"You want me to move a full army without the imperial seal," he said.

"Yes."

"You know how this ends if we lose?"

"I do."

Sun Longzi gave him a long look. "And you still brought the message."

"I trust your aim."

The general’s lips twitched.

"Tell the Quartermaster," he said finally. "We break camp at dusk. Runners go to the palace in the morning. The Red Demons ride south before nightfall."

Zhu Deming inclined his head once. "And the map?"

"I’ll take it myself."

Deming nodded, then turned and disappeared into the trees as silently as he came.

Sun Longzi stood in place a moment longer. Then he looked back to the center of camp, where the Red Demon standard fluttered weakly above a line of tents.

He would ride south.

He would follow the blood.

And when he found who dared touch to touch Daiyu’s soil, he’d show them what kind of monsters the Witch actually was.

"And make sure to bring the traps with us. It’s time that they tasted other blood besides our own."