Xiahou Yuan

Xiahou Yuan; arrives with Xiahou Dun and joins Cao Cao's personal staff.

Xiahou Yuan; one of the generals fighting alongside Cao Cao in the Xingyang ambush.

Reaches the burned and singed Cao Cao at the east gate just after the beam falls, and with Dian Wei lifts him onto his own horse - the ride that gets him out of Puyang alive.

Xiahou Yuan; with Xiahou Dun in the escort force.

Xiahou Yuan; carries his blinded brother off the field after the Cao Xing arrow strike.

Catches the trident halberd thrown down from the wall - the proof that Lü Bu is taken - and the gates swing open.

Xiahou Yuan; commands the assault on Xuzhou.

Xiahou Yuan; commands the Cao Cao van at Guandu.

Fifth ambush company on the left at Cangting; in the Runan campaign he kills Gong Du at the supply train and is beaten off by the avenging Zhang Fei.

Xiahou Yuan; with Cao Cao in the southern campaign.

Xiahou Yuan; with Cao Cao.

Xiahou Yuan; with Cao Cao.

Gallops to the limit, bends over backwards, and puts his arrow in among the other four - 'is not that a better shot than any of its predecessors?'

Commands one face of the four-sided review-day trap.

Commands the right camp at Tong Pass, arrives with thirty horsemen to end Cao Hong's failing duel - and cuts down the scout leader Cheng Yi in the night ambush.

Xiahou Yuan; with Cao Cao.

Would not move without Cao Cao's order while Jicheng begged — then arrives as the third army that breaks Ma Chao, chases him past Licheng, restores order in Xizhou, and sends the wounded Yang Fu to the capital.

Blunders through the fog into Yang Ang's empty camp and takes it, kills Chang Qi in three bouts and Yan Ren with the swinging-horse stab, springs the pit-trap ambush on Pang De — and stays behind on Dingjun Mountain as warden of Hanzhong.

Posted with Zhang He at the key points of Hanzhong under Cao Hong's command.

Off-stage at his Dingjun Mountain station, next to Micang; the Tiandang survivors flee to him for refuge, and Zhuge Liang's warning — 'a real strategist and tactician... Cao Cao puts his whole confidence in him' — frames him as the campaign's true test.

Baited to his death: the Prince's letter ('do not disgrace your previous reputation') pries him off the defensive over Zhang He's every protest. He snares Chen Shi, but Huang Zhong's arrow in Xiahou Shang's back sends him charging in rage; then, besieging Fa Zheng's opposite hill through a wearying afternoon, he is caught flat by the red-flag charge and cleft in two at his own standard.

Named as Xiahou Mao's father and the reason for the campaign — killed by Huang Zhong in Hanzhong, a death his son calls unavenged and uses to claim the western command. It was Cao Cao's grief at this that produced the marriage to Princess Qinghe.

Named twice in the memorial: among Cao Cao's misplaced trusts ('put his trust in Xiahou Yuan, who was defeated and died'), and again as the cost of the First Ruler's northern expedition, 'wherein Xiahou Yuan lost his life'.

Named in passing only, and long dead - but he is the reason all four of his sons are on this campaign: Sima Yi's case for them is that 'all four desire to avenge the death of their father'.

Named in passing only, and long dead, as the reason the hill unsettles Zhong Hui before he knows whose tomb is on it: asked what the sinister cloud-wreathed mountain is called, the guides answer 'It is known as the Dingjun Mountain. It is where Xiahou Yuan met his death.'