Zhao Yun

Zhao Yun's debut chapter - a tall, dignified young warrior from Changshan who has just left Yuan Shao in disgust. Saves Gongsun Zan from death under the Yuan Shao army, takes service with him, and immediately makes friends with Liu Bei after the relief column arrives.

Lent to Liu Bei by Gongsun Zan with two thousand troops for the Xuzhou expedition; he commands the rear column and supports the ox-horn line with Guan Yu. At the parting Liu Bei holds his hands, in tears, unable to let go.

Remembered, not seen: hearing of Gongsun Zan's fiery end, Liu Bei's first anxiety is the fate of Zhao Zilong.

Found holding the Sleeping Bull camp: after Gongsun Zan's fiery end he drifted, refused Yuan Shao's invitations, killed the horse-thief Pei Yuanshao - and drops from the saddle at Liu Bei's shout. 'Now I have reached your side, that is enough for all my life.' The last of the core finally under one banner.

The chapter's saving spear: thirty even bouts with Xu Chu, an alley cut through the night ambush ('fear not, my lord, only follow me!'), Gao Lan dead from the saddle at the moment Liu Bei faces capture, and Zhang He worsted in thirty more bouts. Every road out of ch31 is opened by Zhao Zilong.

Kills Zhang Wu for the Dilu horse at Jiangxia, insists on escorting Liu Bei to Xiangyang with three hundred men, and stands sword in hand at the feast until manoeuvred away to the officers' banquet - to ride out of the gate at chapter's end hunting Cai Mao for vengeance.

Misses his lord at the banquet, corners the lying Cai Mao twice, reads the wet hoof-track on the far bank, and traces Liu Bei to Water Mirror's farm by morning. In the battle that follows he kills Lü Kuang with a single spear thrust.

Duels Li Dian ten bouts in the opening clash, then executes Shan Fu's formation-break: in at the southeast gate with five hundred men, feint at the fleeing Cao Ren, out due west, and back in again until the Eight Gates dissolve. At the night raid he cuts Cao Ren's road of retreat; he ends the chapter garrisoning captured Fancheng.

Recalled from Fancheng to play the ordered loser: he duels Xiahou Dun and retreats, turns and retreats again, dragging one hundred thousand men down the narrowing road - and when the reeds ignite he wheels round for the slaughter.

Commands the four gate parties: fire arrows over the walls when the evening wind rises, the east gate left open as the one door of the trap - and his own company waiting beyond it to slaughter the escapers.

Zhao Yun; the chapter's headline feat. Searches the burning chaos of Changban Slope for Liu Bei's wives and son; finds Lady Mi wounded, who entrusts the infant Liu Shan to him before throwing herself into a well; carries Liu Shan in his bosom and cuts through 50 named Cao Cao officers in a single charge. Cao Cao watches from a hill and orders no arrow shall touch him.

Cuts down both Zhong brothers - the second with the wheel-about slash that leaves half a head - crosses the bridge past Zhang Fei, and lays the sleeping child in his lord's hands with 'death is too light a punishment' on his lips. When Liu Bei flings the baby aside ('to preserve that suckling I very nearly lost a great general!'), he snatches him up weeping: 'were I ground to powder, I could not prove my gratitude.'

Zhao Yun; with Liu Bei at Jiangxia.

Zhao Yun; with Liu Bei at Jiangxia.

Waits at the sand spit exactly as arranged, warns the pursuers off with one exhibition shot - the arrow that severs Xu Sheng's sail-rope - then lands to take his own assignment: three thousand men in the Black Forest jungle, to fire the road behind Cao Cao's passing.

Answers the first laugh: 'I am Zhao Zilong, and long have I been waiting here!' - routs the column but lets Cao Cao ride into the smoke, taking only the banners, exactly as instructed.

Welcomes Zhou Yu's embassy with a display of bold soldiery, then executes the whisper: slips into Nanjun behind the night raid and answers the returning victor from the wall - 'Pardon, General! I had orders from the Directing Instructor to take this city.'

Wins Guiyang by lot over Zhang Fei's wrangling and takes it with three thousand men: unhorses Chen Ying and frees him, accepts Zhao Fan's surrender and his sworn brotherhood - then knocks him down over the offered widow ('is not your sister-in-law my sister-in-law?'). He drinks the two false deserters under the table, beheads them, rides their five hundred men through the gates as a screen, and seizes the city. His three reasons for refusing Lady Fan close the chapter: reputation first, family later.

Zhao Yun; finishes the Guiyang settlement.

Opens the first silken bag at the landing: visit Patriarch Qiao with sheep and wine, and let five hundred guards in gala dress shop the engagement into every mouth in Nanxu. At the temple banquet his eye finds the hidden ruffians - the warning that lets Liu Bei kneel his way out of the ambush - and the Dowager toasts 'the hero of Dangyang' by name.

Idles a year in the front palace watching his lord dissolve into luxury - then opens the second bag: the invented Cao Cao invasion that shakes Liu Bei loose. On the road he opens the third at the roadblock, handing Liu Bei the confession-speech that turns Lady Sun into their rescuer, and stands bursting with wrath beside her carriage at both confrontations.

Appears on the suddenly living wall as Zhou Yu challenges the gate: 'the Directing Instructor knows that you want to try the ruse of Borrow a Road to Destroy the Host' - the sentence that turns the trap inside out.

Commands the funeral escort - the redoubtable presence at Zhuge Liang's shoulder that keeps the grieving southern officers' hands off their swords.

Waits at the Wuchang boundary to greet Zhang Song — soldiers kneeling with wine and food — the first move in Liu Bei's courtship; then assigned to camp at Jiangling in the Jingzhou defense.

Zhao Yun; intercepts Lady Sun's boat on the river and forcibly retrieves Liu Shan from her - the second of the famous baby-rescues.

Leads his own column up the Great River to make the junction at Luocheng — one of the three prongs of the relief march.

Appears from the riverside to free the trapped Zhang Fei — taking Wu Yi prisoner in a single bout — then wrecks the Golden Goose Bridge behind Zhang Ren and bars the north bank, the two moves that close the trap.

Holds Mianzhu with Huang Zhong — then, while Liu Bei banquets Ma Chao on the wall, rides out and comes back before the wine cools with the heads of Ma Han and Liu Jun. Afterwards it is his counsel that stops the land-confiscation plan: 'it would be wrong to reward our own people at the expense of these people.'

Protests the sending of 'a couple of old men' against Zhang He and sniggers with the rest as they leave the hall — then is named van leader, with Zhang Fei, when the great army marches.

Held in reserve behind Huang Zhong, he rides at the noon deadline, spears Murong Lie and Jiao Bing on the way in, and scatters the encirclement 'like the whirlwind scatters the petals of the wild pear tree' to pull out Huang Zhong, then Zhang Zhu. At his own camp he flings the gates wide and stands alone outside them — the empty-camp bluff that stampedes Cao Cao's army into River Han by dark. Liu Bei: 'truly, the man is brave all through!' — and the title General Who Possesses Tiger Prowess.

Shares the evening double attack that breaks Xu Huang at the river, receives Wang Ping's surrender, then plays the night music in Zhuge Liang's ruse — five hundred men, drums and horns behind the hill, rolling out at every bomb until Cao Cao's sleepless army falls back. Attacks the rear in the triple mauling of the retreat and fires the hills against the supply line.

Zhao Yun; one of the Five Tiger Generals.

Named in passing in Zhang Zhao's count of the avengers at Liu Bei's back.

The first court's first dissenter: as the new Emperor vows his whole kingdom against Wu, the Tiger General throws himself at the foot of the throne crying 'It may not be so!'

Makes the case history remembers — 'the enmity against Cao Cao is a public matter; vengeance for your brother is private. The empire should be placed first' — and is answered with 'what care I for myriads of square miles?' Assigned to the reserve, controlling supplies.

Zhao Yun; the chapter's rescuer. Riding in from Chengdu hears of the fire; charges through Lu Xun's pursuit lines and cuts a path to Liu Bei; carries the emperor to Baidicheng. Kills the Wu pursuit officer Zhu Ran in single combat at the crossing.

Holds Baidicheng through the Emperor's decline, takes the dying charge — 'the fidelity of the dog and horse is mine to give' — and then seals Yangping Pass against Cao Zhen: defend only, never battle, until the fifth route gives up.

The feint that ends the invasion: marches out through Yangping Pass toward Changan, and the mere report breaks Cao Pi's nerve at the river. Then recalled — Yong Kai and the Mangs have risen in the south — and Ma Chao takes over his pass.

Stung by being passed over 'for not knowing the country,' he captures his own guides, night-raids the first Ravine camp, and spears Jinhua Sanjie in its center — then blocks the Brocade Mountains road in the net that takes Meng Huo. Exactly the supreme effort the taunt was designed to produce.

Third jaw of the night trap, captor of the drugged Meng You — and the second station of the going-home gauntlet, seated under the great banner with drawn sword: 'do not presume on the kindness of the Prime Minister.'

First pair of the secret orders with Wei Yan — waits at the Mangs' own abandoned camp and springs on the fugitives the moment they run home to it.

Beaten back by the poison crossbows at Three Rivers, plays the first feigned challenges against Lady Zhurong, flees the beast-storm with Wei Yan ('we have never seen the like of this before') — and seals the Coiled Serpent Valley's mouth with the straw-laden carts, timber, and boulders that make the fire inescapable.

The chapter's closing set-piece. Stands forward after the whole appointment list has been read out and no duty has come to him, claiming 'the valor of Lian Po and the heroism of Ma Yuan' — the two old generals who refused to admit age. Zhuge Liang tries to retire him gently, citing Ma Chao's death and the risk to a life-long reputation; Zhao Zilong answers that he has never quailed since the day he joined the First Ruler and that dying on the frontier is a happy ending, and finally settles it by threatening to smash his head on the floor at Zhuge Liang's feet. Gets the van on condition he takes a colleague, and rides out with Deng Zhi and five thousand veterans.

The old tiger's great day and his near-death, on consecutive days. Against Han De's line at Phoenix Song Mountain he kills the eldest son Han Ying in three bouts, fells Han Qi with a spear thrust, shoots Han Qiong in the face when he gives chase, and takes Han Yao ALIVE — captured, not slain — then rides back out to recover the spear he dropped seizing him. Kills Han De himself in three encounters the next day. Deng Zhi's 'slain four generals in one day' draws the real motive: 'the Prime Minister thought me too old and did not wish to employ me. I had to give him a proof.' Then Cheng Wu's ambush nearly ends him: surrounded, down to a thousand men, fire and stones and arrows at moonrise, and the line 'I refused the repose of age, and now my end will come to me here!' Rescued by Zhang Bao and Guan Xing, he sends them on ahead rather than take the credit — 'They are as my own children… I am an old leader and high in rank, but I am not worth so much as these two youths. Yet will I risk my life once more for the sake of my old lord the First Ruler.'

Beaten in the field for once, and by a man nobody had heard of. Lies in ambush to take an emptied Tianshui, announces himself — 'I am Zhao Zilong of Changshan' — and is answered from the wall that it is he who is trapped; Jiang Wei comes out of the fires and presses him so hard he has to cut an alley out, saved by Zhang Yi and Gao Xiang. Afterwards he praises the spearmanship as better than anyone's. Sent to threaten the Shanggui granary, then leads the night attack with Wei Yan and turns back the fleeing Cao Zun and Zhu Zan — 'Whither go ye, O rebel leaders? Stop, for here is death!'

Sent into ambush with Wei Yan against the pursuit Zhuge Liang knows the feigned withdrawal will draw, and kills Zhu Zan, the second of Cao Zhen's two Van Leaders, on his long spear.

The rear guard, and he designs it himself — inverting the usual order so that Deng Zhi leads off showing HIS ensigns while he follows at a fixed distance behind, covering everything. Kills Su Yong on the spear when he ventures into the valley. Then stands alone in the road until sunset to hold Wan Zheng off while the army makes ten miles, and when Wan Zheng is driven back a second time, shoots the plume from his helmet and lets him live to carry an invitation to Guo Huai. 'There were no other episodes by the way' — the retreat gets into Hanzhong intact, which in this chapter counts as the one unambiguous success.

Comes home with his army 'in excellent condition and not a man short, nor a horse nor any of their equipment' — the one clean result of the campaign — and refuses to be congratulated for it, dismounting to bow and call himself a defeated general. Then refuses the reward too: fifty ounces of gold and ten thousand rolls of silk sent back with the argument that the armies accomplished nothing, the rules for reward and punishment must be strictly kept, and the goods should be stored until winter and distributed to the troops. Zhuge Liang's answer is the First Ruler's verdict — 'he never tired of extolling Zhao Zilong's virtues. The First Ruler was perfectly right' — and his respect for the veteran is doubled.

Dies off-stage, and the chapter announces it by omen first: a northeast gale brings down the fir tree in front of the general's shelter, and Zhuge Liang casts lots and says 'That gale signals the loss of a great leader' before the sons arrive mid-banquet to report he died the night before at the third watch. Zhuge Liang's actual cry is not 'Heaven has cut off one of my arms' but 'My friend is gone. The country has lost it great beam, and I my right arm!' The Latter Ruler weeps — 'Zhao Zilong was my savior and friend. He saved my life when I was a child in the time of great confusion!' — and creates him Regent Marshal and Lord of Shunping, with burial east of the Silky Hills near Chengdu, a temple, sacrifices in four seasons, and guards set over the tomb. The eulogy names River Han and Dangyang and the twice-carried prince.

Named in passing only, and long dead, as the measure of Wen Yang's night ride: 'Defiance hurled at Cao Cao's mighty host / Arrayed near Long Slope proclaimed Zhao Zilong, / A valiant man; and peerless stood he till. / At Lojia another hero faced, / Alone, another host, and Wen Yang's name / Was added to the roll of famous people.'