She indeed lived up to Liu Hong’s expectations, as could be seen from Jian Shuo’s attitude when he came looking for her.

To ensure Jian Shuo made it to the top nine, Liu Hong specifically assigned him the easiest opponent from the current applicants.

Fortunately, Jian Shuo wasn’t entirely incompetent and won convincingly.

But Qiao Yan’s responsibility was to eliminate those Liu Hong didn’t want to keep, which was no small task.

Liu Hong was quite pleased with her performance, and Jian Shuo even showed some signs of wanting to build a connection with her.

His words were full of praise for Qiao Yan.

“Does His Majesty have any other instructions?” Qiao Yan interrupted his chatter and asked. “Now that two rounds of competition are over, with nine people left, aside from you and me, Zhao Rong and Feng Fang are the only ones whose military skills are slightly lacking. But they will face Ji Ling and Mengde in the next round, making it impossible for them to win.”

“The Censorate Advisor has a vacant position, and he has experience dealing with bandits. His performance so far is acceptable. In my opinion, he could be appointed as the General of the North.”

“Of course, if His Majesty thinks there’s someone else unsuitable, I will do my best to address it.”

Her words left Jian Shuo no choice but to hold back any dissatisfaction he might have had about being interrupted.

After all, she was waiting for the Emperor’s instructions.

As Qiao Yan mentioned, after two rounds of competition, the number of contenders had been reduced from thirty-six to nine.

According to Liu Hong’s plan, these nine were to fill the positions of the General of the North and the Eight Division Captains of Western Garden, indicating the plan was nearly complete.

With Qiao Yan as an unusual but effective test, any additional person could be accommodated later.

Adding one more person was not difficult for Liu Hong to justify.

Overall, this list still met his expectations.

Besides Zhao Rong and Feng Fang, the vacant position of the Censorate Advisor, Xia Mou, was originally one of the Eight Division captains of Xiyuan.

Compared to the original list, Yuan Shao did not personally participate and opted not to include the obvious choice, Chunyu Qiong.

Instead, he chose Ji Ling and Han Fu to represent the Yuan family.

These two did not disappoint Yuan Shao and others, winning their first two rounds.

The remaining two were Cao Cao and Bao Hong.

In the next round, Xia Mou had Eliminated, while Ji Ling faced Zhao Rong, Feng Fang faced Cao Cao, Jian Shuo faced Bao Hong, and Qiao Yan faced Han Fu.

So Liu Hong did not give Qiao Yan any additional instructions this time.

Jian Shuo came to her only to establish a connection, vaguely mentioning that His Majesty had said Qiao Yan could continue winning.

Qiao Yan realized in the match two days later why Jian Shuo was not worried about losing to Bao Hong.

Given Liu Hong’s plan to make Jian Shuo the leader of the Eight Division captains, he would not let Jian Shuo rank too low.

Bao Hong was likely spoken to by Liu Hong in advance.

Due to the reduced number of matches, participants now competed one by one, and Qiao Yan clearly observed Bao Hong’s performance.

He made several mistakes that couldn’t be explained away as mere errors, giving Jian Shuo the “opportunity” to win.

Even those who did not fully understand the underlying scheme wanted to criticize Bao Hong’s performance.

Qiao Yan, having grown somewhat familiar with her team, overheard the centurion of the Tunqi Camp mutter, “I originally wanted to teach that guy a lesson, but now there’s no chance. I think he’s really gotten too complacent.”

Previously, due to Bao Hong’s morale-boosting act, both Qiao Yan’s Yueqi Camp and the Tunqi Camp were eager to give him a harsh lesson if they faced him.

But now, he had lost outright.

After Bao Hong exited, Qiao Yan’s letter were confirmed.

He gave Qiao Yan a grateful look.

Of course, that gratitude was mixed with some indescribable conflict since Bao Hong initially thought he would be promoted to General of the North but ended up as a Captain in the Emperor’s direct army, The Eight Division Army

But still, it was a promotion, right?

Qiao Yan shifted her gaze from Bao Hong to her next opponent, Han Fu, and responded to the centurion of the Tunqi Camp, “If you have extra energy, use it on our opponents. If we keep winning, you might get recognized by His Majesty.”

“We will follow Lord Qiao’s words,” the centurion replied respectfully.

The centurion of the Tunqi Camp, by this point, couldn’t fail to notice that although Qiao Yan was not officially participating in this selection process, His Majesty’s attention had never strayed from her side.

In the first round, the Yueqi Camp centurion who shot the arrow at Wang Kuang received a special reward from His Majesty.

In the previous round, due to his excellent performance following Qiao Yan in breaking through enemy lines, he was also asked his name by the Emperor.

What about the third and fourth rounds?

He might also get promoted!

This was far more advantageous than merely providing support to their assigned general and receiving incidental rewards.

Even though none of Qiao Yan’s opponents seemed easy to handle, this didn’t dampen his ambition in the slightest.

However, Qiao Yan couldn’t underestimate Han Fu.

Han Fu might not be as difficult to deal with as Dong Min, but the leader he brought, Qu Yi, was no less formidable than Xu Rong.

With the lesson from Dong Min in mind, Qu Yi obviously wouldn’t be fooled by Qiao Yan’s tactic of dividing forces.

This increased the difficulty of Qiao Yan’s side in breaking through the enemy.

But Han Fu—even as the main general—was arguably inferior to Dong Min.

He thought, if he solely relied on Qu Yi’s abilities to win this battle, then he would be no different from a useless figurehead.

As a result, when he saw Qu Yi’s cavalry successfully break through the flank, he decisively pressed his rear soldiers forward.

This time, Qiao Yan didn’t even let Guo Jia take the field but had the centurion of the infantry camp impersonate Guo Jia.

What Qu Yi thought was cutting off an arm was merely sending a centurion down, but Qiao Yan’s bait caught the enemy commander.

As Qu Yi broke into the central camp, the infantry, seeing the cavalry already earning merit, were eager to claim the glory.

They showed extraordinary morale when forming an encirclement, holding out until Qiao Yan secured Han Fu and then turned back to support them.

After Han Fu was captured, Qu Yi didn’t last long on the battlefield either.

However, winning another match, especially against an unusual opponent, didn’t make Qiao Yan relax because she suspected the next round would be much more difficult.

Sure enough, the next round’s matchups were announced:

Jian Shuo against Xia Mu, her against Ji Ling, and Cao Cao had a Free.

Cao Cao once again visited Qiao Yan’s main tent in her camp.

This time, he asked a particularly straightforward question: “In your opinion, has His Majesty already decided to appoint Eunuch Jian Shou as General of the North?”

Appointing an eunuch to an external official position was indeed an incredible thing, but it was something Liu Hong’s character might actually do.

Given the current situation, it was hard for Cao Cao not to come to such a conclusion.

….

Since Qu Yi and Xu Rong were defeated by Qiao Yan, it was clear that Ji Ling would be no exception.

Thus, the final three would be Qiao Yan, Jian Shuo, and Cao Cao.

Previously His Majesty added a new rule called ” Free” which the player automatically step to the next round without fighting.

In his view, under these circumstances, the only one who could get a ‘Free’ would be Jian Shuo, not Qiao Yan!

So it would be him or Qiao Yan going up against Jian Shuo.

But even if Jian Shuo lost, what would it matter?

The position of General of the North was more likely to go to Jian Shuo than to Qiao Yan and him.

If Cao Cao could deduce this scenario, so could Qiao Yan.

She teased, “Should I let Mengde win? Then as we joked over wine, you could become General of the Northern Regions?”

Although she said this, Cao Cao could tell she was mostly joking.

While it was a battle of five hundred against five hundred, it could still be considered a proper fight, with no need for allowances.