Kingdom continues to hopscotch all over the battle lines, with the notable exception of where Xin is fighting at the moment.  I don’t remember exactly how long it’s been since we’ve seen him – it feels like about 4 or 5 episodes.  But while there’s obviously more than enough happening to keep the narrative busy and then some, I was never a fan of abandoning the protagonist for this long when he’s a part of the plot that’s playing out.  Of course Togashi did it multiple times in “Chimera Ant”, so there are exceptions to that rule I suppose.

This episode has a fair bit of movement but in truth, it’s really all about the clash of titans – Qin’s Meng Wu and Chu’s Han Ming.  As Wa Lin sneaks off towards the showdown point – perhaps with designs on Meng Wu’s head herself – and sends her other 5000 troops off on a secret mission we still aren’t privy too, Meng Wu’s progeny head towards the same place.  The entire echelon sweep strategy is the brainchild of Lord Changping – which makes sense, as Meng Wu was never the type for obscure textbook manoeuvers.  Basically the idea is to attack at the fringes and pry Han Ming’s army open like a clam shell, allowing Meng Wu to attack the tasty meat inside.

In that, it works.  Meng Wu is indeed able to get his elite force to the enemy camp, which is what Changping was willing to risk an all-or-nothing gambit to do.  Take down Han Ming, the symbolic heart of the coalition army, and you fundamentally alter the state of the war.  And since the fundamental state of the war really sucks for Qin at the moment, it’s the sort of risk you have to take.  Will it pay off?  Not if in the process of going after the coalition’s great general Qin loses its own.  But it’s the sort of desperate gamble Qin has no choice but to take.

Fittingly, those two giants do battle with maces – Han Ming noting that it’s the first time in a decade he’s been given to using it against an opponent.  Han Ming is quite the talker, giving the sort of battlefield soliloquy that only happens in war fiction as the action grinds to a halt all around.  He tells the story of how he humbled Qin’s great general Wang He, humiliating him so badly that it’s forbidden to talk about the battle in Qin.  And he seems to have the upper hand on Meng Wu as well – very much so in fact.  But given how hard it would be for Qin to survive if this gambit blows up in their faces, I suspect some sort of shocking turnaround next week.