Using a covariant model of mesons developed previously, we obtain new numerical solutions for the light-quark sector, and show explicitly how the small mass of the pion emerges as a natural consequence of chiral-symmetry breaking. Then we generalize the model, and show how chiral-symmetry breaking and confinement could be realized through completely independent mechanisms with different mass scales. In particular, the confining potential can be chosen to be purely scalar, as suggested by lattice studies and phenomenology, and the remaining part of the interaction can be chosen to be chirally invariant. In a symmetry-breaking mode, this new model can still generate quark mass and a massless-pion bound state.