Chapter 124: The Anxi Army and the Great Cloud Temple

"Elder Brother! Elder Brother! I have finally found you!" Inside Zhang Zhao's tent, Li Qilang let out a mournful wail and threw himself before the old monk Huixing, sobbing bitterly.

Anything that could make a man of twenty-seven or twenty-eight or thirty weep so wretchedly was surely no ordinary ordeal.

At the sight of Li Qilang, the old monk Huixing, whose face had always been as still as an ancient well, swayed twice, and tears burst forth in an instant. He reached out to help Li Qilang up from the ground, his mouth making sounds of "en, ah, ya, yi."

He was speaking! But not quite speaking.

Zhang Zhao frowned in puzzlement. From old monk Huixing's babbling, one could actually make out the feel of syllables. Surely he would not still refuse to open his mouth now that he had seen Li Qilang. Could he truly have a speech impediment?

"Elder Brother Huixing, this is Young Lord Zhang Erlang. He was born of the Dragon-Tongue Zhang clan, a renowned family of Shazhou. He is a descendant of the Great Tang Grand Guardian and Guiyi Army Military Governor, Lord Zhang Yichao! The Great Sage Son of Heaven of the Golden Kingdom of Khotan is Young Lord Erlang's own maternal uncle.

Young Lord Zhang Erlang commands several hundred armored shock troops. In recent days he has defeated that rebel Hu, Itihad, several times at Shule. He has come specifically to find us.

Elder Brother Huitong has already agreed with Young Lord Erlang on a plan to strike from within and without, to rescue our master, retake Shule, and avenge our grievances. That day is close at hand!"

Li Qilang said, pointing at Zhang Zhao. In fact, Zhang Zhao had already announced his family background earlier, but the old monk Huixing had shown no reaction at all. Only now, when Li Qilang said the same, did old monk Huixing seriously size up Zhang Zhao.

The Dragon-Tongue Zhang clan was a branch of the Nanyang Zhang clan in Shazhou. It was said that the ancestor of this Shazhou branch of the Zhang clan, Zhang Song, had once slain a vicious dragon that plagued the countryside by the Black River in Shazhou.

Afterwards he sent the dragon's corpse to Chang'an and presented it to the Son of Heaven, and the Son of Heaven ordered that the dragon's tongue be cut out, placed in a box, and bestowed upon Zhang Song.

Thus the branch of his descendants he left behind in Shazhou came to be called the Dragon-Tongue Zhang clan. So the Dragon-Tongue Zhang clan was a branch of the Nanyang Zhang clan.

It sounded rather fantastical. He wondered whether this ancestor of his had killed some sort of alligator or what. But were there crocodiles in Shazhou? Perhaps it was some large lizard or something of the sort?

"Young Lord Erlang, it is not that Elder Brother Huixing cannot speak. Rather, he, together with Master Daozhen and several elder brothers, bears a great secret in his heart.

So when the Great Cloud Temple was destroyed by those rebel Hus, they collectively cultivated the Silent Meditation, and from then on spoke no word, lest the secret be leaked.

But just now Elder Brother has already broken his vow. In a few days, ten at most, he will surely be able to speak again."

Seeing Zhang Zhao's bewildered expression, Li Qilang hastened to explain. As he spoke, he intoned a Buddhist invocation toward Huixing, who sat cross-legged upon the felt rug.

"Elder Brother, Qilang wishes to tell Young Lord Zhang Erlang what he knows!"

Huixing smiled faintly and nodded to Li Qilang.

Li Qilang then solemnly straightened his wrinkled clothes before Zhang Zhao, adjusted the headscarf on his head, and with great formality handed Zhang Zhao the Great Tang Jianzhong Tongbao coin in his hand.

"Young Lord Erlang! I, Li Qilang, am indeed the descendant of the soldiers under the Grand Protector-General of Anxi whom you seek. My sixth-generation ancestor was the younger brother of the Grand Protector-General of Beiting, the Beiting Yixi Military Governor, the Prince of Ningsai Commandery, who was granted the surname Li, with the taboo name Yuanzhong!"

Li Yuanzhong! A surge of hot blood rushed straight to Zhang Zhao's head, and then to his eyes.

Forcing back the heat and redness in his eyes, Zhang Zhao struggled to calm his emotions. He had finally found them. So the Grand Protector-General of Anxi of old truly still had descendants? Truly the legacy remained, and they still remembered their motherland!

But why did they not go to Khotan? Why were they unwilling to acknowledge him?

At this point, Li Qilang's eyes were also red. Then he gave a rueful laugh, and untied the headscarf that had been wrapped around his head. A head of hair tinged with purple-brown appeared before Zhang Zhao's eyes.

"Li! Our family has borne the surname Li for over a hundred years, yet in truth we are not qualified to bear the surname Li. We ought to bear the surname Cao. We have muddled along for over a hundred years, but why must we still grow a head of brown hair?"

After his bitter laugh, Li Qilang somewhat ruefully put the headscarf into his pocket, then deftly tied a futou headwrap for himself.

Zhang Zhao remembered now. Li Yuanzhong was in fact not a Han. He was a Sogdian from the state of Cao, originally named Cao Lingzhong. He had held Beiting alone with Guo Xin, and after his loyalty and valor moved all under heaven, Emperor Dezong of Tang ordered that he be granted the surname Li and renamed Li Yuanzhong.

This was a surname granted by imperial favor, meaning that Li Yuanzhong's own descendants could of course bear the surname Li. But the descendants of Li Yuanzhong's younger brother had no share in that honor. They could only bear the surname Cao — the Sogdian Cao.

But... look at the Li Qilang before him! This short-statured man, his face weathered by travel, his hands covered with calluses from hard labor — after more than a hundred years away from the Great Tang, he could still deftly tie a futou. Could you say he was not a Han?

Li Yuanzhong had guarded Beiting with utter loyalty. The Tibetans had repeatedly tried to win him over using his Sogdian identity, and he had never wavered. Could you say he was not a son of Tang?

In those years, Beiting and Anxi held out alone for decades. Who knows how many Sogdians, Uyghurs, Kuchans, Shuleans, Khotanese, and Yanqians were among them.

In particular, among the two royal clans of Kucha's Bai and Shule's Pei, the King of Shule Pei Lengling and the King of Kucha Bai Huan followed the Iron-Blood Commandery Prince Guo Xin in defending Anxi, holding out until the state was broken and their families perished. Could you say they were not Han?

In Zhang Zhao's view, this was not merely the Anxi of the Han people alone. It was the Anxi of all the peoples of Anxi who observed the laws of the Great Tang, obeyed the Great Tang's commands, and were willing to become part of Han culture!

"If Qilang is not qualified to bear the surname Li, then I cannot see who else could! By virtue of your family's hundred years of loyalty, this Li is rightly borne.

My fourteenth great-aunt married into a distant branch of the Li clan of Longxi. If Qilang does not mind, once we reach Shazhou, I will personally go and ask my great-aunt and my Li cousin-uncle to enter your whole family into the Longxi Li genealogy!"

"Can it truly be done?" A diamond-bright gleam shot from Li Qilang's eyes.

"Your servant thanks Young Lord Erlang for this great kindness! Wuwuwu!" Li Qilang sobbed twice as he spoke. "If we could be entered into the Longxi Li clan genealogy, it would console the spirits of our ancestors!"

"Of course it can!" Zhang Zhao nodded firmly, and an even kinder smile appeared on his face.

"And Qilang may not know this, but you and I should have some marriage ties as well!"

A shocked expression appeared on Li Qilang's face. "Ge" — in the Tang dynasty, that was no ordinary word. It was an honorific. It could truly mean elder brother, and it could also mean father.

In particular, when addressing an elder brother, using the word "ge" signified that the relationship between the two parties was extremely close. If the relationship was not good, whether between brothers or between brother and sister, the younger one would never call the elder "gege."

"I dare not accept it! I cannot bear it! I cannot bear it!" After his shock, Li Qilang waved his hands repeatedly, deeply flustered.

"You can bear it! I do not honor Qilang alone, but the loyalty of six generations of Qilang's family to the nation!" Zhang Zhao stepped forward and grasped Li Qilang's arm, just as his uncle Li Shengtian had grasped his arm more than ten days before.

"Besides, I have not lied. My principal wife comes from the Qiaojun Cao of Shazhou, and among the Qiaojun Cao of Shazhou, there are no few Sogdian Caos who have returned to the clan. Should you and I not be relatives?"

"So that is how it is!" A light of extreme joy burst forth on Li Qilang's face.

"The Shazhou Caos and my family both descend from the Western Cao of the Virtue-Huai King of the city of Serdihin. Young Lord Erlang and I truly are relatives!"

The Sogdian state of Cao was divided into Eastern Cao, Western Cao, and Central Cao. Serdihin was the capital of Western Cao, at Ishtikhan, northwest of present-day Samarkand. The Virtue-Huai King was the King of Western Cao enfeoffed by Emperor Xuanzong of Tang in the third year of Tianbao.

From this perspective, Li Qilang's ancestors and the Cao Yijin family's assimilated Sogdian Caos were both of Western Cao origin. They truly might be kin.

Seeing that he had suddenly gained such a powerful relative and latched onto such a sturdy thigh, the excited Li Qilang grasped Zhang Zhao's arm in return.

"Young Lord Erlang, when Kucha fell back then, the descendants of the various officials of the Grand Protectorate of Anxi, and even the descendants of Commandery Prince Guo, all went into hiding at the Great Cloud Temple in Shule under assumed names, and some even shaved their heads and became monks.

Afterwards, so that the descendants would have the means to await the heavenly troops coming from the east, the monastic overseer of the Great Cloud Temple took the lead and established a Loyalty Treasury.

The Loyalty Treasury is jointly managed by the descendants of the five families of Guo, Li, Yang, Lu, and Bai, together with the abbot of the Great Cloud Temple. Within the treasury are the treasures, armor, and weapons accumulated by the Great Cloud Temple over a hundred years, as well as those of the Grand Protector-General of Anxi and the Bai royal family of Kucha.

In truth, all these years we have been waiting — waiting for someone qualified to make use of these treasures!"

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