Chapter 352: Victorious Return to Liangzhou

In 937, the second year of Tianfu under Shi Jingtang of the Later Jin, at the end of the twelfth month, Zhang Zhao finally returned to Liangzhou City before New Year's Eve, after an absence of seven months.

Zhang Zhao entered through the Xuanwu Gate on the east side, but before he had even entered the city, the Deputy Military Governor Yin Yaozi, charged with guarding Liangzhou, the Prefect of Liangzhou and his eldest maternal uncle Song Shantong, Lady Cao Sanniang, and the little wildcat Guo Wan'er

— even Zhang Zhao's no-longer-a-loli loli Sogdian-Persian princess Saifeiye, along with all the officials of Liangzhou great and small, had come to welcome him.

Of course, even more numerous were the common people of Liangzhou who had brothers or sons who had gone on campaign with Zhang Zhao.

Several thousand people danced gracefully outside Xuanwu Gate, expressing with their dancing their joy at the return of the soldiers, while drums and music sounded together, striking up the ceremonial music of triumph.

At a high, ringing cry of "Remove the armor!", Lady Cao Sanniang took the lead, with Guo Wan'er and Saifeiye on her left and right, and the three of them came over to strip the armor from Zhang Zhao's body and dress him in a festive purple robe.

Now Zhang Zhao had been enfeoffed as a commandery prince, and his offices had reached the rank of upper first-grade Acting Grand Marshal and Grand Military Governor of Hexi and Longyou, so at last he could wear the purple robe.

Once Zhang Zhao's purple robe was on, he directly ordered that armor be removed on the spot, and gave all the soldiers who had gone on campaign a full month's leave.

Then the relatives who had swarmed forward found their own kin and began helping them remove their armor.

The clerks of the military and personnel sections of the military governor's headquarters who had stayed behind began collecting weapons and armor, as well as registering the amounts of pay to be issued and the dates for returning to camp; as for rewards, Zhang Zhao had already distributed them long before.

Of course, according to the custom of the Guiyi Army, the first to enter the city were still the ashes and belongings of the fallen soldiers.

For this campaign into Guanzhong to put down the rebellion, Zhang Zhao had levied four thousand horse and foot soldiers from the Guiyi Army, more than two thousand cavalry from the Six Tribes, over two thousand civilian laborers, and along the way had gathered some three thousand Tangut roving horsemen, and had also conscripted several hundred men in Weizhou.

Including the civilian laborers, the total number who had actually gone on campaign was only twelve thousand.

The reason there were only two thousand civilian laborers, of course, was that the Guiyi Army had a relatively large number of mules and horses.

And of these, those who had actually set out from Liangzhou numbered only eight thousand, of whom only six thousand were soldiers.

In seven months of bloody fighting, a total of more than eight hundred had died in battle, but Tangut casualties accounted for over four hundred of them.

The reason their share was so large was that the equipment of the Tangut roving horsemen, especially their armor, was either nonexistent or consisted of leather armor of very ordinary quality.

And they were often assigned the riskier tasks of scouting and screening, and even leading the vanguard.

Within the Guiyi Army itself, the cavalry of the Six Tribes suffered somewhat heavier casualties, for the same reason, the main cause likewise being equipment.

The casualties of the Guiyi Army's Hanhai Garrison and Yucheng Garrison, by contrast, were only a little over a hundred and ten men.

Because killing a veteran soldier who often wore two or even three layers of armor, practiced formation fighting year-round, possessed top-tier fat reserves, and was rich in experience, was no easy thing.

The Guiyi Army's casualties came almost entirely from crossbow bolts; in head-on combat, not many men died.

Of course, this presupposed that you won every battle; once you lost, even warriors like those of the Guiyi Army would suffer heavy casualties in the pursuit.

Most of the armored soldiers of the Fengxiang Army were killed in the chase after they broke and fled.

Beneath Xuanwu Gate, the families of the fallen soldiers struggled to suppress their weeping; they did not wish to disturb the joy of the army's victorious return.

Moreover, the generous compensation for the dead greatly eased their pain, and since many families, though they had lost a kinsman, also had kinsmen who had returned alive, on the whole the atmosphere was not so very oppressive.

After everyone was settled, came the victory banquet. Back in familiar Liangzhou, back in his own residence, Zhang Zhao's tightly strung heart finally relaxed.

He gorged on meat in great mouthfuls and drank wine from great bowls, turning away no one who came to raise a cup with him, and before long he was drunk and bleary-eyed.

In a daze, Zhang Zhao seemed to see a bewitching, playful loli with a sweet voice and a strange, lilting accent dancing the Sogdian Whirl for him.

Her spinning figure swirled her bright long skirt, fluttering like a flower-butterfly, and as she danced on, the clothes on her body began to vanish one by one.

Until Grand Marshal Zhang, who had been living on a vegetarian diet for more than half a year, let out a howl and hoisted the mischievous creature onto his shoulder.

Very soon, the thin, somewhat wanton laughter turned into the hiss of indrawn breath, and later still, into the sound of pleading for mercy.

Zhang Zhao woke. Only when the sun was already high, the room truly too hot, and his stomach somewhat hungry did he have no choice but to open his eyes.

The moment his eyes opened, before he could even rise, there came a soft gasp from the doorway and the patter of feet scurrying away.

Before long, Lady Cao Sanniang came in person bearing a bronze basin, with several maidservants behind her carrying wooden buckets of warm water.

The little maid — no! She should now be called a senior maidservant — Shanniang, also came in carrying clothes.

Lady Cao Sanniang's eyes held the lingering glow of spring, and without the slightest hesitation she came to undress Zhang Zhao. Zhang Zhao knew in an instant who had come in to take over after the little loli Saifeiye had fled, unable to hold out, the night before.

"Erlang, you ought to show a little pity. Last night your little Hu dancer came wailing to me for help, crying so pitifully!"

Lady Cao Sanniang was slightly ill at ease; she seemed to be scolding Zhang Zhao, but in truth she was saying that there had been a reason for her coming in last night.

Zhang Zhao laughed heartily, caught Lady Cao Sanniang's hand, and said nothing. The two gazed at each other, and there was even a sense of wordless understanding between an old married couple.

At that moment, Shanniang, wearing a high-waisted long skirt, walked past Zhang Zhao. The silly little girl of twelve or thirteen in the cave-temple kitchen back then was now eighteen or nineteen, grown slender and graceful.

Only... Zhang Zhao cast a strange glance at Shanniang's chest a few times, and even pointed at the empty air and tapped it.

"Shanniang, where has all that food gone? Is your lady not feeding you? How is it there's still no change? It used to be smaller than mine, and now, it seems, well, it still is!"

Shanniang was at once so angry she shrieked, and looked as though she even wanted to pounce and bite Zhang Zhao a couple of times.

A person's first impression is truly too important. Everyone else regarded Zhang Zhao as a heaven-sent man whose might awed Hexi and Longyou.

Only Shanniang could never reconcile the Grand Military Governor of Hexi and Longyou, the Prince of Wuwei Commandery, with the silly little novice monk in a single black robe in the cave temple six years before.

Lady Cao Sanniang laughed until she doubled over, and the little awkwardness from a moment before vanished at once. She looked at Zhang Zhao, torn between laughter and tears, and said:

"Does Erlang find Shanniang pleasing? If so, from now on she can take charge of your daily needs!"

Zhang Zhao waved his hand rapidly. "I am but a rough soldier. Daily needs and such — you can handle them yourself.

As for Shanniang, after a while, I will find her a good family. I have so many fine unmarried young men under my command; how much better to let Shanniang go and be the proper first wife of a household!"

These words made Lady Cao Sanniang narrow her eyes in satisfaction, and Shanniang at once forgave Zhang Zhao for saying she was small.

Marrying a young officer as his first wife was certainly far better than staying by Zhang Zhao's side as a bedchamber maid who ranked below even a concubine.

However, after they had finished washing up, Lady Cao Sanniang suddenly grew somewhat melancholy, and tears even welled in her eyes.

She summoned her courage, looked at Zhang Zhao, and said: "Erlang, when you sent Xinchang'er off to the Eastern Capital, was it truly only because you wanted him to marry a princess?"

"It seems nothing can be kept from you!" Zhang Zhao sighed as well.

"Why must Erlang do this? Xinchang'er is brave, handsome, and he took several hundred elite cavalry with him. I fear the Son of Heaven in the Eastern Capital will take a liking to him at first sight — what if he will not let him return to Hexi?"

"Sanniang is so confident that Shi Jingtang will certainly keep Xinchang'er?"

"Naturally. He is a fine boy whom I have painstakingly taught. How many youths under heaven can compare with him?" When speaking of her son, Lady Cao Sanniang was utterly confident.

Zhang Zhao thought for a moment, then opened his mouth and said to Lady Cao Sanniang: "I sent Xinchang'er to the Eastern Capital because I truly had no other choice."

Zhang Zhao's reason for this necessity was actually quite simple: his status was rising steadily, and the days of personally charging into battle would grow fewer and fewer.

And Murong Xinzhang was, in fact, the stand-in Zhang Zhao had chosen for himself — a stand-in for the front lines.

Sending Murong Xinzhang to the Eastern Capital to meet Shi Jingtang this time was, in truth, a test.

If Shi Jingtang tried with all his might to keep Murong Xinzhang, and Murong still found a way to return to Zhang Zhao's side, then he would have passed the assessment.

From then on, apart from lacking the right of succession to the throne, Murong Xinzhang would be no different from Zhang Zhao's own son.

If he failed the assessment and stayed in the Eastern Capital amid its wine and pleasures, then Zhang Zhao would be spared further effort and emotional investment.

Moreover, when the Central Plains fell into upheaval ten years later, Murong Xinzhang, stationed in Kaifeng, could still play a role no one could foresee.

As for the final point, it was Zhang Zhao's private motive: through the marriage of Murong Xinzhang and Princess Yongle, he hoped the Daibei military-merit bloc would accept him to a certain degree.

Thus creating a favorable external environment for Zhang Zhao to later swallow up the Shuofang Military Governor and strike at the Li family of the Dingnan Army.

As for the six hundred elite cavalry who went with Murong Xinzhang, Zhang Zhao was not worried. He, Zhang Zhao, was no civil-official frontier governor of the Song or Ming sort, but a provincial military governor akin to an external vassal state.

Nor was Shi Jingtang a true Son of Heaven whose word was law, but a child-emperor despised by everyone.

At this moment, Shi Jingtang could be said to be the most looked-down-upon ruler of the Central Plains dynasties in a thousand years.

Historically, even Li Shengtian, far away in the Western Regions, despised him, daring to mock him openly before envoys of the Jin court.

The Central Plains went without saying. An Zhongrong's line — "The Son of Heaven is whoever has the strongest soldiers and boldest horses" — was spoken precisely out of contempt for Shi Jingtang.

In fact, before Shi Jingtang sold out his country for glory and became a child-emperor, the Five Dynasties were chaotic, but the dignity of the Central Plains Son of Heaven had not yet been torn down by local warlords and trampled utterly into the mud.

But the moment Shi Jingtang ascended the throne, he directly turned the titles of Emperor and Son of Heaven into nothing more than an oversized Military Governor.

Therefore, even if Shi Jingtang intended to keep the Guiyi Army's six hundred elite cavalry, he would have to offer compensation several times over.

And of these six hundred elite cavalry, half were composed of men from the great clans of Shazhou and the sons of Tang of Hexi. Their reverence for Zhang Zhao could not be swayed by mere gold and silver — and besides, when it came to gold and silver, Zhang Zhao gave more.

The ones Shi Jingtang could truly win over were the two hundred-odd cavalrymen from the Liugu Valley tribes.

And as for these cavalrymen, Zhang Zhao could produce more of them at any time from Liangzhou, Shanzhou, Lanzhou, and Taozhou, so long as he had sufficient equipment and a certain amount of training.

Zhang Zhao had long prepared a backup move. These two hundred-odd cavalrymen were bait offered to Shi Jingtang. The moment he swallowed it, Grand Commandant Zhang would lead him by the nose with the cause of righteousness.

——————Off-topic——————

In case there's anything that needs review, I'm posting this ahead of schedule.

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