Chapter 353: Hexi and Longyou Return to the State Once More

After returning home and passing a peaceful New Year's Eve, the envoy of the Later Jin court finally arrived.

Zhang Zhao formally received the full regalia of the Prince of Wuwu Commandery and Grand Military Governor of Hexi and Longyou — the ceremonial insignia, the great banner, the banner of authority, and the rest.

By this time, because of the rise of goods such as rock sugar, white sugar, cotton, and tea bricks, people had begun flooding into Liangzhou in large numbers, and the city's population had reached over thirty thousand, already taking on something of its old appearance as the girdle of Hexi and the shield of the realm.

Zhang Zhao kept the envoy for several extra days, because he was about to do something of great importance.

That was to present to the court the household registers and maps of the sixteen prefectures of Gua, Sha, Yin, Xi, Gan, Su, Liang, Lan, Shan, He, Kuo, Min, Tao, Wei, and Die, along with the two prefectures of Yuan and Hui.

Apart from Xizhou in the Western Regions and the four prefectures of Qin, Cheng, Wu, and Dang still held by the Later Jin court, these sixteen prefectures comprised the entire administrative territory of the Great Tang's Hexi and Longyou.

Together with Huizhou and Yuanzhou, held by the Guiyi Army, the household registers and maps came to eighteen prefectures in all.

Zhang Zhao prepared to send his maternal grandfather Song Tongyi as special envoy of the Prince of Wuwu, on a mission to the Later Jin, formally returning the eighteen prefectures of Hexi and Longyou to the state.

What was this? This was great righteousness — the great righteousness of the nation and the people!

Yet beneath the cover of this great righteousness, Zhang Zhao had a small scheme of his own.

Had this been not the Later Jin but the Later Tang, the Later Zhou, or even the Later Liang, Zhang Zhao would never have dared do such a thing.

Presenting household registers and maps to the state was no light phrase — it meant acknowledging the ruling authority of the Central Plains dynasty, and it meant complete submission.

The Guiyi Army's current status was roughly that of an outer vassal, but once the household registers and maps were offered up, it would instantly become a regional power somewhat less independent than the Li family of the Dingnan Army, yet stronger than an ordinary military province.

Under such circumstances, the court could with full legitimacy summon you to transfer your command, demand tribute of silver and coin at every season and festival, and even select and dispatch officials to take up posts in Hexi and Longyou.

In history, after Zhang Yichao returned the eleven prefectures of Hexi to the state, the Great Tang court immediately and with full legitimacy transferred two thousand men of the Tianping Army from Yunzhou to Liangzhou, instantly diluting the Guiyi Army's righteous claim in Liangzhou.

So in any other dynasty, had Zhang Zhao dared do this, the court would certainly have seized the advantage and taken over directly.

But Shi Jingtang did not dare, because this child-emperor had gained his throne by selling out the state, and there was not the slightest shred of great righteousness in him.

The Later Jin court had neither great righteousness nor real strength.

Moreover, with Shi Jingtang's success as a model, everyone below followed his example — if you, Shi Jingtang, could sell the state, why couldn't I?

Ten years later, Shi Chonggui's downfall was not brought about by defeat at Khitan hands, but by ambitious men within, following that same example and selling out the dynasty in their craving to taste the imperial throne.

From its founding to its destruction, the territory Shi Jingtang's Later Jin could truly control was the strip of land along the Yellow River from Kaifeng and Luoyang to Chang'an.

As for the military governors elsewhere, Shi Jingtang could not move a single one of them; any attempt to force a transfer would mean war.

With such a feeble, short-lived dynasty, possessing neither strength nor great righteousness, even if Shi Jingtang were given ten times the courage, he would not dare come and take over Hexi and Longyou — nor would he be foolish enough to actually do so.

Zhang Zhao was still thinking of reunifying the realm, but Shi Jingtang had never given the matter a thought.

The child-emperor was forty-five this year; having saved his own skin, all he thought of now was dying a natural death. For him, recovering Hexi and Longyou in name alone was enough.

But to the people of the realm, Zhang Zhao's act was comparable to Zhang Yichao's return of the eleven prefectures of Hexi to the state in years past!

Hexi and Longyou had been off and on outside the state's possession for nearly two hundred years; now that they were once more part of the realm, what a tremendous achievement this was! He absolutely counted as a hero of the nation.

At the very least, the Later Jin chief envoy who had come to deliver the edict — Lu Dao, Right Vice Director of the Department of State Affairs and Administrator of the Ministry of Personnel's Bureau of Evaluations — and the deputy envoy Liu Tao, Compiler in the Historiography Institute and Vice Director of the Ministry of Works, upon hearing this, could not hold back their tears.

Lu Dao, in his dignity as imperial envoy, removed his official robes and bowed three times to Zhang Zhao.

"I once heard that when the Prince left Guanzhong, he said, 'A cup of cloudy wine, a home ten thousand li away,' and only then did I know the Prince was a loyal subject guarding the frontier for the state.

Now the Prince has offered up the household registers and maps of eighteen prefectures. How splendid is the Zhang clan of Nanyang!

In years past, Grand Guardian Zhang returned the eleven prefectures of Hexi to the state and became the model of a loyal subject for all the realm. Now the Prince has once more restored the eighteen prefectures of Hexi and Longyou to the map of the realm — he deserves these three bows from me!"

Seeing Lu Dao so moved, Zhang Zhao hurried forward to help him up, feeling a touch of shame in his heart as well.

Unlike Zhang Yichao, who offered up the household registers and maps of the eleven prefectures of Hexi for the great righteousness of the state, Zhang Zhao this time had in fact harbored considerable selfish motives.

Because he had calculated Shi Jingtang's weakness precisely, and in order to contend for supremacy over the realm, he had deliberately used this matter to promote his own image before the people of the realm — that was why he had made this gesture of returning the eighteen prefectures of Hexi and Longyou to the state.

Compared with Zhang Yichao, his motives appeared somewhat impure.

But this was an open stratagem; anyone with clear eyes understood what was really going on, yet they still had to acknowledge Zhang Zhao's profound understanding of great righteousness.

"Director Lu, you must not do this. Ever since the Great Tang declined, we sons of Tang in Hexi and Longyou have yearned day and night for this very day.

What a pity that Liangzhou has not yet recovered, and there is not even a single place of passable scenery. Otherwise, if I could share wine and discuss poetry and prose with the two envoys from the Central Plains, it would surely be one of life's greatest joys!"

Zhang Zhao knew nothing of poetry and prose; he could not even keep the rules of tonal prosody straight, muddling through them in a haze.

He said this now only to show that he, Grand Commandant Zhang, was a man of culture.

Sure enough, the moment Zhang Zhao spoke, the looks in Lu Dao's and Liu Tao's eyes grew even more full of emotion.

Never mind now — even after Zhao Kuangyin founded the Northern Song, a sitting chief minister could be insulted and extorted by name by military men patrolling the streets.

Sharing wine and discussing poetry and prose? Ha! The military men of this age were far more interested, after drinking, in splitting open a man's skull.

After a brief silence, the younger deputy envoy Liu Tao — who the previous night had talked deep into the night with Fan Zhi — cast a meaningful glance at Zhang Zhao.

"Outside the Eastern Capital, the Jinshui River ripples with green waves; at dusk, the river's surface glitters with golden light — a famous sight of the Eastern Capital, not to be missed!

Pei Yuying once said that the Prince is a hero of the realm, accomplished in both letters and arms. I shall await your arrival in the Eastern Capital with respect!"

Zhang Zhao gave Liu Tao a long look and nodded slightly. Pei Yuan was meticulous and far-sighted; for this man to have specifically mentioned Pei Yuan, there was surely a deeper meaning.

Perhaps Pei Yuan had revealed something of his hand, but this was not yet the time. Zhang Zhao could not well say anything else, and merely cupped his hands toward Lu Dao and Liu Tao with a smile.

"That day will come. When it does, I shall share wine and pleasant words with you both. For now, I ask that you linger in Liangzhou a while longer; when the snows melt, I shall personally lead a great army to escort the imperial envoys!"

After Lu Dao and Liu Tao had withdrawn, Zhang Zhao sat in thought for a short while, considering whether he ought to plagiarize a few more poems.

In the past, he had overcomplicated the matter of building his reputation among the literati; whenever he thought about problems, he unconsciously projected the conditions of the later Song and Ming dynasties onto the present.

And so he had unconsciously held civil officials in rather high regard, and also thought them somewhat slippery.

But in reality, compared with military men, the literati of this time were only a little better off than the common people at the very bottom.

A man with a rough grasp of letters was absolutely not as highly placed as a yabing guard who knew how to cut men down.

Very likely, this group did not need Zhang Zhao to court them at all; as long as he showed that he respected literati and delighted in poetry and prose, the humiliated literati would very likely come flocking to him.

For no other reason than that, in these Five Dynasties, they had lived with far too little dignity.

It seemed that plagiarizing poetry and prose was indeed something worth continuing!

It was the simplest means of attracting the realm's learned and talented men.

Zhang Zhao thought for a while, then a guard came to report that military officers Yan Jin, Yin Yaozi, and others were outside requesting an audience.

Zhang Zhao had summoned them, because of the eighteen prefectures on the map he had just handed over, only Shazhou, Guazhou, Liangzhou, Lanzhou, Huizhou, Yuanzhou, and half of Shanzhou were currently in Zhang Zhao's hands.

The remaining eleven and a half prefectures would still have to be taken through war and other means.

In particular, the Ganzhou Uyghurs, who bordered Liangzhou and sat wedged between Shazhou and Liangzhou, were the next target Zhang Zhao had to deal with.

At the same time, according to the customs and laws of this era, children were required to observe three years of mourning for their parents, but for grandchildren the requirements were not as strict as in the Ming and Qing periods — let alone in the chaos of the Five Dynasties, where whether or not to observe mourning was almost entirely up to the individual.

Cao Yijin had already been dead for over a year, and Cao Shijiu Niang Yanxi was already nearly nineteen. If she truly had to observe three years of mourning, she would be twenty-one.

In this era, for a woman to marry only in her twenties was an embarrassing matter for both families.

Cao Yuanshen had already written several times urging Zhang Zhao to complete the marriage with Cao Yanxi as soon as possible, so Zhang Zhao's marriage also had to be put on the agenda.

Then the Ganzhou Uyghurs had to be removed — they could hardly have Prince Zhang detour through the great desert just to take a wife!

And marrying Cao Yanxi soon would bring other benefits as well.

The main one was that it would help Zhang Zhao better tap the potential of the Guiyi Army in the two prefectures of Guazhou and Shazhou — after all, in Guazhou and Shazhou alone there were some one hundred seventy to one hundred eighty thousand people.

Among this population there were also sixty to seventy thousand sons of Tang, all of whom had migrated to Guazhou and Shazhou over the years as the Guiyi Army's territory steadily shrank.

These sixty to seventy thousand sons of Tang, together with the already-sinicized Sogdians and Tuyuhun people, numbered close to two hundred thousand in total, crammed into the tiny two prefectures of Guazhou and Shazhou, living in bitter hardship.

And Zhang Zhao's side happened to lack enough sons of Tang to disperse and garrison Liangzhou, Lanzhou, Weizhou, and other places.

Zhang Zhao decided that as soon as the grand wedding was over, he would move them out of Guazhou and Shazhou.

Moreover, of the small Silk Road circuit he was building, only two nodes remained outside his grasp.

One was Ganzhou, wedged between Shazhou and Liangzhou; the second was Weizhou, wedged between Lanzhou and the territory of the Xiongwu Army in Qinzhou.

To get his small circuit fully circulating, these two places had to be in his hands.

Weizhou had many Han people, and Zhang Zhao also held the moral high ground there, so it should be settled with just a few hundred cavalry. The only one that could still put up a fight was the Ganzhou Uyghurs.

Zhang Zhao summoned Yan Jin and the others to make plans while waiting for the soldiers' one-month furlough to end.

After that, the Guiyi Army would begin intensive training. Zhang Zhao decided: before the fifth month, take Ganzhou!

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