Chapter 385: This Is Truly a Gathering of All the Worthies

Outside the walls of Xiazhou, the siege continued, though it was not intense.

The attackers were waiting for the Hongliu River to be diverted and for large trebuchets and other siege engines to be finished.

The defenders, for their part, had ample experience, and although the western city within Xiazhou was small, its sturdy fortifications and complete defensive system gave the soldiers and civilians inside great confidence.

More crucially, the people in Xiazhou were almost all members of the Li family of the Pingxia tribe, so they were still fairly united, and dealing with a low-intensity siege like the Guiyi Army's was not difficult for them.

By the time Luo Yu'er had someone bring Zhe Deyi before the walls of Xiazhou, Zhang Zhao could not help giving him a few extra glances — after all, his son-in-law, daughter, and grandson were so famous in history.

Yang Ye, Dowager She, Yang Yanzhao — these were figures who had been endlessly reworked by opera until they became iconic figures of Chinese civilization.

Zhe Deyi was also studying Zhang Zhao; he had not expected Zhang Zhao to look about the same age as himself.

In fact, they really were about the same age: Zhang Zhao was born in the second year of Qianhua of the Later Liang (912), and Zhe Deyi in the third year of Zhenming of the Later Liang (917), making Zhang Zhao five years older than Zhe Deyi.

And the first impression Zhang Zhao made on Zhe Deyi was: "Here is a true lord of men!"

It must be said that in first impressions, appearance always occupies a very important place.

At this time Zhang Zhao was only about 1.76 meters tall, but that height would not be considered short even in the later Republic, let alone in this era.

As for looks, Zhang Zhao really could not be called handsome, but the shape of his face was very fine — the sort of small, square-jawed face like Zhu Shimao's that at a glance marks a man as upright and honorable.

With that kind of face, as long as the features did not suffer some mutation, one would at the very least earn the appraisal of "thick brows, big eyes, and a face full of righteousness."

At this moment, Zhang Zhao was telling old tales to a group of officers of the ranks of squad general, platoon leader, deputy platoon leader, and fire leader.

"Telling old tales" was really just storytelling; after Great King Zhang had plagiarized the Heroes of Sui and Tang, he had now plagiarized the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

For men, for martial men roaring with spirit, there was no story more fitting than the Three Kingdoms — when the stars of their kind shone bright, the martial virtue of the Three Kingdoms was in no way inferior to that of the warriors of this age.

Moreover, the Three Kingdoms was full of champions dueling in single combat, and that was also popular now — Li Cunxiao, Wang Yanzhang, and Zhou Huaide had all had their famous moments.

During the great war between Liang and Jin, there had even been an extreme case where the two commanders dueled in single combat while the soldiers on both sides took off their armor and gathered to watch.

Apart from the fact that most of the rulers of the Five Dynasties were utterly worthless, the Three Kingdoms and the Five Dynasties were, in certain respects, very much alike.

And telling old tales to the soldiers was not because he, Great King Zhang, had some addiction to it, but because it was his best means of winning over the junior officers.

You see, I, the King of Han, never tell such things to officers above the rank of Commander, because Zhang Zhao saw the middle and senior officers often.

But these squad generals, platoon leaders, deputy platoon leaders, and fire leaders before him were all junior officers in the army; the highest-ranking among them, a squad general, commanded only a hundred men — the equivalent of a company commander.

They had no chance to see Zhang Zhao often and were more easily incited by others, and in an age when subordinates overthrowing superiors was commonplace, they also had the capacity to make trouble, so Zhang Zhao placed great importance on making his presence felt among the low-ranking officers.

Of course, there had been a few small interludes: one veteran of the Guiyi Army thought Zhang Zhao's routine was well done and wanted to learn it too, and was promptly packed off by Zhang Zhao to herd sheep at the ancient city of Loulan.

At this moment, Zhang Zhao had just reached the splendid part where Xu Chu fought Ma Chao stripped to the waist, and it was not convenient to stop, so he could only signal Guo Tiance with his eyes to invite Zhe Deyi to sit and wait a while.

Zhang Zhao's version of the Three Kingdoms had one advantage: his military knowledge was quite good, far more reliable than the Ming-dynasty authors who relied entirely on imagination.

Even so, the readers had still voiced their complaints about toxic plot points.

These rough men felt it should have been written so that after a bitter fight between the two, Ma Chao defeated Xu Chu.

Because Ma Chao the Splendid was a man of Xiliang! He was a hometown man, and his entrance was so dazzling — he was called "Golden Lu Bu, Silver Ma Chao," so his martial prowess should have been set a bit higher.

They would only allow Lu Bu to be a tiny bit above Ma Chao; no one else would do, not even Lord Guan the Second.

Li Cunhui in particular felt this was very reasonable. Murong Xinzhang had already stolen the image of Zhao Zilong of the white horse and silver spear, so this Ma Chao the Splendid must have been tailor-made by his foster father for him!

Now, hearing that Ma Chao could only fight Xu Chu to a draw, Li Cunhui felt utterly stifled, wishing he could leap into the book right now and become Ma Chao, finishing off Xu Chu in a few swift blows.

Zhang Zhao was speechless. These fools — why the hell are you arguing about Ma Chao's martial prowess? The Three Kingdoms is clearly about how the Imperial Uncle Liu was faithful, righteous, benevolent, and loving — a true lord of men!

Why don't you hurry up and shout that the Great King is the Imperial Uncle Liu, instead of going on about Ma Chao's martial prowess being too low.

Seriously! I'm telling you I hacked my way from the Southern Heavenly Gate to Penglai East Road, and you're asking me if my eyes are dry?

Zhe Deyi listened for a while. This Great King Zhang's voice was very distinctive, his cadence controlled the rhythm, and his tone and expression were all just right — even if he were not a great king, he could make a decent living on that mouth alone!

As he listened, Zhe Deyi suddenly thought of something, and then started in alarm.

Watching dozens, even hundreds, of junior officers gathered around Zhang Zhao listening to his tales, he suddenly remembered how, as a child, his father had also liked to tell old tales to them brothers and the young men of the clan; back then they had all looked at their father with that same adoration and reverence.

If a general treats his soldiers as his own sons, the soldiers will serve the general as their father. If a general treats his soldiers as his younger brothers, the soldiers will serve the general as their elder brother. When those above and below are of one heart, what city cannot be taken?

"Good! Enough! It's nearly noon — hurry and organize the soldiers for their meal. Those of you going to dig the river channel this afternoon, finish your task and you'll get extra mutton tonight!"

After another cup of tea's worth of time, the day's story was finally finished, and Zhang Zhao immediately shooed away his foolish officers and came specially to receive Zhe Deyi.

And this made Zhe Deyi's eyes widen again. The Zhe family's military discipline was extremely strict; if the Zhe family had been fighting a siege like the one at Xiazhou, then above and below would certainly have followed the rules to the letter, and military law would have been severe.

It was nothing like now, where from the outermost perimeter all the way to Zhang Zhao himself, everything exuded an air of ease. Huh — perhaps "ease" was not quite accurate; it should be called a sense of casual ordinariness.

It was as though the sixty thousand troops of the Guiyi Army did not feel that besieging Xiazhou in winter was anything particularly hard to endure or agonizing.

Still, this feeling was not bad!

Zhang Zhao felt quite good about the fifty guards Zhe Deyi had brought, all fluent in both Tangut and Chinese. Zhe Congyuan truly understood warfare, knowing what Zhang Zhao lacked.

The Tangut people at this time were spread very widely. Although Zhang Zhao had Tanguts from Hui, Yuan, Qing, and other prefectures under his command, the Tangut speech of Hui and Yuan differed greatly from that of Xiazhou.

The Qingzhou ones were somewhat better, but their Chinese was too poor, and they could only barely communicate.

The fifty men Zhe Deyi had brought, however, spoke the Tangut of the Pingxia tribe without any difference, and their Chinese was also quite good — a help that was neither great nor small.

"This time I have come to Xiazhou not only to thank the Great King for his gifts, but also to recruit some Tangut tribes for the Great King.

If the Great King will lend me a hundred or so elite cavalry, I will take them myself and can persuade the Luoli, Guiren, and other tribes northeast of Xiazhou to come over."

The Zhe and Li families were both Tangut, but the Zhe family had arrived earlier — they had come to this region during the Northern and Southern Dynasties and were a tribe formed from the intermingling of Xianbei and Tangut.

Compared to the Li family of the Pingxia tribe, who had arrived during the reign of Emperor Gaozong and the Wu Zhou period, they were the true local power in this area.

Historically, the Zhe family had refused to the death to merge with the Li family of the Dingnan Army, probably also out of this old-money contempt for and resentment of new money.

But precisely because the Zhe family had arrived early, no one else could poach from the Li family of the Dingnan Army, yet the Zhe family could.

During the Northern Song period, Zhe Deyi's son Zhe Yuqing recruited and pacified dozens of Khitan and Tangut chieftains inside and outside the frontier, with a population of over a hundred thousand, and settled them south of Fuzhou.

The Northern Song court conscripted from among them and obtained nearly ten thousand elite cavalry, making Li Jiqian so angry he vomited blood.

Ah, this Great Song — if only it had been even slightly normal and not pulled its absurd stunts, ten Li Jiqians would have been finished.

Just as he was about to instruct Guo Tiance to select elite cavalry for Zhe Deyi, someone came in from outside to report.

"Great King, the Grand Tutor Liu of Hedong has sent men to return the courtesy gifts; they are outside the camp seeking an audience!"

"What a coincidence — let's go meet him together!" Zhang Zhao grabbed Zhe Deyi's arm warmly, and the group headed toward the gate.

Zhang Zhao still felt somewhat uneasy about the Zhe family, because historically they had been a little too obedient to the court's orders.

Having Zhe Deyi meet the envoy Liu Zhiyuan had sent to show goodwill would let them know that once even someone like Liu Zhiyuan stayed out of it, the Zhe family would surely understand the stakes.

While still far from the camp gate, Zhang Zhao spotted at a glance a young officer in a dark-green martial outfit, tall and straight as jade, with a clear, ringing voice, speaking with the officer on gate duty.

Just one distant look told him this man was no ordinary person — neither servile nor overbearing, and simply standing there gave off an inexplicable air of composure.

Up close — whoa! A fine-looking young warrior, around seventeen or eighteen. In terms of handsome bearing, probably only Murong Xinzhang could compare. Even the simple futou cap on his head somehow added a touch of heroic dash and ease.

"You are Grand Tutor Liu's envoy? Come from Hedong?" Seeing that this young officer was indeed impressive, Zhang Zhao did not put on airs. He silenced the guard who was about to announce him and walked to the camp gate himself to ask.

The Grand Canon of All Worlds

The young officer looked at Zhang Zhao and quickly sized him up — amiable, with an uncommon bearing, and accompanied by several military officers of equally uncommon presence.

Just as he was about to ask who he was, the officer caught sight of Zhang Zhao and hurriedly gave a solemn bow, then said, "This is the Great King himself!"

The young officer was startled and hastily prostrated himself. "Chai Rong, cavalry-and-infantry officer under the command of the Military Governor of Hedong, Defender of Beijing, and Acting Grand Tutor Liu, pays respects to the King of Han. The Grand Tutor sent this humble officer with twenty jars of fine Hedong wine and forty jars of aged vinegar as a token of thanks!"

Holy shit!

Zhang Zhao jolted violently. He had not caught a word about fine wine or aged vinegar — he had heard only one name: Chai Rong!

"What did you say your name was?" Zhang Zhao even forgot to tell him to rise.

"Replying to the Great King! This humble officer is Chai Rong, a cavalry-and-infantry officer of Hedong, sent by Grand Tutor Liu to present thanks to the Great King."

Chai Rong was somewhat puzzled, but not a trace of it showed on his face. He remained on one knee, hands clasped, speaking with utmost respect.

"Is Guo Wenzhong your uncle by marriage?" Zhang Zhao, afraid of a mistake, confirmed it.

"He is indeed this humble officer's uncle by marriage!" Chai Rong answered quickly.

"Hahahaha! Up, up, quickly!" Zhang Zhao laughed wildly three times, rushed over, and pulled Chai Rong up from the ground with one hand.

"I have long heard of your great name! The heaven-made match of Guo Que'er and your adoptive mother, Lady Chai — I have heard of it for a long time now.

People say Guo Que'er was destined for such a fine wife, but I say he not only gained a worthy wife, he also gained a filial nephew who travels far and wide to help support the household. What good fortune!"

Zhang Zhao's eyes practically blazed with envy. If only Chai Rong were his adopted son — completely ignoring the fact that Chai Rong was only nine years younger than him.

Chai Rong was dazed. Young as he was, he had traveled the length and breadth of the land and seen much of the world, but he had never witnessed a scene like this.

A prince of the realm, holding his hand with such warmth, made Chai Rong think of certain unsavory things, and he felt a slight chill down his back.

"Today is truly a fine day — two talents arriving together!" Zhang Zhao said with a smile, then looked at Guo Tiance.

"Go and call Murong Xinzhang and Li Cunhui over too. Today I'll show you all a thing or two — let you taste the cooking of a great king."

Guo Tiance understood at once: the Great King was deploying his ultimate recruitment tactic — cooking in person. And the Great King's cooking was, in truth, quite good!

But given the status of Murong Xinzhang and Li Cunhui, having them come too — could the Great King be planning to take more adopted sons? (To be continued)

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