Chapter 700: Harassment! This Is Harassment!

After Zhang Zhao's carriage left Tianshui Prefecture, it immediately switched to full-speed travel mode.

First, most of the common people east and south of Lanzhou had already come to Tianshui Prefecture to pay him homage.

Second, the post roads of Hexi and Longyou were exceptionally well built; in many places the travel conditions already rivaled the township roads of later ages, greatly increasing the speed of the carriage.

Upon reaching Lanzhou, Zhang Zhao even stayed only a single night, then headed straight for Liangzhou.

This was not because he did not value Lanzhou, but because the thirty-one dongdai of Songpan and the thirteen tribal chieftains of the Dafeichuan peoples were about to arrive in Liangzhou.

At the same time, word came from Sulu Xin, who had gone to the Eight Tribes of the Western Mountains, that the submission of the Eight Tribes was proceeding extremely smoothly.

This was inevitable, because the ones originally blocking the spread of the Six Dharma Sect in this region were the Eight Tribes of the Western Mountains themselves; now that they were voluntarily submitting, it naturally could not have gone more smoothly.

And after the various tribes prepared to submit, the chieftains of the Ruoshui and Qingyuan tribes — Su Shangzhi, grandson of Dong Jiniang, whom Zhang Zhao had appointed Pacification Commissioner of Kangding Prefecture — upon hearing that the highland tribes of Songpan and Dafeichuan were coming to Liangzhou to pay court, also proposed to Sulu Xin that he wished to have an audience with the Emperor once more.

Zhang Zhao naturally agreed to this, and so ordered Sulu Xin to lead Su Shangzhi, along with the remaining six tribes of the Western Mountains — the Gelin, Baigou, Buzu, Nanshui, Xidong, and Duoba — as well as more than fifty local Tibetan, Baiyi, and Heiyi chieftains with several hundred followers, to come to Liangzhou as well.

This was a major event. Although the once-mighty Tibetan Empire, whose fearsome reputation had allowed it to wrestle with the Tang dynasty, had long since declined, a small measure of its prestige still remained.

If Zhang Zhao were a bit more thick-skinned, even without the realm yet unified, he could boast that his territorial expansion had already surpassed that of Emperor Taizong, Li Erfeng.

However, although Zhang Zhao did not stay long in Lanzhou, that did not mean he did not value Lanzhou. Zhang Zhao could vaguely sense that Hexi and Longyou were quietly competing with each other.

Once past Tianshui or the Tanzheng Gorge, Hexi and Longyou were a single whole, but within Hexi and Longyou, the people of the two provinces still competed openly and covertly.

Moreover, even within Hexi and Longyou respectively, further subdivisions could be made.

The founding father of the Red Dynasty once said, "Without factions within the party, all sorts of strange things happen" — truly a maxim of the highest wisdom!

Therefore, for the sake of balance, before Zhang Zhao had even left Lanzhou, he issued an edict for a grand troop muster, ordering the young heroes of Lanzhou to follow him to Liangzhou.

Zhang Zhao prepared to hold in Liangzhou a grand Township Archery Rite involving all the prefectures of Hexi and Longyou, on an enormous scale.

This was also the source of the rumor the youths of Baishui County heard, that Zhang Zhao was summoning a great army to campaign against the disloyal. These lads never stopped to think — what power remained now that was worth Zhang Zhao traveling all the way to Hexi and Longyou to conscript troops on such a scale?

But in truth, it was not entirely a rumor, because after receiving Bai Congxin's battle report, Zhang Zhao did indeed develop the intention of making a trip beyond the frontier.

Chen Huzi rode atop a tall dappled-gray horse. This southerner from the shores of West Lake still had not fully adjusted to the rugged scenery and customs of Hexi.

Compared to the peaceful and serene water towns of Jiangnan, this northwestern land seemed like an entirely different world.

Hoofbeats thundered in waves, as if a thousand cavalry were charging up from behind. In the old days, Chen Huzi would certainly have been terrified, but now he could take it in stride.

For in Hexi and Longyou, every household had horses; an ordinary horse held roughly the same family status as a dog in the households of the Wuyue kingdom.

Yesterday Chen Huzi heard a Captain of the inner yabing guards traveling with them say that Liangzhou certainly had more warhorses than Hangzhou had dogs, and Chen Huzi deeply agreed.

In a land like this, the sight of a hundred horses galloping together was not at all rare.

Sure enough, the mounted company that swept past like a gust of wind bore no ill intent toward their Wuyue embassy of a hundred-odd riders; they barely even noticed them.

However, Chen Huzi, who had already reined his horse to the roadside to yield because of his mediocre riding skills, heard a burst of lilting, feminine laughter and could not resist craning his neck for a look.

In the kingdom of Qianyue, it was not that no women rode horses, but they were few; to see dozens of women at once, dressed in men's clothing and galloping freely as they did in Hexi and Longyou, was truly unheard of.

Chen Huzi was not the only one curious — everyone in the party except the chief envoy, Pei Jian, Qianyue's Minister of Rites, was curious, and nearly all of them were craning their necks too.

Ahem! If it were just one person looking, that would be one thing, but of the hundred-odd people in the Qianyue embassy, at least seventy or eighty were staring, which was extremely conspicuous.

"Where did these gawking geese come from? Never seen your mother ride a horse before?"

Chen Huzi was still staring when a sharp, coquettish shout rang out. He instinctively looked up at the sound and found himself meeting the eyes of the scolding woman.

The woman's head and face were wrapped in a gauze veil to shield against the blowing dust, so Chen Huzi could not see her clearly. He only felt that the woman's bosom must be truly magnificent, because even with obvious binding, it still protruded considerably.

But Chen Huzi was, after all, from a family of poetry and propriety, a cultured house whose genealogy could be traced to the Shen clan of Wuxing. After one quick glance, he immediately lowered his head.

The woman let out a soft "Oh?" She herself was wrapped in a gauze veil, so her features were hard to make out, but Chen Huzi, being a grown man, could hardly wrap himself in gauze.

Unlike the martial, swaggering men of Hexi and Longyou — who even when they studied, did so only superficially, the better to kill on the battlefield — his bearing was different.

Chen Huzi, born into a great house of the Qianyue kingdom, was also quite robust, but in his bones he carried a refined, scholarly air distinct from the men of the northwest.

This made the woman, who spent every day among rough men, appreciate him all the more; and since Chen Huzi was himself extremely handsome, it added even more points.

"A fine-looking shell. Wonder if he's just a pewter spearhead with a silver coating." The woman giggled, then suddenly reached out to grab Chen Huzi.

Chen Huzi had never seen anything like this. Although Qianyue was relatively peaceful among the various states, no woman in the kingdom would dare lay hands in public on a man who was so obviously one of the inner yabing guards.

If truly provoked, the yabing guards of Qianyue were fully capable of burning, killing, and plundering. Their ancestors had been members of Sun Ru's man-eating army — they were no good and kindly sort.

So Chen Huzi did not react until the woman's hand was almost at his collar. Instinctively he parried, using only thirty percent of his strength.

In Chen Huzi's mind, how much strength could a woman with such a large bosom — oh no! — how much strength could a delicate woman possibly have?

As a result, with that one block, he realized he had been careless.

The hand the woman extended, though it carried the creamy smoothness of a woman's skin and wafts of fragrance, had a thick layer of calluses at the webbing and certain finger joints, and her strength was frighteningly great.

Chen Huzi, caught off guard, was nearly pulled off his horse.

Fortunately, he reacted quickly and dropped his body low, narrowly avoiding embarrassment, and used nearly all his strength in his hands.

The two grappled back and forth on horseback several times. Although the woman also trained in martial arts, in the end she could not compare to a man, and had to use a few clever tricks and techniques to break free of Chen Huzi's grip.

But after breaking free, the woman did not hurry away. Instead, controlling her horse with her legs alone, she raised both hands high and called out, laughing merrily and without the slightest concern for the tussle just now, to the other women in the distance.

"Sister Ying, this southern barbarian is quite strong. Come test his learning."

At these words, the entire Qianyue embassy was left speechless.

If this had happened anywhere else, what woman would dare toy with a man? They had over a hundred vigorous young men here — anyone daring to be so brazen would certainly be taught a lesson by these young ladies.

But they did not dare now, because these women all rode Hexi heavenly horses and dragon horses that would be worth a fortune in Qianyue.

Qianyue called fine Hexi warhorses with strong folded-ear bloodlines "dragon horses," while "heavenly horses" were those with primarily Ferghana blood.

Besides riding heavenly horses and dragon horses, every one of them had horse bows and short hengdao sabers of top quality hanging from their saddles.

Some of the young ladies even had rolled-up lamellar armor or folded cloth-faced iron armor hanging from the saddles of their spare horses.

Could an ordinary household possess such things? And even if they were ordinary households, in Hexi and Longyou they were no ordinary households — who knew how many of their fathers and brothers served in the personal army and imperial guard of the Shaoming Son of Heaven.

At the shout of the young lady called Xiong Da, fifty or sixty riders of lilting femininity immediately surrounded them, appraising Chen Huzi with critical eyes.

This future chancellor of Qianyue was still only a nineteen-year-old "youth," and was instantly thrown into confusion by the situation.

Moreover, he reckoned that if the woman opposite him drew a short blade or long spear, he would not be able to beat more than a few of them.

Amid the chattering, the woman called Yingniang spurred her horse forward. She raised a hand, and the girls who had been laughing and joking instantly fell silent.

Yingniang looked at Chen Huzi's handsome face and his air of scholarly refinement, and nodded with satisfaction.

The men in her family, father and brothers alike, were all rough, battle-hardened warriors. When it came to reading and writing, each of them found it more agonizing than being slashed twice by a blade.

Yet Yingniang, against all expectation, had loved poetry, prose, calligraphy, and painting since childhood. Her family had found her many fine heroic young men, but Yingniang had looked down on them all.

Some time ago she had even gone herself to the eastern capital, to Kaifeng Prefecture, to search for one. But those so-called famous scholars were either too old or too frail and bookish — not a single one satisfied her.

The man before her, though he could not compare to her eldest brother in the slightest, still had a certain dash about him. Murong Yingniang gave a slight nod.

This girl came from the Murong family of Guazhou. The world-shaking Murong Baipao — my Sage Zhang's fine eldest son, Murong Xinzhang — was her cousin.

Her full brother, Murong Xinchun, was one of Sage Zhang's personal close-guard generals. Her sister-in-law was Lady Cao Shanniang of Xinchang Commandery, who had once been the personal maid of Cao Sanniang, Yanjin's wife, and was as dear to Sage Zhang as his own sister.

Murong Yingniang had been a regular guest at the imperial palace since childhood. At five or six years old she had even dared to climb onto Sage Zhang and tug at the few whiskers Zhang Zhao had.

With such a family background, Murong Yingniang had become one of the "she-devils" that every young man in the western capital, Chengtian Liangzhou Prefecture, feared on sight.

"Hey, you there — have you read the Odes and the Documents?" Murong Yingniang tried to soften her voice, making herself seem a little gentler.

The Odes, of course, meant the Book of Odes, and the Documents meant the Book of Documents. In Hexi and Longyou, anyone well-versed in these two was considered quite learned.

Had she asked about something else, like horsemanship, Chen Huzi would have felt somewhat uneasy. But reading — that was his strong suit. Even though he was surrounded by a crowd of women and feeling rather awkward, at these words he puffed out his chest.

"I am a son of the Chen clan of Wuxing — a great house of a thousand years, passing down the Odes and rites through the generations. To reach the age of twenty having read only the Odes and Documents would make me a laughingstock."

The Chen clan of Wuxing had risen in the Eastern Han. During the Eastern Jin and the Northern and Southern Dynasties, it had been a great family of renown in Jiangnan.

Chen Huzi spoke with a certain proud bearing, as if to say: though Qianyue may be a vassal state, I, Chen Huzi, am a scion of an old aristocratic house.

Unexpectedly, at these words the women burst into giggles again. They pushed forward a girl dressed in a man's lanpao robe, and clamored:

"Sister Chen Qi, here comes a subject of your house! Perhaps you two are even related?"

Chen Huzi flew into a rage and could not help shouting: "The Chen clan of Wuxing is a great house of a thousand years — no one's subjects!"

But this Sister Chen Qi wrinkled her fine nose, looked at Chen Huzi, and declared: "I am a descendant of Emperor Xiaoxuan of Gaozong. You are a son of the Chen clan — were you not subjects of my ancestors?"

Chen Huzi froze, then went numb all over. He had just heard this girl's surname was Chen, and realized the Emperor Xiaoxuan of Gaozong she spoke of was none other than Chen Xu, Emperor Xuan of the Southern Chen.

The highest glory of the Chen clan of Wuxing had been under the Southern Chen.

At that time, the Southern Chen — not counting the deposed Chen Bozong — had four emperors in all. Among them, the empresses of both Emperor Wen, Chen Qian, and the last ruler, Chen Shubao, were daughters of the Chen clan of Wuxing. Five men of the Chen clan had married imperial princesses in succession. For descendants of the Southern Chen to now call the Chen clan their ancestors' subjects was, in truth, not wrong.

Seeing Chen Huzi thoroughly cowed, Murong Yingniang smiled smugly. "However great a house your Wuxing Chen may be, you are still but ministers of Jiangnan. My Murong family served as emperors and kings in the northern dynasties for generations — are we inferior to your house?"

Chen Huzi smacked his lips. Even if they were inferior, would he dare say so? If word of this reached Murong Baipao's ears, would his Chen family not be in terrible trouble?

Even setting Murong Baipao aside, the Murong family of Guazhou was one of the two great pillars of the Guiyi Army, with dozens of its members enfeoffed as dukes, marquises, and earls. Even the Qian family, kings of Wuyue, would not dare contend with them — let alone himself.

Seeing Chen Huzi completely deflated, Murong Yingniang grew more and more pleased with him.

Did you think a girl like her would fancy some domineering overlord type?

Bullshit!

Her family was full of domineering overlord types. Murong Yingniang had long grown tired of them. What she liked was exactly this kind of tall, handsome, well-read, courteous, and warm-hearted young man who knew when he had to back down.

At that moment, the bear-sized young woman who had first blocked Chen Huzi's path giggled and spoke up: "Now that the introductions are done, young lord, what do you think of my second sister here?

Why not skip returning to that Wuyue of yours, and stay here in Chengtian Liangzhou Prefecture with my sister — become a pair of immortal lovebirds?"

Ah! It can go like this? Have I run into a bride-snatching? Is this the sacred place where the Sage Shaoming rose to power, or a den of bandits?

Chen Huzi waved both hands so fast they nearly blurred, and cried out repeatedly: "Such a grave matter — I beg to say I cannot agree!"

Uh, Chen Huzi had in fact already sensed the danger, which was why he refused so firmly.

But he made a mistake again — he should not have treated these northwestern girls with the same attitude he used toward Jiangnan women.

Had he spoken properly just now, and lowered his posture a bit more, Murong Yingniang would not have resorted to force.

But with him acting like this, the proud Murong Yingniang instantly lost face. She let out a sharp cry:

"Guards! Seize him and take him to Liangzhou! It doesn't matter if you refuse — I, your old man, agree!"

Look how angry she is — she's even started calling herself "old man."

Chen Huzi was immediately pinned down by the group of women. He did not dare resist with all his might — perhaps in his heart he felt there was no need to struggle desperately. What could a bunch of women do to a grown man like him?

But he still had to make a show of protest. His face flushed red, and he shouted toward the chief envoy of Qianyue, Pei Jian: "Assault! This is assault! Lord Pei, save me!"

In the chaos, the hundred-odd men of the Qianyue mission were shocked beyond words. They had come under orders, and Chen Huzi was a Commandant of the Guard Army — they could not let him be carried off by a pack of women!

Dozens of riders immediately surged forward, seemingly intending to help. But Murong Yingniang gave a whistle, and three of the women split off, dragging Chen Huzi away, while the remaining dozens of riders formed a battle line in an instant.

First they spurred their horses in a wide circle around the advancing Qianyue soldiers, kicking up a sky-filling cloud of dust so their enemies could not pinpoint the direction of their charge. Then they loosed arrows from their horse bows.

Though the arrows were blunted — wooden practice tips used for training — and the bows were only horse bows, the Qianyue soldiers were on the march and wore no armor!

They were immediately shot into shrieking chaos, and their already unformed ranks scattered even further.

The moment they fell into disorder, Murong Yingniang gave another whistle. The dozens of rose-cheeked riders instantly formed the boar's-head wedge formation for charging, then slammed into them like thunder.

In an instant, the Qianyue soldiers were pierced straight through, then beaten into utter, piss-streaming rout.

Pei Jian sat on his horse, staring dumbfounded as his mission's escort cavalry — the elite inner guard troops of Qianyue — were routed by a pack of women.

Though part of the reason was that the enemy were women, clearly of high courtly birth, and his men did not dare fight back freely, the women's cavalry skills in those few maneuvers were truly superb.

What if it had been the iron cavalry of the Zhou state? Pei Jian shuddered.

But fear aside, he could not allow the escort cavalry commander traveling with him to be abducted — and by women, no less. Pei Jian could only turn to a Director of the Ministry of Rites from the imperial court who was accompanying him.

The Director of Rites looked at Pei Jian, hesitated, but could only steel himself and walk toward the rose-cheeked riders, who had already routed the Qianyue soldiers and were now reforming their ranks.

But before he could get close, before he could even open his mouth, the bear-sized young woman pointed a cudgel at him and shouted: "I am the Sage's own niece, a daughter of the Li clan, granddaughter of the Great King of the Golden Kingdom! Who dares come forward!"

The Director immediately turned around and scurried back into the disordered Qianyue mission, smiling bitterly at Pei Jian. "Lady Murong is merely a bit willful and mischievous. Commandant Chen should be in no great danger."

Pei Jian could not help snorting twice in anger. A female general who could lead troops in a charge against men — and you call her merely willful and mischievous? Who would believe that?

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