Chapter 764: Supreme and Unrivaled

Liu Chengzong had originally intended to erect the stele right on the battlefield.

But unfortunately, the battlefield was too close to the Liaodong border wall, and everyone worried the stone stele wouldn't survive once they left.

Liu the Lion had even considered rigging the stele with something big, leaving behind some fierce warning like "Topple this stele and your kingdom falls."

But after thinking it over, it just wouldn't work.

Liu the Lion put himself in others' shoes — he figured if the rank-and-file soldiers of the Guanning Army knew there was a stele out there that could destroy the Daicing state just by pushing it over, the moment the Marshal's army left they'd smash it to smithereens.

In the end, they had no choice but to head back to the Xing'an Mountains first and carve the merit record into the stone on Green Mountain in the Songmo Prefecture.

"In the bingzi year of Chongzhen, Hong Taiji usurped the imperial title."

"The Later Jin took the northern route to attack the Ming, pressing on Guihua and raiding Xuan-Da."

"Chengzong raised the valiant cavalry of Guanxi, campaigned in Liaodong and burned their capital; the two armies met east of the mountains."

"The wind swept the dust aside — Chengzong's troops, clad in fine armor and mounted on sturdy steeds, their cannon thunderous and arrows thick as hedgehog spines, their cavalry squadrons charged and pierced the formations, routing first the Blue Banner then the White Banner, every man a match for a hundred."

"Hong Taiji, caught off guard, sounded the conch to rally his lines, driving his horde in successive camps to fight scale upon scale; the front ranks died and the rear pressed on, corpses piled against each other across the Gobi. Chengzong's nine formations stood unshaken."

"From the hour of the Sheep to the hour of the Rooster, they clashed dozens of times. The caitiffs' strength could not hold. Hong Taiji blew the horn to flee, but Chengzong swiftly loosed the Guanxi troops to charge into their ranks; none who met their blades remained standing."

"The caitiff host scattered in rout, dragging banners and abandoning standards. Chengzong pursued into the night until the battlefield lay empty. He took eighteen thousand heads, from titled princes down, corpses strewn for thirty li, the sands stained utterly red."

"Chengzong then withdrew his forces and ascended the Xing'an Mountains, sealing the mountain and carving the stone — above, to vent the long-nursed fury of Sarhū; below, to wash clean the old shame of the jisi year — declaring to all that our Zhongguo has men of might, glorifying the heroic dead, and proclaiming the nation's power."

……

When Qian Shisheng finished writing the stele inscription, he was utterly disgusted with Zhang Xianzhong.

Because strictly speaking, this inscription was something he and Zhang Xianzhong had written together.

He had first written a draft — that one was an epigraph, and Qian Shisheng was exceptionally pleased with it, certain it would secure his name in the annals of history.

But Liu Chengzong absolutely insisted it wouldn't do, saying his wording was too obscure.

The absurd part was that Liu Chengzong later actually summoned Zhang Xianzhong, pointed at the chief civil official of the Marshal's headquarters, and said, "Grand Secretary, write me something he can understand."

Zhang Xianzhong, face set grim, snatched up Qian Shisheng's epigraph and started reading.

In his heart he thought: Don't think just because you're the Grand Marshal I won't dare beat you up — you're underestimating the cultural level of my Ministry of Rites!

And then… the Marshal really knew how to read people!

Zhang Xianzhong, with a brazen face, asked Qian Shisheng, "Master Qian, this 'desolation stretching ten thousand li' — what does 'desolation' mean?"

He even gestured with his hands, thinking it meant cutting musical instruments into strips and laying them out for ten thousand li.

Liu Chengzong spread his hands and pursed his lips, pointed at the epigraph, and said to Qian Shisheng, "Write it again."

Qian Shisheng despaired at the illiteracy of the Marshal's headquarters. He could only nod in assent, though he did not look down on Zhang Xianzhong for it, and still earnestly explained, "'Desolation' means wherever Minister Zhang passes through."

And so the two ministers sat there studying it, fussing over it an entire night without producing anything.

The gap between their cultural levels was about one thousand five hundred Zuo Liangyus wide. Qian Shisheng felt like he was literally teaching Zhang Xianzhong how to read.

In the end, word by word and sentence by sentence, they simply let Zhang Xianzhong write it and had Qian Shisheng revise it, and at last they had a mountain-sealing inscription that Liu Chengzong could nod at.

Qian Shisheng was even deeply reluctant to sign his name. If the first draft would have immortalized his name in history, then this one would stink for ten thousand years — the prestige of the Ming dynasty's eighty zhuangyuan would all be dragged down by this… this thing he had written.

Because what they ended up with read like a novel, not an epigraph.

But that was exactly what Liu Chengzong wanted.

If it were merely for sealing the mountain and carving the stone, meant for Heaven and future generations to read, then the more ornate the better.

But he wanted it printed and circulated, smuggled past the border — what he was proclaiming was not the Ming dynasty's national might, but his own, Liu Chengzong's, might.

The very first copies had to go to the rank-and-file soldiers at the border passes. If even Zhang Xianzhong couldn't understand it, then this epigraph of his would have been written for nothing.

In truth, Liu the Lion felt this demand was hardly unreasonable.

After all, he hadn't forced Old Master Qian to write something Zuo Liangyu could understand.

Minister Zhang, ever since following Liu Chengzong, had made astonishing progress in his education — he could now even write out the Thousand Character Classic.

Zuo Liangyu was the true cultural low point of the Marshal's headquarters, a genuine, bona fide illiterate; when he picked up a brush to write his own name, he drew it.

General Zuo's cultural level was even lower than that of the fake Tatars he had brought back from Hetu Ala.

After the battle ended, while they were still on the battlefield processing the spoils, Zuo Liangyu and Feng Rang had circled back from Hetu Ala, and had even swept up six understrength niru from Li Yangeng's command.

By rights it should have been eighteen hundred households, but because many had died in the internal strife during the rebellion, only a little over eleven hundred households had followed Li Yangeng in surrendering — most of them descendants of Liaodong soldiers.

Li Yangeng had grown up in the Later Jin era, and his cultural level was far higher than Zuo Liangyu's. In terms of talent, he was Liu Chengzong's second-greatest gain from this eastern campaign, right after Dudu.

Though barely past thirty, he was the Han shangshu of the Daicing Ministry of Personnel — over there they didn't call it shangshu, but chengzheng.

Zuo Liangyu felt he'd been too slow getting back and had missed this great battle that would make Liu Chengzong's name shake the world, but Liu Chengzong thought his timing was perfect.

Perfect, because he hadn't yet assigned all the Daicing troops to Dudu.

Liu Chengzong did not despise Li Yangeng just because his father, Li Yongfang, had been the first to surrender to the eastern caitiffs. After all, the man was already dead — whatever contempt Li Yongfang deserved was Li Yongfang's own affair.

The fire Li Yangeng had set in Hetu Ala was more than enough to burn away the shame upon himself.

Besides, Li Yangeng was the first Daicing officer to voluntarily defect to him — Dudu had only surrendered after being captured.

Liu Chengzong simply took the banner of the Bordered Yellow Banner, dyed it black as well, and formed two Black Banners, both standard battalions of about two thousand men each. The remaining four thousand-odd Han and Mongol captives were distributed among the other battalions to replenish their losses.

Dudu and Li Yangeng got along very well. When they met, one was shouting "Dudu! Dudu!" and the other "Ingge! Ingge!" — old acquaintances meeting far from home, they were soon deep in conversation.

Liu Chengzong did not restrict their association either.

Li Yangeng had defected from the Daicing on his own and set Hetu Ala ablaze — in the parlance of the Jin state, his "Chengzong quotient" was already no less than Zhang Xianzhong's.

And Dudu was the old Khan's eldest grandson; even if you let him go, he'd cling on and refuse to leave.

These two might not have much loyalty, but they were both men with nowhere else to turn.

There was little chance of them rebelling.

But what Liu the Lion never anticipated was that the way the Marshal's headquarters' bright future was demonstrated would prove far too brutal for Dudu.

The very night the army relocated to the city of Songmo Prefecture in the Xing'an Mountains, Li Yangeng scared Dudu and the Black Banner out of their wits.

A camp panic — they fought their own men.

The reason was that Li Yangeng had worn only bright armor of the Jin army his whole life and had never worn the dark armor of the Ming army.

At that time, Qian Shisheng's inscription had not yet been finished, and he was studying it all night with Zhang Xianzhong. The roads in the Songmo Prefecture were also narrow, so the main army had to be stationed for several days, and the Black Banner Battalion was responsible for digging trenches outside the city of Songmo Prefecture.

The city wall there was nearly tamped solid, but it still needed a great deal of earthwork to reshape the outer terrain for easier artillery fire.

Both men had their own troops and trusted deputy generals to assist them, so they were relatively idle.

Li Yangeng, with time on his hands, sought out Liu Chengzong and requested that he be granted a Ming dynasty hair scarf and a cloth-faced iron armor of a Marshal's Headquarters officer.

Such a small request, Liu the Lion was certain to grant. He not only gave him the iron armor but also presented his own saber, as a gesture of closeness to the first man to surrender.

He had plenty of blades himself. When going to war, two warhorses, four sabers, and four bows were all essential equipment. Giving one away still left him with three, not to mention that in this battle with Daiching, he had acquired over twenty fine sabers alone.

Li Yangeng was overjoyed. Dressed in full armor, wearing the second-hand hair scarf, and bearing the goose-quill saber at his waist, he went that very night to reminisce with Dudu.

Although the two participating generals did not need to be guarded against, the captives, after all, did. Therefore, the two Black Banners were in one encampment, surrounded by the Marshal's Army camp, making it convenient to monitor and manage them.

The two men inquired of each other about the course of the battles on the three battlefields of the Laoha River, outside Shengjing City, and at Hetu Ala, and asked each other whether old friends had died in the line of battle, and how they had died.

They wept and laughed by turns, talking through the night.

Perhaps it was from excessive fatigue, and from fright and fear.

Chatting until midnight, Dudu went out to call for someone to refill the oil lamp. Returning to the tent with the lamp, he suddenly forgot what he was doing. Lifting the tent curtain, he did not recognize Li Yangeng.

The lamplight flickered. As the light fell into the dark tent, he saw only a Marshal's Army officer wearing a saber at his waist and red armor, with a face entirely unfamiliar. Frightened, he let out a yelp and shouted the word "enemy raid" in Jurchen.

Of the six thousand men in these two Black Banner battalions, four thousand eight hundred were in a worse mental state than he was, and every single one of them was in a more exhausted physical state than he was.

With that one shout from Dudu, the entire camp exploded. The Black Banner soldiers in their sleep dreamed they were back on the battlefield of slaughter, waking in terror and grabbing whatever was at hand to fight each other.

It was only because Liu Chengzong had not issued weapons and armor to the Black Banner Battalion, and they had only three-eyed arquebuses for labor within the camp, that anyone was left in the two battalions by daybreak.

Even so, Li Yangeng had kicked Dudu over, drawn his saber, and charged out of the camp.

At this moment, Liu Chengzong, who had pitched his tent within the city of Songmo Prefecture, was also startled awake by the wailing of the Black Banner soldiers. He ascended the city wall, and looking down from his vantage point at the Black Banner encampment, knew at once it was a camp panic.

Although Liu Chengzong had never experienced a camp panic himself, he had heard of it four or five times. This sort of thing had been quite common in their Shaanxi region over the years.

Especially when he was attacking others. For instance, Tang Jiuzhou had ultimately experienced a camp panic at Liupan Mountain, and when Ren Quan'er pursued Zhang Yingchang to Binzhou, the patrol reports also said Zhang Yingchang had a camp panic in Binzhou city.

Liu Chengzong even always believed that Wei Qian'er's great camp charging toward Tong Pass was also a kind of lucid camp panic.

When a group's bodies are overly exhausted and their mental stress is too great, their minds lose the ability to think. Under immense fear, they are prone to blind conformity, so that one person's bizarre action can trigger the entire camp to act blindly in unison.

Not to mention that among them are some barely lucid people who seize the opportunity to do what they usually wish to do but dare not.

That is a camp panic.

Liu Chengzong had no good solution for this kind of thing. By instinct, he ordered Liu Tichun to lead the Feathered Forest Battalion forward to control the Black Banners.

But halfway through giving the order, he suddenly realized the language barrier. He turned and ordered Wu Sihu to lead the Northern Yuan Battalion to surround the Black Banner encampment, and separately dispatched Sun Long to lead the Liaoyang Battalion into the Black Banner camp, to have the Black Banners first lay down their weapons and then exit the camp to form ranks.

Sun Long and the soldiers of his Liaoyang Battalion, through their battles against Hong Taiji, had established preliminary trust within the Marshal's Army. The spoils they had taken on the battlefield, Liu Chengzong had not reclaimed; armor, bows, and sabers were all left to them.

Even the fleeing Respectful and Obedient Prince, Kong Youde, after being captured and surrendering, was given the position of Brigade Commander by Liu Chengzong and assigned to Sun Long's battalion.

Originally, they might also have captured the Cherished and Obedient Prince, Geng Zhongming.

A scout soldier named Guo Jiayin from the Scout Cavalry Battalion reported that during the charge, there was a great general on the Han army's formation carrying a parasol canopy. Seeing him approach, the general did not flee but seemed ready to spur his horse and fight. In the end, however, he panicked and was stabbed in the abdomen by a single spear thrust from Guo Jiayin; the iron armor was certainly pierced.

But the man had personal guards. Two riders pounced to engage in close combat. By the time Guo Jiayin drew his saber and cut those two from their horses, that great general was already clutching his stomach and had fled on horseback.

According to the captives, that was the Cherished and Obedient Prince's army formation, and Geng Zhongming had indeed been stabbed.

Afterward, Liu Chengzong had Dudu inspect the corpses and captives, but he was not found. Geng Zhongming must have fled.

But for Liu the Lion, there was nothing regrettable about this. The two campaigns at Liaoyang and beyond the border had thoroughly annihilated the Heaven Blessed Army, and half of Shang Kexi's Heaven Assisted Army had also been captured.

As for the man Geng Zhongming, compared to the Heaven Blessed Army, he was rather unimportant.

Kong Youde still had some skill. Leading troops into the camp, he shouted his own name and quickly gathered a large group of soldiers from the two Black Banners.

By this time, Dudu had also come to his senses, and Li Yangeng was no longer afraid. They entered the camp together to help stabilize the situation.

Because of the lack of weapons and proper handling, the chaotic camp panic did not kill many people, but it did injure a great many, and it also soured Liu the Lion's mood.

Afterward, he summoned Li Yangeng and Dudu to understand the situation. Liu Chengzong did not reprimand Dudu harshly, but merely had him follow the Tiger Guard Battalion for now. The two Black Banners would be temporarily led by Li Yangeng until they returned to Shaanxi.

Dudu would be dealt with once they returned to Shaanxi.

This fellow's spirit was already on the verge of collapse. He needed to recuperate in a good environment like the Tiger Guard Battalion. To flog him with military law now, Liu Chengzong feared, would drive him mad.

This camp panic also made Liu Chengzong see that the Black Banner soldiers understood the situation. Now, they did not take Dudu very seriously, but instead placed great trust in Li Yangeng.

In this regard, Li Yangeng was even stronger than Kong Youde.

Kong Youde merely held a hollow princely title and was not respected within the Eight Banners. But Li Yangeng was different. He had been by the Old Khan's side since childhood and had grown up with many Eight Banners nobles. He was a Han man among the Eight Banners nobility.

It was quelling this camp panic that made Liu Chengzong realize he had to get rid of those severed heads quickly. The psychological shadow his army had cast upon the Eight Banners in this campaign was too great, especially for these captives and surrendered soldiers; many had been scared out of their wits.

But those heads were rather troublesome to deal with. To throw them away would be a pity, yet keeping them was useless.

Originally, Liu Chengzong had wanted to leave the heads on the battlefield and inform the Ming army so they could come out and collect them themselves.

But on second thought, rather than letting them come out and collect them, allowing the officers to reap the benefits, it would be better to send his own men, along with the printed inscriptions, to deliver them directly to the common soldiers.

Not only would he deliver the heads, but when Qian Shisheng returned to the capital, he would also have the over seven hundred heads of nobles and officers in the army sent directly into the capital as a show of force.

Delivering them directly into the hands of the border troops would use these heads to flaunt his own might, while also giving the border troops around Beijing a bit of benefit, lowering the difficulty of capturing the capital in the future, and perhaps even winning a wave of popular support.

The metropolitan region, after all, had been attacked twice.

But the moment Qian Shisheng learned of this plan, he hurriedly stopped him: "Great Commander, the court has no reward money for over ten thousand heads! Besides, these barbarian heads were not taken by the border troops. This is against the rules!"

"Master Qian, what a joke you tell. The hereditary military nobles of the Great Ming, the heads they use for promotion."

Liu Chengzong asked expressionlessly, "Could it be that they were all taken by their own hands? I don't care whether the court has money or not. If the court has money, this reward money must be issued to the soldiers. If the court has no money, then the Emperor must go beg or borrow, but this reward money must still be issued to the soldiers."

"This..."

Qian Shisheng felt bitterness in his heart. This Liu Chengzong, he did not even know how to describe him.

After the battle in the north, though he held the status of a rebel leader, he had fought under the Chongzhen reign title in the inscription, and even resoundingly declared that there was only one Emperor under Heaven.

He even felt that Liu Chengzong could be called the foremost hero under Heaven in the Great Ming!

Yet at this moment, the great hero had just dealt with Chongde, and now turned around to deal with Chongzhen.

Liu Chengzong did not believe there was any problem whatsoever with his own ideology.

He was a staunch supporter of imperial rule; anyone who dared proclaim themselves emperor would never gain his recognition and would be seen as a provocation and a declaration of war against him — he would fight until they abdicated.

Even if that emperor was someone he himself had installed, he would still be uncomfortable.

Because he wanted to contend for the throne, so of course he had to defend the throne's supreme sanctity!

"The court must bestow rewards, Qian Gelao, understand? I came precisely to make the court spend money. It must reward."

Liu Chengzong said to Qian Shisheng with great firmness: "Because if His Majesty does not reward, I will."

"But — but you have no silver left either!" Qian Shisheng, hearing this, could not help but breathe a sigh of relief, and even laughed once: "This is an enormous sum of money. Your silver has all gone to the soldiers too."

Lion Liu could not help but clap: "The Gelao speaks truly. I indeed have no silver left in hand, but I still have three thousand seven hundred gold bars."

"If the Chongzhen Emperor rewards the border troops, then even if I also bestow fifty taels, I could not contend for this heaven-sent merit. He is the sole emperor under heaven; Chengzong is but a man of modest means, not worth mentioning."

"But if the Chongzhen Emperor does not reward, then half a month later, when the soldiers are seething with rage, I need only offer five taels of silver per head. Perhaps I won't even need to touch the gold bars — my own troops will be happy to put up five taels to recruit a chestful of fury from the Ji Garrison soldiers."

Liu Chengzong laughed: "When that time comes, Jizhou's gates will open, the Ji Garrison troops will be able to escort me, the people of the capital region will be able to welcome me — do you believe we'll fight our way to the walls of Beijing?"

?? Good evening!

? (End of chapter)