Chapter 101: Rich

    “Because the monarch of the Royal Court is Buddha’s son, so I dare to make such an arrangement.”

    Yaoying smiled and said softly.

    She painted a pretty picture for Tumoroga. Whether or not she could deliver, no one could say.

    Would Gaochang agree to the alliance? Would they be able to send a message back to the Central Plains without any problems? Across thousands of miles of mountains and rivers, when the message reached the Central Plains, would something go wrong?

    All these were uncertain.

    But as long as they took one more step forward, they would have one more bit of hope.

    If the Royal Court was still under the control of Kang Mozhe and the other noble ministers, Yaoying would never have proposed an alliance with the Royal Court. Because people like Kang Mozhe, who only cared about their family’s interests, would not care about the Central Plains empire, which was 8,000 miles away. Her proposal would not be taken seriously and would only be met with ridicule.

    And if she allied with Kang Mozhe, she would have to be wary of being taken advantage of by the other party.

    Tumoroga was different. He had the lives of the people of the Royal Court at heart, his vision was long-term, his eyes were wide open. As smart as he was, he certainly understood how little hope there was, but he was willing to give it a try—one more ally was one less enemy. He did not know how long he could last and needed more allies.

    So, Yaoying did not need to spout flowery words and did not have to make any promises.

    No matter what the final outcome, Tumoroga would not make things difficult for her, even if he had no intention of allying with the Central Plains.

    Yaoying was sure of this.

    The man in front of her made her feel at ease. After wandering through the Western Regions for half a year, she was on edge every day. Only after coming to the Royal Court was she able, at last, to sleep peacefully and not wake every night from nightmares.

    He had a pair of deep eyes that seemed to see through everything. When facing him, she did not have to conceal, did not have to calculate, only needing to say what was in her heart.

    Yaoying then said: “The highest form of military strategy is to thwart the enemy’s plans; next best is to sever enemy force’s communication; next in order is to attack the enemy army in battle; the worst policy of all is to besiege walled cities. To frustrate the enemy with one’s own strategy, to make the enemy’s army yield without fighting1. To value lives above all else, Buddha’s son is compassionate and must agree with this.”

     A fifteen-year-old girl at precisely the age of youthfulness and vitality. Her dark hair, the red silk ribbon draped against her white-as-snow tender neck. The soft flesh like snow, countenance like a hibiscus flower2, so gorgeous that the whole inner hall brightened a few points.

    As written in the poems, easterlies of the night call to bloom blossoms of a thousand trees3.

    The sunlight reflecting off all four white walls of the temple faintly flickered. The long table in front of the golden sunshine brimmed, with a volume of spread scriptures atop it, its pages yellowed.

    Tumoroga’s eyes fell on the scriptures.

    “After the Xingxiang puja, Ashina Bisha will escort the princess to Gaochang.”

    Yaoying’s face overflowed with a brilliant smile: he was agreeing to it!

    “This matter must not be spread to outsiders, wronging Princess Wenzhao.”

    Yaoying nodded: “Venerable need not worry, I know propriety. This agreement is only between you and me.”

    She exhaled a breath and smiled.

    “I am far away from the Central Plains, with no soldiers or generals around me, so I am grateful that Venerable is willing to trust me. How can I talk about being wronged? If I can return to the Central Plains, I will certainly try to facilitate an alliance.”

    Tumoroga’s fingertips brushed the scripture scroll. After a moment of silence, he said, “Princess need not be humble.”

    This courage and keen eye of hers was deserving of his trust.

    When he was thirteen years old, he led a mere few thousand Central Army soldiers to fight against the infallible and unbeaten Northern Rong. He, at the time, also had no chance of success. However, he was the ultimate winner.

    Tumoroga’s hand lifted to cover a cough, a weary look appearing on his face.

    Yaoying’s eyes circled his face for a moment and asked softly, “Does Venerable have palpitations or fevers these days, or night sweats when sleeping?”

    Tumoroga raised his eyes to look at her.

    Yaoying had a worried expression and looked closely at his face, the concern in her words overwhelming: “Water anise carries poison and should not be taken for a long period of time. Venerable must tell Mondatipa if you feel unwell.”

    Tumoroga responded without emotion.

    Remembering that he had not yet recovered from his serious illness, Yaoying got up and said goodbye: “Venerable still has to prepare for the scripture debating meeting. I will not disturb Venerable’s meditation.”

    There was no sound behind her, and before she crossed the threshold, she glanced back to see Tumoroga looking down at the scriptures on the table, his lean and slim silhouette outlined in the setting golden sunlight.

    Yaoying returned to the courtyard where she lived. Taking out the dowry booklet, she asked her personal soldiers to find all the Buddhist scriptures and records and send them to the Buddhist temple.

    “The Buddhist sutras in the Central Plains are slightly different from those circulating in the Western Regions. Venerable and the monks in the temple will be debating scriptures with monks from various countries in the near future, and these scriptures may come in handy.”

    In addition to the scriptures, she also instructed her soldiers to send all the large and small gold and jade statues to the Buddhist temple. As the entire Royal Court was preparing for the Xingxiang Festival, these Buddhist statues she had had no personal usefulness. It would be better to give them away.

    As the Royal Court practiced Buddhism, large and small Buddhist temples and stone pagodas could be seen everywhere in the city. The Buddhist statues Yaoying sent out were not extraordinary, but those Chinese Buddhist scriptures soon attracted the attention of the monks in the temple. They competed to read some of the Sanskrit manuscripts and debated the meaning of the scriptures in the books.

    When Banruo learned of this, he paled in fright and hurried to find the Buddhist temple master.

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I’ve said this before, but this dear author has quite a love and appreciation for old texts that I don’t exactly share. I had quite the headache (figuratively) translating this part, so it’s on the shorter side.

1 All these lines are from Sun Tzu’s ‘The Art of War’. I’ve referenced several sources to translate these lines to the best of my ability and did my utmost to have them retain their poetic rhythm. The first sentence’s meaning is like this: the best strategy in fighting a war is firstly by ruining their military plans, secondly by ruining their alliances, then by actual warfare, and lastly by laying siege on a city. Basically, reducing casualties. The second sentence is more comprehensible: fight a war in a way that saves the most lives.

2 舜华: From the ‘Book of Song’, a poem describing a beautiful girl with flushed cheeks and a pale face, resembling a Chinese hibiscus.

3 From the poem ‘Green Jadeite Pedestal, I had translated this but found a prettier translation from this site. Many thanks to them! The translation is essentially describing the beautiful view of lanterns during the lantern festival.