Chapter 10: There Shouldn’t Be a Buddha Part Two

These soldiers were great at battling on horses, but sieging cities was a nightmare for them. After getting complacent for many years, they already forgot that their ancestors used to be unrivaled in the territory that Great Sui had claimed.

Six days. The battle lasted six days, and Mandu Lang retreated with more than 4,000 corpses outside Fangu City. Every time he recalled this battle, Mandu Lang would hammer his chest and curse toward the direction of Fangu. They had to retreat since Left Reverent Guard finally arrived.

This battle made Fangu into a famous city in the world.

This battle told others how indestructible the cities of Great Sui were.

This battle made Great General Li Luan of Left Reverent Guard famous for a simple reason. The reinforcements that came to Fangu were only Li Luan and the 900 cavalrymen who were his guards. With only 900 cavalrymen and thousands of flags, Li Luan scared the tens of thousands of enemies and forced them to the other side of Wolf Breast Mountain Range.

Left Reverent Guard was mostly comprised of heavy infantrymen, so they couldn’t arrive on time. Li Luan had no other way, so he had to act as if he had tens of thousands of soldiers with him. Left Reverent Guard had 50,000 soldiers, but they only had 900 cavalrymen. It went to show how much Great Sui lacked warhorses.

After that battle, Emperor Yang Yun who was managing Great Sui at the time promoted all the soldiers in Fangu to captains, and they were each rewarded with about five acres of land and didn’t need to pay taxes. Also, the residents of Fangu didn’t need to pay taxes for ten years, and the Ministry of Revenue issued 50,000 taels of silver to improve the residential buildings in the city.

Great General Li Luan of Left Reverent Guard’s noble ranking went from the Duke of State to the Duke of Feudal State.

[TL Note: Here is the noble ranking of Great Sui: Royal King, King of State, Duke of Feudal State, Duke of State, Marquis of State, Marquis of County, Marquis of Town, Count of County, Count of Town, Viscount of County, Viscount of Town, and Baron of Town.]

In the battle, there was a young man beside Li Luan. Even though he knew that he would die if the tens of thousands of elite cavalrymen of Mongo-Yuan surrounded them, he didn’t escape despite the fact that he was less than 20 years old. This young man was Li Luan’s elder son, and he inherited Li Luan’s noble ranking as the Duke of Feudal State Tang. He was also the current great general of Right Valiant Guard, and his name was Li Yuanshan.

Although Right Valiant Guard was stationed inside the Jibei State, it wasn’t in Jibei City which was the capital of the state.

The 50,000 elite soldiers of Right Valiant Guard were stationed on the Sleeping Immortal Mountain about 30 kilometers outside Jibei City.

…

“Duke of Tang, you are too kind. It is my first-time doing things outside the Capital, and I hope you will pardon my unintentional rudeness. If the people below didn’t anger His Majesty, the high-level officials from the Court of Judicial Review and the Ministry of War wouldn’t come out of Chang’an to investigate this issue. On the way, I noticed that the brothers on the border work hard, so I’m only doing this to follow the procedures. Duke of Tang, don’t worry.” The person speaking was an eunuch who was wearing a light-blue rank 6 official uniform. He was about 35 years old, and he had a layer of white powder on his face. His lips were somehow painted bright, and it looked strange.

Although this eunuch was only a rank 6 official, the eunuchs who had official ranks were liked by the emperor.

Different from ordinary official uniforms, the official uniforms of eunuch were blue. The darker the blue, the higher the rank. Also, there weren’t embroidery on the chest, and they couldn’t wear hats that ridges on them.