4 The Simple View of Right & Wrong of the Tang (1/2)
Though they discussed it privately in the military camp at midnight and in such an open empire, Ma Shixiang couldn't help becoming anxious when hearing 'stupid princess.'
He was so nervous and cautious with every action when the noble princess arrived in the City of Wei, and he never thought that Ning Que would have such a harsh and unreasonable comment about her, which made Ma Shixiang so displeased.
Nobody would deem the princess as an idiot. Instead, they respected her as their highness with virtue.
As a great country with a strong military force, the Tang would never adopt humiliating political measures like political marriages, no matter if the enemy was from the Tribe of Savages or other countries in the Central Plains. Nothing like that had ever occurred after the several marriages of the most loyal generals of the Tribe of Savages who served Taizu, the founder of theTang Dynasty, with royal women.
However, when the sovereignty of the grassland started to be unstable three years ago, along with an invasion of the largest golden tribe to the Tang's secret incite to enemies, the youngest princess of Tang, at the budding age of thirteen, kneeled in front of the Ming Palace and kowtowed for days and requested to marry the Chanyu of Golden Tribe in exchange for peace in the whole country.
The entire Tang was shocked when the announcement of this marriage of peace was issued. With bitter hatred, old officials kept requesting for the emperor to cancel the marriage. The emperor smashed countless jade cups angrily, and the queen left nothing but loads of complicated emotions. However, none of that could stop the princess's determination. Chanyu felt so astonished after knowing all of those things and quite liked her true identity, and then ordered five thousand lambs and cows as a tribute to the empire to marry the princess. In the end, the Tang emperor agreed with the peace marriage reluctantly.
The couple cared for and respected each other in their marriage. The ambitious leader of the Tribe of Savages had become a calm lion in the grassland, defending his territory and keeping distance with the closest inch of the Tang.
However, beyond everyone's expectation, the young Chanyu died without any warning, and his younger brother succeeded the position against objection. All of this just made the political situations tense again.
Regardless, for quite a long time, four to five years, since the young princess decided to marry Chanyu, the northwestern border of the Tang was in a precious peaceful situation.
There was a rumor saying that the most likely reason why the princess insisted on marrying far away was to get out of the Queen's control. However even if that was true, what the princess did, in the perception of major military and court officials, was the wise and right thing to do—she could have chosen an easier way, but in the end, she walked on the roughest path.
But to the generals who had experienced countless wars, like Ma Shixiang, they would never have felt afraid of any war and those barbarians. That's why the princess's marriage of peace made them extremely shamed—However, no one would reject the gift of peace.
In this case, they developed complicated feelings about the princess, not only an unreasonable anger but also gratitude. As time went on, such mixed feelings had turned to respect from deep inside.
Being an ordinary soldier, Ning Que could hardly understand such complicated feelings. Even if he could, he would not care to, because there was nothing that could be more important than his own safety, and what he was striving for currently was exactly related to that. Therefore, he continued with pretending that he didn't notice the general's concern. ”I have roughly estimated the number of arrow holes on the horse carriages. The new Chanyu was pretty tough to deal with; half of the guard might already have been killed so far.
”It's said there was a Horse Gang.” Ma Shixiang seemed a bit unconfident in what he was saying. The truth was that he did not believe what he said.
”Even the Golden Chanyu wouldn't attack our Tang princess brazenly, so it must be a horse gang, but everyone knows what the face is like under the mask.” Ning Que continued. ”But the thing is, if the Horse Gang indeed was Chanyu's people, why was that barbarian so bold to defend? They seemed fearless of being eliminated by the Tang, which sounds so unreasonable.”
The Tang was established with the foundation of military force. The culture here is simple while aggressive, being known as the most powerful country in the world. Nevertheless, even with such strength, it would still exhaust half of its strength to destroy the Golden Tribe of Savages on the grassland.