Upon entering the city, Zhang Liang was slightly surprised. He had previously scoffed at the idea that the Kingdom of Mopi was quite wealthy, but now he saw that it was indeed quite prosperous.

However, the only difference is that the gap between the rich and the poor is too large; the rich wear silk while the poor are barely clothed.

Clearly, all of this is based on the hard work and dedication of those Shudras.

Zhang Liang had already made up his mind about this. The foundation of the Taiping Sect's development lay in winning over the poor. As long as these large numbers of poor people followed the Taiping Sect, there would be no problem in getting the Brahman sect.

In Zhang Liang's eyes, although the doctrines of Brahmanism and Buddhism were different, they both abhorred him.

The doctrine of the Taiping Religion teaches people to respect heaven and earth and to be self-reliant in order to repay the grace of heaven and earth. However, the Brahmanism, like the Buddhist religion, teaches people to be docile, patient, and willing to be slaves. In essence, it is in natural opposition to the Taiping Religion.

As Zhang Liang was figuring out how to spread the word here, the group arrived at the royal palace of the Kingdom of Mopi.

Seemingly influenced by the north, the architectural style of the Maha Vijaya palace is closer to that of the Western Regions, featuring mostly domed buildings.

When Zhang Liang arrived at the palace gate, the king of Mopi personally came out to greet him.

Although King Maha had never been in contact with the Han army, he had heard of their strength and that religions in the Han Dynasty served the court, unlike his own country where a king had to serve religions.

Moreover, in the present-day Mabi Kingdom, nearly 80% of the Kshatriyas are Brahmans, and their respective kings are practically nothing more than puppets.

The military generals in the country naturally didn't take him seriously.

Therefore, for King Mabi, if the Han Dynasty had no ambitions for his country, it could be used as an external ally to consolidate his royal power.

"Welcome, distinguished guest!" King Mabi said with a smile.

The Mopi official who was following Zhang Liang also began to translate.

Upon learning that the middle-aged man with deep-set eyes and fair skin before him was King Mobi, Zhang Liang returned the greeting with a polite expression, but inwardly he was rapidly calculating his options.

For Zhang Liang, the fact that the ruler of a country would personally come to greet him at the palace must have meant that, apart from respect for the prestige of the Han Dynasty, there were other motives at play.

However, this is actually a good thing; the real fear is that the other party won't want anything at all.

Then, Zhang Liang followed King Mobi discreetly into the palace.

After exchanging greetings, Zhang Liang began to speak with King Mobi according to the pre-arranged script.

As the interpreter relayed the information, King Mobi nodded repeatedly.

Through Zhang Liang's account, King Mobi also learned that the Han Dynasty had dispatched so many fleets to safeguard maritime navigation with Rome, serving as both escorts and scavengers to eliminate bandits in the surrounding area.

However, King Maha also gleaned a rather veiled meaning from Zhang Liang's words: this fleet was extremely powerful, powerful enough to sweep across all the countries of South India.

King Mobi, however, was somewhat skeptical of this. He knew nothing about military affairs, and his understanding of strength was limited to the number of people. Naturally, he did not believe that a mere 20,000 men could sweep across so many countries, including Mobi.

Seeing the expression on King Mobi's face, Zhang Liang felt it was necessary to show him the might of the Han army.

"Your Majesty, I have a suggestion. In order to deepen the exchanges between our two countries, how about we hold a contest between warriors?"

"Of course!"

Upon hearing Zhang Liang's suggestion, King Mobi agreed.

Then, the group arrived at a square, where a Han soldier and a Sindhu warrior stood facing each other in the center of the square.

The Indian warrior drew a long sword from his waist and gestured for the Han soldiers to follow.

The Han soldiers immediately drew their long swords and held them horizontally in front of them.

"Wootz steel?"

The Sindhu warrior was taken aback when he saw the patterns on the longswords in the hands of the Han soldiers.

Wootz steel, produced in South India, later became known as Damascus steel. Swords made from it are very sharp and have patterns.

Of course, although this is the production area, the output is scarce, and only a few of the king's personal guards can be equipped with weapons made of Wootz steel.

Therefore, upon seeing the long swords in the hands of the Han soldiers, the Sindhu warrior was somewhat incredulous.

However, what he didn't know was that what he considered top-grade Wootz steel was merely a relatively high-grade refined steel in the Great Han Ironworks.

Furthermore, with the continuous advancement of Han Dynasty industry, the quality of swords and blades far surpasses that of the Wootz steel used here.

Then, at King Mabi's command, warriors from both sides charged at each other with their weapons.

For a moment, the sound of metal clashing rang out.

Because it was a friendly sparring match, in order not to hurt the other person, the two sides had almost no skills or movements, and it was mostly just a clash of weapons.

After all, the quality of weapons is also a standard for measuring a country's strength.

The soldiers exchanged blows for no more than four rounds when a crisp "clang" rang out, and to everyone's astonishment, the long sword in the Indian soldier's hand snapped in two.

"This...how is this possible? This knife...?"

King Mobi was greatly surprised to see this.

The long sword in the hands of his personal guard was forged by the best blacksmith in the country of Mopi, and there are no more than three hundred of them in the entire country.

Such a fine weapon was broken in just a few blows, which King Mobi could hardly believe.

Seeing the incredulous look on King Mobi's face, Zhang Liang smiled and said, "Your Majesty, this is just a standard weapon commonly used by our soldiers, one for each of them!"

"Wh...what? Everyone has one of these rare and excellent knives?"

Upon hearing Zhang Liang's words, King Mobi exclaimed in surprise. He simply couldn't believe that any country in the world would equip its ordinary soldiers with such top-tier swords.

"Of course, this kind of knife is very common in our area, even ordinary people have them. If Your Majesty likes them, I can arrange to give you a thousand!"

Zhang Liang said with a smile, his words were somewhat exaggerated, but they were about right.

With the continuous advancement of iron smelting technology, wrought iron, which was extremely precious in the Han Dynasty, has now become quite common. Although the swords used by ordinary people are not as good as the weapons used by the army, they are not far off.

Seeing Zhang Liang's calm expression, King Mobi couldn't help but choose to believe him.