After escaping danger, the foreign merchants left with their goods. Before leaving, they presented gifts of thanks and asked the Buddhist disciples to accept them.
Several monks came forward to politely decline the offerings from the Hu merchant, consoled him with gentle words, and even performed a ritual for the dead merchant in the name of Tanmaragha.
The merchants were filled with gratitude.
Yao Ying and his personal soldiers were temporarily placed in the royal court's central army.
The Northern Rong people and other tribes she saw in the Western Regions all wore their hair loose and wore their clothes with the left side of their clothes on. Most of the royal cavalry also wore their hair loose and braided, but their clothing was different from that of the Northern Rong people.
The cavalry in the central army wore blue shirts, light armor, white robes, long swords, and curved bows. The white robes were embroidered with intricate patterns, and each of them had a personal servant who ran errands and did odd jobs for them.
Unlike the fierce and warlike Northern Rong soldiers, they seemed to be quite knowledgeable about etiquette. Although they hated Yao Ying for blaspheming their Buddhist disciples in public and glared at her when they saw her, they did not insult her to her face.
However, the attitude of Tanmarajya's two personal soldiers towards Yaoying was much worse. They had her horse taken away and ordered her to travel with the lowest-ranking slaves.
The most important point: she is not allowed to mention Tanmarajiva’s name, and she is not allowed to look at Tanmarajiva even once.
The chubby, round-faced knight pointed at Yao Ying and shouted, "You shameless Han woman, if you look at our king for even a second, it's a blasphemy against our king!"
Yaoying looked at the front of the team. The huge white flag was fluttering in the wind. Tanmarajava was riding a horse in the front. She could only see his thin back.
Among the thousands of soldiers, he was the only one wearing a crimson cassock, his figure was cold and lonely.
It looks like a god's residence.
The cavalrymen of the central army gathered behind him, looking at his back with enthusiasm and piety.
The knight looked in the direction Yaoying was looking, his face flushed with anger, and he stood in front of her, shouting, "Han woman, you are not allowed to look at our king! Not even once! If you look again, I will dig out your eyes!"
Yao Ying's mouth twitched and she looked away.
The knight glared at her in dissatisfaction and called the soldiers over: "Tell them to follow the back of the team! Don't let this Han woman get close to the king!"
Yao Ying followed the central army with his personal soldiers and looked back at the valley.
Dust rolled in the sky as Haidu Aling left with the Northern Rong soldiers.
Yaoying and her personal soldiers walked at the end of the central army. The cavalry's slaves were all men. Seeing that she was a beautiful Han Chinese lady, they looked at her curiously and treated her kindly.
From them, Yao Ying learned that this place was very close to Sand City. Tanmo Luojia had just sworn an oath with Wakhan Khan in Sand City. When the army was about to leave Sand City, scouts reported that Haidu Aling had intercepted and killed the royal court caravan. He immediately led his troops here to intimidate the Northern Rong people.
Yao Ying was terrified.
Only after Haidu Aling went to Sand City did they have a chance to escape. As a result, they got lost after escaping from the camp and actually ran all the way towards Sand City!
It's like walking into a trap.
Fortunately, Tanmarajiva scared Haidu Aling away.
The royal army marched very quickly and only rested under a desolate cliff when night fell.
The central army was stationed around Tanmaraka's tent, and several armies with uniforms obviously different from the central army were on guard outside.
Yaoying distributed the hard cakes that were hard enough to kill people to other slaves.
As the slave munched on the cake, he told her that most of the knights in the central army were from the noble families of the holy city. They were loyal to the royal family, valued honor, and only obeyed the orders of the monarch. They were the guards of the royal palace and Buddhist temples. The other armies were loyal to several noble families. There was a regent in the royal court who acted as a Buddhist for the government and secular affairs of the court. The officials in the court were all from the noble families. Although Tanmaraka was the monarch, he was sometimes controlled by the nobles.
When he said the last sentence, the slaves were furious: "Buddha is the incarnation of Ananda, he is compassionate and saves all living beings. He is a real good man. He wants to release us captured slaves and let us become civilians, but the nobles disagree."
Yao Ying gave the slave a silver coin.
People in the Central Plains traded with money and silk, while gold coins, silver coins and silk were popular in the Western Regions.
The slave was delighted. He took the silver coin, thought for a moment, and then warned Yao Ying: "You are a Han Chinese. It is best to stay in the Central Army and never go out alone. The Central Army cavalry obeys the king's orders and will not bully Han women."
As he said this, he lifted the curtain and looked at her face.
"The nobles of the royal court will surely be pleased to see a beauty like you. Their subordinates will plunder beauties from various tribes for the nobles during battles in order to receive rewards. You must be careful."
Yao Ying showed a look of surprise and asked in a low voice: "Does the royal court hate Han people?"
South of the Tianshan Mountains, north of the Kunlun Mountains, and east of the Congling Mountains, there are vast tracts of desert and wasteland. The climate is hot and dry, and it is almost an uninhabited area. Only oases are formed where large and small rivers originating from the Tianshan Mountains flow through.
This narrow oasis zone is dotted with tiny countries along the river, with city-states and tribes of all sizes scattered among them. The smallest has only one or two thousand people, while the largest has hundreds of thousands.
Yao Ying knew a little about the Northern Rong royal family, but she was completely unfamiliar with the tribes of all sizes in the Western Regions. She only knew that Wang Ting was a Buddhist country that believed in Buddhism and Taoism, and that it would be destroyed by the Northern Rong in a few years. If she hadn't known about Tanmo Luojia's life, she wouldn't have remembered the name Wang Ting.
After being captured by Haidu Aling and brought to the Western Regions, she was imprisoned in a camp, surrounded by Northern Rong soldiers and unable to find out what was happening in the countries of the Western Regions.
She knew that the Northern Rong people regarded all other tribes they conquered as pariahs, but she didn't know that the same was true in the royal court. Moreover, according to the slaves' hints, the people in the royal court were particularly hostile to the Han people.
The slave lowered his head and wiped the silver coin, saying, "The nobles and common people in the royal court all hate the Han people. In the past, we were also subjects of the Central Plains Dynasty, but later the Central Plains Dynasty did not care about our lives, and other tribes ruled the Western Regions. In the Western Regions, the Han people became the lowest class of scum."
Yao Ying frowned slightly.
I didn't expect that after the fall of the Western Regions, the status of the Han people in the Western Regions would be so low.
After all, Tanmaraka was also a member of the royal family. He was a prince of the royal family, so he could serve as both the secular and religious leader of the royal court. If everyone in the royal court, from the nobles to the common people, hated the Han people, then the words she shouted in public would not only be of no use to him, but on the contrary might be a taboo in the royal court.
Why would he help her?
There are only two explanations:
1. Tanmarajiva wanted to form an alliance with the Wei Dynasty.
Second, monks are compassionate and as a monk, Tanmarajiva could not bear to see her being abducted by Haidu Aling.
Yao Ying weighed the pros and cons and decided that no matter what, as long as she could temporarily escape from the clutches of Haidu Aling, she would have a chance to return to the Central Plains.
From Helan to the Western Regions, no matter where she fled to, Haidu A Ling could capture her back. Only by escaping to the royal court would she have a chance to breathe.
Let's take it one step at a time.
Tanmarajiva seemed to be in a hurry to return to the holy city. The team set out before dawn the next day, and did not stop to set up camp until it was completely dark that night.
On the fourth day, the central cavalry separated from the other troops, left their baggage behind, and continued their advance.
We traveled like this for several days in a row, passing only a small oasis on the way. The rest of the place was endless Gobi desert. The towering mountains in the sky seemed forever far away, and the snow-capped peaks were always shrouded in clouds and mist.
The further north they went, the hotter the weather became. Yao Ying and her personal soldiers had no clothes to change into, so they could only continue to wear their thick felt robes.
The medicine she had bought from the royal cavalry with silver coins was gone, and Xie Qing's injuries did not improve. It was hot during the day and cold at night, and her wounds gradually showed signs of festering.
Yaoying was a little anxious.
After Tanmarajiva rescued her that day, he seemed to have forgotten her. He neither sent anyone to confirm her identity nor said what to do with her.
The cavalrymen from the central army brought her food every day. She asked to see Tanmarajiva, but the cavalrymen immediately sneered and accused her of being delusional: "How can a Buddhist meet a Han woman like you?"
Yaoying thought of other ways.
She had run out of silver coins, but Tanmarajika had no intention of paying any attention to her.
It seems that the monk had no intention of forming an alliance with the Wei Dynasty and only saved her out of compassion.
Yao Ying and her personal soldiers exchanged the felt robes with other slaves for some medicine, changed into the slaves' clothes, and held on for another two days.
That evening, a red sun burned half of the sky bright red, and the marching team suddenly burst into cheers.
The slave pointed to the towering cliffs in the distance and said to Yao Ying, "Han woman, this is our holy city!"
Yaoying looked up and thought she would see a majestic capital city, but all she saw was a large, towering black earth cliff. Below the cliff was a river that was dozens of feet wide. The river branched off to the north and meandered around the earth cliff, forming a natural barrier.
Before she could take a closer look, a knight rode from the front of the team all the way to the back and loudly announced that the team should stop and rest.
Yao Ying was stunned: Judging from the speed of the team's marching in the past few days, Tanmarajiva was obviously in a hurry to return to the holy city. Why did the team stop to rest when they arrived at the foot of the holy city?
Isn’t he afraid that he won’t be able to get back to the capital before dark?
The Central Army was indeed the most loyal team to the royal family. No one made a single complaint about Tanmarajiva's orders. Even though the holy city was right before their eyes, the team, eager to return home, stopped immediately.
The setting sun withdrew its last ray of golden light, and the night wind suddenly turned cold. Yao Ying and her personal soldiers shivered with cold.
Just when she thought they would have to sleep outdoors in the desert tonight, the team suddenly started moving again.
Yao Ying and others hurried on the road in the dark under the guidance of the knights, and thought: It turns out that Tanmarajiva wants to wait until after dark before entering the city. Doesn't he want to alarm the people in the capital?
She had never been to the holy city before and had no idea where to go. It felt like she had been walking for a very long time, and then she seemed to have crossed a long plank bridge, followed by a series of steep stone stairs. After climbing for a long time, she reached the top of the cliff, and then there was a downhill sandy path.
It seems that the holy city is located in a river valley, surrounded by rivers and cliffs...
It was a terrain that was easy to defend but difficult to attack. No wonder the Northern Rong could never conquer the city.
In the darkness, only the torches in the cavalrymen's hands emitted a dim light.
Yaoying couldn't see anything clearly. She felt like she had been walking on the slope for a long time, and then the road ahead seemed to open up. A strong wind was blowing, and the sound of the wind was howling.
The cavalry took her and her bodyguard away from the slave group and took them to a stone prison to keep them.
The stone prison was dry and cold. Yao Ying and his personal guards stared at each other in the dark for a long time and said, "It's better than sleeping in the desert. Let's go to sleep first."
The round-faced cavalryman left the stone prison and rushed back to the palace.
Tanmarajiva had quietly returned to the palace. Lights were lit in the main hall of the palace. Several monks hurried over, talked to Tanmarajiva for a while, and then left.
The cavalrymen saluted the monks respectfully.
One of the brown-eyed monks asked, "Prajna, the Buddha said that you brought back a princess from the Wei Dynasty this time?"
The round-faced warrior's face suddenly turned dark red, and he snorted a few times and said, "Yes, that shameless Han woman said she was the seventh princess of the Wei Dynasty, and her title was Wen Zhao."
The monk's face slightly changed, and he asked, "Where is the Seventh Princess now?"
Prajna replied, "She blasphemed the Buddha in the stone prison. This is a heinous crime. Tomorrow I will ask the Regent to punish her!"
The monk frowned, put his hands together, and said, "The Seventh Princess is a destined person, we cannot treat her so lightly."
Prajna opened her mouth in surprise.
Yao Ying had just fallen asleep when she heard hurried footsteps outside.
Several royal soldiers opened the prison door and said respectfully, "Seventh Princess, please follow us. The wizard wants to see you."
Yao Ying was taken out of the cell and brought to a side hall in the palace.
An old man in a long monk's robe stood in front of the stone steps. When he saw her, he put his hands together and said, "Seventh Princess."
Yao Ying's gaze fell on the old man's haggard face. She was stunned for a while, and finally recognized the pair of brown eyes.
Her heart was pounding, and she was speechless for a long time. She slowly came to her senses, put her hands together, and smiled. Although her hair was disheveled, her face was untidy, and she was wearing slave clothes, her demeanor was still graceful: "Master, I hope you are well since we last met in Chang'an?"
Mundadeva looked at the girl who was still calm despite her misery and smiled: "Thanks to the princess, my long-cherished wish has come true."
The author has something to say: Thank you for your understanding~
Regarding geography and city-state names, it would be very sensitive if it involves real history, ethnicity, etc. The article is fictional, and the cities and characters are all fictional settings.