Du Ruhui’s words filled Yun Ye with immense terror!

The arrival of a new era meant that he no longer had ready-made examples to reference. All matters would have to be resolved and discerned through his own mind.

Yun Ye didn’t believe his courage and learning could cope with the overwhelming flood of new problems. Only sufficiently formidable great men could shoulder such responsibilities. He himself was not a great man, and the Great Tang was not a place that could produce commoner great men. Even if there were great men, they could only be His Majesty the Emperor.

Several years ago, he had already experienced that feeling of being roasted by great flames. Now, this feeling was even stronger. Being the master of his own family was no problem—if he made mistakes, at worst his wife and children would suffer hardship with him eating chaff and swallowing vegetables. But now someone was entrusting him with state affairs—this was a major matter! Crossing the river by feeling for stones—such a terrifying thing—he couldn’t do it. If by chance he led everyone to jump into a pit together, it would produce earth-shattering effects.

Walking alone on the pitch-black Camel City, Liu Jinbao followed distantly behind. These days, the Marquis needed increasingly longer periods of solitary contemplation. With a great battle imminent, having the commander think more clearly was absolutely a good thing. Perhaps at this very moment, the Marquis was considering ingenious strategies to defeat the enemy.

The desert moon was like a hook. It was time to add night fodder for the warhorses. Stable hands pulling fodder carts shuttled back and forth in the open space at the center of the Camel City. Wang Cai, catching Yun Ye’s scent, raised his neck and neighed once.

No matter how busy he was, Yun Ye would take time each day to spend time alone with Wang Cai. In the army, Wang Cai couldn’t live freely as he did at home. Very dissatisfied with his stable quarters, he had resumed his habit of gnawing on the railings, only this time, no wood ear mushrooms would grow out anymore.

Releasing Wang Cai from the stable, man and horse stepped on the soft sand, strolling under the moonlight. The open space enclosed by the Camel City wasn’t very large—walking one circuit didn’t take even two incense sticks’ time. Soon they returned to the starting point. Wang Cai stopped in his tracks and was unwilling to walk further. He hadn’t yet eaten his night fodder—accompanying Yun Ye for one circuit was already giving tremendous face.

Just beans. Wang Cai was very well-behaved. Once he entered the military camp, he would enjoy eating beans. Liu Jinbao said this was a characteristic of a precious steed. Yun Ye believed this was purely Wang Cai’s wicked sense of humor. When other warhorses only had a handful of beans to satisfy their cravings, he could have half a sack of beans to eat as he pleased. Every few days, Na Rimu would even send over two eggs. With such provisions, he still liked to stick his head into other warhorses’ feeding troughs to eat a few mouthfuls of their coarse fodder.

He wondered how things were in Chang’an. Xinyue, leading the entire household, he didn’t know what kind of torment they were enduring. He himself was on the battlefield, but it was they who suffered. Li Anlan could send letters carrying the fragrance of Meiling from distant Lingnan, recounting Li Rong’s changes and her own longing, incidentally complaining about Yun Ye’s heartlessness and lack of devotion. The entire letter was filled with thick spring passion. But Xinyue couldn’t do this. No matter how difficult it was to endure, she had to tell her husband that all was well at home. Even if someone died, she had to say this, fearing lest her husband’s thoughts be disturbed and something happen to him on the battlefield.

Human emotions were excessively complex. Yun Ye always wanted to simplify them, but the result was that now, whoever was closest to him suffered the greatest harm. The most troublesome thing about having multiple wives was having no way to be thorough and comprehensive with everyone.

Having four wives meant he was already unqualified to speak of any love. What could maintain this family now was only tender affection.

He didn’t know from what time humans began to have such complex and beautiful emotions. Yun Ye remembered that in the earliest times, everyone wore leather aprons, lived in caves—upon seeing a beautiful woman, one club knock to knock her unconscious, then carry her away and it was done. Now it had become much more complex. As long as she was a woman, she would raise a whole heap of questions for you to answer, create a whole heap of matters for you to resolve.

After Li Anlan finished cursing Yun Ye in her letter, she proposed a compromise solution—that was to get a scenic island on the sea for herself as compensation. She wanted to experience the dreamlike bikini beach life that Yun Ye had previously described to her.

Seduction combined with pleading left Yun Ye with no resistance. Although legally all land under heaven belonged to Li Er, those islands scattered like pearls on the ocean could be considered as garbage that Li Er couldn’t look after and had thrown away. As someone picking up bargains, what harm was there in collecting all this garbage into his own pocket, then using it to please his wives and concubines?

Stroking Wang Cai’s ears, Yun Ye smiled bitterly. After Zhao She received military orders, he no longer concerned himself with household affairs, so he could become a famous general. He himself was destined to be unable to do this, so being an ordinary general would be fine. Li Jing’s letters were always filled with disdain. Yun Ye wasn’t angry—there weren’t many generals in this world worthy of Li Jing’s regret. Being one of them was an honor, not a humiliation.

All matters were complicated and diverse. Whether praise or disdain, they were merely outsiders’ views. He still needed to walk his own path—no one else could help with this. When tired of walking and wanting to find someone to depend on, even parents might not be reliable.

The wooden clappers on the watch drum sounded three times—it was already the third watch of the night. The hot air balloon in the sky, spraying orange-red flames, was changing shifts. One was slowly descending, another slowly rising.

The sky was as black as a piece of black brocade. To discern fortune and misfortune from the profound stars was simply impossible for Yun Ye. He could only hope that on such a night, Xinyue and Anlan were also looking at the moon, looking at the starry sky. Speaking of which, how pitiful—borrowing the bright moon to send one’s longing, speaking plainly, was just a deep sense of helplessness.

Wang Cai liked to hear wolves howl, and Yun Ye liked it too. It was precisely because of wolf howls that the great desert seemed even more vast and distant. Once the desert no longer had the existence of wolf packs, how lonely this land would be.

“You always dislike shining white light. Look at this old man’s hair—it’s turning black!” Wu She stood in the moonlight with his hands behind his back. The evening breeze blew his robes, the rustling garments setting him off like an immortal.

“You should first come down from the flagpole. Even if your hair is turning black, you don’t need to stand atop the flagpole. This is what Gou Zi and Xiao Miao do. You really don’t need to show off like this, do you?”

Old children were even more annoying than children. Ever since discovering his hair roots were turning black, Wu She seemed to have become a different person. Whether in state of mind or behavior, he had become a young person—or rather, become a child, specifically that most annoying seven or eight-year-old kind of child.

He had already said this sentence at least eighty times. Divine miracles couldn’t be spoken of with others, which suffocated him terribly. He could only speak of it before Yun Ye and Du Ruhui. Du Ruhui, disrespecting his age, worshipped crazily. One of the Great Tang Empire’s super old foxes had been completely conquered by Wu She’s treasures. Therefore, Wu She’s target for showing off had become Yun Ye.

“Young man, don’t blame this old man for alarmist talk. A man’s body begins to decline from thirty years of age. If at this time you don’t know how to properly cherish yourself, you’ll regret it in the future. How about it—you already have little interest in bedroom matters, right? Let me tell you, this is evidence that bodily functions are gradually deteriorating. If you don’t know how to cherish yourself now, you’ll suffer losses in the future.” Wu She wrapped his two legs around the flagpole and slowly slid down.

Discussing romantic affairs between men and women with a eunuch was too embarrassing. Yun Ye decided to change the subject. “Xiao Miao and the others are about to break through Dawa City from Tianzhu. Can’t you old sir worry about Xiao Miao a bit? That child has definitely suffered tremendously this time. Gou Zi said this child always争先 rushes ahead in every battle. Since departing from Lesser Bolu, the fighting hasn’t stopped for a single day. It’s said she’s already covered with countless wounds. She’s your disciple—you should still care about her first.”

After hearing the scenes Gou Zi described, an image of a heroically spirited woman in military garb immediately appeared in Yun Ye’s mind. He didn’t know how much suffering this child had endured to be able to kill her way through Tianzhu from Lesser Bolu, heading straight for the Abbasid lands.

Yun Ye didn’t hope for women to go to the battlefield. They should originally live comfortable lives in the rear, bearing and raising children, looking forward to their husbands in distant places. When a nation sent women to the battlefield, this itself was a manifestation of weakness.

Yun Ye could accept Xiao Miao wearing night-walking clothes and leaping about on rooftops, but he couldn’t reconcile himself to Xiao Miao wearing armor and slaughtering amidst ten thousand troops. Those who should be slaughtering amidst ten thousand troops should be rough men like Zhang Fei, not a delicate woman. No matter how high her martial arts were, it couldn’t change the fact that she was a woman. War required women to step aside.

This thought was actually transmitted to him by Li Er. Once in the Hall of Two Forms, seeing Li Er disconsolate, without even the appetite to eat his favorite boiled fish, seeming very sorrowful—but Yun Ye really wanted to eat, so he was thinking of quickly making Li Er happy so everyone could eat fish together. Who knew that asking would have been better left undone—only upon asking did he learn that that day was Princess Pingyang Zhao’s memorial day.

When Yun Ye asked about Li Er’s melancholy thoughts, he volubly recounted this princess’s achievements completely to Yun Ye. Yun Ye also learned for the first time the cause of Princess Pingyang Zhao’s death.

Good heavens! She had actually died in battle. A woman who dared to lead cavalry charging through chaotic armies—how formidable must she have been? As for falling from a warhorse and having a hundred or so warhorses trample over her body—that was not at all strange.

Wrapped in horse hide! Dragged down from the front lines by military carts, Li Shimin wept for more than three days. This should originally have been something men did, yet it was left to a woman to do. The reason Dou Jiande was humiliated like a dog—the fundamental reason was that he had killed Princess Pingyang Zhao, Li Xiuning.

Later, Li Er told Yun Ye that there were two things he regretted most in his life. One was his mother’s early death. The second thing was Li Xiuning’s death. Originally, such a tragedy shouldn’t have occurred. Therefore, the sovereign and minister both agreed that war should not allow women to intervene.

Wu She looked at Yun Ye, whose spirits were not high, and said: “Did your first wife tell you or not? Xiao Miao has already been recorded in your family’s genealogy. She’s already a Yun family person. When you return home, you’ll need to consummate the marriage. Without nourishing your body well, how can you cope with Xiao Miao’s demands? Young man, you’d better shine some white light together with me.”

“Isn’t this nonsense?” Yun Ye suddenly jumped up.

“White light? This isn’t nonsense at all. Haven’t you seen my hair has turned black? This is already the second time it’s turned black.” Wu She said proudly.

“I’m not talking about the white light—I’m talking about Xiao Miao!”