“Where is my Great Emperor warship?” Li Er suddenly asked this question, probably stirred up by the names Princess, Qingque, and Chengqian just now.

“The keel is already being laid. Qingque brought back many precious timbers from the islands specifically to prepare for it. I don’t know what the progress is now.” Yun Ye decisively sold out Li Tai.

“What solid lies you tell! I have no way to verify this. I estimate in a moment your guards will run to the seaside to transmit this message back to Lingnan so Qingque can hurry up construction there. By the time the people I send arrive to observe, the keel will probably really be laid. Fine, since you plan to build it, then build a good ship properly. Don’t just slap something together carelessly.”

Yun Ye was very grateful for Li Er’s understanding and quickly asked: “Does Your Majesty have any requirements for the Great Emperor? Should weapons be installed on it? What are your requirements for the cabins? How large should the entire warship be? How many guards do you plan to station on it? How many guest rooms should be prepared? How about arranging your cabin according to the Taiji Palace sleeping quarters?”

“Do you prefer red sandalwood, black sandalwood, or purple sandalwood? Oh, Your Majesty’s warship must naturally use purple sandalwood. How about eight-ox crossbows as the main weapons? Fire oil, gunpowder, ramming beams—these standard equipment must be included, right? Can the bridge be made in palace style?”

Yun Ye’s rapid-fire questions left Li Er and Li Chengqian dumbstruck. Li Er stopped Yun Ye’s quick mouth and asked in surprise: “Has Lingnan’s shipbuilding industry already reached such a level? Various sandalwoods are quite valuable!”

“What’s the big deal about timber? Haven’t you seen those kings who rule over a hundred-some li of territory on the islands? The palaces they live in are all made entirely of fine timber. The entire palace is wreathed in fragrance, insects and ants don’t grow there, mosquitoes and flies don’t enter. Qingque helped one of those kings pacify over a dozen countries on the islands. The compensation was over a dozen royal palaces. Even the stepping boards in their latrines are ivory wood! Precious timber isn’t valuable in the South Seas—just like spices, once it grows it fills entire islands.”

Li Chengqian swallowed audibly and asked urgently: “What fine timbers are on my Chengqian?”

“When we were in Java, the craftsmen on the ship replaced all the furniture in your warship with black sandalwood. The entire cabin was also decorated once over with black sandalwood boards. Qingque said you’ve liked black since childhood, so he made the decision to change everything to black sandalwood for you. When returning to the capital, you can ride it back.”

“Really? Could it be that the Qingque and Princess are also entirely decorated with precious timber?” Li Er stroked his beard with great longing.

“Naturally it’s true. Qingque likes rouge wood, so all the Qingque’s cabins are decorated with rouge wood, and so is the furniture. The entire cabin has a faint sweet fragrance of rouge. This subject is rather unambitious and likes red sandalwood, so the Princess is red sandalwood everywhere—unbearably vulgar, at least that’s what Qingque says.”

Li Chengqian was already eager to go see his ship. Li Er also said urgently: “Two years’ time. When you return home, bring back the Great Emperor. I want to hold a great banquet for all the ministers on it.”

“That won’t work, Your Majesty. The Great Emperor is too large. At most it can sail upstream along the Yangtze to Yuezhou. It can’t enter small waterways like the canal and the Yellow River.”

Li Er threw his head back and laughed, slapping his knee and saying: “Only you are clever enough to try to trick me into gracing Yuezhou with my presence using a ship, so you can take the opportunity to build Yuezhou into the premier city along the Yangtze. Dream on! I’m not Emperor Yang of Sui—I won’t harm the nation just to go down to Yangzhou to see jasmine flowers. I won’t do such things. Either you figure out a way to sail the ship here, or you build the ship smaller. In any case, I won’t fall for your tricks. I haven’t forgotten how you made me eat locusts before. Unless Yuezhou truly becomes an indispensable major town for the Great Tang, only then might I grace Yuezhou with my presence. Otherwise, don’t even think about it.”

Yun Ye’s head hurt badly. Now trying to deceive Li Er was becoming increasingly difficult. As soon as his thoughts stirred, the man would immediately detect it. No matter how eloquently you spoke, he would just respond to all changes with constancy. There was nothing you could do about him.

“Your Majesty, you don’t understand—shipbuilding has specifications. The Chengqian, Qingque, and Princess were built in one go as sister ships. Their specifications and models are all the same. They’ve already been built and there’s no way to change them. Your Great Emperor must surpass these three sister ships in displacement and other data.”

“If we build it smaller than these three ships, the Great Emperor wouldn’t live up to its name. Building it would be worse than not building it at all.” In order to pave the way for Yuezhou’s development, Yun Ye earnestly tried to persuade Li Er to go to Yuezhou.

“Could these three ships be even larger than the five-tooth warship Yang Su built?” Li Er understood, knitting his brows as he asked Yun Ye. He was very curious about what such a huge vessel would look like.

“Your Majesty, ocean-going ships and inland river ships are different. The higher the structures on the deck, the higher the possibility of capsizing. If a five-tooth great warship went to sea, as soon as the wind got slightly stronger, it would overturn. Ocean ships have deep drafts for the sake of safety.” Educating this landlubber Li Er with common knowledge was difficult, mainly because he never believed himself ignorant. Even if he was wrong, in the end the correct one would definitely be him. Nothing unusual about that.

“We’ll see when we get there.” Li Er left with a cautious attitude. Li Chengqian immediately became frantic, about to pack his belongings to go to the seaside to see his great ship.

Two dispensable idle men were assigned five thousand soldiers by Li Er, escorted by the two old marshals Cheng Yaojin and Niu Jinda as they began advancing toward the Liao River. He himself led the main force and also began slowly breaking camp. The Great Tang’s first expedition against Goguryeo was successfully completed, compressing the Goguryeo people along the Yalu River so they couldn’t advance an inch.

Zhishi Sili, Qibi Heli, Ashina Mishe, and Zhang Jian were left behind to garrison Baiyan City and Houhuang City to monitor Goguryeo’s movements.

When withdrawing from Liaodong, Li Er forced the residents of Liaodong City and Gaimou City to relocate to Tang territory. About seventy thousand Goguryeo people were forced to move from Liaodong into Tang. His decree was perfectly executed by Zhangsun Wuji. This land would return to wilderness, devoid of human habitation.

On the eleventh day of the fourth month of summer, the Tang army arrived at Yingzhou and held sacrificial rites with the Three Sacrificial Animals (ox, sheep, and pig all prepared) to commemorate the fallen soldiers. On the twenty-first day, Li Shimin led his army into Linyu Pass. Crown Prince Li Chengqian came from Laizhou to Linyu Pass to receive the emperor. On the twenty-third day they reached Hanwu Terrace (on Lianfeng Mountain at Beidaihe in Qinhuangdao, Hebei), where a stone monument was erected to record their accomplishments.

Li Er’s brilliant imperial majesty—ultimately no one dared defy it. The moment he arrived at Hanwu Terrace, Hou Junji’s memorial claiming illness had already been sent via eight-hundred-li express. Gao Shilian also declared himself old and confused, unfit for great responsibility, and requested retirement. Du Zhenlun, the Crown Prince’s tutor and Junior Preceptor, submitted a memorial saying he lacked talent and virtue, was unworthy of assisting the Crown Prince, and requested demotion and distant exile. As for Qiugan Chengji, while carousing in a brothel he simply vanished without a trace.

“Heavy rain falls on Youyan, white waves reach the sky, fishing boats beyond Qinhuangdao. The vast expanse cannot be seen—who knows where they’ve gone? Events of a thousand years past, Lord Wu wielded his whip, facing Jieshi he left his verses. The bleak autumn wind is here again—the world has changed.”

Sitting on the ship in the wind and rain, Yun Ye sang this song “Lang Tao Sha, Beidaihe” by the Great Ancestor. Li Chengqian puffed out his cheeks blowing a reed pipe in accompaniment beside him. Li Er sat in a black sandalwood chair keeping time with his hand. Cen Wenben also clapped the ship’s rail, singing with whistling sounds. As for Xu Jingzong, he had an expression as if savoring fine wine, but when he heard the line “events of a thousand years past,” his face twitched as if he’d eaten rat droppings.

Li Er irritably slapped the chair’s armrest and made everyone stop, pointing at Yun Ye and saying: “I knew things you cobble together always have flaws. Isn’t this embarrassing? Just to match the rhythm, you actually said ‘events of a thousand years past.’ From Lord Wu until now is at most four hundred-some years—where do you get a thousand years from? Nitpicking to the point of being unlearned! Yet it still rhymes—only you have this talent.”

“Minister Cen, you’re also a great talent with mastery of both poetry and calligraphy. Change this line for this unlearned brat. I changed it two or three times but was never satisfied. You try.”

Cen Wenben racked his brains in thought for a long time before saying: “Your Majesty, the line ‘events of a thousand years past’ truly doesn’t accord with facts, but placed here it’s extraordinarily appropriate. If we used a line like ‘events of four hundred years,’ though more reasonable, the momentum of the entire ci poem would weaken by thirty percent. To change it to accord with history while preserving the grand and majestic momentum of the entire ci poem—difficult, difficult, difficult!”

Li Er stood up and also walked into the wind and rain. Feeling the momentum of the Chengqian riding the wind and breaking the waves, he laughed and said: “Throughout my life I’ve never dared pursue perfection, always feeling that having some regrets is better. Perfect matters are things only Heaven can accomplish. What’s wrong with leaving some regrets? Let’s keep this line ‘events of a thousand years past’!”

Xu Jingzong clapped and laughed loudly: “What Your Majesty says truly are golden words! The one that escapes is elusive and intangible, impossible to grasp. Marquis Yun’s teacher also once said that in worldly matters, eight or nine out of ten don’t go as one wishes. Your Majesty returns in great victory from Liaodong and records accomplishments on stone at Hanwu Terrace—naturally this is supreme military merit. But the aura of killing and warfare is perhaps a bit heavy. Now Marquis Yun composes a song, and this small imperfection perfectly supplements civil governance and elegant discourse. Hanwu Terrace gains another fine tale, sufficient to be transmitted to later generations, allowing later descendants to also appreciate our Emperor’s breadth of mind. How delightful!”

The ministers on deck immediately laughed loudly, congratulating Li Er in unison for gaining literary fame. As for this poem’s false author Yun Ye—everyone unanimously ignored him.

In the wind and rain, the huge vessel advanced through the waves like a giant kun fish. Sailors clinging to the masts continuously reported conditions ahead. Liu Renyuan personally controlled the vessel, making the Chengqian advance steadily through the wind and waves. Waves over a meter high were nothing for the Chengqian—it could handle even larger waves as if on flat ground.

The target ship was ahead. Li Er stood on the bridge observing from afar. Seeing Liu Renyuan give the order to prepare, eight small wooden structures rose on the deck. The gun ports below the ship’s rail were also opened. The teeth-aching sound of eight-ox crossbows being drawn was transmitted to the bridge through copper tubes. Liu Renyuan again ordered fire!

Li Er saw over a dozen eight-ox crossbow bolts trailing white smoke strike accurately into the target ship. Following several light bangs, the fire oil packets on the bolts immediately burst open. The target ship was instantly enveloped in flames. Then a tremendous boom came over, and the target ship exploded into a huge fireball. After the flames contracted, all that remained on the sea surface were a few wooden planks floating on the water.