Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 1041 1036 [Lu You, the son of the Chinese high priest]

Although the Tamil soldiers under Xia Yuqing's command were not very good at fighting, they were naturally skilled in burning, killing and looting.

They chased the defeated enemy all the way north, looting any villages they saw.

Faced with the looting madness of the troops, the Han masters did not dare to stop them. But they had to show their authority, so the Han masters also joined in and personally led their troops to loot the village.

While robbing, set rules that the soldiers can keep a small amount of property, and most of it needs to be handed over to the master!

This approach is more acceptable than banning robbery.

After chasing for only a few dozen miles, the pursuing troops completely lost their organization. Xia Yuqing was very frustrated to find that he could no longer command the troops. They were all scattered in various villages, burning, killing and looting. He was unable to gather the soldiers and attack the enemy's lair.

Luckily, their enemies are pretty rubbish too.

Otherwise, Xia Yuqing would have turned a great victory into a great defeat if he had gathered more than a thousand remaining soldiers and launched a counterattack.

It's just a bunch of noobs fighting each other.

The enemy was a coalition of four noble lords, and the only one with real strength was Parakalama. Parakalama's elite troops had been crippled by the Ming envoys a few years ago, and the combat effectiveness of the newly trained troops was much worse than before.

Although the main force of the coalition forces and the ambushes at sea totaled more than 20,000 people, in fact more than 70% of them were farmers.

With the whole army fleeing, it was impossible to organize a counterattack.

Lu You stood outside a village and witnessed the entire brutal robbery. He frowned and said nothing.

"That's how war works," Qi Qi'an said hastily to comfort him. "When I was young, I lived in Shandong, where bandits were rampant, just like the army before us. Bandits in Shandong and Hebei were often unable to attack fortified cities, so they just looted villages in the suburbs, and the former Song soldiers did not dare to leave the city to suppress the bandits."

Bai Shihou said: "So the soldiers of our Ming Dynasty are strictly disciplined, which is why they can truly be called a benevolent and righteous army."

Lu You sighed, "I am too soft-hearted. But it can also be said that I am like Ye Gong who loves dragons. I always wanted to make achievements on the battlefield, but I couldn't bear to see the disorderly soldiers looting the village."

Fan Chengda said: "Brother Wuguan has a heart full of benevolence and righteousness, he is a true gentleman."

Wang Lianqing wanted to say something but stopped himself, then turned his back and no longer looked at the miserable situation in the village.

In fact, according to the original historical trajectory, the Sinhalese people here and their descendants would have suffered countless tragic deaths in seventy or eighty years, and would have been almost killed to the point that the population became mainly Tamils.

At that time, two major families were fighting for the throne, and the Kalinga family eventually won.

This family is the descendant of the Kingdom of Ceylon, and the kings of each generation married Kalinga women from the South Asian subcontinent (probably in Orissa, India, adjacent to the Bengal region). They plundered the southern part of Ceylon and moved the capital directly to the northernmost part, while migrating all the Tamils ​​on the island and massacring and expelling the Sinhalese there.

That is, the royal family members had foreign blood from the Indian subcontinent, and by uniting the Tamils, who were also a minority, they changed the ethnic composition of the northern part of Ceylon.

From then on, the northern part of Ceylon became the territory of the Tamils, and this influence has continued to modern society!

Compared with the direct operation of changing the species, what is Xia Yuqing’s army’s looting of villages?
It can even be said that the descendants of most of the people here were able to survive because of Xia Yuqing.

Of course, this algorithm is nonsense.

Xia Yuqing was now extremely anxious. It took him five days to gather the scattered troops. Some of the more courageous ones had even rushed to the north and east to rob a hundred miles away.

This delay gave the enemy a chance to regroup.

Parakalama gathered the defeated soldiers everywhere and forcibly conscripted civilians into the army, and he managed to gather another six or seven thousand men.

But the alliance fell apart.

In the coalition army composed of four nobles from the east and the north, two nobles quietly led their troops away and sent people to contact Xia Yuqing to negotiate peace.

Xia Yuqing had just gathered his troops when he met the negotiating envoy.

He called several of his senior brothers who held the highest military positions, and after some discussion, they decided to accept the peace talks. Moreover, he also arranged marriages with the two nobles, and several of his senior brothers came forward to marry women from the other family.

The two sides quickly reached a marriage agreement:

They promised not to invade each other and formed a military alliance. If the two nobles were attacked, the Han forces were obliged to send troops to help. The same was true in reverse. For example, this time, the two nobles had to lead the remnants and help the Han forces to attack Parakalama!

After learning the results of the negotiations between the two parties, the six second-generation officials sat down and chatted.

Fan Cheng laughed and said, "It has the flavor of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. The King of Ceylon is like the Emperor of Zhou, who can only rule the area near the royal city. The local princes attack each other and form alliances. The Han people here also have two allies."

Lu You said: "Although the sparrow is small, it has all the necessary organs. I estimate that in a hundred years, the descendants of the Han people here will be able to unify the entire island."

"I think the descendants of the Han people will probably fight among themselves," Li Zuqia said. "Xia Yuqing himself can't control the army, let alone his descendants. The 500 soldiers left by the court will all recruit their own troops and will most likely become the aristocratic families of the Jin Dynasty. A small place cannot accommodate 500 aristocratic families. When they have wiped out all the indigenous forces, or even before they have wiped out all of them, the Han people will fight among themselves and swallow each other up."

"It's hard to say," Wang Lianqing said, "After all, there are too few Han people on the island. After a hundred years, there will be at most 100,000. If the natives frequently revolt, the Han people may be forced to unite."

Bai Shihou said: "I'm afraid it's more than 100,000. Not only can they have children themselves, but they can also recruit fellow villagers in the Ming Dynasty. Aren't there many fellow villagers coming to join them now? Sometimes, one person can recruit dozens or even hundreds of poor fellow villagers." The six people couldn't come to any conclusion after discussing it. No one knew what this deformed Han force would eventually develop into.

Xia Yuqing led his troops to march for another few dozen miles, then set up camp with the entire army, sent out scouts to spy on the enemy, and waited for the two nobles to lead their troops to form an alliance.

At the alliance ceremony, Buddhist monks and Brahmin monks chanted mantras in each place to communicate with the gods.

However, the person who presided over the ceremony invited Lu You to make a guest appearance.

Xia Yuqing introduced the two nobles: "This is the son of the Minister of Rites of the Ming Dynasty. The Ministry of Rites is in charge of rituals and sacrifices. Well... you can regard this Mr. Lu as the son of the Great Kasyapa or the High Priest of the Ming Dynasty."

The Ceylonese nobles witnessed the power of the Ming Dynasty with their own eyes, and they instantly showed great respect to Lu You.

Lu You was at a loss for words, so he presided over the oath-taking ceremony according to Chinese etiquette.

Since these guys formed an alliance, Lu You naturally could not give them the Tailao ceremony, which just avoided killing cows and circumvented the taboo of Brahmanism.

They are not princes, but can be barely considered as ministers, and they can also use the Shaolao etiquette.

They slaughtered pigs and sheep, offered sacrifices to heaven and earth, and read the covenant.

Lu You read the parallel prose alliance letter in the official language of the Ming Dynasty. Not only did the two Ceylonese nobles not understand it, but even many of the old Han brothers only had a vague understanding of it.

It’s okay if you don’t understand it, it makes it more mysterious and solemn!
When he learned that his ally not only ran away but also formed an alliance with Xia Yuqing, Parakalama was shocked and angry.

"Your Majesty, Bahanu has taken his troops away!" A trusted minister came to report in a panic.

Parakalama once killed the king and established himself as the emperor, but he still asked his people to call him "Your Majesty" in private.

Parakalama rode out to chase after the last ally's troops, who had not yet completely left the city gate. He crossed the crowd and stopped them: "Bahanu, are you going to just give up and allow those foreign races to occupy your land?"

Bahanu asked in return: "The Ming people are a foreign race, but the Tamils ​​are not? For nearly a thousand years, Tamils ​​have continuously come to settle on the island. Who can drive them all away? At least the Ming people allow us to believe in Buddhism, and the Ming emperor also canonized five great Kasyapas. Those Tamils ​​are the most hateful. They forced monks to convert to Brahmanism and turned all Buddhist temples into Brahman temples. If I have to choose, I would rather let the Ming people rule Ceylon than the damn Chola Kingdom and Tamils."

"If you retreat now, the Ming people will invade your territory one day," said Parakarama. "They will kill you and your children and take away your land, property, wife and daughters, just as they have done in the past few years."

Bahanu said: "It's different now. They are willing to form an alliance with the island nobles."

Parakalama sneered: "That was their despicable trick. They were willing to form an alliance with the local nobles because I rebelled. If I am defeated and killed, and there is no one to threaten them anymore, those Ming people will definitely turn against me."

Bahanu said: "The future is a matter for the future. If I continue to fight with your alliance, I will soon be killed by the Ming people. The Ming people are blessed by Vajra Bodhisattva, they can control thunder and fire, and our army will not be able to win."

"Idiot, that's not thunder and fire, it's just a weapon!" said Parakalama angrily.

Bahanu sighed, "But the soldiers all thought it was thunder and fire. Some said it was the blessing of the Bodhisattva, some said it was the devil's help, anyway, the soldiers didn't believe it was the power of mortals. My soldiers are like this, and your soldiers are almost the same. They don't want to fight anymore. You now have thousands of troops, but many of them are forced civilians. Can you really win?"

Parakalama was silent for a moment.

"I am leaving, may Buddha bless you," said Bahanu.

Parakalama put his hand on the hilt of his sword, wanting to rush over to kill Bahanu and then devour the remaining soldiers of the enemy.

But he chose to restrain himself after all. If he annexed the troops at this time, it would be bad if a war really came to an end. They might turn against him in the middle of a battle.

Bahanu led the remaining troops to the southeast. Soon, scouts came to report that the Ming vanguard was more than ten miles to the south.

Parakalama thought over and over again, weighing the pros and cons.

His heart drove him to fight to the end, but his reason advised him to escape quickly.

In the end, reason prevailed, and Parakalama took his family and the families of more than a hundred confidants and fled to Kalinga on the northeastern coast of India by boat.

Kalinga was an ancient Indian kingdom. When Master Xuanzang came to seek Buddhist scriptures, Kalinga had already been destroyed and was sparsely populated. Now it has become a nation, and the rulers there are princely nobles.

Parakalama's mother was the daughter of the prince of the Kalinga state.

Historically, it was because Parakalama had Kalinga blood that his descendants married Kalinga women as queens. Eventually, the conflict with the local royal family became increasingly intense, so they simply moved the capital to Jaffna and supported the rise of the Tamils.

Now, Parakalama fled to Kalinga to seek refuge with his grandfather.

Once the lord ran away, the soldiers lost their will to fight. Xia Yuqing took over this place without bloodshed and expanded the Han people's influence to the northernmost part of Ceylon.

Nearly a quarter of the entire island's land is either directly owned by the Han people or is the territory of the Han people's allies.

Moreover, Xia Yuqing captured the port city of Jaffna.

(End of this chapter)