Ch.186Compromise (2)

After meeting Salah, Temujin exited the tent.

He let out a long sigh and muttered to himself.

“A hero truly is a hero.”

The reason Temujin had acted arrogantly was simple.

He wanted to see how Salah would respond.

Temujin had conquered many regions in Iran and forced countless people to submit.

Those people had bowed their heads and surrendered for self-preservation.

This was understandable since the Ulus forces were beyond what they could resist.

The same applied to Egypt led by Ayyub.

The forces he commanded were like a handful of ashes compared to the Ulus.

“Yet his eyes showed he believed he could win.”

The young king said this as he approached his horse.

As he approached, Munglig, who was in charge of the escort this time, came to Temujin.

“How was it?”

Since this was an official occasion, Munglig was using honorifics with Temujin.

Therefore, Temujin didn’t bother mentioning this and answered calmly.

“He’s certainly not an ordinary person. If we were to face him in battle, we would suffer great losses.”

“Knowing that, why did you provoke him?”

“Though it was arrogant, I was testing him.”

“Testing?”

“Yes. I thought if the hero of Islam immediately chose to submit, he must have some ulterior motive. But he showed no such behavior.”

“That means…”

“He was confident he could defeat the Western Crusaders with his small forces. That’s why he took this proposal seriously and was offended by our arrogant behavior. This proves he was genuinely considering the offer.”

“Hmm.”

Munglig clicked his tongue at Temujin’s words.

He was already showing the appearance of a capable politician as the king of Western Liao.

Though still awkward and lacking in many areas, it was certainly remarkable growth.

Having watched Temujin since childhood, Munglig felt this change even more intensely.

“You look quite surprised.”

“Seeing Your Majesty grow into such a fine adult makes me feel that I’ve grown old.”

“Haha. I never thought the great Lord Munglig would show such weakness.”

“I’m human too.”

Munglig said this as he offered his horse to Temujin.

Temujin skillfully mounted the horse. Munglig and the Kheshig followed behind.

“Lord Munglig.”

“Command me, Your Majesty.”

“I need a few spies.”

“Do you want to monitor Ayyub?”

Temujin nodded to this.

Then, after looking around, he continued.

“He will also assign people to watch me. So it would be good for us to learn more about each other.”

Munglig nodded at Temujin’s words.

In his view too, Ayyub was no ordinary person. He was a hero. A hero who carried the entire Islamic world on his shoulders.

“I will speak to Father separately about this.”

“Then I will assign people immediately.”

Temujin nodded in response.

Then he turned his head to look at the tent where he had just been conversing.

“Your Majesty?”

“Ah, I apologize. Let’s quickly return to the Khagan.”

Temujin thought to himself.

That it would be better to postpone the conquest of the Levant and Egypt while Salah was alive.

* * *

It seemed that meeting Salah had been a great inspiration for Temujin.

Since then, he had been continuing small unit training while securing public order in Baghdad.

“It seems I unintentionally provided my son with a good education.”

“You have talent even in such matters, brother.”

“Talent? It was just a lucky coincidence.”

“I thought as much.”

I smiled at Munglig’s words.

Then I raised my clenched fist.

Munglig pretended not to notice.

“Anyway, now that we’ve made a pact with Ayyub, we’ll head north.”

The plan was to attack Arbil north of Baghdad and then head straight to the Anatolian Peninsula.

Since the Sultanate of Rum was located there, the Pope couldn’t really complain about me attacking it.

I could simply say I was occupying the Anatolian Peninsula to secure safety for Christian pilgrims.

In truth, I could have just forced my way without such explanations.

The Pope had only a handful of actual troops to govern the secular world. So it would be difficult for him to pressure the Ulus with military force.

Of course, the Pope’s real power wasn’t military.

What made the Pope fearsome was his “excommunication beam” – using excommunication to erode legitimacy.

If a European monarch was excommunicated and lost legitimacy, they could face a major crisis.

This was because Europe operated under feudalism, where feudal nobles existed at a level similar to or slightly weaker than the monarch who led the country.

Even Barbarossa had to contend with Henry the Lion who could challenge his authority.

Though the Lion eventually lost to Barbarossa politically, diplomatically, and militarily, he had briefly built up enough power to challenge the Emperor’s authority.

This is why papal excommunication was fatal for European Christian monarchs.

But it didn’t matter to me.

The Ulus was essentially a centralized monarchy, and the kings with feudal tendencies were all my sons.

So unless my sons suddenly wanted to become Khagan and went wild, there was no reason for them to rebel against me even if I was excommunicated.

Moreover, I had already declared that I would pass the position of Khagan of the Ulus to Temujin before my death.

I had even formalized this, so even if my sons went mad with power and rebelled, it would be difficult to stop a determined Temujin.

Additionally, the Ulus was essentially a nation with guaranteed religious diversity.

In other words, it wasn’t a nation where Christianity was the absolute majority, so there wouldn’t be people who would resent me if I was excommunicated.

For these reasons, I was planning to attack the Sultanate of Rum.

“When you say north, do you mean the Sultanate of Rum you mentioned before?”

“Yes. It’s technically within the sphere of influence of the Seljuk Turks, but it’s essentially an independent state.”

As I’ve mentioned repeatedly, the Seljuks were already gone.

So the Sultanate of Rum occupying the Anatolian Peninsula was correctly viewed as an independent power like Khwarezm.

“Since they follow Islam, European countries won’t have much antipathy if we attack them.”

“Do we really need to be concerned about their feelings?”

“What do you mean?”

“Honestly, with this military force, couldn’t we just push through and devour that entire place you call Europe?”

Munglig was right.

With this level of military power, if we just pushed through with sheer numbers, it seemed like we could occupy at least Central Europe, if not all of Europe.

However, I had a concern.

It would be difficult to govern those territories stably after occupation.

In fact, the original Mongols had temporarily occupied Eastern Europe.

At that time, the Mongols retreated due to European offensives, but from another perspective, it also meant they couldn’t properly exert influence over Eastern Europe.

If they had properly exerted influence, they could have drafted troops from there and held out until the end.

There were many opinions that this retreat was due to the sudden death of Ögedei Khan, the achievement of the tactical goal of subjugating the Cumans, and the less-than-expected rewards from plundering Eastern Europe.

But since the Mongols weren’t stupid, abandoning occupied territories meant they didn’t have the capacity to defend them.

Of course, this was just one of many academic opinions.

However, I sympathized with this view, which is why I held such thoughts.

So for the Anatolian Peninsula, rather than following Munglig’s suggestion to charge in and destroy everything only to suffer from continuous rebellions, I decided to expand our influence gradually and conquer it slowly.

“You’re right. But if we do that, we might lose the territories we’ve conquered due to constant rebellions. And because of these rebellions, we wouldn’t be able to continue expanding to other regions.”

Munglig nodded in understanding at my words.

Then he apologized to me.

“Your words are correct, brother. I was thinking too hastily.”

“It’s alright. I’ve had the same feelings as you before.”

When expeditions lasted too long, soldiers became fatigued.

And the commanders leading them couldn’t help but be affected.

So it was natural for Munglig to want to finish quickly and return home.

“But if we move hastily here, everything we’ve built up could turn to nothing.”

“I understand, brother. I won’t bring this up again.”

I nodded at Munglig’s words.

Then I raised my hand to gather the commanders.

Muqali, Chilaun, and the Darughachis who commanded the forces under me arrived before me.

“Once we finish fortifying Baghdad, we will head north.”

“North, you say?”

“Yes. We will occupy the Sultanate of Rum, the remnants of the Seljuks there. By occupying that place, we will be able to exert influence over the Crusaders.”

The Crusaders moved not only by sea but also by land.

Just like how Barbarossa died while crossing the Saleph River in the Anatolian Peninsula.

I didn’t yet know if Barbarossa had died or survived in this history.

Anyway, that wasn’t important right now.

Since the Anatolian Peninsula was a transportation hub for Crusader forces, occupying it meant European Crusaders would come under our influence.

Currently, the Crusaders were supplying their needs through both land routes and ships.

In this situation, if the land routes were under our control, European Crusaders would have no choice but to be wary of us whenever they moved by land.

We could suddenly change our minds and control the land routes.

“Additionally, beyond this place, we could target the Balkan Peninsula, which can be considered the gateway to Europe.”

The situation in the Byzantine Empire was not good at the moment.

This was because the tyrant Andronikos I Komnenos, who had killed his co-emperor and was conducting a reign of terror, was ruling.