Fortunately, Charles Bennett had always treated Henry Clark as his own daughter. In fact, Ethan Brooks also knew that Charles Bennett was actually Henry Clark’s biological father!

Sarah Miller had more than once been seen by Ethan Brooks running out of the wild grass, cheeks flushed and panting. After a while, Charles Bennett would come out of the same patch of wild grass, fastening his belt as he walked.

He had considered taking the mother and daughter with him on a long journey back to the Tang Dynasty... Unfortunately, that was something utterly impossible to achieve.

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Chapter Six: Botany Is a Useful Discipline

If Ethan Brooks wanted to return to the Tang Dynasty, the first thing he had to do was change his identity—from a Huihe to a true Tang person. Even this first step was as hard as reaching the sky. Emperor Taizong himself was not purely Han, yet he set the standards for being Tang extremely high. To become Han from a foreigner was absolutely not something that could be done just by having a Han face.

Even if Ethan Brooks became a Tang person, the first thing he would face would be military service. That’s right, the fubing (militia) in the Anxi army came from various zhechong prefectures of the Tang. Because it was so far from the Central Plains, it was hard to replenish troops, so the four chief historians of the Four Garrisons of Anxi had the authority to recruit soldiers locally. Of course, this recruitment was limited to Tang people!

Becoming a Tang fubing did not automatically grant the right to return to the Tang heartland. If a fubing wanted to return to the interior at any time, he shouldn’t even think about it unless he had achieved at least three military merits—unless there was a rotation of the zhechong prefecture!

There were plenty of white-haired veterans in the Four Garrisons of Anxi. The earliest batch of fubing had even participated in Hou Junji’s campaign to destroy Gaochang, which, mind you, was already thirteen years ago.

So what does it mean to have three military merits?

When the army attacks a fortified city, armored and armed, braving a rain of arrows, dodging rolling logs and stones, crossing moats, scaling walls, being the first to climb the ramparts, fighting bravely, covering the rear troops as they ascend, the enemy collapses, the city falls—first in merit, awarded three military merits! The 29th rank of the scattered military officials—Accompanying Military Deputy Commandant!

Ethan Brooks felt he probably couldn’t do it...

In fact, he simply couldn’t!

Because this path of promotion was reserved for the commoners of the Tang! The sons of officials had another route—recommendation!

Ethan Brooks wasn’t even a Tang commoner yet. He was a Tiele Huihe, and among the Tiele Huihe, he was a Sai, a group not at all known for their bravery!

Even thinking with the dead skin on his feet, he could come to the right answer—proud Tang people didn’t want him!

Taking Sarah Miller and Emily Clark with him from Kucha back to Chang’an?

Ethan Brooks couldn’t even be bothered to imagine such a scenario. Along the way, the number of bandits, horse thieves, and those who were herdsmen by day but turned into robbers when they saw lone travelers like Ethan Brooks—if there were fewer than three thousand such groups, Ethan Brooks would consider the world to be completely at peace.

Even the beautiful songstresses in Kucha who wanted to go to Chang’an faced enormous difficulties.

Everyone in the world knew that Tang people were lustful. For beautiful women, no matter what ethnicity you were, as long as you were beautiful enough, you could travel unimpeded to Chang’an, be welcomed by the nobles, wealthy, officials, and commoners of Chang’an, and finally become workers in the taverns, restaurants, brothels, and other service industries of Chang’an and Luoyang...

Of course, there were even more beautiful women who never made it to places like Chang’an or Luoyang, instead becoming the woman of some mountain king or a group of bandits.

As for men—if they weren’t buried in the yellow earth, they’d be cooked in the pots of impoverished bandits and mountain thieves...

And these weren’t even the biggest obstacles. The greatest obstacle came from Charles Bennett, the man who had loved Sarah Miller for many years. He couldn’t leave Sarah Miller, and likewise, Sarah Miller couldn’t leave him.

Their relationship was the only one Ethan Brooks had seen in the Huihe tribe that actually matched his own values of love.

And because he was now an adult, he had become an obstacle on their path to love.

After braiding the whip, Ethan Brooks soaked it in warm, melted beef tallow. Once the cowhide was fully softened by the tallow, he would unravel it and braid it again. A whip treated this way would be less likely to crack and would last much longer.

Charles Bennett hurried over, carrying a large mutton leg.

Seeing her lover arrive, Sarah Miller, who had been scolding Emily Clark, immediately softened her gaze.

Seeing the mutton leg, Emily Clark also stopped crying—mainly because the hind leg Charles Bennett brought still had half a sheep’s tail attached. She remembered the taste of her brother roasting sheep’s tail fat—each bite was a mouthful of oil...

“Ethan Brooks, I found a horse for you!” Charles Bennett handed the mutton leg to Sarah Miller and came over to Ethan Brooks.

Ethan Brooks smiled and nodded, saying, “Thank you, Uncle Charles Bennett, I really do need a horse.”

“Actually, you’re the most promising young man in the tribe. You should have been given a horse long ago, but Grace Bennett wouldn’t allow it. He always says you’re the child of a demon and don’t deserve to have a horse.”

Though Charles Bennett spoke with concern, he wore a smile. It seemed that, as a minor headman under Grace Bennett the Great Apo, he was now able to bypass that annoying superior and do things beyond his authority.

Most likely, this horse came from yesterday’s battlefield.

The Tang people loved warhorses, but the Tang army stationed in Kucha had too many horses, so they would leave some of the less desirable ones to the Huihe who helped them in battle.