The Southeast Fleet's forceful deployment in Joseon had eliminated the threat of peace talks with the Later Jin, but for the negotiations themselves, it meant even more obstacles and interference.
Fortunately, Xu Furen bore the brunt of those worries. Sun Shaozong only needed to make his presence known before the Jurchens every few days.
Time passed.
By mid-April, the stop-and-start peace talks, after several twists and turns, had finally reached their conclusion.
The seventeenth day of the fourth month, Guangde 14th Year.
Wu Pu Heng Duan, ruler of the Later Jin, led his people in a suburban sacrifice and swore a blood oath with Xu Furen, pledging a Marriage Alliance—the latter phrase was entirely absent from the official documents. After all, Great Zhou had no desire to acknowledge the Later Jin's independence, much less compare their relationship to Qin and Jin.
Though this was an agreement both sides had been destined to tear up from the day it was signed, Sun Shaozong's journey to Liaodong had at least come to a satisfactory end.
On the nineteenth day of the fourth month, the Great Zhou delegation formally began its return journey.
On the twenty-sixth day of the fourth month, they spent the night among the Zhesheli Tribe, bedding the mother and taking in her son.
On the twenty-ninth day of the fourth month, he met his bargain-bin elder brother in Xingcheng.
On the fourth day of the fifth month, they passed Shanhai Pass.
On the seventh day, they reached the capital.
The road there had been filled with wind and frost, but by the time he returned, it was nearly midsummer.
Over half a year in Liaodong's bitter cold, even with the occasional Jurchen noblewoman offering herself to his bed, how could that compare to the pretty maids and lovely concubines