After going around Jing'an Prefecture City, the column traveled more than a hundred li east and entered the territory of Qinghua Prefecture.
Tenglong Guard was in the southeastern part of Qinghua Prefecture, but even so, Tenglong Guard did not fall under Qinghua Prefecture's jurisdiction. Under Normal Circumstances, the military households and garrison farms of a guard post were managed by the guard post itself; the County Office and prefectural yamen had no authority to interfere.
Simply put, a guard post was not merely a military organization; it also carried administrative duties.
To a large extent, a guard post was like a prefecture, subprefecture, or county—an independent management system that governed the population, land, finance, judiciary, education, civil administration, and other affairs within the guard post.
And Tenglong Guard was different from other guard posts. Other guard posts all had to bear part of the responsibility for city defense, or else had other duties.
For example, there were three guard posts in Qinghua Prefecture. The first was Qinghua Guard. Qinghua Guard had five thousand-man offices—front, rear, left, right, and center. In addition to garrison-farming duties, Qinghua Guard also had to handle the city defense of the prefectural city. However, this city defense was different from the Garrison Commander's Office in Anyuan City.
Qinghua Prefecture had no Garrison Commander's Office, so the soldiers of Qinghua Guard were only tasked with patrolling the city walls, standing guard at the gates, and similar duties. As for patrols inside the city, catching thieves, public order, and so on, all of that was handled by the prefectural yamen.
The second was Prince Qing's personal guard. Prince Qing's personal guard was also a guard post, and it too had five thousand-man offices—front, rear, left, right, and center. They were responsible for guarding the princely city.
A prince's