Armed Missionaries

Schönbrunn Palace, nursery.

"Mother, I'm already five. I can sleep by myself now." Franz looked at Sophie with some helplessness.

"No. I think you need me. Besides, you can't stop a mother from doing her duty." Sophie insisted.

"Now, on that day, the snow was falling hard. Captain Lin had walked less than half a mile when he spotted a dilapidated church." Franz sighed. It seemed women in every era loved watching dramas.

Phnom Penh, Chenla Royal Palace.

By now, King Ang Chan had long since left the palace, but his four daughters still remained there.

They were princesses of Chenla, and the royal palace was their home. Yet now, they could only live in seclusion in the Cold Palace.

The other palaces had all been occupied by the Vietnamese general Zhang Mingjiang, who held absolute power as Vietnam's military governor in Chenla.

The first thing Zhang Mingjiang did after taking over the Phnom Penh royal palace was to seize King Ang Chan's consorts. Then, in the king's name, he raised taxes and summoned young, beautiful women to the palace.

The Kuan Kim family had not escaped unscathed. More than a dozen of its young women were summoned to the palace, and many had been so humiliated that they took their own lives. As a result, Kuan Kim-pan hated Zhang Mingjiang to the bone.

Zhang Mingjiang did not dare lay a hand on Chenla's four princesses, though not because he feared the Chenla people.

He was afraid of the eunuch surnamed Li, the inspector sent by Emperor Minh Mang.

Officially, the eunuch Li had come to oversee military affairs. In reality, he was there both to curb Zhang Mingjiang's power and to prevent him from getting close to Ang Chan's descendants. They feared he might try to imitate Cao Mengde and control the emperor to command the lords.

Sinology and Confucian thought held an unshakable position in the countries of Southeast Asia. It was hardly surprising that Emperor Minh Mang knew the story.

But the emperor's arrangements gave Kuan Kim-pan room to maneuver.

As a group that had lost the right to live as ordinary men, eunuchs were either greedy, wicked, or possessed of some peculiar interest.

The eunuch Li liked writing poetry. Kuan Kim-pan naturally catered to his tastes, often bringing renowned Chenla scholars into the palace to compose poems and trade verses with him.

How could they compose poems without wine? Kuan Kim-pan sent people far and wide to collect fine wines and present them to the eunuch Li.

Little by little, Kuan Kim-pan became a "kindred spirit" in the eunuch Li's eyes.

One day, Kuan Kim-pan brought him a rare Tang-dynasty book and a delicate jade wine cup.

The eunuch Li was pleased, but kept his delight off his face as he said,

"Brother Kuan Kim, you've brought me such a valuable gift. Just tell me what you want."

"Brother Li, the princesses are old enough to begin their studies. I'd like to hire tutors for them."

The eunuch Li breathed a sigh of relief. He had thought it would be something important, but it was only a matter of finding teachers.

The eunuch Li replied,

"Of course. I'd just like to know which great masters will teach the princesses. Could you let me meet them?"

Kuan Kim-pan naturally understood that there was no way around letting the eunuch Li meet them. Besides, he would find out sooner or later, so there was no point trying to hide it.

"Master An, Master Pa, come and meet Brother Li."

An and Pa were common Chenla surnames, so the eunuch Li had paid them little attention at first.

But when he saw Ambrosius and Pacini, he was genuinely startled.

"Yellow-haired devils!?"

Kuan Kim-pan spoke up. "They're Westerners."

"Oh, right, foreigners. But do they have any real learning?" The eunuch Li prided himself on his vast knowledge and intended to test the two Western masters.

Kuan Kim-pan had no intention of letting the eunuch Li and Ambrosius improvise freely, so he simply said,

"Lack of learning is a woman's virtue. These two Westerners will mainly teach dance and music."

Those words immediately robbed the eunuch Li of interest.

"I knew it. Foreigners know nothing of literature, only songs and dances." Then he said to the little eunuch beside him, "Give them a waist token and take them there."

The little eunuch bowed and agreed. He had just turned to leave when the eunuch Li called him back.

"Wait!"

His shout instantly made the atmosphere tense. Ambrosius's hand had already moved toward the pistol at his waist.

"They stink. Make them bathe and change their clothes. Don't let that stench into the palace."

Ambrosius and Kuan Kim-pan both breathed a sigh of relief.

"Yes."

Ambrosius finally met the "princesses" he had dreamed of seeing, but they were nothing like he had imagined.

They were dressed in a very dowdy fashion, and even their fabric was little different from the palace maids'.

They also seemed so young—most looked no older than their teens, and the youngest only seven or eight.

Ambrosius grumbled inwardly, I never should have listened to that brat.

As Ambrosius looked the princesses up and down, the little girls stared back at him with curiosity.

After all, the princesses had lived in the palace since birth. They had never seen a man, let alone a Westerner.

So they stood there, awkwardly staring at one another.

Father Pacini finally broke the ice. As a professional missionary trained by the Church, he was naturally an excellent communicator.

The princesses' first impression of Ambrosius was very favorable. He was so different from the eunuchs they usually saw, and the Archduke Ambrosius was rather handsome, too. It was only natural that they found him easy to approach.

Chenla, Kompong Som Bay.

The harbor was being built without a hitch. The people here were surprisingly numb to everything and showed no desire to resist the unexpected visitors. After accepting bribes, the officials also became very cooperative.

The Catholic priests began their campaign as well. They first infiltrated nearby villages, treating the sick, distributing medicine, and giving out rice. Such routine measures could only attract the locals' attention.

To preach in a colony, they needed special methods.

A village was frequently harassed by bandits. The combat priests split into two groups. One, armed with guns, hid along the bandits' usual route, while the other went to help the villagers defend the village and prevent any bandit informants from sending word.

When the bandits were driven back by the combat priests defending the village, the other group, already lying in wait, charged out and captured them all.

The priests tied the bandits up in the village square and asked everyone to recount their crimes.

The villagers naturally seized the chance to settle old scores and take revenge. When the bandits had been beaten to the brink of death, the priests stopped the villagers' violence.

The priests demanded that the bandits repent for their sins. To the Buddhists of Southeast Asia, this scene was all too familiar.

"I bet these foreign monks are going to let the damned bandits go," the villagers thought.

The bandits thought the same. They figured they would get away with it, and one day they would kill every last one of these damned commoners. After all, the foreign monks couldn't guard the villagers every day.

But neither the villagers nor the bandits expected what came next. After the bandits repented, the priests put them on crosses and baptized them in the flames.

"May the Lord forgive your sins. Amen!"

After witnessing the priests' strength and methods, the villagers one after another changed their faith.

Watching the villagers grow ever more devout, the priests marveled inwardly. "Archbishop Rauscher's method really works."

They had no idea that these missionary strategies had all come from the mind of a child.