"As comrades united in our efforts to claim the Holy Grail, I believe we Servants should also share information to better understand one another."
Among the five Servants, the proud young man Sakura Matou had summoned was the first to step forward, addressing Sovell and the other Servants.
After receiving his Master's permission through an exchange of glances, the young man cupped his hands in greeting and began introducing himself:
"My surname is Li, and my given name is Shimin. My class is cavalry-in other words, Rider of the seven knight classes. You may simply call me Shimin.
Of course, in public, it would be safer to call me Rider."
"Li... Shimin? You're Emperor Taizong of the Tang Empire?"
Sovell briefly spelled out the name, then suddenly realized that his apprentice seemed to have summoned someone extraordinary.
Li Shimin, the second emperor of the seventh-century Tang Empire in Seres (China), was a wise ruler who ushered in an age of good governance, as well as the true founder of the Tang Empire.
According to historical records, his reign saw stable livelihoods and honest administration. He also destroyed three neighboring khanates and subdued more than twenty nomadic tribes, large and small, along the northern frontier.
He had already become the de facto sovereign of both the agrarian and nomadic civilizations of the East, and Li Shimin himself advocated "loving the Chinese and the foreign peoples alike."
Thus, the tribes of the steppes jointly bestowed an honorific upon His Majesty, the emperor of the Great Tang-"Heavenly Khan."
It meant "the ruler ordained by Eternal Heaven." (Note 1)
His unparalleled achievements in civil governance and warfare were not only widely celebrated by his contemporaries, but also established a nearly perfect model of enlightened rulership in Chinese historiography.
Seeing a sudden gleam of admiration