Inside Taiji Hall.
Cao Mao's headache was growing worse.
He knew Deng Ai was a man who easily got carried away, especially at the sight of military merit.
But this time, Deng Ai had gotten far too carried away.
There was actually nothing wrong with executing chieftains who disobeyed military orders.
Since they had chosen to submit, they were bound by Great Wei law and military law.
And military law had always been the harshest.
Under Qin State military law, missing a deadline meant execution. Many people cited documents discovered later to try to prove that Qin State law punished missed deadlines with a fine of shields rather than beheading.
In truth, there was a considerable difference between civil and military law. The military principle of execution for missed deadlines had persisted for a very long time. Even in later ages, commanders were executed for failing to reach the battlefield by the appointed date.
Military affairs were extremely serious, because even a single day's delay could cause tremendous harm and consequences.
For example, suppose Hu Lie fought the rebels and was surrounded. The commander ordered his generals to reinforce him within fifteen days, but the reinforcements only reached the battlefield a month and a half later. By then, grass would practically be sprouting on Hu Lie's grave!
Then the reinforcements would encounter the regrouped rebel army and be surrounded themselves, and the next wave would once again fail to arrive in time.
That meant sending men to their deaths, wave after wave.
Although Shi Bao had not summoned the various chieftains for a battle, Protector-General of the Qiang was a military office, and those chieftains were all generals directly under his command.
Even in a drill, if the marshal ordered his generals to arrive within a set time and they