Soon after, Guo Jing led Wang Qiu, Nobita Nobi, and Doraemon on a brief tour of a few famed sights in "Tokyo Bianliang." They sighed over the self-destructive theatrics of the Song dynasty's court, and returned to the headquarters of the "Six Jia Divine Soldiers" at Tianqing Temple—only to find the temple gate surrounded by large carts laden with bundled spears, broadswords, daggers, bows and crossbows, shields, and even precious helmets and suits of armor, rare and costly in ancient times.
Several low-ranking officials from the Armaments Bureau were distributing this military gear to the volunteers who had enlisted in the "Divine Troops," each holding a registry book and calling out names.
—As the "Divine Soldiers" under the command of the Daoist Master Guo, the Song court would, of course, never send them into battle against the Jurchens barehanded.
Indeed, at this perilous juncture for the imperial capital, the court's generosity with military provisions had exceeded the bounds of common reason.
—Wang Qiu, who had once read a few books on ancient Greek history, vaguely recalled that when Athens faced the massive invasion of the Persian army and prepared for the now-legendary Battle of Marathon, the city's citizens had scoured every household and still could only muster ten thousand hoplites—not because they lacked able-bodied men, but because they simply didn't have enough weapons and armor!
Yet here in Bianliang, the desperate court had casually allocated ten thousand complete sets of arms and armor for Guo the Daoist to squander at will!
"…Ten thousand full sets, handed out just like that? The imperial court is shockingly generous!"
Faced with mountains of pristine military equipment—everything from the basic swords and shields for individual soldiers, to incendiary "fire wagons," compact catapults, bladed carts for blocking city gates, and trench-crossing platforms—Wang Qiu was genuinely astonished. Everything was here except for cavalry horses. And all this for a hastily assembled civilian militia?
Were this the medieval West on the other end of Eurasia, even a royal guard might not boast such fine gear.
But the armaments officer escorting the shipment merely sneered at Wang Qiu's remark. "The Great Song commands wealth across the Four Seas and fields a million armored troops. Warhorses may be scarce, but weapons have never been lacking. Since the war with the Jurchens began, every imperial and local foundry has operated day and night. The court's arsenals overflow with weapons. A mere ten thousand sets—what of it? Even a hundred thousand could be drawn if needed."
When Wang Qiu pressed for details, he learned that just within Kaifeng, over 300,000 full sets of arms had been stockpiled through the years—enough to raise an army of equal size at a moment's notice. And within the city, there were more than enough able-bodied men to conscript. Given the population of 1.5 million, drafting 300,000 was far from impossible.
Such overwhelming military resources might have sufficed to conquer Europe in the Dark Ages. Yet here, they could not even safeguard their own city walls. After decades of peace, the Song dynasty had grown so decadent that "toddlers know only song and dance, and elders of seventy have never seen weapons of war."
In this wretched age, the Song dynasty boasted the economic and cultural might of a future United States, spent seventy percent of its revenue on military affairs—akin to Nazi Germany—but its army fought with the valor of Fascist Italy, while its people lived in misery comparable to war-torn Afghanistan.
Looking at the newly conscripted riffraff—though clad in solid armor, helmets gleaming, weapons in hand—they still stumbled about, unsteady and slovenly. The so-called drillmasters moved more like street performers, their flashy, ornamental routines utterly useless in real combat… Wang Qiu finally understood why Bianliang would fall.
This grand city, softened by the decadence of peacetime revelry, lacked not food, nor arms, nor manpower—but the most basic necessities of courage and conscience.
—This was a city of cowards: pitiable in misfortune, infuriating in apathy.
Just as Wang Qiu and Guo Jing were resigning themselves to the hopelessness of their "Divine Soldiers," a clamor erupted from the street. Wang Qiu glanced out from the temple gate and saw a red-clad imperial guardsman, astride a stunted, pitiful horse no larger than a mule, galloping through the bustling avenue, shouting breathlessly, "By order of the court! The capital is under lockdown! The Jurchens are storming the city!"
Panic swept the city like wildfire. Even those freshly armed "Divine Soldiers" turned pale as ghosts…