The Tang Sword’s Edge: From Anxi’s Long Saber to the Soul of the Flourishing Tang Army

Atop the walls of Suiye, seven-year-old Li Yan kneels and watches his parents fall beneath the blades of Tibetan cavalry.

An old Changdao veteran presses a bloodstained scabbard into his hands. “As long as the blade remains, the Tang spirit lives.” Ten years later, as Captain Li Yan launches a night raid on an enemy camp, a golden formation suddenly appears between his brows: battle formation simulation!

The enemy camp's strengths and weaknesses, the locations of its ambushes, all surge before his eyes as phantom battle flags.

From night raids on scout camps to ambushes on Tibetan supply routes, from squad leader to brigade commander to military governor of Heshuo, this blade tempered in blood and vengeance, and imbued with the Tang spirit, will at last cleave through the An Lushan Rebellion and carve the words “Tang military system” into the annals of history.