Searching for Talent (1)
The next day.
"I went too far, didn't I? I couldn't even show you proper hospitality. I'm really sorry."
Ma Chao sought out Pang De, who was, as usual, helping me with my work, and held out her hand in a preemptive apology.
"It's quite all right. I was guilty of rudeness myself, so I'd say we're even."
Pang De took the offered hand and accepted the apology with easy grace.
"...Then let's get along from here on."
"...Yes. The pleasure is mine."
The two of them made peace, staring each other down with meaningful looks on their faces.
...We're talking about the same two people, right?
Their relationship didn't improve dramatically after that, but at least they stopped openly antagonizing each other and butting heads the way they had before.
Every now and then they would even spar together. The murderous atmosphere of the old days was gone, though, and since each of them burned with the desire to grow stronger through the study of martial arts, the practice actually seemed to help—slowly, their rapport began to thaw.
Occasionally, while I was buried in my work, Ma Chao would drop by after finishing her patrol and try to lend a hand. But unlike Pang De, who had served as a military clerk, she had no head for mental labor at all, and before long she would overload like a kettle boiling over, practically steaming from the ears.
"...If it's too hard, just go home."
"...Huh? Really?"
The sight of her groaning was pitiful enough that I told her to head back, and Ma Chao immediately kicked the door open and left.
...She actually leaves when I tell her to.
What a straightforward girl.
Between small episodes like that, I kept doling out relief aid across Wuwei Commandery, working to administer the city and keep the peace.
Then three months passed, and...
I turned seventeen.
***
On a bright morning, sunlight dazzling my eyes, I wriggled for a moment before climbing out of bed.
"...Ugh."
My body, worn stiff from being buried in work right up until yesterday, crackled as I stretched—pop, pop—and a low groan slipped out of me.
"Haaah... this is exhausting."
Wuwei had produced nothing but soldiers since its founding, and those damned rebel bastards had wrecked the city besides, so the pile of work waiting to be handled was more than I could bear.
Father and Seongwoong, who had real talent for administration and politics, were busy governing Jincheng Commandery, so my complaints had nowhere to go but out of my own mouth.
The only reason I could rest like this at all was that Pang De, with her experience as a military clerk, was lending a hand, and Uncle Ma Teng was finally getting the hang of things while public sentiment slowly settled.
Right now, in fact, I'd been ordered to take a break after working myself to the bone, so rest was exactly what I was doing.
Those cursed bastards. Xiliang barely produces enough food as it is, with half the people going hungry—and who knows how much they skimmed off the top...
If we hadn't seized the fortunes the rebels had extorted from the people, there would have been nothing left to distribute as relief, and it would have taken far, far longer to calm the populace.
On top of that, our army's influence in Xiliang didn't extend much beyond Jincheng and Wuwei.
The local warlords claim loyalty, but out of sight they never stop wringing the people dry.
Some of them even had the gall to commit their abuses openly, crowing that Father and Uncle—officially appointed as Administrators by the court—were their personal backers.
Ma Chao swept those ones away at the head of her soldiers almost before I'd finished hearing about it.
Once the training of the troops absorbed from Beigong Boyu's forces was complete, we planned to march out and purge the other magnates as well.
Actually shouldering the work of governance made me feel, firsthand, exactly why developing a city was such a miserable slog in Three Kingdoms games without civil officers.
I was scouting literate, sharp-minded talent here in Wuwei and training them, but they were still a long way from ready for real work.
This was a land where swinging a sword came more naturally than wielding a brush, after all.
The harsh frontier prioritized the blade over learning; that was simply the environment people were raised in. It was, admittedly, one of the reasons Xiliang cavalry had earned such fame for their strength.
...It's about time I started looking for other talent.
Scapegoats to drown in paperwork in my place... no, wait—strategists I needed. Men of broad vision, skilled at governing on a grand scale.
The current year was 187 AD, the fourth year of Zhongping.
A few years after the Yellow Turban Rebellion had ended, the great upheaval was coming—an age of chaos that would soon stain the whole realm with blood.
The true opening act of that troubled era would be the Ten Attendants' Rebellion, two years from now.
It would be the moment of ultimate confrontation between the Clear Stream Faction—led by He Jin, the Empress's half-brother and the reigning Emperor Ling's consort kin, along with the scholarly officials of the court—and the ten eunuchs headed by Zhang Yang.
The Ten Attendants were those eunuch vermin who had made the Emperor their puppet, wallowed in corruption, and bled the common people dry.
If history had run its original course, the rebellions in Xiliang wouldn't have ended by then—but I've intervened, and things have changed.
In the original timeline, Han Sui, who raised his revolt, and Ma Teng, who joined him, only submitted to the court in 187 and got involved in the affairs of the Central Plains after the coalition against Dong Zhuo fell apart.
But with their submission having come a full year early, the course of history was clearly going to diverge.
In all likelihood, when He Jin moved to expel the Ten Attendants and summoned warlords from across the land, there was a strong chance he would call on us as well—alongside Dong Zhuo, Gongsun Zan, and the rest.
After all, it was He Jin who had appointed Father and Uncle Ma Teng to their posts as Administrators.
Even if he didn't call for us, all we'd have to do was earnestly beg to help, and we'd be invited along.
His whole aim is to draw in outside forces to crush the Ten Attendants who hold real power in Luoyang.
Cao Cao had opposed He Jin's dangerous plan to summon foreign armies, but her counsel was brushed aside—and He Jin, ignoring that warning, would pay the price in full.
To answer that summons, our army first had to consolidate the territories and foundations we already held.
"Either way, what I need most urgently right now are advisors—brilliant minds for strategy and administration."
Two years remained until the Ten Attendants' Rebellion.
I needed renowned men of intellect, whether in military doctrine or in schemes and stratagems.
Our army's strengths and weaknesses were starkly, almost painfully clear.
On the military side we had Ma Chao and Pang De, and Brother Yan Xing was no slouch either—capable enough of cutting down soldiers to the point of slaughtering civilians in the last war—so that front was secure.
With elite warriors leading the vanguard, we were more than strong enough to win a head-on battle or punch through enemy lines in open-field engagements.
The weaknesses were the narrow breadth of our tactics and our limited strategic vision.
In the last war, the rebels had been hardly more than bandits, so the flaw never really showed—but an army without strategists is an army courting defeat.
It was like Liu Bei before she won Zhuge Liang: even with mighty champions like Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, and Zhao Yun under her command, she suffered crushing defeats at Cao Cao's hands.
At this point in time, the Central Plains should have been brimming with fresh, promising talents just coming of age and entering court service, dreaming of reshaping the Han.
Xun Yu or Xun You, say—or Chen Qiu... no, Xun Yu again... or perhaps Xun You, or Guo Jia...
Every name I listed belonged to strategists destined to play pivotal roles in Cao Cao's army. As far as capable minds available right now went, none other than those came to mind.
Tian Feng and Ju Shou would require a journey all the way to Jizhou, and Jia Xu, the master of self-preservation, couldn't even be found—her whereabouts were a mystery.
Beyond them, no one particularly memorable surfaced in my memory.
Sima Yi and Zhuge Liang were still little more than toddlers, not even teenagers yet, and Pang Tong was the same.
Who else was there? Cai Yong? Zhong Yao?
I was still sifting through the memories in my head when someone knocked at the door and entered carrying a letter.
"Young Master. It's been a while."
It was Brother Yan Xing.
"Yan Xing!!"
He came in with his face brightened by a delighted smile, and I greeted him just as warmly.
"I'm glad to see you looking well. This is a reply from our lord."
I accepted the letter he held out.
Not long ago, I had written to Father saying that since I wished to scout for talent, I intended to tour the nearby regions of Xiliang with an escort and make a brief visit to the Imperial Academy in Sili Province.
I planned to see whether any scholars of renown still lingered at the Academy, and this was evidently the answer to that letter.
I read the delivered letter through carefully.
Summarized briefly, the contents were these: I had his permission to travel to Sili in search of talent, but I was to bring an escort of no fewer than a proper number of men.
Order within the city had stabilized, but bandits still swarmed the roads of Xiliang. That was the reason.
It was the same reason he had sent Yan Xing back to me.
The training to build up our army was nearly finished, so he was returning my brother-in-arms to my side as my personal guard.
Then I'll just bring Pang De and Yan Xing as my escort.
The bandits of Xiliang, whatever else you said about them, were nothing special.
Men who had never received proper training, who'd simply taken up arms to rob others of what wasn't theirs.
There was no chance whatsoever of such rabble defeating Pang De and Yan Xing.
"Pang De. We're heading to Sili Province, so make the preparations."
"Yes, understood."
While Pang De pared my escort down to the bare minimum, I set out under Yan Xing's guard to inform Uncle Ma Teng in person that I would be traveling to Sili Province.
"Heheh. Go with an easy mind, boy."
Uncle approved wholeheartedly of my aim to find talent capable of governing Wuwei, so he granted permission without a moment's hesitation.
I had intended to leave without telling Ma Chao, who was in charge of the city's security...
"No!! I'm coming too!"
Somehow she'd caught wind of it, and she waylaid us as we tried to depart, digging in her heels and raising a fuss.
Was this Uncle's doing?
There was no suspect but him.
I'd meant to leave her behind precisely so she could keep the peace...
...Fine, have it your way.
If I left her here, she would sulk for a solid stretch, wailing that I'd taken Pang De and abandoned her.
Better to just bring her along than suffer the fallout of that tantrum later.
"...Fine. Come with us."
"Really?!"
Ma Chao's eyes lit up, and she vaulted straight onto her white horse.
Watching her bubble over with delight, it occurred to me that living in Xiliang—the frontier beyond all frontiers—had apparently left her burning with curiosity about the rest of the world.
Not that I have any intention of going as far as Luoyang, the capital itself.
The army's discipline and the city's order were only just beginning to take shape. The last thing I wanted was to catch the eyes of the men who would grow into towering warlords in the years to come.
Our purpose on this journey was, first and last, to find and recruit a strategist worthy of the name.
And so the four of us—Ma Chao, Pang De, Yan Xing, and I—rode out for Sili Province with an escort of thirty horsemen at our backs.