A Treacherous Scheme (1)

News that Lu Bu, at the head of barely a few dozen riders, had saved Ding Yuan from mortal peril and brought the imperiled troops of Bing Province home with her spread through Luoyang in no time at all.

Lu Bu, returning crowned with a monumental feat, was welcomed with ringing cheers by the soldiers guarding the camp, while Ding Yuan—who had scraped back with his life—found himself showered in stinging, burning stares.

An incompetent commander who, despite holding a numerical advantage of nearly two to one, had chased the enemy without a flicker of suspicion and brought grievous harm upon his own men; a petty, cowardly officer who had bolted from the field without so much as a thought for rallying his scattered army.

The battle with Han Yeong's army heaped such monstrous disgrace upon him that his old epithet—the Wolf of Bing Province—all but paled into oblivion.

Several days had passed since the battle ended.

Once they had tidied their ranks, Han Yeong's forces came right up before Ding ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Yuan's camp and hurled their provocations, but by his order—another trap had to be waiting, he was certain—the soldiers did not budge an inch, and the standoff only dragged on.

Ding Yuan held his camp fast, exactly as Zhang Yang had urged; yet in his head, the humiliating words that had reached his ears on his return from the brink of death kept circling round and round.

"As expected, it should be the young and promising General Lu Bu who commands and leads this army."

"The old Governor is all bluster and no follow-through—a commander of no ability whatsoever."

"Lu Bu is the one fit to lead our strength as a true warlord."

That was what the sharp gazes of the soldiers who had come back alive alongside Lu Bu seemed to say.

CRASH—!!

GRAAAARGH—!! Ding Yuan loosed a howl like a beast whose pride had been torn open.

By the heaven-sent luck of Lu Bu's aid he had kept his life by a hair, but he could not smother the fury boiling within; he hurled the ornaments from his quarters and spewed out every ounce of the bitterness festering inside him.

The humiliation of defeat. His dignity crashed to the very bottom. The grief of losing soldiers who had followed him with unshaking loyalty—all of it churned together into one anguished cry.

Already white-haired with age and swathed in bandages from his burns, he might have cut a pitiable figure; but the vicious snarl on his face was enough to make even the hardiest officers and men go weak at the knees.

Lu Bu had, the insolence of her, defied the military order issued from his own lips—yet the merit of saving his life had wiped the offense clean, and minding the eyes around him, he had even raised her rank, along with Zhang Liao's.

When the rumor spread that she had been in league with Han Yeong's army, he had tried to use it to strip her of any footing from which she might threaten him—and that very maneuver had turned to poison in his hands instead. Pardoned of her crime by her towering achievement, Lu Bu was enfeoffed as Cavalry Commandant, while Zhang Liao and Gao Shun were likewise appointed Colonels given charge of the garrison troops.

What was more, the battle had cost him so many of the loyal soldiers who followed him that he had been forced to siphon the troops garrisoned in Luoyang to pressure the court officials and march them out to the camp.

"General. Are you within?"

"...Enter."

Having spent his fury on the ornaments, Ding Yuan granted the figure standing before the command tent leave to come in.

Zhang Yang, who moved about under the guise of a strategist called Zhang Gong, stepped into the tent. A veil of gauze hid his face from view, but beneath it his expression rippled and twisted.

...Fool. I warned him until my lips wore thin. And in the end, all he managed was to throw away a great mass of his own soldiers.

The man had never once taken the advice carved out for him, had swaggered about with overwhelming power at his back and wallowed in arrogance—and this was where it had landed him.

Zhang Yang was genuinely torn, just as the rumors drifting through Luoyang implied: whether to treat Ding Yuan like the hound cooked once the hunt was over—discarding him and switching his patronage to Lu Bu.

Lu Bu's martial skill was superb but her wits were dull, so she might prove easier to handle than Ding Yuan, that congealed lump of arrogance; yet so long as Zhang Yang himself could not step out before the world, coping with sudden turns of circumstance would be difficult.

For now, driving out Han Yeong's army comes first.

Lu Bu's heroics had brought Ding Yuan back alive, and the soldiers too had barely clung to their lives, so annihilation had been averted—but measured purely by the scale of the damage, the loss remained overwhelming.

The Black Mountain Bandits' forces had been wiped out to the last man, and the Luoyang soldiers had been taken prisoner where they stood; surrender or death would be the only choices left to them.

Had it not been for Lu Bu acting on her own authority, Ding Yuan ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠would have died beyond all doubt that day.

Even if the captured soldiers surrendered and grain ran short to feed them, it would pose no great problem.

However suddenly his host swelled, Han Yeong, master of the provinces of Yong and Liang, could ship supplies in with ease and keep his army fed.

Which was precisely why a move had already been laid to sever that very supply line.

It is a mercy that the man agreed to take up the stratagem I wrote him.

Days earlier, when Ding Yuan had marched out to make war on Han Yeong, Zhang Yang had dispatched an agent into Yong Province bearing treasure and a letter; the reply had reached him only the night before.

Before long, Han Yeong's army would withdraw from Luoyang as naturally as the tide.

"Was there something you wished to say?"

"I have come concerning the troops Your Lordship pulled from the garrisons stationed in Luoyang to keep the private soldiers of the court officials in check."

"...What choice was there? Han Yeong's army must be held in check, and his offensive prepared for."

Nearly thirty thousand troops were arrayed in the camp as things stood, while fewer than five thousand had been left behind in Luoyang.

One might call that an ample number, but for the manifold duties of the garrison and the watching of so vast a city, the manpower ran somewhat thin.

With the force guarding the palace reduced, the number of soldiers posted to keep watch over the Emperor and the Prince of Chenliu had naturally dwindled as well.

He had to track the court officials' every movement and manage the mood of Luoyang's people besides.

Keeping Han Yeong in check alone already stretched him to his limit; if some grandee of the Clear Stream faction were to collude with a warlord of Gongsun Zan's martial caliber and force his way into this struggle, it would be the end of Ding Yuan's world.

"You must draw another warlord into your camp and swell your army."

"...On that count, I have already set things in motion."

Ding Yuan was not so drowned in rage as to be without thought.

He had already worked out a means to fill the gaps in his troops and his strength.

Zhang Yan, chief of the Black Mountain Bandits and holder of the title General of the Household of Henan—and Guo Tai, chief of the White Wave Bandits.

Ding Yuan, who had governed Bing Province, had never been on the closest of terms with them, but dealings between them had existed in their own fashion.

Bandits though they were, they commanded immense power in the north, and he meant to coax them with promises of official titles and thereby expand his military strength.

The Black Mountain Bandits above all possessed a massive host, to say nothing of Zhang Yan's outstanding skill at arms.

"If they lend me their strength, then I will set Lu Bu at the fore and show that detestable whelp his end."

The detestable whelp he spoke of was Han Yeong.

Unlike the rout that had befallen him when he swallowed the feigned-retreat bait, if the Unrivaled Under Heaven led his vanguard, even soldiers who barely cohered would move as one the moment they witnessed her martial glory.

Of course, having spurned Lu Bu over the rumors Han Yeong's army had spread, to raise her up again now was shameless beyond words—but still.

"As for Han Yeong... I have already made my arrangements."

"...What? When, in all the world, did you—? What exactly have you done?"

"Did I not tell you before? That I would make Han Yeong's army withdraw."

Zhang Yang answered with a thin, cold smile.

"I extended a hand of mercy to the one man in all this world who must hate Han Yeong more than any other."

At those words, delivered with a sinister smile, Ding Yuan could only tilt his head, understanding nothing.

Ma Chao, who had bled freely at Lu Bu's hands, had lost consciousness partway through her examination by the physician. Suturing the wound at her shoulder must have been pure agony.

"How does Ma Chao fare?"

At my anxious question, the physician bent at the waist and answered.

"Her condition was grave, but her body is strong. With a good stretch of rest, she will be quite herself again."

"...Whew. Thank goodness. I was worried out of my mind."

Part of it was Ma Chao's sturdy constitution, but the wound had missed anything vital—truly a stroke of fortune.

She had blocked Lu Bu's attacks while already wounded, tearing the injury at her shoulder back open, and that was why the treatment had taken so long.

The moment Lu Bu took the field, our army had judged a trial of strength hopeless and moved to spring the feigned retreat once more—but the enemy kept their camp gates barred tight and refused to rise to the bait.

Winter was settling in; the weather was turning colder by the day and the snow had begun to fall in slow earnest, and before long our soldiers would be wrung by the bitterest cold.

Our men were Liang Province–born and hardy against the frost, but once the snow lay deep, the mobility that made our army a cavalry force would ebb away, and even a retreat would turn into a slog.

"So what do you plan to do now, I wonder?"

"...Hard to say. Still weighing it."

I could not hand Jia Xu a firm answer.

Avenging Ma Chao—or falling back for now and promising ourselves a later day.

We had won a sweeping victory through the fire attack, and yet we had held our hand, in part because Ma Chao lay in grave condition.

I did want to wash away the shame against Lu Bu.

Whenever I pictured Ma Chao, whom I treasured more dearly than anyone, lying abed, the fury still boiled up in me.

With Ma Chao ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠injured, a head-on fight would go against us—but with a scheme properly laid, we could win. That was why I could not quite let it go.

Even in the last battle, the only reason a variable had crept in at all was that Lu Bu—officially under disciplinary confinement—had forced her way in even at the cost of defying military orders.

Had we built a meticulous strategy from the very start on the premise of facing Lu Bu, we would never have been struck back like this.

In a word, our luck had simply been god-awful.

Spoken aloud, it might sound like consolation borrowed against the facts—but it was the truth.

Jia Xu had apologized at the time, saying she had failed to examine the stratagem with due rigor, but I told her to think nothing of it.

What lunatic in this world defies the military order his own superior handed down and rides out with barely a few dozen horse to pull an ally back from the brink?

Measured on nerve alone, it could be called dauntless beyond measure; but hurling oneself in without weighing what lay ahead could only be called senseless.

Just as I was agonizing over whether to withdraw or press the fight, Yan Xing burst in, urgency written all over him.

"My lord!!"

A single letter was in Yan Xing's hand.

"What is it?"

"A letter from Fa Zheng, my lord!!"

"Fa Zheng?"

Fa Yan, who managed the internal civil affairs of the army, stood nearby, and at the words a letter from his daughter his expression changed as well.

A dispatch from Fa Zheng—who had retaken Chang'an and stood wary against Dong Zhuo. I hurriedly unfolded it and read.

As I read, the grip of the hand holding the letter tightened.

"...Damn it all."

Having read it, I very nearly let fly a curse from the very bottom of my heart.

What the letter said was blunt and to the point.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

...He had squandered the goodwill of the great clans and should have had neither the means nor the treasure to raise a proper army—how in the world did he buy a general over?

The reason escaped me, but if this letter was true, then we had no choice but to withdraw. We could not keep fighting with a knife at our backs.

"...That son of a bitch never does us a single favor, right up to the very end."

To us, Chang'an was a bulwark we could never, under any circumstances, afford to lose.

Fa Zheng and Uncle Ma Teng could likely hold that host at bay—perhaps even divine a victory—but the trouble was that waging the war would make securing our supply lines to Luoyang all but impossible.

...There is no way around it, is there?

Ma Chao's condition weighed on me, and with the shape of things to come at least partly foreseeable, there was no need to gamble our lives in a fight here.

With the field turned thus, only one choice remained.