The Han River Floods and the Relief Army Commander
"General! General! Save us!"
"Here—over here too! Please, save us!"
Yu Jin could only stand there, mouth hanging open, utterly at a loss. What on earth was he supposed to do in a situation like this?
Before his eyes, his own men thronged and wailed, begging him for their lives.
The cause of it all was rain. When the first drops had begun to fall a few days earlier, he had never imagined things would come to this.
At first he had thought it enough simply to secure the grain and the weapons. But the time it took for a soft drizzle to become a catastrophe was not long at all. The moment the swelling water began to lap at their ankles, Yu Jin knew the fire had already reached his feet.
He tried to abandon the supplies and climb to higher ground—but it was already too late.
The Han River, which ran between the twin cities of Xiangfan, had burst its banks. It buried Xiangyang and Fancheng alike, and it buried Yu Jin's seven armies with them.
Yu Jin and his soldiers had no choice but to forsake food and matériel and seek only a path to survival. Higher ground—always higher—to escape the water.
For days on end they fought wind and rain and thunder. Never in his life had he seen a downpour like this.
No—to call it a downpour was not enough. Yu Jin even found himself wondering whether the rain might simply drown the world.
At the very least, his world looked as though it had already ended. These were the elite seven armies the King of Wei, Cao Cao, had personally entrusted to him. Looking at them now, one could find no trace of elite troops.
Every scrap of ground that could still be stood upon was packed tight with soldiers who had barely managed to crawl free, and beneath them the blackened water roared past as if ready to swallow them whole at any moment.
The thirty thousand men of the great host, scattered in every direction, clung to life in isolated clusters and nothing more.
From the sky, it would have looked like islands risen from the sea, each one crowded with people.
When at last the days-long catastrophe from the heavens ceased and the sun they had so desperately longed for rose, the only things that surfaced on their faces were worry and despair.
"H-help! Somebody help!"
One soldier lost his footing and was swept away.
No one even thought of saving him. They could only stare, blank and helpless.
Yu Jin was no exception. He had to save them somehow—but there was no way. The nightmare of the Red Cliffs rose in his mind, and a low groan escaped him.
If only I had prepared boats in advance…
Regret changed nothing. And then—
"General! Ships approaching from that direction!"
"Ships?"
Yu Jin clung to a thread of hope. Sure enough, vessels were growing larger on the water's surface. Could it be a rescue?
Boom, boom, boom, boom!
Clang, clang, clang, clang!
Drums and gongs sounded together.
"General! It's Guan Yu's navy. Guan Yu is leading his fleet this way."
The soldier's cry shattered what little hope remained and replaced it with a deeper despair.
Guan Yu? And a navy? A navy?
Looking where the man pointed, he saw it was true—Guan Yu's forces were advancing straight toward them aboard ships. From bad to worse.
I heard Guan Yu was gathering boats… was this what he intended? How many moves ahead had he been looking?
The ships closed in, surrounding the little islands one by one. Soldiers hemmed in by Guan Yu's navy surrendered without a fight.
"General… what should we do…?"
The soldier beside him mumbled, watching his face. Yu Jin squeezed his eyes shut.
This is all my fault. My response was too complacent.
No matter how he looked at it, there was no fighting to be done. For days they had barely eaten, battling the torrential rain; most of their weapons and armor had been abandoned or lost in the chaos.
Perhaps it was even a mercy that Guan Yu's navy had come. If they could not fight, then at least the men's lives had to be preserved.
Yu Jin cracked open his eyes and spoke in a voice gone raw.
"There's nothing for it. All of us will surrender to Guan Yu's army."
A bitter decision for a general who had led elite troops.
Without a single proper battle, Yu Jin and the elite seven armies knelt before Guan Yu. Guan Yu took them all in and had them transferred to the rear.
Then he kept the navy advancing, to mop up what remained of the enemy.
In every direction the swollen waters of the Han River filled the world. Only days before the river had been clear and calm; now it had swollen several times over—tens of times over—and its color was foul with the silt it had scoured from the land.
Truly… truly a rain that could swallow the world. I never thought it would be this severe.
While Guan Yu was briefly lost in thought, Guan Ping at his side cried out.
"Father! Xiahou Yuan's army is over there!"
"Xiahou Yuan."
Where Guan Ping pointed, Xiahou Yuan's forces were gathered atop a dike, his banners snapping in the wind.
Since the battle for Xiangfan had begun, Xiahou Yuan had harassed Guan Yu time and again. But even that swift general could not escape a catastrophe of this magnitude.
Xiahou Yuan's unit had originally been posted a short distance north of Fancheng. Their situation was better than Yu Jin's, at least—they had managed to take refuge on the dike. Even so, they had not been able to stop a considerable number of soldiers from being swept away.
"Offer them surrender first."
"Yes, Father."
But he did not yield as easily as Yu Jin had.
"Why should I fear death? Even if today becomes the day of my funeral rites, I will never kneel! Guan Yu—if you mean to come, then come as you please!"
So he shouted, resolved to fight to the last. Truly the valorous general who had followed Cao Cao since the first raising of arms.
Heartened by his spirit, Xiahou Yuan's soldiers readied themselves for battle. It was only a dike, but there was ground enough to plant their feet and fight.
"Then we shall grant his wish. Attack!"
Guan Yu's forces ringed the dike with their ships and trained their bows on Xiahou Yuan's men from every side.
Xiahou Yuan held on stubbornly. When he himself took up a bow and loosed arrows, each one found its mark—Guan Yu's soldiers screaming and falling.
Inspired by his desperate stand, his men fought on without flinching beneath the rain of arrows from every direction.
Guan Yu's brow furrowed.
A handful of remnants, and still they thrash about.
No matter how Xiahou Yuan struggled, there was no path to victory. But as casualties among his own men mounted, Guan Yu gave the order himself.
"Bring the ships alongside the dike! Climb up and sweep them all away!"
"Father, be careful—!"
In that instant, with Guan Ping's cry, an arrow flew and buried itself in Guan Yu's arm.
Whissh—!
"Kh—!"
It was Xiahou Yuan. Watching Guan Yu from a distance, he had not hesitated the moment the general drew near—he had loosed the shot.
"Nngh…"
Guan Yu looked at the arrow in his arm and swallowed a groan.
Had Fa Zheng—who had once planned Xiahou Yuan's assassination in Hanzhong and failed—heard of this, he would have beaten his breast in anguish. And in the near future, when Jin Cheong learned of it, she too would only sigh—though for reasons somewhat different from Fa Zheng's.
But Guan Yu was not a man to be cowed by a single arrow. The God of War's command filled the field of battle.
"Did you think a scrap of an arrow like this could bring me down? Keep attacking! I will take that head of yours, just as you wished!"
Xiahou Yuan's men fought bravely, but in the end they could not withstand Guan Yu's forces pressing in like an angry tide.
Most fell in battle. Xiahou Yuan was taken alive and forced to his knees before Guan Yu.
"You fought splendidly to the last. Even now—will you not serve His Majesty the King of Hanzhong?"
"Lord Guan. Could you serve His Majesty the King of Wei?"
"Never."
"I would have answered the same."
"Then do not hesitate. Cut off my head cleanly."
"Very well. I shall grant your wish."
Having firmly refused Guan Yu's final offer, Xiahou Yuan was beheaded at Fancheng by Guan Yu's hand.
"Treat his remains with due respect."
Courtesy for a loyal subject of Cao Cao, and a valorous general.
Then Guan Yu turned his gaze toward Xiangyang and Fancheng. Both cities had suffered heavily from the flood. The walls stood more than half submerged; most of the grain and weapons would have been soaked through.
Breaking those two cities was now only a matter of time—so long as nothing unexpected occurred.
"Your Majesty, King of Wei. It grieves me to report this, but General Yu Jin and the seven armies have surrendered to the enemy, and General Xiahou Yuan has been beheaded."
"What did you say?!"
"The Han River overflowed in the torrential rains, and…"
At the report of his advisor Zhang Ji, Cao Cao could not help but start in shock.
Cao Cao was presently in Xuchang. After his defeat by Liu Bei in Hanzhong, he had been reviewing the state of affairs from here. He had been tense at Guan Yu's northward advance, but he had believed that sending reinforcements would be enough to hold the line. And now—how long had it been since those reinforcements were dispatched—and this was the news that reached him?
"Xiahou Yuan dead, and Yu Jin surrendered… Ha. Hahaha…"
It was so absurd that laughter even escaped him.
Yu Jin was a renowned general who had won many merits since the earliest days of the rising. Cao Cao had trusted him and given him every elite soldier of the seven armies that could be mustered at once.
And Xiahou Yuan had been to him as a brother.
Yu Jin's surrender and Xiahou Yuan's death. He no longer knew which of the two he ought to lament more.
"Your Majesty—what will you do?"
At Zhang Ji's question, Cao Cao set his lament aside for later.
What else? Send more reinforcements. But whom do I send this time?
Even after several defeats, Wei's strength was still vast, and there was ample capacity to dispatch another relief force. The question was who would command it.
After a moment's thought, Cao Cao summoned his third son, Cao Zhi.
"Jageon."
"Yes, Father."
"I am considering appointing you commander and sending you to Fancheng with a relief army."
"What?!"
The one who was more startled by those words was not Cao Zhi, but the eldest son, Cao Pi.
"Father, send me instead. Jageon still lacks experience in command."
"That is not for you to concern yourself with. And I am not sending Jageon alone—I will attach experienced generals such as Zhu Ling, Xu Shang, and Lü Qian. Jageon need only gain battlefield experience and return."
"But even so…"
"Say no more. I have already decided. And Yang Xiu—you will assist Zhi as his strategist."
"Yes, Your Majesty! Leave it to me! I shall assist him with all my heart!"
The moment the order fell, Yang Xiu answered with full confidence.
Cao Cao's decision had not been sudden. Originally, following Jia Xu's counsel, he had intended to name Cao Pi his heir.
But he had not forgotten Cao Pi's outrageous mockery of Wang Zhong and Cao Zhang during the Hanzhong campaign. And so he had still not firmly settled the succession.
He had summoned Cao Zhi from Yecheng to Xuchang precisely to test his qualities.
He had no intention of sending Cao Pi to the front just now, and Cao Zhang had been dispatched on patrol and border watch because of the frequent uprisings of late. In that moment, the one who came to mind was Cao Zhi, standing right beside him.
"Father. If you send this son of yours, I will give it everything I have."
"Good."
When Cao Zhi spoke with composure, Cao Cao nodded.
This time, he expected his son to bring back a result that would satisfy him.
But beside him, Cao Pi's insides burned black.
Why does Father set aside his eldest son and make Zhi the commander of the relief army? Does he mean to cast me aside and name Zhi the heir?
Watching the backs of Cao Zhi and Yang Xiu as they left to prepare for the march, Cao Pi quietly ground his teeth.