Dignified and Excellent
Waaaaah!!!
I snatched up the weapons the eunuchs had handed out and charged outside, only to find He Jin’s men already pouring through the gates.
Blade clashes erupted everywhere. People died fighting back; others fled. The whole place had turned into a living hell.
“...”
Sudden terror washed over me. In the end, I was the one who had thrown open the gates of this hell, wasn’t I?
Saying it was going to happen anyway felt hollow when I’d had days to stop it.
But the die was already cast. What was I supposed to do now? I spotted a eunuch I knew, collapsed on the ground, blood pouring from him.
Ugh...
Nausea surged up. I’d forgotten this game was more real than reality itself.
I’d watched Chosun kill before, but she’d done it so fast in the dark that it never felt real. This guy, though...
“Help me...”
He barely managed to find me and whispered in a dying voice. Instinct drove me to him. I dropped to my knees and checked his condition.
“C-can you get up?”
“I don’t know... It’s cold... I keep remembering when I was little. One day Father gave me meat soup and I was so happy eating it... Then all of a sudden he took me somewhere and—cough...”
His life flashed before his eyes as he spat up thick, gurgling blood. Worse than the blood spattering my body was the shock of watching a life snuff out right in front of me. I couldn’t even open my mouth.
“My stomach... hurts...”
“I’ll try to stop the bleeding. Like this...”
Gurgle, gurgle...
The second I pressed my hands down to stanch the wound, a mass of intestines—large or small, I couldn’t tell—spilled out. I recoiled so hard I landed on my ass.
“Hiiik...”
“Cough... cough...”
His awareness was already fading fast. And I, staring at that raw pile of guts overflowing, felt my own mind go blank.
Uegh... uegh...
I heaved several times, yet the sick feeling wouldn’t leave. Tears I couldn’t stop spilled for a man I barely knew, and all that filled me was regret at ever ending up in a place like this.
“Hah... hah...”
After retching until nothing more came up, the vomiting finally stopped. By then he had gone completely limp, slipping into rigor mortis.
“Uuugh...”
My head was completely scrambled as I forced myself to my feet. Just seeing that scene was going to leave a trauma that would follow me into real life. And according to the records, two thousand eunuchs were massacred here today, weren’t they?
“Over there! There’s a eunuch!”
That was when a voice thick with malice yanked my fraying sanity taut again.
They weren’t soldiers in proper armor. Three men in mismatched clothes came toward me, armed with everything from swords and spears to clubs.
“N-no! I’m not a eunuch!”
I immediately flung my weapon aside and raised both arms in surrender. But their ears, flooded with adrenaline from the chaos, heard nothing.
“Not a eunuch, my ass! Who else is left in here but eunuchs?”
“I’m really not! Look at this! I’ve still got my dick!”
With a desperate thrash for survival I yanked open my robe and dropped my pants. They clearly never expected me to volunteer the proof; every pair of eyes went round as saucers.
“H-he really has one? Then what the hell is a guy who’s not even a eunuch doing in here?”
“I’m just an ordinary commoner who does menial work in the palace. What on earth is going on?”
They looked like neighborhood thugs Yuan Shu had dragged along; how would they know palace protocol? I fed them a plausible enough excuse and they all cocked their heads.
“You know where the Son of Heaven went?”
“I think he headed for the north gate.”
“Fuck, we just came from the north gate and you’re saying he went there? Let’s get back, now!”
Apparently the emperor’s location mattered more than a eunuch like me. They spun around and raced for the north gate. Whew... lucky break. Time to slip out of here myself...
Neigh...
But one person was still standing there. Right as I was awkwardly trying to pull my pants back up.
I found Bibi—no, Yu Bi—standing right in front of me. Huh? Who did I just call?
“Y-Yu Bi? What are you doing here?”
“Ah... is that... Do Yeop’s... hnnngh...”
Yu Bi couldn’t tear her bulging eyes away from my crotch; both hands flew up to cup her cheeks. I yanked my pants up at once and ran to her.
“What is it, Yu Bi? What are you doing in here?”
“That is precisely what I wish to ask! How is it that even after becoming a eunuch, that... is still attached?”
“What are you talking about... Who said I was a eunuch? Don’t you know castrating a grown man like me kills him nine times out of ten?”
“Oh dear... I know little of castration... And this is the first time I have ever seen a grown man’s ‘that’...”
“...”
Yu Bi was so shocked at seeing a man’s member for the first time in her life that she was babbling to herself. In the middle of all this she’d just certified herself as a virgin—should I be happy about that or not?
“Calm down, Yu Bi! Why did you come in here?”
“Master said it would be good experience and told me to go greet the Grand General. Then earlier, when the Prince of Chenliu was processing past, I happened to catch sight of you, Do Yeop. Soon after, an uproar broke out inside the palace; Zhang Yang came out onto the walls, threw down the Grand General’s head, and demanded negotiations.”
After that it was the story everyone already knew. Furious Lu Zhi, Wang Yun, Yuan Shao and the rest had tried to storm the palace at once.
But thanks to Zhang Yang’s scheme, command had already been stripped from them and handed entirely to Fan Ling and He Shang.
That was when Yuan Shu’s gang—the only ones who’d been seriously preparing for a fight—made their dramatic entrance. The moment they smashed the gates open with Wu Guang, Yuan Shao, not to be outdone, sent men home to drag every private soldier he had.
“So then you should have just stuck close behind Lu Zhi and Yuan Shao. Why did you come in here alone?”
“But I had no choice! Lord Yuan Shao ordered every eunuch inside the palace put to death. If I left things as they were, would you not have been in danger as well, Do Yeop?”
“...”
So she’d been so worried about me that she’d risked charging into the palace alone? That heart of hers was so precious I wanted to pat her on the head all day long—but it still didn’t change the fact that she’d done something stupid.
“Yu Bi? As you just saw, I’m not really a eunuch, so you don’t need to worry.”
“Ah... I saw it too. Do Yeop’s dignified and excellent, long yet firm-looking...”
“Y-you don’t need to describe it in that much detail... Anyway, I can get out somehow, so you should hurry back to Lu Zhi or Yuan Shao...”
Neigh!
Just then a horse’s whinny rang out from somewhere, and two mounts arrived beside us.
One carried a eunuch holding the other’s reins; he, too, was covered in blood.
“Cough... Take these horses... and the Son of Heaven...”
Thud!
With those words he toppled straight off the horse. From the look of it, he’d mistaken me for a fellow eunuch and tried to send at least one more person to protect the emperor—a loyal man to the end.
“Ah... now that we have two horses, we can ride them and escape.”
Just as she said, two horses had appeared as if someone had arranged it. Perfect opportunity. Except there was one problem.
“Uh... that might be tough. I don’t know how to ride.”
“What do you mean? A hero like you, Do Yeop, cannot ride a horse?”
Hero, my ass... I’m a Chi-byung-nan-byung, what nonsense is she spouting?
I’d ridden horses on Jeju Island, sure. Though “ridden” mostly meant sitting on a running horse for a few seconds.
Actually holding the reins myself was a completely different story. Yu Bi, however, remained optimistic.
“Oh, come now... there is no need to worry. I am from the northern marches and skilled at riding; I shall carry you.”
She said that, then grunted and strained... For all her confident talk, it still took her several seconds just to climb into the saddle. So she was going to carry me?
“Isn’t it a bit small for two people? And if I climb up behind you, the position’s going to be a little...”
“Over there! Another eunuch!”
But more armed men were already charging toward me from a distance. I had no choice; I scrambled up behind Yu Bi and wrapped my arms around her dizzyingly slender waist.
Hyaa!
Her claim that she was good with horses was no empty boast. The woman who had looked clumsy at everything else transformed the instant she took the reins into a seasoned rider, cutting through the enemies like an arrow.
“Where must we go?”
“The west gate. They haven’t secured the west gate yet, so it’s safe. Head that way.”
Zhang Yang had stolen the emperor and fled west only to run into Dong Zhuo, so west should still be clear. Yu Bi spurred the horse hard toward the west.
Neigh!
As expected, no He Jin men held the west gate. Instead, the corpses of eunuchs who had tried to escape first and been trampled by their own piled up in heaps.
Yu Bi rode straight over those eunuch bodies and out through the west gate. Only after we had galloped a long way did I shout into her ear.
“Stop here!”
Neigh!
Yu Bi reined in at once. I hopped down from the horse.
“Ah... why are you dismounting so suddenly?”
She followed me down and asked. Are you seriously asking because you don’t know?
“I’m grateful you helped me escape, but from here our paths diverge. I’m going west after the Prince of Chenliu. You should rejoin Lu Zhi.”
“W-what do you mean? Master will also try to rescue the Son of Heaven and the Prince of Chenliu. In that case, would it not be better for us to go together?”
“Uh... that makes sense, but I have something else I need to do. I’ll be going now.”
“...”
Yu Bi didn’t answer. She only stared at me endlessly with eyes that looked ready to cry at any moment.
Then, plip... a single wistful tear rolled down. She sniffled in that distinctive way of hers and spoke.
“Sniff... Why must you say such cruel things? I came all this way because I was worried about you, Do Yeop. Why, after meeting me for the first time in days, do you only try to leave as if I am not even here?”
This sly girl was using her tear-duct skill again, doubling her charm. I forced myself to look away so I wouldn’t fall for it.
“I said thank you, didn’t I? But from here on the work gets too dangerous for you to follow. Just getting me out of the palace was already more than enough help.”
“But until this chaos ends, if I cannot confirm that you are safe, Do Yeop, I do not think I will be able to sleep. So please, return with me to Master!”
“Why are you being so stubborn... Honestly, you don’t have to go this far for me, do you? Our debt of gratitude was already settled at the last poetry contest.”
“Again with those wounding words... But are we not from the same hometown? Should we not help each other?”
“I’m not actually from Zhuo County. I just didn’t want to explain, so I picked a place at random and it happened to match.”
“...”
Yu Bi took a solid hit from the news that we weren’t hometown friends after all. The tear that had been rolling stopped halfway down her cheek while she scrambled for another excuse.
“B-but you have always helped me, Do Yeop. When we left Chwiwharu and lived under the pontoon bridge, did you not feed and support me as if I were your wife?”
“Back then I thought you were even more broke than I was. Do you know how betrayed I felt when you showed up in brand-new clothes bought with the money you’d carefully saved?”
“Ah... that was because I thought I needed at least minimal propriety to make a difficult request of Master... And there is more! When I tried to head for Mengjin, you did not want to lose me and came looking for me even while being chased by Yuan Shu’s men, did you not?”
“I didn’t go looking for you—you got caught because you were goofing off. Honestly, if you’d actually gone to Mengjin that day, how was I supposed to follow you all the way there?”
“Sigh... Are we not comrades who shared joy and hardship at Chwiwharu? And you are the only one who ever treated me like a human being when everyone else scorned and looked down on me.”
“Didn’t you used to say Yuan Shao did the same, like a habit? And while we’re at it, I’ve been meaning to ask—what’s that necklace around your neck? I’ve never seen it before.”
One thing had been bothering me the whole time. The finely carved necklace hanging at Yu Bi’s throat.
If I thought that thing was worth exactly one silver tael, was I getting ahead of myself?
“Hup... T-this is something I happened to buy when I went to the marketplace today.”
“Who ‘happens’ to buy something? And where did you get the money, Yu Bi? You wouldn’t have spent the pocket money Lu Zhi gave you for living expenses on something like that, would you?”
“That is...”
“You bought it with the silver tael Yuan Shao gave you! You went to see him full of pride, hoping for a word of praise, so why are you acting like this with me?”
“I-it is a misunderstanding! I merely respect Lord Yuan Shao’s heroic spirit and upright character. There is nothing personal about it!”
“...”
Yu Bi might have been claiming innocence in her own way. But she hadn’t forgotten I was the Chi-byung-nan-byung White-Haired Failure, had she?
The fact that she worshipped Yuan Shao as a capable man pissed me off more than if she’d liked him as a man!
This was hopeless. No matter what Yu Bi said now, I had to go my own way....
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!
But right then a sandstorm suddenly whipped up from somewhere, and nearly ten cavalrymen came galloping in, surrounding us in an instant.
“What are these? A eunuch and a palace maid?”
“The capital really is something. A palace maid this pretty—is that even allowed?”
“...”
Having lived only in Luoyang since the game began, I was seeing clothes and hearing a thick accent for the first time in my life. On top of that, even a complete amateur like me could tell their horsemanship was top-tier.
I could stake my entire fortune that these were Dong Zhuo’s soldiers.
One five-shu coin.