Bugok (3)
The capital, Luoyang, was the heart of the Han Empire—the city toward which every soul who dreamed of office made his way, great ambitions in tow.
Outstanding ability was a given, of course. But even the most gifted found no door to advancement opening for them if the right connections failed to follow.
And yet this very Luoyang harbored one glaring problem: young talents fresh into their posts rarely lasted long once they stepped through the court's gates.
It was hard to blame them. Climb a single rung of the official ladder in Luoyang and you found yourself surrounded by political titans whose names every citizen had heard at least once. More often than not, the newly appointed simply could not withstand the ferocious undercurrents of intrigue churning beneath the court's surface, and were washed out one after another.
If fortune smiled, the Emperor's eye might fall upon you and set you on an express course of meteoric promotion—but such luck was exceedingly rare.
And so an official entrenched in Luoyang's court was left with, in practice, only two choices.
The first, as I just said, was to catch the Emperor's eye and bask in his favor. The Ten Attendants, who had contributed so very greatly to reducing the Han to its present state, were the classic example. Because Liu Hong—posthumously honored as Emperor Xiaoling and better known simply as Emperor Ling—lavished his affection on them, the Ten Attendants climbed to a height no one dared lay a finger on.
The second was to scrape together every scheme at one's disposal, prove one's ability, and claw one's way up the ranks a step at a time. Winning the Emperor's favor was, in truth, little different from winning the lottery, so anyone with real seasoning in the political arena chose this road over leaving things to chance.
Both paths too grueling for you?
Then there was nothing for it but to live meekly with your head down, waiting for a posting to some idle sinecure to fall into your lap. That was the usual lot of young talents newly arrived in office.
Truly frightening old men, those.
Which was why I made a habit of taking noteworthy talents under my wing—freeing them from political pressure, lending them a hand where I could. After all, doesn't the famous adage warn that water left standing will rot in the end? It was all for the sake of a healthy cycle, of offices turning over instead of going stale.
Even Jia Xu, who had few peers in the art of conducting oneself through the world, never once moved to stop me—so I acted with that much less hesitation. And who, watching me carry on this way, would dare breathe a word of complaint?
It sits a little awkwardly to say it with my own mouth, but I currently enjoyed the Emperor's favor. Just as the Ten Attendants had basked in the affection of Liu Hong—Emperor Ling—I basked in that of Liu Bian, the young Emperor Shao, and so for now no one at court could hold me in check.
But with matters in this state, a curious crowd had lately begun to appear at court.
Didn't I just say there were two ways to survive Luoyang's political struggles? It felt as though a third had been added to the list.
And what was that third way? Simple: catch my eye, and make me your shield.
The reasoning ran that since the Emperor spared hardly a glance for any official but me, my favor was as good as the Emperor's own, wasn't it? I couldn't bring myself to dispute Jia Xu's explanation. And when Xun You and Sima Yi chimed in—observing that, with my easygoing attitude, the ranks of those acting this way would only keep growing—I had no rebuttal for that either. Not that I had done any of it deliberately, mind you.
Looked at closely, it amounted to a brand-new faction taking shape around me—much like the Clear Stream and Muddy Stream factions of Emperor Ling's day.
I had expected something of the sort eventually. The seat I occupied was none other than General-in-Chief; it would have been stranger if no faction had sprung up.
The Emperor, for his part, watched the new faction coalesce around me and made no move to touch it. Considering everything he had shown me so far, perhaps that was only natural. The established grandees were far too sharp-eyed to submit memorials warning that my influence at court was swelling and ought to be curbed—doing so would plainly earn them the Emperor's displeasure, and even I couldn't say for certain what would become of a grandee who fell from his sovereign's grace.
Of course, their silence had another root as well: because I strove to govern with benevolence wherever I could, they saw no reason to collide with me. Had I committed every manner of misgovernment like the Ten Attendants or Dong Zhuo of the history I knew, these men would have stood against me at the cost of their very lives. Most of the grandees in the imperial court were straight as bamboo rods—people of unbending principle, with integrity to spare.
In any case, once the new faction formed around me, everyone who had risen to office with grand ambitions threw himself into catching my eye. Sending me rare and precious gifts was the standard approach; others mobilized every flattering word in the language to sing my praises.
I divided these hopefuls by a single criterion before granting any of them an audience.
Had they committed any crimes on the road to their current position?
To put it more concretely, I examined in exacting detail whether they had ever oppressed the powerless. Crimes among the aristocratic class—the great clans—tended to be hopelessly tangled affairs, so I gave those a cursory glance and moved on. Trying to adjudicate their political squabbles over mutual gain from a third party's seat produced nothing but a headache.
Crimes that bled helpless commoners dry, on the other hand, left no room for excuse whatsoever. Whether they had been blinded by wealth or blinded by something else entirely, the fact remained: they had tormented commoners who had no way to fight back. If that wasn't the very picture of a corrupt official, what was?
Having seen how this country had been brought to such a pass, I had come to loathe corrupt officials with a passion.
And what became of the corrupt officials who fell into my hands…?
"General-in-Chief! This is a misunderstanding! I have never once squeezed a single innocent commoner!"
I looked down at the official—a man whose entire estate stood on the brink of confiscation—kneeling and crying out in desperation.
"Then I take it the information I obtained was wrong?"
"…!"
"Then by all means, explain. Are you seriously claiming this ledger was doctored?"
"Th-that is…!"
When I held out the evidence, the official—whose past record of graft matched its entries to the letter—broke into a cold sweat.
"A whole family running schemes like this right on Luoyang's doorstep. It's been a long time since I've seen the like."
"General-in-Chief! I beg you—forgive me just this once!"
Forgive you? There's nothing to forgive.
As if there were nothing more worth hearing, I gave my order to the officer at my side.
"Confiscate every last coin of their property, and lock every person involved away in prison."
"As you command."
The woman—her black hair so long it nearly swept the ground, gathered into a ponytail—bowed to me with clasped hands. She directed the soldiers with effortless command, and at her word they seized the corrupt official by the arms where he lay prostrate before me and began dragging him off to prison.
"Have mercy! Mercy, General-in-Chief—!"
To the man being hauled away, I tossed out a few words, meaning them as some small comfort.
"Well, you didn't kill any innocent commoners, at least. So I'll let you keep your life—for the moment."
"General-in-Chief—! GENERAL-IN-CHIEF—!!"
Judging by the way he wailed, already half out of his mind, not a word had reached him.
So why do the wicked deed in the first place, then? Did he truly believe he could stir up trouble on this scale and never be caught? They say it's no crime so long as you aren't caught—but this man had crossed the line long ago.
I gave my head a small shake, then turned to the woman who had commanded the soldiers.
"Thanks to you, binding him went a good deal more smoothly. I'm grateful."
"It was nothing."
The woman with those striking blue eyes replied, her face a blank mask.
…She was oddly difficult to approach.
How had Liu Bei ever grown close to someone like her?
I added, "No, truly—sending all those burly men flying the instant they rushed out to resist was genuinely something to see."
"…Thank you for the high praise."
Whatever I said, the woman answered in that same stiff voice. What was with this prim, solemn air about her?
Now I understood why Liu Bei—my retainer as of late—had hauled Zhang Fei off with her and left only Guan Yu behind.
It was honestly, unbearably awkward.
Since Liu Bei had become a retainer-officer of my Bugok—the private corps sworn directly to me—her sworn sisters Guan Yu and Zhang Fei had naturally become my retainers as well. That was cause for celebration, unquestionably, but it came with a problem of its own. With Liu Bei and Zhang Fei, I could at least feel the distance between us shrinking. With Guan Yu, I felt nothing of the kind.
When you spend time talking with someone, there's a comfortable silence and there's an awkward one, isn't there? With Guan Yu, only the awkward kind ever settled over us.
What on earth was I supposed to do about it? I resolved to ask Liu Bei later, and turned to face Guan Yu. If Ma Chao's eyes were a blue-silver like diamonds, Guan Yu's were a deep blue like sapphires.
"By now Liu Bei and Zhang Fei should be finished with everything. Let's head back."
"As you command."
Whatever I said, Guan Yu simply obeyed in silence.
……
……
For some reason, a strange sense of déjà vu stole over me, and I glanced back at Seo Yeo gliding along behind me. Guan Yu, I couldn't help thinking, was cut from much the same cloth as Seo Yeo.