Luoyang (Part 1)
Dong Zhuo, who had held the real power of Luoyang in an iron grip, was defeated by Jeong Reung and fled to Chang'an!
It was a battle nearly everyone had expected to end in defeat.
The eyes of the entire world turned toward the man who had overturned those expectations and crushed Dong Zhuo.
News that Jeong Reung had seized victory against a force nearly three times his own size sent a fresh current of tension through the warlords quietly building their power bases in the far provinces.
With the man who had clutched the Emperor in his fist scurrying out of Luoyang with his tail between his legs, the next protector of the throne naturally became Jeong Reung — the very man who had brought Dong Zhuo down.
His Bing Province army, morale soaring to the heavens after battle upon battle. No one alive even entertained the thought of standing against Jeong Reung, a man who had driven out Dong Zhuo himself.
So what path would the new master of Luoyang walk?
A second Dong Zhuo, seizing power to feed his own ambition? Or the last loyal vassal of the Han?
Every soul on the continent kept its eyes fixed on Jeong Reung's next step.
"...and then I smashed my shield right into those Dong Zhuo bootlickers, and wham! Down they went like sacks of rice—"
"PWAHAHAHA! All that talk about the Xiliang cavalry this, Xiliang cavalry that — get up close with them and they're nothing special at all!"
"Did you see their faces when they broke? One bastard pissed himself the whole way to the gates..."
Ever since the victory over Dong Zhuo, my soldiers had been living in one endless festival.
Even I had to admit they had earned it.
They had become the heroes of stories their grandchildren would beg to hear for generations — how could a man not feel good about that?
On top of it all, when I handed out reward money to the soldiers who had bled for me, the mood climbed even higher. My treasury took a savage beating for it, but a man would have to be a real skinflint to pinch pennies from soldiers who had gambled their lives for him.
The troops roamed the city in packs, sometimes wandering alone, savoring their leave in Luoyang. Under my standing order to rest for the foreseeable future, the officers in charge of training were leaving them to it as well.
Every coin the soldiers spent on their holiday would flow into the city's shops, and as it did, the local economy would revive on its own — and Luoyang would win back the vibrancy it had lost.
"...My lord. It is dangerous to remain there. Please come inside and rest."
I was perched atop the high ramparts, gazing out over the city of Luoyang, when the voice drifted up behind me. Stern and earnest, yet beneath it a soft, pleasant voice.
Recognizing it without turning my head, I spoke. "Gao Shun, is it."
"……"
I took a swig from the wine I had brought up with me.
"What's dangerous about it? Name one person up here who would come after me."
"You could fall."
I shrugged at her concern. "Even if this wall collapsed under me right this second, Seo Yeo would save me."
"……"
She would absolutely stop it, too — not only any assassin who came for my throat, but even a sudden, stupid accident.
I turned my head toward Gao Shun. "And what are you doing up here right now?"
"Patrolling for suspicious persons."
Given her personality, I had predicted the answer perfectly — and yet hearing it out loud still left me speechless.
I patted the parapet beside me. "Drinking alone is lonely business. Have a seat and share a cup with me."
"...Is there not another person standing right beside you?"
"You call yourself my bodyguard, and you won't even have a drink."
Coaxing Seo Yeo into sitting within arm's reach was easy enough; the moment I offered her a cup, however, she would clamp her mouth shut and whip her head away. She couldn't quite bring herself to shove me off, so she simply dodged — and that stubborn little look of hers was adorable. I would have to try again next time.
Gao Shun gave a slight shake of her head.
"I am on duty at present. I cannot drink."
Her tone was ironclad. On this point, at least, she would not yield an inch.
"Figured as much. Then let's simply talk for a while."
Truthfully, I had not expected anything more.
Under my gaze, Gao Shun closed her eyes for a moment, then came over slowly and settled near me.
"...Only for a moment."
"Good. Thank you."
Turning my eyes forward again, I spoke.
"I owe you for the last battle."
"……"
"We won that fight because you held the line."
Against that overwhelming disparity in numbers, the men could have crumbled at the first crack. It was Gao Shun who made them endure to the very end.
And it was Gao Shun who, the instant a gap tore open in the enemy formation, seized upon it and broke the Dong Zhuo army apart.
Gao Shun held them. Zhang Liao sealed them. Lü Bu pierced them.
Had even one of them failed at her task, that battle would have been lost.
I had done this often even in the old days — perched on a wall with wine in hand, watching a city below. Why, you ask? Well. I have never given it much deep thought. Call it a modest hobby.
The Luoyang of the past, squeezed in Dong Zhuo's fist, had been perpetually stifled and dead-quiet, save for the screams and weeping that drifted up now and again. The citizens who did venture out scurried anxiously along their way, while Dong Zhuo's lackeys glowered and lorded their abuse over the common folk.
"Luoyang under Dong Zhuo used to irritate me just to look at it."
Even if he had never needled my temper, I would have turned against him all the same.
"If I'd lost to Dong Zhuo, I never would have gotten to see this."
I let my eyes wander across the cityscape of Luoyang.
Lanterns stitching bright patterns into the night streets. The racket spilling out of restaurants and taverns still open at this hour. Figures swaying about in their cups, and touts crying out for customers.
The sun had long since set and the moon hung high — the dead of night — and yet the capital of this realm was still pulsing with life.
I studied the people walking the streets, one by one. The drunks could not keep the grins off their faces, and even the laborers sweating over their work smiled from ear to ear.
Every soul in Luoyang was laughing.
Remembering something I had once said, I suddenly let out a hollow laugh.
"Making the entire continent into this — calling that my dream does sound pretty ridiculous."
Was it actually possible?
Say I somehow steered the Three Kingdoms era to a gentle close. After it came the age of the Sixteen Kingdoms, when every barbarian people under heaven would come pouring across the borders. I would be long dead of old age by then, so it should not have been my problem — so why did it still gnaw at me like this?
"It can be done."
"Hm?"
While I was still chuckling at myself, Gao Shun spoke up beside me.
"In Bing Province, I watched with my own eyes everything you accomplished, my lord."
"……"
At the sheer trust in her words, I found I had nothing to say.
"If you cannot do it, my lord, then no one alive can."
"Is that so?"
"I simply remove the enemies who stand in your path."
Gao Shun held my gaze for a moment with those blue-green eyes, then rose slowly from her seat.
"...It has grown late, I see. The wind is cold — please do head inside soon."
Eyes closed, she bowed her head briefly and walked slowly away along the wall.
I watched her go for a little while, then turned my face back toward Luoyang.
"If not me, no one can do it..."
"……"
Seo Yeo had been listening quietly to my muttering all along.
I smirked.
Well, in the original history, four hundred years of absolute chaos do come next.
"Right. Let's work hard and find out."
After I beat Dong Zhuo within an inch of his life and chased him out of Luoyang, the number of people trying to get close to me multiplied overnight.
Plenty arrived bearing bribes, hoping to curry favor with the realm's new strongman, and I examined each and every one of them, one on one.
"Hold on. Wait. Aren't you the man who used to kiss Dong Zhuo's boots while terrorizing half the city?"
"Wh-what on earth could you possibly mean?"
The official — whose name I could not even remember — was drenched in cold sweat.
"I have never once done any such thing! You must believe me!"
"'Country bumpkins fresh out of Bing Province could never stand against the Xiliang cavalry,' yada, yada, yada—"
"……!!"
"By that logic, Dong Zhuo is a Xiliang man himself. So does that make him a bumpkin too?"
I smiled at the official, whose face had gone corpse-pale.
"Well, anyone can run their mouth. I wasn't planning to hold that against you."
"...Thank you for your mercy."
"By the way — you know what I truly can't stand? Corruption."
"......Pardon?"
Ignoring the man's bulging eyes, I fished something out of the mountain of documents and skimmed through it.
"Let's see... someone's been doctoring the ledgers, for one thing..."
"N-no, that is..."
"And what's this? You bled the commoners for every last copper — why, exactly?"
"That was—!"
"My, my. What a thoroughly greedy little leech you are."
At my smiling words, the official dropped flat to the floor.
"I'll have to report all of this to Her Majesty. Have your neck taken off."
"It's a misunderstanding! Please, hear me out!"
"The evidence is sitting right here — what the hell is there to misunderstand? Who do you take for an idiot?"
"If you desire wealth, I will offer more!"
"Huh. So that's how you interpret it. Lü Bu!"
At my call, Lü Bu appeared in the doorway.
"What."
"Throw that guy out the window."
"Just wait one momen— GWAAAAAAGH—!!"
The instant the words left my mouth, Lü Bu seized the groveling man by the scruff of his neck and hurled him clean through the open window.
Brushing off her palms, Lü Bu grumbled.
"How many is that now?"
"Twenty or so?"
"Isn't this supposed to be the capital? Why is it crawling with rotten bastards?"
"No wonder the country went to ruin."
I nodded along to her lament, then turned and offered my thanks to the girl standing behind me.
"Appreciate the help."
"Anytime, so long as I can be of use."
Zhang Jue answered from behind me with a faint smile.
The one who had sniffed out the officials' corruption was not me — it was Zhang Jue.
She had left the affairs of Bing Province in the hands of her junior disciples and come down to Luoyang, which worried me a little.
"You're certain you won't be found out?"
"Hehe. Only now you worry about that? Please, don't fret. There will truly be no blowback from anything I do."
"Well, if you say so."
Zhang Jue could read the will of Heaven the way the Zhuge Liang and Sima Yi of novels did, so it ought to be certain.
"...Probably?"
"……"
'Probably'? What do you mean, 'probably'? Why can't you sound sure of it?
I asked again.
"So, who's next on the list?"
"Hmm..."
At my words, Zhang Jue turned over a page of the documents and answered unhurriedly.
"It is Lord Wang Yun."
"...That man could simply send me an invitation. Why on earth would he come calling in person?"
"Perhaps it is meant as a gesture of respect?"
Zhang Jue replied, entirely at ease.