Resolve (2)
"One of these days, I'm going to ride around in a grand, luxurious carriage just like that!"
So Liu Bei had once shouted as a little girl, gazing up at the enormous mulberry tree in front of her house. She caught a fierce scolding from her uncle for it afterward, but the outburst proved one thing beyond doubt: Liu Bei was no timid soul.
And even among the bold, she had been a cut above — a little too... exceptional.
"Waaah! Mommy──!"
"One slap and you're bawling? Acting up?! Get over here!"
That was her, thrashing the clueless little brats who teased her for having no father.
"Liu Bei, you little rascal─! Skipping class again, are we?!!"
"He's coming after us with a stick! Run, hurry!!"
Even with the chance to study under Lu Zhi, one of the most celebrated scholars of the age, she had preferred playing hooky.
"So anyway, like I was saying — here's how I beat those thugs into the dirt...."
"Haha! That's our boss for you!"
And once she had gathered a band of followers, she had even styled herself a wandering knight-errant, making her name known throughout her hometown.
Perhaps, as she grew older, she finally understood just how much her mother had labored to raise her. Whatever the reason, these small rebellions of hers dwindled steadily as the years went by.
First she cut out the aimless wandering about. Next she threw herself into her books, pondering question after question of what was right and worthwhile, and wove straw mats to help keep the household fed. She even greeted every soul she met with humility and courtesy — had anyone who knew her past laid eyes on such a Liu Bei, they would scarcely have believed their eyes.
That said, her old spirit had not died out entirely.
After the Yellow Turban Rebellion, while Liu Bei was serving as a county magistrate, an imperial Inspector came to call with demands too vile to repeat. What would have happened if Zhang Fei, who happened to be standing nearby, hadn't tied the man to a tree and thrashed him?
What would have happened, indeed. Liu Bei would have taken up the rod herself and beaten him to within an inch of his life.
Long years of self-discipline had scoured away the wild girl she had once been, yet the instant someone crossed the line, her fury erupted without restraint. Don't they say that a person who never loses their temper is all the more terrifying when they finally do? Liu Bei belonged squarely to that breed.
"……"
And now, Liu Bei was in a truly foul mood.
She had been like this ever since they left Shuchun — or to be precise, ever since she heard Cao Cao's earth-shattering announcement. The air around her was so murderous that even Zhang Fei, who normally couldn't go a minute without chattering, was treading on eggshells.
"Sister Yunchang. You've got to do something."
Zhang Fei sidled up to her dependable right hand and ventured in a small voice. But Guan Yu had no answer either.
"...And what, precisely, would you have me do?"
Guan Yu knew only how to serve a lord and offer up her loyalty; coaxing a superior out of a black mood was an art she had never learned. Besides, Liu Bei could see through a lie at a glance, so any clumsy attempt to smooth things over would only stand to make matters worse.
Zhang Fei said sulkily:
"So we're just supposed to travel all the way to Luoyang in this miserable atmosphere?"
"...That is..."
Faced with Zhang Fei's logic, Guan Yu could produce nothing.
— Neighhh…
The horse the General-in-Chief had gifted Liu Bei plodded along, letting out a listless whinny. For some reason it had looked half-dead for a while now — apparently the ride was sheer torment.
It wasn't as though Sister Xuande was hauling on the reins with any great force, so why on earth...? Zhang Fei puzzled over it for a moment, then shook her head as if to shake the question loose.
"Not me! If it's too much for Sister Yunchang, then I've got no choice but to do it!"
"...Wait. Hold."
Guan Yu caught Zhang Fei just as she was about to spring away. Zhang Fei turned her head.
"Hm? What?"
"We must first learn why Lady Xuande is in such a state. Only then can we hope to lift her spirits, no?"
"...Fair point."
Zhang Fei nodded. Know your enemy and know yourself, and you will never be imperiled in a hundred battles — a saying anyone who had so much as opened a book knew by heart.
Zhang Fei muttered, thinking hard. "Hmm... why Sister Xuande is angry, huh."
Think. Sister Xuande, who never so much as frowned at things that would have anyone else seething — she only ever smiled that warm smile of hers. For her to work herself into a rage like this, it would have to be...
"...No matter how I turn it over, there's only one answer."
The way Sister Xuande hung on the General-in-Chief's every move. Her stubborn refusal of a general's commission, content to remain a mere Colonel. And the odd, prickly power struggle she had carried on with Cao Cao from the very first day they met. Put it all together, and only one conclusion remained.
"...So the baby's daddy is the General-in-Chief?"
Right before they parted ways, hadn't Cao Cao gone on about the child — and what to name it? As Zhang Fei saw it, Cao Cao had always been like a little kid tormenting the boy she liked. That was why she had first taken the whole thing as a mean-spirited joke, but think it through, and there was no reason to joke about something like that.
"This is... not good."
Having sniffed out the truth with her uncanny instincts, Zhang Fei looked distinctly troubled. If the mere words the General-in-Chief's child sent a strange, sour ache through her chest, the situation was serious indeed. Sister Xuande's feelings ran no shallower than her own — if anything, deeper.
"...A child."
Guan Yu murmured the word flatly, then rested a hand over her own belly and thought.
It had been years since she swore to devote her life to benevolence and righteousness. She had thought of nothing but charging down the righteous path — and yet she could never quite tear her eyes from the infants cradled in other people's arms.
But if she were to carry a child in a woman's body, how many years would that demand of her? To hand her own baby off into someone else's care was something Guan Yu's sense of duty would never permit. If you brought a new life into this world, was it not the plainest of duties to see it through to the end?
Had Zhang Fei heard her, she would have nodded along — that's our Sister Yunchang for you, deadly serious about everything.
"Sister Yunchang. I think we've been overtaken."
"……"
"Think about it. That woman being pregnant with the General-in-Chief's child means they've already done it, doesn't it?"
And with that, Zhang Fei curled her index finger and thumb into a ring and slid a finger of her other hand in and out of it — a gesture too lewd for words.
Guan Yu heaved a sigh and chided her. "There are eyes all around us. Have you no shame?"
"Oh, come on. If you blush at this much, what will you do later on?"
Zhang Fei giggled at her own joke, and Guan Yu's eyes narrowed slightly.
"...All bravado, as ever."
"Eh?"
"Do you take me for a fool, Yide? I know full well it is all talk with you."
Guan Yu knew perfectly well that the moment things turned real, Zhang Fei would go scarlet to the ears and be good for nothing. A woman who had never so much as glimpsed a naked man, holding forth about skill.
Hit squarely where it hurt, Zhang Fei pulled a sheepish face. "Th-that's, well..."
"Whew..."
"Anyway! That's not what matters right now!"
Zhang Fei hurriedly changed the subject. "If someone else got ahead of us, then we just have to hurry and catch up, that's all!"
"……"
"And besides, Cao Cao isn't the only suspicious one!"
"What did you say?"
Guan Yu's eyes flew wide in shock. Liu Bei, who had been secretly eavesdropping on her sworn sisters' banter, flinched as well — though neither of the two noticed.
"There are two of them stronger than us, remember?"
"...Ah."
Guan Yu caught her meaning at once. Back then, every eye had been fixed on Cao Cao — but looking back, there had been others behaving strangely. Two who would have reacted more violently than anyone to the news that some strange woman was carrying the General-in-Chief's child. One, a girl who would have radiated a glacial menace behind a perfectly composed face; the other, a girl who would have flushed crimson and unleashed a storm of fury.
Hadn't the air turned razor-sharp when Cao Cao tried to seduce the General-in-Chief right before the clash with Yuan Shu?
"……"
"Hmph."
And yet those two had sailed through the whole affair with perfect calm — as if to say they were long past the age of fretting over such things.
"Unlike that woman, they just don't wear it on their sleeves. I'd wager they've already kissed and sucked and seen every last inch of each other."
"K-kissed and sucked..."
At that remark, which came perilously close to outright lewdness, Guan Yu's face went scarlet as something surfaced in her memory.
Zhang Fei pressed on without a shred of restraint. "It's time we moved ahead too."
"……"
"Waiting never got anyone anywhere. Stand there in a daze and you'll only slip further back in the queue."
"I-is that so..."
Under that resolute gaze, Guan Yu's voice dipped. Zhang Fei took one look at her and spoke up.
"Honestly, you still haven't decided?"
"...Well, that's..."
"Then let me help. Just answer me this one thing. Do you like him? Or not?"
At the question, Guan Yu sank into deep thought.
"...It's not that I dislike him."
"Then we're settled! Let's go!"
"Y-Yide?!"
Guan Yu cried out in flustered alarm as Zhang Fei sprang up and away.
"Sister Xuande─!"
"...What is it?"
Liu Bei turned her head at the voice calling for her. When it came to sheer nerve, at least, Zhang Fei seemed already to have left Peerless Under Heaven far behind.