The Decision (4)
The ship I was riding on turned out to be far larger than I'd expected.
No — calling it "the ship I had been riding on" would be more accurate at this point.
The soldiers Zhou Yu had assigned to us insisted they could sail through the night without rest, but a surprising number of them were complaining of seasickness with remarkable violence.
Soldiers so pale they could hardly be told apart from corpses.
Soldiers sprawled across the deck as though they were already dead.
And soldiers endlessly spewing up something that, were this a comic book, would no doubt have been drawn in rainbow colors.
Convinced this really was going to cost lives, I decided to drop anchor on shore earlier than planned, before the sun had fully set.
Who knew being unaccustomed to ships could loom this large? With no automobiles in this world, people here seemed all the more vulnerable to motion sickness.
Now I understand why Cao Cao lost the Battle of Red Cliffs despite commanding overwhelming strength.
Before supper, I ordered my adjutant to gather only those who wished for it and pitch a modest camp on land — and most of the soldiers stampeded down to solid ground as though they'd been waiting for exactly that order.
…So their thinking was that they'd rather suffer a little hardship than keep being wracked by seasickness, I suppose.
It was meant to be a makeshift camp, one we'd strike right after breakfast the next morning, yet even so I had never seen one go up so quickly.
With the seasick soldiers having escaped to dry land, the ship was left all but deserted. Only a handful of men who, perversely, felt queasy on solid ground had volunteered to stay aboard and stand watch.
The reason I had insisted on stepping out to the railing for a breath of fresh air was related to this as well. There was nothing for me to do anyway, so I might as well watch the soldiers eat their supper inside the camp and whoop it up in good cheer.
"General-in-Chief."
"Hm?"
It was precisely at that moment that Liu Bei came to find me, wearing her gentle smile.
Having accepted Liu Bei's invitation, I followed her along the deck, keeping an eye on the people nearby.
Guan Yu, Yunchang, and Zhang Fei, Yide.
The matches for ten thousand men who trailed after Liu Bei like her own shadow.
The two of them possessed contrasting eyes — one azure, one crimson — as though it had been deliberately arranged. They had also been born with the same jet-black hair as Liu Bei, and they wielded martial might so overwhelming that comparing myself to them felt almost embarrassing.
In later ages they would be hailed as "matches for ten thousand men" — a title meaning they could hold their own against ten thousand — and that alone tells you just how extraordinary these two generals were.
So what, exactly, were those two match-for-ten-thousand warriors doing right now?
"……."
They were staring at me with an intensity that looked ready to bore a hole straight through my skull.
I'm hardly blessed with sharp senses, and even I could feel those gazes.
I stared straight back at the pair who kept flicking glances my way.
"Is something the matter?"
"…!"
The instant her eyes met mine, Guan Yu's pupils trembled violently, as though she had been caught red-handed.
After holding her silence for a moment, Guan Yu opened her mouth to answer.
"……No. There is no problem at all."
I gazed steadily into Guan Yu's azure eyes and said,
"It certainly seems like there is."
"B-believe me, I beg of you."
She was flustered beyond all measure.
It was a lie so transparent that anyone could see through it. Had her famously strict, unbending nature finally come back to bite her? Guan Yu truly seemed like the last person alive capable of carrying off a deception.
"Truly?"
"……Th-that is…"
Just as the face of Guan Yu, still pinned beneath my gaze, began to flush red, Zhang Fei cut in out of nowhere.
"Aw, c'mon, General-in-Chief! I keep telling you — don't watch where you're going and you'll take a spill!"
"……."
"And we're on the deck of a ship, no less! You've gotta be extra careful!"
Deflecting right here and now, are we….
Even if I did stumble as clumsily as Zhang Fei predicted, Seo Yeo was right behind me and would catch me, so there was no real problem. But if I pointed that out, they would no doubt cook up yet another excuse on the spot. Zhang Fei's gift for improvisation was, at times, genuinely awe-inspiring, so nothing about this surprised me.
I simply nodded and let myself be swept along by her intent.
"Very well. Thank you for your concern."
"…Phew."
Zhang Fei exhaled a sigh of relief, as if a disaster had been narrowly averted, then began firing one glance after another at Guan Yu.
And Guan Yu was conducting an entire conversation with her eyes, every bit as much as Zhang Fei was.
Roughly, I imagine it went something like this:
'Yunchang, sis! Is something about to wreck the whole plan?! We nearly had a disaster on our hands!'
'Do you have any idea what a burden it is to me, merely to speak falsehood before our lord?'
'I know, I know — but you are seriously hopeless!'
Judging by how fiercely those glances flew back and forth, they were most definitely fighting.
…But if that's how it is, couldn't you do it in secret, somewhere I can't see? I fail to understand the point of trading glances that look suspicious to absolutely everyone while I'm standing right here watching you.
Are you two filming a sitcom?
In any case, one thing was plain: they were in perfect accord about hiding something. The trouble was, I had no idea what that something was. At the very least, it didn't seem to be anything meant to harm me….
"Is it still far?"
"We will arrive shortly."
Having received my question, Liu Bei smiled as though she couldn't care less whether her sworn sisters' suspicious antics were exposed or not.
…Ah, forget it. I give up trying to figure them out. Surely they wouldn't actually kill me… right?
I simply kept walking, with Seo Yeo glued to my side as my escort.
Just as Liu Bei had said, the room was not far at all. She was, after all, one of the colonels commanding my camp, so it seemed her quarters had been assigned not far from where I myself was staying.
Liu Bei opened the door for me and said,
"Please, go on in."
"Mm."
Seo Yeo and I stepped into the room first, and Liu Bei's party followed after us.
"……."
The moment I crossed the threshold, I noticed one glaring problem and let my consternation show.
"…It's rather cramped in here."
"Yes. It is a ship, after all."
Liu Bei replied with a smile.
Five people crowding into a room that was never spacious to begin with made it positively suffocating. Well, the shipbuilding techniques of this era were never anything remarkable, so there was little to be done about it.
We stood close enough that, had I strained my ears, I could have heard one another breathing — but that alone was not enough to shake my composure. If a stimulus this small could sway me, I'd have made a colossal mess of myself long ago. After all, this was a man who had resisted every temptation thrown his way, right up until the day he took Seo Yeo into his arms.
Which is to say, if I set my mind to it, I could return to those old days whenever I pleased….
"……."
…Could I, though?
Why did I feel so suddenly unsure of myself? It was as though the man I used to be were shaking his head at me.
It was then that Liu Bei spoke, in a voice as calm as still water.
"I have brought some wine. Would you care to drink?"
"I'll pass."
I refused the offer outright.
Seasickness aside, I could not picture myself boarding a ship stone drunk — or hungover — and coming through it unscathed. More likely than not, I'd end up draped over the railing like a dried fish. I had no desire to feed the fish the way my soldiers had.
I went on in an even voice.
"If anything, I'd rather talk you out of it. Drinking and then boarding a ship is… not a very good idea."
Alcohol dulls the mind and throws the senses into confusion, while motion sickness is born of the mismatch between those very senses. So what happens when the two are combined?
…I preferred not to imagine it. One thing was certain: that combination was enough to make even someone who never got seasick empty the contents of their stomach.
"Since you feel so strongly, it would hardly be courteous of me to insist."
Whether my concern had reached her or not, Liu Bei meekly withdrew the offer.
"Awww…."
Zhang Fei — whose face had lit up the instant the word "wine" was spoken — let out a mournful groan the moment Liu Bei took it back.
Truly, the most consistent creature alive.
Then, as though something had only just occurred to her, Zhang Fei spoke up.
"Wait, so what happens to our plan now?"
"……."
You're not even pretending to hide it anymore, are you?
While I held my tongue, Guan Yu rounded on Zhang Fei.
"You gave me such a warning look not moments ago — what is the meaning of this sudden behavior?"
"The premise itself has collapsed! What plan is there even left to speak of?"
"Even so, to overturn the entire board like that — really, what am I to do with…. Whew."
At the sight of Zhang Fei answering with wide, unblinking eyes, Guan Yu heaved a long sigh.
Having listened in on all of that, I nodded slowly and said,
"You meant to get me drunk and do something, didn't you?"
"……."
At my words, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei both flinched.
Reaction or none, I pressed on.
"But since I refused, the whole scheme has come unraveled."
"……."
"At this point, I have no choice but to ask."
I looked Liu Bei — eldest of the sisters bound by the Oath of the Peach Garden — dead in the eye.
"What, exactly, is this 'personal concern' of yours?"
Obsidian eyes, identical to Her Majesty the Emperor's. Yet the woman before me, whose gaze carried a somewhat gentler cast, met my eyes without flinching.
Liu Bei opened her mouth in a tone of warm, generous kindness.
"General-in-Chief…."
"……."
"Do you have a great fondness for women?"
"……?"
What on earth was that supposed to mean? If not women, was I meant to prefer men, then?
"Hehe. It seems I have asked a question with an obvious answer."
At my doubt-filled stare, Liu Bei let out a single soft laugh.
"Then let me change the question."
With those words, Liu Bei closed the distance between us in one fluid motion, and a fragrance of ripe peaches soon tickled my nose.
"……."
A soft pressure brushed against my lips, and I stood there dumbfounded — while Guan Yu and Zhang Fei went wide-eyed in open shock.
A few seconds passed like that.
Liu Bei, having drawn back from me once more, flashed a bright, easy smile.
"Are we attractive women to you, General-in-Chief?"
…That was why you tried to get me drunk?
Seo Yeo, for her part, remained as impassive as ever — entirely unmoved by whether the ranks of women around me grew or not.