A Capable Minister in Peace, a Treacherous Hero in Chaos (8)
I had granted Cao Cao the provisional office of Provincial Governor and set her to governing three provinces, and I found myself wondering just when she would finish the job.
Cleanup afterward, as they say — wasn't that always the most tedious part of all?
Tao Qian, who had ruled Xuzhou, had let his thirst for power drive him into league with bandits and the company of treacherous scoundrels, leaving his own home base a complete shambles.
Kong Rong, who had been staying in Qingzhou, was sorely lacking in military ability, and so the remnants of the bandit horde were now running wild in every corner of the province.
Sorting out that mess and meeting Cao Cao again would surely take at least a month... or so I thought, once upon a time.
There was a time when I genuinely believed that.
Right up until Cao Cao revealed herself before the gates of Luoyang — not long after Kong Rong, having relinquished his post as Chancellor of Beihai, arrived in the capital.
How should I put this? It was a case much like the Peach Blossom Sisters, who had strutted boldly into Luoyang after the Battle of Hulao Pass and gotten themselves arrested.
A warlord at the head of her own faction had walked, entirely of her own accord, into the capital ruled by another.
“...I beg your pardon? Cao Cao came right up to the gates of Luoyang?!”
“She did. I hear the soldiers nearly jumped out of their skins.”
“Well, so did I!”
Those who didn't know the full story reacted with open astonishment, offering one opinion after another — that the whole thing smelled suspicious, that she ought to be seized then and there while the chance was hers.
Naturally, I turned down every last one of those suggestions and set out, instructing everyone to refrain from any pointless provocations.
Escorted by my guards, I went out to meet Cao Cao — and was treated to a rather amusing sight.
“Aigoo... I honestly can't tell if this is right.”
“Perhaps we should start plotting an escape route, even now...”
Inside the circular encirclement the soldiers had formed, several figures were wearing distinctly troubled expressions.
Beautiful women with slate-blue hair, sisters at a glance — and each of them armed for war, one with a great saber at her side, the other with a bow in hand.
Cao Cao would hardly have brought just anyone along, so they were surely dependable generals of the same stripe as Xiahou Dun.
Honestly, when it came to the sibling generals serving Cao Cao, those two were the only names that ever came to mind.
...Right. In this world, they're a pair of sister generals.
Save for Cao Cao herself, every one of them was a stranger to me — but their strikingly distinctive looks made it easy enough to guess who was who.
“……”
And they weren't the only ones. Generals radiating an extraordinary menace were glaring daggers at the soldiers as they guarded Cao Cao's flanks.
Those glares were genuinely murderous. It felt like coming face-to-face with a tiger.
And what of that pair of twin halberds and that iron flail, both of which looked crushingly heavy?
I'd stake my life on it — the moment an ordinary person collided with those warriors, their body would be torn apart or crushed flat.
Indeed, the soldiers who had raised their spears stood stiff as boards, warily watching every move.
Seeing that, I had a fair idea who the generals glaring from Cao Cao's side were.
Who else but Dian Wei and Xu Chu — the first names that spring to mind when anyone speaks of Cao Cao's bodyguards?
Fine warriors both, the kind who would give everything they had — their very lives included — to pull their lord out of a desperate crisis.
In the original history, Cao Cao — the treacherous hero of a chaotic age — won far more battles than she lost, but when she did lose, she lost catastrophically, her forces shattered to pieces as she scrambled for her life.
Sometimes it was her own strange temperament that nearly cost her her head; other times, an enemy offensive far fiercer than she had anticipated.
For the former there was the Battle of Wancheng, where her craving for a widow left her perfectly blindsided by Jia Xu's stratagem; for the latter, the Battle of Tong Pass, where Ma Chao — whose cavalry charged at such blistering speed they ground whole formations like a blender — came within a hair's breadth of taking her life.
At Wancheng, Dian Wei — though entirely unarmed — snapped spear after spear and fought on swinging the corpses of enemy soldiers clamped under both arms, defending Cao Cao until her dying breath.
At Tong Pass, Xu Chu took the oar from a boatman shot dead by an arrow and rowed with one hand while deflecting arrows with the other — multitasking on a whole different level — and delivered Cao Cao safely out of danger.
Quite literally, anyone hoping to lay hands on Cao Cao would have to get past those two first.
“……”
Just then, the general hefting that enormous flail — the mere sight of which sent a shiver down my spine — turned her gaze toward me, standing far off.
...Why. What is it.
Why was she looking at me? Was she planning to grind me into the ground with that flail of hers?
I would very much prefer she spared me that.
If a weapon that hideous connected, I would most certainly splatter like a tomato.
It was terrifying even to imagine.
“...Who do you think you're looking at?”
Naturally, Lü Bu could hardly stand by and watch; she stepped forward and growled:
“Lower your eyes, or I'll kill you where you stand.”
“……”
Even faced with Lü Bu's threat, the woman I took for Xu Chu squared up proudly, as if to say, and what of it?
True to her fearless, lionhearted nature, she didn't retreat a single step even before Lü Bu herself.
A general capable of offering up her own life for another had no reason whatsoever to back away from a mere threat.
After all, even Xu Chu had once crossed weapons with Lü Bu in single combat back in Yanzhou.
And the sight of Cao Cao — watching the exchange and deciding that one Xu Chu would not suffice — committing a full six generals, Dian Wei and the Xiahou sisters included, to pile onto Lü Bu was a deeply memorable scene.
In game terms, you might as well say she came with the Unyielding perk equipped.
Short of truly extraordinary circumstances, she would never once give ground.
At any rate, when the flail-wielding general refused to buckle before her intimidation, Lü Bu readjusted her grip on the Sky Piercer Halberd and said:
“So you do have some grit in you after all, hm?”
“……”
“Good. I was bored out of my mind anyway — and you've just walked right into it... Mmph! Mmph!”
“All right. That's quite enough of that.”
I closed the distance in a flash and clamped a hand over Lü Bu's mouth before she could hit full throttle.
Left alone a second longer, she would undoubtedly have leapt onto Red Hare and come charging out of nowhere.
She had always been that way, but lately Lü Bu seemed to react far more sharply to anything that involved me.
Could it be because she'd given birth?
Don't beasts turn ferociously aggressive the moment something from outside threatens their family?
Lü Bu, I decided, fell squarely into that same category.
—Neigh.
Before I could so much as issue an order, the horse beneath me adroitly pressed itself against Red Hare's flank, conveniently planting itself in Lü Bu's path.
Seeing that, I had to admit the creature was genuinely clever.
It was built nearly as large as Red Hare, too — could it be, heaven forbid, that this horse also counted among the legendary thousand-li steeds?
Considering that neither Seo Yeo nor Lü Bu — who went to every conceivable extreme over my personal safety — had a single word to say about it, that was entirely possible.
Honestly, I couldn't say for certain; I'd never lost a battle badly enough to flee at a dead sprint for my very life.
For the record, I had left the little one for a while in the care of my mother, who was staying near the imperial palace.
“Ah, my son! Our little darling keeps working herself up to cry — what do I do?!”
At first she had squealed with delight the instant she laid eyes on my child, but the moment Yeo Hwa left my arms and started to whimper, watching my mother flounder was thoroughly entertaining.
I said, grinning from ear to ear:
“What do you mean, what do you do? The two of them just need to get to know each other.”
“And how exactly are they supposed to do that...?!”
“WAAAAAAH—!”
“Aaah! This is a disaster!”
In the end, with Yeo Hwa dissolving into full-blown wails, all my mother could manage was to sweat buckets.
From the very beginning I simply watched my daughter keep her grandmother firmly in line, then turned my head toward Diaochan.
“Then I'll leave her in your hands.”
“Yes, my lord.”
Fortunately, Diaochan — who had grown close to the children while working at my residence — handled the childcare splendidly.
“……”
“……”
There was even the time Seo Hui, catching on that I meant to hand her over, seized my collar with ghostly speed and dug in — but let's move past that.
It had become such an everyday occurrence by now that nobody batted an eye.
If I had one worry, it was that I had no idea what would happen once they grew up.
Seriously, why were their personalities all so distinct?
Guan Ping, now warmly greeting the few servants whose faces she had come to know, was astonishing to behold.
...And with that, my thoughts had wandered off somewhere else for a moment.
At any rate, the little performance Lü Bu and I had put on was conspicuous enough to gather every eye around us.
Even the silver-haired woman standing with her eyes closed, as if lost in thought, was no exception.
Cao Cao Mengde.
The woman who, from the very first time we met, had kept me off balance with her singular words and deeds.
“It's been a while.”
“It has.”
Cao Cao addressed me in a manner no different from the past.
A faintly roguish smile, and calm eyes that gave away nothing of what she was thinking.
The pair of swords hanging at her waist, down to the mischievous lilt in her voice.
We were reuniting after nearly a full year, and she hadn't changed one bit.
...No, wait. There was exactly one thing about her that had changed.
“……”
A single swaddling bundle, cradled tenderly against Cao Cao's chest.
Watching the bundle wriggle about all on its own, I could guess exactly what purpose it served there.
“Hwahyeon.”
“...What is it?”
“I've been rushing about so diligently that I've grown a little tired.”
Having caught the flicker of agitation in me, Cao Cao teased me with the same playfulness as ever.
“So then — might you lend me somewhere to rest for a moment?”
“……”
“All the more welcome if it happens to be the very same place as yours.”
“...Haah.”
She truly never changes, I thought, and spoke to the aide at my side.
“Disperse the encirclement.”
“Yes, my lord!”
At my order, relayed down the line, the soldiers lowered their spears in flawless unison and began to move.
Down the broad path that opened through their ranks, I turned my back and addressed Cao Cao's party.
“See that you follow along nicely.”
“Hehe. Even that flustered look of yours hasn't changed.”
I'd been thinking the exact same thing just now.
However long the years that had passed, it seemed nothing between Cao Cao and me ever would.