Rest in Pieces
To cut straight to the conclusion: the assassin did not survive.
Honestly, one look at the wounds he'd taken from Seo Yeo and Lü Bu told the whole story. Take Seo Yeo's kick. She insisted she had restrained her strength, but several of his ribs had been blown to pieces and were now busy skewering his internal organs. The man had gone flying with a sound like a bomb detonating — the miracle would have been if he'd come away unscathed. Even if fortune had smiled on him and he'd escaped Luoyang in one piece, he wouldn't have lasted long. Managing to move at all through that state of ruin, teeth gritted, honestly deserved some measure of praise.
But the assassin's ordeal did not end there.
Next came the injuries inflicted by Lü Bu, who claimed she had merely "tapped" him. That tap proved more than enough to finish off the man Seo Yeo had left half-shattered.
What does that mean, you ask?
It means she crushed the ribs on the other side — the ones Seo Yeo had spared.
"Be honest with me. You didn't just tap him, did you?"
"...W-well, I did put a little strength into it."
"A little?"
"...Okay, a little more than a little!"
"And what did you hit him with?"
"Uh... this."
In answer to my question, Lü Bu pointed a finger at the shaft of her Sky Piercer Halberd.
Smack a person with that terrifying slab of iron, and yes, that absolutely counts as killing them. In other words, the assassin's torso had been pulped like a water deer that lost an argument with a freight truck.
A human body aches miserably from a single cracked bone — and his entire midsection had caved in, with the splintered ribs stabbing into his organs?
...Just picturing it hurt like hell.
Ordinarily, wounds like those would have killed a man outright; that he clung to life at all was a testament to his freakishly rugged constitution. Of course, all he managed was to dodge instant death. He didn't last long.
Even Hua Tuo shook her head, saying the man would be dead before any treatment could take hold.
When the Divine Physician herself declares a case hopeless, that says everything.
"Khh... k-khhk..."
And so, never once regaining consciousness, the assassin groaned his way to the end. The truth behind the assassination plot sank into the realm of unsolvable mystery.
"..."
"Weaker than he looked, huh."
Would you two please not pull that "so why did he die?" face. The man was eminently killable. At the implication from Seo Yeo and Lü Bu that they had, in fact, struck him as gently as humanly possible, I heaved a long sigh.
After that, nothing of note happened.
"A-are you well? You are truly hurt nowhere?"
"Your Majesty?"
...Surely it was nothing?
Her Majesty had graced me with her precious presence in person to see after me, and the knowledge that my life had been threatened brought out a side of her I hadn't seen before.
"I beg of you. Please, let there be no pain..."
"Ah... I am quite alright, Your Majesty, so please do not worry yourself."
It seemed the realization that my neck had very nearly been cleaved open — had Seo Yeo not been there — had shaken Her Majesty badly.
Don't tell me her trauma was relapsing.
I'd assumed her dependence on me was fully resolved. Apparently I had merely been fooling myself.
"Your Majesty, I am right here. There is nothing to fear."
"..."
"Behold — even Ae-ongi... forgive me, even Yaongi here agrees that I am perfectly well, does she not?"
—Ae-ong.
That vicious beast kept crying "ae-ong" after "ae-ong," scrambling her own name in the process, all while flaunting her existence for the room to see. I dearly wanted to rename her on the spot, but since the name happened to have been bestowed by the Empress herself, changing it felt like overstepping.
"Come here."
—Ae-ong.
Good grief. Why is this creature pulling an annoyed face? Does she think she's the master of this household?
Well, she's cute, so I let it slide. Scooping up the warm ball of fur mewing at my feet, I turned to the Empress.
"Should anxiety ever find you, Your Majesty, you need only do as I do."
"And what might that—"
"Here, like so. You simply hold the cat close and—"
—Ae-ooong!
No sooner had I brought my face near than Yaongi shoved me away with both front paws.
...Seriously, this thing. Is she playing push-push with a human face?
Fine by me, actually.
Yaongi wore an expression of monumental irritation, as if to say, You summoned me for this? I gave her a wry little smile.
"You see, Your Majesty? A highly effective method, wouldn't you agree?"
"It appears to Us that you were soundly rejected."
What a heartless thing to say.
For all that display, this was a creature who, when she thought no one was watching, would secretly rub herself against me to coat me in her scent. She was simply prickly, in the way of cats.
...Come to think of it, she literally is a cat.
"...I see. So that is how it is."
Having watched my buffoonish little performance — buffoonish it certainly was — the Empress seemed to settle back into her usual self.
What a relief.
Her Majesty, who until moments ago had kept casting me fretful glances, spoke in a composed voice.
"If you are unharmed, that is enough. Now We must go and do what must be done."
"And what must be done, Your Majesty?"
"Need you even ask?"
In answer to my question, the Empress flashed a smile.
"We are going to tear the corpse of that beast who dared seek to harm you to ribbons."
"..."
"And when We are finished, We shall feed it to the dogs, such that not even a trace remains."
She delivered these chilling words as casually as one ordering tea.
Was this what one would call desecrating the dead? Mutilating a corpse so that even in death, a man could never close his eyes in peace. Splitting coffins open, hacking bodies apart — nothing was more dreaded by the Confucian scholars, who held the rites of burial sacred above nearly all else. One thing was certain: to anyone harboring treasonous ambitions, the political message would come through loud and clear.
I offered a brief moment of silence for the assassin, who had in one stroke managed to pass beyond even Exodia.
Well... he had presumably weighed the risks before pulling a stunt like this.
And I felt no burning urge to play devil's advocate and demand a dignified burial for him anyway. At least this way, it wouldn't hurt.
The Empress regarded me where I stood gaping, and said:
"What are you dawdling for? Come along at once."
"As you command."
Judging by the look in her eyes, I would be keeping her company for the rest of the day. She seemed to have recovered her balance, but there was no telling when she might suddenly floor the accelerator again. If that happened, the brakes were my job. Anyone else who clumsily tried to talk Her Majesty down would only end up pouring oil on a burning house.
"You dare spout such drivel before Us? Very well — since you wish it so, We shall exterminate your three clans."
"Y-Your Majesty! Please, compose Yourself!"
"I see not a shred of remorse. We may have to consider extending it to all nine degrees of kin."
...It wasn't as though a scene like that had never actually played out.
Only because I arrived in a dead sprint at the first word of trouble was a bloodbath inside the court averted. When I asked what on earth had happened, I was told that someone had branded me a villain scheming to plunge the realm into chaos.
Uh... bewildering, certainly, but something remarkably similar had occurred in the original history, so I couldn't quite call it strange.
After Zhuge Liang died and Shu was drowned in grief, there was a man who stood up and argued the following:
"—His passing is, in truth, an occasion for congratulation — one that brings fortune and prosperity upon our state!"
His stated reasoning was that Zhuge Liang's authority had grown so overwhelming that no one in the court had dared so much as breathe carelessly in his presence. At that preposterous claim, Liu Shan erupted in fury on the spot, threw the man into prison, and had him put to death — or so the record goes.
And this was Liu Shan — a ruler whose impression of incompetence notwithstanding, had hardly a jagged edge to his temperament.
Then again, of course it enraged him. This was the man who, even after Liu Bei passed from the world, had poured out a lifetime of loyalty to raise Shu from the dirt. Zhuge Liang had cherished the boy with utter devotion — personally writing books to teach him when he was young — and while Liu Bei was away on campaigns, he had watched over Liu Shan like a second father.
For a man like that to die, and to have someone applaud the death as a blessing — how could Liu Shan not see red? It amounted to spitting on his father's grave.
What made it worse was that this same man had once picked a quarrel with Liu Bei herself, earned her wrath, and nearly paid for it with his life — surviving only because Zhuge Liang interceded on his behalf.
In other words, he had slandered the very man who saved it.
At this point, you really do have to wonder what his deal was.
Was he simply a man for whom nothing in the wide world could ever please?
Or perhaps, with the whole court sunk so deep in mourning for Zhuge Liang, he was a Dark Knight sacrificing his own life to strike a spark back into the people's hearts?
...That last one is obviously a joke.
His name, if I remember right, was Li Miao.
Had Liu Shan's nature been any less gentle, this was a man who — himself along with his entire family — would doubtless have been wiped out to the last.
No, I'm not so deluded as to compare myself to Zhuge Liang.
I only mean that in every age, in every corner of the world, there is always someone who can't read a room to save his life and does nothing but spew complaints. I suppose if you squint, that counts as a kind of individuality too.
Of course, I had no need for that sort of individuality.
—Ae-ong.
Oh — now that I mention it, I'd been carrying Yaongi this whole time.
Cradling babies so often lately had made having something tucked against my chest feel like second nature. These days, if my arms were empty, I felt oddly bereft.
—...
Yaongi shot me a look that plainly said, Haven't you had enough? Put me down. I snorted with laughter.
For a creature whose entire face screamed that everything in life was a hassle, she was astonishingly good at her job.
Had I been carrying a cat treat, I'd have handed one over. Resolving to toss her a cut of good meat one of these days, I fell in behind the Empress.
—Ae-ooong!
Yeah, no. You're staying right here.
The moment I set you down, I know exactly what you'll do — bolt off and hide in some bizarre corner again. And digging you out is always such a production.
"..."
Watching all of this unfold, Seo Yeo appeared to be turning something over in her mind, deep in thought.
Seeing how fond I was of the cat, she was probably running through all sorts of notions.
I had a fair guess what.