The Daoist (4)
After parting ways with Yu Ji, I kept moving on foot until something odd struck me.
And no wonder — the girl who usually clung to my side was nowhere to be seen.
I swept my surroundings once, then asked Seo Yeo.
"Seo Yeo."
"Yes."
"Where's Lü Bu?"
"……"
At my question, Seo Yeo scanned the area around us exactly as I had, then tilted her head.
"……?"
"……"
A look that said she had no idea either.
It seemed absurd that Seo Yeo, whose senses outstripped anyone else's, could lose track of another human being — but then, she devoted every last scrap of those extraordinary senses to observing me. In other words, wherever anyone went and whatever they did, she couldn't have cared less as long as it posed no threat to me.
…Honestly, she wasn't even a machine, yet she was that single-mindedly faithful to her one duty.
Having taken stock of the situation, I muttered with my arms crossed.
"Lü Bu isn't the type to vanish without a word…"
What on earth was going on? She couldn't possibly have gotten lost just following me… could she?
Oh, come on.
A mother who'd given birth to a child, making a mistake straight out of a lost toddler's playbook… She… wouldn't. Right? Right. She wouldn't.
While I was desperately defending Lü Bu in my head, Zhang Jue, who had been quietly watching me carry on, spoke up.
"General Lü said something came up that required her attention, and she stepped away for a while."
"Came up?"
"Yes."
When I echoed the words back, Zhang Jue gave a calm nod.
"She said she would return shortly, and that there was no need to worry."
"Hmm… Well, if that's the case, I suppose it's fine."
Lü Bu had probably felt comfortable leaving my guard unit nearby. Still — what business could have pulled her away on her own?
Nursing the unanswered question, I waited right there for her to come back.
The outskirts of the city, where few people came and went — a secluded spot where a dense forest waited just a short walk ahead. There, a girl roughly shook the blood from her weapon.
Lü Bu Fengxian. The possessor of martial might so overwhelming that no one in the world — save for a single person — could stand against her alone.
Crouching where she was, she addressed the unidentified man retching up blood in front of her.
"Do you people never get sick of this? Where the hell do you keep crawling out from?"
"Ghhrrrk…!"
"Oh, right. I stabbed you through the chest."
The plan had been to rough him up just enough that he couldn't move — and realizing exactly what state she'd left the man in, Lü Bu pulled a helpless expression.
Those childhood days of groaning over her inability to control her strength were long behind her, but when it came to anything involving Jeong Reung, her hands still turned heavy without her meaning them to. And this one flaw, more than any other, simply refused to be fixed.
She already worked hard enough grinding down her impulsive nature; having someone prance up in front of her vowing to kill the man she loved was as good as pouring oil on a burning house.
"Whew… How am I supposed to explain this one?"
"…!"
While Lü Bu scratched her head and let her attention drift, the man with the pierced chest swiftly drew something from inside his robe.
What he held up was none other than a talisman. Talisman in hand, purpose unknown, the man moved straight on to his next action—
CRUNCH—!
"Kghk—?!"
"I knew you'd try something."
Lü Bu had been watching for exactly this, and her Sky Piercer Halberd punched a hole through the man's hand before he could finish.
She stared at the talisman she'd skewered along with his hand, then snorted.
"What, planning to work another one of your creepy little spells?"
"……"
"You people really are a riot."
Always ranting about the will of Heaven and the natural order at the drop of a hat, yet resorting to bizarre sorcery that warped reality itself. Then again, the most famous expert this field had ever produced once told her that even sorcery came burdened with all sorts of limitations.
Lü Bu watched the man's breath slowly fade away, then muttered under her breath.
"Seriously, though, where do these guys keep coming from?"
Unidentified figures who surfaced once every few months at the shortest, once every few years at the longest. Their clothes and their fighting styles changed with every encounter, which made it far more plausible that they weren't some organized faction so much as individuals acting on their own unhinged initiative.
— "Wherever people live, there's always at least one troublemaker harboring extreme ideas."
— "What's that supposed to mean?"
— "It means people who believe themselves destined to be heroes will keep appearing, gunning for the Grand General."
That was how the brown-haired strategist had put it — the one who, whenever there was no work to be done, would spend from dawn to dusk staring at the sky, pondering who knew what.
— "Whew… The land is vast and the people are many; the matters needing my attention number far more than one or two…"
The woman once hailed as the Great Good Master, murmuring in that leaden voice, looked utterly worn out to any eye that saw her.
Every time Lü Bu witnessed that, she counted herself lucky to earn her living with her body instead.
"Hey. You dead?"
"……"
"Hmm…"
Shunk!
Having run the Sky Piercer Halberd through the man's body to confirm whether he was truly dead, Lü Bu shrugged.
"Nothing weird this time."
A few of the men she'd dealt with before had, at the very instant of death, unleashed some grotesque sorcery in an attempt to take her down with them. But if one worthless nobody sacrificing his life could actually harm her, she'd have died on a battlefield long ago.
— "Hmm… It seems you've brought something strange along on your back, haven't you?"
— "Huh? What — you can see them too?"
After all, the one person capable of dealing with such things had been right there within their ranks.
Zhang Jue, the Great Good Master, had flashed a pleasant smile at the spirits quietly glaring at Lü Bu from somewhere near her.
— "Their level isn't particularly high, so I can erase them without any difficulty."
— "…Erase them?"
Lü Bu had asked her.
— "Y'know, aren't those things souls or something? What happens if you erase them?"
— "I've never used that sorcery myself, so I truly couldn't say."
Zhang Jue answered, her smiling expression entirely unchanged.
— "But surely Heaven will see them off as they ought to be?"
— "……"
At the sight of Zhang Jue spouting such bone-chilling words with a bright, sunny face, Lü Bu had gone blank with bewilderment.
Seeing her like that, Zhang Jue had laughed as though thoroughly delighted.
— "Hehe. Saying I would erase them was only half a jest — what I remove is merely the wedge that allows the spirits to linger in this world."
— "…Is that so."
— "Yes. Probably."
Shouldn't you be certain about that part, at least?
It had nagged at her a little, but one thing was certain — whenever Zhang Jue performed her rite, the strange things disappeared — so Lü Bu had let it slide.
— "Graaargh…!"
— "Sounds like some wild beast howling."
After all, she couldn't have cared less what became of men who preached the will of Heaven while trying to harm Jeong Reung.
"Hey. Burn this, and dump whatever's left somewhere in the forest."
"Yes, ma'am!"
Leaving the cleanup to the soldiers who'd followed her out, Lü Bu ambled off at a loose, unhurried pace.
That woman Seo Yeo never strayed so much as a step away, all in the name of guarding Jeong Reung.
"Sigh."
Well, what could she do?
Even now, all she could manage was barely holding her own against every challenger who came at her. Guarding him side by side was one thing — that much she could accept in stride — but the way Seo Yeo's eyes transformed completely the instant she caught the faintest hint that Lü Bu might push her aside… that, she still hadn't gotten used to.
"Weakness is a sin."
Lü Bu murmured it as she heaved a long, deep sigh. Anyone else who'd overheard would have lost their minds at the absurdity — but what could you do?
Strength was always relative.
After walking awhile like that, Lü Bu let the Sky Piercer Halberd slip from her shoulder and trail along the ground as she spoke.
"You can stop skulking around like a rat and come out now."
"Oh ho. So you were aware of me?"
The moment Lü Bu said it, a girl sprang out of thin air.
Blue-eyed, the girl stared straight into Lü Bu's blood-red ones and asked.
"I was certain I could not be seen. How is it that you noticed me?"
"You were staring at me that openly. How could I not?"
Lü Bu replied flatly, leveling the Sky Piercer Halberd at the girl.
"If you're another one of those lunatics babbling about the flow of the era, hurry up and attack. I don't have time for this."
"Puhuhu. Were you not the Defier of Heaven, you would have wandered aimlessly from place to place and died a lonely death — and yet listen to how you speak."
"What did you say?"
Lü Bu's face twisted at the incomprehensible words, but the girl paid her no heed whatsoever and continued.
"Never mind. I merely wished to know who the woman was — the one who stole the prey I had intended to deal with."
"……"
"You need only act in whatever direction your heart desires."
"…As you always have."
At some point the girl had already become wind; with those final words, she vanished from sight once more.
Having witnessed yet another incomprehensible scene, Lü Bu's face creased slightly.
"…How the hell am I supposed to kill freaks like that?"
She'd seen plenty of strange ones — fools who crossed distances in the blink of an eye, or made people see things that weren't there — but turning into an outright natural phenomenon was a first. If anything, this one stood a few steps beyond even the bizarre freaks she'd encountered so far.
"Hmm… It'll work out somehow."
For Lü Bu to go weak at the knees at the sight of an immortal like some ordinary peasant who'd glimpsed a transcendent — she had been through far, far too much for that.