The Yellow Turban Rebellion (2)

Zhang Liang, having blurted out that flabbergasting remark from out of nowhere, simply wheeled their horse about.

"That is all I came to say."

As though trusting I would never attack, Zhang Liang turned a completely defenseless back to me and rode off.

"...Before you go, there's something I'd like to ask."

When I called out and stopped Zhang Liang mid-departure, they turned their head just enough to regard me with half a face.

"Is there something you're curious about?"

The words: the Yellow Turbans will not make enemies of you.

Ever since I'd heard them, a single question had been lodged in my mind.

"Are you really Zhang Liang?"

Zhang Jue. Zhang Bao. Zhang Liang.

According to the reports, the three dressed exactly alike — their builds so identical that telling them apart was said to be nearly impossible. Judging by the figure before me now, the reports were almost certainly accurate. The only difference lay in the color of the masks they wore, and it was by those masks alone, I'd heard, that the government army distinguished one from another.

It seemed absurd that no one knew the faces of the rebel chiefs holding the whole country in an uproar — but then, not one of them had ever once shown their face.

"You may hold a high seat in the Yellow Turban army, but this little stunt of yours looks a lot like overstepping your authority."

The Yellow Turbans were, at their heart, a force gathered around Zhang Jue. Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang were no more than allies who had risen in answer to her call.

And what banner was it the Yellow Turbans held aloft? To tear down the Han dynasty and raise in its place a new nation where harmony and prosperity walked hand in hand — that was their cause.

And yet they would not oppose me?

Granted, as Zhang Liang had said, I'd worked fairly hard — but at the end of the day I was still one more official feeding at the Han's trough. I hadn't defected to the Yellow Turbans, and what Zhang Liang was doing now amounted to sullying the very banner their cause stood under. Younger sibling to Zhang Jue or not, it was not something that could ever be permitted.

If such a thing had to be done at all, only Zhang Jue's own hand could do it with the least backlash.

Which meant — what if the person standing before me right now wasn't Zhang Liang at all?

As I'd just laid out, the mask was the only way to tell the three apart. Swap masks, and the disguise came free.

"......"

At my question, Zhang Liang seemed to smile, just a little.

Getting no answer, I pressed on.

"Fine. If you'd rather not say, so be it. But we have words for you as well."

That they would not make enemies of us — it could only be read as a pledge of nonaggression, a promise never to raise arms against us.

"The only reason we aren't striking first is that things are a mess on our end. If orders come down from the court, we'll have no choice but to hit you too."

There were the border tribes who kept pouring down even after being hammered black and blue by Lü Bu. There were the Black Mountain bandits, likewise, who swallowed beating after beating yet stubbornly kept blocking the mountain roads and looting travelers.

Incompetent as the court was, perhaps it did understand how hopeless things were in Bing Province, because even with the whole nation in an uproar it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠had made no move to interfere here. It was just as true that the court had hardly any strength to spare for the Yellow Turbans to begin with.

But if the Yellow Turbans kept swelling in number and flaunting their power, the silent court would issue its orders soon enough.

"And knowing that, you still say you won't oppose me?"

Someday, beyond any doubt, the day would come when I marched against them.

With whatever expression lay hidden behind the mask, Zhang Liang answered, calm and even.

"It will be all right."

Zhang Liang looked up at the sky, as if on a passing whim.

"...Because when that day comes, it will be the last battle — whether for me, or for the Han."

As if gazing at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠something no one else could see, Zhang Liang's eyes stayed fixed on some far-off point. A tone like a person reading the future itself — and I found I couldn't open my mouth.

And so Zhang Liang returned to the rebel camp, and then led one hundred fifty thousand Yellow Turbans out of Bing Province.

...Or ought I to have been calling them Zhang Jue, not Zhang Liang?

After that, the war between the Yellow Turbans and the Han dynasty raged without mercy.

Huangfu Song, Left General of the Household, took the central regions — Yanzhou, Ye Province, and the lands between. Zhu Jun, Right General of the Household, took the south — Jing Province and Yang Province. And last of all, Lu Zhi, Northern General of the Household, took the north — Jizhou and You Province, where Zhang Jue's main host stood.

Every last one of them was handed a crushing defeat by the Yellow Turban army.

In the middle of it all, when Lu Zhi refused to pay his bribes, the Ten Attendants pulled off the boneheaded move of demoting him and seating Dong Zhuo in the Northern General's place. And when Dong Zhuo then lost to the Yellow Turbans under Zhang Jue, bolted from the field, and came away having lost most of his soldiers, everything turned sour — the court scrambled, belatedly, to sweep up its own mess, hastily reinstalling Huangfu Song, who had all but finished pacifying the central regions, in the Northern General's seat.

There were those who burned their own bodies hoping to set a rotting nation alight.

And there were those who gave everything they had to protect the nation to which they had sworn their loyalty.

This was no mere clash between a bandit horde and a punitive army. It was a brutal war that bled across every corner of the land as each side strove to make its ideals real in its own way.

But as time passed, the scales slowly began to tip toward the government forces.

The once-endless ranks of the Yellow Turban army thinned little by little. Overwhelming as their numbers had been, in the end they were ordinary people who had picked up a sword less than a year before. And rotten as the dynasty had grown, the final reserve of strength the Han had banked over several centuries was nothing to sneeze at.

In the end, Zhang Jue and the whole of the rebel leadership, stripped of most of their soldiers, were waging their last resistance in Julu, the final city they had left.

Just as the government forces pooled everything for one last killing blow, a single letter arrived in Bing Province.

The central court that had kept silent all this while, out of consideration for us, had finally sent down its orders. They meant to finish this once and for all while they had the chance.

...Because when that day comes, it will be the last battle — whether for me, or for the Han.

The last conversation Zhang Liang and I had shared before parting went circling through my head.

That unknown figure, kind to me to the point of being strange.

In the end, your words were true.

With the border tribes and the Black Mountain bandits tying down my troops, I could never have stripped away a grand army. Setting out for Julu, I brought little more than three thousand soldiers, with Lü Bu at my side.

Julu.

The place where Zhang Jue had first set the Yellow Turban Rebellion alight.

Pushed back and back again, the Yellow Turbans had come full circle, making their final stand where it had all begun.

Huangfu Song, the supreme commander, welcomed me warmly the moment word reached him that I had arrived with my army. The old general's hair had gone fully white, and he looked thoroughly spent — yet his eyes had lost none of their martial fire.

"Reinforcements, at a time when we can't spare so much as a single soldier! I won't forget this aid of yours!"

"The honor is mine, General, that you think so well of me."

"Hah! A young friend with a honeyed tongue. Now then — this one standing beside you...?"

Huangfu Song looked over at Lü Bu, standing stiffly at my side. Those blood-red eyes and that blood-red hair certainly made an impression.

"Yes. This is Lü Bu."

"Hahahaha! With the famed Peerless Under Heaven herself come to us, the rebels might as well be dead already!"

Perhaps he could already taste the end of this interminable war, for Huangfu Song roared with laughter in delight. Lü Bu seemed to sneak a glance at Seo Yeo, standing behind me, but Seo Yeo gave no sign of caring one whit.

"You've only just arrived, so we'd best start with the situation. Follow me — I'll walk you through it all, nice and thorough!"

"Thank you."

"No need for thanks over ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a thing so obvious!"

And with that, Huangfu Song laughed heartily once more. What a boisterous old man he was.

Shown to the command tent, I got the broad shape of the situation straight from General Huangfu Song himself.

"Our army stands at about sixty thousand at present, while the Yellow Turbans holding out in Julu come to roughly eighty thousand in all."

"Eighty thousand... They've thinned out considerably."

"They have. Never thought I'd live long enough to call eighty thousand a small number."

"Well, the scale was dizzying enough when the Yellow Turbans first rose."

"Even now, the mere memory of it raises gooseflesh on my arms."

Stack up every Yellow Turban that had risen across the whole realm, and wouldn't the total have pushed up toward a million? Even if the overwhelming majority were farmer levies clutching whatever would swing, it was never a number to wave off.

Huangfu Song went on.

"Eighty thousand is all that's left of them in Julu, but don't expect an easy time of it. Every last one of them has to be counted among Zhang Jue's elite."

"So they're well beyond the level of half-trained farmer levies."

"Exactly. Which is why taking that city is turning into such a devil of a job."

The difference between a farmer levy and a trained veteran needed no lecture; anyone could grasp how wide that gulf ran. Veterans wielded their weapons with real skill, their morale ran high enough that they rarely broke and ran, and their formations did not come apart at the first shove.

"I'd half doubted the tales that Zhang Jue was truly learned in medicine — until I saw the outlandish poisons smeared across her army's weapons."

"Poison, you say..."

"Just so. Where she scrapes together that much of it, heaven only knows — but let an arrow so much as graze a man, and he's left groaning, fit for nothing."

So this was the sorcery by which farmer levies had stood up to elite government armies for nearly two years? How could Zhang Jue alone brew poison enough to coat that entire armory? Even if someone else learned the formula, no ordinary person could hope to reproduce it at will.

Did she truly work sorcery, then?

"I've called in physicians and pressed them to name the toxin, but not one of them can. Bah — it's enough to choke a man with frustration!"

Huangfu Song thumped his chest with a fist.

"That's the full extent of what I know. As for the rest..."

His eyes on the city gates, shut fast as iron, Huangfu Song murmured, quiet and level.

"We'll find out soon enough, once we cross blades with them."

"...So you've come."

A house like any other, one among the countless dotted through Julu. It was far too humble a dwelling for the person who had raised the Yellow Turban Rebellion — and there, Zhang Jue lifted her head.

The secrets of heaven.

From her earliest years, Zhang Jue had been able to read what people called the mysteries ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of the sky.

Reading those secrets had been a joy. Puzzling over what the nameless shapes that bloomed and faded in a cloudless sky were meant to signify, watching the stars in their courses to learn how the world would turn — all of it had felt like wondrous, meaningful work.

But where there is light, shadow follows.

The heavens' secrets had shown Zhang Jue a great many things — and at the same time, had forced upon her things she would have given anything never to know.

Why she had been born at all.

The Mandate of Heaven.

She had wanted to deny it. She could not.

"Physician... it hurts... please, save me..."

A child who should have had long years of laughter and play ahead had sickened and died instead.

"Don't make that face, I beg you. Khh—! Physician... you did... all you could..."

A man flogged for failing to pay his crushing taxes had at last slipped from the world.

"...You mustn't blame yourself, Physician. This worthless wretch simply... couldn't hold on any longer."

And there had been a mother who, weeping with her dead child in her arms, never once laid the blame at her door.

The Mandate of Heaven.

"Great Virtuous Master — please. Rid us of this godforsaken country."

She could not stop.

"I dream only of a world where everyone can lay their heads down at night without fear."

She could not run.

Even knowing the ending was sprinting toward ruin, she could not halt it.

The Mandate of Heaven.

By the time she came back to herself, she could see exactly how many lives had piled onto her shoulders.

O Heaven above — what is it you truly want from me?

There had been days when she wept beneath the unbearable weight of all those lives.

She was not so great a person. She had only ever been an ordinary physician who found her happiness in healing the sick — an ordinary woman, the kind you could find in any village, whose own heart ached whenever those around her grieved.

Why did he ask to speak with me?

There had been a man. In Bing Province, where the pull of heaven had drawn her, he had looked upon her — and for the briefest instant, she had seen them: a man and a woman, seated facing one another, simply gazing into each other's eyes.

"I want a world where people can live as people should."

The man's voice rang through her mind.

"What do you mean by that?"

The woman asked in return.

"That no one goes hungry, and no one freezes to death."

"That no one goes without a physician for want of coin, and no one is robbed simply for lacking the strength to resist."

"I want a world where everyone can greet tomorrow with a smile."

Listening to those words, Zhang Jue found herself smiling before she knew it.