Warlords Carving Up the Realm (3)
I watched as ten Hua Xiongs, ten Yan Liangs, and 3.3 Wen Chous conversed with Zhang Jue.
"How are He Yi and He Man faring?"
"The same as ever. From what I hear, they're roaming the Yingchuan countryside to this day, keeping up their guerrilla war."
Zhang Jue, quietly digesting the news Gwan Hae had brought her, continued slowly.
"…And Gong Du and Huang Shao?"
"Much the same as He Yi and He Man, as I understand it—waging their guerrilla war across Runan Commandery."
Yingchuan and Runan. Both lay in Ye Province, directly below Yanzhou—the territory currently ruled by Liu Dai and Cao Cao. The man holding the post of Inspector of Ye Province and governing it was one Gong Ju, a fellow blessed with a name that sounded suspiciously like "Princess," but he wasn't anyone worth fussing over.
Give it a little time, and he would no doubt be swallowed whole by Cao Cao—the same Cao Cao who would devour Yanzhou and drive Yuan Shu out of it. Even across the various Three Kingdoms media, the man had been so utterly devoid of presence despite his title that I honestly had no idea what he did.
Judging by Gwan Hae's report, the elite remnants of the Yellow Turban army were currently all concentrated in Ye Province. I had no clue what this Gong Ju fellow actually did with himself, but right about now I'd wager he was having such a wonderful time he was halfway to the grave. These Yellow Turbans were a far more capable lot than the ones history had recorded, after all—there was a very real chance Inspector Gong Ju would end up dead at their hands, just as Inspector Liu Dai of Yanzhou had.
Perhaps finding it strange that the Yellow Turbans were all gathered in one place, Zhang Jue put a question to Gwan Hae.
"Why are you all gathered in Ye Province?"
"…Mm. Well, that is…"
At the question, Gwan Hae answered, carefully reading Zhang Jue's face.
"…in case the Great Good Master might wish it, we gathered so that we might escort you—"
"……."
"N-no, never mind! If it is not your wish, you may stay here as long as you like!"
The face Gwan Hae turned toward Zhang Jue had gone deathly pale.
What was that about? Zhang Jue's expression hadn't changed in the slightest—what could have frightened her so badly that her face drained to chalk white?
After a moment of flustered silence, Gwan Hae drew a long, slow breath and tried again.
"…In the first place, who would ever dare belittle the Great Good Master's efforts?"
"It's just that…"
"Even now, the moment I close my eyes, that memory rises before me, vivid as the day it happened."
Was she recalling the Zhang Jue of that time—crushed beneath an excessive sense of duty, swaying as though she might collapse at any moment?
"So now, please do what you wish to do."
Saying so, Gwan Hae broke into a guileless smile.
"Every one of us wishes only for your happiness now."
Zhang Jue, who had once been unable to turn her back on her suffering people, now found herself looking upon the smiles of the very people she had sought to protect.
For a moment her lips moved soundlessly; then she asked.
"How did you know I was here?"
"Ah. Now that you mention it, I never did explain that, did I?"
Gwan Hae bobbed her head, as if only just realizing it.
That had been my biggest question, too. As far as the world knew, Zhang Jue was the unidentified leader of a traitorous cult who had vanished without a trace after the Battle of Julu. Watching the imperial army melt down as one over her baffling disappearance—had she ascended to the heavens, or sunk into the earth?—had been thoroughly entertaining.
Certainly no one had caught on when we secretly spirited Zhang Jue out of Julu. Had even a single soul noticed, they'd have come charging with foam at the mouth.
A woman whose face even her own Yellow Turbans did not know, and who wielded uncanny sorcery besides.
Strange powers and wanton spirits.
The old phrase for any mysterious being or phenomenon that defied rational explanation.
Zhang Jue, as it happened, qualified on both counts.
People of old were quick to fear the strange and bizarre, and so they made a habit of pretending not to see such things, of steering well clear. With no science to dissect an anomaly, they simply chalked it up to the workings of some unknowable something—offered up sacrifices, lifted prayers, and left it at that.
It might have been one thing if only Zhang Jue had vanished. But her younger brothers, Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang, had disappeared right along with her, and the mood in the warlords' camps must have been strange indeed.
In the end, the imperial army spent about a month combing Julu before giving up on finding her and withdrawing—or so I heard.
As I waited to see what answer would come, Gwan Hae opened her mouth.
"One night, I dreamed of a certain city."
"A dream?"
"Yes. A dream in which everyone lived out their days in peace."
At the answer beyond anything she could have imagined, Zhang Jue found herself echoing the question; as for me, I held my silence, resolved to hear it through to the end.
"And within that dream, a girl was chasing a man whose face was blurred beyond recognition, laughing all the while."
"……."
"And not only me. Everyone who spent long years beside the Great Good Master has dreamed that same dream."
Now that was strange powers and wanton spirits for you. To me, it was an outlandish affair I couldn't begin to comprehend.
Even a sorceress like Zhang Jue had apparently never encountered anything of the kind; for once, she couldn't get a word out.
"Then someone spoke up—said they'd been born and raised in Luoyang, and that the city in the dream had been Luoyang to the letter."
"Then you…"
"Yes. We slipped into Luoyang disguised as commoners and walked the city from end to end."
Gwan Hae went on.
"And once we had seen all of Luoyang with our own eyes, we understood."
"This city was exactly like the dream. Everyone here lived in peace, going about their daily lives."
"Everywhere else, the warlords were wringing the people's lifeblood to swell their arsenals every waking hour. This place was different."
"And the time we first noticed it was right at the height of the coalition's activity."
With that, Gwan Hae gave a slow nod.
"So we burned the coalition's buildings to the ground."
"…?"
My brain couldn't keep up. The conversation had just swerved violently into extreme territory.
"It is the place the Great Good Master chose."
Perhaps sensing our bewilderment, Gwan Hae went on as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"If harm comes to such a place, surely those of us who follow her are duty-bound to act. It is only natural."
So this was what a religious order was like. Their capacity for action was downright terrifying.
I offered no comment and kept my peace.
Zhang Jue, who had been listening, turned her amber eyes upon Gwan Hae.
"Then what will you do when you return?"
"We intend to carry on exactly as we have been."
An unreadable emotion rippled through Gwan Hae's eyes as she spoke.
"We will hound those vile wretches without pause, so that never once do they stretch out their legs for a peaceful night's sleep."
"……."
"Have no fear. Guerrilla warfare is second nature to us now—there's no chance we'd ever be caught—"
"Gwan Hae."
Zhang Jue severed the conversation with nothing more than her name. Silence blanketed the room, and a heavy stillness settled over it.
"You must not let your emotions consume you."
At her words, Gwan Hae's eyes wavered, if only for an instant.
"I—I only…"
"…Haa. How many times must I tell you?"
At Zhang Jue's sigh, Gwan Hae flinched.
"Keep your reason about you at all times, and act with a calm head."
"…Forgive me."
With a look of utter shame, Gwan Hae lowered her head slightly.
"In my heart, I would call every last one of you back to me—but that would be too much to ask, wouldn't it?"
"It would."
I nodded at Zhang Jue's question.
As things stood, the whole realm regarded the Yellow Turbans as a faction beyond negotiation entirely. Dangle gold before them and they would sneer, "Do we look like covetous wretches, the likes of you?"—and dismiss you outright. Offer to fill their granaries and it was "You swine! We provide for ourselves—now be gone!" Dismissed again. Promise them territory and it was "Is that land not the people's, in the end? You carry on as though you were its masters—how utterly laughable." Dismissed yet again.
At the very least, they returned their envoys alive instead of killing them, so the prevailing verdict was that while negotiation was impossible, they were not raving madmen either.
And now those very people had suddenly vanished without a trace? The warlords would certainly find that strange and launch investigations of their own, and at least one faction was bound to realize they had all streamed into Luoyang. And then the thinking would begin:
'The Yellow Turbans refuse negotiation outright—so how were they won over?'
'Someone actually managed to appease this insane cult?'
'How, in the world?'
Our faction had fought at Julu—and when the imperial army combed the city on rumors that the Black Mountain bandits were attacking, we had been the first to withdraw to Bing Province. Zhang Jue, missing since the Battle of Julu. A radical cult that obeyed no one but its leader, Zhang Jue. And a faction that had somehow, by some unknowable means, won that very cult over. The warlords were no fools; with clues like these stacked together, every last one of them would arrive at the same conclusion. That Zhang Jue was with us.
The faction that claimed to shield the imperial house had taken in the arch-rebel who had risen against the Han itself? And what would the backlash look like then? Terrifying even to imagine.
"Then what should be done…?"
To Zhang Jue's worried murmur, I answered evenly.
"It's all right. Given the state of the realm, the Yellow Turbans are in a position where no one can easily stamp them out."
"…?"
Pests who saw red at the mere sight of a warlord passing on the road, then gnawed away at him with endless guerrilla raids. Yet at the same time, a chivalrous band that plundered neither innocent commoner nor merchant caravan—indeed, one that shielded them from other bandits. Displaying such contradictory behavior, the Yellow Turbans left plenty of warlords agonizing over what on earth to do with them.
And was putting them down easy? Not in the least. The Yellow Turbans made their lairs high in the mountains, and after years of hard scrambling since the rebellion first erupted, they had become consummate specialists of guerrilla warfare. March a great army against them, and they melted into the mountain depths, forcing you into a grinding war of attrition. Pick equally swift-footed troops to counter them, and the Yellow Turbans simply fought too well—another headache. Even after defeating them, the aftermath was brutal: because they protected the common folk, public opinion turned against you at once, and the very bandits the Yellow Turbans had been hunting down came crawling back out of the woodwork.
And so the warlords found the Yellow Turbans, their tormentors, maddening beyond words—yet could never quite bring themselves to march out and exterminate them. With every surrounding faction a potential enemy, where would they find the strength to drive deep into the mountains after them?
All of this was something the sharp-witted Zhang Jue could surely have worked out on her own. I laid it out for her, point by point.
"Unless someone truly leads an army to storm one of your cities, the risk of your being wiped out to the last soul is slim."
"…Thank you."
Having heard me out, Zhang Jue offered her thanks, then turned to Gwan Hae.
"You heard him, yes?"
"Yes."
"Please—stay safe until the time comes. I beg this of you."
With those words, Zhang Jue gently took Gwan Hae's hand.
Gazing at Zhang Jue's tranquil smile, Gwan Hae spoke.
"To bring about the world the Great Good Master dreams of, we will never give up."
Conviction rang in her voice.