My chuunibyou nickname is coming out of the boss's mouth
My chuunibyou nickname is coming out of the boss's mouth
There are times when a person sees nothing but the path ahead.
And right now,
She was, quite literally,
in that very state—seeing nothing else.
"Ugh..."
"Guh..."
Soldiers sprawled at the entrance of the government office.
At the center of it all,
She stood alone, her gaze cold and unwavering.
A woman with green hair and green eyes,
Two spears slung across her back and a sword at her waist.
Yet, despite carrying three weapons,
She had drawn none of them here.
With only her bare fists and feet,
She had laid out a dozen armed soldiers on the ground—nothing more.
Watching her, radiating the presence of a tiger,
The other soldiers who had gathered could only stand frozen in place, not daring even to think of approaching.
"Y-you wretch! What in the world do you think you're doing!"
"H-how dare you raise a ruckus here, of all places!"
Soldiers raising their voices, trembling all the while.
Looking at them, eyes filled with fear,
She was about to repeat, in a voice as cold as frost, the same words she had spoken to the ones now lying on the ground.
"Clear the way."
"Guh..."
"Now."
At her warning, the soldiers already paralyzed by fear began to waver violently.
Yet, they still did not dare to open the path, their eyes still glancing around nervously.
The flicker of so-called loyalty visible among them seemed to speak volumes about the character of the master they served, though it was hardly a welcome sight to her right now.
Thinking she would simply have to show them her strength once more, the woman began to advance slowly toward the soldiers.
She was well aware that these actions went against every rule of decorum.
But even so...
Right now, she had no space left in her mind for courtesy,
nor any time left to observe it.
Even as she was delayed here,
Every moment those children's lives were under threat.
Seeing the soldiers approach, their weapons trained on her, the woman clenched her fists once more and settled into a stance.
Then.
"Halt!"
"!"
"G-General!"
At the sharp command, the soldiers parted to the left and right, clearing the way.
From between them, a man stepped forward.
A man in striking armor, with an extremely handsome face.
The moment she saw him, accompanied by a blonde, brown-skinned female general behind him,
The woman knew instinctively.
'I see... So this man is...'
The supreme commander of the great army of over 100,000 stationed here,
The hero who had beheaded Zhang Jiao himself and annihilated the Yellow Turban main force.
And... the very man she had been so desperately hoping to meet just moments before.
"Insolent wretch! Before you stands the General Who Conquers the North, Lord Yuan Shu. Show your proper respect at once!"
A soldier spoke with firm resolve.
At this, the woman immediately knelt and offered a formal salute without a trace of resistance.
A complete contrast to the violently belligerent behavior of moments before.
But considering her purpose here from the start was to meet this man,
Yuan Shu, it was no strange thing.
As she offered her respects,
Yuan Shu looked down at her with a cold expression and spoke.
"Barging into the government office at this hour to stir up trouble. Just who do you think you are?"
His voice carried considerable displeasure.
It was an entirely understandable reaction, and the woman bowed her head even deeper as she spoke.
"Before I answer that, I must first beg forgiveness for my rudeness. Yet, if I had not resorted to this, I would never have been able to secure an audience with the General..."
"Spare me the extraneous explanation. State only who you are and why you have committed this act. If you have caused such a disturbance for a trifling reason, you will be punished under military law."
Yuan Shu's declaration held an icy warning.
Hearing it, a deep tension began to settle in the woman's heart.
She hadn't even gotten to the main point yet, but she already knew.
What was about to come out of her mouth would, from anyone else's standpoint, likely seem trifling indeed.
Perhaps, just as her subordinates had feared, she would receive no help but only punishment before being driven away.
But regardless, she knew.
That without the person standing before her, she had no other option left.
That no matter what, she had to secure this man's help.
Even if it meant resorting to every conceivable method she could think of...
Having steeled herself for that final resolution,
The woman bowed her head to the man who radiated clear displeasure and spoke, her voice suppressing every ounce of tension she felt.
"My name is Sun Jian, courtesy name Wentai. I currently hold the post of Major of a Separate Command."
"Sun... Jian?"
For an instant, Yuan Shu's eyes flew wide open, his voice trembling slightly.
Whether it was from displeasure or something else, she could not tell, but Sun Jian could recognize that the man before her knew of her.
But then.
"You say you are... Sun Jian? The one they call the Tiger of Jiangdong?"
"!? N-no... how do you... urgh... Yes. That... is so."
"I see. So it is you. I thought we would meet someday, but to encounter the Tiger of Jiangdong so soon..."
"Urgh..."
As the unexpected nickname spilled repeatedly from Yuan Shu's lips, Sun Jian could not help but feel deeply flustered.
Tiger of Jiangdong.
A nickname she had bandied about in her immature, reckless youth,
a title that now, for the current Sun Jian, was a dark past that made her toes curl just to recall it.
Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined it would come rolling out of the mouth of the famous Yuan Shu, of all people.
'Agh... I was out of my mind... Why on earth did I go around letting that childish nickname drip from my own mouth...'
When she was young, she had thought it sounded cool and spread it around, but looking back now, it was a name that just made her want to roll on the floor with a red face.
Because it had spread so pointlessly far, these occasional reminders of her dark past never failed to turn her stomach inside out, just like now.
"First, rise. If the Tiger of Jiangdong has come at this late hour, the matter must be important. Let us go inside and discuss the details."
"Th-thank... you."
The toe-curling, finger-cringing sensation washed over her once more.
However,
Despite the cringe of her dark past, Sun Jian barely managed to collect herself and began to focus on what she needed to do.
In any case, this was Yuan Shu, who knew her by her nickname.
This meant he held some sort of interest in her.
A man's interest in a woman.
There was much to ponder about what that signified,
but what mattered immediately was that she did not sense any of the negative feelings Sun Jian had feared from the man before her.
This was a ray of relief for Sun Jian, who had been deeply anxious over a first encounter that had unfolded so poorly.
And so,
Thinking the situation was flowing more favorably than she had expected,
Sun Jian followed Yuan Shu's guidance and arrived at a spacious room inside the government office.
"All of you, withdraw. I must speak with our guest about an important matter. Ji Ling, wait by the entrance."
"Yes, General."
"Understood, my lord."
Yuan Shu even dismissed the soldiers, arranging for privacy.
Once they were alone,
Yuan Shu looked at her face, a gentle smile on his handsome features, and asked.
"So? What business does the Tiger of Jiangdong have with me? To come all the way to this distant land of Ji Province, no less."
"That is..."
Aside from mentioning that embarrassingly cool nickname again, Yuan Shu's attitude was one of clear goodwill.
With a slightly lightened heart, Sun Jian began to state the main point she had prepared in her head.
"General. I have a request."
"What is it? Speak. I will grant it if it is within my power."
Seeing Yuan Shu's unexpectedly forthcoming goodwill, Sun Jian immediately spoke of the purpose that had brought her here.
The fact that was even now burning her up from the inside out.
"Please... save my children. Save my children who have been taken by the Yellow Turbans."
"Children?"
Yuan Shu's reaction was considerably more surprised than she had expected.
Seeing this, Sun Jian quietly swallowed hard and briefly explained the situation so far.
The Yellow Turbans led by the chieftain Zhao Hong.
Originally stationed in Wan, they had been defeated by the government forces under Sun Jian, lost many soldiers, and fled all the way here to Ji Province.
If that were the end of it, Sun Jian would have had no reason to pursue them further.
This Ji Province was not under her jurisdiction, and their forces had been severely weakened since the defeat.
However, just before they fled.
Zhao Hong had launched an unforeseen ambush and dealt Sun Jian a massive blow.
And it was not a matter of soldiers...
Nor of wealth.
It was her family.
The ones Sun Jian treasured and loved above all else.
Her husband Wu Guotai, ruthlessly murdered by those bastards.
And her three young children, kidnapped in the chaos that followed.
This utterly horrific wound left by the Yellow Turban scum just before their flight
was what drove a woman named Sun Jian all the way to this distant land of Ji Province.
To avenge her husband as a wife,
And to save her children as a mother...
But,
Even after pushing herself to the limit to get here, Sun Jian's resources were gradually reaching their end.
Firstly, she and her subordinates knew absolutely nothing about the geography of Ji Province.
On top of that, their provisions were already exhausted, and her soldiers were dead tired from the reckless forced march.
She had no knowledge of the terrain and no soldiers fit to move.
Furthermore, she herself was worn to shreds in both body and mind from the journey here.
In this situation,
Only one path remained to Sun Jian.
A man she had never even seen face-to-face,
Yet a fellow government commander who possessed the mightiest military force in this northern region,
And someone of whom one could at least hold minimal expectations, given his reputation for being humane.
Yuan Shu.
Begging this man for help was the only thing Sun Jian could do now.
And as fast as possible...
Before those savage Yellow Turbans took the lives of her children as well.
"And so... I beseech you, General. Please... just this once... just this once, extend your hand to me. If you help me just this once, I shall never forget this grace for all eternity."
Sun Jian bowed her head deeply, her plea earnest.
Yet.
"Hmm..."
In response to Sun Jian's words, Yuan Shu did not give an immediate answer, instead falling into thought.
A heavy silence stretched on.
The actual time that passed was by no means long,
but in that space where each second felt like a year, Sun Jian began to feel as if her insides were being roasted alive.
She was Sun Jian, who had risen to the rank of Major of a Separate Command by accumulating her own share of achievements.
But even so, her accomplishments and results were, compared to this Yuan Shu, as pitifully insignificant as a candle before the sun.
Yuan Shu, who, three years her junior, already commanded a great army of over 100,000 and had his name resounding throughout the realm.
A man who held such fame and power could not possibly be a soft touch.
His showing of goodwill was one thing, but he would not easily agree to mobilize his forces.
Especially when a woman with nothing to her name barged in out of the blue in the middle of the night with this kind of request, the likelihood that he would swallow it without any collateral was...
'No... There is one thing... I do have.'
A thought flickered through Sun Jian's mind in an instant.
Though no clear decision had been made, unlike the rough atmosphere of their first meeting, Yuan Shu had shown her a rather favorable response.
And the look on the man in front of her
brought a single card to mind for Sun Jian.
Having married at the young age of fourteen,
Already the mother of three children,
And now having lost her husband Wu Guotai, Sun Jian was alone.
From marriage and married life to childbirth, child-rearing, and even bereavement—things others must experience over a lifetime, she had already gone through at the young age of twenty-four.
This bitterly accumulated life experience
allowed Sun Jian to faintly grasp what the man before her was thinking as he looked at her.
The way Yuan Shu was looking at her now, with a kind of smoldering intensity in his gaze.
When she compared it to her late husband, it was clearly...
'... That day. Quan was conceived.'
A memory from that time, both passionate and sweet.
Seeing the look in this man's eyes that 'coveted' her, which she had deduced from that memory,
Sun Jian bit her lip lightly
and spoke in her heart to the person she could no longer see.
'I'm sorry... dear husband...'