You son of a bitch!
You son of a bitch!
Lü Bu was raining down ever-intensifying attacks, steadily eating away at any room Dong Zhuo had to move.
She had expected as much, but facing a warrior called Unmatched Under Heaven was never going to be easy.
Dong Zhuo had braced herself to give it everything, pouring in every last ounce of strength.
Yet despite all that,
Lü Bu was simply too strong.
Speed, power, technique.
Proving that the little brat's title of Unmatched Under Heaven wasn't for nothing, Lü Bu's martial prowess outclassed Dong Zhuo in every dimension.
A chain of attacks that permitted no opening, not even for an instant.
Dong Zhuo was a fighter who surpassed the average general by a fair margin, and that was just enough to hold out for a while.
But the moment the fight passed the twenty-bout mark, even she found herself in trouble.
—CLANG!!!
"Kgh!"
With a draining heaviness in her limbs, Dong Zhuo barely managed to fend off the blow.
She narrowly deflected the strike crashing down toward her head and gasped for breath.
'Can I... really do this?'
Fatigue swamped her entire body, and the arm gripping her weapon was screaming in protest.
The chance of success, faint even at the beginning, had now grown so dim it was barely visible.
But.
"Hyaaaaat!!!"
—BOOM!!!
To snatch at that fading chance, Dong Zhuo swung her blade with every fiber of her being.
For that person's sake...
And for her own sake as well.
However.
—Crack!!
"Kgh!"
The Fangtian Halberd pierced sharply into her flank.
The strike drove into the gap left by her reckless attack, ripping through her armor and wounding her.
A crushing pain and a suffocating sense of despair washed over her at the same time.
Glaring down at her with a cold expression, Lü Bu raised the Fangtian Halberd high.
"Die."
That single clipped word fell together with the blow that came crashing down at her head.
Yet in that moment, the agony of defeat weighed on her more heavily than any fear of death.
She had let Gongsun Zan slip away,
and she had failed to defeat Lü Bu.
She had used a minor stratagem and strode forward brimming with confidence, only to produce a result so pathetic it was beyond contempt.
And now... the only thing left to her as the price of failure was death.
'Is this the end... After all this... I...'
She had never faced peril this severe except once, long ago, when she had first set out to suppress the Yellow Turbans.
At that time Yuan Shu had stepped forward and saved her, but she could hardly expect the same thing to—
—CHING!!
"!!"
"... Huh?"
In that instant, instead of the expected pain, a sharp clang resounded in her ears.
Surprise began to dawn on Dong Zhuo's face.
And then a familiar and equally sharp voice followed.
It was...
"What're you standing around dazed for? If you're wounded, pull back quickly!"
"Ji... Ji Ling? How did you get here..."
"My lord sent me, obviously. Why ask what you already know?"
Ji Ling's voice was practically laced with irritation.
She then moved to block Lü Bu, who for some reason was quietly inching her horse backward, and pressed Dong Zhuo again.
"Just get moving! Honestly. Making people worry about you... This is exactly why my lord kept agonizing over you and couldn't take his eyes off things."
"Ah..."
Yuan Shu had been watching the entire situation from the start and had immediately taken action.
Hearing that made a whole rush of emotion well up in Dong Zhuo's chest, and she turned her horse right around.
"... I'm sorry."
"Save the apology for my lord. Although... if you really want to apologize to me, you can just treat me to a whole jar of wine later."
"I promise... I will."
With those words, Dong Zhuo sped back toward the main camp.
In practical terms, this was retreat after an effective defeat... but in this moment, her heart was filling with a sensation far different from the agony it had known just a moment before.
'He was watching... me... the whole time...'
The man who had perceived her danger and extended a helping hand precisely when needed...
Yuan Shu.
She had failed to secure a gift for him,
but the fact that he kept watching over her—
the fact that he was protecting her—
planted a trace of happiness, of pure joy, in Dong Zhuo's heart.
Enough to ease, at least a little, the fear that he might have grown so preoccupied with that bitch Liu Bei that he had forgotten her entirely.
And so, after wiping away the tears that had welled at the corners of her eyes, Dong Zhuo rode Red Hare back toward camp.
Her gaze fixed on the face of the man who had come out to the entrance to watch her return.
*
Dong Zhuo was safely back.
A faint sigh escaped Ji Ling's lips as she watched her retreating figure. A moment later...
a deadly chill, utterly unlike her usual manner, began to settle over her face.
"Sis, then I'll..."
"Wait. First... give me just a moment."
"Hm? Ah... yeah, got it."
Ji Ling gestured for Zhang Fei, who had ridden with her, to hold back, and fixed her eyes on Lü Bu.
She then addressed Lü Bu—whose face had gone so pale that anyone could see it—in a hard, clipped voice.
"It's been a while, you. You haven't forgotten who I am, right? Not from Luoyang. Even longer before that. From Hedong."
"Khh!..."
A stifled groan escaped Lü Bu's lips.
Watching her, Ji Ling felt the suspicion she'd been entertaining at around eighty-percent certainty—
the guess she had not yet dared voice to the others—
harden into certainty, and she spoke in a voice thick with raw fury.
"Seeing you like this, I guess it's true. Damn. I never imagined the Unmatched Under Heaven herself would turn out to be such an ungrateful piece of trash. Isn't that right, Gung Seon?"
A name she had not heard in a very, very long time.
The hand gripping the Fangtian Halberd began to tremble.
*
Ji Ling.
She had harbored her doubts about the person called Lü Bu for a while.
That maybe this brat was the little girl they'd once rescued in the past—
the child who had been called Gung Seon.
Other evidence aside, time had passed and her face had changed a great deal as she grew up, but Ji Ling's distinctive sharp eye kept sending her the signal that this brat was that brat.
Added to that was the fact that Lü Bu had come from Bing Province, which kept hardening her suspicion.
And now, Ji Ling could be certain.
Here was Lü Bu, shaking and trembling, unable even to offer an excuse.
That was unmistakably the fear of someone whose identity had been exposed.
Yet while exposing her identity was one thing, a small complication remained with this situation...
Under normal circumstances, once you grabbed a weakness like this, the textbook move was to apply quiet pressure to extract what you wanted.
Regrettably, Ji Ling had none of the brains needed to exploit the situation that way.
"Lü Bu! How could you do this to us? My lord saved your life and your mother's life back then, and this is how you stab us in the back?!"
Ji Ling raised her voice, pouring out a pure and simple fury.
The distance was such that no one else could hear, but her words sank into Lü Bu's chest like daggers.
"Me, personally! I gave you rice balls back then! I changed your bandages! I even taught you a little bit about how to grip a spear! I remember everything, got it? When your mother said you had to leave or whatever and we sent you off, my lord and I were so horribly sorry to see you go! Is this how you repay that kindness?"
"Uu..."
"They say even a beast doesn't forget kindness, but we went and saved something lower than a beast! Ugh, hell! What I want is to crack your skull open with my own hands!"
Ji Ling was grinding her teeth in genuine fury.
There was no strategic motive or cunning scheme behind any of this—just words spewed out of sheer, simple disgust.
Meanwhile,
Zhang Fei, who had been listening beside her, erupted with her own anger and shouted.
"Lü Bu! I knew you were a famous warrior who'd made a name for yourself, but now I see you're a complete son of a bitch! Not only did you become the lapdog of a rebel, you'd even point your blade at the person who saved your life!"
"Tch..."
Zhang Fei carried on as if the grievance were her own, digging in with unmistakable sincerity.
At that, Lü Bu's expression read, 'And what the hell are you supposed to be?', but even so, a burning prickliness forced her to frown.
"There's a lot I can stomach, but I cannot stomach repaying kindness with betrayal! Sis! Say no more! I'll handle this creature worse than a beast and be done with it!"
"All right! Go, Zhang Fei! Go take the head off that ungrateful wretch!"
"Got it! Hyaah!"
The moment Ji Ling gave her permission, Zhang Fei shot forward, Eight-Zhang Serpent Spear held firm in her grip.
And,
though Lü Bu felt a deep churn of turmoil in her chest,
she also felt a very tiny measure of relief that at least Ji Ling wasn't the one coming at her.
No matter how much she told herself she had come to avenge Zhang Liao, she still could not bring herself to point her weapon directly at her benefactors Ji Ling and Yuan Shu.
Much less against Ji Ling, who was firing off the full details of the past and letting loose righteous fury.
In contrast, this Zhang Fei or whatever—this bitch who looked unpleasant at a single glance—was someone she could face with a comparatively easier heart.
Of course, even so, the woman looked to be someone under Ji Ling's command, or like a younger sister to her, so she'd handle her just enough to wound her without—
"You son of a bitch! Take Zhang Fei's spear!!"
—Swoosh!
"!?"
The instant the thought crossed her mind, Zhang Fei's Eight-Zhang Serpent Spear came tearing in faster than she'd expected.
Having assumed the woman would be at best on par with the Dong Zhuo she'd just faced, or weaker, a flicker of consternation crossed Lü Bu's face.
"You little—!"
—Clang!
Lü Bu swung the Fangtian Halberd to meet it.
Despite the monstrous strength that even Dong Zhuo had been helpless against, Zhang Fei blocked it rock-solid.
Lü Bu felt the heavy shock travel up her hand.
She was startled by the opponent's brute force, which far exceeded expectations, but late understanding began to dawn: now she saw why Ji Ling had sent this woman in her place.
Because Ji Ling had judged she could actually win in a fight against her.
As if mocking Lü Bu's earlier thoughts of showing restraint or going easy, Zhang Fei displayed formidable martial prowess and pressed her attack without pause.
—BOOM!!!
The two female warriors' weapons clashed with a sound like something bursting apart.
With every bout, a deafening roar echoed and a hair-raising shockwave shuddered outward; the two of them swung more and more savagely at one another.
A Dragon-Tiger Duel.
The sight of them locked in a desperate, fiercely matched melee—as though a dragon and a tiger were locked in mortal combat.
Soldiers and officers from both sides who were watching couldn't help letting out sounds of awe.
But then...
Whether in metaphor or in reality,
a tiger still came up a little short when trying to match a dragon.
'Hrm... Is this a bit much for her?'
Ji Ling, observing the situation, could tell.
Zhang Fei was being pushed back, little by little.
Lü Bu still kept glancing warily in this direction, which itself showed she had a measure of composure to spare, whereas Zhang Fei, despite her full efforts, was showing a slight but clear disadvantage compared to Lü Bu.
As expected of a general called Unmatched Under Heaven.
She had shown plenty of promise even as a small child, but looking at things now, there was likely no one in the world who could defeat her one-on-one.
'Hrm... In this case, maybe I should jump in too? But if I do, it feels like we'd just get in each other's way...'
A sudden two-against-one could easily turn into a zero-point-five-against-one.
Without a certain amount of prior practice together, you ran the risk of hitting your own ally with a swung weapon.
More than anything, wasn't Lü Bu herself still keeping a constant eye on this side?
That wasn't just the flimsy, threadbare guilt of a son of a bitch—it meant she was keeping intervention from this side firmly in mind.
A surprise attack against someone already braced for it is no surprise at all, and for several reasons like that, the situation wasn't favorable for Ji Ling to jump in.
Just then.
"Hm? When did you two get here?"
"The youngest looked to be at a disadvantage, so we came."
"So that's Lü Bu... truly impressive. To hold that much of an advantage against Zhang Fei."
Before she knew it, Guan Yu and Liu Bei had smoothly ridden up alongside her on horseback.
Liu Bei had not drawn her weapon, keeping her composure, while
Guan Yu held the Green Dragon Crescent Blade, her gaze fixed solely on one person.
The woman currently pouring attacks against Zhang Fei: Lü Bu.
Liu Bei was one thing, maybe, but Guan Yu, at a single glance, radiated a deep thirst for battle.
Sensing that things were about to get interesting, Ji Ling quietly watched the situation unfold.