Wu and Yue in the Same Boat (1)
I had expected Zhuge Liang would summon me.
I did send that sudden letter warning that Liu Bei was underestimating the danger of a fire attack, after all.
In the Romance, Zhuge Liang only learns Guan Suo is still alive when he sets out on the southern campaign against the Nanman. In other words, he had just received a letter warning him about fire attacks from the son of a friend he had believed long dead—an utterly baffling situation. From Zhuge Liang’s perspective, it had to leave him stunned.
…I was only half-convinced he would even believe me.
I had hinted that Liu Bei’s judgment had clouded and his vision narrowed in his rage over losing his sworn brothers. But even as Guan Yu’s son, there was no guarantee Zhuge Liang would take my words at face value. If he had trusted his lord Liu Bei instead, that would have been the end of it.
Thankfully, he did believe me—and that is why I am still alive.
Zhuge Liang had seen for himself how stubbornly Liu Bei insisted on invading Wu, so he must have decided there was merit in what I said. With that keen foresight he stationed Zhao Yun at Zigui and succeeded in reducing the army’s losses.
…Still.
I cut off the train of thought and looked at the man walking ahead of me. The one guiding me to the Chancellor’s residence was Zhuge Liang’s adopted son, Zhuge Qiao.
Zhuge Qiao walked before me looking utterly drained, his face haggard. I spoke up as I watched him.
“…Excuse me—are you all right?”
“…Y-yes? What is it?”
“You look terribly worn out… Are you sure you’re all right?”
His complexion was deathly pale, his frame gaunt. I had heard he was four years younger than me, yet on looks alone he seemed the older of us. Even his frail body had no flesh on it; he was skin and bones. His face stayed pale the entire time, and his expression never lightened.
“Y-yes. I am fine.”
Zhuge Qiao gave an awkward smile and insisted he was all right. Yet his hands trembled as if seized by a spasm, and his arms were as thin as withered branches.
“I have been covering the work of those who marched out to Yiling, so I suppose that is why my color is poor.”
He, too, was one of Yiling’s victims.
…The adopted son Zhuge Liang took in because he had no heir of his own…
Zhuge Liang had failed to produce an heir even past the age of forty. He would eventually have a biological son, but having no successor so late in life had been a problem.
With no child to carry on the line, he adopted his elder brother Zhuge Jin’s son and brought him here.
Before I knew it, a look of pity had settled in Guan Suo’s eyes as he regarded Zhuge Qiao.
He must be suffering terribly inside.
Dark circles hung heavy under Zhuge Qiao’s eyes. Anyone who knew the Three Kingdoms was well aware of Zhuge Liang’s murderous workload. As the man expected to succeed him, Zhuge Qiao would have borne enormous hopes—and an enormous share of that work. On top of that, the Battle of Yiling had broken out, driving the conflict between Shu and Wu to the brink.
Of course, even as Zhuge Jin’s own son, no one would dare openly abuse him while Zhuge Liang was around… but the sideways glances he has to endure must still be considerable.
Caught between his birth father in Wu and his adoptive father in Shu, the inner conflict must have been severe.
…He may have worked himself into an early grave trying to live up to those expectations.
Died of overwork, they said.
“If anything is weighing on you, I would at least be willing to listen.”
Feeling sympathy for him, I offered to serve as a listening ear whenever things became too much.
“……Pardon? Ah—yes.”
Zhuge Qiao shot Guan Suo a dubious look at the unexpected words. After walking a while longer, Guan Suo and Zhuge Qiao arrived at the Chancellor’s residence.
“Please come in.”
“Then I will take my leave.”
Zhuge Qiao bid me farewell and left the Chancellor’s residence, his steps quick—other duties still waiting, no doubt. An official inside guided me onward.
“His Excellency the Chancellor is waiting within.”
When the sliding doors opened, a man sat unfolding bamboo slips and attending to his work. Even those who knew little of the Three Kingdoms would recognize the name.
Zhuge Liang.
The chancellor who, through the strategy of dividing the realm into three, raised a man who possessed nothing into an emperor.
After the disaster at Yiling that set Shu on the road to ruin, his extraordinary administrative skill had prolonged the nation’s life.
“I present myself before the Chancellor.”
I stepped inside, clasped my hands, and offered formal greetings. At the same time I took in Zhuge Liang’s appearance. He was a refined, handsome man with a faintly delicate air, yet his eyes were sharp and cool. Clad in a crane-feather cloak, a silk headcloth on his head, a white-feather fan in hand—
It feels like looking at an immortal or a Daoist sage.
Something about him felt untouchable.
“You have come well, Guan Suo.”
Zhuge Liang, still at his work, welcomed me warmly.
“Sit here.”
“Yes.”
I did not decline his invitation and took the seat offered.
“Chancellor, for what reason have you summoned me……”
I already had a fair idea, yet I asked anyway just to be sure.
“First I must offer my thanks.”
As expected, he brought up what had happened at the Battle of Yiling.
“You saved His Majesty and the lives of the soldiers.”
When Zhuge Liang bowed his head, I waved my hands in modest refusal.
“Not at all. Had Your Excellency not sent General Zhao Yun to Zigui, we would have been finished as well.”
After dispatching Fei Shi as messenger, Zhuge Liang had ordered Zhao Yun to hold Zigui. He had felt deep unease at the way Liu Bei failed to anticipate a fire attack. In the end it proved a masterstroke.
If we had kept fighting there, who knows how many more would have died.
Even the generals I had tried so hard to save might well have perished.
“Your foresight saved the lives of countless officers and men.”
Zhuge Liang was clearly pleased that the loss of talent had been so light.
“You achieved a great merit, yet because of the offense you committed against His Majesty, you were only appointed General of the Standard.”
In other words, he had originally intended a higher post.
“It is more than enough. I am already grateful simply that my crime was pardoned.”
“I called you because I have many questions, but I will ask only this one.”
“And this is a personal curiosity of mine…… I have heard from His Majesty and the other generals that you opposed the war with Wu.”
“Yes. That is so.”
“Why did you think so? Is Wu not your father’s enemy?”
I gave the answer I had prepared in advance.
“If the only two nations under heaven were Shu and Wu, I would have chosen war with Wu.”
“You held back because of Wei?”
“That is correct.”
With Zhuge Liang’s brilliant mind, no further explanation was needed. He, too, regarded Wu as an ally against Wei.
“I judged that my father would not wish to see Shu decline and walk the path of a fallen state.”
Honestly, even Guan Yu would want revenge—yet he would not want to watch the nation perish. Hearing this, Zhuge Liang sank into thought for a moment before opening his mouth for the next question.
“How did you foresee that His Majesty would pitch camp in the forests at Yiling?”
I had prepared an excuse for this as well.
“I heard that His Majesty was enraged by the deaths of my father and uncle.”
Having lost the sworn brothers with whom he had vowed to die on the same day, Liu Bei had been beside himself. Zhuge Liang and Zhao Yun both knew that well.
“In a situation where he needed to take Sun Quan’s head at once, I believed he would never have returned to a base no matter the circumstances.”
“And that is why you predicted he would camp in the forest?”
“Yes. In the sweltering heat the soldiers would have suffered heatstroke, and to escape the heat they would have had no choice but to head for the woods. With His Majesty so intent on taking Sun Quan’s head and destroying Wu, I believed he would dismiss the danger of a fire attack.”
“……Your thoughts have grown deep indeed.”
Inwardly impressed, Zhuge Liang praised Guan Suo with a quiet, satisfied smile.
“Guan Suo, I watched you when you were young.”
Then his eyes grew distant with fond memory.
“You were interested in martial arts and making friends among the guests, and you used to go about with bright flowers in your hair.”
…I did?
A grown man with flowers in his hair……
What a lunatic.
Just imagining it made my skin crawl. From what Po Sanniang had told me, his womanizing had already been no joke—he really had done every ridiculous thing imaginable.
“To be frank, compared to Guan Xing I never expected you to become more than a vanguard commander. And yet……”
“Through this affair I have learned how lacking my own judgment was.”
I could not deny it.
…Looking at the case of Ma Su, he may not be wrong.
“Truly a strange thing. That a father’s death could change a man so completely.”
Zhuge Liang murmured as he regarded the Guan Suo who had gained both gravity and outstanding insight.
“As if you had become an entirely different person.”
The words struck me like a blow to the chest—sharp enough to pierce the lungs.
“I did not summon you to the Chancellor’s residence solely because of what happened at Yiling.”
“Pardon?”
Then there was another reason?
“After the war ended I called for Jixiang so that we might discuss the path ahead.”
Jixiang—Ma Liang’s courtesy name.
So he met with Ma Liang separately.
In the original course of events Ma Liang would have died at Yiling, and the two men would never have met again. With talents such as Ma Liang and Huang Quan having returned safely, the chance of Zhuge Liang working himself to death had lessened a little.
“While we were discussing future affairs, Jixiang told me I should meet with you. He said your view of the larger picture is broad.”
…Ma Liang?
At Yiling, unlike the other generals, Ma Liang had given my opinions his full support. After the retreat to Baidi City he had even come to me privately to express his thanks. As a close friend of Zhuge Liang, he had clearly recommended me.
“I wish to speak with you about the future of Shu.”
Zhuge Liang then laid out the policies Shu would pursue. Though they had prevented a catastrophic weakening of national strength, the loss of Jing Province still left Shu the weakest of the three kingdoms.
“For the time being I will focus on stabilizing our national power and on policies aimed at internal stability.”
They had avoided annihilation at Yiling, yet the damage was far from nonexistent. In particular, the loss of forty thousand carefully selected elite troops was a heavy blow.
“Guan Suo, in your view, how should Shu handle diplomacy from here on?”
Zhuge Liang asked, expectation in his eyes.
“I believe we must form an alliance with Wu.”
“……Hrm.”
Hearing my words, Zhuge Liang let out an intrigued hum. He covered his mouth with the white-feather fan and asked,
“What is your reason for thinking so?”
His eyes narrowed as he pressed for the rationale.
“The answer is of a piece with what I said to your earlier question. It is to bring down Wei.”
Soon Cao Pi’s southern campaign would begin, and the formal friendship between Wu and Wei would shatter.
The fact that they did not pursue us when we fled to Baidi City already makes it a certainty.
We would seize that opening to restore friendly relations with Wu. Then, joining forces with Wu, we would stand against Wei—this was what I urged upon Zhuge Liang.
“Do you believe the other generals will accept it?”
“They will have realized it this time as well. Wu is no soft opponent.”
Having been thoroughly scorched by Wu at Ma’an Mountain, they would understand just how strong Wu was.
“There is a saying in the Art of War: Wu and Yue in the same boat.”
It meant a situation in which people who bear mutual enmity must cooperate against a common foe.
“Above all, once the state has decided a course, the generals are in no position to argue for or against it.”
If it were the decision of a foolish ruler, perhaps. But they could not quibble with a direction that served Shu and all the people under heaven.
“Guan Suo.”
Having heard my counsel, Zhuge Liang fixed me with a serious gaze. Those hawk-bright eyes looked exactly like—
“Would you have any interest in serving as a staff officer?”
—the eyes of a professor who has just found a graduate-student talent.
Remembering the haggard face of Zhuge Qiao I had seen on the way here, I smiled faintly and opened my mouth.
“I must decline.”
Dying in battle was one thing; I had no desire to die of overwork.