Rebellion (3)
Having slain Yong Kai, Gao Ding and E Huan absorbed his forces.
The soldiers they had hidden in ambush struck without warning, and Yong Kai's men surrendered almost without a fight.
Gao Ding and E Huan presented Yong Kai's severed head and submitted to Zhuge Liang.
Zhuge Liang's response, however, was coolly indifferent.
"Cornered as you were, did you not simply betray Yong Kai to save yourselves?"
He pressed them, asking whether Gao Ding had only killed Yong Kai once he was trapped and needed a way to survive.
"N-no, Chancellor! We struck first because we knew Yong Kai meant to betray us!"
"It is true, Chancellor. Please, believe us."
Gao Ding and E Huan pleaded desperately.
"Then why have you not brought me Zhu Bao's head as well? Did he not plot with Yong Kai to betray you?"
"Th-that is…"
Gao Ding, who had been so single-minded about killing Yong Kai, faltered; his pupils darted wildly.
"Very well. I shall grant you one more chance. Bring me Zhu Bao's head, and I will accept your surrender."
"Yes, Chancellor!"
"Zhu Bao meant to betray us alongside Yong Kai—we will bring you his head!"
To preserve their own lives, the two men accepted Zhuge Liang's terms.
Gao Ding and E Huan raced toward Zhu Bao's camp.
Once they had gone, Zhuge Liang turned to Guan Suo.
"An excellent stratagem. If we take Zhu Bao's head as well, our army will suffer no losses at all."
"Even without me, Chancellor, you would have devised a scheme of discord yourself."
I watched Gao Ding and E Huan depart as I spoke.
It ended sooner than I expected.
We had captured E Huan quickly, though by a different method than in the Romance. I wanted to keep the army's losses to a minimum while pacifying the unknown reaches of the Nanman lands.
Yong Kai had betrayed Shu, joined hands with Meng Huo, and laid bare his ambitions. Those who had answered his call to revolt would already have found his faithlessness unsettling. Breaking a bond already riddled with hairline cracks had been simple.
Yong Kai had never intended to betray Gao Ding, nor had he ever sent us secret letters of collusion. What Gao Ding and E Huan had seen were forgeries carefully copied in Yong Kai's own hand.
All of it was possible only because Yong Kai had once been an official of Shu.
Memorials he had submitted during his service still lay in Chengdu. Recruiting a skilled calligrapher to imitate his brushwork had been no great difficulty.
We had shown E Huan kindness until his wariness softened, then used the false letters to sow distrust between Gao Ding and Yong Kai. Gao Ding had not believed them at first—but when we deliberately refused to engage Yong Kai's troops, suspicion hardened into certainty. Growing ever more convinced, Gao Ding finally took Yong Kai's head, led his men over, and submitted.
A strategy made possible only by the thinness of the trust between them. We had sown discord in the enemy ranks while our own losses remained slight. Indeed, with Gao Ding bringing Yong Kai's and Zhu Bao's soldiers into our fold, our strength only grew.
As reward, Zhuge Liang pardoned Gao Ding's crimes and ordered him to govern Yong Kai's and Zhu Bao's former domains as well. E Huan was made Gao Ding's subordinate general.
"This Gao Ding will grind his bones to dust in loyalty to Shu."
Deeply moved, Gao Ding and E Huan knocked their heads to the ground again and again, swearing fealty.
"We thank you for the relief force, Chancellor."
With Zhu Bao's death the encirclement collapsed. Wang Kang and Lü Kai threw open the tightly shut gates and came out to welcome them.
"You must have endured a bitter siege. You held well."
Zhuge Liang praised their steadfast loyalty. Had they not resisted the rebels, the calamity might have reached all the way to Chengdu.
Wang Kang and Lü Kai received the army with every courtesy, letting the soldiers rest and recover from their hardships.
"Chancellor, this is a map of the Nanman lands. Please accept it."
Lü Kai presented a chart detailing the terrain and geography of the south.
"My thanks. Thanks to you, pacifying the Nanman will be far easier."
Lü Kai, who knew the Nanman well, asked to accompany the expedition; Zhuge Liang readily agreed.
Of the thirty thousand soldiers who had surrendered with Gao Ding, Zhuge Liang incorporated ten thousand into the main force and left the rest under Wang Kang.
Having shaken off the fatigue of the march, the Shu army had won its first battle; their morale soared as if to pierce the heavens.
"Now we march for Nanzhong!"
Yi Province was already infamous for its forbidding mountains, yet the Nanman country was harsher still—dense jungle and towering ranges, the humid air doubling the soldiers' exhaustion. Even the hardy troops of Shu struggled as they advanced. Streaming sweat like rain, the army pushed deeper into the south.
Nanman—the Southern Barbarians.
"Great King!"
A tribal warrior came sprinting into the palace, shouting.
"What is all this clamor?"
A man of towering build yawned, mouth gaping like a hippopotamus's.
"Speak. It must be urgent indeed if you dare wake me from my nap."
The sheer presence of him, looking down upon the messenger, radiated crushing pressure. This was Meng Huo, king of the Nanman tribes who ruled Nanzhong.
"Yes, Great King! Zhuge Liang of Shu has raised an army!!"
"Zhuge Liang?"
Meng Huo narrowed his brows, searching his memory, until Meng You at his side whispered,
"The Chancellor of Shu who sent us a letter some time ago."
"Ah— I remember. That Central Plains dog who wrote telling us to surrender?"
"Yes. That man is Zhuge Liang."
Yong Kai, who had been in collusion with him, had harped endlessly on watching Zhuge Liang of Shu with the utmost care; the name had lingered faintly in Meng Huo's mind.
"He offered to recognize our dominion over the Nanman if we would open friendly relations and submit to Shu, did he not?"
To Meng Huo, however, they were no different from any other lot who looked down on his people as barbarians.
"…Those Han dogs. So they raise an army after all. But why the panic?"
Meng Huo asked with a look of bored indifference.
"They say Zhuge Liang has already annihilated Yong Kai's forces that were stationed at Yuesui."
"…Yong Kai has fallen already?"
At the news that Yong Kai, who had been attacking Yuesui, was dead, Meng Huo's eyes changed.
"How did it happen?"
"…According to the reports, Gao Ding killed Yong Kai and surrendered to Zhuge Liang."
"Gao Ding betrayed him?"
"…Rumor has it Yong Kai meant to kill Gao Ding first and surrender to Shu himself."
Meng Huo shook his head at Meng You's words.
"That rat-faced schemer must have gone sniffing for his own escape and failed."
Meng Huo had never trusted Yong Kai. He had only joined hands with the powerful local magnate of southern Yi Province in order to use him. He had long since seen through Yong Kai's design to exploit him and seize Chengdu.
For all his brutish exterior, Meng Huo possessed a shrewd mind. Had he been mere brawn, he never would have become overlord of the Nanman.
That one thought he could use me for his own ambitions…
The sort who would cast aside allies without a second thought the moment the situation turned against him. A man who had abandoned the country he once served and fleeced the people for his own greed—Meng Huo felt not a shred of pity.
"And Zhu Bao? What of him?"
"Zhu Bao fell to Gao Ding as well."
Gao Ding and E Huan had surrendered to Zhuge Liang, then lured Zhu Bao out and killed him to prove their loyalty. Zhu Bao's soldiers had passed under Gao Ding's command. In the end, every faction that had risen against Shu under Yong Kai had been absorbed by Shu.
"Fools. Far from weakening Shu, they have only made it stronger."
They had failed to check Shu's advance into the Nanman and had instead reinforced the enemy.
"Those Yi Province country bumpkins think they can treat the Nanman lightly. It seems this body must take the field myself."
"Elder Brother means to go in person?"
"Of course! Do you think I will sit idle while outsiders set foot in Nanzhong?"
The Nanman people had survived the law of the jungle itself. By day they battled the scorching heat; by night the beasts prowled. We do not want to be ruled. Meng Huo felt fierce resentment toward Shu for seeking to subjugate the Nanman tribes. They wanted no control—only to live free, as they always had.
I will teach those Han dogs who do not know their place a lesson.
While considering how to drive out the Shu army, Meng Huo asked Meng You,
"How large is the Shu host said to be?"
"With the rebels absorbed, nearly eighty thousand."
"Eighty thousand, is it…"
Meng Huo smiled a savage smile and gave his orders.
"Contact every tribal chieftain in Nanzhong at once!"
"Yes!"
At Meng Huo's thunderous command, the tribes from every corner of the Nanman began to gather one by one. They shared his resolve: the invasion of outsiders would not be forgiven.
From among his subordinate generals, Meng Huo meant to entrust the vanguard to the bravest—Jinhuan Sanjie, Ah Huinan, and Dong Dona—and give them troops.
But then—
Boom!
Someone flung the doors open with a crash.
A woman strode in.
At the sight of her commanding presence the soldiers flushed. She had inherited her mother's ivory-pale hair and the sun-bronzed brown skin distinctive of the Nanman. Tall for a woman, her eyes held a brilliant light, and her wild, unbound hair only heightened her untamed beauty.
"Send me, Father!"
She shouted, full of fire. Her ringing voice and spirit rivaled any man's.
"I will teach those Han people from the north their place!"
"Huaman, the battlefield is still too soon for you."
Meng Huo soothed the warlike daughter who took after him so strongly.
Meng Huaman.
Meng Huo's daughter, who bore the epithet "Foremost Beauty of the Nanman." He had raised her like a treasure of gold and jade, and he had no intention of sending her to war.
"Do you not trust my martial skill?"
Meng Huaman's prowess surpassed that of the tribal chieftains. Having inherited Meng Huo's strength and Lady Zhurong's martial arts, the bone of a warrior ran deep in her. Her competitive spirit burned hotter than most grown men's.
"When the time comes for you to shine, I will call for you."
"…Tch. As you wish."
Blocked once more by her father's stubborn refusal, Meng Huaman could not take the field. Crestfallen, she withdrew. Meng You sidled up, chuckling.
"You truly refuse to let Huaman go to war, no matter what?"
"Of course. The battlefield is a dangerous place. How could I send her?"
A father's love for his daughter is the same everywhere. Meng Huo wanted only that his child not die on the field.
"Yet it is true that Huaman's skill is outstanding, is it not?"
Her martial arts ranked among the very best in the Nanman; ordinary chieftains could scarcely match her.
"That may be so. But if Huaman were taken prisoner, it would be a disaster, would it not?!"
On this one point Meng Huo remained immovable. He left word with his wife, Lady Zhurong, to hold Yunnan and keep a close watch so that their daughter did nothing rash.
"The Han people from the north who call themselves Shu have invaded!"
"From this moment we march to crush those insolent Han!"
"Waaaaaah—!!"
The Nanman warriors roared their approval. Warlike by nature, they raised a thunderous cheer, spirits soaring.
"Let us go hunt the men of Shu!"
Meng Huo led seventy thousand Nanman troops out to face Zhuge Liang.