Buying the Realm's Finest from a Land of Ruins
By now the state of Xuzhou had grown familiar. Refugees reduced to beggars came running in droves, and we ladled out seaweed soup, barley, and millet gruel until every one of them was eating and drinking in Tan County.
"I need a hundred men to raise a palisade! Don't just eat—get out here!"
"Anyone want to try swinging this spear? We've got weapons to spare."
"Anyone who can read—come read what's posted here, right now!"
Guan Yu had accepted the offers I put up, and so the refugees were put to work one after another. If all of them gathered and entered Liu Bei's army, they would become a formidable strength in the days to come—and I would be able to keep laying the bill at that same Liu Bei's feet.
"Chief. I've brought them."
"Hm?"
The men Zhang He led in were dressed in shabby clothes and looked too frail to be called soldiers, yet every one of them had sharp, piercing eyes. Illiterate vagrants they were not.
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am Gyeom, of Pengcheng. I used to deal in meat."
"Hoh. A real merchant?"
"Those bastards from Yanzhou burned my slaughterhouse and my house. I barely got my wife and children out alive."
I had asked for men who could search while disguised as merchants, and they had gone and carefully selected actual merchants.
"We'll put merchants' goods in their hands and split them into teams."
"If they know this ground, there'll be no trouble."
"Know the ground... they do know it, don't they?"
Something else struck me at once, and I went straight to find Guan Yu.
"Lord Guan, there's something I'd like to ask."
"What is it? Speak."
"We're holding Cao Cao's Yanzhou army here in Xuzhou. Are reports of the fighting actually reaching the Governor of Xuzhou?"
"Hmm. A month past I sent a fellow called Taishi Ci, a man of Beihai. No word has come since."
The name Taishi Ci made me want the man for ourselves, but he had gone as a messenger and then vanished from contact.
"And after that—was there any support at all for General Tao?"
"Had there been, would our host have stood one step from starvation when you arrived?"
Tao Qian, it seemed, was no great man either. Even if the court's power could not reach into an age of chaos, Xuzhou was still a domain he himself was bound to govern. If he could not come forward in person, was it not at least his duty not to starve the army that had marched to his aid?
"Good. Then I think I can do something."
"What do you mean?"
"From among the men disguised as merchants, I'll pick those with a sharp eye for roads and the legs to cover a long distance. I'll send them to Xiapi, where the Governor of Xuzhou sits, and have them report how the war stands."
"Hmm."
"I'd like you to write what it says, Lord Guan. That the Chancellor of Pingyuan is standing bravely against Cao Cao's army and fighting without cease—and the helping hand from Jizhou! That is, that I came of my own will, brought supplies, opened them freely, gathered the refugees, and am feeding them. I'd like all of that written in as well."
Guan Yu heard him out and nodded.
"I see. You mean they ought at least to know how we fare."
"If they understand what is right, they will remember it, and they will act."
"Understood. I shall write the letter at once. In truth I too have wished to seek aid from any quarter, that my elder brother's toil upon the front might be known."
Guan Yu accepted what I asked without a moment's hesitation, and the shape of the plan grew clearer for it. While he was writing the letter I stepped outside, and Zhang He spoke to me in a low voice.
"Now I see it. You mean to make what you've done known across all of Xuzhou."
"If we're doing it, then past Xuzhou—to all under heaven!"
"Then write one for the Governor of Jizhou and send it as well. I can't say how you regard him, but tell him that by the thousand soldiers he sent, you reached Xuzhou in safety, and praise that grace."
"Oho. And while I'm at it, I'll write that Military Major Zhang's martial skill and ability were outstanding too."
"The more the Governor of Jizhou is pleased, the larger his hand becomes."
And behind that generous hand sits our own family's money, invested in him...
Even so, I agreed. A little promotion for Zhang He, one greasing of Yuan Shao's palm, and this war could be brought to an end all the sooner.
"Once the rest is finished, I'll write that too. Let's get ready to move."
Zhang He followed in silence.
"Halt. Who goes there?"
"Merchants, if you please?"
We had walked straight into Cao Cao's soldiers. I undid my bundle as if I hadn't a care and showed them the salt, beans, and silver inside. There were some ten of them, their armor crusted thick with old blood.
"Merchants, in a place like this? Something's off."
"Please, just spare our lives. We travel as merchants between Xiapi and Huainan."
I held out a silver flask and let my hands shake. Their eyes narrowed, and they snatched it. I really was shaking—but if this got us through, I was willing to let it pass.
"Enough. Nothing left here. Let's look somewhere else."
"Yes, thank y—"
In that instant Zhang He, who had been kneeling and bowing at my side, drew his sword the moment they turned their backs and struck the foremost soldier across the nape.
"Kh—khek!"
"What?!"
Steel hissed free. The moment the blade left the scabbard Zhang He cut down the two men in front of him, one after another, and the disguised merchants Guan Yu had sent—standing right beside me—drew as well and stabbed Cao Cao's men dead in a heartbeat.
Blood sprayed. A gout of it struck my face, and I barely wiped it away with a trembling hand.
"Hoo..."
This was an age of chaos, where one wrong step meant dying to a blade on the spot. It felt nothing like any common sense I had lived by until now. But I had to endure it. Not run because I was afraid—watch it through to the end, and keep walking forward.
"Well done, all of you."
"Been a while since I played the knight-errant."
"Back in Zhuo Commandery we took Yellow Turban bastards the same way."
Once the merchants of Xuzhou joined the old knight-errant soldiers who had followed Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhang Fei since the Zhuo days, the fighting power they showed was truly something else.
"Th-that's incredible."
"Gyeom. Take the lead again."
"Y-yes!"
The merchant Gyeom guided us on at once, and wherever he led, the road kept turning up tiny settlements—slash-and-burn hamlets and little clusters of houses.
"Spare us! We've done nothing wrong!"
"Easy, easy! We're the relief force for Xuzhou."
The moment they saw people they flung themselves flat and begged for their lives. We caught hold of them and explained.
"Everyone who came out trying to live, just as you did, has gathered at Tan Fortress. I'll keep this short. Pack your things and go there."
Told to make for Tan Fortress, the village elders looked at one another, eyes unsteady with fear. Just then I noticed children who had been quietly watching from inside the houses. When I approached, the villagers started in alarm and tried to hold them back, but I opened my pack, drew out rice balls and wheat cakes, and held them out. One child who had been staring bolted over, snatched the food, and crammed it into his mouth. Once he ate, the rest came tumbling out and took their share.
Hearts, as ever, moved fastest once the children had been fed.
Seeing what I had done, Zhang He came over as well, willingly undid his own bundle, and shared out food. Then a low voice drifted from inside one of the houses.
"You give food to the children first. You are no pack of murdering demons, then."
"Who's in there?"
"A scholar of the Yan clan, from Pengcheng in Xuzhou."
At the words the Yan clan of Xuzhou, a name came to me at once.
"I don't know your courtesy name, but might your name be Jun?"
"It is. My courtesy name is Manzai."
Yan Jun, courtesy name Manzai. A scholar of Pengcheng in Xuzhou—the man who, in the history I knew, fled the turmoil south to Jiangdong and became a key minister of the Sun clan. He came out and introduced himself looking as gaunt as if he had not tasted even gruel in three days, but the keen light in his eyes was striking.
"If it isn't rude, can you read this?"
Of the two bamboo slips I had prepared—one written with numbers, one with an old text—I held out the second. Yan Jun read it in a single breath.
Though a common man be guiltless,
the precious jade he carries becomes his crime.
"A passage from the chapter on Duke Huan of Qi, is it not? That a man who keeps a treasure beyond his station brings disaster upon himself."
"You really are a scholar. Let me greet you properly. I am Zhang Qian, come to save a man such as you."
Yes. Not wandering villagers begging from door to door—if I could secure even two or three scholars like this in Xuzhou, the profit would already be mine.
"When you go to Tan Fortress, show them this and it will be enough. The man defending the place is Lord Guan Yunchang, younger brother of Lord Liu Xuande, Chancellor of Pingyuan. Seek out the giant of nine chi with the long beard, show him this, and he will let you in at once."
"Thank you. Truly, thank you."
"If you're grateful, then always remember the name of Zhang Qian, the merchant who came from Jizhou, and of Lord Liu Xuande, who fights in Xuzhou."
So I sent the villagers under Yan Jun's care on toward Tan Fortress. Then he hesitated, came up to me, and spoke.
"If you are looking for powerful clans or scholars fleeing the war, go south at once."
"South?"
"In Yangdu County of Langya Kingdom there is a clan village of the Zhuge family. Young friends of mine were fleeing, and I could not help them with so much as a single thing. I simply sent them on."
The Zhuge clan? The Zhuge clan, in Langya Kingdom of Xuzhou?
"When did they leave, and for where?"
"They came yesterday evening, barely caught their breath over a single cup of water, and went on down. From what I heard, they spoke of Jing Province—or perhaps Yang Province."
"Thank you for telling me!"
I took Zhang He and the knight-errants and ran south at once. Zhang He had no idea why, but the moment I burst ahead he followed. I ran without a word, barefoot, until I was truly gasping—but I had to catch them, no matter what.
"Chief, the sun is setting. If we're late, the road back to Tan Fortress will be a hard one."
"Just one more double-hour!"
"Heaven help me... Everyone, drink and keep moving!"
He grumbled, and still he granted every request I made. Travel with a man like that at your side, and there was no one more reliable.
So the sun went down, and when the night had gone pitch-black, shadows were moving far ahead. They saw us and hurried into the forest. One of them fell; the others tried to get him up, and that was when we caught them dead to rights.
"Stop!"
"Please, spare us! They're only innocent children!"
A woman—and a young one, an older sister with a string of little siblings in tow.
"We are only a party bound for Jing Province."
"Ah—easy! Easy! We're a rescue party, saving the wanderers of Xuzhou."
"Eek!"
"I said it's true. The food and water we brought... is any of this left?"
I opened the bundle, wondering whether anything remained after what I had shared with Yan Jun's people, and fortunately there was still a little dried meat. I held out a bare handful. They watched my face, and then the youngest child snatched it up at once.
"Jun!"
"Jun, you mustn't!"
"I said it's all right."
I gave water to the child who had stuffed the hard jerky into his dry mouth and was coughing on it, and I soothed him until the tears fell drop by drop.
"You're... not going to kill us?"
"I keep telling you. I came to save you."
I spoke to the woman and the two boys.
"A scholar surnamed Yan told us that if we came this way we would find Zhuge refugees from the Zhuge clan village of Langya Kingdom. That's why we came looking for you."
"I-is that really true?"
The woman cried out first, then collapsed where she stood. A boy in his teens, who looked to be the older brother of the child with the jerky, came up to me.
"I thank you with all my heart. I cannot be certain we are the party you seek, sir, but we are indeed of the Zhuge clan."
"And your name is Liang?"
"How do you know that?"
"That little one is Zhuge Jun, and the young lady is your sister?"
"Th-that is so."
I had found Zhuge Liang. Zhuge Liang, fleeing Xuzhou in desperate haste—and I could take him into my own keeping. In all of Xuzhou, this was a very great find.
"Every refugee has gathered at Tan Fortress now. There's food there, and a place to sleep, so come with us. The Chancellor of Pingyuan and I will see you safe."
The night was pitch-black, but the road back had never felt lighter.