“Yellow Sky”: Crisis for the Han Dynasty sample (Act I) -- T. P. M. Thorne
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“Your Majesty, I am here because I want to serve,” Lu Kang pleaded.
“Allow me to prove that I am able to repeat my success in Gaocheng! Allow me to
help Your Majesty bring much needed stability back to the empire!”
Emperor Ling hummed thoughtfully and said, “We have been spoken to about
this matter in private… and your abilities are wasted here. We follow the
advice of others and appoint you ‘Administrator of Lujiang’ to pacify the
rebels.”
The eunuchs and their allies grumbled audibly.
Lu Kang fell to the floor and kowtowed, saying, “I only ask to be sent
there to punish the bandits! Do not bestow such rank on me undeservedly,
Majesty!”
“You need authority to be effective, and so it is granted,” Emperor Ling
replied. “Leave at once.”
Cao Cao watched Administrator Lu Kang as he left the hall and decided
that he would need to leave his own mark on the court. He glared at the fawning
eunuchs with renewed and inflated hatred, and after a few moments, he made a
choice.
Weeks later, a self-satisfied Cao Cao visited Yuan Shao’s Luoyang
residence after one eventful court session to relay his latest antics.
“Ayah! Not again!” Yuan Shao exclaimed. “Mengde, you are self-destructive!”
“Not so,” Cao Cao replied. “It had to be done.”
“You…!” Yuan Shao said with
distress. “I cannot believe you! Two years of unkindness, and you are allowed
back into the fold… most likely after your father had to bribe the ‘Ten’,
grovel to the ‘Ten’, earn office that allowed him to bypass the ‘Ten’, and what
do you do…? Do you remain silent, and continue our good work…? No, you-!”
“It’s like I told you before; sometimes, a man who publicly protests can
gain a strange form of inconspicuousness,” Cao Cao said. “Would the ‘Ten’ ever
suspect that I would simultaneously protect ‘partisans’ and openly defy them…?”
“Don’t talk to me!” Yuan Shao
chortled. “You… you…! This is your most
ridiculous mischief yet, Mengde! You escape the wrath of the ‘Ten’ for your
petition, and so what do you do…? …Write another
one!”
“Mister Kong also protests, though more quietly,” Cao Cao countered.
“And-”
“Mister Kong is a descendant of the Great Philosopher!” Yuan Shao
whined. “You, on the other hand, are lucky to be alive! And what of Cai Yong?”
“Hah… now you care about Cai
Yong,” Cao Cao snickered. “Yes, I know… he didn’t even get as far as leaving
the frontier, did he, before he upset them again! I at least got to come back
to the capital.”
“Now he must rot in Wu Prefecture,” Yuan Shao said bitterly. “In Yang Province! All those flies, and
swamps, and marshes, and-”
“Lu Kang hailed from there: it isn’t that bad, I’m sure. And even if it
was, it’s produced some brave men,” Cao Cao said with amusement. “It’s more
hard-going than most of the north, though… Elder Cai will have quite a few
off-days. But isn’t that the fate of a brave man that stands up against
injustice in a world founded on purposeful suffering…? Lu Kang stood up to them
and survived, and he is the example I prefer to use. Now he’s in Lujiang,
fighting an army of ‘bandits’ - rebels, more likely - that probably won’t be
the last, sad to say…”