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From beginning to end, what Xiang Yu valued most was strength.
He disdained to play political tricks. In his eyes, those were aberrant thoughts, unworthy of a true lord.
Due to his good upbringing, he was willing to address Liu Bang as the Duke of Pei, he was willing to acknowledge the man’s efforts to reach his current power, and he was also willing to respect the talented civil and military officials he’d gathered around him.
But this didn’t mean that he recognised Liu Bang as an opponent comparable to himself.
With his four hundred thousand Chu soldiers, he won a great victory over the Qin army at Julu, made Zhang Han and the other generals surrender to him, and all the lords sincerely supported him as the leader of their alliance.
He made his name with iron and blood, but look at Liu Bang. He relied on just one hundred thousand Han soldiers to simply stroll through Hangu Pass, what a joke!
This was just a monkey playing at king while the tiger was away. To have someone who hardly knew his place take the King of Chu’s words as justification to sit on Guanzhong’s throne, that wouldn’t just be trampling all over his military achievements, it would be the shame of his life.
To put it bluntly, the reason why he so easily believed Xiang Bo about Liu Bang’s willingness to reconcile wasn’t only due to his trust in Xiang Bo, it was also because of the disparity between their two sides.
The gap was so large that it was hard for him to accept that he seriously wanted them to become enemies.
…Unless Liu Bang went crazy, or thought Xiang Yu was retarded.
It was exactly because Xiang Yu had never regarded Liu Bang as an opponent worthy of attention that now, when he realised that Liu Bang might actually have those intentions and may be secretly proud of toying with him in the palm of his hand at this moment that he felt like a tiger being fooled by a monkey, and his anger grew ever higher.
Concluding that he was being made to seem a fool, his face turned dark as the bottom of a pot and he thumped his hand on the table!
“How dare he!!!”
He had the strength to lift a cauldron1鼎: vessels used throughout Chinese history for ritual purposes, comes in 2 variations: 1) round with three legs, or 2) rectangular with four legs. Known to be heavy (they’re solid bronze), and lifting one was a way of showing off. Wikipedia single-handed. With the addition of his anger, this strike directly cracked the solid wood in two.
Seeing him so angry, Fan Zeng slightly lowered his eyelids to hide the smile in his eyes.
In his view, no matter what intriguing role Xiang Bo played in this, now that Xiang Yu had directed his fury towards the Han army, there was no need to pursue it.
The important thing was that Xiang Yu had recognised Liu Bang’s evil intentions and once again planned to send troops.
How could Lü Bu have known that just choosing a token of guarantee could lead to so many chain reactions.
He couldn’t remember when exactly the Hongmen Banquet would take place, but estimated that it would be around this time.
Right now he could only wait, it was no use for him to be anxious. He happily followed Xiang Yu’s personal soldiers to a ramshackle hut, where he washed himself quickly with the water in the tank, roughly towelled himself off, and changed into a new set of casual clothes.
Although Xiang Yu had kept him, he hadn’t conferred an official position, so he wasn’t given a specific uniform.
After he changed, the soldier politely asked him if he wanted to eat or rest first.
Lü Bu had been too lazy to go hunting after he finished the rabbit leg last night, so with this reminder, he suddenly felt hungry. He chose to fill his belly first without hesitation.
It was already dark, this was the busiest time for army cooks. And the mess tent was right next to the hut.
Youthful and handsome yet not inferior to any general, Lü Bu was also unnaturally tall, and so of course he attracted the attention of all the Chu soldiers.
And ever since eight hundred years ago… or rather three hundred years in the future, he’d long been used to this. He unceremoniously ordered enough food for three people, calmly walked past many curious eyes, and sat his ass down next to Han Xin, who seemed to be isolated in no man’s land.
Han Xin seemed to be concentrating on eating, but in reality his mind had flown far away into his own little world.
He had always been reticent and reluctant to talk to people. After numerous communication failures, the Chu soldiers gave up and no longer stuck their hot faces on his cold butt.
A mere sentry2previously translated as halberd-bearer was so arrogant, why shouldn’t they curry favour with someone else instead?
Lü Bu didn’t care at all about the increasingly strange gazes shot towards him; he hummed a little ditty under his breath, and after sitting next to Han Xin, he only raised an eyebrow and greeted his doubting expression with a “Yo.”
Han Xin couldn’t help hesitating for a moment.
…Should he say ‘yo’ back?
Just when he was hesitating, unsure how to call him, Lü Bu lowered his head and pushed around the food a few times with a disgusted look on his face before gulping down the unpalatable food.
Indeed, it was easy to go from frugality to extravagance but hard to go from extravagance to frugality.
He completely swept away a meal for three. Although his belly bulged by the time he was finished, he felt that it wasn’t as good as the unsalted roasted game he hunted in the wild for the last few days.
That wasn’t even mentioning the delicacies he’d tasted back then.
Never mind, never mind.
Lü Bu quickly adjusted his mentality. Anyways, he didn’t come to the Chu camp to eat or enjoy life, he came only to obtain Liu Bang’s head.
“Thankfully Attendant Han introduced me earlier,” Lü Bu grinned at Han Xin, “in the future, I will definitely return the favour.”
Han Xin paused for a moment, then said coldly, “No need.”
If it were someone else, they might have been dissuaded by Han Xin’s apathetic response, but Lü Bu was different, he was even full of curiosity towards this man. He knew that Han Xin would be known as a ‘god of war’ in the future.
Lü Bu didn’t expect to have a heart-to-heart talk in their first meeting. But by relying on his own knowledge and his understanding of Han Xin’s skilled tactical prowess, he could always hit on a few topics Han Xin was interested in and have a little chat.
It was fortunate that Han Xin wrote military books and not poetry books, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to have a conversation even if his face was as thick as a stone wall.
But talking about marching and fighting? That was his specialty! Whether it was the military books he read or the battles he personally witnessed, he could easily speak for days and nights without end.
And although this Han Xin was talented, he was still young and had little experience — he was by no means the future Han Xin who would command and use soldiers like a god.
Therefore, it was easy for the battle-tested Lü Bu to fool him.
The Chu soldiers who had been secretly watching them from the corners of their eyes were surprised to find that Han Xin, who usually cherished his words like gold, hardly spoke once in a day, and kept people a thousand leagues away, suddenly turned into a chatterbox!
From a cautious beginning to letting go, he was so happy that he gestured with his chopsticks as he seriously discussed something with the newcomer.
Oh gods above and below, the sun really came out from the west!
Lü Bu didn’t care how surprised they were. When he felt that the time had come, he mentioned becoming brothers. “To be honest with you, I’m new to Chu and not familiar with anything here, I can’t help but feel uneasy. Fortunately, both you and General Xiang have taken care of me, so this trip hasn’t been in vain. And after our conversation just now, I feel like we’re old acquaintances.”
Hey, big-eared Liu knew how to use these tricks, and so did he.
It’s just that before, he recognised foster fathers to get ahead, this wasn’t so different!
Han Xin didn’t notice Lü Bu’s thoughts at all.
Ever since he joined the army, no one took him seriously no matter how many enemies he killed or how earnestly he advised the lord; the frustration in his heart was beyond words.
He was surrounded only by impulsive soldiers with shallow thoughts, there were no like-minded people around him.
His deep loneliness and disappointment was what made him so withdrawn.
Han Xin stared at Lü Bu, slightly lost in thought.
This person in front of him had been different from the beginning, he was particularly suited to his tastes.
He was able to come out without a hair out of place after meeting with General Xiang, which indicated that he would be promoted in the future, which meant that the two would likely become colleagues.
The most special thing was that Lü Bu was the only one in the camp who could talk to him on equal footing, and vaguely gave him great satisfaction…
Thinking up to here, Han Xin of course wouldn’t repudiate him. He naturally followed with, “I think so as well. May I ask when you were born?”
This usually unremarkable question stunned Lü Bu.
His birthday was three hundred years in the future, if he said it, it would be stranger if he wasn’t considered crazy.
Seeing his hesitation, Han Xin instantly misunderstood, thinking that although Lü Bu was born a scholar, perhaps his background was rough, or he had some unspeakable secrets, so he couldn’t even name his birth date.
Thus, he considerately gave an excuse. “From a glance, I seem to be a few years older. If you don’t mind, you can call me your foolish older brother.”
Lü Bu originally intended to take advantage of the situation to accept the future god of war as a little brother.
However, he’d forgotten about his newly rejuvenated shell’s tender skin and was pitted.
He had troubles he couldn’t say, but he quickly recovered after a brief moment of awkwardness.
Forget it, anyways, he’d already recognised two foster fathers, it wasn’t too much of a loss to be unable to call Han Xin his little bro.
…No matter who was older, his pillar would always be the bigger one.
After miraculously finding a psychological balance, Lü Bu enthusiastically accepted reality and said cheekily, “I can’t ask for more! Thank you, brother, I hope you can teach me more in the future.”
Although they hadn’t seriously burnt incense and worshipped each other as brothers, only calling each other so, Han Xin still felt that he had invisibly become closer to Lü Bu.
Earlier, he hadn’t asked about the head in order to avoid suspicion, but he was actually very curious.
Now that he was brothers with Fengxian, he took the opportunity to ask while there were few people around them on their way to the barracks.
Lü Bu had no intention of hiding it from him, not to mention that he didn’t consider it a secret at all. “It’s Ying Ziying.”
A calmly spoken sentence struck Han Xin like a bolt of lightning.
The former King of Qin, Ying Ziying?!
“Fengxian really…” Han Xin was dazed and hardly moved for a long while, until he finally murmured, “You have Minister Qing’s talent!”
Minister Qing, that is, Jing Ke.3 lived during the Warring States period, famous for his assassination attempt on King Zheng of Qin, who later became Qin Shi Huang. Wikipedia
Previously, he’d judged from Lü Bu’s healthy body that he should be quite strong.
And now he found that he went into the depths of the Qin Palace alone, slipped through the Han soldiers like a ghost, and brought out Ying Ziying’s head without suffering a single scratch, showing both courage and strategy. He couldn’t help but look at him with admiration.
Lü Bu chuckled a few times, trying to get this topic out of the way.
First he duelled three generals at once at Hulao Pass,4a fictitious battle in Romance of the Three Kingdoms; Lü Bu is ordered to defend Hulao Pass from the coalition army, he defeats 4 generals in succession then fights 1v3 for 80+ bouts before retreating. Wikipedia then later defeated the hundred-thousand-man strong Heishan army with only 800 light cavalry;5honestly couldn’t find this army, the closest are the Heishan bandits but Lü Bu never fought them. with these two battles that made even him exhausted, he really didn’t think it was much to take care of a weakling like the former King of Qin.
Moreover, he was rebellious to his bones and didn’t like to be compared to Minister Qing or whatever — it would be one thing if Jing Ke had succeeded, but he failed in his assassination attempt and was even executed, that was too inauspicious.
Thinking of this, Lü Bu rubbed his intact neck as he recalled the feeling of being strangled to death.
Seeing that Lü Bu had no intention of going into the details of his infiltration, Han Xin admired his humility and composure even more.
“The former King of Qin has a long-standing blood feud with the general, no wonder you were so confident coming here with his head.” This was why Xiang Yu didn’t mind him even as he was in a bad mood.
Hearing this, Lü Bu proudly raised his chin and humbly didn’t say anything more.
Yes, he was very proud of his skills, and they were why he dared to go alone into the Han and Chu camps.
If they fought head-on, he might lose to the Hegemon-King of Western Chu.
But if he only wanted to escape, and relied on the element of surprise, there might not be anyone who could stop him.
Of course, he couldn’t just say that.
“If I accidentally offend General Xiang, and he orders me to be cooked,” Lü Bu said casually, “I still need to remind you of one thing.”
Han Xin raised an eyebrow and waited patiently for his next words.
“I’m so big that I might not fit in one pot,” he smirked lazily, like a ruffian, “you’d need one with a bigger opening.”
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- 1鼎: vessels used throughout Chinese history for ritual purposes, comes in 2 variations: 1) round with three legs, or 2) rectangular with four legs. Known to be heavy (they’re solid bronze), and lifting one was a way of showing off. Wikipedia
- 2previously translated as halberd-bearer
- 3lived during the Warring States period, famous for his assassination attempt on King Zheng of Qin, who later became Qin Shi Huang. Wikipedia
- 4a fictitious battle in Romance of the Three Kingdoms; Lü Bu is ordered to defend Hulao Pass from the coalition army, he defeats 4 generals in succession then fights 1v3 for 80+ bouts before retreating. Wikipedia
- 5honestly couldn’t find this army, the closest are the Heishan bandits but Lü Bu never fought them.
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