Bu Zhi, courtesy name Zishan, stood on the deck of a modest riverboat and tried very hard not to have a complete mental breakdown.
The universe, as usual, had a cruel sense of humor. Years ago, Bu Zhi had served as Lu Su's trusted deputy in Jiangxia, working alongside the very man now standing on the opposite boat. Yet somehow, after everything that had happened, fate had arranged for the two of them to meet again in the middle of the Han River, of all places.
According to military protocol, this should have been the moment when Bu Zhi demanded answers. He was supposed to ask why Lu Su had abandoned Lord Sun Quan, demand an explanation for his association with the Jinfan pirate Gan Ning, and generally make it very clear that he was still a loyal subject of Jiangdong. In fact, he had already rehearsed the entire speech 3 times that morning, and in his head it had sounded extremely impressive.
Unfortunately, reality had other plans.
Lu Su stood calmly at the bow of his own boat, looking so relaxed that Bu Zhi nearly mistook the man for someone else. There was no guilt on Lu Su's face. No nervousness. He simply looked like a man who had reached enlightenment by deciding that worrying about things was no longer worth the effort.
Then Lu Su casually asked where Bu Zhi was heading.
That was it.
Whatever righteous anger Bu Zhi had carefully built up over the course of the morning evaporated on the spot, while the magnificent speech he had prepared fled his mind like rats abandoning a burning granary.
To be fair, his hesitation was not entirely unreasonable. Bu Zhi had spent years serving on the front lines and had been given what could only be described as a VIP seat to the brutal internal politics of Jiangdong. He had watched good men walk into Sun Quan's court wearing confident smiles, only to come out with the hollow eyes of someone who had just been summoned to explain a suspicious discrepancy in the treasury accounts.
Bu Zhi had learned an important lesson from watching all of that unfold. Bold accusations were admirable right up until they got you killed. Knowing when to keep your mouth shut was not cowardice. Sometimes, survival itself was a form of wisdom.
Bu Zhi settled for polite respect.
"General Lu," he called across the water, his voice cracking only slightly. "Where are you heading?"
Lu Su glanced at the flags flying from Bu Zhi's boat before giving him a smile. It was warm, genuine, and somehow made Bu Zhi's stomach sink even further, because it told him that Lu Su had already processed this entire encounter and decided there was nothing here worth worrying about.
"Wherever Zishan is going, I am going there too."
Bu Zhi nodded before he could stop himself. He had absolutely no idea why he had agreed. The statement made no strategic sense, no navigational sense, and barely even qualified as a proper answer, yet Lu Su had delivered it with such complete certainty that Bu Zhi's brain simply filed it away under Things That Are Apparently True Now and moved on.
For a while, neither man said anything. The river flowed between them while clouds drifted across the sky, and the awkwardness settled over the two boats like an unwanted third passenger.
Under normal circumstances, the vessels would have gradually drifted apart as the current carried them in different directions. Unfortunately for Bu Zhi, the captain of his boat happened to notice the two men talking and apparently decided he was witnessing an emotional reunion between old friends. Perhaps he was simply a romantic at heart, because instead of allowing the boats to separate, he ordered his oarsmen to match Lu Su's speed perfectly.
Curse this man and his belief in human connection, Bu Zhi thought bitterly.
The distance between the boats continued to shrink until they were close enough for Bu Zhi to step onto Lu Su's deck with a single stride. At that point, continuing to say nothing would have been even more awkward, so Lu Su finally broke the tension.
"My captain just caught a rather fat carp. I remember you enjoy this fish, Zishan. Why not come over and share a meal?"
Bu Zhi opened his mouth, hesitated, and then closed it again.
A few minutes later, he was sitting cross-legged on a woven mat aboard Lu Su's ship, staring down at the deck while conducting what he considered a very serious internal review of his life choices.
I must have lost my mind.
He had heard the words fat carp, and apparently his brain had short-circuited. Every sensible thought had vanished, leaving behind a single, overwhelming conclusion: yes.
I am a serious military official on a diplomatic mission. I am not supposed to be sitting cross-legged on the boat of a political defector, waiting patiently for fish soup like an excited dog.
He glanced toward Lu Su, who was stirring a pot of boiling broth with a wooden spoon. Every so often, the former commander would lean closer to inspect the color of the soup with the concentration of a master alchemist judging the progress of some priceless pill refinement.
This man had committed treason.
And now he was seasoning broth.
Bu Zhi finally could not take it anymore. The pressure building inside his chest felt strong enough to crack a rib.
"General Lu," he began carefully, "why did you..."
The word betrayal caught in his throat.
It felt too harsh.
How could he possibly say something like that to a man who was standing there stirring soup with such peaceful dedication? At this rate, the negativity might actually make the broth curdle.
Lu Su merely smiled. He ladled some hot broth and tender pieces of fish into a ceramic bowl before handing it to Bu Zhi with both hands.
"Eat the fish."
Bu Zhi stared down at the bowl. The broth was a rich golden color, and the fish flakes were perfectly white and tender.
He is doing this on purpose, Bu Zhi thought.
This is psychological warfare involving carp.
He refused to be distracted. Setting the bowl down, he fixed Lu Su with a stubborn stare.
"General Lu Meng is gone. Lord Sun Quan speaks your name every day. Everyone knows he misses you."
Lu Su's hand stopped halfway through another stir. Something complicated shifted behind his eyes, carrying memories that were clearly much older than this conversation.
After a moment, he sighed and let the wooden spoon drop back into the pot with a soft clunk. He rose from his seat and smoothed the folds of his robes, like a man who had decided that whatever happened next was not worth leaving his clothes untidy.
"We have already reached this point. What good would it do to discuss it now?"
Returning to Jiangdong meant returning to suspicion, and Lu Su understood that reality as naturally as a man understood gravity. Even if Sun Quan forgave him today, there would always be a jagged thorn left behind. They could still cooperate when circumstances demanded it, but what would happen once the crisis passed and stability returned? Suspicion would eventually creep back in, and paranoia was not something rulers simply forgot.
Besides, Lu Su had already gained a clear picture of the war ahead. Governor Jiang Wan had briefed him thoroughly, and from everything he had heard, saving Jiangdong now would require something approaching divine power.
Possibly an actual god.
Maybe two.
Jiangdong had betrayed its oldest ally and then attempted to strike a cynical bargain with Cao Cao, which was rather like trying to negotiate with a tiger by offering it your neighbor as a peace offering. At the same time, the southern Yue tribes had erupted into violent rebellion, while the young Gan Gui had begun treating the Yangtze River like his personal playground.
The Jiangdong of today was a house already rotting from within, its foundations crumbling and its walls barely holding together. One good shove in the wrong place might be enough to bring the whole structure down.
If Lu Su were still an active general, he would have thrown himself into that fire without hesitation.
But he was not anymore.
He had already stepped out of that world, and his elderly mother was with him, resting below deck and probably taking a peaceful nap without the slightest concern for the collapse of the geopolitical order above her.
She would never go back into that political snake pit.
Neither would he.
Lu Su had already made peace with his decision.
He would travel to Chang'an, meet Liu Bei and Zhuge Liang, and fulfill the promise he had made. After that, he would find a peaceful piece of land somewhere, work the soil, take care of his mother, and perhaps open a small school where he could teach local children how to read.
It sounded perfect.
In fact, it might have been the best life anyone had ever planned for themselves.
The grand ambitions of Jiangdong, the restoration of the Han, the endless calculations of war and politics. None of it mattered to him anymore. Lu Su had retired from that world. These days, his biggest concern was whether the carp in front of him was fresh.
Bu Zhi watched his former commander without saying a word, the conflict on his face becoming harder to hide. Eventually, he pushed past his hesitation and asked the question he had been avoiding.
"General, have you surrendered to the Zuo General?"
Lu Su shook his head, but the title immediately caught his attention.
Zuo General.
Formal. Respectful.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
"Zishan, are you traveling north to seek peace with Liu Bei?"
The pause that followed was so heavy that Bu Zhi almost wished Lu Su would simply accuse him of something. Instead, he was left sitting there through the longest pause he had experienced in his entire life, because Lu Su had just read him like an open book, and apparently he had done it at a speed most people reserved for reading menus.
When Lu Su finally denied it, Bu Zhi felt an enormous weight lift from his chest. He trusted Lu Su's character, and if the man said he had not defected, then Bu Zhi believed him.
He nodded.
"Everyone in Jiangdong wants the fighting to stop."
Lu Su gave a soft chuckle.
"Stop the fighting."
He did not bother pointing out the hypocrisy. There was no need to mention who had started the war with a cowardly ambush, either. This was perfectly in line with Sun Quan's usual style: strike when the other side is not looking, then start asking for peace the moment someone bigger pulls out a sword. It was consistently terrible, but at least it was consistent.
Lu Su thought about it a little further. Bu Zhi was probably carrying a personal letter from Sun Quan, along with a generous collection of concessions designed to make the offer more attractive. Most likely, the letter had even been written in expensive calligraphy by some highly paid scholar.
Unfortunately, there was one rather obvious problem.
Jiangdong had just stabbed Liu Bei in the back, and the blood was barely dry. Did Sun Quan really believe Liu Bei would be willing to sit down and discuss peace right now?
The more Lu Su thought about the mission Bu Zhi had been given, the more an unexpected emotion began to rise inside him.
Gratitude.
Deep, overwhelming gratitude.
For once, the disaster was not his problem.
He did not have to clean up this spectacular mess. He did not have to waste his mind trying to solve an impossible political crisis, and he certainly did not have to stand in front of an enraged Liu Bei and explain why Sun Quan's latest apology deserved to be taken seriously this time.
That was Bu Zhi's problem now.
The realization left Lu Su feeling remarkably light. In fact, he had not felt this relaxed in years. He settled back down, picked up his bowl, and took another bite of carp.
The fish smelled wonderful.
Life was good.
Bu Zhi watched the transformation happen right in front of him. One moment, Lu Su had been discussing the collapse of Jiangdong with the seriousness of a veteran strategist. The next, he looked genuinely happy, like a man who had just discovered that his ex's new relationship was falling apart and, for once, he was not required to get involved.
Then Bu Zhi noticed something else in Lu Su's eyes.
Pity.
That was somehow even worse.
Bu Zhi thought about his own situation, and the bitter irony settled into his stomach like a stone.
Only a year earlier, the powerful Bu clan had married one of its daughters to Sun Quan. The entire clan had celebrated like they had finally reached the pinnacle of Jiangdong society. The wedding banquet had lasted 3 days, and everyone had been convinced that the family's rise had only just begun.
Then the new year arrived, and everything went to hell.
The war turned into a disaster, while the leadership of Jiangdong stumbled around like a group of men who had been hit over the head with a brick and were desperately trying to pretend they were fine.
Bu Zhi had been given this diplomatic mission because of his connection to Lady Bu. On paper, it was an honor. In reality, it was a nightmare assignment wrapped in expensive paper.
Sun Quan had betrayed Liu Bei and then sent Bu Zhi to ask for forgiveness.
It was the kind of job you gave to the man you did not particularly like, but could not openly punish.
The fish soup sat untouched in front of him. It was his favorite dish.
Suddenly, he had absolutely no appetite.
A deep sense of grievance began rising in his chest. When the marriage had been arranged the previous year, the elders of his clan had hounded him constantly, begging him to smooth over every political detail and praising him as the pride of the Bu family.
Now, after the catastrophic defeat, those same elders had suddenly developed an impressive talent for avoiding him.
They claimed ignorance. They washed their hands of the whole affair with the efficiency of surgeons and left Bu Zhi holding the entire mess by himself.
And the mess happened to be a stack of diplomatic apologies addressed to a man whose army was currently sharpening its swords.
Bu Zhi slowly looked at Lu Su.
His former commander had already abandoned the sinking ship. He was free now. He was going to become a farmer, take care of his mother, and probably live a long, peaceful life far away from Jiangdong's political madness.
Meanwhile, Bu Zhi was still on the ship.
The realization left him utterly desolate. He stared at Lu Su with the pleading eyes of a man who had just discovered that he was the last person still standing on a burning ship, holding nothing but a mop.
"General Lu," he asked weakly, "do you happen to have any strong wine on this boat?"
---
While two scholars shared a depressing meal on the northern river, a very different scene was unfolding far to the south.
Gan Ning was standing on the bustling military docks of Jiangxia, having what was quite possibly the best day of his life. He treated the Jingzhou warships like an interactive museum where he was also allowed to punch the exhibits, running his huge, calloused hands over everything in sight, from the hull plating to the railing joints. Every few steps, he would knock on the wood and listen to the sound it made, nodding sagely like he could diagnose structural integrity by ear.
He could not.
He just liked knocking on things.
The legendary flagship monsters were gone, replaced by rows of standard assault ships, each one redesigned under Lady Huang's supervision. Heavy crossbow mounts had been integrated directly into the hull, while the prows were reinforced for ramming and covered with actual metal plating.
Someone had done math.
Gan Ning did not do math. He respected people who did math, preferably from a safe distance.
Then he spotted the two ships at the far end of the pier.
They were brand-new and noticeably different from everything around them, enough that even the dock workers spoke about them in hushed voices. Prototypes.
Gan Ning knew prototypes. Back in Jiangdong, engineers were constantly building experimental boats, and most of them were disasters. They were usually bizarre contraptions dreamed up by scholars whose understanding of water came primarily from reading poetry, and half of them sank the moment they left the dry dock.
The Jiangling shipwrights, however, were a different breed.
Gan Ning stopped beside a large wooden drafting table where the Master Shipwright stood surrounded by mountains of parchment. The old man had the permanently irritated expression of someone who had been interrupted during something important, combined with the brilliant mind of a man who apparently considered sleep a design flaw.
He pulled out several enormous sheets covered in numbers, diagrams, measurements, and other things that immediately made Gan Ning's eyes hurt. Then he launched into an explanation of hull angles, weight distribution, structural stress, and several other terrifying concepts involving numbers.
Every so often, the old man would stop and glare at the giant pirate, who was usually in the process of touching an extremely expensive model with his greasy fingers.
"General Gan," the old man grumbled at one point, "are you certain you are actually a naval commander? How do you not understand basic water displacement?"
Gan Ning merely gave him a goofy grin.
No offense taken.
It was difficult to argue with the old man, anyway. Gan Ning genuinely did not understand water displacement. He understood that water was wet and that enemies who fell into it tended to drown. That had been sufficient for his entire career.
His naval philosophy had always been beautifully simple: row toward the enemy as fast as possible, jump aboard, and hack everyone to pieces.
It had never failed him.
He did not care about displacement. He cared about violence, which was reliable, honest, and had never once asked him to solve an equation.
Still, Gan Ning knew brilliance when he saw it. The battle reports were proof enough that these shipwrights knew exactly what they were doing, so the legendary river raider swallowed his pride and began hovering around the old man like an eager student. He even tried to act charming.
This mostly involved enthusiasm and a lot of teeth.
Surprisingly, it worked.
"Old master," Gan Ning coaxed, rubbing his hands together, "please explain the striking pole one more time."
The prototype ships had a strange appearance. Thick wooden pillars rose vertically from both the bow and stern, making the vessels look like someone had planted two trees on the deck and then simply given up halfway through the construction process.
They also looked extremely dangerous.
The old shipwright glanced toward the pillars, and a deep professional admiration settled over his weathered face.
"Originally, we designed these test ships to mount multiple heavy ballistas on a single deck. Unfortunately, we had problems with structural integrity. The recoil kept cracking the hull. Very frustrating. I lost several nights of sleep over it."
He tapped one finger against the blueprint.
"Then news arrived from Hanzhong. A descendant of an ancient naval architect presented some lost blueprints to Lord Liu Bei. Strategist Zhuge Liang analyzed them and extracted the mechanical concept behind this striking pole before sending the schematics south. We worked through the night modifying the hulls."
The old man paused, his expression solemn.
"3 of my apprentices fainted from exhaustion."
He nodded.
"I consider that a successful evening."
Gan Ning stared at him.
The old shipwright continued like he had said nothing unusual.
"Now, look at the striking pole itself. Its destructive power is absolute. You load a huge boulder into the cradle at the top, then use the heavy pulley system below deck to raise it. The soldiers turn a mechanical winch to lift the stone into position, and once the enemy ship gets close enough, the crew releases the locking mechanism."
He raised both hands and mimed the arm crashing downward.
"Gravity does the rest."
His eyes practically sparkled.
"The arm swings down, the boulder smashes through the enemy deck, and the impact can shatter the keel. The entire ship sinks within seconds."
The old man's expression had become positively radiant.
"Terrifying, is it not?"
He turned toward Gan Ning with the pure happiness of an engineer who had just invented a highly efficient new way to ruin someone's day.
"Think about it. A warship equipped with heavy crossbows can shred the enemy from a distance, while these striking poles crush anyone foolish enough to get close. Who in this world could possibly stand against a fleet like that?"
Gan Ning stared at the enormous wooden weapon.
He imagined his own men trying to board one of these ships, his finest fighters leaping across the gap with their swords raised, only for a 1 ton boulder to drop directly onto their heads.
A chill ran down his spine.
It was the particular kind of chill that came from realizing your entire combat philosophy might be about to become obsolete.
The era of men swinging swords at each other on boats was ending.
The era of mechanized slaughter had arrived, apparently ushered in by a grumpy old man who was personally offended by Gan Ning's inability to understand water displacement.
Gan Ning slowly nodded, and when he spoke, his voice had lost all its usual bravado.
"You are absolutely right, old man."
He looked at the striking pole again.
"Who could possibly stand against that?"
For once, he had no immediate answer.
He looked down at his own hands. They were very large, very strong, and very good at violence. Yet for the first time in his entire career, Gan Ning had the uncomfortable feeling that they might not be enough.
I should probably learn math. He immediately rejected the thought.
No. Absolutely not.
He would just board the ship before they dropped the rock. That was the new Step One.
Step One: Row faster than the rock.
Step Two: Still hack everyone to pieces.
Gan Ning nodded to himself.
Much better. He felt better already.