HLCOB C34

Chapter 34

 

“Huaseo told the gentry what?”

“…Th‑that… he told them to choose offices.”

While playing Go with Zhang Rang, the Emperor asked the trembling eunuch.

“Offices?”

“Yes. It is said he told them he would submit r‑recommendations to Your Majesty, so they should name the offices they seek.”

At the eunuch’s words, stillness filled the imperial study.

To choose one’s office.

It was plain usurpation; only the Emperor could appoint to office. Zhang Rang glanced at the Emperor’s face—yet rather than displeasure, the Emperor burst into laughter.

“How did those who heard it react?”

“T‑that much was not heard, Your Majesty. Yirang Im conveyed the words only last night… Ah, there is talk that at the Runan Yuan residence, old voices were raised in anger.”

The gentry’s anger was natural. Selling offices—this struck at their pride.

“Huaseo always leaps beyond expectation.”

Smiling, the Emperor set down a Go stone and asked in a light tone,

“So—do you know why Huaseo does this?”

“…?”

Startled, Zhang Rang looked up. The Emperor’s dull eyes were looking down at him—

As if knowing Zhang Rang and Jaheon had joined hands.

“…How could such a question be put to this slave, Your Majesty.”

Zhang Rang barely answered the pregnant question; he swallowed hard.

Gulp—

He was taut with tension when—

“Well, you and Huaseo would hardly be on good terms.”

“…?”

By temperament the Emperor should have pressed Zhang Rang; instead he did not. Zhang Rang had never once escaped the Emperor’s hand; yet the Emperor’s silence made his knees ache. What was he waiting for? Did he perhaps know the hand behind this—one even Zhang Rang could not discover?

“But is this how you intend to play your stones?”

The Emperor tapped the board as he spoke.

It was a board set for the Emperor’s overwhelming victory.

Having forgotten the proper role of a eunuch—to amuse the Emperor—while trying to read his true mind, Zhang Rang started and bowed his head.

“M‑my apologies, Your Majesty. This slave, struck dumb by Your Majesty’s Go prowess, forgot himself for a moment.”

“Do not think that saying so will make all things pass easily.”

“It shall be remembered, Your Majesty.”

Clicking his tongue at Zhang Rang’s obvious flattery, the Emperor recalled Lady He, who had come last night to discuss the Prince’s return to the palace and his education. Lady He had, in effect, cut off both affinal kin and eunuchs herself; if a tutor were to be attached to her son, the Qingliu were the only choice.

“Be that as it may.”

But had not Lady He joined hands with Jaheon? Her requests were Jaheon’s requests. Knowing this, the Emperor murmured as he looked at the Go board, where the shape was fixed.

“Since Huaseo seems to be doing something amusing…”

On the bored imperial face, a smile flickered.

“The Throne should give him a gift.”

Thus Jaheon was struck by a bolt from the blue.

“What was that?”

Jaheon, about to set out for the Sunbu to meet those who had responded to his “choose an office,” frowned at the news that suddenly arrived. O Juk‑yeop stammered,

“My lord! Th‑the rumor says! His Majesty will raise you to Crown Prince’s Attendant!”

Crown Prince’s Attendant.

An office that served the Prince at his side—and the very office Jaheon had originally planned to obtain. Was it not a post that could make one the intimate of the next Emperor? According to the record of events, the present Emperor’s death was not far off. If he grasped the Prince’s closest seat, Jaheon’s aims would be easily reached.

“But the Prince is not yet raised—what is this…?”

Yet this was not the time to take that office.

Nothing was yet fixed—neither Empress nor Crown Prince. For the Prince’s attendant’s seat to be put in Jaheon’s hand at this stage was wrong; all who coveted power would fix their eyes on him.

“I do not know either…! It is said that as a reward for revealing Wang Bo’s crimes, His Majesty will appoint you Crown Prince’s Attendant…! That an edict will come shortly!”

It felt as though the Emperor were pushing him to the vanguard—ordering him to fight—

As he had with the eunuchs.

“There is even talk that the Prince whom my lord selects will become Crown Prince…!”

Even O Juk‑yeop could see it—the Emperor was not granting office out of favor.

“What shall be done? If it is so, the gentry will truly think my lord intended to sell offices!”

…

Jaheon had played the “selling offices” card to distinguish enemy from ally—

As bait.

In truth, Jaheon had no power he could actually wield; what he had promised was only an introduction. It was the Emperor who chose who would rise to office.

Damn it.

But the Emperor had given Jaheon the power to actually make selling offices possible. The bait was no longer bait.

As before—

Before he knew it, Jaheon was the bait—

Bait to gather the forces that would check him. He could not guess the Emperor’s intent to rally forces through him. Swallowing a curse, Jaheon asked O Juk‑yeop,

“…Were there other rumors?”

“Ah—th‑that His Majesty will soon lift the Partisan Prohibitions.”

“…?”

The Partisan Prohibitions.

It was how the Emperor had pressed down the Qingliu—a law that blocked the advancement of entire houses; because of it, the Qingliu houses, stripped of power, had to go down to their native places. An imperial order so ruinous to the Qingliu it was called the Disasters of the Partisan Prohibitions.

“His Majesty is said to be seeking the Prince’s tutor. And to find a tutor for the Prince, he must not discriminate by faction…”

Jaheon had not expected the Emperor to lift the Prohibitions so readily. More precisely, he had thought that even should Lady He plead and they be lifted, it would be only for great houses like the Yingchuan Xun. Was this not an Emperor who had maintained strong authority through mutual checks of forces amid near‑tyrannical rule?

Why?

He had thought he would never grant power so easily to the Qingliu.

“If the Throne permits you nothing at all, then what?”

Suddenly, Jaheon recalled the Emperor’s words.

History had changed through Jaheon’s intervention.

With the fall of the eunuchs—his guard—the Emperor’s authority had weakened. Therefore the Emperor had to create a means to check Jaheon.

Could it be—

Then the lifting of the Prohibitions was not a choice for Jaheon, who had begun to gain renown among the Qingliu. The present enemy who aimed at Jaheon was presumed to be the Qingliu.

It was a choice to check Jaheon instead.

Thus if the one who now moved to check Jaheon was one who would profit by the lifting; one who had influence to form a faction within the court; one who would benefit if the eunuchs killed or maimed Jaheon—then the Emperor’s choice made sense.

Heh.

Jaheon laughed.

Damn old man.

There was only one who fit all those conditions now—

One who would be coming up from Bingzhou leading the Qingliu great houses; the Qingliu notable who had shored up Jaheon’s lacking justification; the one who, through Jaheon’s rise, was emerging as the Qingliu’s head.

As expected, he did not intend to leave me be.

Wang Yun.

Xun Shang, style Ziming.

Current head of the Xun family, and Xun Yu’s uncle.

“Sent by Censor-in-Chief Wang?”

“Yes. That is so.”

At the servant’s words, Xun Shang unrolled the bamboo slip.

…

On it was written Jaheon’s past—how he had done any work at all to feed Choseon. Reading down the slip, Xun Shang asked,

“What did the Censor say was the reason for sending this to me?”

“He said he hoped it would aid your judgment.”

At the answer, Xun Shang sighed and gestured.

“Very well. Go.”

When the servant left, Xun Shang sank into his chair. Xun Yu called to him gently,

“…Uncle.”

But Xun Shang did not answer—only recalled the words Jaheon had sent to the Luoyang gentry last night:

“My lord would receive recommendations for those fit to rise to office.”

What did that mean?

If one showed him sincerity, he would raise one to office—it was no different from what the eunuchs had done. And given the background written on the slip, Jaheon seemed to have ample possibility of becoming another eunuch.

“Is Im Huaseo, in the end, the same as the eunuchs.”

After the Disasters of the Partisan Prohibitions, when Qingliu were swept away by eunuch slanders, Xun Shang had been among those who, disillusioned with the Han house, went down to his native place.

Then, one day, Jaheon appeared.

With his appearance, a gloomy Han house changed. The incompetent affinal kin were driven out, the eunuchs who blocked the Emperor’s eyes fell. Xun Shang placed hope in Jaheon—he thought him timber that could become Xiao He, Chancellor to the Gao Emperor Liu Bang. So he gladly came up to Luoyang.

“They are only words. And the Prohibitions are said to be lifted as well—do not be too swayed…”

Watching him, Xun Yu managed to speak. He still wished to trust Jaheon. At his words, Xun Shang smiled and quietly asked,

“…Then what do you make of the rumor that Im Huaseo will become Crown Prince’s Attendant?”

But Xun Yu could not answer.

…

He too had heard that Jaheon had sought to sell offices. A minister who would receive the attendant’s seat to a Prince who did not yet exist. Even one who had not passed the learning age knew what that meant: that a minister dared to choose the Crown Prince.

“Can you truly guarantee he will not become like the eunuchs?”

Such is power—

In the moment one grasps it, one may change. Just as the famed upright Wang Yun, so lauded, had sent such a bamboo slip to slander the newly appointed young Jaheon before him.

At his question, young Xun Yu’s eyes trembled.

…

Seeing him silent, Xun Shang raised a wrinkled hand and pressed his eyes.

“Attend.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What of Im Huaseo?”

The servant answered cautiously,

“He is due to arrive within the hour. What shall be done?”

After quietly thinking on the present situation, Xun Shang let out a hollow laugh.

“One cannot treat one who is to arrive so coldly. Besides, who is Im Huaseo… is he not one favored by the Emperor?”

The Han house would not change.

“Show him in.”

All who entered this Luoyang, in the end, became like eunuchs. Thus nothing would change.

“We must at least offer greeting, if we are to keep our lives in this Luoyang.”

There was no strength in Xun Shang’s voice, heavy with despair at that fact.