Liu Bei POV

And so we stayed in this position for about half a minute before she finally moved her blade away from my neck.

“You actually think I’ll do it. I won’t do that of course, idiot.”

“Hahaha…” I was drenched in cold sweat but hopefully it wasn’t obvious when we are in the water.

When she finished, she glared at me once more. Because I turned her down, I wasn’t sure how to react. This felt like I’d just rejected Lu Meng’s confession.

“Then…” I carefully raised my arm and pointed at Chen Dao and the rest to which Lu Meng nodded.

“You can go and join your companions then.” She didn’t forget to give me some advice as well, “Huang Zu’s loss is sealed. We have even more reinforcements who are on their way. When you return, don’t fight anymore and just retreat to Xiangyang.”

“Un, I got it.” I said, and then remembering something, spoke up again, “If you take Jiangxia city, the people should be fine right?”

“… I cannot promise that.”

“Eh?”

“You should know that our side’s General Ling Cao fell in battle. Leaving aside her exact cause of death, one can say that it was because of the Jiangxia garrison.” When she said this, her expression became a difficult and complicated one, “Ling Tong came to look for me before this battle and asked for permission to ma.s.sacre the city.”

“Eh?! Did you approve of it!?”

“I didn’t approve, but I didn’t deny it either. It’s a delicate issue after all–”

“Please don’t ma.s.sacre the city.”

“Eh?”

It’s not just Lu Meng. Even I, who was the one who uttered those words, felt surprised. I didn’t think that I would say such words so resolutely even though I’m keenly aware that my opinion counts for nothing at this time.

But for some reason, my lips continued flapping as I continued.

“The people of Jiangxia city are all good people, and the city is a good city. I too am saddened by Ling Cao’s death but this has nothing to do with the people of Jiangxia at all!”

“Please calm down, Imperial Uncle.”

“Promise me first!”

“… Hai.” Seeing how resolute I was, she began to cave in a little, “I cannot give you any a.s.surances but I am of the same opinion as Imperial Uncle on this. In any case, I will do my utmost best to prevent a ma.s.sacre.”

“Ah… Un.” When I heard this, I realised that I was being too forceful and unreasonable. At the end of the day, it’s entirely up to Lu Meng after all.

I don’t know if it’s me, but it feels like Lu Meng is a lot more reliable than when we fought against Yuan Shu.

“Un, that’s that then.” She said as she sheathed her weapons and swam off several dozen meters away.

I’d thought that she would just slip away but she stopped some distance away and turned as she pointed at me, “Imperial Uncle! I won’t give up! I’ll tell my lord about this when I return so just wait for news!”

“Ah! That’s–” I wanted to stop her but she disappeared before I could finish.

Hai… Looks like Lu Meng hasn’t changed much after all huh…

But to sum up, it looks like Lu Meng doesn’t feel betrayed at all by my actions. Instead, she even got angry for me. I don’t really get it, but it’s a good thing anyhow.

“My lord!!” Those 3 were still calling out some distance away.

In any case, this isn’t the time to be thinking about this, I should meet up with them first.

“Oi!! Over here!” I yelled out to them and waved so that they could see me. I was still rather clumsy in the water and it took a long while before they noticed me.

“My lord! Oh, my lord!” Chen Dao embraced me and cried when we met up.

“Chen Dao! Chen Dao, calm down!”

Because of her weight, I sank into the water several centimeters when she glomped me, which made me rather nervous. I was happy by how emotional she was but I’m still jittery about drowning.

“My lord! You scared us to death when you fell into the water!” Zhou Cang exclaimed with an anxious and grateful expression that was unlike her usual happy-go-lucky demeanor, “I leapt down immediately to find you but I couldn’t find you at all.”

“I thought that… I thought that!” Chen Dao began wailing again as she said so while Chen Gong finished her words for her.

“We all thought that the clumsy Imperial Uncle was killed by some enemy naval troop.”

“Clumsy is a little unneeded.” I was a little unhappy by what she said but she was on the mark. That said, now isn’t the time to go through what happened in detail.

“… But it’s good that you’re alive.”

Eh? I thought that I would end up exchanging jabs with Chen Gong for a while more but she turned away and I saw that her eyes were a little wet. I know that these could just be water from the river but I felt that I should take them as tears at this time.

Ah, this isn’t good.

“In any case, I’m sorry for making all of you worry.” I hurriedly got my emotions in order and switched to the more urgent and important matter at hand, “How is the battle situation now?”

“You should be able to tell just by looking.” Chen Gong didn’t look like she was back to normal, but her speech did.

I raised my eyes to look at where our side was and was stunned.

Of the impressive and awe-inspiring fleet of over a dozen large s.h.i.+ps, over half were on fire. Flames shot up to the skies as the river was filled with yells and screams. Even though our side had actually seemed dominant at one point,they were now reduced to this.

Ah.

Only after looking closely did I realise that the large s.h.i.+ps at the front were riddled with small boats that were lit up. Looks like they used the small boats as burning battering rams.

To think that they had this as well. Looks like Lu Meng has indeed grown a lot.

Looking at the s.h.i.+ps, I felt sad for the suffering troops but right now, there was something more urgent.

“What about Liu Qi?! Has she left the s.h.i.+p!? And what about Huang Zu? What’s it like on her side?”

At this, the 3 of them only shook their heads.

“We don’t know. We swam here to look for you before all of this happened.”

“Lord Liu Qi should be fine. She made her preparations beforehand. I saw her preparing a small boat before the battle commenced.”

I felt somewhat relieved when I heard these words from Chen Gong.

“Then what about Huang Zu? How is Huang Zu right now?”

“I really don’t know anything about that.”

Wu… Honestly, I shouldn’t be too bothered about Huang Zu. But as I looked at the torched s.h.i.+ps, I couldn’t help but think about our conversation on the city tower. It would be too tragic if she really intends to defend this place to the death.

“My lord should get to the sh.o.r.e first, if you stay here you will catch a cold!”

“Waa!”

Before I could reply, Zhou Cang hoisted me onto her back and began to swim for the sh.o.r.e. The other 2 also followed closely, keeping their guard up for any enemies.

Only now did I realise how cold the water was. It wasn’t long after winter after all and the waters had just melted so it was much colder than I thought. Looks like the effect of adrenaline has just worn off.

“Hang on, my lord! We will reach the sh.o.r.e soon.”

Nearby, Zhou Cang and Chen Dao were yelling to me. Only Chen Gong wasn’t shouting but I could feel her worried gaze on me despite her mouth which was shut tight.

Is she always this stubborn? Or is she unwilling to call out to me?

Never mind.

Ah, I just hope these 3 and Liu Qi and her people are fine…

After G.o.d knows how long, my body began to warm up.

“Ah…” I gave a long exhalation and felt a source of heat near my abdomen area which made my body feel a lot better.

My consciousness was slowly returning but my eyelids were still tightly shut and were really difficult to open.

As I lay where I was with my eyes closed, my 1st thought was that I might have already died. The 2nd thought I had was that perhaps this very long dream was about to end and I felt a little bit of a relief followed by a set of very complicated feelings.

It was a mixture of reluctance to leave and longing to stay, with a little bit of regret mixed in.

As I thought about this, my head seemed to feel heavier and several waves of pain emanated from my head, jolting my eyes open.

Ah… I breathed out once more with relief.

Looks like all of my guesses were wrong. I’m still alive and what appeared in front of me was not the ceiling of my room but a rather downcast sky that looked like a storm was about to begin anytime.

“This is…”

“My lord?” A tearful and emotional call came from near my ear, “Zhou Cang, Chen Gong! Come over here! Our lord is awake!”

I blinked and looked in the direction where the voice came from, and saw that just above my head was a protruding breastplate that almost covered my entire field of vision. Above that breastplate was an exquisite face covered by dirt and ash.

Ah… It’s Chen Dao huh…

Eh?!

Just then, I realised that I was lying on Chen Dao’s thighs. I tried to get up but felt faint and lay back down on Chen Dao’s thighs again.

Chen Dao was unlike Huang Zu and some others, and did not wear a plate skirt so lying down on her thighs was actually quite comfortable.

“Don’t move about too much, my lord. You haven’t recovered fully yet.”

“Chen Dao… This is…” I spoke up now that I’d recognised her but when I did, it felt like something was blocking my throat and my voice was hoa.r.s.e.

“Don’t speak yet, my lord.” Chen Dao got anxious once more when she saw this and placed her hand on my forehead as she looked at me with a worried expression very unlike how she was on the battlefield, “Un… No good, you’re still a little too hot.”

Eh? Did I get a fever?

“Imperial Uncle is too much. How could you have such a weak body?”

“Didn’t you sneeze a couple of times just now?”

“There was something in my nose! Don’t think that everyone is as boneheaded as you!”

“What did you say!”

“Chen Gong, Zhou Cang! Will you both quit it! Can’t you see that our lord isn’t feeling too well now?”

Chen Gong and Zhou Cang were still bickering as they came over while Chen Dao yelled out angrily at them with such a thunderous voice that even I was scared stiff.

“Ah… My lord, I didn’t mean to scare you!” She hurriedly apologised to me when she saw me frowning.

“… Haha… Hahah…”

“M, my lord?”

At this sight before me, I could only chuckle.

They don’t know why I’m laughing but I do. No matter what, it’s good that they’re all so lively.