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삼국지 365 · Day 1 · Book 1 “Stars Gather”

It was the year 168 CE. Three hundred and seventy years had passed since the founding of the Han (漢). The Emperor was young, the ministers were old, and the eunuchs (宦官) stood in a single line between the two. Within the palace, a man died; outside, a farmer failed to cross the winter and died — and the record of that year ended in a line. In the western lands, a drought ran long; upon the eastern sea, the waters overflowed; in the south, a summer hail fell. The heart of all under heaven had been clouding for a long time.

At a hut in the village of Louxang (樓桑里), in Zhuo County (涿縣), Zhuo Commandery (涿郡), of You Province (幽州), a man was living. His name was Liu Bei (劉備), style Xuande (玄德). His age was twenty-eight. His height was seven chi and five cun. His arms ran so long that when he let both hands fall, they reached to his knees; his ears ran so large that when he turned his head, he could see his own ears. His words were few. When he met a man, he neither rejoiced greatly nor grew greatly angry.

In the days of his childhood, his father had gone early. He and his mother carried on their livelihood by weaving straw sandals and plaiting mats. A saying drifted about that he was a distant descendant of the Han house; yet that saying did not raise the price of a pair of straw sandals by a single coin.

Yet within the shape of his life there were a few unusual strands. He loved dogs and horses. When a strand of music flowed, he would stop his step and listen a long while. Even in a poor seat, when a garment came to him, he would iron it clean and wear it long. When the profit of a pair of straw sandals came to his hand, he did not take a cup alone at a tavern, but would call the young men of the village and pour a cup to each. In front of the hut of a man whose words were not many, the young men of the village gathered quietly, evening after evening.

Beside the southeast fence of Liu Bei’s hut stood a great mulberry tree. Its height reached some five zhang of a grown man. Seen from a distance, the round shape of its upper leaves looked like the canopy of a small cart. Among those passing by, someone would point at that tree and leave a line behind.

“From within a house where such a tree grows, a person of high station will one day come forth.”

That line the child Liu Bei heard. His age had not yet reached ten full years. Playing hide-and-seek with the children of his age under the mulberry, on one afternoon he opened his mouth without warning.

“I shall ride a cart with such a roof.”

An uncle who heard that line came rushing, his face gone pale.

“You fool. Such a line, spoken loose, wipes out this household at a stroke.”

The child Liu Bei looked at his uncle a long while, then bowed his head. After that, he did not bring that line out from his mouth — not one more time. Yet that line, because it had not been brought out again, grew quietly inside this child, never erased.

The uncle had gone, some years back, from illness; the grandfather who planted the tree was likewise no longer there. Only the mulberry kept, year after year, its round shade a little wider, guarding the southeast corner of the hut in its quiet way.

On this afternoon in the twenty-eighth year, Liu Bei sat quietly beneath the mulberry. In his right hand he held a pair of straw sandals. A thread of wind passed. The round shade of the leaves settled upon his shoulder. The round form of that shade overlapped exactly with the shape of the cart-roof in a line he had never brought out again.

From the east, news had begun to cross over. Three men of Julu (鉅鹿) had, it was said, raised a Dao (道) of their own, and wrapped yellow kerchiefs upon their heads. The name of the chief among them was passed as Zhang Jue (張角). Eight characters rode upon their mouths as they went about — that the blue sky was to die, and a yellow sky to stand. Beyond the round shade of this afternoon’s mulberry, the far edge of a yellow banner had begun to move quietly.

Liu Bei lifted his head and looked upon the eastern sky. A single star rose inside his two eyes. The seed of a line never again brought out was, in the round shade of this afternoon, waking once more.

The first afternoon of Book 1 “Stars Gather” opened quietly beneath the mulberry at the southeast corner of Louxang. A line from a child’s day returned in the posture of a round shade, settling upon the shoulder of a twenty-eighth year. The seed grown quietly inside one man was meeting, a little at a time, with the far news of yellow kerchiefs.

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