Chapter 75 – Mother's flesh (Lu Bu's childhood story)
Translated by Bloodfalcon, Edited by Krayto
“Father, I am hungry!” His widened eyes showing his childlike innocence to the person who he called father.
“Bu, my good son. Please stave your hunger okay?! We will have something to eat soon!” Said that man with a firm and resolute face.
“Um!” He nodded to appear to understand, but he really didn't understand anything at all.
After a while, he said again "Father, I am hungry!"
“Bu, my son, sleep. If you sleep, you will not feel hungry!” That man is helpless now. He wouldn't be afraid when confronted with ten thousand men, he can take their heads easily. But when faced with his impoverished family, he felt utterly helpless.
“But father, I am still hungry!” He blinked his eyes. The intense sense of hunger urged him to call his father again and again. He has a mother, but his father said that his mother was very tired and fell asleep.
“Bu, my son. You wait for your father to seek food!” the famished man, drew up his body to pick up the dusty long bow from his room.
That evening, the man came back, his eyes devoid of any hope, his face very tired, and his hand completely empty. There are no trees or grass nearby, how he can expect to bring back prey with his longbow?
But at that time, the boy did not understand anything. He only knew that each time his father brings his long bow, he surely will bring something delicious, and therefore he opened his hands and shouted “Father, I am hungry!!! Let's eat!”
That innocent face made that famished man's complexion very dim, his tears started to flow “I am sorry, Bu, my son, I am sorry, father is useless, I cannot bring food for you!”
“Father!” Although he is still small, he is very sensible. He knows that this man that he called father has made an effort even though the result ended in failure. Then he said “Father, Bu is not hungry, Bu wants to sleep!” Then he closed his eyes, slowly the world around him lost its color and became dim.
While his consciousness was slipping in and out, he thought he heard two people's voices. One of them has a very sweet and warm sound...
“Bu, my son, come here, come here!”
“Dear mother!” In his hazy state, he heard his mother's voice.
“Bu, my good son, mother is here!”
“Mother, I am hungry!” even though it had been a long time since he last saw his mother, he said his thoughts without hesitation.
“Bu, my son, come to mother, Bu will not feel hungry! Come, Bu, my son!” That gentle voice beckons him.
Suddenly he heard another sound, a hoarse and anxious voice... “Bu, my son, wake up, please wake up! You cannot fall asleep. Please, stay strong!” This is his father's voice.
“Mother, will Bu not be hungry there?!” He asked her while tilting his head full of doubts.
“Yes, come to mother now. Bu, my son, you will not feel hungry anymore! Come here Bu, my son!” That gentle sound beckoning him again.
“But, what about father?!” He hesitated.
“Your father, sooner or later will join us, we will both go first and wait for him!”
“Oh!” his small head did not understand what his mother meant, but he did not want to be hungry anymore. Being hungry is sad and very uncomfortable.
“Bu, my son. You wake up, wake up!!!” That man worried insanely because his son's body become colder and colder. His breath and palpitation slowly stopping. He knows that this is not a sickness, this is hunger! This is how hunger works, as long as he has food to eat, his son can survive.
But currently he does not have anything to eat.
“I have to search for meat!!! Meat, meat, yes, there is meat!” That man suddenly thought of something and then bite his teeth and stood.
“My wife Yi, I am so sorry. I lost you, but I cannot afford to lose our son Bu as well!”
Gradually, he opened his eyes. In his field of vision, his mother is no more, he did not have a full tummy that his mother promised. The only thing left was his father's voice and that hunger feeling.
"Father! I am hungry!"
“Come, come, Bu my son. We have food! Look, there is meat, a lot of meat!” In the man's hand there's a lump of raw flesh still bloody.
“Hungry, must eat!” What his father had is a low quality raw dirty meat. When he nipped on that flesh, it had a very fragrant and earthly smell. That was his first impression.
After he ate a large portion, he noticed his father did not eat the meat and said “Father, you also have to eat!”
The man just shook his head and said “Father is not hungry, Bu, you eat, be strong again!”
From that day onwards, although it was raw, he had meat for his daily meal. But it at least can satiate his hunger! His father however did not eat at all.
Finally that great man could not outlast his hunger, the man had finally fallen.
“Father, oh father, what happened to you!” He was startled and flustered. In his eyes, his father is a god, but now that god has fallen. He really was frightened and tears started to moisten up his eye socket.
“Bu, my good son. You must not cry, strong men must not cry. Our son Bu is a great man, he will be a general of Han Dynasty in the future, and how can you cry!” The great man struggled to clean his boy's tears “Bu, father misses your mother. Father wants to accompany your mother! I am sorry to have to leave you behind!”
“I do not want that, father! I also want to go with mother! I also want to accompany father and go with mother!” This was the worst day in his whole life. It was the day where he cried the most.
“No, Bu, my son. You must promise father. You must survive. Live long and prosper. You cannot accompany father and mother, you cannot!” That man shook his head “Do you see that knife? When father falls asleep, cut father's meat gently, they can make you survive, it can make you live on through famine this year!”
Cut father's flesh with a knife? He did not understand at all, his subconscious rejected his father's wish.
“After you finish eating, please bury father and mother together. Live well, okay? That is your father biggest desire. Bu, my son. I am sorry! Father cannot look after you. My wife Yi, I come to your side now!” With those words, the great man closed his eyes forever.
“Father, oh father!” Father has fallen asleep, mother has also fallen asleep, in this world only he remains, the last of his name.
That thin and small stature dragged that man's body from that tattered family room toward where his mother was. He dragged his father where his mother lay, covered with a quilt made of earth. He still remembers father's last words. That father must rest with his mother in the same place.
He did not have a tool to dig the earth, therefore he can only dig with his father's knife that is in the house. But he did not want to use that knife, so he used his thin little hands to dig up the earth, bit by bit, breaking the soil up, until his fingernails are broken, until his hands lost its energy, until his mother reappeared from the earth quilt.
When he saw her mother, he was shocked.... He stood still frozen and stunned for a long time.
His mother who was buried not to long ago, although her head remained intact, the other places were mutilated here and there. Her thighs and arms no longer had any flesh, the only thing remaining were her bones.
At that moment he finally understood what had happened. He understood the meaning of his father words, also understood the origins of the meat he ate several days before.
Those fragrant bloodied raw flesh were from his mother, which his father sheared little by little from his mother's corpse. He understood completely why his father preferred to starve to death rather than eat that flesh.
“Oh, father!” lowering his head. Confusion siphoned his physical strength.
The famine had finally ended, the invaders also left and he had survived.
He left his home which contained buried behind their house, two people's bones who now remained embracing forever beneath the earth.
The young Bu went on to serve Ding Yuan, in Ding Jianyang's forces.