diff --git a/pymysql/connections.py b/pymysql/connections.py
index 32bf509b..63a8b3a9 100644
--- a/pymysql/connections.py
+++ b/pymysql/connections.py
@@ -25,7 +25,6 @@
     EOFPacketWrapper,
     LoadLocalPacketWrapper,
 )
-from .util import byte2int, int2byte
 from . import err, VERSION_STRING
 
 try:
@@ -76,7 +75,7 @@ def _lenenc_int(i):
             "Encoding %d is less than 0 - no representation in LengthEncodedInteger" % i
         )
     elif i < 0xFB:
-        return int2byte(i)
+        return bytes([i])
     elif i < (1 << 16):
         return b"\xfc" + struct.pack("<H", i)
     elif i < (1 << 24):
@@ -675,7 +674,7 @@ def write_packet(self, payload):
         """
         # Internal note: when you build packet manually and calls _write_bytes()
         # directly, you should set self._next_seq_id properly.
-        data = _pack_int24(len(payload)) + int2byte(self._next_seq_id) + payload
+        data = _pack_int24(len(payload)) + bytes([self._next_seq_id]) + payload
         if DEBUG:
             dump_packet(data)
         self._write_bytes(data)
@@ -1056,7 +1055,7 @@ def _get_server_information(self):
         packet = self._read_packet()
         data = packet.get_all_data()
 
-        self.protocol_version = byte2int(data[i : i + 1])
+        self.protocol_version = data[i]
         i += 1
 
         server_end = data.find(b"\0", i)
diff --git a/pymysql/protocol.py b/pymysql/protocol.py
index 24b3f23e..aa5feade 100644
--- a/pymysql/protocol.py
+++ b/pymysql/protocol.py
@@ -4,7 +4,6 @@
 from .charset import MBLENGTH
 from .constants import FIELD_TYPE, SERVER_STATUS
 from . import err
-from .util import byte2int
 
 import struct
 import sys
@@ -21,10 +20,8 @@
 
 def dump_packet(data):  # pragma: no cover
     def printable(data):
-        if 32 <= byte2int(data) < 127:
-            if isinstance(data, int):
-                return chr(data)
-            return data
+        if 32 <= data < 127:
+            return chr(data)
         return "."
 
     try:
@@ -38,7 +35,7 @@ def printable(data):
     dump_data = [data[i : i + 16] for i in range(0, min(len(data), 256), 16)]
     for d in dump_data:
         print(
-            " ".join("{:02X}".format(byte2int(x)) for x in d)
+            " ".join("{:02X}".format(x) for x in d)
             + "   " * (16 - len(d))
             + " " * 2
             + "".join(printable(x) for x in d)
diff --git a/pymysql/tests/test_basic.py b/pymysql/tests/test_basic.py
index f8e622e6..fc195312 100644
--- a/pymysql/tests/test_basic.py
+++ b/pymysql/tests/test_basic.py
@@ -4,7 +4,6 @@
 
 import pytest
 
-from pymysql import util
 import pymysql.cursors
 from pymysql.tests import base
 from pymysql.err import ProgrammingError
@@ -44,7 +43,7 @@ def test_datatypes(self):
             )
             c.execute("select b,i,l,f,s,u,bb,d,dt,td,t,st from test_datatypes")
             r = c.fetchone()
-            self.assertEqual(util.int2byte(1), r[0])
+            self.assertEqual(b"\x01", r[0])
             self.assertEqual(v[1:10], r[1:10])
             self.assertEqual(
                 datetime.timedelta(0, 60 * (v[10].hour * 60 + v[10].minute)), r[10]
diff --git a/pymysql/tests/test_nextset.py b/pymysql/tests/test_nextset.py
index 2679edd5..28972325 100644
--- a/pymysql/tests/test_nextset.py
+++ b/pymysql/tests/test_nextset.py
@@ -1,7 +1,6 @@
 import pytest
 
 import pymysql
-from pymysql import util
 from pymysql.tests import base
 from pymysql.constants import CLIENT
 
diff --git a/pymysql/util.py b/pymysql/util.py
deleted file mode 100644
index 1349ec7b..00000000
--- a/pymysql/util.py
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,12 +0,0 @@
-import struct
-
-
-def byte2int(b):
-    if isinstance(b, int):
-        return b
-    else:
-        return struct.unpack("!B", b)[0]
-
-
-def int2byte(i):
-    return struct.pack("!B", i)