601 Bygones (1/2)
Gu Shenwei had an open and honest talk with King Rizhu, and both sides were anxious to expose the truth.
Gu Shenwei said that Shangguan Yun had come to threaten him into killing the lord and that he was in the camp right now. While expressing his surprise, King Rizhu claimed that King Kuari's desperate move showed that his plans had already been thrown into disorder.
The two then made several vows and pushed the alliance to a deeper level.
In a sincere atmosphere, Gu Shenwei raked up the past again, saying, ”I beg your pardon for my frankness, but this matter has become a wall in my heart, and I can't help but ask. I heard a rumor that the poison on my father's saber twenty years ago was secretly smeared on by someone else.”
King Rizhu stayed silent for a while and took the Dragon King's question as a test. To show his sincerity, he decided to tell the truth. ”This matter has also occupied my mind for more than twenty years. Well, if the Dragon King wants to know the truth, I'll tell you the truth.”
King Rizhu, who always looked rude and straightforward, let out a long sigh, revealing an expression of deep sadness that did not suit him. When he opened his mouth again, he regained his true colors. ”That son of mine is a complete bastard. When he was just seven or eight years old he was already a blackout drunk, and by the time he was a teenager, he had learned to sleep with women. He slept with everybody he was interested in, even with my concubines and female slaves.”
King Rizhu spat on the ground and looked still furious after so many years. ”He's my son from the first princess consort, the Khan's younger sister. I have endured and indulged him for the sake of his mother's face. But no matter how perverse his actions were, I only whipped him at worst. But this kid was soft in the mouth and hard in the crotch. He begged for mercy when I beat him but raped my favorite female slave before he had even recovered.”
These words were not worth mentioning in front of outsiders, but they had been simmering in King Rizhu's mind for many years, and once a crack appeared, they immediately spilled out.
”I have always been wondering if this is a punishment of Heaven. I have killed countless people when I was young, so Heaven sent an unworthy son to torture me. Fuck it, you can send him to me, so why can't I send him back? Yes, I killed my own son. Dragon King, you don't need to listen to the rumors. Your father did cut him, but there was no poison on the saber. I put the poison on the brat's wound myself.”
King Rizhu's eyes widened with anger and showed no sign of remorse. He seemed to not have yet vented all of his hatred, so he continued. ”The Dragon King must have heard many rumors that you didn't say for my sake? Some people must have said that I killed my son and sent my daughter-in-law to please Khan. Yes, I did, but look at what my son did to the Second Consort's family. He regarded one of the most important tribes of the Naihangs as a brothel and slept with women almost every day like a stallion in heat, tossing his thing all over the prairie.”
”The Second Consort's father knelt down and begged me, hoping to relocate to a remote place and saying the women in his tribe were left to my son to choose and he could keep as many as he wanted. But could I agree with him? If I allow the Second Consort's tribe to leave, the whole Naihang Tribe would fall apart. All the branch tribes relied on my protection, yet only to be trampled upon by my son.”
”And the Second Consort used to be my daughter-in-law, so who else could she marry? The Khan was her best destiny, and also my compensation to her whole family.”
This wasn't the thing that concerned Gu Shenwei most, but King Rizhu talked on and on and didn't calm down after another round of confessions. ”I can't help it. Dragon King, please understand an old man's nagging. Anyway, the truth is, your father and I never really hated each other. I pretended to be angry but I never tried to 'avenge' myself.”
”The poison was supplied by Golden Roc Castle?”
”Mmm. By Shangguan Jianyi, an ambitious kid, a typical scion of the Shangguan family. He sniffed around like a hound in the Royal Court. Nobody knows how he found out my secrets and offered to help, thinking that he had obtained some 'evidence' in his hands from then on. Hey, he didn't expect that I'd betroth my daughter-in-law to the Khan and the 'evidence' immediately became much bigger than the whole Golden Roc Castle. He was clever and never mentioned it to me again.”
”I still support Golden Roc Castle greatly, but we were not allies, ever. The reason is very simple. I have witnessed the effect of Golden Roc Castle's poison and will never let people who have this kind of thing come near me. In fact, it is due to my efforts that the Norland forbids Golden Roc killer from moving freely in the Royal Court. The Dragon King has actually helped me greatly by eliminating a hidden danger through killing Shangguan Jianyi.”
Gu Shenwei mostly believed King Rizhu's story, which unraveled the knot in his mind that his father Gu Lun had been a despicable and vicious poison user, and maintained the impression he had formed about his father as a child, which was righteous, serious, dignified, and especially aboveboard and never injuring people by underhand means.
As a killer, Gu Shenwei regarded underhand means as a matter of course, but deep down, he still had a bottom line. This line separated the normal people from the killer, the majority from the minority, the good from the bad, and the righteous from the evil. He accepted his depravity and was proud of it, but he would never take the killer's point of view of despising all sentient beings, and had to change his good impression of his father because of this.
When it came to controlling emotions, the young killer was much more skilled than the old king. Gu Shenwei continued talking, with the topic being about Golden Roc Castle. ”Shangguan Yun has brought many killers with him this time. Does the Khan not worry about this at all?”
”The Khan has too many things on his mind to worry about and it won't be the Golden Roc Castle's turn for awhile.”
All of a sudden the atmosphere of frankness vanished. King Rizhu avoided the question and immediately put forth his demands. ”It's urgent, since King Kuari will make a move at any time. If he doesn't die, we will have to go to war and the Norland will be thrown into chaos by that time. The Central Plains will be the only superpower, and the whole Western Regions will be annexed into the Emperor's territory. Has the Dragon King thought it through?”
Gu Shenwei nodded. ”Within three days.”
”All of Norland will be grateful to the Dragon King,” said King Rizhu, with a satisfied smile.
”I hope King Rizhu won't regard my sword as Shangguan Jianyi's poison after the event.”
King Rizhu laughed merrily. He seemed to appreciate the Dragon King's remark so much that the ceasing of his laughter appeared quite abruptly. ”To tell you the truth, the Dragon King must leave the Norland immediately after it's done. The Western Regions will be yours but you and your men must never set foot on the prairie again. Am I clear on this?”
Gu Shenwei nodded again.