Chapter 411: The General
Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
A woman’s voice had identified Gu Shenwei as the Dragon King, but the result was not as she desired.
Gu Shenwei did not admit or deny it. He spread out his arms slightly and slowly turned a circle so that everybody from all directions could see him.
“He’s the Dragon King?” Someone in the crowd asked, with a tone full of doubt. “Stop joking. Dragon King is at least twice as tall as he is!” Said another.
“At most, his pale face is a bit similar,” conceded one person.
“He also carries a saber and sword, like Dragon King.”
“But why would the Dragon King volunteer to help us defend the city? If he was the Dragon King, then I’m the Buddha!” another voice shouted.
Gu Shenwei then turned to the guard leader again. He remained silent, with a helpless expression.
The guard leader was taken aback upon hearing the accusations. But after closer examination of the young man, he just could not match him with the legendary Dragon King. So he rea.s.sured himself, and shouted to the crowd, “Don’t talk nonsense! We have to stay united if we want to live! Since this… Lord Gu knows how to fight battles, let’s–”
“You bunch of fools!” It was that same woman’s shrill voice again, “You are being sold yet you are still helping others to count the money. He is the Dragon King! If you don’t believe–”
Her next words came to an abrupt end. It was as if she kept quiet because she was scared. Only Gu Shenwei knew that this was to be credited to Maid Lotus.
Once Dragon King showed up in public at the pier, the traitors of New Moon Hall could not help but create chaos to try to get rid of him. But as a result, they exposed themselves and became Maid Lotus’ prey instead.
It was a small broil and n.o.body took it seriously. Everybody urgently hoped “Lord Gu” could tell them what to do.
The guard leader continued, “All of us will listen to Lord Gu. Please issue an order, Lord Gu.”
Gu Shenwei pointed to the 30 or so unarmed guards around him, “I can command the guarding of the city, but I have one condition: All of you will be my personal guards and obey my orders unconditionally. Violators will be beheaded.”
This was the ordinary duty of the guards, the only difference was that the subject of their obedience had now changed. They all nodded in agreement. The smart ones took the lead and knelt, others including the guard leader, followed suit.
Gu Shenwei accepted their respects. After they all rose, he shouted to the people standing on the pier, “Are you willing to obey my orders?”
“Yes, of course,” the crowds answered noisily. Some knelt while others remained standing.
“Well, my first command–” Gu Shenwei was interrupted.
“Pull out your saber and sword! Let everybody see if it’s Dragon King’s Dragon Head Sword and Five Peaks Saber!” shouted the same lady from the crowd. This time, her voice was special, it sounded far yet near, as if there were two or three people speaking one after the other.
The traitors of New Moon Hall did not dare to compete in Kung Fu, nor did they dare to use their dark magic loosely, with Maid Lotus around. So they could only hope to stir up a fury among the crowd and take advantage of the situation to create chaos and kill Dragon King.
All of them knew what happened when the first instigator suddenly went quiet. So the second person tried to use the Seven Magical Tones to hide her location.
Compared with Old Man Mu, the Seven Magical Tones of this person was far less convincing. Gu Shenwei was immediately able to locate her true position, but he deliberately looked in the wrong direction. He then drew his sword and saber and held them high in the air.
Under the sunlight, the sword and saber shone brightly. The crowd could only glance at it, before turning away.
Even farmers who had never touched weapons were able to tell that these were no ordinary weapons.
The guard leader was the closest, but he appeared embarra.s.sed; for he desired to examine the weapons more carefully, but dared not.
Gu Shenwei handed the sword to him freely. “You can take a look at it,” said Gu Shenwei
The guard leader took it carefully and examined the sword from hilt to tip. He turned it over and looked at it again. Then he gladly proclaimed, “This is not the Dragon Head Sword of Dragon King! There are no words carved on it!”
At east, the crowd hissed. “Who said it was Dragon King’s sword? Find her!” shouted someone from the crowd.
No one answered. Both Gu Shenwei and Maid Lotus knew the exact location, but the instigator could not speak.
It was well known that the Dragon Head Sword and Five Peaks Saber belonged to Dragon King; not to mention, there were many legends about the two weapons. However, not many people were interested in the small details. The traitors of New Moon Hall a.s.sumed the sword would have inscriptions on it and had no idea that Dragon King came up with the weapons’ names only after the castings had been completed. He did not make any inscriptions on it afterward.
The crowd did not believe that the young man in front of them was the Dragon King. It was not only because there was no evidence, but also the thought itself was unimaginable. Moreover, they had enough fears for now so would rather bury their heads and ignore the facts than learn about something terrible once again.
“It is a good sword,” the guard leader praised heartily, before returning it to “Lord Gu” using both hands.
But even though it was a good sword, it was very different from the sword that he imagined Dragon King should possess.
Gu Shenwei put away his sword and saber, and told the crowds off in a berating tone, “I was stranded here by accident and volunteered to command and guard the city when you were helpless. But you did not believe in me and kept accusing me and making me prove something that’s impossible. How can I not be bitterly disappointed?”
The complaints of “Lord Gu” immediately caused panic among the crowd. It was not easy to find a commander, and if he decided not to take up the role, the residents would once again lose the one person they could rely on. So they denounced the woman who spoke out, and many even rolled up their sleeves and walked around the crowd, in an attempt to find the instigators.
The guard leader more or less had some experience in officialdom. He knew they needed to do more to retain “Lord Gu”. So he said loudly, “Do not spread rumors to deceive people, witch! Please, don’t mind her, Lord Gu. Please command us to fight. You are our… general. Yes, General Gu! Please issue an order.”
Therefore, “General Gu” became Gu Shenwei’s new t.i.tle. Everyone nodded, and almost everyone repeated the t.i.tle to themselves. In this way, “General” became an unbreakable t.i.tle that was no longer a simple position, but the owner of special power.
Gu Shenwei felt a jolt. “General Gu” reminded him of the memories of his father, so he accepted the t.i.tle and raised his arms. He said loudly, “You gave me the t.i.tle of General Gu, and I will perform the duties of a general. I am the first and the last volunteer. Now that the enemy is at present, there is no such thing as ‘voluntary.’ My first order is to ask all of you, men and women, old and young, to join the army in guarding the city and shoulder the responsibilities that you are capable of.”
The guard leader only wanted 100 volunteers, but General Gu recruited thousands of people from the pier and other parts of the city as soldiers the moment he opened his mouth. His appet.i.te was a hundred, or even a thousand times more than that of the guard leader.
“Strangely enough, when recruiting 100 volunteers, no one dared to enlist. And no one dared to oppose when all the volunteers joined. In fact, most people were very excited and even agreed with one another. This is how a general should be. It seems the young man was not lying when he claimed that he had fought in many places.”the guard leader thought to himself.
“I need a s.p.a.ce big enough for the general’s main tent.” Gu Shenwei told the guard leader.
“Yes, we have. The Council Chamber in the royal palace is very big, however…” The guard leader was somewhat hesitant. After all, this “General Gu” had not yet been approved by the King.
“It must be close to the South gate.” General Gu requested.
“Close to the gate…” the guard leader thought aloud, “Then the tax office would be the largest.”
“Then it shall be there. Let others take me. Hurry, take 10 men with you to close the city gate. People are allowed to enter but not leave.”
The guard leader was taken aback. Generally, to stop the spies from sneaking in, people were prevented from entering but permitted to leave.
“I want it to be foolproof,” Gu Shenwei explained.
Suddenly, the guard leader’s admiration for the young man rose, and he immediately accepted his orders. Just when he was about to leave, Gu Shenwei asked again, “What is your name?”
“I am Wu Zongheng,” he replied.
“You are from the Central Plain?” asked General Gu.
“It has been three generations since my family moved to the Western Region,” said Wu Zongheng.
Gu Shenwei nodded as guard leader Wu Zongheng hurried off with 10 men.
General Gu, who was “chosen” by the residents in public, went to the tax office under the protection of more than 20 guards, followed by a large crowd. Before long, there was almost no one left on the pier.
Gu Shenwei’s original purpose was to lure the disciples of New Moon Hall to appear, but he had more ideas the further he progressed.
Small countries in the Western Region could not afford to keep too many ministers, but there were two positions that must be taken up: one was the prime minister who a.s.sisted the king; the other was the tax minister who guaranteed that the treasury was always adequate. But both fled with the king.
The tax office was s.p.a.cious indeed. Gu Shenwei set up the general’s office here and began issuing a series of orders.
The first thing was to appoint five guards to guard the gate. The guards would be responsible for reporting and presenting people to him, while a dozen other guards would run errands and notify others of the general’s orders.
The tax minister took away his official seal, but the tax stamp was still there. So Gu Shenwei used it as the general seal instead.
The second thing was to search for weapons. The king had fled in a hurry and took away a lot of jewelry, but left many things behind. The treasury vault of the royal palace was forcefully opened, and the weapons were all taken out while the valuables remained intact.
Then came the selection of soldiers.
In order to not give anyone an excuse to refuse, Gu Shenwei ordered a nationwide conscription. However, when it came to the distribution of weapons, he needed to select soldiers carefully and not arm the wrong ones.
After excluding the old, the young, the sick, and the women, there were actually more than 900 men remaining. However, there were only 300 to 400 weapons available. So the people guarding the city took turns using weapons.
The first task of the soldiers was to search the city and bring all men of suitable age who were hiding from conscription to the tax office. They were to face charges of deserting the army and then be locked up in the nearby market, guarded by special personnel.
After searching through the city, the troops had increased by more than 200 people.
From this, Gu Shenwei managed to roughly estimate the potential of the five countries in Xiaoyao Lake. This was something that Golden Roc Fort had not managed to discover, and he would take over all of it.
After nightfall, the new General Gu issued a curfew order: n.o.body was allowed to leave for any reason– this was in order to capture the spies who sneaked into the city.
The task of capturing the spies would be carried out by General Gu himself.
Maid Lotus quietly returned and reported the results: Three traitors from New Moon Hall were exposed. They were all killed and thrown into the water.
Yan Er and a total of 13 traitors were killed. At least one of them volunteered as the Undying Corpse Poison. Three had died at the dock, and eight remained. Maid Lotus believed that they were still hiding in the city.
Eliminating the traitors of New Moon Hall was just one of the urgent problems for Gu Shenwei to solve. For him, the most important and urgent problem was the boats.
Without boats, the Great Snowmountain army would be trapped in the south of Xiaoyao Lake, unable to be put to good use and at a disadvantage.