Da Tang Shuang Long Zhuan Volume 2 Chapter 2 part1

Book 2 Chapter 2 - Mutual Deception[1]

Carried under Du Fuwei's arms, the two boys really covered about a hundred li that day. Before daybreak they have arrived at Xin'an County [Luoyang, Henan].

This county is one of the two thriving big cities along the Yangtze River. Because the fire of war has not reached this place, compounded with a large numbers of refugees fled here to seek shelter, the city was bustling with noise and excitement.

With hands behind his back and a face that did not show any expression, Du Fuwei led the way. It was not clear whether he felt embarrassed that everybody was avoiding him due to his demonic appearance, or whether he was proud of it.

Kou Zhong made an eye signal to Xu Ziling before he hastened his steps toward Du Fuwei. "Die!” he called, "Aren't you supposed to go back to Liyang to become big king over there? Perhaps there are people who took advantage of your absence to rise in rebellion!”

Du Fuwei said indifferently, "Good boy, you'd better speak a couple of words less. Otherwise, if other people hear it, I would have to kill them to shut their mouth.”

Kou Zhong stuck out his tongue. Pretending to be scared he returned to Xu Ziling's side and said in a low voice, "Li Dage was right. Die is not a good material for somebody who would conquer the world [tian xia]; he is too eager to kill, and don't know how to buy the hearts of the people.”

Du Fuwei turned his head around to glower at him; his sharp eyes shot a chilling murderous intention. The scared Kou Zhong did not dare to continue.

Du Fuwei was about two cun taller than the two boys, plus he was wearing a tall hat; walking among the crowd, he really looked like a crane in a flock of chicken, very conspicuous.

The three of them climbed the stairs in the largest restaurant in town. The restaurant was jam-packed with people, trying to find an empty table was definitely harder than ascending the heavens. Du Fuwei pulled a water aside and stuffed two strings of zhu coins [1 zhu = 1/24 of a tael] into his hand. God knows how the waiter conjured up his magic trick, right away the waiter led them to an empty table next to a window, and respectfully asked them, three ‘father and sons' to sit down.

After ordering tea and some appetizers, Du Fuwei only took a sip of tea, and then he stopped and looked at the two boys devouring their food. With an indifferent tone he asked, "Who said I don't know how to buy the people's heart?”

Kou Zhong replied in low voice, "If Die knew how to buy the people's heart, you would not go around forcing people into service, to enlist your troops by force; as a result those who saw it are terrified.”

Du Fuwei was incredulous, "What does a kid like you know? There's a common saying, ‘wealth define character'. Right now Die can barely scrape a meager living by living like a pauper. If I am not careful, even my family property can be lost. Where can I find the capital to buy the people's heart?”

Kou Zhong shook his head and swayed his noggin, "If Die knew how to buy the people's heart, you would dress your children to look like great heroes, so that when you toot your horn about coming to the aid of the people and saving the world, we, two brothers, will follow good ol' Die delightfully, and even help you conquering the world. It would be much better than relying on fear to control us, and thus harming the congeniality between us, father and sons.”

Xu Ziling could not endure it, he nearly spurt the delicious pastries out of his mouth; but seeing Du Fuwei's unsightly countenance, he hurried covered his mouth and hung his head low.

Kou Zhong totally ignored the ominous glint in Du Fuwei's eyes; he still giggled and said, "Die, you, Senior, should not be angry; sincere advice is always unpleasant to hear. The reason the muddle-headed ruler is called muddle-headed ruler is precisely because he is unwilling to listen to sincere advice. Die, if you only want to be a gangster leader, naturally there won't be any problem, but if you want to be the world's leader, no matter how unwilling you are to listen to criticism, you have to put up an attitude of ‘respecting the wise', ‘encouraging free airings of different views'. Only then would people not call you ‘just another muddle-headed ruler'.”

Du Fuwei was listening to him with a blank expression on his face.

He started his career by making a life-and-death [orig. kissing neck] friendship with Fu Gongyou, mustering wanderers and riffraff [orig. grass and weeds/uncultivated land] and became the region's overlord of the underworld. Later on he led his troops to seek shelter under Wang Bo of Changbai Mountain. And then he broke away from Wang Bo to become an independent general crisscrossing the Huai River, never suffered any defeat. Right now even Liyang had fallen into his hands, his reputation shook the world. But he had never had anybody dared to reprimand him on his face, especially not a bookish advice coming from a kid's mouth, whose smell of his mother's milk has not dried yet. However, while listening to him, he felt something fresh; in particular the way Kou Zhong kept calling him ‘Dad'. If he got angry because of this, he really lacked grace; therefore, momentarily he did not know how to refute.

Kou Zhong had not finished; he ate and talked at the same time, "Die, your martial art skill is so formidable. It seems to me that even Yuwen Huagu is not your match.”

Casting a glance at Du Fuwei's expression, he let out a ‘huh?' and then continued, "Could it be that your son kissed the wrong butt? Why does Die's expression become so unsightly? Ay! After obtaining the ‘Secret to Long Life', you are going to kill your children to shut our mouths anyway, so just bear with us a bit longer! Or perhaps you could seal our mute acupoint, so that we cannot make any noise. Hee hee! Actually, is mute acupoint real?”

Du Fuwei's strong eyes swept around, he noticed that Kou Zhong constantly increased the volume of his voice. He shook his head with a wry smile and said, "If you, this kid, are thinking about drawing other people's attention to save you, it's just a wishful thinking. All you are doing is just adding a few more lives to take.”

Suddenly he reached down under the table to pinch Xu Ziling's thigh. As soon as he exerted strength to his five fingers, Xu Ziling was in so much pain that he had to spit the culinary delicacy in his mouth.

Kou Zhong raised his hands in mock surrender and said, "Die is still more ruthless than your child. This strategy ‘besieging Wei to rescue Zhao' [to relieve besieged ally by attacking the home base of the besiegers] and ‘make declaration for the east but strike to the west', I really cannot ward off. Die, please be magnanimous! Child understood that in everything power trumps logic. Die's lesson is very good.”

Du Fuwei was still a bit at a loss. His biggest problem was that right now was not the time to kill people to shut their mouth yet. Withdrawing his big hand, he said drily, "From now on you are not allowed to speak.”

Kou Zhong giggled and coughed, trying to stifle his laugh, but in the end he tossed his head back and roared in laughter. Only then did he lower his head and munched busily.

Du Fuwei was so furious he nearly blew his lungs. But since he did not say that they must not laugh, he felt embarrassed to punish them.

The two little demons exchanged a glance and both smiled knowingly in triumph.

Leaving the restaurant, with bamboo toothpicks in their mouth, Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling strolled leisurely behind Du Fuwei. From time to time they bumped their shoulders against each other; their mind seemed to be free from the immediate trouble.

Without saying a single word, Du Fuwei headed for the marketplace and bought two horses; he had the two boys rode together in one horse with a strict warning, "If you are still daydreaming about relying on the horse's legs to escape, I will dig one eyeball from each of you. Are we clear?”

The two boys nodded their head deferentially; their appearance made others laugh.

Du Fuwei was in no mood to argue with them, he told them to ride in the front, leading the way, while he followed behind them.

As soon as they left the city, the horses galloped along the official road. Xu Ziling let the horse speed along without trying to rein it at all.

Seeing that Du Fuwei was lagging behind at least five zhang away, Kou Zhong whispered in Xu Ziling's ear, "This is bad, if we let this evil man takes the treasure underneath the Emperor Guan Temple in Yangzhou, Niang will definitely blame us.” But with his other hand he wrote on Xu Ziling's back, "Just now at the restaurant I tried to attract other people's attention. If someone is blocking our way, we can seize the opportunity to escape.”

Xu Ziling understood his intention, so he said with a sigh, "He is so formidable, we had no choice but to obey. In my opinion, although he is cruel and overbearing, he is actually a good person. At least until now he has not beaten us yet. We'd better give the ‘Secret to Long Life' to him first, and then we'll see whether he would really take us as his sons. When he becomes the emperor in the future, won't we become crown prince? Yifu [foster father/godfather] ought not to kill yizi!” [foster child; ‘yi' here means ‘righteousness', same as ‘righteous army' I mentioned earlier, also same character in ‘yiqi']

Based on previous experience with Fu Junchuo, the boys knew that even though they were separated by a few zhang, it would be hard to conceal anything from Du Fuwei's ears.

Kou Zhong knitted his eyebrows and said, "Ay! Just before her death Niang told us about the secret of opening the treasure-trove, something like three left six right, seven forward eight backward, three turns two spins; did you hear her clearly? Seems like there were two more sentences. Niang's death was so tragic, I cried so hard that my ears turned deaf; how could I hear clearly? Didn't Niang said that if we fail to know the secret of how to open the door, even if we get into the Temple we won't find the entrance to the treasure-trove?”

Inwardly Xu Ziling praised Kou Zhong's ingenuity. "Of course I remember,” he played along, "But unless he is willing to take us as his sons, otherwise he would kill us to shut our mouths anyway, we might as well not tell him anything. Fortunately Niang taught us the technique to break our main artery; worst case scenario we immediately commit suicide to end our miserable life.”

Kou Zhong pretended to be horrified, "You must not do that,” he said, "I'll say the old ghost Du can be considered a rare talent, as long as he does not have any son yet, he must find two genius and outstanding talents like us to be his heirs; at least he could use us to admonish his ministers. If he throws us away for nothing, he is a really big fool [orig. muddled egg].”

After a short pause he sighed and added, "Ay! But you were right too, if he deal with us ruthlessly, if he gives us even half a slap on the face, we will immediately kill ourselves, to teach that evil tyrant Dad a lesson, instead of obtaining the treasure, he will be crushed to death when the while Emperor Guan Temple collapse on him.”

Hearing the more he bragged, the farther off-track he was, Xu Ziling was afraid Du Fuwei might see through their charades. "Stop talking,” he busily said, "He might catch up with us!”

Kou Zhong pretended to look back, he saw Du Fuwei lowering his head, so he knew their brilliant scheme was successful; thus he promptly shut his mouth, while in his heart he was so pleased with himself that it was hard to describe his feeling right now.

By dusk that day, the three of them reached a big town called Nanzhi. Du Fuwei found a small inn, but he only booked one room. And then he took the two boys to a small restaurant nearby to have dinner. His manner was a lot more ‘benevolent' than before.

From the dozen or so tables, only half were occupied. The patrons appeared to be local ‘the haves'.

The three chose a quiet table on the corner. After ordering food and drink, slowly and casually said, "Since the two of you are obedient, you are now allowed to talk.”

Kou Zhong lightly kicked Xu Ziling's leg under the table. He heaved a sigh and said, "Whatever Die, the Senior, is unwilling to hear, you might as well tell us plainly, so that your sons will not offend you by breaking your taboo, but will seal our lips instead.”
[1] Title chapter original: you hoodwink me, I cheat on you.

Chapter end