Remnants of Filth(Yuwu) Volumes 1-5

NOT LONG AFTER Mo Xi received the secret missive from the capital, the emperor of Chonghua finally announced the news of Gu Mang's return, along with how he would be punished: Wangshu-jun would be granted complete control over him.

The news spread like wildfire across all of Chonghua. Although Mo Xi's army was stationed all the way on the northern frontier, they nevertheless found out a mere three days later.

The Northern Frontier Army exploded. On the surface, they were as solemn and calm as ever, but during breaks between patrols, almost everyone started weighing in. Mo Xi saw it all, and for once, he didn't stop them.

He thought it perfectly normal that these soldiers would feel dissatisfied-after all, the Northern Frontier Army had once been the invincible army of Gu. A healthy majority of the soldiers had once risked their lives alongside Gu Mang. Their feelings about him were extremely complicated. Though their loyalties remained unquestioned, they had once wholeheartedly sworn allegiance to their commander Gu Mang-even though that same Gu Mang had once dubbed them the "Wangba Army."

Seriously that wasn't a joke. Wangba as in "tortoise," and wangba as in "bastard." Before Mo Xi took over, this army's roster had read like this: Liu Dazhuang, Soldier of the Wangba Army. Zhang Dayan, Squad Leader of the Wangba Army.

And so on and so forth, bastards all the way down the line.

First on the list had been: Gu Mang, Commander of the Wangba Army.

Logically speaking, no one would want to enlist in an army with such a vulgar name, but that concern hadn't borne out. At the time, Gu Mang had been the most illustrious general of Chonghua. Most of the well-known generals were constrained obligations, or pretensions-but by their own challenges, Gu Mang was different. He was slave-born; he had no father or mother, no worries or cares, no ego to lose, nor any fear of death.

If all of Chonghua's noble young masters took off their clothes and stood in a row, Gu Mang might not have been the most mus- cular, but he definitely would have had the most scars. He had fully deserved the title of Chonghua's "Beast of the Altar."

In those days, Gu Mang's deputy had always reprimanded him at the sight of his wounds. "You're the commander-why do you always run to the front? Don't you know how to dodge?"

Gu Mang would smile. His dark eyes were very bright, and his lips looked very soft. His voice was naturally smooth as silk as he cheerfully mollified his angry friend. "My legs are too long; I have no choice but to run fast, no choice at all."

His very presence seemed to bring laughter and sweetness to the battlefield, as though such places could be more than freezing cold and crimson blood.

He remembered every one of his comrade's birthdays, and between battles, he often took the cultivators from his camp to make merry and drink wine in some little village. Sometimes, they'd be met with crafty villagers who charged sky-high prices, but General Gu never got angry; he merely laughed and tossed all his money on the table in order to buy his soldiers wine and meat.

In the end, he'd yell, "Eat up, drink up! You'd better all stuff your faces and eat your fill! You're my precious darlings-if there's not enough money, I'll pay in other ways!"

Gu Mang was a man of his word. He traded fur coats for wine and spirit jades for meat, and once even took off all his military robes and armor and tossed them on the bar in exchange for nü'erhong rice wine(3), at which point the army thugs started laughing and heckling him, "General Gu, we want beef too. Do you have anything else you could take off?"

By then, he'd already stripped down to a single snow-white robe, but he still laughed and pointed at them. "Just you wait."

"No way! General Gu, you wouldn't really take off your under- wear too!"

"That can't be worth very much..."

Gu Mang didn't plan to take off his underwear, but it was true that he didn't have anything left. He bit his lip in thought, and before everyone's amused and shocked expressions, he scooched up to the pretty, widowed proprietress and planted a kiss on her cheek.

The soldiers all stopped talking and stared. Even the widow was stunned speechless, drops of wine plinking off her ladle. It took her a moment to snap back to her senses and start chasing after Gu Mang, ladle held aloft.

"Shameless! You awful flirt!"

Everyone roared with laughter.

Amid the thigh slapping and sympathetic wincing, the widow chased Gu Mang around the entire room. "I'm serious! I'm serious!" Gu Mang cried, begging for mercy as he ran. "You're beautiful! You're beautiful!"

out here "I know I'm beautiful! You're not bad-looking either, young man! But you're way too fucking shameless! Couldn't you sneak alone and kiss me at night? Why'd you have to do it in front of so many people?! Pervert!"

This pervert ran about in utter chaos, yet he made sure to shame- lessly shout, "Yes, yes, yes, I'll come over tomorrow night-or I can stay here tonight, as long as you give us another two catties of beef. Please, dear miss."

"Pah! You've already asked me for beef on credit three times since you've been stationed here, and this is the fourth! Every single time, you say you'll come over 'tomorrow night'! Do you think I'm gonna fall for your tricks?!" the widow yelled back, her little fists punching the wooden bar so hard it cracked.

The army ruffians were laughing so hard they were about to fall over.

No matter how indignantly the widow spoke, in the end, Gu Mang was still able to use his pretty face and the promise of "coming over tomor- row" to secure another two catties of marinated beef for his brothers.

"General Gu, you sure know how to win people over..."

"Of course I do," Gu Mang said smugly, preening with delight. "I've gone through thousands of beautiful flowers-everyone knows of my exploits."

With a commander like that, it was no wonder a youth in those days grandly declared, "Who cares if they're called the Wangba Army? Even if they were the Jiba Army(4), I'd enlist in the Cock Army for General Gu!"

His friend standing next to him turned up his nose. "Aiya, you read your classics in vain, I see. How vulgar."

"How would you make it elegant?"

"If you're going to go with the Jiba Army, why not call it the Ji Ba Army? Ji Ba as in 'cease battle."

"What a good name!" the youth exclaimed in admiration. "I like it."

"No way-I just made that up. Who would like a name like Ji Ba? Wouldn't you find it embarrassing? Go ahead and try it if you don't believe me. Even a dog would get mad at you if you called it that."

The youth laughed. "Never say never. Just because something doesn't exist now doesn't mean it won't in the future. If even an imperial army can be named Wangba, I don't think it's impossible that something else might be called Ji Ba in the future."

Fortunately, Gu Mang didn't hear this discussion-otherwise, he might have slapped the table with a triumphant yell and changed his title to "Gu Mang, Commander of the Ji Ba Army," thereby making all his subordinates suffer alongside him.

Amid the cruelty of war, only a little madman like Gu Mang would be inspired to joke around. In addition to dubbing his troops the Wangba Army, he also personally crafted their flag, creatively cutting a tortoise out of a jade-green banner, complete with a very realistic little tail. He cast a spell on the flag, and with every incense time that passed, the tortoise roared, "Wangba, Wangba, Chonghua's pride, a mighty name known far and wide!"

In short, it was extremely embarrassing.

The first time Gu Mang rode out to battle with this flag, the enemy general nearly laughed himself into an early grave. Nevertheless, before the day was out, Gu Mang's Wangba Army had reduced the hundred-thousand-strong opposing army to a sobbing mess.

Gu Mang fought many more battles after that one, both large and small, and came away victorious every time.

As a result, during the years that Gu Mang was a general, the enemies of Chonghua would pale the glimpse at of a tortoise's tail. The sight they dreaded most was, perhaps, that of a little tortoise flag raised up over the smoke of the battlefield as General Gu rode out, cleared his throat, and introduced himself with absolute seriousness:

"This humble one is Gu Mang, General of the Wangba Army. I'm here to learn from your honorable selves."

Failing to defeat this young cultivator was shameful enough. Even worse was having to snivel through one's report to one's emperor: "Wahh, this subordinate is truly incompetent and failed to defeat the Wangba Army!"

It was the stuff of nightmares.

As for Chonghua's soldiers, although Gu Mang was outrageous and mischievous, his charisma was unsurpassed. Many people revered him in those days, and some even took his nonsense "shitty names keep you safe" mantra as gospel. In accordance with the trend, many babies born during that time had the misfortune of being given "shitty names":

Chu "Strong Root" Genzhuang.

Xue "Iron Pillar" Tiezhu.

Jiang "Aching Balls" Dantong.

When Mo Xi took over the Wangba Army, the first thing he did was change its ridiculous name. He would never allow for his entry on the military roster to become "Mo Xi, General of the Wangba Army." Absolutely not!

And so the Wangba Army was renamed the Northern Frontier Army and assigned to Mo Xi's command. The dark humor that had stood up to spilled blood and the smoke of war crumbled away, much like Gu Mang's glorious reputation.

Those little tortoises that had shouted and yelled "Wangba, Wangba, Chonghua's pride, a mighty name known far and wide" were like an absurd and fleeting joke. They were never seen on the vast battlefields again.

The army's existence became a solemn one. There were no more flowers or nectar; no one who would strive to memorize any of the lowly soldiers' names; no one to take the men out to make merry; no one to buy them cheap wine with the clothes off his back. Battle regained its absolute and pitiless severity.

An eternal winter had arrived.

Although most of the Northern Frontier Army hated Gu Mang nowadays, perhaps that past was the reason they couldn't feel quite the same way ordinary civilians did when they spoke of him.

This was especially true of those old soldiers who'd fought in the Wangba Army with General Gu. Every time they said his name, a hint of something unreadable rose in their eyes.

"Ah, I really, really didn't expect him to end up like this."

"Everyone knows of Wangshu-jun's cruelty. I'm afraid it's an awful sign that His Imperial Majesty is letting Wangshu-jun deal with him."

"He'll definitely die a horrible death..."

A man of ambition wasn't necessarily disliked, but a traitor was certain to be universally reviled. Only when these veterans of the Wangba Army gathered did they murmur about things that had nothing to do with hatred.

As the night wore on, some of the ones who were getting on in years finally lost all enthusiasm. "Ah, what a good man he was... If only certain things hadn't gone the way they had, then he wouldn't have-"

Shh! Be quiet! The nerve, to mention such things-do you want to die?!"

The old soldier shook himself out of his reverie with a yelp. As he realized what he'd nearly let slip, the drunken sparkle in his eyes vanished, and he couldn't help but shudder.

The other soldiers continued chiding him. "Now we're working under General Mo, and Gu Mang is the person he hates most in the world. It's not as if you don't know his temper-if he heard you, none of us would live to see morning!"

"Ah, you're right, silly me, getting confused as soon as I start drinking..."

The soldiers sitting around the firepit fell silent and stared blankly into the flames, each of them lost in their own thoughts. After a long time, someone else sighed and said, "But everyone changes, I suppose. All we can say is that this is General Gu's fate."

"How many years has it been? Why are you still calling him General Gu?"

"Oh, right, I meant Gu Mang."

It was a still night at the frontier fortress. The bonfire crackled, bursting with a stream of golden sparks more dazzling than the stars.

The tipsy old soldier lay on the ground with his head pillowed on his arms. He gazed up at the starry sky and the twinkling Ziwei Star(5)

, the jut of his throat bobbing as he muttered a few words no one else could hear. "Ah, to be honest, it was only because of Gu Mang that I enlisted. I once even drank with him around a fire. He didn't put on any airs, either. Back then...back then, as I watched him laugh, I thought-if one day I could die for him in battle, it would be a good way to go. Who could've known he would end up..."

Meeting such a fate.

Gone are the birds, discarded lies the bow.(6)

After making use of Gu Mang, the enemy nation was offering him as part of a gift of peace and giving him back to Chonghua. This man had lived through many turns of fortune and seen much of the world's beauty, but a single wrong move had left him a traitor. What was done was done; there was no going back.

Was this what it meant to reap what you sow? To be the architect of your own destruction?

Returning to the topic at hand-although Gu Mang had come into a cruel fate, he had only himself to blame. It satisfied the people to see him unwanted by either side. For a while, almost everyone in Chonghua eagerly awaited Gu Mang's end.

Whether he was to be beheaded, given death by a thousand cuts, boiled alive, hacked to pieces, or drawn and quartered—even a little girl who had just learned to speak could lisp sycophantically after the adults, "We can't go easy on that disgwaceful pighead."

Thus, Gu Mang, General Gu, Chonghua's former heroic com- mander, Mo Xi's archenemy-the legendary man who had once been praised as the Beast of the Altar-had so pathetically become a "disgwaceful pighead."