Bob’s Memoir: 4,000 Years as a Free Demon
34
Pagoda
I found the emperor to be personable. He treated us with the utmost courtesy when we arrived. When Zhi spoke in his presence, however, I was concerned for her safety.
“My Lord Daozong,” Zhi said when she was presented. “I bring you greetings from my father, Fa Man-su. I pray that you will find it pleasing to grant my boon of becoming a priestess in the temple of Buddha. I have committed myself to this monk, Bob.”
Of course, that wasn’t the name I was using in China, but it gets confusing otherwise. This was the telltale point. Would the Emperor grant her boon, or insist she become his wife and execute me? Or execute both of us. What I wasn’t counting on was a Khitan tradition of guest prostitution. When a high-ranking official was a guest in another’s home, the host was expected to provide his wife or a virgin from his household to the guest for his entertainment. This was the most demeaning of customs, but I could think of no way to spare Zhi after her bold declaration.
“We shall consider your request in the morning, and the disposition of this monk.” With that, the emperor dismissed his court. His women took charge of Zhi. I was led to a convenient room deep in the palace where I discovered guards had been placed at my door. I waited impatiently, too concerned to even open a gateway for my women.
It is not often that I find myself too concerned about something to consider having sex with one of my wonderful women. At this time, I had three wives—Namia, Penelope, and Lakshmi—and two possessions—Josie and Pari. And there were about a hundred willing women in my harem which included concubines and women who hadn’t decided where they fit in yet, but liked the way I fit in them.
My wives and my possessions were kept exclusively for me. It is not that I demanded it of them, but that they chose that. Well, perhaps it was different with Josie and Pari. I possessed them and their will was mine. It would never have occurred to me to share one of them with another man. I didn’t mind them playing with any number of women, but… Let’s just say it is the male human in me that prevented me from sharing with other men. I often fought the masculine impulses in me with only moderate success. I, myself, had had sex with close to fifty men during the time that I was a woman. And not all of them were women I transformed. I had no justifiable reason to withhold male sex from my wives or concubines. I simply couldn’t fathom sharing my wives or possessions with any other man.
So, the whole idea of guest prostitution baffled me. I noted that the emperor had conveniently reversed it, taking my woman for his pleasure, and leaving me with none. Not that I’d have enjoyed a woman who was sent to me without her explicit consent. And this night, not at all.
I wondered when it had begun to dawn on me that Zhi was my woman. Not that I possessed or even wanted to possess her, but that we had bonded on this journey. I asked myself if anyone would miss the emperor if he suddenly died, or scurried around the palace as a cockroach until someone stepped on him. But Zhi had warned me that this might be a possibility. It would be unlike a man as powerful as the emperor not to take his intended to bed when she got there. Fresh pussy and all that.
Still, I hoped she would be able to talk sense to him. I mean in our favor, of course.
“Monk Bob, stand before us,” the emperor declared the following day when I was brought into his presence. I was not chained, but a guard stood on either side of me. “From whence does this name come?” he said.
“I come from the far south where it is a common name—often combined with another name just as Man-su or Ji-lin. Billy Bob is quite common, great Bìxià,” I said respectfully. He was pleased and the meeting thawed.
“Bob, my woman Fa Zhi has told me of your plan to build a temple for Buddha and her desire to become Buddha’s priestess. How do you plan to build this temple?” he asked.
“With your great lordship’s permission, I have plans that I have made for a great pagoda honoring Buddha, as well as grounds and buildings to house his monks and a school for those who would learn the arts of a monk,” I said. I presented the scroll on which I’d been drawing plans ever since I left Nihon. I liked the wooden temple I had left there and the dozen or more shrines I had built since then.
“You have built temples before?”
“Many, Emperor. I have built temples of stone, of brick, of wood, and of sand. The material is not a factor as much as is honoring Buddha.” Well, technically, I’d only built a few temples to Buddha. But he didn’t need to know that. He called counselors to his side to look at the plans and they all nodded in agreement.
“I would have Buddha honored in my town, along with our ancestors and the guardian spirits. How will you build and finance your project?”
“I have found that where men provide freely of their labor, the gods provide abundantly. I will seek laborers among the poor and downtrodden. I will have only those who will freely give of their talents and they will be compensated from the benevolence of the gods,” I said. In reality, I could reach into my satchel at any time and pull out bags of the local coinage. This, too, I kept to myself.
“Guards. Maintain vigilance. I will walk in my garden with the monk,” he said. With that he led me to a courtyard with gardens that grew rare plants and flowers. I wanted to collect several specimens for the infinity room. We were accompanied by twelve guards, fully armed and looking very strong.
“Bob, you have a reputation already. My people have heard from those who accompanied Fa Zhi that you overcame her guards and that your servants made short work of a band of brigands.”
“Stories have a way of growing out of proportion, your majesty. Fa Zhi’s guards were at fault for drinking so early in the day when they should have been vigilant. The brigands were taken by surprise and were not very good fighters.”
“Yes. And they have been punished. Still these stories must be put to rest. I would know the true measure of a man I employ.” I looked at him, understanding his meaning and nodded. He stepped away and turned to the dozen guards who had accompanied us to maintain vigilance. “Kill him,” he said.
I may have mentioned, that was a command I really couldn’t submit to. A brave guard drew his sword and attacked me by himself. He ended up face down in a pond. The other guards were disciplined and attacked as a single unit, using the best of armed combat discipline. Spears and swords both came at me and I was pressed to disable each of them. I was glad the emperor did not send a legion after me. I stood before the emperor and bowed.
“Soldiers!” the emperor cried out. Oh, shit. Heavy shoes echoed from every direction as armed men descended on the courtyard, all weapons pointed at me. “Collect all these sleepers who were supposed to attend and protect your emperor. Take them out and execute them.”
The attention of the soldiers was immediately taken from me and they hurried to collect the unconscious guards and carry them from the courtyard. A dozen soldiers remained with the emperor and me. He turned and we re-entered his throne room.
“Bob, I trust you understand that I had to test you. There are disciples of another god who would have simply stood and died. I would have been very disappointed if you had done that. We really do need a temple.”
“Yes, your highness. I pray for the easy release of your guards in knowing that to the end they followed your commands.” I hoped the message got across that I wasn’t pleased, but it didn’t make a difference. Their fate was sealed.
“I cannot have people talking about how a single man defeated so many armed guards,” the emperor said. “I will approve your plans and decree that a temple shall be built next to the palace. The rest is up to you. Oh. And you may have Fa Zhi for as much good as she will do you. She has a sloppy open cunt and is a dead lay. I cannot imagine you will have much pleasure in her. It was like fucking the ocean.”
Hmm. I’d found her quite tight around my dick. I wondered at the emperor’s equipment. Nonetheless, Zhi awaited me at the doors and we went to begin surveying the area next to the palace for the new Fagong Temple.
It has come to my attention that gods and rulers are quick to approve a site for a temple, a school, a prison, a pipeline, or a capitol building if the location is a problem site. The capitol of the United States was built on a swamp that neither Virginia nor Maryland wanted to deal with. It turned out beautifully and the swamp was no longer there. Unfortunately, development of the site could not ease the muggy heat or mosquitoes.
Even the Temple of Ninra was planned on land that not only had many poor people living there, but already had a temple, as well. A temple to Ganesh I built in India was commanded in the heart of a slum, intending to displace the poor and clean up the area. All without concern for what would happen to the poor.
I was called upon near the end of the twentieth century to submit plans for building a church in the midwestern city where I was building suburban luxury houses. Well, I have nothing against the Christian god. And the congregation claimed to be followers of Issa—of course, they called him Jesus. The site occupied a full city block just on the edge of the city’s worst ghetto. Building there would mean the destruction of a habitat for the poor and people of color. The city had further approved plans to develop portions of the surrounding blocks into parkland. Not parks with playgrounds and jogging trails. No, just manicured lawns and benches for people to sit and meditate.
You might think, Well, Bob would never have taken a commission like that. He cares too much about the poor. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I did take the commission. And I am happy that I did.
I went about it in my time-honored way. Before I began bulldozing apartment buildings and ramshackle houses, I bought up dozens of buildings in the surrounding area, using half a dozen different corporate identities. The city was pleased that these partially empty buildings would be put to use and possibly re-developed with the area improvement. As far as either the city or the church was concerned, we were expanding the zone of improvement and pushing the poor and homeless out farther away from the attractive downtown area.
Of course, I sent my own people into the area intended for destruction and had them move people to new homes in the broader area. It was my intent to keep as many people in the area where their homes were as I could. And I offered all those who would take them jobs building the new church and tearing down the old buildings. My promise to them was that everyone who worked to build God’s temple would be cared and provided for.
Of course, I had to deal with unions and labor restrictions. It is amazing, however, how many people were admitted to the organizations when their fees were paid and they were compensated at full union rates. It seems there was no basis for complaint unless I was paying less than union scale. Or not paying the right union boss.
The result, of course, was that the neighborhood prospered. We redeveloped buildings in the expanded area gradually so that people would have better homes. The park area was planted by mothers and children who took pride in the lawns and played on the grass.
And the house of God was built. People who would never be welcome inside its doors still took pride in the beauty of the thing they had built. And when the church opened, with its predominantly white congregation, they found they were fully surrounded by people of color who spent Sunday mornings meeting in the park and singing gospel music.
Some years later, the congregation of the beautiful church filed for bankruptcy and I funded a new congregation of local people to buy the building and move their praise services inside.
The Fagong temple site reminded me of the site where Ninra commanded he wanted his temple. There was already an old and broken-down temple there. Houses had been built right up to its walls and the walls of the palace grounds next door. People tend to huddle together where they see safety, and a temple or a palace has always been one of those places. Perhaps fifty little houses would need to be removed before serious work on a temple could begin. Fifty poor peasants who were right in the palace’s shadow. I knew that if the emperor were involved, he would simply set fire to everything in the district and make the survivors clean up the rubble. If there were any survivors.
Instead, I started by sitting on the steps of the temple and teaching. In addition to Zhi, I brought six of my students from the infinity room to sit and be instructed.
“Zongshi, how does a poor person improve his lot in the next life?” one of my students asked. She used the highest honorific for me as an ancestral teacher. Over the coming years, I would be known here as laoshi (teacher) and shifù (master) as well as the high honorific.
“Our lives are like the boards of this temple,” I said. “Unless the boards near the ground are strong, the exalted boards on the fourth and fifth level will tumble to the ground. Do not question where the fates have put you now, but strive to be the strongest you can be at the level you are. In this way, not only will you improve your lot, you will make the lives of all those above you better.”
“How can we become strong?” asked another.
I stood and they jumped to follow me as I led them in the ancient and more modern forms. The first to join us, of course, were the children. My people quickly ushered them to the front so I could see them and gently correct their form. When we had followed all the prescribed forms, my people brought food out of the temple and fed those who were gathered. Then I instructed people on the cleaning of the temple area and the removal of garbage and rubbish that had collected there.
In all this time, I did not mention my purpose of building a new temple, nor how much space would be required for the edifice. But slowly, over the course of several days, even the surrounding huts had been cleaned and improved. Occasionally, someone who felt threatened by the development would pack his meagre belongings and leave. When that happened, we carefully dismantled their habitation and stacked the wood for future use.
The only thing I had to take to the emperor was the matter of the palace waste. In the mornings, a servant would bring all the night pots to the wall and dump them on the other side. This went unnoticed as long as there was a peasant hut up near the wall with the waste poured in its back garden. When the fresh waste was dumped out in the open, however, it was a different matter.
I made my approach in the most direct way, by leaping over the wall at that point and capturing the unfortunate servant—much to the surprise of soldiers patrolling the grounds. They wanted to apprehend me, but they had all been warned not to confront me. Despite his desire to keep my abilities quiet, the word had spread that those who challenged me ended up dead, either by my hand or the hand of the emperor.
“Who is the person who instructed this servant as to where to empty the sewage?” I demanded. It took a bit, but an officious man who declared himself as the major domo or some such came to demand of me what I wanted.
“Why are you detaining my employee and how did you get into the palace’s private grounds?” he demanded.
“I came here investigating why sewage is being dumped into the temple grounds,” I said.
“Temple? Ha! That pile of shit is worth only having our shit added to it,” he laughed.
“And do you have no sewer into which your toilets run?”
“Of course, we do. But it is all the way over on the other side of the grounds. Why should I have a servant waste valuable time by carrying chamber pots all the way over there? Now clear out and let us get back to our work.”
I turned to one of the soldiers who had been watching the exchange and trying to decide whether he should interfere. He was caught between a rock and a hard place as to whether he should permit the intruder or sacrifice his life by challenging him.
“Tell the emperor that Monk Bob wishes to speak to him about the passage from the palace to the new temple,” I commanded. The soldier hastened to an official at the chamber of meetings to inform him of my request. I followed to the approach to the audience chamber and soon I was called to the presence of the emperor.
“Monk Bob. I thought we had resolved all design issues. What is so important that you must disturb my meeting?” the emperor demanded.
“Your grace, it seems that an official decree is needed to stop the pouring of sewage from the chamber pots over the wall into the temple grounds.”
“Why should I be concerned with where the sewage is poured?”
“Well, it happens that it is being dumped exactly where you have requested a gate from the palace grounds into the temple grounds. Any sewage dumped on that side of the palace will make your visits distasteful at best,” I said smiling.
“Call the major domo!” the emperor barked. The frightened man was brought into the chamber. I sincerely hoped the emperor was not about to execute the man, distasteful as he was. “Let this be officially your order. All sewage, chamber pots, and waste of any kind shall be dumped only in the sewer drain and the wall adjoining the temple grounds shall be kept clean and pristine. You, personally, are to lead a cleanup crew to the temple grounds to remove all waste that has been dumped over the palace walls and take it to the sewer. Let this be done!”
The frightened major domo bowed his way out of the chamber and ran to collect a crew and start cleaning the mess of waste that had accumulated over the wall. The convenient dumping ground had been used for a long time. They had a task that lasted several days.
It all took time. Each morning I would come out to the temple courtyard and begin meditative forms. More and more people joined me, some only because they knew we would feed people afterward. Most, however, stayed to work as we leveled the ground and built up the foundation of what would become the new temple.
Just as when I built the temple in Bathra, anyone who worked on the temple was sheltered and fed. We began converting some of the surrounding huts to dormitories where workers could sleep. I seldom issued commands, and then only in the building process. Beyond that, I let the latent pride of the people direct the cleansing of the temple area. When enough area had been cleared, I marked off the boundaries of the temple grounds. Within those boundaries, only the construction I directed was allowed.
Since we spent part of every day in meditation and exercises, it seemed almost as if we were not working on the temple at all. However, the grounds were gradually cleared and the walls arose almost silently. There was never the crack of a whip or the cry of a disciplined slave to herald the construction.
“Bob, how are you able to feed all these people?” Zhi asked me as we settled on our sleeping mats.
“Fa Zhi, will you be one of my women and join me for all eternity?” I asked. “For the answer to your question is in service.”
“My master and my lover, I would join you and all that is yours if you will but have me,” she answered.
That night, for the first time, I took her into the infinity room and she realized I was not just a simple monk building a temple, but I was the life and sustenance of an entire world.
I have seen love in many forms. I have seen suddenly inflamed passions. I have seen comfortable old couples. I have seen utter submission and utter dominance. I have seen the love of soldiers for their general and the love of one soldier for another. I have seen a mother’s tender love for her children and a father’s protection of his family. But I believe that night with Zhi may have been the first time I had seen or experienced love as utter and pure devotion.
It was very different from when I possessed a woman. That woman made the choice to become mine and from that moment our hearts beat as one. I had lovers who cherished me and I had cherished many. I had even seen slaves who came to love their masters. But to have a woman worship me in her devotion was beyond my ability to grasp.
Zhi worshiped me with her heart and with her body. She was among the smallest of my women, but she threw herself into the meditation and martial arts training with as much passion as she threw herself into my arms. She learned the art of tantric sex and the meditations that emptied her soul to the universe. When I parted her wet folds with my cock and thrust into her, she was transported to a new plane of spiritual awareness. I could not help but love her with all my heart.
As we loved, the temple grew. Word spread that there would be a new temple and offerings began to arrive from as much as a hundred miles away. Lumber, tile, stone, paper, ceramics, and even rare plants and herbs arrived, often with laborers who followed instructions as to where something was to be done, but already knew how it should be done.
Surrounding the temple grounds, people planted gardens instead of shacks. Water ran freely through the pools as I pumped it from the river, and it drained through our own sewer system to the waste ponds. When new plants arrived, we separated out samples to take to the infinity room and found a place where they could propagate there as well. In all, the temple grounds flourished. Much more was accomplished in much less time when the people approached the task feeling strong and refreshed after our forms and meditation.
The main pagoda rose six rooftops into the air and above that, I erected a tower as tall as five men, visible from everywhere in the city. By the time it was finished, over a hundred monks had gathered to do service and to train in the courtyard.
Many of the emperor’s soldiers came to learn the arts as well. Since these did not labor on the temple, but rather for the emperor, we did not feed and house them. But we did not withhold any of the training from them.
The emperor, of course, was quick to take credit for the temple which he published far and wide as “The Temple Decree of Emperor Daozong,” also levying a tax to help defray the expenses of the temple. Most of that tax went to the emperor, not to the temple. In fact, as much as the emperor took credit for being a holy ruler, his administration, as represented by his major domo, was corrupt.
It only got worse after he died. Eventually, I left the temple in the care of the monks and packed my satchel. I bid farewell as I set off on a sacred pilgrimage alone. Some distance away from town, I found a quiet place where I could change my shape and form, becoming a completely different Bob, the monk being gone.
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