Gan Nineteenth Sister Chapter 5

The cold wind hissed. The darkness thickened.

Yin Jianping turned again and launched himself forward with the Chasing Stars, Catching the Moon¹ technique, covering the ground in three leaps that carried him deep into the third courtyard.

This yard was far smaller than the first two. Along one side stood two rows of buildings that served as the disciples’ quarters. Along the other rose the imposing bulk of Yueyang School’s ancestral temple.² The school’s newly wronged dead were enshrined within. In this time of fresh mourning, the spirit tablets of the school’s two fallen zhangmen and all the slain disciples stood arrayed upon the altar, where two eternal flame lamps³ burned with a cold, spectral green light that shivered in the darkness.

Yin Jianping landed soundlessly before the temple and halted thirty feet from the entrance.

The temple doors stood half-open, half-shut, creaking softly on their hinges. An old plaque hung beneath the eaves, swallowing and exhaling the night wind in a low, ghostly whistle that deepened the air of gloom. Yin Jianping stood at the threshold, weighing whether to enter and pay his final respects.

A faint prickling of unease ran through him—the sense that something was not as it should be. His hand tightened upon the hilt of the Jade Dragon Sword.

Upon his back, Duan Nanxi’s gaze fell upon the ancestral shrine of his own school, and a grief beyond all ordinary sorrow welled up from the depths of his heart.

“Go inside and have a look,” he rasped.

Yin Jianping murmured his assent. He touched his toes to the ground and was at the doorway in an instant. His right palm thrust outward through the air and the temple doors flew wide.

In the very moment the doors swung open, a flash of cold steel plunged down from the shadows just inside the threshold, accompanied by the shrill whistle of a blade cleaving the air.

A white-clad man had struck with lethal speed, his killing stroke already committed—but he had misjudged his mark. The sword cut empty air, and in doing so betrayed his position. Yin Jianping’s alertness had saved him from a stroke that would have been fatal. Seizing the instant of advantage, he surged forward. Before the white-clad man could recover his stance or shift to a new technique, Yin Jianping had already launched his own attack.

The Jade Dragon Sword slid from its sheath with a faint, keening note—the whisper of a dragon’s cry. Its blade was black as ink from the lethal poison that coated it, devoid of any gleam or lustre.

The swordplay was magnificent.

The blade moved like a golden eel sporting through waves, and a thin, piercing whistle cut the air. Terror flooded the white-clad man’s face. He twisted his wrist to bring his own sword up in a desperate parry, but somehow—impossibly—the blade would not rise. It was trapped, pinned beneath the dark edge of the Jade Dragon Sword.⁴

Shock seized the white-clad man. He tried to pivot and retreat, but his feet, too, were blocked by his opponent’s stance. In that single heartbeat of hesitation, the Jade Dragon Sword swept across his neck, its tip slicing cleanly through the throat.

The stroke was not merely exquisite and vicious—its true lethality lay in how it silenced his foe. Not the faintest cry escaped him. He staggered, swayed, and crumpled to the ground, never to rise again.

His next stroke was more brilliant still. Having dispatched the first man, Yin Jianping⁵ did not pause for so much as a breath. He spun like a whirlwind to face the opposite direction—and a blur of white flashed at the edge of his vision. In the very instant he turned, a second sword slashed down, grazing the hem of his robes. This stroke was even more perilous than the ambush at the door, yet once again Yin Jianping’s preternatural alertness had carried him clear, and the blade met nothing but cloth and air. The second white-clad man was blindingly fast. Having missed, he tapped his foot against the ground and sprang backward.

The white-clad man struck again in a twisting pivot. This time he employed the Dark Bird Scoring Sand⁶ technique, driving his blade upward from below in a vicious arc aimed at Yin Jianping’s belly. Yin Jianping snorted coldly. For days he had endured the enemy’s savagery in silence, choking down the blood-hatred of his school’s annihilation until it had risen to a boiling fury that could be contained no longer. Even in his desperate flight, the enemy pressed relentlessly, giving no quarter. He knew with absolute certainty that he could defeat this man. There would be no mercy.

The ink-black Jade Dragon Sword flicked outward—a sharp ring of steel on steel—and the enemy’s blade was knocked aside. Before the white-clad man could withdraw, Yin Jianping was upon him, closing the distance like a shadow stitched to his body.

A man of discerning eye—Duan Nanxi⁷, for instance—would have recognised that footwork at once. It was unmistakably one of the Six Shadowing⁸ movements of the Cold Zither Hermit,⁹ master of the Cold Zither Pavilion¹⁰ at South Putuo.¹¹

The white-clad man found himself driven into utter helplessness. He stumbled backward. He had space to retreat to, yet there was nowhere to plant his feet. He held a sword, yet there was no opening to use it.

These two white-clad retainers were no ordinary fighters. Their footwork and bladework alike bore the marks of masterful training, and it was precisely because Gan Shijiu Mei¹² valued their skill that she kept them at her side. Accustomed to sweeping all before them in her service, they had grown proud and complacent, never once encountering a foe worthy of their steel. This time, they had met their deserved doom at the hands of Yin Jianping.

The second man sensed disaster and opened his mouth to cry out, but before a sound could leave his lips, Yin Jianping’s left hand had clamped around his throat. The force behind that grip was unlike anything the man had ever known—a crushing, inexorable pressure, as though the weight of a mountain bore down upon his throat.

It was no wrist of flesh and blood. It was forged iron.

The white-clad man’s eyes rolled back. His entire body convulsed. A muffled crack sounded from his neck as the central vertebra snapped clean through. In a final spasm of dying reflex, he swung his sword with all his remaining strength at the arm that held him. The blade struck Yin Jianping’s wrist—and rebounded with a ringing clang, as though it had struck cast bronze. It was no sound that a sword makes against living flesh.

The white-clad man toppled. His eyes were wide open, frozen in disbelief. He could not fathom how a man’s arm could turn aside a sword’s edge. But no answer would ever come to him now.

It had taken no more than the space of a blink. Two formidable enemies, and Yin Jianping had dispatched them both.

He calmly returned the Jade Dragon Sword to its sheath and walked toward the spirit altar. Then, from behind him, came the sound of Duan Nanxi choking and gasping for air. His breathing had turned thick and laboured. A dire sign.

“Hall Master¹³!” Yin Jianping cried. “Are you all right?”

“Set me down…” Duan Nanxi’s voice came as though through a mouthful of phlegm. “Quickly… set me down.”

Yin Jianping was startled. “Hall Master, we cannot afford to tarry. They will be upon us at any—”

“Set me down,” Duan Nanxi croaked. “Set me down.”

Yin Jianping knew then that the worst had come. He untied the silk sash in haste and lowered the older man to the ground. In the lamplight, Duan Nanxi’s face was unusually haggard. A dark, livid discolouration had spread across his entire complexion. After all Yin Jianping had witnessed that day, there was no need to question what he saw. A single glance told him everything. Poison! Deadly poison!

He stood rooted to the spot, and felt his eyes begin to sting. Two streams of tears fell unchecked down his face.

As the old saying goes, “A man does not weep lightly, until true grief strikes.” In that moment, he was engulfed by profound sorrow.

Fury, self-reproach, hatred—all of it crashed upon him in a single overwhelming tide. Grief, for the last surviving elder of Yueyang School¹⁴ was about to perish. Fury and self-reproach, for he cursed his own helplessness. As for hatred, it was reserved for the enemy alone.

“Jianping.” A faint smile hung at the corner of Duan Nanxi’s mouth. “Go. I am finished. But my heart… is glad.”

Yin Jianping shook his head, his expression bleak, tears falling one by one.

“What is there for you to be glad of?”

“If you…” Duan Nanxi’s body had curled like a drawn bow. “You… are still alive. As long as you live… Yueyang School still has hope.”

The bow at last went slack.

He was dying, yet still he clung. “Tell me… how can you stand fearless before the poison? And those extraordinary… extraordinary martial arts of yours?”

He had voiced the questions of his heart, but he would never hear their answers. After a violent convulsion, dark purple blood seeped from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Then his soul departed for the Yellow Springs.¹⁵

Yin Jianping clenched his jaw until his teeth ached. A bitter smile flickered across his face. He unfastened the cloth-wrapped bundle from the dead man’s back—Yueyang School’s Iron Casket Codex¹⁶—and secured it upon his own. As his gaze swept the temple, something caught his eye. He moved to the spirit altar in a single fluid step.

Upon the altar sat a small, delicate incense burner. From within it, several threads of fragrant smoke curled lazily upward.

The unmistakable sweetness of osmanthus.

Poison! The realisation struck him like a blow.

Now he understood why Duan Nanxi had perished so suddenly after entering the temple. Poison! What a deadly Seven-Pace Gut-Severing Red!¹⁷

If not for the poison-repelling jade ring¹⁸ that Xian Bing¹⁹ had bestowed upon him with his dying breath, Yin Jianping too would have been a dead man. The thought sent a cold bead of sweat sliding down from between his brows.

He turned to the two white-clad corpses and used the toe of his shoe to kick open each man’s jaw. In both mouths he found a green pill the size of a sparrow’s egg—antidote pellets, taken in advance to neutralise the Seven-Pace Gut-Severing Red.

Before the spirit tablets of the school’s successive patriarchs, Yin Jianping performed the formal prostration of farewell.²⁰ He rose and made to step out of the temple—then froze.

He had heard something. Footsteps.

His body shifted in an instant. He glided to the window, punctured the paper with a fingertip, and peered out.

His blood ran cold.

Gan Shijiu Mei, escorted by the crimson-clad Ruan Xing²¹, had entered the courtyard.

The situation was desperate beyond measure.

To slip away now, with composure and stealth, was utterly impossible. Yin Jianping stepped back. Every fibre of his being urged him to burst through the door and fight—yet he could not, dared not act so rashly. He knew full well that the girl called Gan Shijiu Mei possessed martial arts of a calibre far beyond his own. He was no match for her.

A moment’s rashness ruins the greatest design.²² He had no choice but to swallow his fury whole. There was no time left to think. If he could not flee, he could only hide. His gaze swept the temple and fell upon a gap beneath the spirit altar, roughly four feet square, screened by a hanging curtain of blue cloth. Without a moment’s hesitation, he slipped inside and employed the Ruyi Bone-Dislocating Art²³ to compress his frame to an impossibly slender size, wedging himself deep into the corner beneath the altar. He had scarcely concealed himself—with no time even to check whether his hiding place would bear scrutiny—when crimson light flashed at the doorway.

The girl called Gan Shijiu Mei and her crimson-clad attendant Ruan Xing entered the temple, the crimson glass lantern casting its rosy glow before them.

Through the narrow gap at the curtain’s edge, Yin Jianping could see them with terrible clarity. Even with all his powers of self-mastery, how could his heart not hammer at the sight? But he was a man long practised in finding stillness amid chaos. He sealed his breathing at once, and his body became as still and unyielding as stone.

The instant Gan Shijiu Mei and Ruan Xing crossed the threshold, both stopped short.

A look of cold fury rose upon Gan Shijiu Mei’s lovely features. She walked slowly forward and stood before each of the two white-clad corpses in turn, pausing over each for a long moment. At last she moved to where Duan Nanxi lay and halted there. Ruan Xing followed close behind, his face a mask of open astonishment.

Gan Shijiu Mei regarded the dead man.

“This, I take it, is old Xian,” she said, her voice flat and cold.

Ruan Xing crouched beside the body and studied the face with care. He shook his head. “No. This is not Xian Bing. This man’s surname is Duan—a Hall Master of Yueyang School. I have seen him before. I never crossed swords with him, but I am quite certain it’s him. Strange… I would never have thought him capable of such skill. That he could have killed the Sheng brothers²⁴ is difficult to credit.”

Gan Shijiu Mei shook her head. “It does not add up.”

“What does the young mistress mean?”

“Can you not see?” said Gan Shijiu Mei. “This man died of Seven-Pace Gut-Severing Red. How could a man already dying of poison have had the strength to deal with the Sheng brothers? There must be another—someone of considerable skill.”

The Sheng brothers were obviously the two white-clad, hat-wearing youths who now lay dead upon the floor.

At the words “someone of considerable skill,” Ruan Xing’s expression shifted visibly. Deep lines carved themselves into his lean, wooden face. He shook his head slowly. “I do not think so.”

Gan Shijiu Mei regarded him sidelong, and a cold smile touched her lips.

“Before we came to Yueyang School,” said Ruan Xing, “I investigated every person in the school from top to bottom, on the young mistress’s orders. There are no outsiders here.”

“I did not say it was an outsider.”

“Then it is even less possible!” Ruan Xing said. “Everyone in Yueyang School is dead. Unless…”

He seemed to recall someone, and his voice rose sharply. “Xian Bing! Could it have been the old man himself?”

Gan Shijiu Mei had begun to nod, but her gaze caught something, and she turned sharply. There, set along the flanking corridors of the temple, stood two coffins. Her body blurred, and in a gust of movement she was standing before them. Ruan Xing hurried after her.

They were plain coffins of fresh white wood, each bearing a spirit tablet inscribed with the name of the deceased. Upon the front of each coffin, the names were unmistakable: Xian Bing upon one, and Li Tiexin on the other.

Gan Shijiu Mei studied the coffin bearing Xian Bing’s name, her expression betraying not the slightest trace of alarm.

“No!” Ruan Xing cried. “This must be a deception!”

“I think it is the truth.” Gan Shijiu Mei’s smile was thin and cold. “I suspect old Xian was already dead before we arrived.”

“But then—” Ruan Xing’s brow furrowed. “Who was the old man who answered us?”

“Him.”

Gan Shijiu Mei’s slender, jade-pale hand pointed at Duan Nanxi’s body.

Ruan Xing stared, genuinely bewildered.

“If you do not believe me,” said Gan Shijiu Mei, “open the coffin and see for yourself.”

Ruan Xing pressed both palms down upon the white wood. A sharp crack sounded as he prepared to unleash his Giant Spirit Vajra Palm²⁵ and shatter the entire coffin, but Gan Shijiu Mei stopped him.

“Not like that,” she said. “He was the patriarch of a renowned school. He deserves a measure of respect. Open the lid and confirm his identity. That will be enough.”

“As the young mistress commands.”

As he spoke, Ruan Xing channelled his neili and the wooden pegs holding the coffin lid snapped one by one. The lid lifted free.

Beneath the altar, Yin Jianping felt a surge of grief and fury so intense it was nearly beyond his power to contain. And yet Gan Shijiu Mei’s words had given him pause—an unexpected glimpse of another nature beneath the ruthlessness. He had taken her for a merciless demoness who killed without blinking. It had not occurred to him that she was also capable of a kind of respect.

The lid was open.

Ruan Xing raised the lantern and brought it close.

“Do you recognise this man?” asked Gan Shijiu Mei.

Ruan Xing examined the face at length, then shook his head. “No.”

“Then there can be no doubt. This is Xian Bing.”

Gan Shijiu Mei stepped back as she spoke.

“How does the young mistress know?” Ruan Xing asked, hesitant.

“I am not mistaken.” A cold smile settled upon her face. “Ruan Xing, for all your martial skill, you have no eye for reading men. Close the lid. No one but old Xian himself could carry such bearing, even in death.”

Ruan Xing murmured his assent and replaced the coffin lid.

Gan Shijiu Mei moved with the slow, measured grace of a maiden crossing a garden, and came to stand beside the bodies of the Sheng brothers. She gazed down at the two fallen men, her brow lowered, her eyes still. Her face betrayed no grief, yet in those clear, liquid eyes there dwelt a deep and genuine affection. By contrast, Ruan Xing’s pallid face was a mask of unrestrained grief and fury. That the Sheng brothers—fighters of such calibre—should have fallen to another’s hand was beyond his reckoning. Who could have done this?

A spasm passed across Ruan Xing’s features. He ground his teeth and snarled, “When I find whoever did this, I will tear him to pieces!”

“The Sheng brothers’ martial arts, though inferior to yours, were not far behind,” said Gan Shijiu Mei, her voice cold and level. “Fighting together, they had scarcely a match in all the wulin. Even Xian Bing in his prime could not have been certain of defeating them both at once. Whoever did this is not merely skilled—his abilities are beyond all estimation.”

Ruan Xing stood dumbstruck for a moment, then asked woodenly, “How does the young mistress know?”

“One need only look at how they died,” said Gan Shijiu Mei.

She pointed at the first body. “Look at this single sword wound. See how clean it is. There is not another mark anywhere upon his body. From that alone, I can say with certainty that the killer struck but once.”

In his hiding place, Yin Jianping⁵ could not suppress a start. His admiration for her was genuine and deep.

Gan Shijiu Mei¹² continued. “A person capable of taking a man’s life with a single stroke of the sword—consider what manner of skill that requires. You should be able to imagine.”

Then she turned to the second corpse and gave a cold, mirthless laugh. “Do you know how this one died?”

“I can see no wound upon his body,” said Ruan Xing.²¹ “He must have perished under some form of internal technique.”

“Wrong.” Gan Shijiu Mei smiled thinly. “Try lifting his head.”

Ruan Xing assented, reached down, and grasped the dead man’s skull, tilting it upward. He recoiled at once.

“Do you see now?” said Gan Shijiu Mei.

Ruan Xing’s face was stricken. “His… his cervical vertebrae have been snapped clean through.”

“Just so.” Gan Shijiu Mei nodded. “Can you tell what technique was used?”

Ruan Xing considered for a moment. “Could it be the Millstone Skill?”²⁶

Gan Shijiu Mei shook her head. “If it were merely that, it would hardly be remarkable. To seize a man’s neck in bare hands and wrench the bone apart—to my knowledge, there is only one technique under heaven capable of such a feat.”

Ruan Xing started. “What technique?”

“The Diamond Iron Wrist.”²⁷

“The Diamond Iron Wrist?”

“Just so.” A bitter smile crossed Gan Shijiu Mei’s lips. “This person clearly possesses the skill, and has moreover attained a high degree of mastery.”

In the shadows, Yin Jianping was no longer merely admiring. He was shaken to the core. He could not help stealing several more glances at her. The more he observed, the more keenly he felt that this young woman called Gan Shijiu Mei was jade and pearl without, brocade and silk within²⁸—possessed of a beauty that transcended her age, a mind of piercing brilliance, and martial arts that could overturn the world. Such a person, once loosed upon the jianghu, would be a blessing to all under heaven if she chose the path of virtue, or a scourge upon the living if she chose otherwise. She was, in truth, a figure at once awe-inspiring and terrifying. When Yin Jianping considered that the day must come when he would face her as an enemy, a cold dread rose unbidden in his heart. He could not help but fear for the task that lay ahead.

With so formidable a foe before him, Yin Jianping redoubled his caution. It was fortunate that his training encompassed the strengths of many schools, and that his mastery of breath-sealing²⁹ had reached the seventh level of neili. Once he stilled his breathing, not the faintest whisper of air escaped him—one could press an ear to his very nostrils and hear nothing.

His caution was far from excessive. Gan Shijiu Mei was indeed a young woman of crystalline perception and meticulous vigilance. Though on the surface she appeared wholly absorbed in her exchange with Ruan Xing, in truth her awareness extended to every corner within a radius of thirty feet beyond the temple walls. Within that compass, not even a drifting petal or a falling leaf could have escaped her hearing.

She was, without question, stunningly beautiful. Under the glow of the red glass lantern in Ruan Xing’s hand, her unearthly grace seemed only to deepen—an immortal’s countenance, a figure of quiet, willowy elegance. Her bearing was poised and assured, her words incisive and measured, like a silver bowl heaped with fresh snow, permitting not a mote of dust.³⁰

Yin Jianping found his gaze lingering upon her longer than was wise. A tremor passed through his heart, and he forced himself to look away, fixing his eyes instead upon the crimson-clad Ruan Xing.

Their conversation was drawing closer and closer to the matter that concerned him most. Ruan Xing said, “Then this person—could he be a master from the Double Crane Hall?”³¹

Gan Shijiu Mei raised one slender brow. “I have been wondering the same thing. I think not. Since their former zhangmen, Kanli the Ascetic,³² went into seclusion, there is no one left in the Double Crane Hall who possesses any real skill.”

“Could it be Kanli the Ascetic himself?”

“It could not.” Gan Shijiu Mei shook her head lightly. “Before I set out into the jianghu, my aunt³³ gave me a thorough account of every faction and figure of note in the wulin today. You know how she is—her judgement of people and affairs is unerring.”

Yin Jianping sharpened his attention, listening with every fibre of his being.

Ruan Xing had already voiced the question on his mind. “What did the Matriarch³⁴ say?”

Gan Shijiu Mei said, “My aunt once told me that this Kanli the Ascetic has been timid as a mouse his entire life—cautious and craven in all his dealings. He was so in his youth, and in old age he has only grown more firmly wedded to the creed of sweeping one’s own doorstep and never minding the frost upon another’s roof. Such a man would never entangle himself in an affair like this. I am certain it was not him.”

Hearing this, Yin Jianping could scarcely contain himself. He very nearly clapped his hands in appreciation, for her assessment of Kanli the Ascetic struck precisely to the heart of the matter.

Gan Shijiu Mei went on. “By the same reasoning, I believe it was not merely Kanli the Ascetic himself but no one from the Double Crane Hall at all.”

Her brow creased. “In my estimation, this person’s martial arts are in fact superior to those of Kanli the Ascetic.”

At this, Ruan Xing was plainly stunned into silence.

Gan Shijiu Mei let out a soft sigh. A shadow of worry passed across her fine-boned face.

“Why does the young mistress sigh?” asked Ruan Xing.

A bitter smile touched Gan Shijiu Mei’s lips. “I am thinking of my aunt. She has placed all her faith and hope upon my shoulders. It may be that she was wrong to do so.”

Ruan Xing’s tone turned cold. “The young mistress does herself too little credit, and the enemy too much. With your abilities, I dare say there is no one under heaven who could be called your equal. Even the Matriarch herself may not surpass you by much.”

“You sound just like my aunt.”

“Because it is the truth.”

“Whether it is the truth,” said Gan Shijiu Mei quietly, “no one can say. There are always higher mountains beyond the mountains one can see, and greater men beyond the men one knows.³⁵ Overconfidence and arrogance will sooner or later lead to bitter regret.”

Ruan Xing exhaled a long breath, clearly unconvinced. Gan Shijiu Mei said coldly, “Take the matter before us. This person—I can feel it in my bones—is a formidable adversary.”

Ruan Xing shook his head. “I am certain he is no match for the young mistress.”

“That depends on how one defines it,” said Gan Shijiu Mei slowly. “Perhaps in martial arts alone, he is not yet my equal—otherwise he would have no need to flee from me so desperately. And yet… one cannot say even that with certainty. In short, though I have never laid eyes upon this person, I sense that he is the most dangerous opponent I have encountered since I first set foot in the jianghu.”

As she spoke, her expression suddenly brightened and a smile broke through, revealing a row of teeth white as jade. “Yet that too has its appeal. I should rather like to meet this person and test myself against him, to see which of us proves the better. Otherwise, this foray into the jianghu would be rather too dull for my taste.”

Ruan Xing said, “Even if this person has fled, he cannot have gone far. Both the land and water routes ahead are covered by our people. Let us give chase at once and see whether he can escape.”

Gan Shijiu Mei shook her head. “I should prefer that he has not left the Yueyang School at all.”

Ruan Xing started. “The young mistress believes he is still here?”

“It is not impossible.” Gan Shijiu Mei’s voice was ice. “If he has in fact already gone, then I fear we do not know how many of the men we sent out will die at his hands.”

Ruan Xing flinched, as though the implications had only just struck him.

Gan Shijiu Mei swept the temple interior with her gaze and gave a short nod. “Come. Let us go.”

Her slender form flickered—graceful as a startled swan³⁶—and she was already through the temple door and gone.

Ruan Xing was only too eager to pursue the quarry. He followed her out at once.

The temple fell instantly into silence. Only the pair of white candles upon the altar table remained, their flames guttering and spitting at the darkness, casting their feeble light upon the two white wooden coffins and the three blood-soaked corpses sprawled across the floor. The scene was ghastly beyond measure.

For the span of time it takes to drink half a cup of tea,³⁷ Yin Jianping did not stir. He held his breath as before, crouched in the shadows beneath the altar, maintaining the exact posture he had assumed when they were present—motionless as stone. Against extraordinary people, one must take extraordinary measures. Yin Jianping seemed, if anything, more vigilant now than before.

His caution saved him once again.

A shadow flickered at the temple’s edge, and Gan Shijiu Mei returned—gone and come back.

Her movement was so light, so effortless, that she alighted within the temple like a swallow darting through a window, disturbing not a mote of dust. Close behind her came the flash of crimson as Ruan Xing followed with his lantern. He could not fathom her purpose, and asked, “What is it? Why have we come back?”

Gan Shijiu Mei’s lovely face bore a look of faint disappointment. Those limpid, deep-pooled eyes still moved slowly across the temple interior, unwilling, it seemed, to abandon their search.

She found nothing, of course.

“Is someone here?” asked Ruan Xing.

Gan Shijiu Mei shook her head, her expression dispirited. “Send someone presently to carry the Sheng brothers’ bodies to the boat. Let us go.”

Ruan Xing hesitated. “And… this person?”

A smile ghosted across Gan Shijiu Mei’s face. “He and I are bound to meet sooner or later. Surely you do not fear you will never see him?”

The words had barely left her lips before she had slipped through the window and vanished.

---

North from Dongting Lake into the marches of Hubei; east along the river, travelling under the stars by day and night without rest. Four days and four nights brought him to Xiangyang.³⁸ There he left his boat and struck inland, plunging deep into the hills of Longzhong.³⁹ Another day and night of hard travel, and he reached White Stone Ridge.⁴⁰

The journey had very nearly broken him.

Now, as dusk gathered and the weary birds sought their roosts, he stood before a stand of maple trees that he remembered well. His eyes found the grey stone door half-hidden among the trunks, and a pang of sorrow rose within him. This scene of late snow and withered maples was enough to wring tears from a man. If any solace remained to him, it was the knowledge that he had arrived ahead of the enemy—by one day at the very least. He had reached the Double Crane Hall⁴¹ first.

Pillars of grey stone flanked a pair of great half-moon doors cast in solid copper. The doors looked immensely strong, yet years without polishing had let a film of green moss creep across their surfaces, lending them an air of ancient decay. Upon the face of each door, a crane stood with wings outspread as though about to take flight—the emblem that proclaimed this place to be the seat of the once-renowned Double Crane Hall.

Any man of the wulin⁴² with the least knowledge of history would remember the Double Crane Hall’s former glory. The name of its zhangmen—Kanli Zi⁴³ Mi Ruyan,⁴⁴ master of the Seven Flying Gongs⁴⁵ and the Diamond Iron Wrist—had once resounded through every corner of the jianghu. Yet how swiftly that fame had waned. In the shifting tides of the wulin, the Double Crane Hall’s ascent had been as brief as the blooming of the night cereus⁴⁶—a single, dazzling flowering, and then nothing. In the years that followed, no one spoke its name again, and no one could recall a single deed of note the school had accomplished since.

People might still recall that in the early days of his stewardship, Mi Ruyan had accomplished several deeds that shook the wulin to its foundations. For a brief time, the Double Crane Hall had blazed with glory and was hailed as the foremost school in the jianghu. But no one could have foreseen that its decline would prove as swift as its rise. Once it began to fade, the name of the Double Crane Hall was heard no more.

Kanli Zi—who in later years became known as Kanli the Ascetic—had, in the truest sense of the word, forsaken the dust of the world and entered the Realm of the Three Pure Ones⁴⁷ as a Daoist cultivator. For several years, the incense smoke at the Double Crane Hall rose thick and fragrant, and the place took on all the trappings of a proper Daoist temple. Kanli the Ascetic, when he was not occupied with the burning of mercury and the refining of lead,⁴⁸ could occasionally be seen with a medicine chest on his back and a string of bells in his hand, perched upon a small donkey, ambling through the countryside. Those who saw him knew only that he was a Daoist priest and itinerant herbalist; few recognised in him a former pillar of the wulin. In time, even the incense smoke dwindled to nothing. The old man seemed to lose even the inclination to ride his donkey and treat the sick. At that point, the Double Crane Hall’s decline was truly complete.

The incense ceased, the disciples scattered. One could have strung nets for sparrows at the Double Crane Hall’s gate, so few were the visitors who came.⁴⁹ Yet the maples upon the surrounding hills, when late autumn arrived, blazed redder and more brilliantly than ever—a splendour that far surpassed the glory of former days. That beauty of rice-golden fields and autumn-crimsoned maples⁵⁰ stirred in the beholder an ache beyond words.

Yin Jianping trod over a carpet of dead leaves, their dry crackling loud in the silence, until he stood directly before the stone doors. A deep, droning hum rose around him as a great cloud of snow-flies, startled from their resting place, swirled into the air. A gust of mountain wind set the bare trees keening on every side. He paused before the doors and gazed about him. Every tree, every stone in this place was an old acquaintance.

He made his way to the left of the main gate, where he found the great jujube tree he remembered. It stood five zhang⁵¹ tall, its trunk so broad that a man could barely encircle it with his arms. Upon the bare wood, a web of scars crisscrossed in every direction—the marks of countless blows dealt over years beyond counting. It was here, day after day, year upon year, that he had tempered his Diamond Iron Wrist. One mark in particular he had never forgotten: a deep cross-shaped groove, cut more than an inch into the heartwood, left by the blow of his crossed forearms channelling the full force of the Diamond Iron Wrist. That single stroke had earned Kanli the Ascetic’s unreserved praise, and stood as proof that his mastery of the art was complete.

Beside the cross-shaped groove, a line of characters had been carved into the bark by a fingertip: Yin Jianping’s art perfected, the year of Yihai, when the red leaves first turned.⁵² By his reckoning, that had been seven years ago.

He raised his hand and traced the old scars with his fingertips, and for a moment it seemed as though he had been carried back to those years of relentless practice.

A few jackdaws squabbled on the eaves above him. The bird-scaring bells⁵³ at the corners of the roof chimed faintly in the wind—but the birds paid them no heed. When the bells meant to frighten birds only served to attract them, one could well imagine how desolate this courtyard had become.

Yin Jianping circled round to the side of the compound. A low stone wall, scarcely three feet high, presented no obstacle; he need only swing a leg to clear it. He came to the wall and was in the act of raising his foot when his eye caught a figure, and the lifted leg came back down of its own accord.

A gaunt, tall man in yellow stood beneath a nearby tree, regarding him with a level, appraising gaze. No more than forty or fifty feet separated them. That a man could have been standing so close without Yin Jianping’s knowledge was an oversight he could ill afford. The shock of it ran through him like a jolt.

The man in yellow was smiling at him, showing a row of white teeth. He was very thin, though not at all pallid. He looked to be around thirty—perhaps a few years older than Yin Jianping. His clothes were clean and neatly pressed, and there was about him an air of effortless refinement.

Yin Jianping’s alarm was genuine. After the ordeals of recent days, his nerves were those of a bird that has once felt the bowstring’s snap.⁵⁴ The sudden appearance of a stranger set his heart hammering.

The man in yellow’s smile faded. A glimmer of surprise passed through his eyes as well.

He was tying a series of knots. Very strange knots.

To call the material “rope” was not quite accurate. It was hemp—yellow hemp, like newly reeled raw silk, its loose strands lifting and drifting in the breeze. One end was lashed to the thick trunk of a tree; the remainder hung down in long, trailing skeins. At intervals along its length, three tight knots had already been formed. The man in yellow was clearly in the process of tying a fourth when he had noticed Yin Jianping.

Yin Jianping walked over to him. The man in yellow glanced at him and resumed his work. His technique was peculiar—looping, threading through, threading back out again. It was, in short, a method that no other man could have replicated. Presently, the fourth knot was complete.

Yin Jianping stood quietly at his side and watched. The stranger struck him as gentle and scholarly, as demure as a maiden in bearing; yet for reasons he could not articulate, Yin Jianping was certain this was no mere bookish gentleman of the present age. The man’s long robe was of a most unusual fabric—some kind of hemp, apparently identical in material to the yellow hemp lashed to the tree. To wear a garment of hemp in such bitter cold was singular in itself.

Then Yin Jianping noticed more. The man seemed to have a particular affinity for yellow hemp. His head-cloth, his shoes—all were fashioned from the same material. Moreover, upon one of his long, slender fingers he wore a ring set with a yellow gemstone. He had perhaps read ten thousand books and walked ten thousand li; the lines of wind and weather were etched deep into his refined, scholarly face.

Everything about this man’s presence gave the impression that his appearance here was no accident. At length, Yin Jianping could contain himself no longer. He clasped his fists in salute. “This gentleman, well met.”

The man in yellow gave a faint nod and shifted his gaze from the hemp knots to Yin Jianping.

“Come to burn incense and pay your respects at the temple?” He shook his head almost at once. “No—that is not it.”

Yin Jianping gestured toward the Double Crane Hall and smiled. “This is where I once studied, in years past. It has been a long time since I last returned, and I have come to pay my respects.”

The man in yellow smiled. “From the way you speak, it sounds as though you are a disciple of the Double Crane Hall. Might I know your name?”

Yin Jianping clasped his fists. “Yin Jianping, at your service.”

The man in yellow’s face lit up at once. He nodded. “So you are Yin Jianping. I have heard your name. I have also had the pleasure of examining the mark you left upon that jujube tree. Most impressive. Only—it is a pity that you are not the Double Crane Hall’s true heir, and cannot rightly be called a disciple of their school.”

Yin Jianping was thunderstruck. He stood rooted to the spot. These were matters he had always regarded as private—not to be shared with outsiders. That this stranger in yellow should know them so plainly, and speak them so bluntly at first meeting, was deeply unsettling.

“You need not wonder how I know.” The man in yellow gave a cool smile. “Suffice it to say that in the Double Crane Hall’s hour of mortal peril, you still thought to come back. That, at least, speaks well of your conscience. Compared to all the other so-called disciples, you are better by far.”

As he said this, two deep grooves appeared in his face, and a distant, wintry light settled in his deep-set eyes. With his extraordinary self-possession, this was not a man whose measure one could easily take upon a first encounter.

“You have perhaps returned at just the right time,” he said. “The Double Crane Hall is all but empty. Few remain. Mi Ruyan⁵⁵ has lost the fire of his former days. You should do what you can to steady his nerve and strengthen his resolve against the enemy that is coming.”

Yin Jianping started. “You… you already know about the calamity that threatens the Double Crane Hall?”

The man smiled faintly. “Shui Hongshao⁵⁶—old and hideous as she has become—sends out a pretty young disciple to reclaim her lost honour.⁵⁷ The scheme is as vainglorious as it is absurd. The jianghu has been buzzing with word of it. How could I not know?”

Yin Jianping’s heart lurched.

The man in yellow continued, heedless. “The Gan girl’s abilities are formidable, there is no denying it. In three days she razed the Yueyang School⁵⁸ to the ground. Pitiable Li Tiexin⁵⁹—both the old generation and the young, all perished at her hand. The girl’s methods are rather too ruthless.”

Yin Jianping was inwardly staggered, though he kept his face still. “How do you come to know of this?”

The man in yellow smiled. “There is nothing in the jianghu that can be hidden from the world’s eyes and ears. An affair such as this—how could it be the exception?”

Yin Jianping could make no sense of it. The destruction of the Yueyang School had occurred a mere five days ago. He had lived through it himself, and had travelled without rest, day and night, to arrive here. The swiftest news could not have outpaced his own mouth. Yet this man in yellow had known of it before Yin Jianping even reached Longzhong. It defied all reason. His suspicion sharpened at once, and the questions that had been forming on his tongue retreated back behind his teeth. Of the Yueyang School, he resolved to say nothing more.

The man in yellow gave a slight nod. “You had best go in.”

Yin Jianping clasped his fists in farewell, turned, and walked away.

He had not pressed the man in yellow for his name or origins. To do so might have resolved his immediate doubts, but it would equally have exposed his own identity. With so formidable an enemy bearing down upon them, the less he revealed of himself, the better.

He had gone no more than six or seven paces when he glanced back. The man in yellow had vanished. Only the skein of yellow hemp remained, still lashed to the branch, its loose strands streaming in the wind like a horse’s tail. The man’s appearance had been strange enough; those knotted strands of hemp, stranger still. Had Yin Jianping not been burdened with a task of far greater urgency, he would have stopped to puzzle the matter out.

He swung his leg over the low stone wall and dropped into the courtyard, startling a flock of great black crows from their play beneath the eaves.

He went straight to the front hall.

The double doors swung to and fro in the wind, creaking on their hinges. Dead leaves carpeted the floor—red maple leaves, blown in during the autumn months and never swept away. Upon the altar of the main hall stood the gilded images of Patriarch Lü⁶⁰ and the Grand Supreme Elder Lord.⁶¹

Having once been a disciple of the Double Crane Hall, Yin Jianping would not neglect the rites of his old school. He stepped forward and performed the full prostration, found a stick of incense, lit it from the longevity candle,⁶² and set it in the burner.

He had expected that these actions would surely rouse whichever disciple was charged with tending the front hall. But no one appeared.

He crossed the hall, treading over the carpet of red leaves, and followed a covered side gallery outward. Two dogs, sleeping in the passage, woke with a start and came lunging at him, barking furiously. From somewhere behind him came the sharp chiming of a small bell, and at the sound the dogs tucked their tails and fled.

Yin Jianping recognised that the bell had come from the direction of the hall master’s elixir room.⁶³ A voice reached him, sighing as it spoke: “So you have come back after all.”

The words were without context, and Yin Jianping halted in his tracks. If the master of the Double Crane Hall had truly divined his arrival at this precise moment, then he was a living immortal indeed. Astonishment filled him. He was on the point of calling out when the voice spoke again from within:

“It is well that you have returned. I shall not treat you ill.”

The words trailed off. Then the bamboo door-curtain clattered upward, and out stepped a white-haired old Daoist in a dark blue robe.⁶⁴

Had Yin Jianping not been certain that this was the man who had once been his teacher, and had he not been paying the closest attention, he would never have recognised him.

This man who had once made the wulin tremble—who had, in the span of a few short years, aged beyond all recognition. At first glance, Yin Jianping doubted his own eyes. Yet beneath the wild tangle of white hair and unkempt beard, the gaunt, wasted face still bore traces enough for one who had known him well to follow.

His hair had gone white, his back had bent, and the fierce light that had once blazed in his eyes was utterly extinguished. Compared with the man he had been, he was scarcely recognisable.

And yet Yin Jianping was certain. The man before him was none other than Mi Ruyan,⁴⁴ known once as Kanli the Ascetic³²—the very master who had forged his Diamond Iron Wrist.²⁷

He took several involuntary steps forward. The old Daoist blinked his silver brows rapidly and retreated three or four paces, his face clouded with suspicion.

“You are…” he murmured. “You are not Shi Mingjiang?”⁶⁵

“Does the Master not remember his disciple?”

Yin Jianping strode forward, reaching warmly for the old man’s hand. The Daoist’s body blurred and he drifted back a full ten feet—proof that his skills, at least, had not been entirely abandoned.

“Who are you? Speak.”

The old Daoist regarded him with frank alarm. His left hand was curled like an eagle’s talon, hidden deep within the wide sleeve of his robe.

Yin Jianping bowed low. “Surely the Master has not forgotten even his disciple’s face? It is Yin Jianping, come to pay his respects.”

The Daoist gave a soft exclamation. His eyes widened.

“Jianping?” he whispered. “You… you are Yin Jianping?”

Yin Jianping came closer and stood directly before him. The old Daoist studied his face for a long moment, and then, as though recognition had struck all at once, his expression broke into a smile of pure delight. He seized Yin Jianping’s hand and laughed aloud. “It truly is Yin Jianping! What made you think to come back? Has something happened?”

“There is an urgent matter I must report to you in person, Master.”

Kanli the Ascetic frowned, but the frown dissolved almost at once into a smile. “Come. Let us speak inside.”

He pushed open the door of the elixir room. Within, all was darkness—no lamp had been lit.

Kanli the Ascetic groped for a fire-striker. It snapped alight with a sharp crack, and he touched the flame to a lamp.

“Dark already…” he muttered to himself. Then he turned, clapped Yin Jianping on the shoulder, and said, “Sit down. Tell me everything.”

“As you command,” said Yin Jianping, and took his seat.

The elixir room was cluttered with all manner of objects, leaving only a small patch of clear floor in the centre where one might sit. Directly before the master’s cushion hung a small wooden board inscribed with a pattern of intersecting lines whose purpose Yin Jianping could not fathom.

“Master,” he said, “how is it that you are here all alone?”

“Just so…” Mi Ruyan sighed. “The incense offerings dried up long ago. The temple cannot feed them, so I let them go their own ways. It is only I who remain, and I find that suits me well enough.”

Yin Jianping’s heart grew heavy. “You have been living in hardship, Master…”

“No hardship at all. I am free of all encumbrances—lighter for it, in truth. The only trouble is that Shi Mingjiang left without warning, and that has meant I go without meals.”

He let out a sigh. “You know how it is. My grain-abstention practice⁶⁶ was never any good. When the craving for food comes upon me, I am at a loss.”

Yin Jianping exhaled slowly. His heart ached. The man he had once revered—this former pillar of the wulin—had sunk into a state of abject neglect, a shadow abandoned by the world and seemingly content to remain so. A sharp pang of self-reproach pierced him. He felt, with sudden and terrible clarity, that the ruin of this school was in some part his own responsibility—and that to have turned his back upon the master who had transmitted his art to him was a debt that could never fully be repaid. Grief, disappointment, and guilt converged upon him, and he bowed his head in silence.

After a time, he asked quietly, “Who is Shi Mingjiang?”

“The last disciple I took in.”

Yin Jianping started. “I have never heard the name.”

Kanli the Ascetic said, “You would not have. I accepted him only within the last two years. Who could have known that beneath a loyal appearance he harboured a treacherous heart? Once he had won my trust and wrung every last teaching from me, he abandoned me and left. I was deceived.”

Yin Jianping’s lips thinned. “How long has he been gone?”

“Several months, at least.”

Yin Jianping committed the name to memory. Kanli the Ascetic brightened. “But though he has gone, you have come. That is well. From this day forward, you shall stay here with me in the temple.”

Yin Jianping shook his head. “You misunderstand, Master. I have not come to live at your side.”

“Then why have you—” The old Daoist looked bewildered.

Yin Jianping drew a long breath. “Have you heard, Master, of a certain person who has lately appeared in the jianghu?”

“What… person?”

“A young woman called Gan Shijiu Mei.”¹²

“Gan Shijiu Mei?” Kanli the Ascetic shook his head. “I have not heard the name. What is she?”

Yin Jianping gave a bitter smile. “Then perhaps you still remember the woman called Shui Hongshao?”⁵⁶

Kanli the Ascetic went rigid. “Who?”

“Shui—Hong—Shao.”

Yin Jianping pronounced each syllable with deliberate weight, watching the old man’s face as he spoke.

The colour drained from it.

Then, abruptly, Kanli the Ascetic rose from his seat. “Shui Hongshao? You speak of the woman who was killed at Phoenix Mountain⁶⁷ forty years ago?”

“I do.”

Yin Jianping realised with a shock that his master knew almost nothing of recent events. There was no choice but to tell him the full truth.

“What you do not know, Master,” he said, “is that the demoness Shui Hongshao did not die.”

Kanli the Ascetic stood as though turned to stone. Yin Jianping continued. “Forty years ago, you joined with Fan Zhongxiu⁶⁸ of the Huai region and Xian Bing¹⁹ of the Yueyang School,¹⁴ along with several other elders, to lure Shui Hongshao into the tunnels and set them ablaze. But Xian Bing, in a moment of weakness, opened one end of the passage, and the woman escaped with her life.”

Kanli the Ascetic’s face had frozen over, as though encased in ice.

Yin Jianping went on. “Though Shui Hongshao escaped alive, the fire ruined her beauty beyond all recognition. She has nursed her hatred ever since, and has sworn to take her vengeance.”

The old man’s knees buckled. He sank back down.

“This… how do you come to know all this?” He looked at Yin Jianping. “Tell me the rest.”

Yin Jianping assented, then shook his head gravely. “In the forty years since, Shui Hongshao has not only survived but mastered terrible new arts. Loathing her own ruined face, unable to show herself in the world, she trained a gifted young disciple to carry out her vengeance in her stead. That disciple is the Gan Shijiu Mei I spoke of.”

Kanli the Ascetic nodded slowly. A bitter smile crossed his lips. “No wonder I have been restless these past days—unable to sit still, unable to sleep, as though some calamity were gathering. But tell me, Jianping, how did you learn all this?”

“From Xian Bing himself. He told me in person.”

“Xian… Bing?” Kanli the Ascetic murmured. “You mean Xian Bing of the Yueyang School?”

There was nothing for it. Yin Jianping gave a brief account of the destruction of the Yueyang School—the full horror of it, compressed into as few words as he could manage. When he had finished, Kanli the Ascetic’s face was the colour of earth. For a long time he did not speak. Then he rose and turned away, pacing in a tight circle. Yin Jianping saw that his body was trembling. His face had gone deathly white, his expression slack and vacant.

Yin Jianping started. “Master, what is the matter?”

Kanli the Ascetic regarded him with dull, slow eyes and gave a feeble smile. He shuffled to the far corner and lowered himself to the floor.

There stood a ceramic jar. His shaking hands found its surface, and a flicker of something—not quite joy, but the ghost of comfort—crossed his face.

“Wine… wine…”

He prised the lid off, and the reek of strong spirits flooded the elixir room.

He ladled a full bowl of aged white liquor⁶⁹ and drained it in a single draught, then reached for a second. But before the bowl could reach his lips, Yin Jianping’s hand closed over it.

Kanli the Ascetic struggled, but could not break free of the younger man’s grip.

“You…” He glared, his voice a hoarse rasp. “What do you think you are doing, boy? My wine… give me my wine…”

The aged spirit swirled in the great ceramic jar, its rich fumes rising in waves. The scent of it seemed to dissolve the very marrow of Kanli the Ascetic’s bones. He cried out and wrenched at the bowl with all his strength, but he could not tear it loose. In the struggle, liquor sloshed over the rim and splashed across the floor. Then the heavy ceramic bowl slipped from between their hands and shattered on the flagstones.

Kanli the Ascetic let out a bellow. He sprang to his feet and struck at Yin Jianping’s face with his open palm. “Damn you, boy!”

Yin Jianping turned his wrist and caught the old man’s arm without the slightest effort. Kanli the Ascetic roared. “You—insolent wretch!” His right hand lashed out, driving a palm strike toward the crown of Yin Jianping’s skull. This too was caught, effortlessly, in Yin Jianping’s other hand.

The two of them grappled in the cramped elixir room, their feet scuffling in rapid circles. Then Yin Jianping gave a single, firm push, and Kanli the Ascetic spun away like a leaf in a gale, landing hard on the ground. Before he could rise, Yin Jianping’s hand was on his shoulder. The old Daoist heaved and strained, his gaunt face flushing crimson with the effort, but he could not break free of that iron grip—the grip of the very art he himself had taught.

At last he ceased struggling. He sat gasping like a winded ox.

“You… wretch…” he panted. “Your skill… is complete, then… and you come back… to use it against me… you will be… the death of me…”

Yin Jianping stood over him, his eyes blazing. Words rose to his lips—but none came. Instead, his head sank, and tears spilled down his cheeks in a sudden, uncontrollable torrent. The hand upon Kanli the Ascetic’s shoulder loosened of its own accord.

In that instant, the old man snatched up the wine jar. He cradled it in both hands, tilted it to his mouth, and drank. Great gulps of spirit poured down his throat, spilling from the corners of his lips, drenching his Daoist robe from collar to hem. When the jar was empty he set it down, chest heaving, and only then did he realise that Yin Jianping was watching him still. The young man’s gaze was sharp with grief and fury—and something in it made Kanli the Ascetic flinch. The reckless defiance that had driven him to seize the jar drained away, leaving him hollow.

Footnotes

1. 追星赶月 – zhuīxīng gǎnyuè. Literally chasing stars, catching the moon. A high-speed qinggong footwork technique emphasising explosive forward movement across great distances. ↩

2. 宗庙祠堂 – zōngmiào cítáng. Literally ancestral temple and shrine hall. A sacred hall within a martial arts compound where the spirit tablets of deceased masters and members are enshrined and venerated. ↩

3. 长生灯 – chángshēng dēng. Literally eternal life lamps. Ritual lamps kept perpetually burning before ancestral tablets or spirit shrines, symbolising the enduring connection between the living and the dead. ↩

4. 玉龙剑 – Yùlóng Jiàn. Literally jade dragon sword. ↩

5. 尹剑平 – Yǐn Jiànpíng. His name meaning “Sword’s Balance” or “Balancing the Sword”. ↩ ↩²

6. 玄鸟划沙 – xuánniǎo huà shā. Literally dark bird scoring sand. A low-to-high sword technique that mimics the arc of a swallow skimming across sand, designed to strike upward at an opponent’s exposed midsection. ↩

7. 段南溪 – Duàn Nánxī. His name meaning “Southern Creek”. ↩

8. 六随 – liù suí. Literally six followings. An advanced set of six body techniques emphasising relentless pursuit and close-quarters positioning, making it impossible for an opponent to disengage. Associated with the Cold Zither Hermit of South Putuo. ↩

9. 冷琴居士 – Lěngqín Jūshì. Literally cold zither recluse. Master of the Cold Zither Pavilion at South Putuo; origin of the Six Shadowing body techniques. ↩

10. 冷琴阁 – Lěngqín Gé. Literally cold zither pavilion. A martial arts establishment at South Putuo. ↩

11. 南普陀 – Nán Pǔtuó. South Putuo. A Buddhist site associated with Guanyin worship, here referenced as the home of a distinct martial tradition. See Wikipedia. ↩

12. 甘十九妹 – Gān Shíjiǔ Mèi. Her name meaning “Nineteenth Sister,” indicating she is the nineteenth child. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩ ↩² ↩³

13. 堂主 – tángzhǔ. Head of a hall within a martial arts school. ↩

14. 岳阳门 – Yuèyáng Mén. Literally gate south of mountain. Yueyang carries a deep sense of scholarly-official duty and concern for the nation as a result of Northern Song statesman Fan Zhongyan’s essay Record of Yueyang Tower. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩ ↩²

15. 黄泉春 – huángquán chūn. Literally Yellow Springs spring. The mythical place where souls journey after death, associated with the underworld and the Buddhist concept of rebirth. See Wikipedia. ↩

16. 铁匣秘笈 – tiěxiá mìjí. Literally iron casket secret compendium. The Yueyang School’s most sacred heirloom, containing the school’s founding martial arts secrets. ↩

17. 七步断肠红 – qībù duànchánghóng. Literally seven-pace gut-severing red. A lethal contact poison that kills within seven paces of exposure, spread along the ground to create an impassable barrier. ↩

18. 辟毒玉玦 – bìdú yùjué. Literally poison-repelling jade ring. A rare protective talisman, typically a ring-shaped jade pendant, imbued with properties that ward off toxins and venoms. ↩

19. 冼冰 – Xiǎn Bīng. His name meaning “Ice”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩ ↩²

20. 别师大礼 – bié shī dàlǐ. Literally farewell-to-masters great ceremony. A formal prostration performed before ancestral tablets when a disciple departs, possibly for the last time, as a final act of filial respect. ↩

21. 阮行 – Ruǎn Xíng. His name meaning “Action”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩ ↩²

22. 小不忍则乱大谋 – xiǎo bù rěn zé luàn dà móu. Famous Confucian proverb from Analects, 15.27. See Wikipedia. ↩

23. 如意卸骨之术 – rúyì xiègu zhī shù. Literally as-you-wish bone-dislocating art. A rare body-manipulation technique that allows the practitioner to dislocate and compress their own joints and skeletal structure at will, drastically reducing their physical profile. Related to the broader category of bone-shrinking skills (缩骨功). ↩

24. 盛氏兄弟 – Shèng shì xiōngdì. The Sheng brothers. ↩

25. 巨灵金刚掌 – jùlíng jīngāng zhǎng. Literally giant spirit vajra palm. A powerful striking technique capable of shattering solid objects through concentrated neili. ↩

26. 磨盘功 – mópán gōng. Literally millstone skill. A neigong technique that develops rotational crushing force in the hands and forearms, enabling the practitioner to twist and grind through solid objects. ↩

27. 金刚铁腕 – jīngāng tiěwàn. See earlier note. ↩ ↩²

28. 珠玉其外，锦绣其内 – zhūyù qí wài, jǐnxiù qí nèi. Literally jewels and jade without, brocade and silk within. A classical expression describing one who is both outwardly beautiful and inwardly brilliant. ↩

29. 闭气 – bìqì. See earlier note. ↩

30. 银碗盛雪，不容纤尘 – yínwǎn chéng xuě, bùróng xiānchén. Literally a silver bowl filled with snow, permitting not a speck of dust. A Chan Buddhist metaphor for flawless purity of speech and bearing, originating in Song Dynasty literature. ↩

31. 双鹤堂 – Shuānghè Táng. See earlier note. ↩

32. 坎离上人 – Kǎnlí Shàngrén. See earlier note. ↩ ↩²

33. 姑姑 – gūgu. Literally paternal aunt. Gan Shijiu Mei’s term of address for her shifu, Shui Hongshao the Cinnabar Phoenix. ↩

34. 主母 – zhǔmǔ. Literally matriarch or mistress of the house. The formal term of address used by Shui Hongshao’s retainers. ↩

35. 人外有人，山外有山 – rénwài yǒu rén, shānwài yǒu shān. Literally beyond every person there is another; beyond every mountain there is another. A classical proverb counselling humility. ↩

36. 翩若惊鸿 – piān ruò jīnghóng. Literally graceful as a startled wild swan. A celebrated simile from Cao Zhi’s “Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River” (洛神赋), evoking ethereal, unearthly feminine beauty. ↩

37. 半盏茶 – bàn zhǎn chá. Literally half a cup of tea. A traditional measure of time, roughly five to seven minutes. ↩

38. 襄阳 – Xiāngyáng. See earlier note. ↩

39. 隆中 – Lóngzhōng. A mountainous area west of Xiangyang, famous as the site where Zhuge Liang lived in seclusion before being recruited by Liu Bei. See Wikipedia. ↩

40. 白石岭 – Báishí Lǐng. Literally white stone ridge. A remote, forested ridge deep in the Longzhong hills, where the Double Crane Hall is situated. ↩

41. 双鹤堂 – Shuānghè Táng. See earlier note. ↩

42. 武林 – wǔlín. Literally martial forest. The broader community of martial arts practitioners. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

43. 坎离子 – Kǎnlí Zǐ. Literally Master of Kan and Li. Mi Ruyan’s original Daoist name, derived from the Yijing trigrams Kan (water, ☵) and Li (fire, ☲), representing the alchemical union of opposites. ↩

44. 米如烟 – Mǐ Rúyān. His name meaning “Delicate as Mist”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩ ↩²

45. 七面飞锣 – qīmiàn fēiluó. Literally seven flying gongs. A concealed weapon technique employing seven bronze gong-discs that can be hurled simultaneously, each along a different trajectory. ↩

46. 昙花一现 – tánhuā yīxiàn. Literally the night cereus blooms but once. A classical idiom for a brilliant but fleeting phenomenon. The night-blooming cereus (昙花, Epiphyllum) flowers for a single night before withering. ↩

47. 三清 – Sānqīng. Literally the Three Pure Ones. The three highest deities of the Daoist pantheon—the Jade Pure, the Supreme Pure, and the Grand Pure—representing the ultimate source of all existence. To “enter the Realm of the Three Pure Ones” means to devote oneself fully to Daoist spiritual cultivation. ↩

48. 烧汞炼铅 – shāo hǒng liàn qiān. Literally burning mercury and refining lead. A reference to Daoist external alchemy (外丹, wàidān), the practice of transmuting base metals in pursuit of the elixir of immortality. ↩

49. 门可罗雀 – mén kě luó què. Literally one could set up nets for sparrows at the gate. A classical idiom describing a place so deserted that birds roost undisturbed at its threshold. ↩

50. 稻晚枫秋 – dào wǎn fēng qiū. Literally late rice, autumn maples. An evocation of the wistful beauty of late harvest and turning leaves—a landscape tinged with melancholy and the passage of time. ↩

51. Roughly fifty-five feet. The zhang (丈) is a traditional Chinese unit of length equal to approximately eleven feet. ↩

52. 乙亥年 – yǐhài nián. A year in the traditional sexagenary cycle, which combines the ten Heavenly Stems with the twelve Earthly Branches to produce a sixty-year calendrical rotation. ↩

53. 惊鸟铃 – jīng niǎo líng. Literally bird-scaring bells. Small bells hung from the eaves of buildings to startle birds away with their chiming. ↩

54. 惊弓之鸟 – jīnggōng zhī niǎo. Literally a bird frightened by the bowstring. A classical idiom describing someone so traumatised by past dangers that they startle at the slightest alarm. ↩

55. 米如烟 – Mǐ Rúyān. See earlier note. ↩

56. 水红芍 – Shuǐ Hóngshāo. See earlier note. ↩ ↩²

57. The Chinese phrase 找回已失的面子 (to reclaim one’s lost face) carries a double meaning here. 面子 means both “face” in the sense of honour and reputation, and literally “face”—an allusion to Shui Hongshao’s disfigurement in the Phoenix Mountain fire. ↩

58. 岳阳门 – Yuèyáng Mén. See earlier note. ↩

59. 李铁心 – Lǐ Tiěxīn. See earlier note. ↩

60. 吕祖 – Lǚ Zǔ. Lü Dongbin, one of the Eight Immortals of Daoist legend, widely venerated as a patriarch of internal alchemy and swordsmanship. See Wikipedia. ↩

61. 太上老君 – Tàishàng Lǎojūn. The Grand Supreme Elder Lord, the deified form of Laozi and one of the highest deities of the Daoist pantheon. See Wikipedia. ↩

62. 长生烛 – chángshēng zhú. Literally longevity candle. A perpetually burning votive light maintained in Daoist temples before the altar, symbolising the undying Way. ↩

63. 丹房 – dānfáng. Literally elixir room. The private chamber of a Daoist cultivator, used for alchemical practice, meditation, and study. ↩

64. 青袍 – qīngpáo. A dark blue Daoist robe, the standard clerical vestment for ordained priests. ↩

65. 石明江 – Shí Míngjiāng. His name meaning “Bright River”. Mi Ruyan’s most recently accepted disciple, who absconded after extracting all the teaching he could. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

66. 辟谷 – bìgǔ. Literally grain avoidance. A Daoist ascetic discipline in which the practitioner abstains from all grains and cooked food, sustaining the body through breathing exercises, medicinal herbs, and internal qi cultivation. Advanced practitioners claim to subsist on qi alone. See Wikipedia. ↩

67. 凤凰山 – Fènghuáng Shān. See earlier note. ↩

68. 樊钟秀 – Fán Zhōngxiù. See earlier note. ↩

69. 老二白 – lǎo èr bái. A potent, aged variety of baijiu (白酒), Chinese grain spirit. The prefix 老 (old) indicates long ageing, which intensifies both the aroma and the alcohol content. ↩