The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 14 – Part 4

Inspiration struck Huang Rong. She leapt to the side of a pillar and called, “Jing gege, watch me!” Guo Jing struck twice in a row, Advantage in Crossing the Great River¹ and Wild Goose Advances to Land,² and drove Mei Chaofeng far back. Looking up, he saw Huang Rong running round the pillar and signalling to him again and again, and for a moment he did not understand. Huang Rong ducked behind the pillar and called, “Fight her here.”

Only then did Guo Jing see what she meant. He turned, leapt forward and came up beside a pillar. Mei Chaofeng’s five fingers came grabbing at him, and at once he ducked behind the pillar. There was a dull thunk, and her five fingers drove into the wood. She relied entirely on the sound of her enemy’s fists and footsteps to tell where he was. A pillar stood fixed to the floor and made no sound at all, so when Guo Jing suddenly hid behind one in the thick of the fight, how could she know? His palm came whooshing out from behind the pillar, and she had no choice but to meet it head-on, thrusting her left palm hard straight at the oncoming blow. The shock threw them several steps apart, and only then did her five fingers come out of the pillar. Mei Chaofeng, in a towering rage, pounced at him like lightning. There was a ripping sound, and a strip was torn from the front of Guo Jing’s jacket. Her claw caught his arm in passing too, but luckily he was not hurt. Before three moves had passed he darted behind a pillar again, and with a great angry shout Mei Chaofeng drove the five fingers of her left hand into the pillar once more.

This time Guo Jing did not press his advantage. “Senior Mei,” he called, “my martial arts are far below yours. Please show me mercy.” Everyone could see that Guo Jing had the upper hand. Fighting from behind the pillars, he plainly could not be beaten, and to speak like this was to give her face so that she could stop there. Lu Chengfeng³ thought, To end it this way would be best of all. Mei Chaofeng said coldly, “If this were a contest of martial arts, I failed to beat you within three moves, and I should have admitted defeat long ago. But today is no contest. It is revenge. I lost to you long ago, but I must kill you all the same!” The words were hardly out when she drove force into both arms and struck three palms in a row with her right hand and three with her left, all at the middle of the pillar. Then with a great shout she pushed out both palms together. There was a splintering crack, and the pillar snapped in two at the middle.

Everyone in the hall was a martial artist and quick to read the moment, and when they saw her striking the pillar they had all darted outside. Lu Guanying⁴ ran out last, carrying his father. There was a great crash that shook the heavens, and half the hall caved in. Only Military Commander Duan was too slow to get away. His legs were pinned under a huge beam, and he screamed for help. Wanyan Kang⁵ went over, lifted the beam and pulled him up, then tugged at his hand, meaning to slip away in the confusion. The two of them had only just turned round when each felt a numbness in his back. Someone, they did not know who, had struck their acupoints.

Mei Chaofeng’s whole attention was fixed on Guo Jing. Hearing him fly out of the hall, she sprang after him at once.

In front of the manor the clouds hung heavy and the moon was dark. The others had barely collected themselves when they saw that Guo Jing and Mei Chaofeng were locked in battle again. In the faint starlight the two figures parted and closed in a flash, and amid the whoosh of palm-wind came the crackle of Mei Chaofeng’s joints as she drove her power, more harrowing even than the fierce fight in the hall a moment before. Guo Jing had been no match for her to begin with, and in the dark he was at a still greater disadvantage. In an instant he met one dangerous move after another. Seeing Mei Chaofeng’s left leg sweep in, he at once kicked up with his right foot, straight at the shinbone of her left leg. If the two met, her lower leg was sure to break. But Mei Chaofeng’s kick was a feint. It went only halfway. Suddenly she sprang back, and the five fingers of her left hand came clawing down at his leg.

Lu Guanying, watching from the side, saw it clearly and cried out in alarm, “Look out!” The day his own lower leg was clawed, this was exactly the move Wanyan Kang had used. In that instant Guo Jing sensed the danger. His left hand shot out and, with what strength he had left, blocked at Mei Chaofeng’s wrist. It was a change of move made in a crisis, and though it was quick, it had little force behind it. As their hands met, Mei Chaofeng felt it at once. Her left hand flipped over, and her little finger, ring finger and middle finger raked across the back of his hand. Guo Jing’s right palm whooshed out. Mei Chaofeng sprang aside and gave a long, unrestrained laugh. Guo Jing felt a stinging numbness on the back of his left hand, as though it were on fire. He looked down and saw that the back of his hand had been scratched, and the three streaks of blood seemed faintly tinged with black. Suddenly he remembered the nine skulls Mei Chaofeng had left on the clifftop in Mongolia, and how his six shifu⁶ had said that, once she had trained the Nine Yin White Bone Claw,⁷ her claws carried a deadly poison of their own. When she grabbed his arm just now she had not torn the flesh or drawn blood, so the poison had not got into him, but this time there was no escaping it. “Rong-er,” he cried, “I’ve been poisoned.” Without waiting for Huang Rong to answer, he sprang at Mei Chaofeng with two whooshing palms, thinking that only by catching her and forcing her to hand over the antidote could he save his life. Mei Chaofeng sensed the ferocity of the palm-wind and had already dodged.

Huang Rong and the others were aghast at Guo Jing’s words. Ke Zhen’e⁸ swung his iron staff, and the seven of them, the Six Eccentrics and Huang Rong, closed in round Mei Chaofeng. “Mei shijie,”⁹ Huang Rong called, “you lost long ago, so why are you still fighting? Bring out the antidote and save him, quick.”

Mei Chaofeng could feel how fierce Guo Jing’s fists were, and dared not let her attention stray to answer. Inwardly she rejoiced, The harder you strain, the faster the claw poison works. Even if I lose my life here today, I’ll have avenged my husband.

By now Guo Jing’s head was swimming and his eyes were dazzled. His whole body felt indescribably easy and slack, his left arm, worse still, was weak and aching, and little by little he lost the wish to hurt his enemy. These were the very signs of the poison taking hold, and had he not once drunk the python’s precious blood, he would already be dead. Seeing a lazy, half-smiling look on his face, Huang Rong shouted, “Jing gege, get back, quick!” She drew her Emei piercer¹⁰ and was about to hurl herself at Mei Chaofeng.

Her cry roused Guo Jing’s spirits, and he struck out with his left palm. It was Sudden Arrival,¹¹ the eleventh palm of the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing,¹² but his left arm was numb and aching, and the palm travelled extremely slowly. Huang Rong, Han Baoju,¹³ Nan Xiren¹⁴ and Quan Jinfa¹⁵ were about to attack Mei Chaofeng together when they saw Guo Jing’s palm drift slowly out, and yet she did not know to dodge it. It caught her full on the shoulder, and down she went. Mei Chaofeng fought entirely by listening for sounds to tell where things were, and Guo Jing’s move had travelled so slowly that it made no wind for her to hear.

Huang Rong was taken aback, but Han, Nan and Quan had already thrown themselves on Mei Chaofeng together to pin her down. With a mighty heave of both arms she flung Han Baoju and Quan Jinfa off at once, then turned her hand back to claw at Nan Xiren. Nan Xiren rolled away across the ground. Mei Chaofeng seized the moment to leap up, but before she was steady on her feet she was caught off guard by another palm from Guo Jing in the back, and went sprawling again. This palm too came suddenly and without a sound, hard to dodge and hard to block. Only because it was struck slowly did it have little force, and though it landed on the vital point in the middle of her back, it did her no harm. Having struck these two palms, Guo Jing felt his mind clouding. His body swayed a few times, his feet stumbled, and he fell, landing right beside Mei Chaofeng. Huang Rong quickly bent to help him up.

Hearing the sound, Mei Chaofeng jabbed with her five fingers before she was even up, and suddenly felt a sharp pain in her fingers. At once she realised she had struck the spikes of the Soft Hedgehog Armour¹⁶ Huang Rong wore, and she flipped herself up with a carp’s leap. Then she heard someone shout, “Here’s one for you!” Something strange came flying at her with a rush of wind. Unable to tell from the sound what weapon it was, Mei Chaofeng swung her right arm and, with a crack, smashed it to the ground. It was a chair. She had barely begun to wonder at it when she heard the wind surge, and something larger still came flying fast at her. She put out her left hand to grab it and found a tabletop, smooth and hard, with nowhere to take hold. Zhu Cong¹⁷ had thrown a chair first, then hidden behind a square red-sandalwood table and, gripping two of its legs, rammed it at her. Mei Chaofeng kicked the table away, but Zhu Cong had already let go of the legs. His right hand reached forward and slipped three live things down the collar of her robe.

Suddenly Mei Chaofeng felt several icy, slippery things wriggling and jumping about against her chest, and in spite of herself she broke out in a cold sweat. What strange hidden weapon is this? she thought. Or is it witchcraft, some sorcery? She hastily thrust her hand into her robe and grabbed hold, and found they were goldfish. But as her hand touched the front of her robe she had a far worse shock. Not only was the porcelain bottle that held the antidote gone from her bosom, but the dagger and her copy of the lower volume of the Nine Yin Manual¹⁸ had vanished without a trace as well. Her heart went cold. She stopped dead and stood there, dazed. When the pillar fell, it had smashed the goldfish bowl, and the goldfish had spilled across the floor. Zhu Cong knew that Mei Chaofeng’s senses were extremely keen and her hands very quick, far beyond Peng Lianhu,¹⁹ Qiu Qianren²⁰ and the rest, so he had picked up three goldfish and put them in her robe, to startle her and distract her first, and only then worked his sleight of hand to pick everything from her bosom. He pulled the stopper from the porcelain bottle and held it under Ke Zhen’e’s nose. “Well?” he said quietly. Ke Zhen’e was a great expert in the use of poisons, and the moment he smelt the medicine he said, “This is it, both to swallow and to put on the wound.”

At the sound of their voices Mei Chaofeng sprang up and swooped down on them from the air. Ke Zhen’e swung his Demon-Subduing Staff to block her, and Han Baoju’s Golden Dragon Whip,²¹ Quan Jinfa’s steelyard²² and Nan Xiren’s pure-steel carrying pole²³ came at her from three sides at once. Mei Chaofeng reached to her waist for her White Python Whip,²⁴ but heard the swish of a weapon thrusting at her wrist, and had to turn her hand to counter, forcing back Han Xiaoying’s²⁵ long jian.²⁶

Meanwhile Zhu Cong handed the antidote to Huang Rong. “Give him some to swallow, and put some on the wound,” he said. In the same movement he tucked the dagger he had taken from Mei Chaofeng into the front of Guo Jing’s robe. “This was yours to begin with.” Then he raised his iron fan and went in to join the attack on Mei Chaofeng. Mei Chaofeng and the Six Eccentrics had been parted for more than ten years, and because each had kept a formidable enemy in mind to spur them on, each had trained hard and diligently, and every one of them had grown greatly in skill. This savage fight was several times fiercer than the night battle on the barren hill all those years ago. Lu Chengfeng watched, dazzled and appalled, thinking, Mei Chaofeng’s martial arts are fierce beyond compare, but the Six Eccentrics of Jiangnan²⁷ truly live up to their name too. “Stop, all of you,” he shouted, “and hear what I have to say.” But they were all deep in the heat of battle, and how could they stop?

Not long after taking the medicine, Guo Jing’s head was clear again. The poison went as fast as it had come, and though the wound still hurt, he could move his left arm. At once he leapt up and ran into the thick of the fight. Earlier he had won by chance with a slow palm, and now he had learnt the trick of it. He watched for an opening and sent out a palm slowly, and only when it was about to touch Mei Chaofeng did he suddenly put his force into it. This move, Shocking a Hundred Li,²⁸ had tremendous power. There was no sign of it beforehand, and Mei Chaofeng was struck without warning. How could she withstand it? Down she went. Guo Jing bent and caught the weapons that Han Baoju and Nan Xiren were bringing down on her together. “Shifu, spare her!” he cried, and he leapt back along with the Six Eccentrics of Jiangnan. Mei Chaofeng rolled over and stood up. She knew that if Guo Jing fought like this, blind as she was, she could never hold him off, and all she could do was shake out her White Python Whip to guard herself and keep him from getting close.

Guo Jing said, “We won’t make things hard for you. Go!” Mei Chaofeng coiled up her silver whip and said, “Then give me back the manual, and our old feud is settled here and now. If you don’t, the ghost of Mei Chaofeng will never rest, and I will hound you to the end. I can no longer see this manual. I mean to take it back to my revered shifu.” The Six Eccentrics of Jiangnan all thought, She learnt vicious, evil martial arts from the Nine Yin Manual and has done a great deal of harm. How can we give it back to her? Still, it’s true that she’s blind and can’t read it. Seeing her standing there dazed, utterly lost, Zhu Cong could not bear it. “This booklet, is it?” he said. “All right, I’ll give it back to you.” He held out the handwritten copy, and Mei Chaofeng snatched it quickly.

Suddenly everyone’s eyes blurred, and there behind Mei Chaofeng stood the man in the green robe again. He moved so fast that none of them saw how he got there. He reached out, seized Mei Chaofeng by the back, lifted her up, and in the blink of an eye vanished into the woods outside the manor. For all her martial arts, once he had hold of her Mei Chaofeng could not move in the least. By the time the others took it in, all they could see was the two of them from behind. They stared at one another and said nothing for a long while, and all they heard was the waves of the lake lapping on the shore, now rising, now falling away.

As the man seized Mei Chaofeng by the back, his fingers pressed squarely on the acupoints there, and at once she could not move in the least. He strode deep into the wood and threw her to the ground. “Just now that doddering old fool cursed me as dead with his nonsense,” he said, in a voice that chilled, “and you actually wept your heart out over it, and very mournfully too. So you still have your shifu in your heart?” When Mei Chaofeng heard this she knew her shifu had come. She crawled to him, clasped his legs and sobbed, “Shifu, Shifu! Thank heaven, thank heaven you’re all right!”

Huang Yaoshi²⁹ said, “You still have the face to call me Shifu?” Mei Chaofeng wept, “Shifu, Shifu, answer me just once, then kill me with one palm. If I can only hear you answer me once more, I’ll die gladly this very moment. Shifu, I truly wronged you, and I wronged Shimu³⁰ too. Shifu, Shifu…” She reached up, took hold of Huang Yaoshi’s right hand and shook it gently. When she was a young girl she had often coaxed and pleaded with her shifu like this, and Huang Yaoshi had usually given in. For an instant Huang Yaoshi felt a wave of warmth in his heart, and he answered softly, “Mm!”

Mei Chaofeng was overjoyed and kowtowed on the ground again and again. With both hands she held up the copy of the manual and said, “Shifu, I have kept this book with me all along. I’m blind and can never see it again, and all I wanted was to give it back to you.” Huang Yaoshi took it and put it inside his robe. Slowly he said, “This Nine Yin Manual has brought misery to a great many people. The martial arts set down at the front of this lower volume are there for others to break. You and Xuanfeng did not know that, and actually trained in them, and suffered greatly for it. Even had you mastered them, the martial arts that come after would have broken and beaten them one by one. Anyone who studied the upper volume would have grasped this. All the things you practised, the Nine Yin White Bone Claw, the Heart-Crushing Palm,³¹ the external hard training,³² the White Python Whip, are in the end utterly useless. If they were any use, how could Xuanfeng have been killed by a little boy?” Mei Chaofeng kowtowed. “Yes, yes!”

Huang Yaoshi said, “Go and defeat the old beggar’s disciple, then stay at Lu shidi’s³³ manor and roam the jianghu³⁴ no more. With your eyes ruined, you would only be bullied.” Hearing real care and tenderness in her shifu’s words, Mei Chaofeng could hold back no longer. She burst into loud sobs, crying, “Shifu, Shifu!” and caught hold of the hem of his long robe.

Huang Yaoshi, afraid his heart would soften and stir up more trouble, gave a grunt of assent. “Go back!” he said. He gave her a few instructions in a low voice, then put a hand under her arm and brought her back to the front of Returning Clouds Manor.³⁵

When Mei Chaofeng was carried off by the man in the green robe, everyone was appalled. It was a good while before they settled down. Ke Zhen’e said, “My disciple’s fight with that wicked woman has damaged your fine manor and its splendid hall. I am truly sorry.” Lu Chengfeng said, “Today the Six Xias³⁶ and Brother Guo honoured us with their presence and spared my household, young and old, from disaster. I could never thank you enough. When Ke Daxia³⁷ talks like that, he is being far too formal.” Lu Guanying said, “Please, all of you, come and rest in the rear hall. Brother Guo, does your wound still hurt?” Guo Jing had just answered, “It’s nothing now!” when a green shadow drifted before their eyes, and the man in the green robe and Mei Chaofeng were in front of the manor once more.

Footnotes

1. 利涉大川 — Lì shè dà chuān. Literally advantage in crossing the great river, a phrase from the Book of Changes. One of the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing. ↩

2. 鸿渐于陆 — Hóng jiàn yú lù. Literally the wild goose gradually advances to the land, a phrase from the Book of Changes. A move of the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing. ↩

3. 陆乘风 — Lù Chéngfēng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 陆冠英 — Lù Guānyīng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 完颜康 — Wányán Kāng. See Wuxia Wiki (spoiler). ↩

6. 师父 — shīfù. Teacher responsible for technical instruction and moral guidance. Shī means teacher. Fù means father. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

7. 九阴白骨爪 — Jiǔyīn Báigǔ Zhǎo. Literally nine yin white bone claw. A claw technique. ↩

8. 柯镇恶 — Kē Zhèn’è. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 师姐 — shījiě. Female senior. Both apprenticed to the same shifu. Shī means teacher. Jiě means older sister. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

10. 蛾眉刺 — éméi cì. Literally moth-eyebrow thorn. A short stabbing weapon with a crescent guard, usually carried in pairs. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 突如其来 — Tū rú qí lái. Literally coming all of a sudden, a phrase from the Book of Changes. The eleventh of the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing. ↩

12. 降龙十八掌 — Xiánglóng Shíbā Zhǎng. Literally eighteen dragon-subduing palms. Hong Qigong’s palm technique. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 韩宝驹 — Hán Bǎojū. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

14. 南希仁 — Nán Xīrén. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

15. 全金发 — Quán Jīnfā. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

16. 软猬甲 — Ruǎnwèijiǎ. A vest set with tiny barbs, proof against blades and fists, treasured on Peach Blossom Island. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

17. 朱聪 — Zhū Cōng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

18. 九阴真经 — Jiǔyīn Zhēnjīng. Literally true scripture of the nine yin. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

19. 彭连虎 — Péng Liánhǔ. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

20. 裘千仞 — Qiú Qiānrèn. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

21. 金龙鞭 — Jīnlóng Biān. Han Baoju’s whip. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

22. 秤杆 — chènggān. The iron beam of a merchant’s steelyard, Quan Jinfa’s weapon. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

23. 纯钢扁担 — chúngāng biǎndan. Nan Xiren’s weapon, the woodcutter’s carrying pole made of pure steel. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

24. 白蟒鞭 — Báimǎng Biān. Literally white python whip. Mei Chaofeng’s extremely long whip. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

25. 韩小莹 — Hán Xiǎoyíng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

26. 剑 — jiàn. A straight, double-edged blade. ↩

27. 江南六怪 — Jiāngnán Liù Guài. Literally six eccentrics of Jiangnan. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

28. 震惊百里 — Zhèn jīng bǎi lǐ. Literally a shock that startles for a hundred li. A move of the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing, named from a line of the Book of Changes. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

29. 黄药师 — Huáng Yàoshī. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

30. 师母 — shīmǔ. The wife of one’s shifu. Shī means teacher. Mǔ means mother. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

31. 摧心掌 — Cuīxīn Zhǎng. A palm from the Nine Yin Manual that injures the internal organs, practised by the Twin Evils of Dark Wind. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

32. 横练功夫 — Héngliàn Gōngfū. External conditioning practice making the body hard like cast copper and iron. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

33. 师弟 — shīdì. Male junior. Both apprenticed to the same shifu. Shī means teacher. Dì means younger brother. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

34. 江湖 — jiānghú. Literally rivers and lakes. The world of martial artists, outside mainstream society. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

35. 归云庄 — Guīyún Zhuāng. Literally returning clouds manor. The Lu family manor on Lake Tai. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

36. 六侠 — Liù Xiá. Literally six xia, a courteous form of the Eccentrics’ name with 侠 (xia) in place of 怪 (eccentric). See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

37. 柯大侠 — Kē Dàxiá. Literally great xia Ke. ↩