The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 22 – Part 6

Zhou Botong¹ was furious. “Is that so?” His right hand gripped something or other in the shark’s mouth, and his left pressed down on the fender timber hanging over the side of the great ship, and suddenly man and shark together came flying over everyone’s heads and landed on the deck. “Who is so bold,” he shouted, “as to dare bully my sworn brother?”

Every one of the people on that ship had seen a great deal of the world, but the white-bearded old man had appeared in so weird and outlandish a fashion that they all stood goggling, struck dumb, and even Hong Qigong² and Ouyang Feng³ were utterly astonished.

Zhou Botong was surprised to see Huang Rong⁴ too. “How come you’re here as well?”

Huang Rong laughed. “Yes. I worked out that you’d come today, so I came on ahead to wait for you. Quick, teach me how to ride a shark.”

Zhou Botong grinned. “Good, I’ll teach you.”

“First deal with these villains, then teach me.”

Zhou Botong’s eyes swept over the people on the deck. He said to Ouyang Feng, “I thought nobody else would dare be so outrageous, and sure enough, it’s you again, you villain.”

Ouyang Feng said coldly, “A man who breaks his word and yet clings to life invites the mockery of every brave man under heaven.”

“Not a word wrong,” said Zhou Botong. “In this life a man can fool about with anything he likes, but talking and farting he must always keep clearly apart, so that people listening won’t be left wondering whether the noise came out of the top end or from his lower stance. I was just looking for you to settle accounts, so you being here couldn’t be better. Old Beggar, you be the witness. Stand up and say what’s fair.”

Hong Qigong lay on the deck and managed a smile.

Huang Rong said, “When Old Venom was in trouble, my shifu saved his life nine times over. Who would have thought he had the heart of a wolf and the lungs of a dog, and would turn round and injure my shifu and seal his acupoints?”

In truth, Hong Qigong had saved Ouyang Feng’s life only three times. Huang Rong had multiplied the figure by three, and Ouyang Feng was in no position to argue the point. He glared in silence.

Zhou Botong bent down and rubbed Hong Qigong’s Quchi⁵ and Yongquan⁶ acupoints a couple of times.

Hong Qigong said, “Old Wild Child, that won’t work.”

Ouyang Feng’s method of sealing acupoints was exceedingly vicious, and apart from himself and Huang Yaoshi, no one in the world could undo it. Ouyang Feng was very pleased with himself. “Old Wild Child, if you’re so clever, undo his acupoints.”

Huang Rong could not undo them herself, but she knew this acupoint technique when she saw it. She pulled a face. “What’s so wonderful about that? My father could undo this Bone-Penetrating Acupoint Strike⁷ without the slightest effort.”

Hearing her name the technique, Ouyang Feng thought, The little wench has learnt a thing or two from her family. He paid her no more attention, and said to Zhou Botong, “You lost the wager, so why are your words worth no more than a fart?”

Zhou Botong held his nose. “Farting? What a stink, what a stink! Now let me ask you, what exactly did we wager?”

Ouyang Feng said, “Apart from the Guo brat and this little wench, everyone here is one of the renowned heroes and men of valour. I’ll tell it, and they can judge who’s in the right.”

Peng Lianhu⁸ said, “Excellent, excellent. Please go on, Mister Ouyang.”

Ouyang Feng said, “This is Old Zhou, Zhou Botong of the Quanzhen Order,⁹ known in the jianghu as the Old Wild Child. He is of no small seniority, shishu¹⁰ to Qiu Chuji, Wang Chuyi and the rest of the Seven Zis of Quanzhen.¹¹”

For more than ten years Zhou Botong had been imprisoned on Peach Blossom Island.¹² Before that his martial arts had not yet come to full maturity, and apart from mischief and tomfoolery he had done nothing remarkable, so his name was little known in the jianghu. But they had all just watched him ride a shark at sea and lift it bodily onto the ship, a feat of extraordinary power. So he was the shishu of the Seven Zis of Quanzhen, they thought, and no wonder he was so formidable. They exchanged a few low words among themselves.

Peng Lianhu remembered the appointment at Misty Rain Pavilion¹³ in Jiaxing at the Mid-Autumn Festival in the eighth month. He thought, If the Seven Zis of Quanzhen have this strange fellow to help them, they’ll be harder to deal with than ever. He could not help feeling secretly uneasy.

Ouyang Feng said, “Brother Zhou here was trapped in the sea by a school of sharks, and I rescued him. I said a school of sharks was nothing, that I could kill every last one of them with a mere wave of the hand. Brother Zhou did not believe me, so the two of us made a wager. Brother Zhou, is that right?”

Zhou Botong nodded vigorously. “Every word is right. You ought to tell everyone what the wager was, too.”

Ouyang Feng said, “Exactly! I said that if I lost, I would do whatever you told me, and if I refused, I would have to jump into the sea and feed the fish. And the same if you lost. Is that right?”

Zhou Botong nodded again. “Right, right. Not a word wrong. And then what happened?”

“And then? You lost.”

This time Zhou Botong shook his head. “Wrong, wrong. You lost. Not me.”

Ouyang Feng said angrily, “A true man does not turn right and wrong on their heads, muddle the facts and wriggle out of his word. If I was the one who lost, why would you have jumped into the sea to take your own life?”

Zhou Botong sighed. “Yes, at first I thought so too, that the Old Wild Child had been unlucky and lost to you. But once I was in the sea, Heaven sent me a lucky coincidence, and then I knew that it was you, Old Venom, who had lost, and I, the Old Wild Child, who had won.”

Ouyang Feng, Hong Qigong and Huang Rong all asked at once, “What coincidence?”

Zhou Botong bent down, took hold with his left hand of the wooden stick wedged in the shark’s mouth, and hoisted the shark up. “Meeting this mount of mine, that’s what. Old Venom, take a good look. It was your precious nephew who wedged this stick in its mouth, wasn’t it?”

That day Ouyang Ke¹⁴ had used a vicious trick, wedging a wooden stick in the shark’s mouth so that the greediest creature in the sea would starve to death, and Ouyang Feng had seen it with his own eyes. Now, looking at the size of the great shark and the shape of the stick, and the wound torn at the corner of its mouth by the fish-hook, he remembered that this was indeed the shark they had put back into the sea that day.

“So what if it is?”

Zhou Botong clapped his hands and laughed. “Then you’re the one who lost. The wager was to kill the whole school of sharks, but thanks to your nephew this fine fellow couldn’t eat the dead sharks, so he wasn’t poisoned. There’s one of them left, so haven’t I, the Old Wild Child, won?” And he roared with laughter.

Ouyang Feng’s face changed colour. He could find no reply.

Guo Jing said joyfully, “Big Brother, where have you been all this time? I’ve missed you terribly.”

Zhou Botong laughed. “I’ve been having a fine old time. I jumped into the sea, and before long I saw this fellow at the surface gasping for breath, looking very sorry for himself. I said, ‘Old shark, old shark, today you and I are fellow sufferers!’ and I jumped straight onto its back. It dived for the bottom of the sea at once, so I held my breath, hugged its neck tight with both arms and kicked away at its belly with my feet, and at last it came up to the surface again. Before I’d had time to take two breaths, the brute went under again. The pair of us fought it out for a good long while before it admitted defeat and did as it was told. Now if I want it to go east, it goes east, and if I want it to come up, it doesn’t dare dive.” He patted the shark’s head gently, very pleased with himself.

Of them all, it was of course Huang Rong who was most envious. Her eyes shone as she listened. “All these years I’ve played in the sea, and I never thought of this. How stupid of me!”

Zhou Botong said, “Look at its mouthful of teeth, every one like a sharp knife. If that stick weren’t wedged in its mouth, would you dare ride it?”

“You’ve been riding it all this time?”

“Of course I have. The pair of us are great hands at catching fish. As soon as we see a fish, it gives chase, and I punch it or palm it like this and kill it. Of every fish I don’t even get one part in ten, and this fellow gets nine and a half.”

Huang Rong felt the shark’s belly. “You stuff the dead fish into its belly? Can it eat without its teeth?”

“It doesn’t need to bite. It just swallows. It only obeys me because I keep feeding it. Once, the two of us were chasing a great cuttlefish…”

The old man and the girl chattered away in high glee, as if no one else were there, while Ouyang Feng groaned inwardly and cast about for some way to deal with it.

Suddenly Zhou Botong said, “Hey, Old Venom, do you admit you’ve lost or not?”

Ouyang Feng had committed himself too fully before, and how could he go back on his word in front of everyone? He could only say, “So I lost, what of it? Do you think I’d try to wriggle out of it?”

Zhou Botong said, “Mm, I’ll have to think of something hard for you to do. Right. You called me a farter just now, so I order you to let one go this minute! Let everyone have a sniff.”

Huang Rong heard Zhou Botong tell Ouyang Feng to fart. To let one go out of nowhere would naturally be very hard for an ordinary man, but for someone of deep neigong, whose whole life’s training was in moving the breath about his body, it was no trouble at all. She was afraid that Ouyang Feng, crafty old fox that he was, would seize his chance, let one go with the greatest of ease and so slip out of the whole business. She broke in quickly, “No, no, make him undo my shifu’s acupoints first.”

Zhou Botong said, “There you are, the little Miss is afraid of your stinking farts, so we’ll let you off that. I won’t ask you to do anything hard either. Just hurry up and heal the old beggar’s injuries. The old beggar’s skill is certainly no less than yours, and if you hadn’t played some dirty trick, you could never have hurt him. When he’s better, you two can have another fight, fair and square, and the Old Wild Child will be the witness.”

Ouyang Feng knew that Hong Qigong’s injuries could not be cured, so he had no fear of his revenge later. What he did fear was that Zhou Botong might suddenly take some wild notion into his head and set him a strange, hard task that would leave him unable to save face in front of everyone. So without another word he bent down, gathered force into his palm and undid Hong Qigong’s acupoints. Huang Rong and Guo Jing hurried forward to help him up.

Zhou Botong swept a glance across everyone on the deck. “What the Old Wild Child dreads most is the stink of the Tartars’ mutton. Lower a boat at once and send the four of us ashore.”

Ouyang Feng had seen Zhou Botong fight Huang Yaoshi and knew how exceedingly strange the man’s martial arts were. If they fell out and came to blows, he might not lose, but his chances of winning were slim. For now he would have to bear it, and settle accounts with him once he had mastered the martial arts of the Nine Yin Manual.¹⁵ Luckily he could plead today that he had lost the wager and must do whatever was asked, and the sooner he was rid of this plague god the better. His mind made up, he said, “Very well, who told you to be so lucky! Since you won the wager, it shall be just as you say.” He turned to Wanyan Honglie.¹⁶ “Your Highness, lower the sampan and send these four ashore.”

Wanyan Honglie did not answer. He was thinking, If those four set foot on shore, they may well reveal the purpose of my journey south.

Venerable Lingzhi¹⁷ had been watching coldly from the side all this time, and had long been seething at Ouyang Feng’s high-handed airs. He thought, Look at you, bedraggled as a drowned rat, doing whatever that shameless old fellow says without daring to answer back with half a word. You’re most likely a man with an empty reputation. And even if your martial arts really are high, you won’t necessarily be a match for all the masters we have here. Seeing Wanyan Honglie hesitate, he stepped forward two paces.

“On a raft, Mister Ouyang may do as he pleases, and who would dare say a word? But now that you are aboard the great ship, you must take your orders from His Highness.”

At these words, everyone stirred and looked to Ouyang Feng for his reaction.

Ouyang Feng looked Venerable Lingzhi coldly up and down, then raised his eyes to the sky. “So the big monk here is set on making trouble for this decrepit old man?” he said mildly.

Venerable Lingzhi said, “I would not presume. This humble monk has seldom been to the Central Plains and knows little of the world. Today I meet a great master for the first time, and it is the first time I have heard Mister Ouyang’s illustrious name. What quarrel could I have with you, sir…”

Before he had finished, Ouyang Feng stepped forward. His left hand feinted, and his right had already seized Venerable Lingzhi’s great burly body. Turning with the movement, he hoisted him up head down and feet in the air.

It was extraordinarily fast. All anyone saw was a flurry of scarlet kasaya, and then a fat body was already held up in mid-air. None of them had seen what technique Ouyang Feng used. Venerable Lingzhi stood a head taller than most men, and Ouyang Feng had grabbed him by the bulge of fat at the back of his neck, so that had he simply raised his arm straight up, the man’s feet might not even have left the deck. But Ouyang Feng had turned him upside down, and the top of his head was some four feet above the deck. His legs kicked wildly in the air and he bellowed with rage again and again.

That day at Prince Zhao’s Estate, when Venerable Lingzhi fought Wang Chuyi, they had all seen how formidable his hand skills were, yet held upside down like this by Ouyang Feng, his arms dangled limply beside his ears as if they were broken, and he was utterly powerless to resist.

Ouyang Feng still kept his eyes on the sky. “You heard my name for the first time today, and already you look down on me, is that it?” he said casually.

Venerable Lingzhi was alarmed and furious. Again and again he circulated his neili and struggled with all his strength, but there was no breaking free.

Peng Lianhu and the rest looked on, and their faces went white with shock.

Footnotes

1. 周伯通 — Zhōu Bótōng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

2. 洪七公 — Hóng Qīgōng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 欧阳锋 — Ōuyáng Fēng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 黄蓉 — Huáng Róng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 曲池穴 — Qū Chí Xué. Literally crooked pool. An acupoint at the outer end of the elbow crease. ↩

6. 涌泉 — yǒngquán. Literally gushing spring. An acupoint at the centre of the sole of the foot. ↩

7. 透骨打穴法 — Tòugǔ Dǎ Xuè Fǎ. Ouyang Feng’s acupoint-striking art, very hard to undo. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

9. 全真教 — Quánzhēn Jiào. Literally complete truth order. Daoist martial-monastic order founded by Wang Chongyang, one of the most influential orthodox factions. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

10. 师叔 — shīshū. Junior lineage uncle. The shidi or shimei of one’s shifu. Shī means teacher. Shū means father’s younger brother. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 全真七子 — Quánzhēn Qīzǐ. Literally the seven zi of Quanzhen, zi being an honorific for a master. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 桃花岛 — Táohuā Dǎo. Huang Yaoshi’s island in the East China Sea. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 烟雨楼 — Yānyǔ Lóu. Misty Rain Pavilion, on South Lake in Jiaxing. ↩

14. 欧阳克 — Ōuyáng Kè. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

16. 完颜洪烈 — Wányán Hóngliè. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

17. 灵智上人 — Língzhì Shàngrén. Literally the venerable of spiritual wisdom. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩