The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 31 – Part 7

Great Master Yideng marvelled over and over. “I once heard Chongyang the Perfected One¹ tell the story behind this. The eminent master who compiled the Nine Yin Manual,² Huang Shang,³ had not only read every text in the Daoist Canon but was also deeply versed in the Buddhist scriptures and could read Sanskrit. When he finished writing the manual, the final chapter of the lower volume was a general summary of the entire work. The manual’s highest and most secret principles were contained within that summary, and it served as the key to every difficult passage in the preceding chapters. Then it suddenly struck him that if the manual fell into the hands of someone whose heart was crooked, that man could use it to run riot through the world and no one would be able to stop him. But to destroy the chapter expounding the supreme martial arts was more than he could bring himself to do, so he rewrote it in Sanskrit, transliterating the sounds in Han characters. He reasoned that whether the manual would even be passed down to later generations was already uncertain, and among the people of the Central Plains very few could read Sanskrit at all, while those who combined a knowledge of Sanskrit with cultivation of the highest martial arts were rarer still. If the one who found the manual was a man of Sindhu, he might know Sanskrit well, but he would not read the Han script. And a man of the Middle Kingdom who could read Sanskrit and was also highly skilled in the martial arts would be no wicked villain. By arranging things in this way, he made it all but impossible for later generations to understand his manual’s meaning. And so even Chongyang the Perfected One could not decipher this Sanskrit general summary. Yet Heaven’s ways are wonderfully subtle. You cannot read Sanskrit, yet you have learned this long discourse by heart like a string of incantations. It is a rare chance indeed.” He had Guo Jing recite the Sanskrit of the manual slowly, line by line, while he put it into the Han tongue, wrote it down, and taught it to Guo Jing and Huang Rong.

The martial arts of the Daoist tradition were originally predominantly soft and yielding, and when ninefold yin reached its zenith it became a calamity. The reason Huang Shang named it the Nine Yin Manual was precisely to convey that an imbalance of yin and yang becomes a disaster. The general summary of the Nine Yin Manual expounded the supreme principle of yin and yang supplementing each other, of yin and yang in harmony, correcting the Daoist school’s one-sided emphasis on softness and yielding. In this respect, the teaching it contained went deeper than anything in the manual itself.

The general summary was so subtle and profound that even Great Master Yideng, for all his learning and the depth of his neigong,⁴ could not fathom it all at once. He said, “Stay on the mountain a few more days. Once I have studied it in detail, I shall pass it on to you both.” He added, “My profound skill has been impaired, and by rights it would take five years of training to restore. But practising according to this manual, it seems I need no more than three months to achieve what would otherwise take five years. Although the practice I follow is of the Buddhist school and differs a good deal in approach from the Daoist neigong described in the manual, this general summary shows that when martial arts reach their highest plane, all paths lead to the same destination, and there is little difference from what the Buddhist tradition teaches.”

Huang Rong spoke of how Hong Qigong had been struck and injured by Ouyang Feng. Great Master Yideng was deeply concerned and said, “If you two pass this Nine Yin Divine Skill on to your shifu, he will surely be able to restore his neili⁵ through it by himself, and there will be no need for an old friend to do it for him.” Guo Jing and Huang Rong were delighted to hear this.

The pair stayed on the mountain for more than ten days. Each day Great Master Yideng expounded the essential principles of the Nine Yin divine skill, and Huang Rong used the time to nurse her injuries as well. One day the two of them were strolling outside the temple when they heard the shrill, urgent cries of eagles overhead, and the pair of white eagles came flying from far off in the east. Huang Rong clapped her hands and cried, “The golden salamanders⁶ are here.” The two eagles folded their wings and came down, looking utterly spent. The pair of them were alarmed to see that the female eagle’s left breast was a bloody mess. She had been hit by an arrow, but the shaft was gone, plucked out by the bird herself, perhaps. A strip of blue cloth was tied to the male eagle’s leg, but there was no sign of the golden salamanders.

Huang Rong recognised the blue cloth as torn from her father’s robe, so the eagles had certainly been to Peach Blossom Island. Judging by their condition, could Peach Blossom Island have been visited by a formidable enemy? Could Huang Yaoshi have been so busy fighting it off that he had no time for his daughter’s errand, which was no urgent matter? The eagles were uncommonly strong and swift, yet the female had been struck by an arrow, which meant the archer’s martial arts must be exceedingly high. Guo Jing hastily bound up the female eagle’s wound and applied medicine.

Huang Rong pondered for a long while but could make nothing of it. The eagles could not speak, and though they had witnessed what happened on Peach Blossom Island, they could reveal nothing. The two of them, anxious for Huang Yaoshi’s safety, immediately took their leave of Great Master Yideng.

Yideng said, “I had hoped we would have many more days together, but since Peach Blossom Island is in trouble, I cannot keep you. But Brother Yao⁷ is a man of boundless resource and great cunning. I should not think anyone in this world could harm him. Try not to worry.” He then called in the fisherman, the woodcutter, the farmer and the scholar, had Guo Jing and Huang Rong sit on the hassocks before him, and expounded the deepest principles of the martial arts for more than a shichen⁸ before he was done. The two took a reluctant leave and descended the mountain. The scholar and the farmer, not yet recovered, saw them to the temple gate. The fisherman and the woodcutter went with them all the way to the mountain’s foot, and only when the pair had found the little red horse did they clasp hands and bid each other farewell.

The way back was familiar ground, the scenery unchanged, but their state of mind was altogether different from when they had entered the mountains. Thinking of Great Master Yideng’s profound kindness, Huang Rong could not help turning to the peak and sinking into a graceful bow. Guo Jing knelt beside her and kowtowed.

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Though Huang Rong was anxious about her father on the road, she told herself that he had roamed the world all his life and rarely met defeat. Even if he encountered an enemy he could not overcome, he would certainly be able to protect himself. As Great Master Yideng had said, “I should not think anyone in this world could harm him.” She was not greatly worried. The two sat astride the little red horse, chatting and laughing as they rode. The pair of eagles followed slowly above.

Huang Rong said with a smile, “Since we first met, I don’t know how many dangers we’ve been through. But every time we came off worse, we gained something from it. This time, taking those two palm-strikes from that old rascal Qiu Qianren has earned us the secret of the Nine Yin divine skill, something not even Wang Chongyang knew in his day.”

Guo Jing said, “I’d rather not have a single scrap of martial arts, so long as you’re safe and well.”

Huang Rong was delighted, and laughed. “Oh my, if you want to butter me up, you needn’t boast quite so wildly! If you didn’t know any martial arts, you’d have been killed long ago. Never mind Ouyang Feng and Sha Tongtian and the rest, even one of those black-clad men of the Iron Palm Keep would have sliced your head off with one stroke of his dao.”

Guo Jing said, “No matter what, I can’t let you get hurt again. Last time in Lin’an it didn’t matter so much when I was injured myself, but these past few days, watching you in such pain, ah, it really hurt me.”

Huang Rong laughed. “Hmph, you heartless thing.”

Guo Jing was puzzled. “How so?”

Huang Rong said, “You’d rather be injured yourself and leave me feeling miserable.”

Guo Jing had no answer to that. He threw back his head and laughed long and loud, touched the little red horse’s flank lightly with his toe, and the horse raised its head with a soft neigh and shot forward like lightning, its four hooves seemingly never touching the ground.

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By midday they reached the county seat of Taoyuan. Huang Rong’s vitality had not yet fully recovered, and after half a day in the saddle her cheeks were flushed and her breathing short and rapid. In the town of Taoyuan there was only one establishment that could be called a proper wineshop, called the Avoiding-Qin Wineshop.⁹ The two went in, took a seat and ordered wine and food.

Guo Jing said to the serving boy, “We need to get to Hankou. Please go down to the river and find us a boat, and ask the boatman to come here to speak with us.”

The serving boy said, “If you’re willing to share a boat with other passengers, it’s much cheaper. Hiring a whole boat for two of you will cost quite a lot of silver.”

Huang Rong shot him a withering look, took out a five-liang¹⁰ ingot of silver and tossed it onto the table. “Is that enough?”

The serving boy hastened to say with an obsequious smile, “Quite enough.” He turned to go downstairs.

Guo Jing, afraid that Huang Rong’s injuries might flare up, would not let her drink wine. He kept her company by not drinking either, and they ate only the food. The serving boy came back with a boatman, and they agreed on a fare straight to Hankou, rice provided but no other dishes, three liang and six qian of silver in all. Huang Rong did not bargain. She handed the ingot to the boatman, who took it, bowed in thanks, pointed at his own mouth, and made several hoarse “ah” sounds from his throat. He was a mute. He gestured east and west in a flurry of sign language. Huang Rong nodded, then made an elaborate series of gestures of her own, complicated and long, flowing on without pause. The mute nodded repeatedly and went away.

Guo Jing asked, “What were you two saying?”

Huang Rong said, “He said we should set off as soon as we’ve finished eating. I told him to buy several chickens, a few jin¹¹ of meat, and the best wine and food he can find. He can buy as much as he likes, and we’ll pay him back afterwards.”

Guo Jing sighed. “If I’d been the one dealing with that mute boatman, I’d have been completely lost.” The fact was that the servants on Peach Blossom Island were all mutes, and Huang Rong had learned to communicate by sign language at the age of three.

One dish at the wineshop was particularly fine: honey-steamed dried fish. Guo Jing ate several pieces and thought of Hong Qigong. “I wonder where Shifu is now, and how his injuries are. It weighs on my mind.” He wished he could wrap the dried fish up and take it to Hong Qigong.

Huang Rong was about to reply when they heard footsteps on the stairs. A Daoist nun came up, wearing a grey cloth Daoist robe, her mouth and nose covered with a dust-veil, only her eyes visible.

The nun went to a table in the corner of the wineshop and sat down. The serving boy came over to attend her. The nun spoke a few words in a low voice, and the serving boy gave his orders. Before long a bowl of plain noodles was brought up. Huang Rong thought the nun’s figure looked strangely familiar but could not place where she had seen her before. Guo Jing, seeing that Huang Rong was paying close attention, glanced at the nun as well, but she quickly turned her head away, as though she had been studying him in turn. Huang Rong whispered with a laugh, “Jing gege, that Daoist nun has taken a fancy to you. She thinks you’re handsome and dashing.”

Guo Jing said, “Pah, don’t talk nonsense. How can you make jokes like that about someone who has left the world?”

Huang Rong laughed, “If you don’t believe me, that’s your affair.”

The two finished their meal and walked towards the stairs. Huang Rong, still puzzled, glanced at the nun once more. The nun had lifted a corner of the veil from her face, revealing it. At one look, Huang Rong nearly cried out. The nun gave a little wave of her hand, then replaced the veil over her face and bent her head to eat her noodles. Guo Jing was ahead and noticed nothing.

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They went downstairs and settled the bill. The mute boatman was already waiting at the door of the wineshop. Huang Rong signed that they needed to buy a few things and would board the boat a little later.

The mute boatman nodded and pointed to a large boat with a bamboo-mat awning down on the river. Huang Rong understood. Seeing that the boatman was not leaving, she walked eastward with Guo Jing. At the corner of a street she ducked behind a wall and stopped, keeping her eyes fixed on the entrance to the wineshop.

Before long, the Daoist nun came out of the wineshop. She glanced at the red horse and the pair of eagles at the door, as though searching for Guo Jing and Huang Rong. Catching no sign of them, she walked straight west.

Huang Rong murmured, “Yes, that’s just what she should do.” She tugged Guo Jing’s sleeve and walked quickly east. Guo Jing, utterly bewildered, did not ask what was going on but simply followed.

The town of Taoyuan was not large. In a short while they were out of the east gate. Huang Rong turned south, rounded the south gate, then turned west again. Guo Jing said, “Are we following that Daoist nun? Please don’t play tricks on me.”

Huang Rong laughed, “What tricks? A Daoist nun as beautiful as a celestial maiden. If you don’t chase after her, you’ll regret it.”

Guo Jing was flustered. He stopped walking and said, “Rong-er, if you keep saying things like that, I’ll be angry.”

Huang Rong said, “I’m not afraid at all. Go on, get angry and let me see.”

Guo Jing had no choice but to follow. After another five or six li,¹² they saw the Daoist nun sitting beneath a pagoda tree in the distance. When she saw them approaching, she stood and followed a small path towards a mountain hollow.

Huang Rong took Guo Jing’s hand and led him along the path. Guo Jing said urgently, “Rong-er, if you keep fooling about, I’ll pick you up and carry you back.”

Huang Rong said, “I really am tired from walking. You go after her on your own.”

Guo Jing crouched down. “Don’t tire yourself out. Let me carry you back.”

Huang Rong giggled. “I’ll go and pull the handkerchief off her face so you can have a look.” She quickened her pace and ran towards the nun. The nun turned to wait for her. Huang Rong threw her arms around her and reached for the veil.

Guo Jing hurried up behind, calling, “Rong-er, stop fooling around!” Then he saw the nun’s face and started so hard that he stopped dead. Her moth-brows were drawn deep in a frown, her eyes brimming with tears, her expression utterly forlorn and piteous. It was Mu Nianci.

Huang Rong held her by the waist. “Mu jiejie, what’s wrong? Has that rascal Yang Kang been bullying you again?”

Mu Nianci lowered her head and said nothing. Guo Jing stepped closer and greeted her. “House Sister.”¹³ Mu Nianci gave a soft murmur of acknowledgement.

Huang Rong took Mu Nianci’s hand and led her to sit beneath a weeping willow beside a small stream. “Jiejie, how has he been bullying you? Let’s go and settle accounts with him. Jing gege and I were both played for fools by him. We nearly lost our lives at his hands.”

Mu Nianci hung her head and said nothing. Her reflection and Huang Rong’s lay in the stream, so clear that the bottom showed, and fallen petals drifted slowly over them one by one. Guo Jing sat on a rock a few feet away, his mind full of questions. Why was House Sister Mu dressed as a Daoist nun? Why had she not greeted them in the wineshop? And where was Yang Kang?

Seeing the anguish in Mu Nianci’s expression, Huang Rong stopped asking questions and held her hand in silence. After a long while, Mu Nianci said, “Little sister, House Brother Guo, the boat you’ve hired belongs to the Iron Palm Keep. They’ve laid a trap to harm you.”

Guo Jing and Huang Rong started. Together they said, “The mute boatman’s boat?”

Mu Nianci said, “That’s right. Only he’s not a mute. He’s a skilled man of the Iron Palm Keep. His voice is perfectly loud, but he was afraid that speaking would arouse your suspicions, so he pretended to be dumb.”

Huang Rong was secretly alarmed. “If you hadn’t told us, I truly would never have guessed. His sign language was very well done. I suppose he plays the mute often.”

Guo Jing leapt into the willow tree and scanned the surroundings. Apart from two or three farmers in the fields, there was nobody about. He thought, If the two of them hadn’t gone round in such a wide circle, the Iron Palm Keep would surely have someone following us by now.

Mu Nianci heaved a long sigh and said slowly, “You already know what happened between Yang Kang and me before. Afterwards I was taking the coffins of my foster father and foster mother south, and at Niu Family Village near Lin’an, as ill luck would have it, I ran into him again.”

Huang Rong broke in, “We knew about that too. We actually saw him kill Ouyang Ke with our own eyes.”

Mu Nianci’s eyes widened in disbelief.

Huang Rong briefly told her of how she and Guo Jing had healed their injuries in the secret chamber, and how Yang Kang had fraudulently claimed to be the Beggars’ Guild Chief, and how they had escaped. These events were tortuous and long in the telling, but Huang Rong was eager to hear Mu Nianci’s own story, so she kept it to the barest outline.

Mu Nianci ground her teeth. “That man has done so much evil that he will surely come to a bad end in the future. I only hate myself for having been blind, and for the misfortune in my fate that brought me across his path.”

Huang Rong took out her handkerchief and gently wiped the tears from Mu Nianci’s cheeks.

Mu Nianci’s mind was in turmoil. The events of the past came crowding in upon her, and for a time she did not know where to begin. Only after a long while, when her heart had gradually stilled, did she begin to speak.

Footnotes

1. 重阳真人 — Chóngyáng Zhēnrén. Literally Chongyang the Perfected One. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

3. 黄裳 — Huáng Shang. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 内功 — nèigōng. Literally internal cultivation. The practice of developing neili through breathing and meditation. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 内力 — nèilì. Literally internal force. The kinetic manifestation of cultivated qi. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 金娃娃 — jīn wáwa. Literally golden baby. A golden giant salamander, which is called 娃娃鱼 (wáwayú), baby fish, because its cry sounds like a baby’s. ↩

7. 药兄 — Yào Xiōng. Literally Brother Yao. ↩

8. 时辰 — shíchén. Traditional Chinese unit of time equal to two hours; the day was divided into twelve shichen. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 避秦酒楼 — Bìqín Jiǔlóu. Literally Avoiding-Qin Wineshop, after Tao Yuanming’s ‘Peach Blossom Spring’, whose villagers had fled the turmoil of the Qin. ↩

10. 两 — liǎng. A traditional unit of weight, one-sixteenth of a jin, and the unit in which silver was reckoned. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 斤 — jīn. A unit of weight, about 590 grams in the Song dynasty. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 里 — lǐ. A traditional unit of distance, about 500 metres or one-third of a mile. ↩

13. 世妹 — shìmèi. Literally generational younger sister. A courteous address to a younger daughter of a family long on friendly terms with one’s own. ↩