The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 34 – Part 3

Before the two of them set foot on the island, it had rained. The paths were wet with mud. Huang Rong said, “There are three people’s footprints.”

Guo Jing said, “Quick, we must go and help Fourth Shifu. Rong-er, if I find your father attacking my Fourth Shifu, I’ll have no choice but to fight him to the death.”

Huang Rong said, “Fine! Then kill me first.”

Guo Jing said, “How can there be three people’s footprints?”

Nan Xiren’s heavy footprints in front kept taking wrong turns, while the two sets behind seemed to know the way, following lightly and swiftly after him. Guo Jing thought that whoever was trailing Nan Xiren must be Huang Yaoshi, for no one else in the world had such superb qinggong¹ and knew the twisting paths of Peach Blossom Island so well.

Huang Rong said, “Fourth Shifu’s prints have dried. He came through here several days ago, but the two sets behind are fresh.”

Guo Jing said bitterly, “Fourth Shifu fled to this remote spot days ago, and today your father has come after him again to kill him. Hurry, hurry! Saving him comes first!”

Huang Rong felt another chill in her heart. She thought, If his Fourth Shifu sees me, it will be a wonder if he doesn’t kill me. I wonder if Papa is there? But by now she cared nothing for what might happen. She knew disaster lay ahead and had no wish to avoid it, and she led Guo Jing straight on at a run. In the bleak moonlight they saw, beneath a peach tree ahead, a figure writhing and rolling on the ground.

Guo Jing gave a great cry and rushed forward to gather him up. Nan Xiren’s face wore a smile, and a hoarse chuckling kept coming from his mouth. Guo Jing was startled and overjoyed. Then all at once he burst into tears, and as he wept he called, “Fourth Shifu, Fourth Shifu.”

Nan Xiren went on chuckling. Then, without warning, he struck back-handed with his palm. Taken completely off guard, Guo Jing ducked by reflex. The palm missed, and Nan Xiren’s left fist followed at once. This time Guo Jing thought it was his shifu punishing him and was actually glad, and he stood quite still and let the blow land. But the punch was astonishingly strong. It struck him with a thud and sent him head over heels.

Guo Jing had sparred and drilled with Nan Xiren since childhood, thousands of times. He knew the strength of his shifu’s fists and palms by heart, and he had never expected this punch to carry such sudden added power. He was badly shaken and bewildered.

He had barely regained his feet when Nan Xiren threw another punch. Again Guo Jing made no move to dodge. This blow was mightier still. Gold stars burst before his eyes and he nearly blacked out. Nan Xiren bent and snatched up a great rock, then swung it down towards Guo Jing’s head with all his strength.

Still Guo Jing did not dodge. Brought down on him, the rock would have smashed his skull open. Huang Rong saw the peril from the side and darted forward. With her left hand she shoved Nan Xiren’s arm. He toppled over, rock and all, still making his hoarse cries, and could not get up again.

Guo Jing shouted in anger, “Why did you push my Fourth Shifu?”

Huang Rong had only meant to save Guo Jing. She had not expected Nan Xiren to be so feeble, to fall from a single shove. She reached out at once to help him up. In the moonlight she saw that his face was all smiles, but the smile looked forced, and strangely horrible. Huang Rong cried out in alarm. Her hand was outstretched, but she did not dare touch him.

All at once Nan Xiren swung his fist back and caught her on the left shoulder. Both of them cried out at once. Though Huang Rong wore the Soft Hedgehog Armour,² the blow still left a dull ache, and she stumbled several paces away. Nan Xiren’s fist was pierced by the armour’s spikes, blood streaming from the wounds.

Amid their cries and Guo Jing’s repeated calls of “Fourth Shifu”, Nan Xiren turned his eyes on Guo Jing. He seemed suddenly to recognise him. He opened his mouth as if to speak. The muscles at the corner of his lips twitched. He strained with all his might, yet still no words came. His face still wore the smile, but his eyes showed the bitterest disappointment.

Guo Jing cried, “Fourth Shifu, rest. Who did this to you?”

Nan Xiren tilted his head back and strained to speak, but his lips would not open. He struggled on for a moment, then his head sank and he fell backwards.

Guo Jing called out “Fourth Shifu” several times and lunged forward to catch him. Huang Rong, watching closely from the side, said, “Your shifu is trying to write something.”

Guo Jing’s gaze flickered sideways. Sure enough, Nan Xiren’s finger was trembling, trying to trace characters in the ground. Huang Rong watched him struggle to move his finger, but no characters took shape. Her heart hammered, and a thought suddenly struck her, He’s on Peach Blossom Island. Even the stupidest man would know it was Father who killed him. He has only moments to live, and still he spends the last of his strength writing his killer’s name. Could the killer be someone else?

She fixed her eyes on his finger. It moved more and more feebly. She prayed silently, If he means to write another name, let him write it quickly. She watched his finger move across the wet mud: a horizontal stroke, a short vertical, then another stroke ending in a hook. He had written the character for “ten”,³ and before he could finish the word, his finger quivered and went rigid.

Guo Jing had been kneeling all along, holding him. He felt a violent shudder pass through the body, and then there was no more breathing. His eyes on the little cross, he cried, “Fourth Shifu, I know you meant to write ‘east’, for the Eastern Heretic,⁴ Huang Yaoshi. Yes, that’s it. On this island, the one who could kill you is of course that hateful old Eastern Heretic!” He flung himself upon Nan Xiren’s body and wept aloud.

That long, breast-beating cry released all the grief and fury he had suppressed through the entire day. He wept until at last he collapsed across Nan Xiren’s corpse and lost consciousness.

---

He did not know how long passed before he slowly came to. The sunlight dazzled him. It was already broad day. He rose and looked about him. Huang Rong was gone, nowhere to be seen. Nan Xiren’s eyes were still open. Guo Jing thought of the saying “to die with eyes unclosed”,⁵ and his tears fell again. He reached out and gently closed the eyelids.

Recalling the strange expression on Nan Xiren’s face at the moment of death, he wondered what wound had killed him. He untied the clothes and examined the whole body. Apart from the wounds on his hand, where the spikes had pierced it when he struck Huang Rong the night before, there was not a single mark on him from head to heel, and his chest and back showed no sign of any blow from a fist or palm driven by neili.⁶ He thought, Old Heretic Huang’s Divine Finger Flick⁷ kills without drawing blood. I don’t understand that skill. He can’t have been gone long. Sooner or later I will kill him and avenge my shifus.

Guo Jing lifted Nan Xiren’s body, meaning to bury him alongside Zhu Cong and the others. But the paths through the trees were strange and the footprints confused, and after a few dozen paces he could no longer find the way he had come. He had to turn back. Beneath a peach tree he dug a pit and laid Nan Xiren to rest.

---

He had eaten nothing all day and was hungry. He meant to find his way to the shore and take a boat back to the mainland, but soon had no idea which way he was going. He sat down to rest, then roused himself and set off again. This time he made a decision: no matter whether a path lay before him or not, he would walk straight towards the sun, due east.

After a while he came to a dense wood that there was no getting through. It was a very strange wood. Every tree was covered with long vines and hooked thorns, so that there was hardly anywhere to set foot. He thought, Today it’s forward, never back! and sprang up to the treetops.

He had taken only one step through the treetops when there was a ripping sound. A thorn had torn away a piece of his trouser leg and left several bloody scratches on his calf.

Two more steps and long vines had wound about his left leg. He drew his golden dao⁸ and cut them through. He looked ahead. The thorny trees stretched on, layer upon layer, without end. He cried, “Even if every scrap of flesh is torn from my legs, I’ll fight my way off this devil’s island!”

He was about to leap forward when Huang Rong’s voice came from below, “Come down. I’ll take you out.”

He looked down. She was standing beneath a row of thorn trees on his left.

Guo Jing did not answer. He dropped to the ground and saw that her face was deathly pale, utterly bloodless. His heart gave a start. He wanted to ask if her old injuries had flared again, but forced the words back. Huang Rong saw that he seemed about to say something to her, but his lips only moved slightly and he turned his head away. She waited a moment, and when nothing came she sighed softly and said, “Let’s go!”

The two wound their way east.

---

Huang Rong’s injuries had not healed. Now, struck by this sudden, terrible change, her heart had been wrung a hundred ways all night. She thought, None of this is Jing gege’s fault, nor Father’s, and perhaps not even the Six Eccentrics of Jiangnan’s. Yet she had done nothing wrong, so why should Heaven punish her like this? Could Heaven really be jealous that she had been too happy?

She led Guo Jing towards the beach, knowing he would never return to this island, that they would never meet again. Each step felt as though a piece of her heart cracked apart. When at last they emerged from the thorn-vine thicket and the beach lay before her, she could support herself no longer. She swayed on the verge of falling and thrust her bamboo staff into the ground to brace herself. But her arm too had gone limp and useless. The staff tilted. She pitched forward.

Guo Jing’s right hand darted out to catch her. His fingers were about to touch her arm when the thought of his shifus’ blood debt flashed through his mind. His left hand shot out and struck his own right wrist with a smack. This was the Ambidextrous Self-Combat⁹ that Zhou Botong had taught him. Struck, his right hand turned over and returned the blow, and he sprang back.

Huang Rong had already fallen.

Guo Jing watched her tumble to the ground. Regret, tender pity, grief and fury surged into his breast all at once, and hard as he had made his heart, he could not help bending to gather her up. He looked about for some soft place to lay her down. To the northeast, among the rocks, he saw a scrap of blue cloth fluttering in the wind.

Huang Rong opened her eyes. She saw Guo Jing gazing into the distance. Following his look, she too spotted the blue cloth. She cried, “Papa!”

Guo Jing ran over with her in his arms. A long robe of blue cloth was wedged among the rocks, and beside it lay a human-skin mask. They were Huang Yaoshi’s.

Guo Jing set Huang Rong down gently. Torn between fear and doubt, she bent and picked up the robe. On its front was the clear print of a bloody palm, every finger mark distinct, a dreadful sight.

A thought flashed through Guo Jing’s mind, Huang Yaoshi wiped his hand on this after he used the Nine Yin White Bone Claw¹⁰ to kill my Third Shifu. He had been holding Huang Rong’s hand. Now the hot blood surged in his chest. He flung her hand away, snatched the robe and with a rip tore it in two. Then he saw that a piece had been torn from one corner, and by its shape the missing piece was exactly the scrap of blue cloth that had been tied to the eagle’s leg.

The bloody palm print stood out clearly on the robe, even the lines of the palm stamped into the cloth. In the sunlight it seemed ready to leap off the cloth and strike him full in the face. The sight shook Guo Jing to the core, and he was half mad with grief and fury.

He rolled up the skirt of his own robe and tucked it into the front, then waded out to a sailing boat near the shore. The deaf-mute sailors who had manned it had all long since vanished. He did not look back at Huang Rong even once. He drew his golden dao and cut the mooring cable, raised the anchor, and set sail.

---

Huang Rong watched the boat run before the wind to the west. At first she still hoped he might have a change of heart, put about and come back to take her with him. But the sail grew smaller and smaller, and bit by bit something like a great block of ice formed and hardened in her chest.

She stood staring at the sea. At last the sail vanished at the rim where heaven met the water. The thought came to her that she was alone on this island, that she would never see Jing gege again, that she did not know whether her father would ever return, and that the days ahead would never end. Was she to stand here by the sea for the rest of her life? Rong-er, Rong-er, she told herself, whatever you do, you must not take your own life!

---

Guo Jing sailed alone, leaving Peach Blossom Island behind and heading west. When he had gone a dozen li¹¹ or more, he heard eagles screaming urgently overhead. The pair of eagles had come flying after him, and they settled on the yard of the sail.

Guo Jing thought, The eagles have come with me. Rong-er is all alone on the island. She’ll be lonelier than ever! Pity rose in him unbidden. He could not help but turn the helm, meaning to go back and take her with him. He had sailed a short way when another thought came to him, Eldest Shifu ordered me to cut off the heads of Huang Yaoshi and Rong-er and bring them to him. Eldest Shifu came to Peach Blossom Island with Second Shifu and the others, and Huang Yaoshi struck them down without mercy. Eldest Shifu cannot see, but he heard it all clearly, and somehow, by Heaven’s grace, he escaped with his life. He raised his iron staff to beat Rong-er to death and told me to kill her. What is wrong in that? I can’t kill Rong-er. It wasn’t Rong-er who killed Second Shifu and the others. But how can I go on being with her? Huang Yaoshi has only just killed Fourth Shifu, so he must be close by. I’ll cut off Huang Yaoshi’s head and take it to Eldest Shifu. If I can’t beat Old Heretic Huang, I’ll just let him kill me.

So he put the helm about again, and the boat swung round in a circle on the sea and headed west once more.

Footnotes

1. 轻功 — qīnggōng. The martial art of body lightness. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

3. 十 — shí. The character for ten. ↩

4. 东邪 — Dōng Xié. Literally eastern heretic. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 死不瞑目 — sǐ bù míng mù. Literally to die with eyes unclosed. To die with a grievance unredressed, unable to rest. ↩

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

7. 弹指神通 — Tánzhǐ Shéntōng. Huang Yaoshi’s finger-flicking art, which strikes acupoints or sends small objects flying. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

8. 金刀 — jīndāo. The golden dao Genghis Khan bestows on Guo Jing. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 双手互搏 — Shuāngshǒu Hùbó. Fighting technique where both hands operate independently, allowing each hand to perform different techniques simultaneously. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

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