The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 34 – Part 8

On the surface the words mocked the Quanzhen Zis, but underneath they were a kindly warning that to fight Ouyang Feng meant certain death. The seven Quanzhen Daoists could not beat Huang Yaoshi, so they were no match for Ouyang Feng either. The Six Zis had long been in the jianghu,¹ and how could they miss his meaning? But with their great enemy before them, how could they draw back?

Hong Qigong,² flicking a glance sideways, saw Guo Jing glaring at Huang Yaoshi in fury and Huang Rong on the brink of tears. He guessed there was much tangled business between them, and thought, Once the Old Wild Child³ arrives, with his martial arts he’ll outclass the whole field, and this old beggar will have his say then. He barked, “This old beggar wants to sleep. Whoever lays a finger on anyone else is picking a fight with me. Tomorrow night you can turn the world upside down for all I care, and this old beggar won’t take sides. Ma Yu,⁴ Qiu Chuji,⁵ you motley-haired lot, sit down and get some practice in. Every bit of neili⁶ you gain is a bit gained. Even clasping the Buddha’s feet at the last minute beats not clasping them at all. Jing-er, Rong-er, come pound my legs.”

Ouyang Feng,⁷ who harboured a quiet dread of him, thought that if he joined forces with the Quanzhen men he would be impossible to face, and said at once, “Old Beggar, Brother Yao⁸ and I, the two of us, have a feud with the Quanzhen Order.⁹ The Nine-Fingered Divine Beggar’s word stands firm as a mountain. Today I’ll do you the courtesy, but tomorrow you mustn’t take anyone’s side.”

Hong Qigong laughed inwardly and thought, Right now a flick of your little finger could knock me flat, and still you’re afraid I’ll interfere. He called out loudly, “This old beggar’s farts smell sweeter than your words. If I’m not to help, I won’t help. But are you so sure you’ll win?” With that he lay back, pillowing his head on his wine gourd, and shouted, “You two children, hurry up and pound my legs!”

The mutton leg he had been gnawing was now nothing but bone, yet he still gnawed and licked at it as if he could never have enough of the taste. Gazing at the layered clouds on the horizon, he said, “Those clouds look mighty strange. I’m afraid the weather’s going to turn.” Then, noticing mist rolling across the lake, he drew in several deep breaths and shook his head. “How stifling!” He turned to Huang Yaoshi. “Brother Yao, lend me your daughter to pound my legs, will you?”

Huang Yaoshi¹⁰ gave a faint smile. Huang Rong¹¹ came over and sat beside Hong Qigong, tapping his legs lightly. Hong Qigong sighed. “Ah, these old bones have never known such fortune!” He glared at Guo Jing. “Silly boy, Old Heretic Huang hasn’t broken your dog’s paws, has he?”

Guo Jing answered “Yes” and sat on the other side to pound his legs.

Ke Zhen’e¹² leaned against a willow by the water’s edge, his sightless eyes fixed hard on Huang Yaoshi. He used his ears in place of eyes. As Huang Yaoshi paced to and fro by the lake, Ke Zhen’e’s head turned east when he went east and west when he went west. Huang Yaoshi took no notice, a faint cold smile at the corner of his mouth.

The Six Zis of Quanzhen and Yin Zhiping¹³ each sat cross-legged on the ground, still set out in the Big Dipper Formation,¹⁴ their eyes downcast and brows lowered, quietly at their practice.

Ouyang Feng’s snake herders brought tables, chairs, wine and dishes from the boat and set them out below Misty Rain Pavilion.¹⁵ Ouyang Feng sat with his back to the company, drinking and eating, turning over in his mind how Hong Qigong could have recovered so quickly after taking the full, crushing weight of his palm.

The air was close and muggy. Insects swarmed in every direction, and a white haze lay across the lake. Hong Qigong said, “My thigh-bones are aching, and a great storm is coming for certain. If there’s a moon tomorrow night at Mid-Autumn, I’ll chop off my leg and give it to you.” He squinted at Guo Jing and Huang Rong and saw that their gazes kept dodging from each other’s, never once meeting. He was blunt by nature, and the sight of such awkward business was more than he could bear. He asked several times, but the two hedged and stammered and would not answer.

Hong Qigong called loudly to Huang Yaoshi, “Brother Yao, does this South Lake¹⁶ have another name?”

Huang Yaoshi replied, “It is also called Mandarin Duck Lake.”

Hong Qigong said, “Well now! Then why, on this Mandarin Duck Lake, are your daughter and son-in-law, the young couple, at odds, and you, the father-in-law, won’t even try to talk them round?”

Guo Jing leapt to his feet, pointing at Huang Yaoshi. “He… he… killed my five shifus.¹⁷ How can I still call him father-in-law?”

Huang Yaoshi sneered, “As if I cared! The Seven Eccentrics of Jiangnan¹⁸ aren’t all dead yet. There’s still one stinking blind man left. If I choose, he won’t live past tomorrow either…”

Ke Zhen’e did not wait for him to finish. He hurled himself forward.

Guo Jing darted out ahead, slower to start, yet arriving first. Huang Yaoshi met him with a single move, and their palms clashed with a thud that jarred Guo Jing two paces back.

Hong Qigong barked, “I said no fighting. Or does this old beggar’s word count for no more than a fart?”

Guo Jing dared advance no further but glared at Huang Yaoshi in hatred.

Hong Qigong said, “Old Heretic Huang, the Six Eccentrics of Jiangnan were men of heroism and chivalry. Why did you kill the innocent? This old beggar doesn’t like the look of you one bit.”

Huang Yaoshi said, “I kill whoever I please. What business is it of yours?”

Huang Rong cried out, “Papa, his five shifus weren’t killed by you, I know it. Tell them it wasn’t you.”

Huang Yaoshi, in the moonlight, saw his daughter’s face haggard and worn, and his heart softened with tenderness. But when he shot a sideways glare at Guo Jing and saw murder written all over his face, his heart hardened again. “I killed them.”

Huang Rong choked back tears. “Papa, why must you insist on saying you killed them?”

Huang Yaoshi said loudly, “The world says your father is wicked and eccentric, don’t you know that? Would a villain do a good deed? Every evil under heaven is your father’s doing.”

Ouyang Feng laughed aloud. “Those words of yours, Brother Yao, are wonderfully forthright. I admire you, I admire you.” He raised his cup, drained it, and said, “Brother Yao, your brother has a present for you.” His right hand flicked, and he threw a bundle across. The two men stood several dozen feet apart, yet at a casual toss the bundle came flying through the air straight to him, and everyone watching was astonished.

Huang Yaoshi caught it, and from the feel of it there seemed to be a human head inside. He opened it, and there, sure enough, was a freshly severed head, wearing a square scholar’s cap and bearded at the chin, but the face was a stranger’s.

Ouyang Feng laughed. “As I came from the west this morning, I stopped to rest at an academy and heard this musty pedant lecturing his students, going on about being a loyal subject and a filial son. I grew sick of listening, so I killed him. You and I, the Eastern Heretic and the Western Venom, are birds of a feather, you might say.” He threw back his head and laughed loudly.

Huang Yaoshi’s expression changed. “What I have honoured above all in my life are loyal subjects and filial sons.” He bent down, clawed the earth into a pit, buried the head, and bowed to it three times with the deepest respect.

Ouyang Feng, rebuffed, laughed. “So Old Heretic Huang’s name is an empty one. You are bound by the rules of propriety after all.”

Huang Yaoshi said sternly, “Loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness are the great moral principles, not rules of propriety!”

The words had scarcely left his lips when a thunderbolt cracked overhead. Everyone looked up. Black clouds had blotted out half the sky, and a thunderstorm was about to break. At that very moment came the blare of drums and pipes, and seven or eight large boats were rowed out across the lake, hung with red lanterns, with placards reading Silence and Make Way standing upright in their bows, in the full style of an official’s retinue.

Author’s note:

The seven stars of the Big Dipper are seven stars of the constellation Ursa Major in Western astronomy, and the Daoists call them Tiangang. Of these, the four stars Tianshu, Tianxuan,¹⁹ Tianji and Tianquan²⁰ form the bowl of the Dipper, and the three stars Yuheng, Kaiyang and Yaoguang (“Swaying Light”, also called “Jade Light”) form the handle.

Footnotes

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

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

3. 老顽童 — lǎo wántóng. Literally old wild child. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 马钰 — Mǎ Yù. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 丘处机 — Qiū Chǔjī. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

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

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

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

11. 黄蓉 — Huáng Róng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 柯镇恶 — Kē Zhèn’è. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 尹志平 — Yǐn Zhìpíng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

14. 天罡北斗阵 — Tiāngāng Běidǒu Zhèn. Literally Big Dipper formation of the Heavenly Ladle. A Quanzhen formation of seven, laid out on the stars of the Big Dipper. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

16. 南湖 — Nán Hú. Literally south lake. A lake in Jiaxing. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

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

18. 江南七怪 — Jiāngnán Qī Guài. Literally seven eccentrics of Jiangnan. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

19. 天璇 — tiānxuán. The second star of the Big Dipper, and the position in the Big Dipper Formation named for it. ↩

20. 天权 — tiānquán. Literally heavenly authority. The fourth star of the Big Dipper. ↩