The Return of the Condor Heroes Chapter 17 – Part 3

At these words, every face in the great hall changed colour. This remark was clearly a declaration of war against the Valley Master, blows would be exchanged within moments. Guoshi and the others were all puzzled. “This Xiaoxiangzi is ordinarily the most sinister and cunning, always letting others take the vanguard in every affair. Why today is he so bold and eager to lead the charge?”

The Valley Master paid him no attention. With a wave of his hand toward the long-bearded old man standing behind him, the old man said loudly, “The Valley Master honours you as guests and treats you with courtesy. How dare you speak such nonsense?”

Xiaoxiangzi gave another gurgling laugh and said in that strange, eerie voice, “Your old ancestor must have drunk Yang Guifei’s foot-washing water back in the day. If he didn’t, I’ll cut my head off and give it to you.” Ma Guangzuo, greatly puzzled, asked, “Brother Xiaoxiang, how do you know? Were you there drinking it together that day?” Xiaoxiangzi burst out laughing, his voice shifting again. “If drinking foot-washing water didn’t turn his stomach, why else would he refuse all meat and strong flavours?” Ma Guangzuo clapped and roared with laughter. “Right, right! That must be the reason.”

Guoshi and the others, however, frowned deeply. They all felt Xiaoxiangzi had gone too far. Everyone had their own dietary habits, how could they be made a subject of mockery? Besides, the six had come deep into the valley uninvited. The other party was not obliged to provide fine food. And seeing clearly that these people were not to be trifled with, even if they meant to test each other’s martial skills, they should leave some room for retreat.

The long-bearded old man could bear it no longer. He strode to the centre of the hall and said, “Master Xiaoxiang, our valley has given you no offense. Since you insist on testing your hand, please step forward.” Xiaoxiangzi said, “Fine!” Still seated in his chair, he soared over the table before him, chair and man together, and landed with a thud in the centre of the hall. He called out, “Long-bearded old fellow, what is your name? You know my name, but I don’t know yours. That would be too unfair in a fight. I absolutely cannot afford to take such a disadvantage.” These words were half-sensical, half-nonsense. The long-bearded old man’s anger deepened, but seeing Xiaoxiangzi’s display of qinggong, man and chair soaring together, graceful and nimble, far from ordinary, his wariness deepened as well. The Valley Master said, “Tell him. It does not matter.”

The long-bearded old man said, “Very well. My surname is Fan, my given name Yiweng.¹ Please rise and display your skill.” Xiaoxiangzi said, “What weapon do you use? Bring it out first and let me see.” Fan Yiweng said, “You wish to contest weapons? Very well.” He stamped his right foot on the ground and called, “Bring it!” Two green-clad servant boys rushed into the inner chamber. When they emerged, they carried on their shoulders a dragon-headed steel staff, roughly one zhang and one chi in length. Yang Guo and the others were all startled. “Such a long and heavy weapon, how can this dwarf wield it?”

Xiaoxiangzi paid no attention. From beneath his long robe he produced an enormous pair of scissors. “Do you know what these scissors are used for?” he asked. The others, seeing the giant scissors, merely found them curious. But Yang Guo was greatly alarmed. He did not even need to reach into his clothing to check. The slight pressure against his back told him the large scissors in his pouch were gone. He thought, “These large scissors were forged for me by Blacksmith Feng. I meant to use them to cut Li Mochou²’s horsetail whisk. How did this living corpse steal them in the night without my noticing at all?”

Fan Yiweng took the steel staff and stamped it on the ground. The stone hall was extremely spacious. The staff’s impact sent out a humming reverberation, and the echoes from the four walls made the display all the more imposing.

Xiaoxiangzi picked up the scissors in his right hand. He had to stretch his fingers to their limit just to open and close them. He called out, “Hey, Short Beard, you don’t know the name of my precious shears. Shall I teach you?” Fan Yiweng said angrily, “A freakish, heretical weapon like that, what refined name could it possibly have?” Xiaoxiangzi laughed heartily. “Correct. The name is indeed inelegant. They are called the Dog-Fur Shears.” Yang Guo felt displeased. “A perfectly good pair of scissors, and you give them such an ugly name.” Xiaoxiangzi continued, “I knew long ago that there was a long-bearded freak here, so I specially commissioned these Dog-Fur Shears, to cut your beard.”

Ma Guangzuo and Nimoxing roared with laughter. Yin Kexi and Yang Guo could not help laughing aloud either. Only Jinlun Guoshi maintained solemn composure, sitting opposite the Valley Master. The two seemed not to have heard at all.

Fan Yiweng raised the steel staff and shook it slightly, stirring a gust of wind. He said, “My beard is indeed too long. If you wish to play the barber, nothing could be better. Please begin!”

Xiaoxiangzi raised his head and stared blankly at the crossbeam of the great hall, as though he had not heard a word. Suddenly his right arm shot out like lightning. With a snap, the great scissors went for the beard. Fan Yiweng had never imagined that, seated in his chair, the man would launch such a sudden attack. In the crisis, there was no time to dodge. He thrust the steel staff hard against the ground and vaulted upward, flipping over a zhang into the air, the staff still planted beneath him. Xiaoxiangzi’s attack had been launched with extreme speed. Fan Yiweng’s evasion had been equally swift. In that one cut and one dodge, the two masters had each revealed superior martial skill in a single instant. Yet Fan Yiweng had suffered from being caught off guard. Though he had avoided the shears, three strands of his beard had been snipped off by the scissor tips.

Xiaoxiangzi was enormously pleased with himself. He raised the beard strands in his left hand and blew. The three strands flew toward his own tea bowl on the table. With a crash, the tea bowl shattered on the floor. Yang Guo and the others all knew Xiaoxiangzi was merely showing off, what knocked over the tea bowl was the force of his breath. Ma Guangzuo, however, did not understand this principle and assumed the three beard strands, blown with such force, could produce such power. He shouted, “Xiaoxiangzi, your beard is mighty impressive!” Xiaoxiangzi laughed heartily. He opened and closed the scissors with a snap. “Short Beard, would you like to try my Dog-Fur Shears again?”

The others watched him laughing uproariously, yet the flesh of his face did not move at all. They grew increasingly astonished. “When neili is cultivated to the highest realm, one can indeed keep joy and anger from showing on the face, even reach a state beyond delight and displeasure. But for him to laugh with such obvious delight while his face remains so sinister and terrifying, we have never seen anything like it.” His face was simply too hideous. Everyone took only a single glance before turning away.

Fan Yiweng, repeatedly humiliated, blazed with fury. He bowed to the Valley Master and said, “Master, this disciple can no longer treat this man with the courtesy due a guest.” Yang Guo found it very strange. “This dwarf is far older than the Valley Master. Why does he address him as Master?” The Valley Master nodded slightly, his left hand making a gentle gesture. Fan Yiweng swung the steel staff. With a whoosh, it swept horizontally toward Xiaoxiangzi’s chair. Though his body was short, his strength was astonishing. As the staff, weighing over a hundred jin³, swung out, the wind howled fiercely.

Yang Guo and the others, though they had come with Xiaoxiangzi, did not truly know the depth of his martial skill. They watched intently as the two fought. The steel staff was less than half a chi from the chair leg when Xiaoxiangzi dropped his left arm and actually reached out to grab the staff’s tip. At the same time, he opened the scissors and again went for his opponent’s long beard. Fan Yiweng was enraged. “He despises me so!” He jerked his head to the side, flinging his beard clear, while the staff continued toward the hand. This blow struck the palm squarely. Everyone cried “Ah!” He rose to their feet simultaneously. All thought Xiaoxiangzi’s hand must have suffered grave injury. Yet Fan Yiweng felt the staff strike as though hitting water, soft and insubstantial. Knowing something was wrong, he hastily pulled back the staff. But Xiaoxiangzi had already flipped his wrist and seized the tip.

Fan Yiweng felt the opponent pulling and, driving the steel staff forward with a mighty thrust, sent such ferocious force through it that it seemed Xiaoxiangzi would surely be torn from his chair. But suddenly, man and chair soared upward together once more, veering left. The staff missed. Yet Xiaoxiangzi’s fingers had no choice but to release the tip. Fan Yiweng circled his left hand above his head. The staff traced an arc and swept down toward his opponent’s crown. Xiaoxiangzi, intent on showing off, leaped man and chair a full zhang into the air, actually clearing the staff entirely. The onlookers, seeing such a peculiar yet nimble display, as though being in the chair made no difference at all, could not help but cry out in admiration.

Fan Yiweng fought with total concentration. The steel staff howled as he wielded it. He knew that striking the man’s body would be extremely difficult, but if he could smash the chair, that would count as gaining the first advantage. But Xiaoxiangzi’s right-hand scissors kept snapping open and shut, never ceasing their attack on the long beard, while his left hand employed grappling techniques, seizing every opening to snatch the steel staff. Guoshi and the others were secretly alarmed. “Who would have thought this corpse-like freak possessed such remarkable skill.”

After several more exchanges, Fan Yiweng’s staff kept sweeping low along the ground. Xiaoxiangzi, man and chair together, leaped and dodged. The chair legs rose and fell with a rapid clatter, faster and faster. The Valley Master suddenly called out, “Stop attacking the chair, or you will not be able to handle him.” Fan Yiweng started, then understood. “With him seated in that chair, I can barely fight him to a draw. If his feet touch the ground, I fear in a few moves my beard will be cut off.” He changed his staff technique, whirling and thrusting with wild speed. A sphere of silver light now enveloped the long-bearded dwarf in green, while outside the silver light, a corpse-like figure in a chair bounced and leaped, a truly rare spectacle.

The Valley Master perceived that Xiaoxiangzi was deliberately toying with his opponent. If the fight continued, Fan Yiweng would certainly come to harm. He rose slowly from his seat and said, “Yiweng, you are no match for this master. Withdraw.” Fan Yiweng, hearing his shifu’s command, answered loudly, “Yes!” He thrust the steel staff forward and was about to pull back and leap clear when Xiaoxiangzi cried, “No, no!” His body shot from the chair and dove straight onto the steel staff. With a crack, the chair was smashed to splinters. But the staff was already caught in Xiaoxiangzi’s left hand, his left foot planted on it. At the same moment, the great scissors opened wide and caught Fan Yiweng’s chin beard between the blades. One snap, and this magnificent beard would be no more.

But Fan Yiweng had grown this long beard precisely as an exceedingly formidable soft weapon, used in the same manner as a soft whip, a cloud duster, or a chain hammer. With a slight shake of his head, the beard curled backward and slipped free of the scissor blades. It reversed and coiled around the scissors, and with a backward jerk of his head, a great force pulled the scissors upward. Xiaoxiangzi cried, “Ow! Old Dwarf, your beard is truly impressive. I concede to you.” One man’s long beard wrapped around the scissors, the other’s left hand gripped the steel staff. For a moment, neither could break free. Xiaoxiangzi laughed heartily, shouting, “Interesting! Interesting!”

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Suddenly, a grey figure flickered at the main entrance. A shadow darted in with astonishing speed, both palms thrusting toward Xiaoxiangzi’s back. The Valley Master shouted, “Who goes there?” Xiaoxiangzi released the staff with his left palm and swung back, bracing beneath the attacker’s elbow, instantly neutralizing the palm force. The attacker raged, “You wretched bastard! I’ll fight you to the death!”

Yang Guo and the others stared, utterly astonished, and cried out in unison: “Xiaoxiangzi!” The person who had burst in to attack was also Xiaoxiangzi. How could one man split into two? And why would he attack his own double? For a moment, no one could make sense of it.

Looking more carefully, they saw that the man entangled with Fan Yiweng was indeed wearing Xiaoxiangzi’s clothing, robes, shoes, hat, everything exactly the same. The face was corpse-like as well, but the features were entirely different from Xiaoxiangzi’s original appearance. The man who had entered later matched in features but wore the green shirt and trousers of the valley’s inhabitants. His hands were like bird claws as he clawed again at the scissor-wielding Xiaoxiangzi’s back, shouting, “Bastard! You struck from the shadows!”

Fan Yiweng, seeing a sudden ally appear, one dressed in the valley’s colours but a stranger nonetheless, withdrew his staff in surprise and stood aside. The two corpse-like figures traded blows with crashes and thuds.

By now, Yang Guo had figured it out. The man holding the scissors must have stolen his human-skin mask,⁴ put it on, and swapped clothes with Xiaoxiangzi, then slipped into the great hall to cause chaos. Because Xiaoxiangzi’s ordinary face already looked like a dead man’s, no one had noticed at first. Yang Guo often wore the human-skin mask himself, but he had never known what he looked like while wearing it. He had not dared to study Cheng Ying’s appearance in the mask closely either. Thus this man had fooled him completely. After watching intently for a moment, he recognised the martial arts of the scissor-wielding man and shouted, “Zhou Botong! Return my mask and scissors!” He leaped into the centre of the hall and reached to snatch the great scissors from his hand.

Footnotes

1. 樊一翁 – Fán Yīwēng. His name meaning “Fan, the one old man”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

2. 李莫愁 – Lǐ Mòchóu. Her name meaning “do not sorrow”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 斤 – jīn. Traditional Chinese unit of weight, approximately 500 grams or 1.1 pounds. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 人皮面具 – Human-skin mask. Rénpí miànjù. Disguise mask crafted to look like real human skin, capable of transforming the wearer’s appearance completely. Huang Yaoshi is known for crafting these. Yang Guo received his from Cheng Ying. ↩