The Return of the Condor Heroes Chapter 6 – Part 3
Translation by Jenxi Seow
As Xiaolongnü grew older, she became ever more exquisitely beautiful, peerless in her purity. By this year, Yang Guo was already sixteen. His frame had grown taller, his voice deeper, he was now a handsome youth, no longer the child who had first entered the ancient tomb. But Xiaolongnü had grown accustomed to him and still treated him as a child. Yang Guo was deeply respectful towards his shifu. In two years, he had not once acted against her wishes. The moment Xiaolongnü thought of something she wanted done, he would have already rushed to do it before she could even speak. Yang Guo also constantly took the initiative to cook and boil water, doing his utmost to spare his shifu any toil. Xiaolongnü’s cold, icy nature remained the same as ever. She was sparing with her smiles towards him, her expression indifferent, as if she felt not the slightest familial affection. Yang Guo, however, did not mind. Sometimes Xiaolongnü would play a tune on the zither, the melody calm and placid. Yang Guo would sit quietly at the side and listen.
One day, in the narrow chamber, Yang Guo had reached the point where he could force down all eighty-one released sparrows one by one, trapping them in a cluster from which they could not scatter. The qinggong of the “Heaven’s Net Stance” that Xiaolongnü had taught him was also largely mastered, only his internal power was still insufficient, so he could not yet fly forward and back with godlike ease, nor strike with lightning speed. Xiaolongnü said, “Good! Guoer, you have trained very well. Let us go outside to practise.” The moment Yang Guo heard the words “go outside,” his eyes lit up and his face glowed.
The two emerged from the tomb. Xiaolongnü and Yang Guo each used the “Heaven’s Net Stance” to force down the flying sparrows. Some flew too high and, seeing no way to reach them, they let them go. Sometimes a sparrow was too nimble and Xiaolongnü could not force it down. Yang Guo would then dart forward and lend a hand, and with their combined efforts they would force the sparrow down. Xiaolongnü said happily, “That’s right, Guoer. What we have trained so far is only the first and second layers of the Ancient Tomb School’s martial arts. From the third layer onward, many of the skills are for the two of us to join hands against an enemy.”
Yang Guo was overjoyed. He flipped backwards in a somersault and said, “Gugu, if I could join hands with you to fight those bull-noses and wipe out the Quanzhen Order, I would die happy!” Xiaolongnü said, “The Quanzhen Order cannot be wiped out. Those bull-noses did nothing more than cause Granny Sun’s death, they haven’t done any other evil. We will only settle accounts with Hao Datong alone. My shifu said that those bull-noses travel the jianghu performing chivalrous deeds, helping those in danger and relieving those in distress. They have done many good deeds, they can be counted among the chivalrous.” Yang Guo said, “There are always plenty of villains in the jianghu. The two of us can join hands against enemies and fight the villains.” Xiaolongnü said, “Let villains be villains on their own, it’s no concern of ours. The two of us here in this ancient tomb, free and at ease, villains cannot harm us.”
Hearing his shifu speak as if she intended to spend the rest of her life in the ancient tomb, Yang Guo felt unbearably stifled. He was about to argue back when he suddenly registered Xiaolongnü’s words: “the two of us here in this ancient tomb, free and at ease.” He thought to himself: “Gugu is willing to let me stay with her in this ancient tomb for all my life, never to be parted. She said ‘free and at ease’, it seems she doesn’t dislike the idea of me keeping her company for a lifetime. That would be wonderful.” The words burst from his mouth: “Gugu, I am willing to stay with you in this ancient tomb for all my life. You promised Granny Sun, you will never, ever send me away!” Xiaolongnü smiled faintly. “That depends on whether you behave.”
Yang Guo said, “Of course I’ll behave. I’ll listen to you forever and ever, so you’ll never bear to send me away.” Xiaolongnü said, “Do you think you’re so precious? Why would I be unable to bear sending you away? After you leave, I’ll take in a female disciple and won’t be lonely.” Yang Guo said, “Female disciples are stupid and naughty!” Suddenly a fear gripped his heart, and sorrow welled up from within. He threw himself onto the grass and wept. “Gugu, when I grow up, you still mustn’t send me away. If I’m naughty, you can beat me, you can kill me, but I would rather die than leave you!” He wept louder and louder. His emotions were in turmoil, and his crying was almost deliberately petulant.
He had only wept twice before, when he first entered the ancient tomb and when Granny Sun died. Since then he had never cried. Xiaolongnü could never have expected that just a few words would make him burst into loud sobs. Flustered, she said, “Don’t cry, don’t cry! I’m not sending you away.” Yang Guo said, “Then you must never frighten me again by saying you’ll send me away.” Xiaolongnü said, “The moment you hear the words ‘go outside,’ your face lights up with joy. I thought you must be terribly bored in the ancient tomb.” Yang Guo said, “Staying with you, I’m not the least bit bored, on the contrary, I’m very happy. If you won’t let me stay with you, I’ll take a sword and kill myself.” Xiaolongnü’s face hardened. “As long as you behave and listen to me, that’s enough. You are not to threaten me with suicide. If I wanted to send you away, whether you live or die would be no concern of mine, threats are useless.” Hearing her say “whether you live or die would be no concern of mine”, words so cold and heartless, Yang Guo could not help but throw himself down and weep again. Xiaolongnü said, “You’re not a little baby anymore, crying at the slightest thing. Is that behaving or not?”
Yang Guo flipped up to his feet. “Gugu, I won’t cry anymore!” He saw a pair of white butterflies fluttering past together and immediately leapt forward, his palms tracing a circle, catching one butterfly in each hand. Butterflies in flight are far slower than sparrows. With Yang Guo’s current qinggong and hand techniques, catching butterflies was as easy as reaching out to take them. Xiaolongnü said, “These butterflies are so lovely, don’t hurt them.” Yang Guo said, “Yes!” He opened his palms and let the butterflies flutter away. The tears on his cheeks were still not dry. He wiped them away with his sleeve and said with a smile, “Soaring Through the Azure Sky!”
That evening after the two had eaten dinner, Yang Guo cleared away the bowls and chopsticks. In the kitchen he washed the bowls, dishes, and chopsticks clean, set them on the wooden rack to dry, and washed the wok and pot as well. He returned to the Cold Jade Bed and lay down, cultivating his neili according to the method Xiaolongnü had taught him. By this time Xiaolongnü still slept in the same chamber as him. Sometimes when Yang Guo encountered difficulties in his neigong, he would cry out, and Xiaolongnü could immediately give guidance, preventing his internal breath from going astray during moments of extreme cold or extreme heat. Day and night the two faced each other with solemn respect, neither harbouring any thought of male and female. It had not occurred to Xiaolongnü to sleep in a separate chamber.
That night, after Xiaolongnü had washed her face, hands, and feet, she entered the bedchamber, hung up the long rope, and climbed onto it to sleep. Yang Guo completed one cycle of the internal technique his shifu had taught him and was just about to close his eyes when he suddenly saw Xiaolongnü’s pair of slender white feet turn on the rope, she must have rolled over. Yang Guo was used to seeing this and had always been unmoved. But today, after weeping and wailing over whether Xiaolongnü would send him away or not, his emotions were stirred. Seeing those white feet, he found them indescribably lovely and thought to himself: “If I just behave obediently, Gugu won’t send me away. If I can spend my whole life here gazing at her pair of little white feet, then my whole life will be happy.” His thoughts wandered for a moment, then he dared not think further and fell asleep.
He did not know how much time had passed when he suddenly felt a surge of heat in his chest, slowly moving downward towards his lower abdomen. Suddenly he saw a pair of white butterflies dancing before his eyes, now up, now down, now left, now right. Yang Guo watched for a while, finding it delightful. He leapt up sharply, stretched out both palms, and used the “Heaven’s Net Stance.” His right palm blocked high while his left hand gently caught one white butterfly, then his right palm darted forward and caught the other. He felt an icy coldness in his hands. The two white butterflies had soft bodies, but they were shockingly cold. After a moment, he felt the two butterflies gradually grow warm and tremble slightly. Yang Guo was afraid of hurting the butterflies and loosened his grip gently, not daring to hold tight, yet afraid the butterflies would fly away, so he still held them loosely, not letting go. Suddenly he felt the two butterflies lunge and slip out of his palms. A voice shouted, “Guoer, what are you doing?”
Yang Guo started awake and immediately realised that both his hands were gripping his gugu’s two feet, and that he was standing on the ground before the long rope on which Xiaolongnü lay sleeping. Horrified, he leapt back onto the bed with a crash, landing on the Cold Jade Bed. His voice trembling, he said, “Gu… Gugu… I’m… I’m sorry. I was dreaming, I caught a pair of white butterflies, but… but it turned out I had caught your feet. I… I really didn’t do it on purpose…” The cold air rose from the Cold Jade Bed, and in his panic he did not think to circulate his energy to resist it. Immediately he was so cold his teeth chattered, clacking audibly, and his body shivered.
Xiaolongnü said, “Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid! As long as you didn’t do it on purpose, it’s all right.” She gently patted his chest. Yang Guo felt a stream of warm energy surge towards his “Shanzhong” acupoint,1 and gradually his whole body grew warm. He calmed down and circulated his own energy to resist the cold. Xiaolongnü climbed back onto the rope to sleep, bending her knees and tucking her feet inside her skirt, so that Yang Guo could no longer see her bare feet.
The next day, afraid that Yang Guo would dream again, Xiaolongnü hung the rope in the adjacent stone chamber and slept there instead. Yang Guo pleaded, “Gugu, I swear I won’t dare to dream of catching you again. I’ll tie up my own hands. If I dream again, you can cut me with your sword, the moment I feel pain, I’ll wake up.” Xiaolongnü said, “I can see you truly didn’t do it on purpose, so I forgive you. Your energy cultivation has already made progress, you won’t easily suffer a deviation now. Just be careful on your own.” Yang Guo dared not plead further. After this, he trained with redoubled caution, and indeed nothing happened.
One day Xiaolongnü said, “You have now learned all of our Ancient Tomb School’s martial arts. Tomorrow we shall begin training in the martial arts of the Quanzhen Order. The skills of those Quanzhen old Daoists are not easy to train. Back then, even my shifu did not fully understand them, and I have grasped even less. We shall start from the beginning together. If my interpretations are wrong, you must speak up.”
The next day, master and disciple went to the first strangely shaped stone chamber and began training according to the symbolic formulae and diagrams that Wang Chongyang had carved into the ceiling all those years ago.
Yang Guo trained for several days. By now his martial foundation was already far from shallow, and he was naturally intelligent, many points he grasped the moment they were explained. At first his progress was extremely rapid. But after ten-odd days, he suddenly went several days in a row without advancing, on the contrary, he regressed. The more he trained, the more awkward it felt.
Xiaolongnü analysed and discussed it with him, but she too felt beset by difficulties. She said, “When I studied the Quanzhen martial arts with my shifu, we had not trained long before we could advance no further. By then Founding Grandmaster was no longer in this world, and there was nowhere to turn for guidance. We knew clearly that it was because we had not obtained the essential oral formulae, but there was nothing we could do. I once said I would go to the Quanzhen Order to steal the formulae, but my shifu gave me a severe scolding. This skill was set aside after that. After all, it’s only Quanzhen martial arts, it doesn’t matter if we don’t train them. This matter is not difficult. We only need to catch a Quanzhen Daoist, keep rapping him on the head, and force him to teach us the introductory formulae. That will do. Come with me.”
These words sparked something in Yang Guo. He suddenly recalled the “Song of the Great Way of Quanzhen” that Zhao Zhijing had taught him, which contained the lines: “When first cultivating the Great Way, penetrate the nine orifices. The nine orifices originate at the Tail Gate acupoint. First surge upward from the Bubbling Spring at the sole. From Bubbling Spring surge gradually to the knee. Past the knee, slowly reach the Tail Gate. At the Mud Pill summit, whirl back swiftly. Through the Golden Lock pass, descend the Magpie Bridge. Past the Twelve-Storied Tower, descend to the palace chamber.” He recited these lines aloud.