The Return of the Condor Heroes Chapter 7 – Part 3

“And then what?” asked Xiaolongnü. “Did you just let it go?”

“What then?” said Li Mochou. “Once a man’s heart has turned, a thousand horses won’t drag him back! Even if you held a steel dao to his throat and forced him back to your side, he’d only fake his feelings and fool you a while longer with sweet talk, and what joy is there in that? The men of this world, every last one of them, love the new and cast off the old, and change their hearts at the next pretty face. Be you a fairy come down from heaven, with a thousand charms and a hundred graces, you still could never keep him true to you for ever and ever. Little shimei,¹ this man, he’s truly willing to die for you. A man like that, I’ve dreamed of him morning and night, praying only for the luck to meet one. Idiot or ugly monster, I’d have loved him with all my heart. Shimei, and you’ve found one. You’re truly blessed! I don’t envy you Shifu passing you the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra. I only envy you for finding such a good disciple.”

“Li shibo,”² Yang Guo said loudly, “I’m the lucky one, to have found such a good shifu!” Li Mochou sighed. “You’re both lucky. It’s just a pity you’re so young, and must spend the rest of your lives in this ancient tomb where the sun never shines, and never see the bright, gaudy world outside again. You’ll regret it one day.”

“Never,” Yang Guo protested loudly, “never! If I ever feel the least regret, let her cut me down with one stroke of her jian. I won’t run.” Xiaolongnü looked at him with gentle tenderness and soothed him. “Don’t fret, Guoer. I believe that with me, you’ll never regret it.” Yang Guo reached out and took her hand. As palm met palm their hearts became one, and each knew to the depths that in this life they would never betray the other. They gazed at each other. The light in the stone chamber was dim, yet it felt as if they had spoken a thousand words, a hundred thousand, pledging their love to each other, and there was no fear that either would ever change.

Li Mochou sighed. “Shimei, you’re a young girl. You don’t know how wicked men’s hearts are, and no one can blame you for that. Today your shijie³ will teach you a move to protect yourself. Shifu would never have taught you this one, because she never left the stone tomb and didn’t understand it herself.” Hearing how gravely she spoke, Xiaolongnü said, “Thank you, Shijie, for your teaching.”

“If one day your man’s manner towards you suddenly changes,” said Li Mochou, “if he was once all fondness, loving you to distraction, and then all of a sudden he turns distant and polite, that means his heart has changed. You may not see it at first, but you must be doubly on your guard. Watch for any telltale sign, and on no account let him get away with it.”

“We’re only ever here in this stone tomb,” said Xiaolongnü. “What telltale signs could there be? Shijie, thank you for telling me what happened to you. But I’ll have no use for it, because in a thousand years, in ten thousand years, his heart will never change towards me.”

A pang of bitterness went through Li Mochou’s heart. “That’s wonderful,” she went on. “Then you ought to go down the mountain and enjoy yourselves to the full. Out in the bright, gaudy world the two of you could roost together and fly together, and the pleasures and delights would truly never end.” Xiaolongnü raised her head and gazed into space for a while. “Yes,” she said softly. “But it’s too late now.” “Why?” said Li Mochou. “The Dragon-Breaking Stones are already down,” said Xiaolongnü. “Even if Shifu came back to life, we could never get out again.” Li Mochou had humbled herself and talked at length, hoping to rouse Xiaolongnü’s will to live, so that with her knowledge of the ancient tomb’s layout she might find a way out. And in the end it was all hopeless. She thought of how she had been betrayed, how her lover’s heart had turned, and how now, at the last, she was trapped in the ancient tomb to be buried alive. Fury and desperation overwhelmed her, and the urge to kill rose in a rush. With a slight turn of the wrist she raised her palm and brought it down at the crown of Xiaolongnü’s head.

Yang Guo saw Li Mochou suddenly strike to kill. In his panic he dropped into a crouch without thinking, gave a great croak, and thrust out both palms: the Toad Skill⁴ that Ouyang Feng⁵ had taught him. He had learned it as a child and had never once practised it since entering the ancient tomb, but it was stamped deep in his mind, and at the moment of greatest danger it came out unbidden. Li Mochou’s palm was about to land when she felt a fierce gust of palm force bearing down on her from the side, and she hurriedly swung her palm down to block. Yang Guo had trained in the ancient tomb for two years and his neili had grown enormously. That had nothing to do with the Toad Skill, but the force behind his push was still far beyond anything it had been before. With a thud he sent Li Mochou flying backwards. She slammed into the stone wall, and pain tore through her spine.

Li Mochou flew into a rage. She rubbed her palms together, and at once the little room filled with a rank, fishy stench that turned the stomach. Xiaolongnü knew Yang Guo’s blow just now had landed only by luck. If her shijie unleashed her truly deadly Scarlet Serpent Divine Palm,⁶ she and Yang Guo together could never withstand it. At once she seized Yang Guo by the arm and darted out through the door.

Li Mochou swung her palm, but her hand was still in mid-air when a slap caught her on the left cheek. It did not hurt, but it rang out sharp and clear, and she heard Xiaolongnü cry, “You wanted to learn the skill of the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra. Here it is!” In the instant Li Mochou stood stunned, another slap landed on her right cheek. She had always known that the martial arts of Shifu’s Jade Maiden Heart Sutra were deadly beyond measure. Now Xiaolongnü’s hands came at incredible speed, shifting and changing past all reckoning, plainly in the manner of their own school’s martial arts, and yet with mysteries she could not fathom at all. This could only be the skill of the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra, and her nerve failed her on the spot. She could only stand and watch as her shimei led Yang Guo by the hand into another room and shut the door. She stood there still, rubbing her cheeks, and thought, At least she held back. If she’d put force into those two blows, would I still be alive? What she did not know was that the skill of the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra sought speed, surprise and ferocity. Xiaolongnü’s palm technique was superb, but the force behind her palms was not usually enough to injure anyone.

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Yang Guo was delighted to see his shifu slap Li Mochou twice, neat and clean. “Aunt, with the skill of the Heart Sutra, Li Mochou’s no match for it…” Before he could finish he saw Xiaolongnü shaking uncontrollably, as though she could not stop herself. “Aunt,” he cried in alarm, “what’s… you…” “I… I’m so cold…” said Xiaolongnü, her voice trembling. Light as the force of those two blows had been, it was the true power of internal cultivation she had put into them, and with her strength not yet recovered from her grave wound, the effort had done her no little harm. All her life she had trained on the Cold Jade Bed,⁷ and cold was the very root of her. Now that her control was gone, it was as though she had plunged into black ice ten thousand fathoms deep. The cold pierced her to the bone, and her teeth would not stop chattering. “What do I do?” Yang Guo kept crying, frantic. In desperation he wrapped her tight in his arms, hoping the warmth of his own body would help her fight the cold. But he had held her only a little while when he felt her growing colder and colder, until soon he himself could barely bear it.

Xiaolongnü felt her neili ebbing away, drop by drop. “Guoer,” she said, “I’m finished. You… carry me to… to the room where the stone coffins are.” Yang Guo was heartbroken and could not speak. But then it came to him that neither of them had more than a few days to live anyway, so to die with her now would be all the same. “All right,” he said cheerfully. He carried her into the chamber of the stone coffins, laid her on the ground beside one of them, and lit a candle. In the candlelight the stone coffin looked massive and heavy, and Xiaolongnü all the more slight and frail.

“Push open the lid of this… this stone coffin,” said Xiaolongnü, “and put me inside.” “All right!” said Yang Guo. Xiaolongnü heard no grief in his voice and thought it a little strange. Yang Guo pushed back the lid, lifted her and laid her gently inside. Then at once he jumped into the coffin himself and lay down beside her, head by head. The two of them were squeezed in so tight that neither could turn.

Xiaolongnü was glad and puzzled at once. “What are you doing?” she asked. “Staying with you, of course,” said Yang Guo. “Those two wicked women can have the other coffin.” Xiaolongnü let out a long sigh. Her heart was at peace, and the cold in her body was no longer as fierce as before. She turned her eyes to Yang Guo and found his gaze already fixed on her. She nestled against him, and her heart burned hot. Yang Guo put his arm round her and held her close.

Xiaolongnü felt a little shy. In Yang Guo’s arms the cold was quite gone. She turned her head away, not daring to look at him, and for a long while her thoughts were in a whirl. Then she noticed what seemed to be writing on the inside of the coffin lid. She looked hard, and there they were, sixteen large characters:

The Jade Maiden Heart Sutra would outdo Quanzhen; Chongyang, all his life, was no man’s inferior.⁸

The sixteen characters were written in thick ink, in bold, powerful strokes, and were very large. The lid was only half pushed back, but looking sideways she could still see them perfectly clearly. “Huh?” said Xiaolongnü. “What does that mean?” Yang Guo followed her eyes to the sixteen characters, thought for a moment and said, “Did Wang Chongyang write that?” “It looks like his hand,” said Xiaolongnü. “He seems to be saying that our Jade Maiden Heart Sutra hoped to beat Quanzhen martial arts, but that he himself was in fact no weaker than our founding matriarch. Is that it?” Yang Guo laughed. “The ox-nosed⁹ old Daoist is boasting.” When Xiaolongnü looked at the sixteen characters again, she saw that many smaller characters were written after them. But they were small, and at the far end of the lid, and lying at this end she could not make them out. “Guoer, get out,” she said. Yang Guo shook his head. “I’m not getting out.” Xiaolongnü smiled. “Get out for a moment, and then come back in and keep me company.” Only then did Yang Guo climb out of the stone coffin.

Xiaolongnü sat up, asked Yang Guo to pass her the candlestick, turned round and lay down at the other end to read the small characters. She read them through slowly, one by one, twice over. Then all at once the strength went out of her hand. The candlestick wobbled and fell on her chest. Yang Guo snatched it up and helped her out of the coffin. “What is it? What do the characters say?”

Xiaolongnü’s face looked strange. She steadied herself for a moment before she sighed and said, “So after our founding matriarch died, Wang Chongyang came back to the ancient tomb.” “What did he come for?” asked Yang Guo. “To mourn her and make offerings,” said Xiaolongnü. “He saw the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra she had left on the ceiling of the stone chamber, and found that it had broken every single one of the Quanzhen martial arts. So he wrote on the underside of this coffin lid that what our founding matriarch had broken were only the crude, shallow martial arts of Quanzhen. Set beside the highest Quanzhen skills, what was the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra worth?”

“Pah,” said Yang Guo. “Our founding matriarch is dead anyway. He can say whatever he likes.” “He wrote something else too,” said Xiaolongnü. “He has left the way to break the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra in another stone chamber, and those who come after, if fate allows, will understand it at a glance.” Yang Guo’s curiosity was roused. “Aunt, let’s go and look.” “Wang Chongyang’s last words say that the chamber lies beneath this one,” said Xiaolongnü. “I’ve lived here all my life, and I never knew there was such a room.” “Aunt,” Yang Guo begged, “let’s find a way down and have a look.”

Footnotes

1. 师妹 – shīmèi. Female junior. Both apprenticed to the same shifu. Shī means teacher. Mèi means younger sister. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

2. 师伯 – shībó. Senior lineage uncle. Shixiong or shijie of one’s shifu. Shī means teacher. Bó means father’s elder brother. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 师姐 – shījiě. Female senior. Both apprenticed to the same shifu. Shī means teacher. Jiě means older sister. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 蛤蟆功 – Hámá Gōng. Literally Toad Skill. Ouyang Feng’s supreme neili technique, storing and releasing explosive power like a toad’s sudden leap. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 欧阳锋 – Ōuyáng Fēng. His name meaning “blade” or “cutting edge”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 赤练神掌 – Chìliàn Shénzhǎng. Literally Scarlet Serpent Divine Palm. Li Mochou’s palm technique, infused with poison. ↩

7. 寒玉床 – Hán Yù Chuáng. Bed carved from rare deep-cold jade found by Lin Chaoying. Training on it greatly accelerates neili cultivation by forcing the practitioner to circulate qi constantly to resist the cold. ↩

8. Sixteen-character couplet (玉女心经，欲胜全真。重阳一生，不弱于人). Wang Chongyang’s declaration that while the Jade Maiden Heart Sutra seeks to surpass Quanzhen martial arts, he himself was never weaker than anyone. An expression of the lifelong rivalry between Wang Chongyang and Lin Chaoying. ↩

9. 牛鼻子 – niú bízi. Literally ox-nose, a derogatory term for Daoist priests, alluding to the topknot that resembles an ox’s nose. ↩