The Return of the Condor Heroes Chapter 7 – Part 7

Ouyang Feng talked on for a while, then glanced round and caught sight of Xiaolongnü sitting to one side. “Oh no, that won’t do,” he cried. “Mustn’t let that little girl shifu of yours listen in.” He went up to Xiaolongnü. “Hey, little girl, I’m teaching my boy martial arts. No listening in.” “What’s so rare about your skills?” said Xiaolongnü. “Who wants to listen?” Ouyang Feng cocked his head and thought. “Fine. Then go a long way off.” Xiaolongnü leaned against a flowering tree. “Why should I do as you say?” she said coldly. “I’ll go if I like, and stay if I like.” Ouyang Feng flew into a rage. His beard and brows bristled like halberds, and he reached out to claw at her face, but Xiaolongnü acted as if she had not seen and paid him no heed at all. “Father,” Yang Guo shouted, “don’t be rude to my shifu.” Ouyang Feng drew back his hand. “All right, all right. Then we’ll go a long way off. But will you come after us and listen?”

Xiaolongnü thought Guoer’s adoptive father an utter rogue and could not be bothered with him any more. She turned her head away and did not answer. Then, without warning, a numbness struck her back. Ouyang Feng had shot out his long arm and jabbed a finger into an acupoint there. The move was astonishingly fast, and Xiaolongnü was completely off her guard. By the time she knew it and tried to fight back, her upper body would no longer turn. Ouyang Feng jabbed again, at her waist, and laughed. “Don’t fret, little girl. When I’ve finished teaching my boy, I’ll come and let you go.” And off he went, laughing.

Yang Guo was silently committing to memory the Toad Skill and the Nine Yin Manual his adoptive father was handing down. The formulae Ouyang Feng gave seemed a little tangled and muddled, all at sixes and sevens, yet beyond any doubt there were many wonderful uses in them. He was so deep in thought that he had no idea Xiaolongnü had been attacked. Ouyang Feng came and took him by the hand. “Let’s go over there, so your little shifu can’t listen in.” Yang Guo thought, Aunt would never listen in. Even if you insisted on teaching her, she’d never agree to learn. But his adoptive father’s mind was unhinged, and there was no need to argue with him, so he followed him a long way off.

Xiaolongnü lay limp on the ground, exasperated and amused at once. Her martial arts, she thought, had been trained deep, but she was short of experience against an enemy, and so after falling to Li Mochou’s ambush she had now been taken by surprise by this bearded oddball. Quietly she worked the divine skill of the Nine Yin Manual to open her acupoints, holding her breath first by the method, hoping to free the acupoints and meridians. But the two sealed points not only showed no sign of loosening, they grew still more sore and numb, and she was badly frightened. Ouyang Feng’s technique ran exactly counter to the Nine Yin Manual, so that when she tried to break it with Wang Chongyang’s method, the harder she sought release the tighter it held. She tried a few times, felt a dull ache where she had been struck, and dared not try again. That madman, she thought, would come and free her himself once he had finished his teaching. Nothing in the world ever weighed on her mind, so she did not fret. She lay looking up at the stars for a while, lost in thought, then shut her eyes and fell asleep.

A long while later she felt something lightly touch her eyes. She could see by night as well as by day, yet now she could see nothing at all: someone had bound her eyes with cloth. Then she felt someone put their arms around her. At first the embrace was very timid, but little by little it grew bolder and more unrestrained. Xiaolongnü was terrified. She tried to open her mouth and cry out, but her lips and tongue would not move. She felt the stranger’s mouth seek hers, kissing her cheeks. At first she thought it was Ouyang Feng suddenly using force on her. But when their faces touched, his face felt smooth, nothing like Ouyang Feng’s bristling beard. Her heart stirred. The fear slowly left her, and desire rose in its place. She thought, So it’s Yang Guo, the boy, come to tease me. His hands grew more and more forward, and slowly he loosened her clothes and sash. Xiaolongnü could not move and could only let him do as he would, startled and glad and shy all at once. She felt how tenderly, how lovingly Yang Guo held her, and wished only that the two of them might melt into one. Her soul drifted, and body and heart were drunk.

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Ouyang Feng saw that Yang Guo was very clever. He could not take in everything in the formulae he was taught, but he got them by heart quickly, and Ouyang Feng was delighted. The more he talked the higher his spirits rose, and he talked on until it was broad daylight before he had finished setting out the essentials of the two great marvels. Yang Guo went over them silently for a long while, then said, “I’ve studied the Nine Yin Manual too, but it’s quite different from what you’re telling me. I wonder why.” “Nonsense,” said Ouyang Feng. “What other Nine Yin Manual is there besides this one?” “For instance,” said Yang Guo, “in training the art of Transforming the Sinews and Forging the Bones,¹ you say the third step is to send blood and qi running backwards to burst through the Celestial Pillar acupoint. But my shifu says you must hold your mind on the dantian² and pass through the Portal Gate acupoint.” Ouyang Feng shook his head. “Wrong, wrong… Mm, hold on…” He tried it as Yang Guo said, and at once his neili spread out freely, and the whole feel of it was quite different. He could never have guessed that the text Guo Jing had written out for him had been turned upside down and altered. His mind fell into utter confusion, and he muttered to himself, “What’s this? Am I wrong, or is your little girl shifu wrong? How can such a thing be? I… who am I?”

Yang Guo saw his eyes staring fixed and empty, like a man whose soul has left him. He called him several times and got no answer, and was very worried that his madness was about to break out again. He remembered how his adoptive father could not recall his own name, and how that day Auntie Guo had deliberately called him “Zhao Qian Sun Li, Zhou Wu Chen Wang, Feng Zheng Chu Wei, Jiang Shen Han Yang”,³ plainly to scramble his thoughts. His adoptive father had been sorely troubled by it. Later Yang Guo had heard Guo Jing and his wife talking about him behind his back, calling him Ouyang Feng, and had always meant to remind him, but at the time one thing after another had come crowding in and he had never had the chance. So now he said, “Father, your name is Ouyang Feng. Do you remember now?”

Ouyang Feng gave a sudden start. A light flashed through his mind, and a great many things from the past came flooding back all at once. He roared with laughter and leapt to his feet. “Yes, yes, who is Ouyang Feng?… Ha ha, Ouyang Feng!” He snapped off a branch and launched into his Serpent Staff⁴ technique, whirling it till the air howled. “Ouyang Feng is the greatest… Ouyang Feng is the first martial artist under heaven…” he bellowed. “Ouyang Feng’s martial arts are mighty, he fears nobody! Ha ha! Ha ha!” And paying Yang Guo no more heed, he was gone like a gust of wind.

Yang Guo was about to go after him when he heard a sudden rustle behind a tree several dozen feet away. At once he thought of his aunt. A figure flashed past, and among the flowers and bushes he caught a glimpse of the corner of an indigo Daoist robe. This was a lonely spot where hardly anyone came. How could a stranger be here? And the figure was moving so stealthily, it plainly meant no good. His suspicions flared, and he dashed after it. The figure was fleeing fast, and from behind Yang Guo could see it was an Adept. “Hey, who’s that?” he shouted. “Stop right there!” He called up his qinggong and raced in pursuit.

At the shout the Adept ran faster still. Yang Guo put on a little more strength and shot forward like an arrow, caught him by the shoulder and wrenched him round. It was Zhen Zhibing.⁵ His robe and cap were in disarray, and his face kept turning red and then white. “What were you up to?” Yang Guo demanded. By now Zhen Zhibing had been made senior of the third generation of Quanzhen disciples. His martial arts were high and his bearing was usually most dignified, but for some reason now his face was full of panic and he could not get a word out. Seeing him so badly frightened, Yang Guo remembered how resolutely he had sworn his oath that day. He was not such a bad fellow after all, and Yang Guo let go of him. “If nothing’s wrong, then off you go!” he said kindly. Zhen Zhibing looked back several times as he hurried away in a fluster.

Yang Guo laughed to himself. That Daoist looks as if he’s lost his soul. What a joke. He went back to the huts. Among the flowering trees he saw Xiaolongnü’s two bare feet sticking out, quite still, as though she were asleep. “Aunt!” Yang Guo called twice. There was no answer. He pushed into the bushes and found Xiaolongnü lying on the ground with a strip of dark blue cloth over her eyes.

Yang Guo was a little surprised. He pulled the cloth from her eyes and saw a very strange look in them. A flush had risen to her cheeks, and she was shy beyond words. “Aunt,” he asked, “who tied this cloth over your eyes?” Xiaolongnü did not answer, but there was a faint reproach in her eyes. Yang Guo saw that her body was limp, as if her acupoints had been sealed. He reached out and gave her a tug, and sure enough she could not move. He thought for a moment and saw at once how it was. It must have been my adoptive father, sealing her with his Reverse-Force technique. Otherwise, however strong the sealing, Aunt could have freed herself. Following the method Ouyang Feng had just taught him, he opened her acupoints.

When her acupoints had been sealed, Xiaolongnü’s whole body had of course been limp. But now that Yang Guo had freed them, she still leaned softly against him, as though every bone in her body had melted. Yang Guo put an arm round her shoulders. “Aunt,” he said gently, “my adoptive father does everything topsy-turvy. Don’t stoop to his level.” Xiaolongnü hid her face against his chest. “You’re the topsy-turvy one,” she said, sweet and clinging. “Shameless, and still talking about other people!” Yang Guo saw how differently she was behaving from her usual self, and it flustered him a little. “Aunt, I… I…” Xiaolongnü raised her head. “Still calling me Aunt?” she said crossly. Yang Guo was more flustered than ever, and the words came out of their own accord. “If I don’t call you Aunt, what am I to call you? Do you want me to call you Shifu?” Xiaolongnü gave a faint smile. “After what you did to me, how can I still be your shifu?” Yang Guo was astonished. “What… what did I do?”

Xiaolongnü pushed up her sleeve and bared an arm like a snow-white lotus root. It was pure as jade, without the slightest blemish. The crimson dot of Guardian Palace Sand that had always been there was gone.⁶ “Look,” she said shyly. Yang Guo could make neither head nor tail of it. He scratched his ear. “Aunt, I don’t understand.” “I told you,” said Xiaolongnü crossly, “you’re not to call me Aunt any more.” She saw the dismay on Yang Guo’s face, and an unspeakable tenderness welled up in her. “In our Ancient Tomb School,” she said softly, “from generation to generation it has always been maiden passing on to maiden. My shifu put this Guardian Palace Sand on me. Last night… after what you did to me last night, how could the Guardian Palace Sand still be on my arm?” “What did I do to you last night?” said Yang Guo. Xiaolongnü blushed. “Don’t talk about it.” After a while she said softly, “Before, I was afraid to go down the mountain. But it’s different now. Wherever you go, I’ll follow you gladly.”

Yang Guo was overjoyed. “Aunt, that’s wonderful,” he cried. Xiaolongnü’s face grew grave. “Why do you still call me Aunt? Don’t you truly care for me?” When he gave no answer, she grew anxious. “What am I to you?” she asked, her voice shaking. “You’re my shifu,” Yang Guo said with all sincerity. “You’ve cared for me and taught me. I swore I’d honour and revere you all my life and do as you say.” “Don’t you think of me as your wife?” said Xiaolongnü loudly.

Yang Guo had never once thought of such a thing. Asked so suddenly, he was thrown into confusion and had no idea what to answer. “No, no!” he stammered. “You can’t be my wife. How could I be worthy of you? You’re my shifu, you’re my aunt.”

The night before, Ouyang Feng had sealed Xiaolongnü’s acupoints, and while she lay unable to move, someone had violated her. She was a maiden and knew nothing of such things, and since there had been no one else about at the time, she took it for certain that it was Yang Guo. Feeling for him had long been growing in her heart in secret, so she had not resisted. Since Yang Guo had done this to her, she thought, he must have made up his mind to take her as his love for life, and given up thinking of her as his aunt and his shifu. The two of them would have to swear eternal vows by mountain and sea, and become husband and wife from that day on, and change the names and the bond of “Aunt” and “Shifu”. Would he call her “Sister Long”, she wondered, or the coarser “wife”? And she did not know what she would call him either. Should she call him “husband” now?

Her head was full of these sweet reckonings when she heard him still calling her “Aunt”. And when, blushing with shame, she had spoken of the Guardian Palace Sand, he had been cold and offhand, as if last night’s intimacy meant nothing to him at all. To her it was a thing that mattered more than life or death, yet he did not care. Plainly he set no great store by their love. All at once she remembered what her shijie⁷ had said before: “If one day your man’s manner towards you suddenly changes, 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 must be doubly on your guard, and watch for every telltale sign.” And she had heard him say, quite plainly, “No, no! You can’t be my wife. How could I be worthy of you? You’re my shifu, you’re my aunt.” She thought, If that isn’t a changed heart, what is? It’s as good as saying outright that he won’t have me for his wife. This is no faint telltale sign. What use is being on my guard now? She was so angry that she shook from head to foot, and then, with a sudden choking cry, she spat out a mouthful of blood.

Yang Guo did not know what to do. He could only cry, “Aunt, Aunt!” Hearing him call her that still, Xiaolongnü stared at him fiercely and raised her left palm to bring it down on the crown of his head. But the blow never fell. Slowly the look in her eyes turned from anger and hatred to reproach, and from reproach to tender pity. She heaved a long sigh. “So that’s how it is,” she said softly. “You really don’t want me. You’d rather be on your own, free and easy, with nobody to drag you down. Then don’t ever see me again, so I’ll be spared the heartache.” With a sweep of her long sleeve she turned and ran swiftly down the mountain.

Footnotes

1. 易筋锻骨之术 – yìjīn duàngǔ zhī shù. Technique from the Nine Yin Manual for strengthening the body’s sinews and bones through neili cultivation. ↩

2. 丹田 – dāntián. Literally elixir field. Primary energy centre below the navel, where qi is stored and cultivated. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. “Zhao Qian Sun Li, Zhou Wu Zheng Wang…” (赵钱孙李，周吴郑王，冯陈褚卫，蒋沈韩杨). Opening lines of the Hundred Family Surnames (百家姓), a classic Chinese text listing common surnames. Huang Rong once called Ouyang Feng by these to confuse him when he could not remember his own name; in her version here, Chen and Zheng change places. ↩

4. Serpent Staff (蛇杖). Shé Zhàng. Ouyang Feng’s signature weapon, a staff carved with serpents that can be used to deliver venomous strikes. Staff techniques are designed to mimic the unpredictable movements of snakes. ↩

5. 甄志丙 – Zhēn Zhìbǐng. His name meaning “aspiring to the third stem”. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. So-called “Guardian Palace Sand” (shougong sha, 守宫砂) was a traditional belief in ancient Chinese folk culture. It was said that by grinding a “palace guardian” (a small creature resembling a gecko, with a long tail and four legs) together with cinnabar and other special medicinal ingredients into a paste and applying it to a maiden’s arm, a single crimson dot would remain, unfading for a long time. If the woman married or lost her chastity, this “Guardian Palace Sand” would vanish. Ancients used this method to distinguish maidens from non-maidens. In ancient times, government offices and common folk alike often used this method to determine criminal cases or to inflict private punishments, and not a few innocent young women suffered wrongful punishment or even lost their lives as a result. Modern medicine has determined that this method has no scientific basis and it is no longer used. Some also believe that the true “palace guardian” is extremely rare (the name “palace guardian” means guarding a maiden’s chastity, and it is not actually a gecko or lizard), and that the recipe for the necessary medicinal ingredients has been lost, making it impossible to produce genuine Guardian Palace Sand, so that the reliability of the ancient method cannot be disproven. The novel mentions this method only to indicate that at the time when the events of the story take place, this practice was widely known. Readers may regard it as a folk superstition of China’s Southern Song dynasty and need not take it as truth. Even in ancient China, government offices often summoned wenpo (experienced midwives) to determine whether a woman was a maiden, and did not use the Guardian Palace Sand as genuine basis for judgment. ↩

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