The Heavenly Sword & the Dragon Sabre – Chapter 17 – Part 6

Miejue Shitai rallied her disciples for the assault on Bright Peak, revealing the full strength of the Ming Order's leaders and accepting that death might await them all.

Miejue Shitai gave a snort. Without warning a sharp crack rang out — she had slapped Ding Minjun across the face. “Our shifu failed to overtake him and could not save Jingxu’s life,” she said, her voice hot with anger. “That means he won. Friend and foe alike know the result throughout the world. Do you suppose heroes and brave men title themselves?”

Ding Minjun’s cheek swelled red on the spot. She bowed and said, “Shifu’s rebuke is just. This disciple knows her error.” In her heart, though, she thought, You cannot match him yourself, and you have lost face. Now you take your spite out on me. My bad luck!

Jingxuan said, “Shifu, what manner of man is this Green Winged Bat King? Please instruct us.”

Miejue Shitai waved her hand and gave no answer. She strode on ahead. The disciples, seeing their eldest shijie¹ draw so sharp a reproof for her trouble, dared not add another word. The party walked in silence until dusk, when they lit a fire and made camp beside a sand dune.

Miejue Shitai stared at the blaze, motionless as a stone idol.

None of the disciples dared sleep while their shifu sat awake. They remained thus, rigid and silent, for more than one shichen² before Miejue Shitai thrust both palms forward. A gust of force swept out and, with a muffled whoom, the bonfire went dark. Still the party sat without moving. The cold moon’s pale light fell across their shoulders.

Compassion stirred in Zhang Wuji’s heart. Can it be that the mighty Emei Order³, renowned throughout the land, is to suffer utter defeat here in the Western Regions, perhaps even annihilation? He thought further, Miss Zhou I must save, no matter what. But the Ming Order⁴’s fighters are so formidable — what skill have I to rescue anyone?

Miejue Shitai’s voice rang out, “We have quenched that demon fire, extinguished that fiendish blaze.” She paused, then spoke more slowly, “The Ming Order holds fire sacred and worships flame as divine. Since the death of their thirty-third-generation Order Leader, Yang Dingtian, they have had no Order Leader. The Bright Left and Right Messengers, the Four Guardian Kings, the Five Unbound Adepts, and the chiefs of the Gold, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth Banner Factions — all of them covet the Order Leader’s seat. They war among themselves, and the Order has withered for it. It is only because the righteous factions were due to prosper and the fiends were fated to perish that matters have gone this way. Had the Ming Order not torn itself apart with feuds, rooting out those fiends would have been no easy task at all.”

Zhang Wuji had heard the name of the Ming Order since he was a child. His own mother had ties to the Order, yet whenever he pressed for details his parents would not speak of it. When he asked his sworn father, Xie Xun the Golden Haired Lion King, the man would either fall into a dull stare or else flare into sudden rage. What the Ming Order truly was had always remained a mystery to him. Later, when he followed his Grand Shifu Zhang Sanfeng, the old man loathed the Order no less and warned him again and again never to associate with its people. And yet the men he had since encountered — Chang Yuchun, Hu Qingniu, Wang Nangu, Xu Da, Deng Yu, Tang He, Zhu Yuanzhang — were all of the Ming Order, and each had been forthright and generous, not villains at all, though their comings and goings were so clandestine that outsiders found them unfathomable. Now, hearing Miejue Shitai speak of the Order, he bent every ear to listen.

Miejue Shitai continued, “After the Ming Order was brought into the Central Plains, each successive Order Leader took the Holy Fire Tablets⁵ as the seal of succession. But in the hands of the thirty-first-generation Order Leader, Heaven robbed him of his wits and the Tablets were lost. The thirty-second and thirty-third Order Leaders held the title without the Tokens, and so their authority sat uneasily. Yang Dingtian’s sudden death — whether by poison or by some hidden hand, none can say — left no successor named. The Order is not short of fearsome fighters. At least five or six among them might claim the title, and none will yield to another. The Order has been riven by the quarrel ever since, and to this day no Order Leader has been chosen. The man we met today was one who aspired to the seat himself. He is Wei Yixiao the Green Winged Bat King, one of the Order’s Four Guardian Kings.”

At the name “Wei Yixiao the Green Winged Bat King” the disciples fell silent, recalling the swiftness they had witnessed.

Miejue Shitai said, “That man never sets foot in the Central Plains, and the Ming Order’s people move like shadows. For all his skill, then, his name is unknown here. But the White Brows Eagle King Yin Tianzheng and the Golden Haired Lion King Xie Xun — you have heard of them, surely?”

Zhang Wuji felt a chill. Zhu’er gave a soft, startled cry.

The names of Yin Tianzheng and Xie Xun were known to every soul in the wulin. Jingxuan asked, “Shifu, are those two also of the Ming Order?”

Miejue Shitai said, “Hmph! Not merely ‘also of the Ming Order.’ The saying runs: ‘The Order’s four kings — Purple, White, Gold, Green.’ The Purple Dress Dragon King, the White Brows Eagle King, the Golden Haired Lion King, the Green Winged Bat King — those are the Four Guardian Kings. The Green Winged Bat King ranks last of the four. You have seen his skill with your own eyes today. Imagine, then, what the Purple Dress, the White Brows and the Golden Haired can do. The Golden Haired Lion King has lost his reason and walks contrary to all that is right. More than twenty years ago he began to slaughter the innocent without cause, and then vanished from the jianghu⁶ altogether, a riddle that has never been solved. Yin Tianzheng, having failed to become Order Leader of the Ming Order, stormed away in rage and founded the Tianying Order⁷ to taste the title for himself. I had supposed that, since Yin Tianzheng had broken with the Ming Order, the two were irreconcilable. Who would have thought that, when Bright Peak faces peril, the Order would turn to the Tianying Order for aid?”

Zhang Wuji’s mind was in turmoil. He had long known that his sworn father and his waizu’s conduct were unorthodox, shunned by the righteous factions. He had not imagined that both sat among the Ming Order’s Four Guardian Kings, figures of the highest rank and the first importance. Miejue Shitai had also spoken of the Bright Left and Right Messengers coveting the Order Leader’s seat. Then Yang Xiao, the Bright Left Messenger and father of Yang Buhui, whom he had met years ago — was he likewise on a level with the four kings? He was so occupied with these thoughts that he did not catch what the Emei disciples were saying.

After a while he heard Miejue Shitai speak again, “The six great factions — Shaolin, Wudang, Emei, Kunlun, Kongtong and Huashan — have marched together against Bright Peak with victory as our purpose. Even if the fiends join their strength, what have we to fear? Many will fall in the fighting. Each of you must steel yourself to die. Let no one harbour hope of a lucky escape or carry fear into battle, lest you shame the honour of the Emei Order.” The disciples rose as one, bowed, and answered in unison.

Miejue Shitai went on, “Strength in martial arts depends on natural endowment and fortune, and no amount of striving can supply what Heaven withholds. Jingxu fell to a hidden strike and died beneath the blood-sucking fiend without so much as exchanging a single blow. No one who hears of it will laugh at her. Why do we train in the martial arts, if not to root out the strong who prey upon the weak and to purge the fiends that walk the world? Today Jingxu was the first to die. Perhaps tomorrow her shifu will be the next.” She paused. “Shaolin, Wudang, Emei, Kunlun, Kongtong, Huashan — the six great factions have laid siege to the Ming Order together, confident that, united, we could crush a sect torn apart by its own feuds. Yet today we have seen the Green Winged Bat King’s skill. The Ming Order still counts formidable men among them. The road ahead is long and perilous. Good fortune or ill, fortune or disaster — the Emei Order must hold such things as nothing.”

Zhang Wuji thought, So the Wudang Order is indeed among them. A foreboding crept over him that this journey westward would lead to sights too grievous to behold and sounds too terrible to bear. He wished he could take Zhu’er and flee at once, never to witness the jianghu’s quarrels and bloodshed again. But the matter touched his waizu and his sworn father. He could not simply walk away.

Miejue Shitai spoke again, “There is a saying: ‘A thousand coffins pass from the gate, and the house thrives. A son outlives his father; a grandson, his grandfather.’ What man does not die? So long as sons and grandsons carry on the blood, a house may lose a thousand souls and still prosper. What I dread most is that you should all perish, and this old nun alone be left to live on.” She paused again. “Yet even so, it would not be regretted. A hundred years ago there was no Emei Order in the world. If we fight and die to the last, and the Emei Order is wiped out in a single stroke — what of it?”

The disciples’ blood ran hot. They drew their weapons and cried, “We swear to fight to the death. We will not coexist with demons and fiends!”

Miejue Shitai gave a faint smile. “Well said. Be seated.”

Zhang Wuji watched them. Most were women of slight build, yet their resolve to die unflinching carried a gallantry that yielded nothing to any man. The Emei Order ranked among the six great factions for no accidental reason: skill alone would not have placed them there. The sight before him called to mind Jing Ke setting out westward into mighty Qin, the wind moaning, the Yi River cold. The hero goes, and never returns. Such speeches should have been made before the march began, but then they had supposed the Ming Order, riven by feuds, might be overthrown at a stroke. They had not foreseen that, even in disarray, the Order’s fighters could still join hands against an outside assault. Only now, after witnessing the Green Winged Bat King’s display, did they know how wrong their calculations had been.

Sure enough, Miejue Shitai said, “If the Green Winged Bat King can come, then the White Brows Eagle King and the Golden Haired Lion King can come as well. The Purple Dress Dragon King, the Five Unbound Adepts and the five Banner Faction chiefs are likelier still. Our original plan was to throw the strength of six factions against the Bright Left Messenger Yang Xiao first, then sweep away the remnants one by one. It seems Xianyu Tong the Divine Calculator, zhangmen of Huashan School, has miscalculated this time. The whole scheme is wrong.”

Jingxuan asked, “The Purple Dress Dragon King — what sort of fiend is he?”

Miejue Shitai shook her head. “The Purple Dress Dragon King’s misdeeds are not well known. I have only heard the name. It is said that, having failed to win the Order Leader’s title, he fled far out to sea and severed all contact with the Ming Order. If he keeps apart from this affair, so much the better. ‘The Order’s four kings — Purple, White, Gold, Green.’ He ranks first of the four, which means he is not one to be trifled with. Of the Ming Order’s Bright Messengers, one is Yang Xiao. The Order’s tradition holds that there is always a Bright Left Messenger and a Bright Right Messenger, both ranking above the Four Guardian Kings. Yang Xiao is the Bright Left Messenger. But the name of the Bright Right Messenger is unknown to anyone in the wulin, even to men as well-read as Shaolin’s Great Master Kongzhi and Wudang’s Song daxia. We face Yang Xiao in open combat, and victory or defeat will be settled by skill alone. That is well enough. But if the Bright Right Messenger lies in wait and looses a hidden bolt at our backs — that is what I fear most.”

The disciples felt a chill run through them and could not help glancing behind, as though the Bright Right Messenger or the Purple Dress Dragon King might swoop down upon them at any moment. The cold moonlight whitened every face.

Miejue Shitai said coolly, “Yang Xiao murdered your Guhongzi shibo, and murdered Ji Xiaofu as well. Wei Yixiao murdered Jingxu. The debt between the Emei Order and the Ming Order is a debt that Heaven itself will not settle. Since our founder Guo xiaoshi⁸ established the Order, the zhangmen’s seat has by tradition been held by a woman. Not only may no man inherit it — even a married daughter of the Order is barred. But today the Order faces a crisis of survival. We cannot cling to custom when the very house is at stake. In this battle, whoever performs great service — man or woman — shall inherit my mantle.”

The disciples bowed their heads in silence. Their shifu was laying her affairs in order with a solemnity that spoke of no return to the Central Plains, and each of them felt the chill of it.

Miejue Shitai raised her voice in a long, clear whistle. Hoho, heihei — the sound carried far across the desert. The disciples exchanged startled looks, their hearts uneasy. Miejue Shitai flicked her sleeve and said, “Sleep, all of you.”

Jingxuan began, as on any other night, to assign the watch. Miejue Shitai said, “There will be no watch tonight.” Jingxuan started, then understood: if a fighter of the Green Winged Bat King’s calibre came in the dead of night, what chance had any of the disciples of detecting him? A watch would be kept in vain.

That night the Emei Order’s defences seemed slack without but were taut within, sparse in appearance yet dense in fact. Nothing untoward came to pass.

Footnotes

1. 师姐 – shījiě. Female senior. Both apprenticed to the same shifu. Shī means teacher. Jiě means older sister. ↩

2. 时辰 – shíchén. A traditional Chinese unit of time, equivalent to two hours. The day was divided into twelve shichen. ↩

3. 峨嵋派 – Éméi Pài. The Emei Order, founded by Guo Xiang on Mount Emei, one of the six great orthodox factions. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 明教 – Míng Jiào. The Ming Order, a revolutionary cult with Manichaean and Zoroastrian roots, based at Bright Peak in the Kunlun Mountains. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 圣火令 – Shènghuǒ Lìng. The Holy Fire Tablets, twelve golden tablets that served as the seal of succession for the Order Leader of the Ming Order. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 江湖 – jiānghú. Literally rivers and lakes. The itinerant world beyond settled society and official reach, holding not only martial artists but the trades that travel with them. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

7. 天鹰教 – Tiānyīng Jiào. The Tianying Order, founded by Yin Tianzheng the White Brows Eagle King after his break with the Ming Order. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

8. 郭祖师 – Guō Zǔshī. Guo Xiang, founder of the Emei Order, daughter of Guo Jing and Huang Rong, and granddaughter of the heroes of the Central Plains. ↩