The Heavenly Sword & the Dragon Sabre – Chapter 39 – Part 6

Zhang Wuji had fought the Xuanming Elders¹ several times before and knew that the two old men were no match for him even at their best. Yet his recent three bouts of fierce combat with Du'e² and the other Shaolin monks had carried his martial art to yet deeper depths, and to defeat the pair was well within his power. Still, their cultivation was far from trifling, and he dared not take them lightly. He unfolded the Taiji Fist,³ circle following circle in unbroken succession, and the Nine Yang Divine Skill⁴ shone forth from each circle, whether upright or slanting. The Xuanming Elders soon felt the yang energy growing fierce. The yin-cold qi⁵ emitted by their Xuanming Divine Palm⁶ was either dissolved or forced back upon them.

When they had exchanged a hundred-odd moves, Zhang Wuji caught a glimpse of two dark shapes quivering on the ground, the shadows of Zhao Min and Zhou Zhiruo cast in the moonlight. His heart gave a lurch. He glanced sideways and saw that Zhao Min was swaying ceaselessly, as though she could no longer hold Zhou Zhiruo in her arms. He thought, No good! Zhiruo has taken Lu the Old Man’s Xuanming Divine Palm and cannot withstand it. Her own cultivation is yin-cold to begin with, and on top of that comes the coldest qi in the Xuanming Divine Palm, the most vicious yin poison under heaven, cold upon cold. It looks as though Min mei⁷ cannot endure it either. He redoubled his strength and pressed ferociously towards Lu Zhangke.

Lu Zhangke saw his fist technique change of a sudden and at once divined his thoughts. He turned his body and dodged, crying, “Shidi,⁸ fight him on the move. The cold poison in Lady Song is breaking out. Don’t let him free a hand to save her.” He Biweng replied, “Quite right!” He leapt clear of the circle, meaning to pick up his crane-beak pen.⁹ Zhang Wuji swept a palm towards him, and the gust of force pressed so hard that He Biweng could scarce draw breath. Lu Zhangke whipped his deer-staff about and thrust it at Zhang Wuji’s flank. Zhang Wuji shifted through several fist-techniques in rapid succession, bringing out the thirty-six forms of the Dragon Claw Grasping Art¹⁰ he had learned from the Shaolin divine monk Kongxing: Plucking the Zither, Strumming the Lute, Catching the Wind, Embracing What Remains, each attack sharper than the last.

Lu Zhangke called out, “That Dragon Claw Art is well trained. It will do nicely for digging a pit in the ground presently.” He Biweng asked, “Shixiong,¹¹ what’s the use of digging a pit in the ground?” Lu Zhangke laughed, “Lady Song is a dead woman. Dig a pit to bury her!” The moment he spoke his concentration wavered. Zhang Wuji flew out his right foot and kicked him in the left leg. Lu Zhangke staggered but at once regained his stance, whirling his deer-staff so that not a gap remained in his defence.

Zhang Wuji glanced back at Zhao Min and Zhou Zhiruo. They were trembling more violently still. He asked, “Min mei, what is it?” Zhao Min said, “It’s bad! The cold is terrible!” Zhang Wuji was startled. A moment’s reflection revealed the cause. Zhou Zhiruo had taken the Xuanming Divine Palm, and however fierce the yin-cold, it should have afflicted her alone. But now Zhao Min too had grown cold. Plainly Zhao Min, in her kindness, had pressed her palm against Zhou Zhiruo’s back to help her channel neili¹² in resistance. Their neili was far apart in strength, and Zhou Zhiruo’s neigong¹³ was strange and grotesque besides. Zhao Min, trying to save her, had only entangled herself the more. Zhang Wuji threw his fists wide and great, hoping to drive the two old men back as swiftly as he could. But the pair kept their distance, darting now ahead, now behind, content to drag out the fight and refuse him a direct engagement.

He grew anxious and called, “Min mei, let go of Zhou guniang!¹⁴ Don’t hold her!” Zhao Min said, “I… I can’t let go.” Zhang Wuji asked in surprise, “Why?” Zhao Min said, “Her… her back… is stuck to my palm.” As she spoke her teeth chattered and her body swayed as though about to fall. Zhang Wuji’s alarm redoubled.

Lu Zhangke’s voice came to him: “Order Leader Zhang,¹⁵ Lady Song is a cruel woman. She is channelling the cold poison from her own body into the Princess.¹⁶ The Princess will soon be dead. Let us strike a bargain, shall we?” Zhang Wuji asked, “What bargain?” Lu Zhangke said, “We cease fighting on both sides. I take the martial arts secret manual from Lady Song, and you save the Princess.”

Zhang Wuji snorted. He thought, These Xuanming Elders are already formidable enough. If they also master Zhiruo’s yin-poison arts, the evil they do henceforth will be beyond even my power to check. In the press of battle he glanced back. A greenish hue had already crept over Zhao Min’s cheeks, which before had been bright as fine jade. Her face was twisted with pain. Zhang Wuji stepped back twice, seized her right palm in his left hand, and sent the Nine Yang zhenqi¹⁷ of his body pouring into her through his palm in an unbroken stream.

Lu Zhangke cried, “Press the attack!” The two elders’ deer-staff and crane-beak pen descended on him like a whirlwind and a hailstorm.

With more than half his true strength devoted to saving the two women, Zhang Wuji could neither move his body nor meet the assault with more than a single palm. In an instant his position was perilous in the extreme. With a rip of cloth the crane-beak pen slashed a long tear in his left trouser-leg, and blood welled down his leg.

Zhao Min had been nearly frozen stiff by the yin-cold qi forcing its way out of Zhou Zhiruo, her very blood seeming on the point of congealing. When the Nine Yang zhenqi reached her she gradually felt warmth return. But Zhang Wuji, defending alone against the Xuanming Elders with a single palm, was hard pressed on every side. The Nine Yang zhenqi flowing to Zhao Min weakened, and she fell to shivering all over once more.

Lu Zhangke swung his staff three times, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, and the antlers on the staff-thrust stabbed straight at Zhang Wuji’s eyes. He Biweng’s crane-beak pen attacked at the same moment. Zhang Wuji suddenly unleashed the ancient Persian martial arts from the Holy Fire Tablets.¹⁸ He flipped head over heels into the air and came sitting down upon the two old men’s heads, buttocks first. The Xuanming Elders had never seen so bizarre a technique. In their alarm they leapt aside.

Seeing the ploy succeed, Zhang Wuji pressed on with strange and grotesque forms one after another. The Xuanming Elders dared no longer press close, and all the Nine Yang zhenqi within Zhang Wuji’s body flowed into Zhao Min. With this full expenditure, the Xuanming cold-poison afflicting Zhou Zhiruo was at once driven clean away. But when yin and yang qi interact within the body, the stronger prevails and the weaker yields. When the Xuanming cold-poison was spent, the Nine Yang zhenqi turned to cancelling out the Nine Yin neili¹⁹ that Zhou Zhiruo had cultivated.

After Zhou Zhiruo had obtained the Nine Yin Manual on Peach Blossom Island,²⁰ she had trained and practised day and night. But the Heroes Assembly had drawn near and time was short. She could not proceed by the gradual steps of foundation-building, and so her neili was not deep. When she had taken the Xuanming Divine Palm, she had meant to channel the yin-cold qi into Zhao Min’s body. But when Zhang Wuji lent his aid, she had felt her whole body grow pleasantly warm. Her strength had seemed to return, and she had been about to wrench free of Zhao Min’s palm, only to find herself held fast, as though bound by some powerful adhesive. She struggled but could not break free. She understood at once that just as her back had been stuck to Zhao Min’s palm moments ago, now Zhao Min’s palm was stuck to her back, all because of the difference in their neili. She was seized with alarm.

Zhang Wuji struggled to drive out the cold poison. He felt his Nine Yang zhenqi sent forth and met by a cold qi streaming back from Zhao Min’s palm in resistance. He supposed the cold poison of the Xuanming Divine Palm was not yet exhausted and redoubled his efforts, not knowing that with every measure of Nine Yang zhenqi he channelled across, he was consuming a measure of the Nine Yin neili Zhou Zhiruo had so bitterly trained to acquire. Zhou Zhiruo cried out in her heart but dared make no sign, knowing that if she opened her mouth to speak she would at once vomit blood in a gush and spill every last drop of her neili.

Zhao Min felt harmony and comfort suffuse her body. She laughed, “Wuji gege,²¹ I am well now. Go and deal with the Xuanming Elders in earnest!” Zhang Wuji said, “Good!” He drew his neili back.

Zhou Zhiruo was like a criminal reprieved at the scaffold. Freed of the adhesive force, she knew that though the Xuanming cold-poison within her was now driven clean away, her own Nine Yin neili was grievously spent. She saw Zhang Wuji’s palms flying as he turned his whole mind to attacking the elders. At once she channelled force through her five fingers and struck swiftly at the crown of Zhao Min’s head.

Zhao Min gave a great cry, “Aiya!” A spasm of pain shot across her skull, and she thought herself surely dead. But a crack sounded. Zhou Zhiruo uttered a cry of anguish and fled.

Zhang Wuji was startled and turned at once. “What is it?” Zhao Min raised her hand to her brow. She was so terrified that her soul fled beyond the heavens and no word would come. Zhang Wuji supposed she had been wounded by the Nine Yin White Bone Claw²² and his own soul fled in turn. His right hand held the elders at bay while his left went to the crown of her head. His fingers came away wet and sticky. Blood had flowed, but fortunately the bone was not broken nor any hole pierced. Only then did his heart settle. He comforted her, “A flesh-wound. It is nothing to worry about!” He wondered inwardly, Strange, strange! He did not know that when Zhou Zhiruo had struck, the Nine Yang zhenqi he had poured into Zhao Min was not yet spent, while Zhou Zhiruo’s own neili was grievously weakened. Attacking strength with weakness, she had not only failed to harm the other but had recoiled and injured her own fingers.

Zhang Wuji’s moment of distraction gave the Xuanming Elders their chance, and they attacked once more. He circulated his internal breath with the utmost speed, stilled his mind and concentrated. His left hand drew in a guiding circle, bringing to bear the Great Shift of Heaven and Earth,²³ and turned the direction of a palm He Biweng was striking towards him. That single pull and guide was suffused with the Nine Yang Divine Skill and employed the seventh and highest level of the Great Shift. That level consumed neili and mental effort as no other. The slightest lapse would bring Qi Deviation.²⁴ For this reason he had not dared use it when his attention was divided between the two women and the cold poison. The Xuanming Elders were fighters of the first rank. Had he employed the fifth or sixth level of the shifting art, he could have made nothing of them.

With that one deflection, He Biweng’s right palm went sailing out and, pop!, struck Lu Zhangke full on the shoulder. Lu Zhangke started. “Shidi, what are you about?” He Biweng’s martial art was exquisite, but his wits were slow. A matter required long reflection before he grasped it. This blow had come so suddenly that even he could not account for it. He stood bewildered, unable to answer, knowing only that Zhang Wuji must have played some trick. He thought that only by pressing the attack harder could he make amends to his shixiong. He channelled force into his right leg and kicked out. Zhang Wuji brushed it aside with his left hand and, with a pull and guide, sent the kick flying towards Lu Zhangke’s lower abdomen, straight at the dantian.²⁵ Lu Zhangke, startled and enraged, cried, “Have you gone mad?”

Zhao Min called out, “Quite right, Master He! Seize that rebellious, lecherous shixiong of yours. My father will reward you handsomely.” Zhang Wuji laughed inwardly. This sowing-distrust ploy is wonderfully apt. He had meant to use the shifting art to draw He Biweng against Lu Zhangke, then Lu Zhangke against He Biweng. But hearing Zhao Min’s words, he now confined his pulling and guiding to He Biweng’s fists and feet, while against Lu Zhangke he employed only the postures of Taiji Fist. He called, “Master He, do not worry. Between the two of us we shall certainly slaughter that lustful deer. The Prince of Ruyang has already appointed you… appointed you…” He paused, unable at once to think of a suitable rank.

Zhao Min called, “Master He, the official warrant of your appointment is right here.” With that she drew a bundle of paper slips from her robe and waved them, reading: “Ah, it says Guardian of the Realm, General Who Proclaims Might of the Great Yuan. Make haste!”

Zhang Wuji swept his right palm out and drove Lu Zhangke to the left. Just so He Biweng’s left palm, guided by Zhang Wuji’s pull, came sweeping from left to right, so that both elders found themselves attacked from either side. Lu Zhangke and He Biweng had been closer than true brothers for decades, and he had no thought that his shidi would betray him. But now, before his very eyes, He Biweng had struck five moves in succession, each aimed at his own vital points, each charged with full force, as though meaning to kill him outright. Where was the least trace of brotherhood? His rage and grief were boundless. “You covet wealth and rank and care nothing for the bond between us?”

He Biweng cried in distress, “I… I…” Zhao Min took up the words: “Quite so. You had no choice. To become Guardian of the Realm, General Who Proclaims Might, you must offend your shixiong. There is nothing more to be said.” Zhang Wuji increased the force of his right hand and, with a concentrated pull and guide, sent He Biweng’s palm crashing, bang!, full onto Lu Zhangke’s shoulder. Lu Zhangke’s fury blazed. He struck back with his palm and knocked several of He Biweng’s teeth from the left side of his mouth. He Biweng roared, “Shixiong, you have lost all sense of right and wrong! It was not done on purpose!”

Lu Zhangke raged, “Who struck first?” Broad as his learning was, he did not know that the seventh level of the Great Shift of Heaven and Earth possessed such terrifying power. With He Biweng’s cultivation, even if Zhang Wuji could defeat or kill him, he could by no means reverse the direction of He Biweng’s own palm-force and turn it back upon its owner. Not the slightest suspicion of an enemy’s trickery entered his mind.

He Biweng, desperate to prove his loyalty, cursed, “You thieving boy, you are playing tricks!” Zhao Min called, “Quite right! No need to call him shixiong any longer. Just curse him as ‘thieving boy’.” Zhang Wuji pinned Lu Zhangke’s palm-force down with his left hand and guided with his right. He Biweng’s left palm struck Lu Zhangke’s right cheek, which at once swelled high. Zhang Wuji saw that Lu Zhangke, fury driving him past reason, his eyes red, had turned his palm against his own shidi He Biweng. Taking advantage of the moment when the two were attacking each other, he struck out with his left hand and, with heavy finger-force, sealed Lu Zhangke’s acupoints.²⁶ Seeing He Biweng standing beside him in panic and confusion, he at once sealed his acupoints too. Then he thrust both palms forth, one pressed against Lu Zhangke’s shoulder, the other against He Biweng’s back. He set the Nine Yang zhenqi working and by degrees dissolved the Xuanming yin energy within the two old men’s bodies.

When he had dissolved three or four tenths of the yin energy in He Biweng’s body, he turned to consume that in Lu Zhangke’s. Round and round he went, until the Xuanming yin energy the two old men had laboured to cultivate over decades was at last seven or eight parts gone. Never again could they practise it. Should they attempt it, the yin poison would attack the heart, as it had when Zhang Wuji was a child. The Xuanming Elders were reduced henceforth to third-rate mediocrities in the wulin,²⁷ and were no longer figures of the first rank. Zhang Wuji had endured the Xuanming Divine Palm as a boy, suffering for years in agony, and only now had his revenge. He laughed aloud and released their acupoints. The Xuanming Elders were furious. Each thrust his right palm at Zhang Wuji’s chest. Zhang Wuji neither blocked nor dodged but took their palm-force upon himself. Pop! The two old men’s arms shot through with pain, the qi and blood in their chests surged, and they crumpled to the ground, unable to rise. With their martial cultivation now reduced to what it was, they could not have matched even the Divine Archers Eight, who had once served under Zhao Min.

Footnotes

1. 玄冥二老 – Xuánmíng Èr Lǎo. Literally the Two Elders of Mystery and Darkness. The aged pair Lu Zhangke and He Biweng, masters of the Xuanming Divine Palm. ↩

2. 渡厄 – Dù È. The eldest of the three Shaolin monk brothers who once imprisoned Xie Xun. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 太极拳 – Tài jí Quán. The Wudang Order’s foundational unarmed technique embodying yin-yang balance through circular, continuous motion. ↩

4. 九阳神功 – Jiǔ Yáng Shén Gōng. Literally Nine Yang Divine Skill. A legendary internal cultivation method emphasising pure yang energy. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 气 – qì. The universal life force cultivated by martial artists. ↩

6. 玄冥神掌 – Xuánmíng Shén Zhǎng. Literally Mystery-Darkness Divine Palm. A palm technique inflicting extreme yin-cold damage, the most vicious yin poison known to the jianghu.²⁸ ↩

7. 妹 – mèi. Younger sister. A term of endearment and familiarity, here used by Zhang Wuji for Zhao Min. ↩

8. 师弟 – shīdì. Male junior fellow disciple of the same shifu. Here Lu Zhangke addresses He Biweng. ↩

9. 鹤嘴笔 – hè zuǐ bǐ. Literally crane-beak pen. A pointed weapon shaped like a crane’s bill, wielded by He Biweng. ↩

10. 龙爪手 – Lóng Zhǎo Shǒu. Literally Dragon Claw Hand. Gripping techniques mimicking dragon talons, targeting acupoints and tendons. One of the seventy-two supreme skills of Shaolin. ↩

11. 师兄 – shīxiōng. Male senior fellow disciple of the same shifu. ↩

12. 内力 – nèi lì. Internal force; the kinetic manifestation of qi cultivated through neigong. ↩

13. 内功 – nèi gōng. Internal cultivation; the art of refining qi within the body. ↩

14. 姑娘 – gū niang. Young lady; a respectful form of address for an unmarried woman. ↩

15. 教主 – jiào zhǔ. Order Leader; the head of a martial or religious order. Here applied to Zhang Wuji as leader of the Ming Order. ↩

16. 郡主 – jùn zhǔ. Princess; a title for the daughter of a prince. Zhao Min is the daughter of the Prince of Ruyang. ↩

17. 真气 – zhēn qì. True qi; refined qi born of internal cultivation. ↩

18. 圣火令 – Shèng Huǒ Lìng. Literally Holy Fire Tablets. Six metallic tablets bearing ancient Persian martial arts inscriptions, relics of the Persian Ming Order. ↩

19. 九阴真经 – Jiǔ Yīn Zhēn Jīng. The Nine Yin Manual. A comprehensive martial encyclopedia focusing on yin-energy cultivation. ↩

20. 桃花岛 – Táo Huā Dǎo. Literally Peach Blossom Island. The island stronghold of the Eastern Heretic Huang Yaoshi. ↩

21. 哥哥 – gē ge. Elder brother; a term of affection and familiarity. ↩

22. 九阴白骨爪 – Jiǔ Yīn Bái Gǔ Zhǎo. Literally Nine Yin White Bone Claw. A vicious technique from the Nine Yin Manual. ↩

23. 乾坤大挪移 – Qián Kūn Dà Nuó Yí. Literally Great Shift of Heaven and Earth. The supreme secret art of the Ming Order, capable of redirecting force and reversing the trajectory of attacks. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

24. 走火入魔 – zǒu huǒ rù mó. Literally entering the demon through fire deviation. Qi Deviation; the catastrophic result of internal cultivation gone wrong. ↩

25. 丹田 – dān tián. The energy centre below the navel; the seat of neili. ↩

26. 点穴 – diǎn xué. Point-striking; the technique of sealing an opponent’s acupoints to immobilise or disable them. ↩

27. 武林 – wǔ lín. Literally martial forest; the community of martial artists and their affairs. ↩

28. 江湖 – jiānghú. The circuit of martial artists and their affairs. ↩