The Heavenly Sword & the Dragon Sabre Chapter 7 Part 2

Chapter 7: Who sends the ice vessel to the immortal land? (2)

The two of them knelt together upon the iceberg. Zhang Cuishan spoke in a clear, ringing voice, “With heaven above as witness, I, Zhang Cuishan, do this day take Yin Susu as my wife. In fortune and calamity alike, we shall be as one, and I shall never forsake her.” Yin Susu prayed with fervent devotion, “May the heavens preserve us. I pray that we shall be husband and wife, life after life, world without end.” She paused a moment, then continued, “Should the day come when we return to the Central Plains, I, Yin Susu, vow to wash my heart clean and turn from all my former wrongs. I shall follow my husband in righteous deeds, relieving the suffering of others, striving always to atone. Never again shall I take a life without cause. Should I break this oath, let my husband cast me aside.” Zhang Cuishan was overjoyed—he had never imagined she would swear such a vow. He drew her into his arms at once. Though the sea had soaked them both to the bone, their hearts blazed as warm as a spring wind.

A long while passed before they remembered they had not eaten in a full day. Zhang Cuishan took his silver hook to the iceberg’s edge, and when fish surfaced, he hooked them one by one. The sea fish in these waters had evolved thick flesh and heavy fat to withstand the cold. Raw and reeking though they were, they restored strength wonderfully.

The two of them dwelt upon this iceberg knowing full well there was no hope of return, yet they felt strangely free of care. The days stretched impossibly long and the nights were brief beyond all reckoning—the natural order seemed wholly inverted. They could no longer count the passage of time, nor did they know how many times the sun had risen and sunk beneath the waves.

One day, Yin Susu caught sight of a plume of black smoke rising from due north, piercing the heavens. The colour drained from her face at once. “Fifth Brother!” she cried, pointing at the smoke. Zhang Cuishan’s heart lurched with mingled dread and hope. “Can there truly be people living in such a place?”

Though they had sighted the smoke, the distance was vast. The iceberg drifted for an entire day without drawing nearer, yet the column of smoke climbed ever higher, and at length they could make out the faint glow of fire within it. Yin Susu asked, “What is that?” Zhang Cuishan shook his head and said nothing. Yin Susu’s voice trembled. “Our days are at an end. That… that is the gate to the underworld.”

Zhang Cuishan had long since been seized by the same terror, but he forced calm into his voice to comfort her. “Perhaps there are people on the far side, burning brush to clear the land.” Yin Susu said, “What brushfire could burn so high?” Zhang Cuishan sighed. “Since fate has brought us to this uncanny place, we can only submit to heaven’s will. If the heavens refused to let us freeze to death only to have us perish in fire, then so be it. If you must enter the underworld, I shall go with you—let them fry us in iron cauldrons and boil us in oil!”

Strange to say, the iceberg on which they stood drifted steadily toward that great pillar of fire. Zhang Cuishan and Yin Susu did not understand the forces at work and could only believe it was the hand of fate—for good or ill, this was where they were meant to go. In truth, the fire came from a volcanic peak near the Arctic. The flames heated the surrounding seawater; the warm current flowed southward, drawing cold water northward to replace it, and with that cold water came the iceberg, pulled inexorably toward the mountain.

After another day and night of drifting, they arrived at the foot of the volcano. Around the pillar of fire stretched a vast green landscape—an enormous island. Its western reaches were a chaos of jagged, grotesque pinnacles, strange beyond the power of words to describe. Zhang Cuishan and Yin Susu had travelled widely, yet neither had ever beheld a volcano; they could not know that these bizarre formations were the accumulated deposits of molten rock laid down across untold millennia. To the east, however, the land opened into an endless plain, built up over the ages from volcanic ash spilling into the sea. Though the island lay near the Arctic, the volcano’s eternal fires had tempered the climate until it resembled the region around the Changbai Mountains.¹ The high peaks wore crowns of dark ice and white snow, yet the lowland plains stretched green to the horizon, thick with towering pines and ancient cypresses of extraordinary size, and strewn with rare flowers and strange trees the like of which existed nowhere in the Central Plains.

Yin Susu stared for a long while, then suddenly leapt up and flung her arms around Zhang Cuishan’s neck. “Fifth Brother, we have reached the land of the immortals!” Zhang Cuishan’s heart overflowed with joy; dazed and speechless, he could only hold her. Across the plain, a herd of sika deer grazed peacefully with lowered heads. In every direction the eye could see, apart from the fearsome volcano, all was serene. There was nothing to dread.

Yet as the iceberg drifted close to the island, the warm current caught it and pushed it away again. Yin Susu cried in alarm, “It cannot be! The Island of the Immortals—we shall miss it!” Zhang Cuishan saw that the situation was dire. If they did not make landfall now, the iceberg would drift onward to who knew where, and who could say when it would stop? In his urgency, he struck with hook and palm together, shattering loose a great slab of ice with a rapid series of blows. They threw their arms around it and plunged into the sea, kicking and paddling until at last they dragged themselves onto solid ground.

The herd of sika deer raised their round eyes to regard the newcomers with frank curiosity, showing not the slightest trace of fear. Yin Susu approached one slowly and stroked its back. “If only there were a few cranes as well,” she said, “I would say this was the Garden of the Southern Immortal.” All at once the earth shifted beneath her feet and she tumbled to the ground. Zhang Cuishan cried, “Susu!” and rushed to help her, only to stagger and nearly fall himself.

A deep rumbling sounded as the ground shook—the volcano was erupting afresh. After drifting upon the ocean for weeks on end, riding the ceaseless rise and fall of waves day and night, they had at last set foot on land, and their legs had not yet found their bearing. The sudden tremor sent them both sprawling.

Their fright lasted only a moment. When nothing further happened, they picked themselves up with embarrassed laughter. By then they were exhausted beyond measure, and they lay down upon the open plain and slept for more than four double-hours. When they woke, the sun still hung above the horizon. Zhang Cuishan said, “Let us have a look around and see whether anyone lives here, and whether there are venomous creatures or wild beasts.” Yin Susu said, “You need only look at how gentle these sika deer are to know this island must be perfectly safe.” Zhang Cuishan laughed. “I hope you are right. Still, we ought to pay our respects to whatever immortal dwells here.”

Even upon the iceberg, Yin Susu had taken pains to keep her appearance presentable and her clothes in order. Now that they had reached the island, she fussed over her garments with redoubled care, straightened Zhang Cuishan’s hair, and only then set out to explore. She carried her sword; Zhang Cuishan, having lost his iron pen, broke off a stout branch to serve in its place. The two of them employed their qinggong and ran swiftly from south to north, covering some ten li. To have solid ground stretching before them after so long—ground enough for true running—was a joy beyond expression. Along the way they passed low hills and tall trees, and everywhere the land was carpeted in green grass and strange flowers. From time to time, great birds and small beasts of unfamiliar species started from the undergrowth, but none seemed the least bit dangerous. In the distance, rivers of red-hot molten rock flowed westward; wherever they passed, every tree and blade of grass was charred to cinder. The pair gave that region a wide berth.

They rounded a great stand of forest and came upon a stony hill in the northwest. At its foot gaped the mouth of a cave. Yin Susu cried, “What a splendid spot!” and rushed ahead. Zhang Cuishan called, “Careful!” Before the word had left his lips, a harsh grunt sounded and a white shape burst from the cave—an enormous polar bear, its fur long and its body immense, far larger than the biggest bull.

Yin Susu recoiled with a gasp. The bear reared onto its hind legs and brought a tremendous paw crashing down toward her head. She twisted her sword upward, slicing at the bear’s shoulder, but weeks at sea had sapped her strength. Though the blade found its mark, it did no more than graze the hide. She recovered for a second cut, but the bear lunged forward and swatted the sword from her hand with a ringing slap. Zhang Cuishan shouted, “Susu, get clear!” He sprang forward and swept the branch across the bear’s left foreleg at the knee, putting every ounce of force behind the blow. The branch snapped in two with a sharp crack, but the bear’s leg buckled and broke with it. Maddened with pain, the beast let out a roar that echoed from the surrounding hills and threw itself at Zhang Cuishan.

Zhang Cuishan kicked off the ground and executed the Ladder Cloud Ascent,² soaring more than a zhang into the air. He applied the Contention Formula’s³ downward hook—the silver hook swept through the air in a vicious arc and buried itself in the bear’s temple. The blow carried tremendous force, driving the hook several inches deep. The bear loosed one final, earth-shaking roar that dragged the silver hook from Zhang Cuishan’s grasp. It thrashed upon the ground, rolled several times, and lay still.

Yin Susu clapped and exclaimed, “Magnificent qinggong! Magnificent hookwork!” She bent to retrieve her sword, and in that instant Zhang Cuishan shouted, “Jump to me—now!” There was such alarm in his voice that she obeyed without question, launching herself forward and crashing straight into his arms. She turned her head and could not suppress a cry of horror. Behind her stood a second polar bear, jaws agape and claws raised, poised to strike.

Zhang Cuishan was unarmed. He seized Yin Susu’s hand and leapt up into a great pine tree. The bear circled below, snarling and roaring. Zhang Cuishan snapped off a pine bough, took careful aim at the bear’s right eye, and hurled it downward. The sharpened branch struck true with a soft, wet sound. The bear bellowed in agony and began to claw its way up the trunk. Zhang Cuishan took the sword from Yin Susu, aimed at the crown of the bear’s skull, and flung it down with all his strength. The blade sank in to half its length. The beast sagged slowly and collapsed dead at the foot of the tree.

Zhang Cuishan said, “I wonder if there are more inside.” He gathered a handful of stones and lobbed them into the cave. After a time, nothing stirred. He entered first, Yin Susu close at his heels. The cave proved spacious, stretching eight or nine zhang deep, with a fissure in the rock above that admitted a sliver of daylight like a natural skylight. The floor was littered with the bears’ leavings—scraps of fish and gnawed bones—and the stench was fierce. Yin Susu covered her nose. “The cave itself is wonderful,” she said, “but the smell is dreadful.” Zhang Cuishan said, “A few days of sweeping and scrubbing, and the smell will be gone.”

Yin Susu thought of the years stretching ahead, she and Zhang Cuishan together on this island until the end of their days, and her heart was at once full of happiness and tinged with sorrow.

Zhang Cuishan went out, broke branches, and bound them into a large broom. He swept the filth from the cave while Yin Susu lent her hands to the task. When the refuse was cleared, the stench lingered still. Yin Susu said, “If only there were a stream nearby for rinsing. The sea has water enough, but we have no bucket to carry it.” Zhang Cuishan said, “I have an idea.” He went to the shaded, colder side of the hill and hauled back several large blocks of ice, setting them upon the high ledges inside the cave. Yin Susu clapped with delight. “Clever!” The ice melted slowly, trickling down and out of the cave—a crude but effective rinse, if terribly slow.

While Zhang Cuishan scrubbed the cave, Yin Susu used her sword to skin and butcher the two bears, cutting the meat into strips and slabs. Though the island lay near the Arctic and the air was bitterly cold, it was warmer than the open sea. She packed the bear meat with ice blocks around it; it looked as though it would keep for months without spoiling. Yin Susu sighed. “The heart is never content. Having gained Longxi, one covets Shu.⁴ If only we had fire, we could roast a bear paw—what a feast that would be.” Then she added, “I only hope the ice in the cave does not melt too slowly to wash away the stink.” Zhang Cuishan gazed up at the flames leaping from the volcanic peak. “We have fire enough,” he said. “The trouble is that there is far too much of it. Let us think of some way to bring it down here.”

That evening they feasted on bear brains, then settled into the branches of a tree to sleep. In their dreams they still felt themselves adrift upon the ice, rising and falling with every wave, though in truth it was only the wind stirring the boughs.

The next morning Yin Susu spoke before she had even opened her eyes. “What a lovely fragrance,” she murmured. She climbed down from the tree and found the scent drifting from a great mass of blossoms growing at its base, flowers of a kind she had never seen. Yin Susu said with delight, “Such flowers before the cave—how wonderful!” Zhang Cuishan assumed a solemn expression. “Susu, I must tell you something.” Yin Susu saw the gravity in his face and felt a stab of unease. “What is it?” Zhang Cuishan said, “I have thought of a way to bring fire here.” Yin Susu burst out laughing. “You wretch! I thought it was something terrible. What way? Tell me, quickly!”

Zhang Cuishan said, “The flames at the crater are too fierce to approach. I expect that within a few dozen zhang, a man would be roasted alive. But if we plait a long rope from bark, and let it dry in the sun, and then…” Yin Susu clapped her hands. “A fine plan! We tie a stone to the rope and hurl it toward the crater. The flames catch the rope, and the fire follows it down to us.”

Footnotes

1. 长白山 – Chángbái Shān. Literally Perpetually White Mountains. A major volcanic mountain range on the border of modern Jilin Province and North Korea, known for its harsh winters and dense old-growth forests. See Wikipedia. ↩

2. 梯云纵 – tīyún zòng. Literally ladder cloud ascent. A supreme Wudang qinggong technique that allows the practitioner to gain altitude by bracing against vertical surfaces in rapid succession. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 争字诀 – zhēng zì jué. Literally contention formula. One of the foundational character formulae of Zhang Cuishan’s silver hook technique, emphasising aggressive downward strikes. ↩

4. A classical allusion from the Book of the Later Han (后汉书), referring to the general Cen Peng’s endless ambitions. Having conquered Longxi (modern Gansu), he immediately set his sights on Shu (modern Sichuan). The phrase has come to mean insatiable desire or never being satisfied with what one has. ↩