Tian Guinong (simplified: 田归农, traditional: 田歸農, pinyin: Tián Guīnóng, jyutping: tin4 gwai1 nung4), called Young Master Tian (田相公) in the tales of the Cangzhou duel, was zhangmen of the Northern Branch of the Tianlong School. He descended from the Tian bodyguard of Li Zicheng, and his father Tian Anbao vanished beyond the pass together with Miao Renfeng’s father. He supplied the poison that killed Hu Yidao and ran off with Miao Renfeng’s wife, Nan Lan. He is already dead when Flying Fox of the Snowy Mountain opens: his daughter Tian Qingwen is in mourning for him.
Biography
Early years
As a young man Tian Guinong was a bandit, with Tao Baisui as his deputy. He gave up robbery when he married, and later betrothed his only daughter, Tian Qingwen, to Tao’s son Tao Zian. Tao Baisui believed the match was meant to buy his silence (ch. 7).
The Cangzhou duel
With Guild Chief Fan, Tian Guinong led the band that tried to stop Hu Yidao and Madam Hu near Cangzhou. During the first day’s fight between Hu Yidao and Miao Renfeng he fired a volley of pellets at Hu Yidao. Miao Renfeng snapped his slingshot and ordered him out of the hall, and Tian never forgave the insult (ch. 4, 7).
Hu Yidao sent the bonesetter Yan Ji, later the monk Baoshu, to tell Miao Renfeng three things: the origin of the feud, how Miao’s and Tian’s fathers had died, and the secret of Li Zicheng’s dao. Miao was out, and Tian received the message. He paid Yan Ji thirty taels to say it had been delivered, and never passed it on. He also gave Tao Baisui a box of Tianlong School poison, the poison of the Poison Dragon Awl, to smear on both men’s weapons. Tao passed the task to Yan Ji. Tian hoped that each man would kill the other (ch. 7).
On the fifth day the two fought with exchanged weapons. Miao Renfeng, now using a dao, grazed Hu Yidao’s left arm, and the poison killed him. Madam Hu took her own life. When the inn’s kitchen boy Ping Asi fled with the infant Hu Fei, Tian caught him and tried to take the child back. Ping Asi bit his hand, leaving a scar Tian carried for life. Tian slashed Ping’s face, cut off his arm and kicked him into the river (ch. 5).
Nan Lan
Tian Guinong came to Miao Renfeng’s home as a guest. Handsome, eloquent and ingratiating, he won over Miao’s wife, who left her husband and three-year-old daughter Miao Ruolan to go with him. Miao Renfeng pursued them for three days and nights and caught them, but Tian did not dare fight him, and Nan Lan shielded him. Miao Renfeng and Miao Ruolan both believed that what Tian really wanted was the Miao family’s treasure map (FLY ch. 10; SIDE ch. 2).
In Side Story of the Flying Fox
Tian Guinong sent Miao Renfeng a letter through his second disciple, Zhang Yunfei. Poison was hidden in the envelope, and it blinded Miao when he tore it open. He then sent a band to kill the blind man, but Hu Fei defeated him. At Fuk’anggan’s Grand Assembly of Zhangmen under Heaven he took part as head of the Northern Branch. He fought with jian in his right hand and the Tianlong School’s treasured dao in his left, until Hu Fei wrested the dao from him. Later, at the head of Fuk’anggan’s warriors, he attacked Hu Fei at Hu Yidao’s grave near Cangzhou (SIDE ch. 8, 11, 18–20).
Death
Tian Guinong went to Beijing and met Commander Sai. He offered Li Zicheng’s treasure to the emperor and proposed a plan for capturing Miao Renfeng, since Miao held the map. The plan was later carried out through Guild Chief Fan’s Dragon Claw Grasping Hand (ch. 7, 9).
Nan Lan fell ill. She refused medicine and food, and she died. On the day Tian retired, sealing his jian and naming Cao Yunqi head of the Northern Branch, he received Hu Fei’s visiting card and found that the treasured dao had been stolen. That night Miao Renfeng came to his room. He brought the dao, which a disciple had buried, and Tian Qingwen’s dead infant, and asked how Nan Lan had died. Tian gave him her ashes and the phoenix-head pearl hairpin she had asked him to return. Miao opened the hairpin and showed him the map that had been hidden in it all along. Then he left him alive, saying that a man who lives is not necessarily happier than the dead. Tian drove an arrow into his own heart. Liu Yuanhe, hidden under the bed, witnessed it all (ch. 7).
Personality
Tian Guinong was handsome, eloquent and adept at pleasing people. Tao Baisui describes him as proud and vindictive. He avoided open fights with stronger men and worked through poison and other hands. In Side Story of the Flying Fox he is gratuitously cruel to beaten opponents.
Martial arts
Tian Guinong trained in Tianlong Swordplay from childhood and fought with the jian. His school’s secret poison, which Tao Baisui says Tian had mixed with drugs from the Poisoned Hand Medicine King, gave the Poison Dragon Awl its name. As head of the Northern Branch he held Li Zicheng’s Treasured Dao, the school’s treasured dao.