by Jin Yong
One standing up the other sitting down, time quietly passed, the crescent moon rose from the sea and slowly reached the top of their heads. The food in the basket had already turned cold, as cold as the hearts of this couple.
In this chilly wind under the cold moon, amidst the faint sound of waves breaking the shore, suddenly from a distance came a cry. The sound was intensely mournful, like a wolf’s howl or a tiger’s roar, but it also sounded like a human’s voice. The sound was transmitted by the wind, so when the wind died, the sound also disappeared. Huang Rong inclined her ears to listen attentively; she vaguely recognized it was the voice of someone struggling in severe pain, only it was not clear whether the voice belonged to a human or a beast. After determining where the voice came from, she moved her feet and rushed toward that voice.
Actually she wanted to take Guo Jing along, but then she changed her mind, “Most likely this is not something good, it will only increase his anxiety.” Darkness enveloped her on every side, she was actually afraid to go alone; fortunately she knew every grass and every tree on the Peach Blossom Island very well, hence although her heart was thumping hard, she gathered all her courage and went forward.
She had only walked for about a dozen of steps when suddenly felt a gust of wind by her side; Guo Jing dashed past her and was running ahead of her. He did not know the way, so very soon he was lost. Huang Rong saw his hands hacking and his feet kicking, trying to destroy the trees and bushes blocking his way, as if he was losing his mind. “Follow me,” Huang Rong said.
“Si Shifu [Fourth Shifu], Si Shifu!” Guo Jing called out. He had recognized his Si Shifu, Nan Xiren’s voice.
Huang Rong’s heart turned cold, she thought, “It will be very strange if his Si Shifu saw me and did not want to take my life.” But by now she had already disregarded all consequences; she knew perfectly well a big disaster was looming ahead, but she did not even try to run away from it. She led Guo Jing into the thick forest on the east side of the island. They saw underneath a peach tree a man was rolling around with twisted body.
Guo Jing cried out and rushed ahead to hug him. Nan Xiren’s face showed a smile, his mouth produced ‘heh, heh’ sound. Guo Jing was scared but also happy; suddenly, ‘wah!’ he broke into crying. He was crying and calling out, “Si Shifu! Si Shifu!”
Nan Xiren did not say anything; he struck Guo Jing with the back of his palm. Guo Jing was taken by surprise; instinctively he ducked to avoid the blow. As his palm did not hit its target Nan Xiren’s left fist struck out. This time Guo Jing thought that his shifu was punishing him; he was happy, so he let Nan Xiren’s fist to hit him. Who would have thought that Nan Xiren’s fist carried a surprisingly strong force. ‘Bang!’ Guo Jing was sent rolling down on the ground.
Since he was little Guo Jing had practiced fist technique with Nan Xiren several hundreds or thousands times; he knew perfectly well the strength of Nan Xiren’s fists and palms, he was greatly surprised to find Nan Xiren’s strength suddenly increased several folds. Guo Jing had just barely stood up when Nan Xiren’s fist came again. Guo Jing still did not want to fend off. This fist carried an even stronger force; Guo Jing saw stars dancing in front of his eyes, he almost passed out. Nan Xiren stooped down to pick a big rock up, and fiercely pounded it down on top of Guo Jing’s head.
If Guo Jing did not evade, this big rock would certainly crack his skull open and turn his brain to mush.
From the sideline Huang Rong saw the critical situation, she quickly flew forward and pushed Nan Xiren’s arm with her left hand. Nan Xiren, with the rock still in his hands, fell down to the ground. His mouth made a ‘heh, heh’ sound and to everybody’s surprise he did not crawl back up.
“Why did you push my Si Shifu?” Guo Jing shouted angrily.
Huang Rong’s sole purpose was to save Guo Jing, she did not expect Nan Xiren would be this weak; as soon as she pushed, she hastily held out her hands to help him up. Under the moonlight she saw his face was smiling, but this smile resembled the exaggerated smile of an actor on stage; his face looked very frightening. Huang Rong called out in alarm and withdrew her hands immediately, she did not dare to touch his body. All of a sudden Nan Xiren turned over and struck her left shoulder with his fist. Two people shouted in pain simultaneously.
Although her body was protected by the soft hedgehog armor, this fist had given her enough pain and sent her staggered a few steps back. Blood was dripping from Nan Xiren’s fist, which was pricked by the thorns on the armor. Amidst the two people’s shouts Guo Jing called out, “Si Shifu!”
Nan Xiren looked at Guo Jing as if he had just recognized him; he opened his mouth to speak, but no matter how much the muscle around his mouth twitched, he still could not say anything. His face showed a smile, but his eyes showed extreme despair.
“Si Shifu,” Guo Jing said, “Please take a rest. Whatever it is you want to say, you can say it later.”
Nan Xiren tried hard to say something, he lifted his neck to look up, but his lips were unable to form the words. After straining for a while his head dropped, looking down to the ground.
“Si Shifu!” Guo Jing repeatedly called out; he rushed forward to lift Nan Xiren up.
From the side Huang Rong could see clearly. “Your Shifu is writing,” she said.
Guo Jing looked sideways and saw Nan Xiren’s right index finger was slowly writing on the soft earth. Under the moonlight he saw Nan Xiren wrote character by character: “My . killer . is .”
Huang Rong noticed he wrote with great difficulty, her heart was thumping hard; suddenly she remembered something, “He is on the Peach Blossom Island, even an idiot will know that it is my Father who killed him. But he is on the verge of death and is still using his very last strength to write the killer’s name, could it be that the murderer is someone else?” She was watching Nan Xiren’s finger with a rapt attention; she noticed that the finger moved slower as if losing its strength, so she kept praying in her heart, “If he is going to write some other name, please, please let him write it down quickly.”
Nan Xiren was writing the fifth character [Chinese character, that is], he started from the upper left hand corner and wrote a small ‘ten’ ( ) character, then his finger trembled and stopped moving all
together.
Guo Jing was kneeling on the ground, hugging his shifu. He felt Nan Xiren’s body shook violently then he stopped breathing. He looked at the small ‘ten’ character and called out, “Si Shifu, I know
you were going to write the Huang ( ) character, you were going to write the Huang character!”
He threw himself on Nan Xiren’s body and wept bitterly. In this one cry he had vented up the grief and indignation that had been welled up in his heart the whole day. He cried for quite a while, then his body fell on top of Nan Xiren’s lifeless body; he had fainted.
Without knowing how much time had passed, he woke up under the bright morning sunlight. He stood up and swept his gaze around. Huang Rong was gone, and Nan Xiren’s body was still lying down on the ground with his eyes open. Guo Jing remembered a saying, ‘die without closing his eyes’; he was unable to restrain tears from flowing down his cheeks again. Stretching out his hand he gently closed Nan Xiren’s eyes. Suddenly he recalled just before he died Nan Xiren’s facial expression was very strange; he wonder what kind of injury was so fatal. Thereupon he untied Nan Xiren’s clothes to examine his whole body. Strange to say, except for the pricked hand from hitting Huang Rong’s soft hedgehog armor last night, from head to toe, Guo Jing could not find a single scar on Nan Xiren’s body. Neither his chest nor his back showed any sign of injury by internal strength strike; the skin was neither black nor burnt, so there was no sign of poisoning either.
Guo Jing picked up Nan Xiren’s body and carried it to be buried together with Zhu Cong and the others; but the pathways in the forest were so strange that after about dozens of steps he lost his bearing. He had no choice but turn back and dig a hole underneath a peach tree to bury Nan Xiren.
&nb
sp; Guo Jing had not eaten for a whole day; his stomach hurt from hunger. He wanted to find a way to go back to the shore and find a boat to return to the mainland, but the farther he went, the more confused he became. He sat down to take a rest for a while, then he stood up with a renewed vigor and walked again. This time he had an idea, regardless of he found a pathway or not, he would keep his eyes toward the sun in the east.
After walking for a while ahead of him was a dense forest, seemingly impassable. Nothing strange about the forest, it was just that each tree was full of long and thorny rattan cane; it would be truly difficult for him to set his feet on. He made the decision, “I am not coming back today!” and then jumped up to the tree top.
He only walked one step on the tree when ‘rip!’ the corner of his trouser was tore by a thorn and his calf was bleeding from several cuts. He walked two more steps, and his left leg was entangled in some long canes. He took his dagger out and cut the canes. Lifting his head up he saw far ahead the rattan trees were very dense, seemingly without end. He called out, “Even if my legs are sheared, I have to leave this cursed island!”
He was about to jump ahead when suddenly Huang Rong called out from the ground, “Get down, I’ll take you out.” He looked down and saw Huang Rong standing underneath a rattan tree on his left.
Guo Jing did not reply, he jumped down and saw Huang Rong’s face was deathly pale, as if her blood was drained completely out. He could not help but startle; he wanted to ask whether her injury recurred, but he forced himself to bite his lips. Huang Rong noticed he wanted to say something, but as soon as his lips started to move he turned his head around. She waited for a moment without seeing any response from Guo Jing; she sighed gently and said, “Let’s go!” Two people walked along the winding path heading east.
Huang Rong’s injury had not been completely healed, and she had to face this heavy misfortune; she was tossing and turning in her sleep the previous night. She knew she could not blame her Jing Gege, she could not blame her father, and she could not even blame the Six Freaks of Jiangnan. She only resented herself; why would she have to endure the Heaven’s punishment like this? Did the Heaven hate people who lead a happy life?
She led Guo Jing toward the beach; knowing in her heart that this time he would never come back, it would be difficult for them to see each other anymore, so she felt that with every step a piece of her heart was also taken away.
Just beyond the rattan trees forest they could see the beach ahead. Huang Rong felt weary, she was unable to restrain her body from shaking; hastily she used the bamboo stick to brace herself, but unexpectedly there was no strength left on her arm, the bamboo stick skewed and she fell down to the ground.
Instinctively Guo Jing outstretched his right hand to hold her, but just as his finger was about to touch her arm, the injustice his shifus suffered flashed in his mind. His left hand moved and ‘slap!’ it struck his own right wrist. He was using Zhou Botong’s Mutual Hands Combat Technique; as his right hand was stricken, he turned his palm over and leapt backward immediately.
Without receiving any help Huang Rong fell down to the ground. As Guo Jing saw her falling down, remorse, affection, grief, indignation and all kinds of emotions bubbled up inside his heart. Even if his heart was made of stone he could not restrain himself from stooping down and pick her up. He looked at all directions trying to find a comfortable place to lay her down, and it was then did he saw a green cloth flutter in the wind on the rock toward his northeast.
Huang Rong opened her eyes and saw Guo Jing’s gaze was fixed on a distant place; she followed his gaze and also saw the green cloth. “Father!” she called out in alarm. Guo Jing let her down, and hand in hand they ran toward the rock. They saw it was a long gown, stuck in the crook of the rock; they also saw a piece of human skin mask lying next to it. Obviously they belonged to Huang Yaoshi.
Huang Rong was really alarmed; she stooped down to pick up the gown and clearly saw a bloody hand print on the lapel of the gown, with the fingers left winding traces. It looked very scary.
Guo Jing remembered, “After killing my San Shifu with the Nine Yin White Bone Claw Huang Yaoshi must have wiped his fingers with this cloth.”
Initially he was holding Huang Rong’s hand, but now his blood was boiling inside his chest; he shook Huang Rong’s hand away, snatched the gown, and with a ‘rip!’ sound he tore the gown into two parts. He saw the corner of the gown was torn, looked like it was the green piece of cloth tied on the eagle’s foot. The blood print was so clear that under the bright sunlight it looked as if the palm would jump out of the clothes and slap someone on the face; but it provoked Guo Jing’s anger even more so that he felt he was going to go insane from grief and indignation. He tucked his own gown into his belt and waded into the water towards a sailboat.
The mute and deaf servants on the boat had long gone, disappeared without a trace. Without looking back to Huang Rong he drew his dagger out and cut the rope, hoisted the anchor and sailed to the sea.
Huang Rong watched the boat sail to the west. At first she was hoping that he would change his mind, turn the rudder and head back to the island to take her traveling together; but then she saw the boat was getting smaller and smaller, while her heart was turning colder and colder. She stared blankly at the sea until the boat disappeared on the horizon. Suddenly she remembered that she was alone on the island; Jing Gege had gone, and she did not know whether her father would ever return. How could she pass the rest of her days? Would she just stand on this shore forever? Rong’er, Rong’er, you must not take a short cut and die!
All by himself Guo Jing steered the boat, leaving the Peach Blossom Island, heading west. He had sailed for several dozen ‘li’s when he suddenly heard the eagles’ anxious cry high above his head. The pair of eagles had followed him and perched on the sail arms. Guo Jing thought, “The eagles come after me, Rong’er is alone on the island, she must be very lonely!” Overcome with pity and regret he spontaneously turned the rudder around, wanting to take her to travel together. But after sailing for a short while he remembered, “Da Shifu told me to cut Huang Yaoshi’s and Rong’er’s heads before I can come and see him. Da Shifu, Er Shifu and the others came to the Peach Blossom Island and fell under Huang Yaoshi’s poisonous hands. Although Da Shifu is blind, he can hear clearly. For some reason he was fortunate to escape and stay alive. He raised his iron staff to kill Rong’er; he wanted me to kill Rong’er, what did Rong’er do? I can’t kill Rong’er; Er Shifu and the others were not killed by Rong’er. But how can I be together with her? I must cut Huang Yaoshi’s head and take it away to see Da Shifu. If I am not the Old Heretic Huang’s match, then I’ll let him kill me.” Immediately he turned the rudder again, making a circle on the sea surface, heading west once more.
Late on the third day the boat reached the shore. Out of hatred of everything from the Peach Blossom Island he took the anchor and smashed the bottom of the boat before leaping onto the beach. He watched while the sailboat slowly leaned sideways and sunk to the bottom of the ocean. He could not help but feel a loss in his heart. Leaving the shore he walked to the west; he found a peasant home and bought some rice to eat. After finding the right direction he went straight to Jiaxing.
That evening he spent the night by the bank of Qiantang River; he saw the reflection of the bright moon on the river, like a big golden wheel floating on the water. Suddenly he jumped up with a start; he was afraid he missed the martial art contest appointment at the Misty Rain Tavern. Immediately he asked the host where he lodged, and found out that today was the thirteenth of the eighth month. Hastily he crossed the river that very same night; he bought a healthy horse and whipped the horse to gallop quickly, and arrived at Jiaxing by early afternoon of the next day.
Since his childhood he had heard his six shifus recounted their battle with Qiu Chuji; how they had a wine drinking contest out of the huge copper vat at the Drunken Immortal Tavern [zui xian lou], the exquisiteness of their martial art skills and the heroi
sm surrounding that battle. Six people loved to tell the story good-naturedly. So as soon as he entered the southern gate he asked the location of the Drunken Immortal Tavern.
The Drunken Immortal Tavern was located by the bank of Nan Hu [South Lake]. Guo Jing arrived at the front of the tavern. He looked up and saw this tavern’s appearance was exactly like what Han Xiaoying had told him. The tavern had been imprinted in his mind for a dozen of years, today he had seen it for the first time with his own eyes; he noticed the exquisiteness of the carving of the eaves, it was truly a beautiful building. At the front of the tavern stood a big wooden sign with ‘tai bai yi feng’ [the great (Li) Bai (a famous poet of the Tang Dynasty)’s left behind manner/custom/air] four letters engraved on it; while above the main entrance there was a sign with ‘zui xian lou’ [Drunken Immortal Tavern], inscribed by Su Dongpo [a famous calligrapher of the Song Dynasty], in golden letters, gleaming under the bright sunlight.
Guo Jing’s heart was thumping madly; walking and leaping, he went upstairs. A wine shop attendant welcomed him and said, “Honorable Guest, please use the downstairs room, since the upstairs is already reserved for some other guests.”
Guo Jing was about to reply when suddenly someone was calling, “Jing’er, you are here!” Guo Jing looked up and saw a Taoist priest sitting and drinking wine, his long beard reached his chest, his face was ruddy; it was none other than Changchun Zi [Eternal Spring] Qiu Chuji.
Guo Jing rushed forward and bowed to the ground, “Qiu Daozhang [Taoist Priest Qiu]!” he called out. His voice was somewhat choked.
Qiu Chuji held out his hand to raise him up; he said, “You are a day early, that is very good. I am also a day early. I thought tomorrow we are going to fight Peng Lianhu, Sha Tongtian and the others, so I want to be here early to drink wine and reminisce about the past with your Six Shifus. Have your Six Shifus arrived? I have prepared some tables for them.”
