by Jin Yong
If Huang Rong could pursue, she would take advantage of this favorable situation and launch the ‘fan jie gou tun’ [flipping up and cutting the dog’s butt]; certainly she would be able to harm his life. But she was sitting cross-legged and must not move, so she cried out inwardly, “What a pity!”
Lu Guanying and Cheng Yaojia were shocked to suddenly see there were people inside the cabinet. By the time they saw clearly it was Guo Jing and Huang Rong, Ouyang Ke and Huang Rong had started fighting.
As Ouyang Ke fell down, his hands pushed the ground and he leaped back to the table and sat back down. He used the ‘qin na’ [grab and capture] technique trying to catch Huang Rong’s hand across the secret room’s door. Huang Rong’s Dog Beating Stick Technique was marvelous, but she could not move; besides, she had to take Guo Jing’s internal energy situation into consideration so that she could not use too much strength of her own. Ouyang Ke’s martial art skill was actually several times better than hers, so after more than a dozen moves she fell into a desperately dangerous situation.
Lu Guanying husband and wife drew out their saber and sword and attacked from both sides. Ouyang Ke let out a long laugh and ferociously launched a palm strike hacking toward Guo Jing’s face. At this moment Guo Jing was unable to exert any strength, so he simply closed his eyes waiting for death.
Huang Rong was shocked; she lifted up her stick to block. Ouyang Ke flipped his palm over and grabbed the end of the stick, pulling it out from Huang Rong’s hand. Huang Rong could not match his strength; her body staggered forward. She was afraid her palm would be separated from Guo Jing’s palm, so she let the stick go. Immediately she reached into her pocket and threw a steel needle out.
Those two were only several feet away from each other. By the time Ouyang Ke saw the flashing light, the steel needle was already in front of his face. Busily he bent his waist and threw his head backward, almost reclined on the table, thus evading the needle.
Lu Guanying saw his condition as if he was a sacrificial meat on the table, his saber chopped down toward Ouyang Ke’s neck. Ouyang Ke rolled to the right and with a ‘crack!’ sound his saber hacked the tabletop. Right at that moment he heard swishing noise of a steel needle above him and suddenly felt his back numb; one side of his body was paralyzed. He wanted to move aside, but his right arm had already been grabbed by the enemy from behind.
Cheng Yaojia was shocked and rushed forward trying to help. Ouyang Ke laughed and said, “That’s wonderful!” His hand moved so swiftly and grabbed the front upper part of Cheng Yaojia’s gown. Cheng Yaojia hastily hacked her sword down to cut his hand, while trying to leap backward at the same time. ‘Rip!’ Her gown was torn by his hand. She was so scared that the sword almost fell from her hand; her face turned deathly pale and she did not dare to rush forward anymore.
Ouyang Ke sat at the corner of the table. He turned his head around and saw the door to the secret room was already closed. Recalling his dangerous encounter with steel needles earlier he shuddered in fear. “This little girl is really not easy to fight,” he thought, “Aha! I got it! I am going to play around with this Cheng Da Xiaojie, let that kid surnamed Guo and the little girl hear it. Their concentration will be broken and thus their energy cultivation will be disrupted. I want to see if by that time she won’t listen to me nicely.” Thinking to this point he was very happy. He further considered, “This Huang family’s little girl is like an angel, nevertheless I have to make her willing to follow me for the rest of her life. It won’t be as much fun if I use force. I think it will be wonderful. Just marvelous beyond words!” So he turned to Cheng Yaojia and said, “Hey, Cheng Da Xiaojie, do you want him to live or to die?”
Cheng Yaojia saw her husband was in the hands of the enemy; she could not make any rash move. Hastily she said, “He has never wronged you, nor did he have any enmity with you. Please release him. You were very hungry a while ago. Didn’t I give you some food to eat?”
Ouyang Ke laughed. “How can two bowls of rice pay the price of a life? Hey, hey, you’ve never imagined that one day you Quanzhen Sect people will ask someone else’s help, have you?”
Cheng Yaojia said, “He ... he is the Peach Blossom Island’s disciple; don’t hurt him.”
Ouyang Ke laughed, “Who told him to chop me with a saber? If I wasn’t quick enough to evade, do you think my head will still be perched on my neck? Don’t you use the Peach Blossom Island to scare me, Huang Yaoshi is my father-in-law.”
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Cheng Yaojia did not know whether he was lying or was telling the truth; she hastily said, “Then he is your junior. Just let him go, let him apologize to you later.”
“Ha ... ha ...” Ouyang Ke laughed, “How can there be such an easy thing in this world? You want me to release him? That’s easy, but you must do what I tell you to do.”
Cheng Yaojia saw the lewdness in his face, she knew he must have malicious intentions; hence she lowered her head but did not say anything.
“Look at me!” Ouyang Ke roared. ‘Crack!’ his palm hacked down and cut the corner of the table; making a neat cut as if the table was cut by an axe or a saber. Cheng Yaojia was stunned, she thought, “Even my Shifu does not have this kind of ability.” Ouyang Ke had been training martial art under his uncle’s tutelage since he was little; no wonder his skill surpassed Sun Bu’er who started to learn martial art in her adulthood.
Seeing the frightened look on her face Ouyang Ke was immensely puffed up. “You must do whatever I tell you to do,” he said, “Otherwise I’ll do this to his neck.” Then he made a hacking move. Cheng Yaojia broke in cold sweats and called out in alarm.
“Will you do it?” Ouyang Ke asked. Cheng Yaojia reluctantly nodded her head. Ouyang Ke said with a smile, “Good! That’s my good girl. Now go and close the door.” Cheng Yaojia hesitated; she did not move.
“You are not listening!” Ouyang Ke was angry. Cheng Yaojia trembled in fear; she did not have any choice but stand up and close the door.
Ouyang Ke said with a smile, “You two got married last night, I heard it clearly from the other room. It was your wedding night, but you did not take your clothes off. There is no such thing in this world. You don’t know how to be a bride, so I am going to teach you. Now take your clothes off. All of them. If you leave even half a strand of silk, I am going to send your husband returning to heaven, and then you will become a young widow!”
Lu Guanying could not move his body, but he could hear clearly. He was so angry that he felt his eyes were about to pop out of their sockets. He wanted to tell his wife to run away and forget about him, but his lips were unable to move.
When Ouyang Ke grabbed Lu Guanying, Huang Rong quickly closed the door to the secret room. She took her dagger out, waiting for his second attack. Suddenly she heard him ordering Cheng Yaojia to take her clothes off; she was angry, but at the same time found it amusing. She was still childish so even though she hated Ouyang Ke’s despicable behavior, she also wanted to know whether this girlish and bashful Cheng Da Xiaojie would follow his order or not.
“What’s the big deal about taking off all your clothes?” Ouyang Ke said with a laugh, “Did you wear anything when you came out of your mother’s belly? Do you want your pride or his life?”
Cheng Yaojia hesitated a moment, then with a sad voice said, “Just kill him!”
Ouyang Ke did not expect she would say such thing; he was slightly startled, but then he saw she lifted her sword horizontally across her own neck. Hastily he waved his hand, sending out a ‘tou gu ding’ [bone penetrating nail]. ‘Clank!’ her sword fell down to the ground.
Cheng Yaojia was about to stoop down to pick her sword up when suddenly she heard someone knocking the door, “Innkeeper, innkeeper!” someone called out. It was a woman’s voice. Cheng Yaojia was delighted, “Someone’s coming, things may change,” she thought. She busily bent down to pick her sword and leaped to open the door.
There was a young woman wearing white standing outside the door, with a white clot
h on her head and a dagger on her waist. Her face was thin and pallid, but it was obvious that she was a beautiful woman. Cheng Yaojia did not care what kind of person she was, she already considered her to be her liberator. “Please come in Miss,” she quickly said.
That woman saw her exquisite clothes and adornment, her sweet and pretty face, also a sword in her hand; never in her wildest dream would she expect a desolate inn in this rural village like this would have this kind of innkeeper. She was dumbstruck. “I have two coffins outside, may I bring them in?” she asked.
If it were an ordinary house, the coffins may never enter in; but an inn was different. Besides, Cheng Yaojia was hoping she would come in quickly. She would not care if it was a hundred or even a thousand coffins, let alone only two coffins. She busily said, “Wonderful, wonderful!”
That young woman was taken aback, she thought, “What’s so wonderful about coffins going into an inn?” She beckoned outside and eight porters carrying two black coffins came into the inn.
That young woman turned her head and was surprised to see Ouyang Ke. With a ‘qiang lang’ sound she unsheathed the dagger on her waist.
Ouyang Ke laughed a big laugh and said, “The heaven has destined us to be together. You can run away, but you cannot escape your fate. It has delivered us good fortune, so we commit a great sin if we do not enjoy this blessing.”
This young woman was precisely Mu Nianci who was once captured by Ouyang Ke. After she broke off with Yang Kang at Baoying she cut her hair in grief, completely discouraged. Then she remembered there was one thing on earth she had to take care, thereupon she rushed back to the capital to fetch Yang Tiexin’s, husband and wife, bodies and brought them to the south. She wanted to bury her adopted father and mother at their hometown, the Ox Village of Lin’an; and then she was going to leave home and become a Buddhist nun.
At that time the Mongolian army was launching a large scale attack against the capital, they laid siege around the city. As a single woman traveling with two coffins in the turmoil and chaos of war, she experienced untold hardships, until finally she arrived at her adopted parents’ hometown. She had left home since she was five years old, and had never been to the Ox Village before. As she saw Shagu’s inn she was thinking of stopping by for some food and directions; who would have thought that she came across Ouyang Ke here.
At this time she did not know whether this beautiful woman wearing exquisite gown was her captor’s accomplice or not; when Cheng Yaojia was taken prisoner by Ouyang Ke, Mu Nianci was already hidden away inside the empty coffin. These two women had never met each other, so Mu Nianci thought Cheng Yaojia was one of Ouyang Ke’s concubines. She chopped her dagger toward Cheng Yaojia, then darting toward the door trying to escape. She heard the rustling noise of a clothes, someone was leaping over her head. Mu Nianci lifted her dagger up, Ouyang Ke’s body was still midair, his right hand’s index finger and thumb pinched the back of her dagger and pulled 752 Eagle Shooting Hero
it away, while his left hand grabbed her wrist. Mu Nianci was forced to let her dagger go; her body leaped up and two people fell together on the doorway, halfway above the coffin.
“Aiyo!” the four porters cried out in alarm. The coffin fell to the ground, pinching five, six of the porters’ eight feet.
Ouyang Ke’s left hand embraced Mu Nianci in his bosom, while his right hand stabbed the dagger randomly toward the back of those four porters. The porters screamed in terror and scrambled anxiously over the coffin to run away. The other four porters also dropped their coffin and ran outside the inn; without asking for their money.
Lu Guanying tumbled down as he was free from the enemy’s hand. Cheng Yaojia rushed over to help him up. She was totally ignorant of what was going on around her; her mind was set on how to get away from the enemy. With Mu Nianci in his left hand Ouyang Ke pushed the coffin with his right hand, and leaped back to the table. He snatched Cheng Yaojia’s belt and very soon she was also embraced at the crook of his right arm. Ouyang Ke sealed both women’s acupoints and sat on a bench. He laughed and called out, “Huang Meizi, you have to come over here too!”
While he was feeling smug, a shadow flashed in from outside; a young gentleman came in. It was Yang Kang. After he went out from underneath Huang Yaoshi’s legs along with Wanyan Honglie, Peng Lianhu and the others, they ran away out of the Ox Village. Everybody was angry at the humiliation they had just received; they hung their heads low and nobody said anything. Yang Kang thought if he wanted to seek revenge, he must find Ouyang Feng first, who had not returned from stealing the book in the imperial palace. Thereupon he asked for Wanyan Honglie’s permission and went back alone, waiting in the forest just outside the village.
That night Zhou Botong, Ouyang Feng and Huang Yaoshi three people came and go in a flash. With Yang Kang’s current skill level, he could not even see them clearly. Early the next morning he saw Mu Nianci bringing the coffins into the village. His heart pounded from excitement and he followed behind her quietly. He saw her enter the inn, and then saw the porters running away, he felt strange, so he peeked through a crack on the door and did not see Huang Yaoshi inside; but he saw Mu Nianci was embraced by Ouyang Ke in a frivolous way.
Ouyang Ke saw him come in, he called out, “Xiao Wangye [Young Prince], you came back!” Yang Kang nodded. Ouyang Ke saw his face looked unusual, he tried to console him, “In the past Han Xin had also received humiliation by crawling underneath someone else’s crotch. But a real great man can be bent and can be stretched. It was nothing. Just wait for my uncle, then you can extract your revenge.”
Again Yang Kang nodded his head. His gaze was fixed on Mu Nianci.
Ouyang Ke smiled and said, “Young Prince, what do you think of my two beautiful women?” Yang Kang nodded again. Ouyang Ke was not present when Mu Nianci and Yang Kang were jousting to find a spouse on the street of the capital; therefore, he did not know that these two had a deep relationship between them.
At first Yang Kang did not think much of Mu Nianci, and then afterwards he saw how much she was passionately devoted to him; his heart could not help but be moved by her love, hence he promised to marry her. Right now he saw Ouyang Ke was hugging her, his heart swelled with hatred, but he maintained his composure.
Eagle Shooting Hero 753 “There was a wedding in here last night,” Ouyang Ke said with a smile, “There is some wine and chicken in the kitchen. Xiao Wangye, I’d like to bother you to fetch the food, I want to drink with you several cups. I am going to tell these two beautiful women to strip and dance to accompany your drinking.”
“Nothing better than that,” Yang Kang replied with a smile.
To suddenly seeing Yang Kang, Mu Nianci was pleasantly surprised. But when Yang Kang did not pay her any attention, she was mad. Now she saw his frivolous expression as he was going to join Ouyang Ke in humiliating her, her heart turned icy cold. She was determined that as soon as her hands and feet were free, she would cut her own throat in the presence of this heartless fellow; and then she would forever be free from the anxieties of the world.
She watched him turn and go into the kitchen. He fetched the food and drink, then sat alongside Ouyang Ke. Ouyang Ke poured two cups of wine and held them up in front of Mu and Cheng two women’s mouths and said with a smile, “Drink this wine first, it will help to make your dancing more interesting.” The two women were very angry, but since their acupoints were sealed, they were unable to turn their heads away from the wine cups on their lips. Ouyang Ke managed to pour half a cup into their mouths.
“Mr. Ouyang,” Yang Kang said, “I admire your martial art skill very much. Let me toast you one cup before we enjoy the dancing.”
Ouyang Ke took the cup Yang Kang handed over; he drank it in one gulp, then casually he released the two women’s acupoints, but he placed his hands on the acupoints on their backs. He smiled and said, “If you listen nicely to what I say, not only you won’t get hurt, but I will make you happy!” He turned to Yang Kang and said, “Xiao Wangye, whi
ch one of these young girls do you like? I’ll let you choose first!”
Yang Kang slightly smiled and said, “Thank you very much!”
Mu Nianci pointed toward the two coffins on the doorsteps and imposingly said, “Yang Kang! Do you know whose coffins are those?”
Yang Kang turned his head and saw on the first coffin there was a red piece of paper with this line of characters on it: ‘da song yi shi yang tie xin ling jiu’ [the bier of Yang Tiexin, a chivalrous warrior of the Great Song Dynasty]. His heart turned cold, but his face did not show anything. He said, “Mr. Ouyang, can you hold them closely for me? I want to see which one has the smaller feet. I am going to choose her.”
Ouyang Ke laughed and said, “Xiao Wangye is truly smart! I think this one’s feet are smaller.” While saying that he rubbed Cheng Yaojia’s chin before continuing, “I have a special skill. I only need to look at a girl’s face to know what her body looks like, from top to bottom.”
Yang Kang laughed, “Amazing! I am impressed! What if I bow to you and take you as my master? Then you’ll teach me this special trick.” While saying that he bent down under the table.
Mu and Cheng both women had decided that as soon as he touched their feet, they would kick his ‘tai yang’ [sun] acupoint on his temple. Yang Kang smiled and said, “Mr. Ouyang, drink another cup of wine, then I’ll tell you if your guess is correct.” “All right!” Ouyang Ke laughed, taking the cup with both hands. Yang Kang glanced upward from underneath the table, he saw Ouyang Ke was drinking the wine with his head thrown backward; suddenly he took a broken spearhead from his bosom. He sent all his strength to his arm, from his arm to his wrist, lunged it forward and ‘Stab!’ the spearhead went five, six inches deep into Ouyang Ke’s abdomen. Immediately he somersaulted backward behind the table.
It was such a sudden change that Huang Rong, Mu Nianci, Lu Guanying and Cheng Yaojia were all startled. They only knew something changed, but nobody saw what happened under the table. Ouyang Ke raised his arms and pushed Mu and Cheng two women, they fell under the bench; and then he threw the wine cup in his hand out. Yang Kang ducked to evade and ‘crash!’ that cup hit the ground and turned into thousands of pieces; indicating the power behind that throw must be astonishing.
