by Jin Yong
Iron Palm Water Glider—Qiu Qianren.
Guo Jing hopped to his feet and stood in front of Lotus protectively, but, to their surprise, Qiu merely grinned, waved and flew back down the stairs.
“Was he scared of us?” Lotus said. “What an odd man. I will find out.” And she began to run after him.
“Be careful!” Guo Jing rushed to follow, but, by the time he reached the bottom of the Tower, they were both gone.
“Lotus! Lotus! Where are you?”
What if she had fallen victim to Qiu’s merciless kung fu? The possibility terrified Guo Jing.
Though Lotus could hear the panic in Guo Jing’s voice, she chose to ignore him. She wanted to find out what Qiu Qianren was up to first. If she replied, the old fossil would know she was on his trail.
She tiptoed after him at a safe distance as he made his way around the outer perimeter of a large mansion, pausing as he turned a corner at its northern end. She would wait a little before catching up with him.
Qiu Qianren guessed Lotus must be following him from Guo Jing’s cries. He turned the corner and stopped.
They both waited, and listened. Nothing. Then, at the same moment, they both crept up to the corner.
Lotus was confronted with a vision of wrinkled, pockmarked skin, just like that of Dongting Lake’s famous mandarins.
Qiu Qianren was greeted by a face as delicate and ravishing as the blossoms on the banks of the River Xiang.
Their noses almost touched.
Panic flashed across their eyes.
Yelping, they spun round and bolted in opposite directions.
Although wary of Qiu Qianren’s kung fu after his display the night before, Lotus could not let him slip away so easily. She sprinted most of the way around the mansion’s outer wall, fleet of foot thanks to her lightness qinggong; she was planning to spy on him from the eastern corner.
Qiu Qianren, it turned out, had had exactly the same idea. Once more, they almost rammed into each other—this time, by the screen wall opposite the mansion’s south-facing main gate.
Lotus stood facing him. She could not risk turning, because that would open her back to his attack, but if she could keep him talking until Guo Jing had found them, then she would not be in any significant danger.
She smiled sweetly. “Uncle Qiu, what a small world! We meet again.”
“Indeed, and so soon after we parted ways in Lin’an! I trust the young lady has been well?” Qiu Qianren returned her pleasantries with an equally pleasant grin.
So, you’re back to your old lying ways, Lotus said to herself. Don’t you remember seeing me last night, at Jun Hill? Well, well, whatever you say, I’ll answer with the Dog Beater.
“Guo Jing, now’s your chance!” Lotus called at the top of her voice.
Qiu Qianren whipped around in alarm.
No one.
Only a gust of air against his shin.
He had been duped. He jumped.
Lotus swung the bamboo stick low, using Count Seven Hong’s Trip technique.
Qiu Qianren dodged the blow, but he had no idea that the cane would whip back at him so rapidly, nor that it could create a rush of parting air that would crash against him like the waters of a mighty river.
Trip. This one word described ten thousand subtle variations. The quicker Qiu Qianren jumped out of the way, the faster Lotus flashed her cane, to the point that any observer would see nothing but a whirl of green where once a young girl and an old man had stood.
At the eighteenth sweep of the stick, Qiu Qianren was a fraction too sluggish. A whack on his left shin was followed by his right ankle being hooked out from under him.
Thump! He found himself lying flat on the ground.
“No, stop, hear me out!” he yelled.
Beaming, Lotus pulled back. He hopped to his feet, but, just before he was about to land, he was met with a flick and a strike from the Dog-Beating Cane. Once more, Qiu Qianren lost his footing, again landing on his back.
By the sixth tumble, Qiu Qianren had learned his lesson. He would stay down, with his belly pressed flat to the ground.
“Get back up.”
Following her command, he leaped up and yanked at the drawstring of his trousers.
It snapped.
He grabbed his waistband.
“Shoo, or I’ll let go!”
For once, Lotus was speechless. Never in her life would she have imagined a martial master and the leader of one of the jianghu’s most influential gangs resorting to such a sordid ruse.
She decided she would rather not take the risk.
“Pah!” she muttered under her breath as she retreated.
Qiu Qianren roared with laughter.
Amused by the absurdity of it all, she had to admit, albeit grudgingly, that she had been outwitted.
Qiu Qianren was about to chase Lotus away, far enough that she would not turn back to pester him, when Guo Jing appeared between them.
The young man guarded his chest with one arm as he drew a languid semicircle from his hip upward with the other.
Qiu Qianren had seen enough to be sure that, if the boy’s left palm joined the right, as though he was cradling an invisible orb, a force quite unlike anything he had ever known would burst forth.
He started to laugh, then gave out an almost undignified squeal.
“Ignore him,” Lotus called. “Strike!”
Guo Jing was still wary of the man’s Iron Palm, for its intensity and complexity was equal to that of the most prized kung fu of Zhou Botong, Apothecary Huang, or Viper Ouyang. He knew it would be a mortal mistake to underestimate his opponent at such close proximity. And yet, he gathered his qi in the Elixir Field, relaxed his body and prepared to strike.
“Little ones, Grandpa here has been overindulging and has given himself a bad stomach, yet again,” Qiu Qianren said, still holding his trousers up by the waistband. “Once more, I must beg your pardon.”
“Strike him,” Lotus urged as she backed away.
“I know what you young ’uns are thinking. You won’t let it rest until old Grandpa shows his true colors. Well, the problem is, my tummy has been having a mind of its own of late. Especially at crucial moments like these. But I have an idea. Listen carefully, now. If you want to prove your mettle, meet me at the foot of the Iron Palm Mountain in seven days.”
Irritated by his patronizing tone, Lotus reached inside her clothes for her needles. She was waiting for him to lose himself in his prattling, so that she could unleash a Skyful of Petals. Would he still refer to himself as jolly old Grandpa then? But, on the other hand, what if she struck his hands by accident and made him lose his grip…? As she deliberated over what to do, she was struck by a sudden realization. Iron Palm Mountain … The secret message in the painting!
“Dragon’s den or tiger’s lair, we’ll be there!” She paused for a moment. “How do we find you?”
“Go west from here. Through Chengde, Chenzhou, then up the Yuan River. Between Luxi and Chenxi, you’ll find a mountain that looks like all five fingers of one hand are pointing up to the heavens. That is Iron Palm Mountain. The terrain is treacherous and Grandpa’s kung fu most fearsome, so you have been warned. You can always apologize to me now, instead. There’s no need to put yourselves in danger.”
Lotus was overjoyed. His description was just like Guo Jing’s painting!
“May we meet again within the week.” She accepted the challenge with exaggerated politeness.
Qiu Qianren nodded, then crunched up his face as if in pain. “Aiyooooo! Aiyoooo!” And off he dashed, clinging to his waistband to preserve his modesty.
3
“Lotus, I don’t understand,” Guo Jing said.
“What is it?”
“Why does he pretend to know so little kung fu? He could have overpowered us easily. Remember when he struck me in the chest at Roaming Cloud Manor? If he had used the same neigong then that he did last night, I wouldn’t be standing here today. Why does he put on this silly act?�
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Lotus nibbled on her thumb as she pondered these questions. “I really have no idea. I tripped him over again and again with the Dog Beater, just now. He was defenseless … Maybe the move with the beggar’s staff was some kind of sleight of hand?”
Guo Jing shook his head. “He crushed all the bones in Surefoot Lu’s hands. He also met my attack head-on. What he did requires real learning; he couldn’t have faked it.”
Lotus pulled a pearl hairpin from her hair, sat on her heels and started scribbling on the ground. After a while, she sighed. “I don’t know what the old fossil is playing at, but I’m sure we’ll find out when we get to Iron Palm Mountain.”
“But shouldn’t we head back to Lin’an to look for Shifu instead? That awful old man is probably playing another trick on us. Why go to Iron Palm Mountain?”
“Remember the hidden message in the painting Papa gave you?”
Guo Jing scratched his head, trying to recall. “We don’t know what it says. The rain washed away half the characters…”
“You still haven’t worked it out?”
Guo Jing was stumped. “You know what I’m like. Just tell me. You obviously have worked it out.”
Lotus scratched four broken lines in the dirt. “Though there is a missing character in the first line, it can only be Yue Fei’s final writings. I was struggling with the second line, but it must be shan—mountain!”
“Are you saying … the first two lines … that General Yue Fei’s writings are in Iron Palm Mountain?” Guo Jing clapped his hands together. “Let’s go now! The Iron Palm Gang have betrayed their homeland by joining forces with the Jin. We can’t let them give Yue Fei’s writings to Wanyan Honglie! What about the last two lines?”
“Qiu said Iron Palm Mountain is shaped like the five fingers of a hand, so the third line probably is Beneath the middle crag.”
Guo Jing applauded. “You are smart! What about the last line?”
Lotus was now speaking more to herself than to Guo Jing. “In the second … the second … What could that be?” She tilted her head and her long hair fluttered. “I can’t work it out. I’ll try again when we get there.”
* * *
TOGETHER, THEY rode west with the condors, passing through Chengde, Taoyuan, and Yuanling. Before long, they had arrived in Luxi. Yet, when they asked the locals for directions to Iron Palm Mountain, the townsfolk simply shook their heads.
Disappointed, they decided to stay in Luxi for the night. That evening, Lotus asked an inn boy about the local sights. The young man rattled off a long list, yet there was no mention of Iron Palm Mountain.
Lotus pursed her lips. “How dull! Sounds like this little place has no areas of natural beauty.”
“Luxi may be small, but the scenery around Monkey Claw Mountain is incomparable!” The man was clearly rankled.
“Monkey Claw Mountain? Where’s that?” Lotus kept her tone casual. It could be just the place they had been searching for.
The man turned to the door with a terse, “Pardon me.”
Grabbing the back of his shirt, Lotus pulled him back into the room. She placed a sycee ingot of silver on the table.
“Yours, if you tell me everything about Monkey Claw Mountain.”
The serving man reached out. “Really? Mine?”
Lotus nodded with a smile.
“I will tell you, but don’t go there. Evil men dwell up there. Death awaits any soul who strays within five li of Monkey Claw Mountain.”
Lotus caught Guo Jing’s eye. She could tell he had had the exact same thought: the Iron Palm Gang!
“Does this mountain have five peaks, shaped like the claws of a monkey?” Lotus blinked innocently.
“Indeed! The five summits are lined up like this.” The man opened his palm, fingers pointing skywards. “The middle one is higher than the peaks either side. The most curious thing is how each crag is split into three segments—just like our fingers.”
“Segment!” Lotus leaped to her feet. “In the second segment!”
“Yes!” Guo Jing cried in joy.
The man gaped at them.
Lotus asked him a series of questions about how to get there, only letting him go when she was entirely satisfied.
Cradling the silver with both hands, the man skipped out of the room, delighted with his unexpected good fortune.
“Come on!” Lotus was raring to go.
“It’s only sixty li away, it won’t take Ulaan long to make the journey. Why don’t we make our pilgrimage in the morning?”
“Pilgrimage?” She laughed. “We’re on a mission to take back Yue Fei’s writings!”
“Oh.” Guo Jing felt very silly. How could he have forgotten?
* * *
LOTUS AND Guo Jing slipped through the window and took Ulaan from the stables without anyone at the inn noticing. The condors flew ahead as they galloped southeast along the route described by the inn boy.
Clumps of foliage at chest height sprouted from both sides of the rugged mountain path. It would have been a difficult journey, had they been on foot, or on a lesser horse.
In no time, they had covered forty li. Looming ahead, five vertiginous tors towered above them, their tops shrouded by scattered clouds.
When they reached the foot of the mountain, they gazed up at the craggy summits that seemed to tear angrily at the moonlit sky, as if someone was thrusting their hand right up into the belly of the heavens.
“The middle peak is just like in the painting.” Guo Jing was thrilled. “Look! It’s even got pine trees at the very top.”
Lotus chuckled. “All we’re missing is a general practicing with his sword. Why don’t you go up and give it a try?”
“Too bad I’m not a general.”
“I’m sure Genghis Khan will…” She trailed off.
Knowing what she meant, Guo Jing looked away. He did not have the courage to look her in the eye.
* * *
AFTER SETTLING Ulaan and the condors, and checking there was no one in sight, Guo Jing and Lotus began to ascend the middle crag on foot.
Circling to the other side, they scaled the rock face with their lightness kung fu until they reached a narrow path. They followed the track for several li, winding back and forth, and eventually arrived at a dense pine forest. Before they could decide whether to explore the woods or continue upward, they saw light glimmering between the branches. Their eyes met. Without saying anything, they crept in silence toward the source.
A few steps later—whoosh!—two men, clad in black, burst from the trees, their glinting weapons pointed straight at their faces.
If we fight these men, the Iron Palm Gang will know we’re here and it’ll make stealing Yue Fei’s final writings more difficult. Lotus weighed their options as she recalled the hand-shaped token she had taken from Qiu Qianren. Removing it from the inside pocket of her robes, she showed it to the black-clad men without saying a word.
They took one look, stepped aside and bowed.
Swift as lightning, Lotus twirled the bamboo cane and tapped their pressure points. Neither man could move. She then kicked them into the undergrowth and stole toward the light, with Guo Jing following close behind.
Candles and lamps were glowing at both ends of a stone house. They tiptoed to the western side and peeked through the window.
Vapor rose from a large wok that was sizzling over red-hot coals. A boy, dressed head to toe in black, tended the stove. His small body worked the bellows with all his might. Another boy in a similar outfit noisily scraped the contents around the bottom of the pan with a metal ladle.
A grizzled old man sat cross-legged in front of the fire, his eyes closed in concentration. He was inhaling the steam from the wok, his breathing deep and slow.
Qiu Qianren, dressed in his signature arrowroot shirt.
Before long, wisps of hot air began to rise from the crown of his head. He stretched his arms high—heat seemed to be issuing from the tips of his fingers, too.
All of
a sudden, he leaped up and plunged his hands into the wok.
The sweat-soaked child at the bellows somehow found a new burst of energy and pumped faster.
Qiu Qianren stood motionless at the stove. The leader of the Iron Palm Gang was clearly not impervious to the heat—it was his will alone that kept his hands buried in the hot pan.
At length, he drew his arms back and thrust his palms out. They smacked loudly against a small sandbag suspended from a roof beam by a slender piece of string.
But the bag did not even quiver.
Guo Jing was astounded. To hit it without making it swing requires the most exquisite kung fu. This man is a true master.
Meanwhile, Lotus was certain that this was another show put on to fool any onlookers. She would have said something, had they not had more important things to do—that is, finding Yue Fei’s final writings.
They watched Qiu Qianren repeat the move over and over: temper the hands, strike the bag, then back to the stove again.
Lotus was aching to discover how he made steam rise from his head and fingertips, but she could not see any device that might help to create such an illusion. She recalled how Zhu Cong had exposed his stunts at Roaming Cloud Manor.
If Zhu Cong was here, he would see through the old sham at once, she said to herself. Even I can admit that he is far more perceptive than me in these matters.
Since they could glean nothing more from Qiu Qianren’s ritual, they crept over to a window on the eastern side of the house.
Lotus and Guo Jing were shocked to find Yang Kang inside, and, next to him, Mercy Mu. What had brought her here? they both wondered, as they eavesdropped on the conversation.
Yang Kang was being his most charming self, all sweet nothings and empty promises. He was trying to convince Mercy to marry him as soon as possible, but the young woman would not be swayed. She refused to consider their union until Yang Kang had killed Wanyan Honglie and avenged the death of his birth parents—her godfather and his wife.
“My dear, don’t you understand?” There was a hint of accusation in Yang Kang’s tone.
