Book 24 Chapter 10: The Victor[1]
Book 24 Chapter 10: The Victor[1]
Yang Xuyan, Hou Xibai and An Long all had a terrifying feeling of tripping forward.
Based on their skill, naturally they could not possibly trip and fall down for real because Wanwan was scaring them using the ‘Tianmo Jing Chang’ [demonic powerful field]; but they had to apply their power to resist it, to withdraw backward.
Both Yang Xuyan and An Long were shrewd men; they had already thought about all kinds of method Wanwan might use to break the stalemate, including the possibility of she giving the Print Scroll to one of them, and thereby executing the ‘shifting the misfortune to the Eastern Wu’ stratagem. Wanwan then would turn from becoming the target of a multitude of arrows to gaining control over the overall situation from the side.
Now it had become clear that Yang Xuyan and An Long were on one side, while Xu Ziling and Hou Xibai were on the other side. Although in term of power An Long and Yang Xuyan were one line ahead, but because previously An Long had fully used the Tianxin Lianhuan and wasted a lot of energy, the strength between them has more or less balanced out.
Under this kind of circumstances, Wanwan could help either side to defeat the others rapidly. Therefore, just now An Long and Yang Xuyan secretly agreed to – by all means – attack and kill Wanwan first, before dealing with Xu and Hou, two men. Who would have thought that Wanwan’s intelligence far surpassed their expectation, that surprisingly she was able to see through their conspiracy, and in this critical juncture launched the Tianmo Da Fa will all her strength, to form a ‘vacuum’ force field that could absorb and borrow any true qi, so that even if they wanted to attack, there was simply no opening they could exploit.
It was more formidable that any method of using the true qi to protect one’s body. Only Xu Ziling saw it as it should be by rights, simply because he had already suffered many times under Wanwan’s Tianmo Da Fa.
‘Qiang!’
While pulling himself backward, Yang Xuyan drew the Phantom Sword; instantly its cold rays radiated all around. Abandoning Wanwan, he attacked Xu Ziling, turning the sword rays into a soaring long rainbow, turning the usually-hard-to-fathom-between-the-true-and-the-false phantom sword move into a thousand-catties-thunderbolt, jolting-the-mountain-shaking-the-peak powerful strike, using the-sword-is-the-man, the-man-is-the-sword stance to take the formidable opponent standing on top of the Luohan statue.
This moment Xu Ziling had just caught the Print Scroll. Seeing Yang Xuyan’s all-out sword strike, he groaned inwardly, realizing that this time Wanwan was cruel beyond human comprehension, because when catching the scroll, his mind would immediately be distracted, hence it would be difficult to maintain its optimum state. If he was either killed or seriously injured by Yang Xuyan’s sword, it would be an extreme injustice.
He was a great expert in martial art study. In just one glance he knew that Yang Xuyan’s sword strike this time truly revealed his strength, unlike his namesake as the number one assassin in the world. In a snap of the fingers, the power of the entire body was unleashed in its finest detail, a sword strike that – as soon it was executed – was earth shattering. Before the sword arrived, the murderous aura had already enveloped him completely. Even if he evaded it, he could only delay the moment of death. The opponent’s sword strike made him feel like he fell into the mud, his feet went deep into difficult situation; from this, Yang Xuyan’s formidability could be clearly seen.
If Yang Xuyan’s Phantom Sword before was like a fine carving or delicate cut [on gems] of a small pattern of an insect head, the swordplay this moment was like large river Chang Jiang [Yangtze]; it flowed out swiftly with a thousand li might, joyous like stirring cursive [calligraphy] so that others could not grasp where the brush would move next.
In his quick wit, Xu Ziling tossed the Print Scroll in his hand toward Yang Xuyan; soaring in the air, while roaring in laughter, he said, “How about if I give it to you instead?” Simultaneously he transferred his strength to his feet, while crying inwardly, ‘Sorry for the offense’, the Luohan statue under his feet disintegrated into cun-sized fragments, so that his entire body sank down to the ground.
This moment Hou Xibai was rushing over as well. Seeing Xu Ziling throwing the Print Scroll away, he called out loudly, “Good throw!” Folding his fan, his handsome eyes radiated powerful beam all around, he rapidly cut across toward Yang Xuyan, who, afraid of damaging the Print Scroll, had his hands and feet flustered.
The moment Yang Xuyan drew his sword, An Long also retreated backward to break away out of the Tianmo Power’s range, and his retreating speed was even higher and more urgent than Hou and Yang, two men’s, because he felt that Wanwan’s concentrated force was aimed at him alone. On top of that, Wanwan previously threatened and warned him by saying that if he did not show fear, that meant he was bluffing. Even if he were at his peak condition, he did not have the confidence of defeating Wanwan, much less after fighting two hard battles one after another.
A white shadow flashed.
Wanwan’s floating ribbon flew into the air, producing a sharp noise like a ghost wailing or a god calling, piercing through An Long’s eardrums.
If just now An Long could be considered shocked, right now it could be said that his soul flew away and scattered. He was a senior veteran of the demonic schools; naturally he knew what it was.
Naturally floating ribbons could not wail or call; the whistling noise came from the floating ribbon slicing the air and in a bizarre way it vibrated the air around it into sonic wave. It became Tianmo noise simply because his own heart and guts had been scared and his mind was under control of the fear, which caused the demon to grow from his heart. His natural disposition was ‘everything for self and selfish profit’, so he only knew how to harm others for his own personal benefit. This moment, he no longer cared, nor was he interested in – Yang Xuyan’s life or death. Ferociously raising a mouthful of true qi, he summoned back his shaken will to fight simultaneously, while swiftly backing off. Taking advantage of his weight, which surpassed others, his own momentum made him flying backward even faster; leaning left and tumbling right, ‘Bang! Bang!’ one by one the Luohan statues were knocked over and shattered, meeting with calamity.
All along, Wanwan’s floating ribbon was no more than a cun and a few fen away from brushing his fatty flesh.
Wanwan suddenly stood still charmingly, her eyes moved toward Yang Xuyan, three men. Although she did not look completely satisfied, her heart was cheerful.
Among the four men, the one giving her the most headache was An Long. His Tianxin Lian Huan was truly a pinnacle among the demonic schools’ skills. When launched at full strength, even her Tianmo Da Fa could not do much against him.
If fighting one on one, she might be able to wait until his momentum exhausted his strength depleted to strike back. But under current circumstances, she might fall into critical situation where it was difficult for her to get out. Therefore, she had used up all kinds of trick and psychological tactics and was finally successful in planting the seed of doubt that he would certainly be defeated, which then led him to be frightened. She was also trying to make An Long believe that she might abandon the Print Scroll and take his life instead, while the fact was that she still wanted to obtain the Print Scroll. This moment, with An Long being ‘scared back’, she felt that victory was within her grasp.
She was so sure that by giving the scalding-the-hand, heating-up-the-mountain Print Scroll to Xu Ziling, she would lure Yang Xuyan to try to snatch the Scroll with all his strength. Naturally the most ideal situation would be if he were able to inflict heavy damage to Xu Ziling. At that time Hou Xibai would join the fray, and then he would fight a desperate battle with Yang Xuyan until you die, I live.
At this time she could take advantage of the one-in-a-thousand-year golden opportunity of An Long running away in difficult situation to execute her scheme; not only to single-handedly obtain the Print Scroll, but perhaps she could even strike the four men one by one, eliminating these bunch of formidable opponents. Who would have thought that Xu Ziling unexpectedly passed on the Print Scroll to others, and thus forcing her to change the plan?
With a tender shout Wanwan moved forward at lightning speed. Her floating ribbon shot out, starting later but arriving sooner, it accurately threatened the major acupoint on Hou Xibai’s back.
On the other side, Yang Xuyan plainly saw that the Print Scroll was flying straight toward his sword, but he did not dare to receive it, because in front of him was Xu Ziling, staying close to the ground to attack, while on his left was Hou Xibai, coming from the air to kill him. Under these two major martial art masters’ pincer attack, if he withdrew the sword momentum and stretched out his hand to fetch the scroll, he would only end up dying violently on the spot.
Although Xu Ziling seemed to be tossing the scroll casually, the fact was that he was using an extremely crafty trick; he imbued the Print Scroll full of his true energy, which was a lot stronger than Yang Xuyan’s sword momentum.
With no other choice, Yang Xuyan ferociously clenched his teeth; the sword turned at will, it changed direction from attacking upward to pouncing downward, without changing the original style – to stab Xu Ziling, letting the Print Scroll whizzed past overhead. His only wish right now was that Hou Xibai would chase after the Print Scroll and ignore him.
Hou Xibai was able to see very clearly the two men’s intense, no-one-wants-to-yield battle; inwardly he was greatly shocked, because as the Print Scroll was filled with Xu Ziling’s power, any object it would fall onto would be smashed up into pulp. Yang Xuyan deliberately avoiding the scroll was to force Hou Xibai to care more about the Print Scroll remaining intact, and thus would be too busy to join Xu Ziling in pincer attack against him. While he was groaning inwardly, a qi power attacked his back.
Hou Xibai sighed inwardly. Without even looking, he swung the Fan of Beauty backhandedly to block the brushing away floating ribbon. Borrowing the reaction force of the collision, he changed direction from the battlefield between Yang and Xu, two men, to the Print Scroll shooting toward the western wall.
From the moment Wanwan threw the Print Scroll toward Xu Ziling, the changes had been treacherous beyond human comprehension; everybody has been carrying out strange scheme, which was beyond everybody else’s expectation. Seeing Yang Xuyan’s brave action of abandoning the Print Scroll and pouncing down with all his strength to attack him, Xu Ziling could not help admiring his accurate judgment. But no matter what, the opponent’s concentration was slightly distracted; the originally powerful momentum was thus slightly weakened by the change of stroke, no longer imposing irresistible momentum like before. Thereupon Xu Ziling promptly seized this opportunity by gathering the fingers of his left hand into a palm chop, while forming his right hand into a fist. With wonderful footwork, he swiftly stepped forward and sent out a punch across the empty space.
Spiraling qi power ferociously shook the sharp blade of the opponent’s sword qi, followed by his palm chop coming down, while his foot stepped aside to enter the small gap to the left of the sword momentum. Strange, abstruse, quick-witted, leaving Yang Xuyan with no choice but to change stroke again to block. In the end, all four killer sword strikes returned without any achievement.
From this, it could also be clearly seen how formidable Yang Xuyan’s sword strikes were; even after the formidable power was weakened, Xu Ziling still had to give everything he had and exhausted his strength to neutralize it, not daring to meet the sharp blade head on.
Presently, the person Yang Xuyan wanted to kill the most has shifted from Hou Xibai to Xu Ziling. Come to think about it, there was a very big difference between the Xu Ziling that he met at Shen Luoyan’s fragrant residence in Xingyang City in the past and the Xu Ziling before his eyes right now. Come to think about it, the difference was enough to make the heart of any person – who stood as his enemy – shivered in fear.
Every change of Xu Ziling’s move, none was not brimming with like-a-heavenly-steed-soaring-across-the-sky, wonderful-to-the-highest-peak creativity. During the fierce battle just now, his moves in confronting the enemy were in harmony with the postures of the Luohan in the hall; continuous like a chain, the method changed just like the birds in the sky, the fish in the water, without leaving any trace, enabling him to use the weak to subdue the strong, to seize the strategic high ground. Nobody did not have their heart alarmed and their countenance moved.
Left without any choice, Yang Xuyan sank his qi down and turned his sword around to sweep and hack, blocking and diverting Xu Ziling’s piercing palm chop full of true power. Unexpectedly it produced a loud ‘Bang!’ as the sharp of the blade was jolted by the qi power and thus it was unable to harm the edge of Xu Ziling’s palm the slightest bit.
The thing that gave Yang Xuyan more headache was the spiraling qi power, which was sometimes slow, sometimes fast – invading his body via the edge of the sword.
A dense, cold and raw murderous intent welled up in Yang Xuyan’s heart. Retreating to the space between two Luohan and after neutralizing Xu Ziling’s vortex of energy, he met Xu Ziling’s not-yielding-a-single-cun chasing-to-kill attack head on with irresistible counterattack. His sword hacked down three times in a row; one strike was more violent than the other.
Using fantastic, swiftly moving technique Xu Ziling countered every move with all he had, while shouting loudly at the same time, “Hou Xiong, get the treasure and don’t worry about Xiaodi, just leave!”
This remark was even more formidable than any moves; Yang Xuyan pulled his sword back in panic and flashed backward. At this time Hou Xibai was not having a good time either. He saw that the Print Scroll was about to crash onto the wall and shatter to pieces, plus Wanwan was ferociously pursuing close behind his back like a maggot sticking to the bones, as if he had suddenly become her mortal enemy with enmity as deep as the ocean.
According to reason, Wanwan ought to have the same thought he did, i.e. she would not want the Print Scroll to turn into scraps of paper. Thinking to this point, Hou Xibai suddenly had a flash of understanding. He knew that Wanwan was forcing him to take ‘the right to save the scroll’ from her, based on the fact that the Print Scroll’s importance to Hou Xibai far surpassed its usefulness for her.
If the Print Scroll was destroyed, at most Wanwan would lose the opportunity to understand the Immortal Print method, but Hou Xibai might never have the opportunity to climb to the highest level. The difference might be more than a thousand li away.
The contradiction in Hou Xibai’s heart was aggravating. When martial art masters fought against each other, the difference between victory and defeat was only a thread away. If he wanted to save the scroll, he might lose his life. But avoiding the Print Scroll meant he would fall into Wanwan’s hand, and he still had to give her advantages as much as possible, to avoid affecting her action to save the Scroll.
He had always loved the flowers, cherished the flowers, and was most forgiving toward the beauty’s shortcomings. But now, he hated this stunning woman – whose beauty could be compared to Shi Feixuan – to the point of gnashing his teeth in anger, and thus was feeling helpless.
Upon considering the severity of this case, Hou Xibai’s foot tapped the tip of the nose of the Luohan by his side and changed direction sideways. With a silver-bell-like tender laughter, Wanwan said, “Now, that’s a good boy!”
The floating ribbon turned into a hundred white rainbows, rolling toward the Print Scroll, which was about six, seven chi away from crashing against the wall.
‘Whoosh!’
A jade hand, surpassing-the-snow, taking-unfair-advantage-of-the-frost – reached out from behind one of a row of Luohan statues leaning against the wall, and snatched the Print Scroll one step ahead before the floating ribbon wrapped itself around the Print Scroll. And then the missing-her-fragrant-trace Shi Qingxuan, like a specter – floated over, and spoke with cold humph, “This time it ought to be my turn to be the fisherman who reaps the benefit!”
Wanwan pulled the floating ribbon back and flashed over in increased speed, and said with tender laugh, “Could it be that Xuan Mei [younger sister] has not heard ‘to whom the deer falls’, and has not known about it?”
Remaining tranquil and calm, Shi Qingxuan replied, “Of course I have!” The jade flute in her right hand sprinkled a wide expanse of dark green light protecting various vital acupoints on her chest, while the Print Scroll in her hand shot out toward the turning-around Hou Xibai.
It was this moment that Xu Ziling shouted loudly to tell Hou Xibai to get the scroll and get out; it could be said that the call was extremely timely. Wanwan did not have time to mind Shi Qingxuan, much less Shi Qingxuan received her training directly from Bi Xiuxin; taking care of her was absolutely not something that can be accomplished in just a few strokes. With a tender shout she changed direction to attack Hou Xibai.
The distance between Hou Xibai and the thrown Print Scroll was continuously decreasing. Having lost it and then regained it, he was very excited, so much so that his spirit rose to its highest peak. He even considered how to deal with Wanwan’s howling-wind-and-torrential-rain-like attacks after receiving the scroll.
At this critical moment, a revered Luohan statue, which was standing against the wall, unexpectedly moved suddenly, as if it was alive. It sprang up high into the air and pounced down toward him. If he continued flashing forward to take the scroll at the current speed, he would collide against the Luohan head-on.
This change was unexpected, even for Wanwan. Hou Xibai knew that although the Print Scroll was important, but if he lost his life, any Print Scroll would not have any use for him. The statue weighed more than a hundred catties, with the momentum of its movement on top of that, the total force he had to withstand was not a laughing matter.
He suddenly halted his steps.
The Luohan brushed past and slammed against another revered Luohan on the opposite side, creating a loud explosion that reverberated across the entire hall, as both statues exploded into smithereens and splashed in all directions. An Long’s huge obese body flashed past between Hou Xibai and Wanwan, while the Print Scroll also disappeared without any trace.
Howling with laughter, An Long said, “After all, the older the ginger, the spicier it is; Wan yatou [girl/servant girl], you fall into the trap!”
‘Boom!’
The entire hall shook. An Long broke through the wall and fled out of the hall.
This moment both Xu Ziling and Yang Xuyan were rushing over, and both were stunned at this unexpected change. Other than Wanwan herself, no one understood what kind of trap he was referring to when he said that Wanwan has fallen into his trap. Only Wanwan secretly blamed herself for underestimating this Zongzhu [head of a school] that could rank among the Eight Major Martial Art Masters of the Demonic Way along with Zhu Yuyan.
Previously she had used all kinds of tricks to instill fear in An Long’s heart; she was even able to force him into difficult situation, so that he fled in disorder – using her floating ribbon. At that time she managed to enter by exploiting a weak spot, by relying on the floating ribbon to produce Tianmo sound to control his mind, expecting him not to be able to recover in such a short period of time, thereupon she felt comfortable enough to fight over the Print Scroll. Plus she still heard the sound of An Long smashing the Luohan on the other side of the hall, hence she felt even more comfortable.
Now, of course, it turned out An Long was able to recover quicker than she had expected, and that he continuously smashed the statues to create a false impression that he was running away.
But this moment it was already too late for regret, and even if she wanted to chase after him, it would be too difficult to catch up with him.
Right this moment, suddenly An Long shrieked and flew back inside from the hole on the wall.
Everybody in the hall looked at each other in astonishment; they were even more stunned compared to when An Long successfully snatched the Print Scroll away.
[1] Chapter title, The Victor – orig. to whom the deer falls, usually refers to who seizes the empire. See Jin Yong’s Deer and Cauldron, translated by yours truly, for more info on this idiom.