The Legend of the Condor Heroes

" If every little beggar in the country came to find me, for me to sort out their affairs, that would be a catastrophe!"

" You have good reason," Qi Gong sighed. "As I am of a lax and lazy nature, the weight of grandmaster of the Beggar Clan is really too heavy for my shoulders. But I can't find a person to whom I can entrust it. Then I have well to do with… "

" So that's why old Liang fears you so much: if all the beggars of the country came to give trouble to him, he would be in big trouble. If each one dropped a louse in his collar, that would trouble him until the end of his days!"

Qi Gong and Guo Jing burst out laughing.

" No," the old beggar said at last, " not just for that; he's also scared of me."

" What is that?"

" Nearly twenty years ago, he was committing an evil deed when I fell upon him…"

" What evil deed?"

" That old monster," said Qi Gong hesitantly, " believed a section of the adage «Gather the yin to nourish the yang… » He had obtained for himself several virgins, of which he violated their bodies, supposedly to obtain immortality."

" What's that, to violate the body?" asked Huang Rong.

The girl, whose mother had died in childbirth, had been taught by her father. After the treachery and escape of Chen Xuanfeng and of Mei Chaofeng, Huang Yaoshi, furious, had crippled his other disciples and they had all fled. No others remained on Peach Blossom Island than some mute servants. No one had therefore spoke to the girl of the things that happened between men and women. Since that she had met Guo Jing, she felt a joy and an unspeakable softness in his company, a melancholy and an unbearable solitudes when she was separated of him even for an instant. She believed that to be husband and wife meant nothing more than never to part from each other, that was why for so long she had considered Guo Jing as her husband, without knowing the nature of conjugal relations.

Her question therefore put Qi Gong in great difficulty.

" To violate the body of the virgins," the girl insisted, " this is to kill them?"

" No," Qi Gong responded, " when a woman undergoes a such outrages, this is sometimes more painful than the death itself. The proverb says: «To be dishonoured is grave, to die of hunger is nothing». That says well what I want to say…"

Huang Rong did not understand not yet:

" Does that mean to cut the ears or the nose with a knife?"

" Peuh!" said Qi Gong, bothered, " not at all! Little imp, you better ask your mother when you get back home…"

" My mother is dead…"

" Ah!" said the beggar. " Then you will understand after your wedding night with our silly young fellow!"

Huang Rong reddened, understanding at last that it was a matter of shameful things. She said softly:

" If you do not want to explain, so worse… Therefore, you fell on the old monster in the process of committing this evil deed, than itself is it passed then?"

Qi Gong, relieved to see that she did not put anymore embarrassing questions, continued:

" Well, I intervened, that's right. I caught this rascal, I gave him a good thrashing and pulled out all his hair! After, I obliged it to bring back these girls at their place and to promise solemnly that he would not recommence ever again. If I resumed it to do that, he would regret ever having been born! It would seem that, for all these years, he never broke his promise, that's the reason why I spared him today. He said then, goodness, did his hair grow back?"

" Oh yes! said Huang Rong while bursting out laughing. Pull out all the hair of the head, that would have been really funny!"

All three finished the meal.

"Qi Gong," Huang Rong then said, " now, even if you wanted to give me this bamboo stick, I wouldn't want it. But we cannot anyway to remain close to you all our lives! Now, what if we come across this Liang fellow, and he says to us: "Well, little brat, last time, you sheltered yourself under the name of Grand Master Hong and you hit me with his bamboo stick, today I'm going to avenge myself: I will pull out you all your hair!" That will we do then? When my Jing fought with him, his one and only blow, "Resisting the Dragon Means Regret", that is of course powerful, but that means little all the same, no? I am sure that Liang said in his heart: " Grandmaster Hong has gongfu of an infinite power, but when it begins teaching to a disciple, this is really not that terrible!"

" I know well," said Qi Gong, " that you hurl all these stupidities, provoking and threatening, so that I'll sign off all my skills to you two! Well, so long that you get ready some good dishes for me, I won't disappoint you."

Huang Rong, delighted, took Qi Gong by the hand to go in the pine wood.

Qi Gong imparted then to Guo Jing the second blow of the «Eighteen Dragon-Mastering Palms», called " Flying Dragon in the Heavens". In this blow, it was necessary to jump in the air and strike from the top down, an extremely powerful attack. Guo Jing took three days to assimilate it. During these three days, Qi Gong took the snack occasion to about ten more delicious placement them a than the others. Huang Rong, for its part, asked nothing from him for herself; provided that he consented to teach her loved one, she was more than enough satisfied.

In the space of a month, Qi Gong had taught to Guo Jing fifteen of the «Eighteen Dragon-Mastering Palms», from "Resisting the Dragon Means Regret" to "Sighting the Dragon in the Field".

These "Eighteen Dragon-Mastering Palms" were Qi Gong's ultimate skills. He had originally learned them from his Shifu, instrumental invented himself. The number of blows of course was limited, but each of them was full of exceptional power. At the time of the first Huashan tournament, when the five supreme Masters had measured themselves, these Eighteen Palms were not completely up to the mark, but they had already given rise to respect and general admiration. Thereafter, Qi Gong often had expressed his regrets: if he had concentrated all his efforts to perfect this technique some years earlier, the title of "First in the Martial World" might not have been fallen to the grandmaster of the Quanzhen Sect, Wang Chongyang, but to himself!

At first, Qi Gong had no intention to pass on more than two or three of these Eighteen Palms to Guo Jing, which would already have far sufficed for him to defend himself. But Huang Rong was really an unparalleled cook; every day she prepared new dishes of exceptional taste, never repeating herself, and the old beggar could not resolve himself to leave. So, day after day, he ended up teaching the fifteen blows. Guo Jing did not understand quickly, but the little that he learned, he retained, and repeated day and night, working with determination, so well that he achieved a good mastery of the fifteen blows, lacking no more in power than time and practice alone could give to him. Thus, in a little more of a month, his gongfu had achieved such progress that he was no longer the same person!

That morning, after breakfast, Qi Gong said, while sighing:

" My children, we've been together for more of a month, it's time we took leave of each other."

" Ah, but no," protested Huang Rong. " I have many more small dishes for your taste…"

" There is not endless banquets, but there is an infinity of dishes… I never have, of all my life, taught anybody for more than three days. This time, I've done that for more than thirty days! If this continues, it'll be a catastrophe!"