A Hero Borm

by Jin Yong

  But this move . . . This made the Freaks look at each other. They had not taught him that. The thought that he might have another shifu was beginning, ever so slowly, to plant itself in their minds.

  Guo Jing had by now somersaulted onto the back of the horse and galloped away. Not long afterwards they returned, the horse rearing wildly and bucking. It was all Guo Jing could do to squeeze his thighs and hold on.

  Ryder Han began calling out instructions.

  The onlookers were astonished. The old herder knelt and began praying, begging the spirits not to punish them for offending the dragon horse. He then called to Guo Jing to jump off. But Guo Jing was concentrating too hard to hear him. It was as if he had tied himself to the animal. No matter how the horse bucked and cried, Guo Jing clung fast.

  Guo Jing was thus stuck, clasping on to the back of the horse for over two hours.

  “Guo Jing, get down and let your Third Shifu take over,” Jade Han called.

  “No chance,” Ryder Han cried. “All his hard work will have been for nothing if I take over!”

  This was a strong-willed young colt indeed, but whoever broke him would be his master for life. If Ryder Han stepped in, the horse would never be tamed.

  Guo Jing was just as stubborn, but he was beginning to tire. His skin glistened with sweat. He slipped one arm around the horse’s neck and embraced it tight. He then began to gather his inner strength to his arms and pulled tighter. The horse bucked and leapt with even greater force, but still the young man held on, his grip suffocating the steed. It had met his master.

  The animal stopped.

  “You’ve done it!” Ryder Han called out in delight.

  Guo Jing was still scared to jump down in case the animal ran off.

  “Come, boy,” Ryder Han coaxed. “You’ve tamed him. He’s yours for good now.”

  Quietly, Guo Jing slipped back onto solid ground.

  The auburn horse stuck out its tongue and tenderly licked Guo Jing’s hand. The crowd laughed. One of the herders tried to approach, but the horse kicked, sending him sprawling. Guo Jing led his proud colt to a nearby trough and cleaned him.

  “From now on, you will be called Ulaan,” Guo Jing whispered.

  The Freaks decided that Guo Jing had earned himself a rest for the day, but they could not help feeling suspicious about their student’s new-found skills.

  Chapter Six

  Combat at the Cliff

  1

  AFTER LUNCH, GUO JING WENT TO THE FREAKS’ GER.

  “Guo Jing, show me your Split Mountain Palm,” Gilden Quan said.

  “In here?”

  “Indeed. Potential enemies are everywhere, you have to practise fighting in confined spaces.” Gilden Quan feigned a left and struck with his right. Ke Zhen’e sat and listened.

  As custom dictated, Guo Jing was waiting until his shifu’s fourth move before launching his riposte. Gilden Quan was swift and relentless and suddenly struck at the vital point on Guo Jing’s chest with both palms in an Enter the Tiger’s Lair. They were no longer practising; his shifu was trying to hurt him! Guo Jing retreated in shock and within moments had his back against the ger’s felt walls. Instinct now took over. He hooked his left arm and blocked Gilden Quan’s attack. Gilden Quan’s fists were still placed on Guo Jing’s torso, but the young man was soft as cotton, and before Quan realised what was happening, he had been propelled backwards. His arms tingled and he stumbled.

  Guo Jing stared at his Master and then knelt on both knees. “I have been foolish, I will accept my Sixth Shifu’s punishment.” Flustered, he could not think what he had done to make his Master try to hurt him in such a way.

  The Freaks stood around him with grave expressions on their faces.

  “You have been training with someone else in secret. Why didn’t you tell us? If your Sixth Shifu had not confronted you, how long would you have continued to lie to us?”

  “Master Jebe teaches me to use the bow and arrow – that’s all.”

  “Still you lie to us?” Zhu Cong was furious.

  “I . . . I wouldn’t dare lie to my shifus.” Tears shone in his eyes.

  “Then who taught you this neigong inner strength? Now you are supported by this powerful master, you disrespect us?”

  “Neigong? I don’t know any neigong.”

  “Pah!” Zhu Cong spat. He jabbed his finger two inches below the boy’s ribs, at the Turtledove Tail acupressure point, which if hit results in an immediate loss of consciousness. Guo Jing was too scared to dodge it, so he stood stiff like a tree. But two years of training with the Taoist with three buns had produced results, even if he did not realise it. His muscles contracted and then pushed away his Master’s finger. It hurt, but he felt no other effect. Zhu Cong had not used all his strength, but there was no doubt that Guo Jing had used neigong to rebuff the move.

  “Are you still trying to tell me you don’t know neigong?” Zhu Cong snarled.

  Could the Taoist have been teaching me neigong? Guo Jing asked himself.

  “For two years, someone has been instructing me in breathing techniques to aid my sleep, but he never taught me any martial arts. I thought it was just for fun. He told me never to tell anyone. It didn’t seem to be doing any harm to my training.” Guo Jing began to kowtow. “But I know now I was wrong. I will never meet with him again.”

  The Freaks looked at each other.

  “You didn’t realise this was neigong?” Jade Han asked.

  “I don’t really know what neigong is. He just told me to sit, breathe and empty my mind. To think of how the qi travels around my body. It was hard at first, until recently when it began to feel like there was a warm little mouse running around in there. It feels so strange!”

  In one respect, the Six Freaks of the South were delighted, and rather surprised, that he had achieved such proficiency in just two years. But he was a simple young boy with few thoughts to distract him; it was no doubt easier for him to clear his mind than someone of intelligence and wit. Zhu Cong had long given up on their reading lessons.

  “Who is this teacher?” Zhu Cong asked.

  “He didn’t want me to tell you. He said that my shifus’ kung fu is as accomplished as his, so he has nothing to teach me. He says I am not his student and he is not my Master. He made me promise not to describe what he looks like to anyone.”

  This only made the Freaks more curious. At first they had assumed Guo Jing had run into a fellow wanderer of the wulin by chance, but there seemed to be something else going on.

  Zhu Cong gestured for Guo Jing to leave.

  “I promise I won’t meet him again. I won’t go tonight.”

  “No, listen to me. You will keep practising neigong with him. We aren’t angry with you. You go tonight. But don’t tell him we know.”

  Guo Jing nodded and left, happy that his Masters did not blame him. He pulled open the door to the ger and saw Khojin standing outside with the two condors by her side. They were fully grown, majestic birds by now, almost as tall as her.

  “Come, I’ve been waiting for you for ages.”

  One of the birds flew up and hovered on Guo Jing’s shoulder.

  “I just tamed a horse. It can really run! I’m not sure if he’ll let you ride him.”

  “Then I’ll kill him!” Khojin replied.

  “I won’t let you.”

  They joined hands and ran to play with the birds and their horses.

  The Six Freaks, meanwhile, were deliberating their next move.

  “He has taught Guo Jing well. There can be no malicious intent, surely?” Jade Han said.

  “Then why doesn’t he want us to know? And why didn’t he explain to the boy what he was teaching him?” Gilden Quan contended.

  “I’m afraid we may know him,” Zhu Cong said.

  “Know him? If he’s not a friend, then he must be an enemy,” Jade Han said.

  “None of our friends possesses such superior neigong kung fu,” Gilden Quan muttered.

  “If he is
our enemy, then why teach Guo Jing his skills?” Jade Han said.

  “Maybe it is all part of some devilish plan.” Ke Zhen’e’s words sent a shiver through the other Freaks.

  “Sixth Brother and I will follow Guo Jing tonight and find out who he is,” Zhu Cong said. The others nodded their approval.

  THAT NIGHT, Zhu Cong and Gilden Quan hid themselves outside Guo Jing’s mother’s ger, where they waited for over an hour. Then it came.

  “Ma, I’m leaving!” Guo Jing appeared in the doorway and left. He was moving quickly, and within moments he was far ahead. With no trees to block their view out on the grasslands, they could follow at a safe distance.

  He arrived at the bottom of the cliff and, without stopping, began to climb. Guo Jing was now able to ascend to the top without help from the Taoist.

  Zhu Cong and Gilden Quan watched in astonishment, not knowing what to say. Before long, the other Freaks arrived. They had brought their weapons with them. Zhu Cong told them Guo Jing was already at the top.

  “We can’t get up there,” Jade Han said, gazing up at the clouds which had since swallowed up the summit.

  “Let’s hide in the bushes and wait for them to descend,” Ke Zhen’e said.

  Jade Han recalled their fight twelve years previously with Twice Foul Dark Wind. They had hidden in the bushes then as now. A cutting wind had been blowing that night too; the moon’s cold light, the large expanse of desert sand, the lonely hill, the occasional neighing of distant horses – it was all so familiar. And by the next morning, her beloved Zhang Asheng was dead, his smiling face still for eternity. A deep sadness came over her.

  Time passed, minutes gave way to hours. The morning sun began to burn off the clouds and still there was no Guo Jing. They waited a few more hours, but all was quiet.

  “Sixth Brother,” Zhu Cong said, turning to Gilden Quan, “why don’t we take a look?”

  “Can we even get up there?” Ryder Han replied.

  “We can only try.”

  He ran back to their ger and returned some time later with two ropes, axes and a bundle of nails. Together, Gilden Quan and Zhu Cong began to climb, hammering nails, using their lightness kung fu and pulling each other up. It was a long and sweaty process.

  But what they saw once they reached the top surprised them both. In fact, it drained the blood from their cheeks.

  There, beside the rock where Guo Jing was used to practising his neigong, lay a neat pile of nine skulls: five, three, and then one balancing on top. Closer inspection revealed five perfect, clean-cut holes in each, as if carved with a knife.

  Their hearts were thumping as they moved around, scanning their surroundings. Apart from the deep scar that scored the rock, they saw nothing unusual, and so lowered themselves back down the cliff face.

  Ryder Han was waiting, shaking with anxiety.

  “It’s her – Cyclone Mei,” Zhu Cong declared. The others froze.

  “What about Guo Jing?” Jade Han asked.

  “They descended on the other side, as far as we can tell,” Gilden Quan replied. He went on to describe what they had seen.

  “Eighteen years of hardship, and twelve of them were spent raising a fox,” Ke Zhen’e said.

  “The boy is loyal and honest, he wouldn’t behave in such an ungrateful manner,” Jade Han cried.

  “Loyal and honest? If so, how could he spend two years training with that witch without saying anything?” Ke Zhen’e’s voice was as hard as ice.

  Jade Han did not know what to say, her thoughts were so tangled.

  “Is that blind hag using Guo Jing to hurt us?” Ryder Han said.

  “It looks that way,” Zhu Cong said.

  “But Guo Jing isn’t capable of acting like that. We’ve known him since he was a child,” Jade Han said.

  “So she has kept him in the dark as to her true intentions,” Gilden Quan said.

  “His lightness technique has improved and his neigong inner strength is considerable, to be sure,” Ryder Han said. “But his martial skills are still lacking. Why hasn’t she worked on that?”

  “She’s using him, she doesn’t want him to be truly competent,” Ke Zhen’e said. “Guo Jing killed her husband, after all.”

  “Indeed,” Zhu Cong said. “She wants him to kill us all, one by one. Then she will finish Guo Jing herself, her revenge complete.”

  Their brother’s logic sent shivers through them.

  Ke Zhen’e jabbed his staff into the ground. “We will go back and pretend we know nothing of this,” he said. “When Guo Jing arrives, we will kill him. Then, when the witch comes to find him, we will fight her. Her martial arts may have improved, but she is still blind. It is not beyond us.”

  “Kill him? What about our bet with Qiu Chuji?” Jade Han said.

  “Which is more important – our lives or a bet?”

  No-one replied.

  “We can’t!” Woodcutter Nan broke the silence.

  “We can’t do what, exactly?” Ryder Han asked.

  “We can’t kill him,” Nan said, shaking his head.

  “I agree with Fourth Brother,” Jade Han said. “We must first investigate the truth before jumping to conclusions.”

  “This is serious,” Gilden Quan said. “If we hesitate, if we let him know we know, who can say what will happen to us!”

  “There will be terrible consequences unless we act now. This is Cyclone Mei we are dealing with.”

  “Third Brother, what do you think we should do?” Ke Zhen’e turned to Ryder Han.

  Ryder Han was undecided, but the sight of his sister’s tears moved him. “I have to agree with Fourth Brother. I cannot kill Guo Jing.”

  They had reached a deadlock: three favoured killing their disciple, three preferred a more cautious approach.

  “If Fifth Brother was here, he would agree with us,” Zhu Cong said sadly.

  This sent a stabbing pain through Jade Han’s heart, and the tears poured down her cheeks in earnest. “We must avenge Fifth Brother. Let us do as Big Brother says!”

  “Then let’s go back.”

  The Freaks returned to their ger in silence, each nearly drowning in the swell of their own thoughts.

  2

  WHEN GUO JING CLIMBED TO THE TOP OF THE CLIFF, HE found the Taoist waiting for him as usual. “Look!” the Taoist said, pointing at the rock.

  Guo Jing approached and saw nine skulls gleaming in the moonlight.

  “Twice Foul Dark Wind are back?” he said, a quiver in his voice.

  “You know about Twice Foul Dark Wind?”

  Guo Jing told the story of their fight on that bleak mountain top, the battle in which he lost his Fifth Shifu and killed Hurricane Chen. The memory made his body shake and he could barely talk. He was just a child back then and he only learned who the two ghastly figures were many years later from his shifus.

  “Copper Corpse stopped at no evil, but he died by your hand!”

  “My shifus frequently talk of Twice Foul Dark Wind. My Third and Seventh Shifus tell me Cyclone Mei must be dead, but Master Ke always says, ‘Not necessarily!’ But look! Iron Corpse is still alive.” The Taoist saw another shiver go through the boy. “Did you see her?” Guo Jing asked.

  “I arrived not long ago, but I spotted the skulls at once. She must have returned for you and your shifus.”

  “Master Ke blinded her. We aren’t supposed to be so scared of her.”

  The Taoist took a skull and examined it. “Her kung fu is impressive indeed,” he said, shaking his head. “I fear your shifus are no match for her. Not even if I were to help.”

  The man’s words frightened Guo Jing. “Twelve years ago, when she still had her sight, she was unable to overcome my Masters. There were only seven of them then. Now we are eight. You will help us, won’t you?”

  The Taoist paused before answering. “I cannot understand how her fingers have come to be so strong and terrible. As they say, the good cometh not and those who cometh are not good. She must be confident that she
can defeat you.”

  “Why did she arrange the skulls here? A warning? This way, we have time to take precautions.”

  “I imagine it is part of the practice of the Nine Yin Skeleton Claw. She probably assumed no-one ever comes up here as it’s so difficult to reach. We are lucky to have come across them.”

  “I must warn my shifus. At once!”

  “Good idea. Tell them a good friend has asked you to pass on this message: They must not fight her; it’s not worth it. Instead, you must all hide and think of a solution.”

  Guo Jing nodded and made his way to the edge of the cliff. But seconds later, the Taoist grabbed him around the waist and jumped, landing lightly behind the rock, where they hid. Guo Jing was about to ask what was happening when a hand cupped his mouth and he was pulled to the ground.

  But he could not resist looking, so he raised his head back up above the rock.

  A dark silhouette was rising up from behind the other side of the cliff, her long hair fluttering in the moonlight. She had in fact ascended by the more difficult side, but as she was blind, she most likely could not tell. The Six Freaks of the South had been lucky.

  Cyclone Mei began spinning quickly and Guo Jing ducked back down. Then he remembered she was blind. By now she was sitting cross-legged on the rock he used for training, breathing slowly and deeply.

  Some time passed, and then a cracking sound started echoing around them. First slow, then faster, like beans popping in hot oil. The noise was coming from her joints, but she was sitting perfectly still. Guo Jing had no idea what kind of neigong this was, but he became acutely aware of his own limitations in comparison.