The Return of the Condor Heroes

Chapter 12 – Great banquet for heroes, Part 13

When Guo Jing heard his wife say this he interrupted, “Asking Taoist Hao to fight Jinlun Fawang may be a bit too risky. If the victory or loss won’t affect the overall result, then I’m afraid during that round the enemy might too be ruthless, it would be difficult to defend against him.” He spoke frankly and didn’t care that he counted as the first class ‘si’, regarding Hao Datong as the third class ‘si’ may be a bit too impolite.

Hao Datong knew that this duel will affect the fate of the country; this was not the normal duels for fame that occurs frequently in the world of Wulin. If the position of the Chancellor of Wulin is taken by the Mongolian Protector, not only will the Han martial artists lose face, they will also lose their spirit. The goal of uniting together and fighting against the invaders will be unachievable, he said, “There is no need to worry about that, as long as it’ll help my country, losing my life to that Tibetan monk is not important.”

Huang Rong said, “All we need to do is to win the first two matches, then there will be no need for the third match.” Guo Jing was delighted and agreed.

Zhu Ziliu laughed and said, “I have an important mission; if I lost to that Mongolian Prince then I’d suffer a lifetime of insults from the world’s heroes.”

Huang Rong said, “There’s no need to be modest, please go ahead.”

Zhu Ziliu went to the middle of the hall and saluted Huo Dou with his hands and said, “In the first match, it will be me who’ll be asking for some advice. My surname is Zhu first names Ziliu; the things that I love most in life are poetry and literature, my kung fu is very coarse. I have come to request some pointers from you.” As he said this he searched himself, from his sleeve he took out a pen, he circled it a few times in the air, looking completely like a scholar.

Huo Dou thought, “These types of people will have profound skills, I cannot take it easy.” He held his fists and returned the greeting and said, “Little Prince requests pointers from senior, please show your weapon.”

Zhu Ziliu said, “Mongolians are a barbaric nation, they have yet to be enlightened, since you want some pointers, then I will point you in the right direction.”

Huo Dou was furious, “You insult my country; then I can’t spare you.” He opened his fan and said, “This is my weapon, are you going to use a saber or a sword?”

Zhu Ziliu wrote the word ‘pen’ in the air and laughed as he said, “In my life I have always been associated with a pen; how would I know how to use other weapons?”

Huo Dou concentrated on his pen, he saw the bamboo tube and the brush head, at the tip of the pen was half an inch of black ink, there was nothing special about it. It was completely different to the ‘chun gang’ pen that people in Wulin used for sealing pressure points, he was about to ask about it when a girl in white entered from outside.

She stood at the entrance of the hall, her eyes slowly scoured across the crowd; it was as if she was looking for someone. Everyone in the hall was concentrating on Zhu Ziliu and Huo Dou when the girl in white entered; they turned their heads involuntarily and looked at her. They saw her face was pale white as if she was ill; though the light of the candles was like red clouds, her face had no hint of blood in it, showing off her elegance even further, her beauty was incomparable. People use the phrase ‘as beautiful as a goddess’ to describe a girl’s beauty but no one knew how beautiful a goddess was. As soon as these people saw this girl, they couldn’t stop the words ‘as beautiful as a goddess’ from running though their minds. It was as if a light fog, a thin mist, surrounded her body; she appeared real but also looked like an illusion; she was not from this world.

As soon as Yang Guo saw this young girl, he was overjoyed, his chest felt like it had been struck by a metal hammer; he leapt from the corner of the room and hugged her, he called out, “Gu Gu, Gu Gu!”

That young girl was Xiao Longnu.

After she left Yang Guo, she circled around the land a few times and then returned to the ancient tomb. Before she was eighteen, living in the ancient tomb was not hard for her, but after she met Yang Guo and experienced many twists and turns, she could never return to the way she was before, not caring about anything.

Every time she sat on the chilled jade bed to practice her martial arts she remembered that Yang Guo had slept on this bed; when she sat at the table eating she remembered the times when she ate with Yang Guo. After practicing kung fu for a little while she would become troubled and impatient, it was difficult to carry on. She spent over a month like this before she could endure it no longer; she decided to look for Yang Guo. She didn’t know how she would treat him once she had found him. She didn’t know anything about worldly matters, similar to a person from the mountains or wild lands, now something had suddenly changed and was unfamiliar, she was completely at a loss. After she left the mountain, everything that she saw was new to her; how would she know the roads, whenever she saw someone passing by she would ask, “Have you seen Yang Guo?” When she was hungry she would take other people’s food because she didn’t know that money was needed. She created a lot of trouble along the way. But when people saw that she was innocent and beautiful, they couldn’t refrain from making her allowances; no one caused trouble for her. One day she heard two men talking in a restaurant, they said that the famous heroes of the world will be going to Da Xingguan’s ‘Heroes Feast’ at the Lu Manor. She thought that Yang Guo might be there so she found out how to get there and headed for the Lu manor.

Apart from Hao Datong, Zhen Zhibing and Zhao Zhijing, no one amongst the two thousand present knew a thing about her; all they saw was that she was extremely beautiful, everyone’s heart felt touched. Sun Bu’Er knew about this person but had never seen her before. Zhen Zhibing’s face was pale, his body trembled. Zhao Zhijing looked at him and chuckled.

Guo Jing and Huang Rong were greatly surprised with how Yang Guo reacted to her.

Xiao Longnu said, “Guo’er, indeed you are here, I’ve finally found you.”

Tears flowed from Yang Guo’s eyes as he choked, “You… you won’t abandon me again will you?”

Xiao Longnu shook her head and said, “I don’t know.”

Yang Guo said, “Where ever you go I will follow.”

There were over a thousand people here in the main hall but the two acted as if no one else was there, talking naturally. Xiao Longnu held Yang Guo’s hand, she didn’t know whether she was happy or sad.

Though Huo Dou’s heart was moved when he saw Xiao Longnu, he didn’t know that this was the girl whose hand in marriage he was trying to get years ago at Mount Zhongnan. He saw that Yang Guo’s garments were ragged and torn but the two of them looked very close, his heart was disgusted and he said, “We are dueling, go and find another place for this!”