The day they crossed the
provincial border into
Fujian, the hills were covered in flowers and dancing
butterflies. Chen thought of Princess Fragrance and
how she would have loved such a scene.
They were met at the Shaolin Monastery by Lord Zhou,
who had come south to Fujian with his wife and
servants to meet the Monastery's abbot, Heavenly
Rainbow. With Zhou's great name in the fighting
community, the Shaolin priests were happy to exchange
knowledge with him. Heavenly Rainbow insisted that he
stay in the temple, and by the time the Red Flower
Society heroes arrived, several months had slipped by.
The abbot led his assistants, Great Insanity, Heavenly
Mirror, Great Hardship and Great Idiocy into the great
hall to meet the visitors. After they had introduced
each other, the abbot led them to a quiet antechamber
when tea was served. He asked the reason for their
visit.
Chen knelt down before the abbot, tears glistening in
his eyes. Greatly surprised, Heavenly Rainbow moved
quickly to help him up.
"Great Helmsman," he said. "What need is there for
such
formality? Please say whatever you wish."
"I have an embarrassing request to make that according
to the rules of the fighting
community should not even
be uttered," Chen replied. "But, Venerable Sir, for
the sake of millions of souls, I
boldly make this
appeal to you."
"Please speak freely," the abbot said.
"The former Great Helmsman of the Red Flower Society,
Master Yu Wanting was my
foster father..." Heavenly
Rainbow's expression changed immediately as he heard
the name, and he raised his white eyebrows.
Chen told him in detail about his
relationship with
the Emperor Qian Long and about the plan to restore
the Chinese
throne and
overthrow the Manchus. Then he
asked why his
foster father had been expelled from the
Shaolin school and whether it had anything to do with
Qian Long's identity.
"Please, Venerable Sir," he concluded, his voice
almost choked with sobs. "Think of the common
people....."
Heavenly Rainbow sat in silence, his long eyebrows
trailing over his closed eyes. He was in deep
meditation and no-one dared disturb him.
After a while, his eyes sprang open, and he said: "For
several hundred years, it has been the practice of the
Shaolin school not to reveal to outsiders information
on members who offend against the school's
regulations. Great Helmsman Chen, you have come a
great distance to our
monastery to enquire into the
behaviour of our expelled pupil, Yu Wanting. According
to the
monastery's rules, this would
ordinarily be out
of the question..." the faces of the heroes lit up
with delight. "...but as this affair involves the fate
of the common people, I will make an exception. Great
Helmsman Chen, please send someone to the Upholding
the Monastic Regulations Hall to collect the file."
Chen bowed to the abbot in thanks, and another monk
led the heroes to guest rooms to rest.
Chen was congratulating himself on his success when he
saw Lord Zhou looking worried. "What's wrong?" he
asked.
"The abbot asked you to send someone to the Hall to
collect the file. But to get there, it is necessary to
pass through five other halls, each guarded by a kung
fu master and each one stronger than the last. It will
be difficult to make it through all five," Zhou
replied.
"We could try and force our way through together," Wen
suggested.
Zhou shook his head. "No, the problem is that one
person has to win through all five halls alone. If
anyone helped him, the monks would come to the
assistance of the guardians of the halls and it would
turn into a brawl. That wouldn't do at all."
"This is an affair involving my family," Chen said
quietly. "Perhaps Buddha will be
merciful and let me
through."
He took off his long gown, picked up a bag of his
'chess piece' projectiles, tucked the ancient
daggerinto his belt, and let Zhou lead him to the first
hall.
As they reached the hall entrance, Zhou stopped.
"Master Chen," he whispered. "If you can't make it,
please come back and we'll think of some other way.
Whatever you do, don't try and force your way through
or you may get hurt." Chen nodded.
"Everything is arranged!" Zhou shouted, and then
stepped to one side.
Chen pushed open the door and walked inside. Under the
bright candle-light, he saw a monk seated on a mat,
and recognised him as one of the abbot's chief
assistants, Great Hardship.
The monk stood up and smiled. "So you have come
yourself, Great Helmsman Chen. That is excellent. I
would like to ask you to instruct me in a few martial
arts moves."
Chen saluted him with his fists. "Please," he replied.
Great Hardship bunched his left hand into a fist and
swung it round in a great arc while his right palm
swept up. Chen recognised it as the 'Drunken Boxing'
style kung fu. He had once
studied the style, but
decided not to reveal the fact by using it now. He
clapped his hands together and countered with the
'Hundred Flowers' kung fu style. Great Hardship was
taken off guard and only avoided being struck by
dropping to the floor. He rolled away and stood up,
and the two continued to fight closely, each a master
of his own style.
Great Hardship aimed a blow at Chen's legs. Chen leapt
up, and as he landed, hooked his right leg round,
tripping the monk up neatly. As fast as lightning,
Chen bent over and stopped him from falling. Great
Hardship's face flushed red with
embarrassment and he
pointed behind him.
"Please proceed," he said.
Chen saluted once more and walked through into another
hall, seated in the middle of which was the senior
monk, Great Insanity. As Chen entered, the monk rose
and picked up a thick staff lying beside him. He
casually tapped the floor with its tip, and the impact
shook the very walls of the hall, bringing a shower of
dust down from the rafters. The monk lightly flipped
the staff from left hand to right, then attacked using
the 'Crazy Demon' staff style of kung fu. Chen knew it
would be folly to underestimate the power of this
opponent, and he drew his
dagger. Great Insanity swept
the staff across and Chen ducked down to avoid it then
countered with a thrust from his
dagger. The two
fought round and round inside the hall, their weapons
apparently greatly mis-matched.
Rather than attack, Chen concentrated instead on
trying to tire the monk out. But Great Insanity's
Inner Strength Kung Fu was
profound, and as time
passed, Chen could
discern no
hesitation in the monk's
actions. On the contrary, the staff seemed to whirl
and dance with ever-increasing speed, forcing Chen
back into a corner of the hall. Seeing Chen could not
escape, Great Insanity grasped the staff in both hands
and swung it down at his head with all his strength.
Chen stood stock-still until the staff was no more
than two inches from him, then grabbed its end and
carved a deep line across the middle with his
dagger,
snapping it in two.
Great Insanity was furious, and charged at Chen again.
But with the staff only half its former length, he
wielded it with much less
dexterity. A moment later,
Chen snapped another piece off the end, then dodged
passed the monk and ran towards the rear of the hall.
With a roar of anger, Great Insanity threw what was
left of his staff to the floor and sparks flew in all
directions.
As he entered the third hall, Chen's eyes were struck
by a bright glare, and he saw both sides of the hall
were full of burning candles, several hundred of them
at least. In the centre, stood the monk Great Idiocy.
"Master Chen," he said, a welcoming smile on his face.
"Let us compete using projectiles."
Chen bowed. "As your Reverence wishes," he replied.
"There are nine candles and eighty-one
incense sticks
on each side of the hall. Whoever can
extinguish all
the candles and
incense sticks on his opponent's side
is the winner." The monk pointed to the altar table in
the centre of the hall. "You will find darts and
projectiles of all kinds over there. When you have
used up all the ones you have, you can go and get
more."
Chen pulled a pile of chess pieces from his pocket and
wished he had spent more time in the past learning the
finer points of dart kung fu from the Red Flower
Society's dart expert, 'Buddha' Zhao. "After you," he
said.
Great Idiocy smiled again. "Guests first," he replied.
Selecting five chess pieces, Chen threw them
simultaneously at the foot of the opposite wall and
extinguished five
incense sticks.
"Excellent kung fu," Great Idiocy praised him. He took
a string of prayer beads from around his neck, snapped
the chord and let five of the beads fall into his
palm. With one movement, he slung them away, snuffing
out five
incense sticks on Chen's side.
Chen quickly
extinguished another five sticks of
incense. Great Idiocy replied by knocking out all nine
candles on Chen's side, and in the darkness, the
burning tips of the
incense sticks became much easier
targets for the monk.
"Of course, why didn't I think of that?" Chen thought.
He chose nine chess pieces and threw them three at a
time at the candles on the monk's side of the hall.
But the flames were
untouched. He had heard a series
of clicks coming from the centre of the hall and he
realised that Great Idiocy had knocked each of his
nine projectiles down with his prayer beads. As Chen
gaped in surprise at such skill, the monk
extinguished
another four
incense sticks. Chen waited for the monk
to throw another wave of prayer beads, and then aimed
chess pieces to
intercept them. But with the candles
on the opposite side still burning he found it
difficult to spot the small beads clearly and only
managed to hit two of the five. The other three struck
home.
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