Huang Zonghai shook his head. "The True Martial Scripture is a secret of our True Martial Sect, never passed to outsiders. Without the sect master's permission, it absolutely cannot be shared. Forgive me, but I cannot comply... If you asked anything else of me, Brother Bai, I would not refuse even if it meant dying ten thousand deaths... I hope you can understand!"
Bai Xiang Shou frowned. "Brother Zonghai, I only want to borrow the book for a look. I will never divulge its secrets!"
Huang Zonghai still shook his head. "I trust you, but..."
He was only halfway through his sentence when an aged voice suddenly rang out in his sea of consciousness. Sect Master Meng Xinghe was secretly transmitting his voice to him.
After hearing the sect master's brief message, a flicker of surprise passed through Huang Zonghai's eyes. He paused only a moment before continuing, "Very well. Since you insist on reading the True Martial Scripture, Brother Bai, please follow me..."
Though Bai Xiang Shou did not understand why Huang Zonghai had suddenly changed his mind and agreed so readily, he could not be bothered to ask. He followed Huang Zonghai deep into the bamboo grove, along a path paved with bluestone, through rustling bamboo shadows and dappled sunlight, to a secluded spot behind the mountain.
They were now at the foot of Taihe Mountain. A few clumps of shrubs grew among piled rocks, and weeds overran the ground. Few people seemed to visit this place. Huang Zonghai walked straight to the cliff and stopped, then lightly pressed his palm against its smooth face. With a rumbling crash, a slab of stone swung open, revealing a square entrance. It was a stone chamber the True Martial Sect had built into the mountain.
Bai Xiang Shou followed Huang Zonghai inside and immediately felt a rush of cool air. The chamber was immensely spacious, a hidden world unto itself. Countless stone formations and stalactites hung from the ceiling. Some were craggy and whiskered like dragon heads; some surged majestically like waterfalls. Some resembled icicles, others tigers, leopards, or lions, and still others palaces and vessels. Each had its own shape, so lifelike and beautiful that the eye could scarcely take them all in. This stone chamber was actually a natural limestone cavern within Taihe Mountain.
"Wait here a moment. I will be right back," Huang Zonghai said, then turned and left.
Bai Xiang Shou carefully surveyed the chamber. The stalactites were crystalline and flawless white, like the Milky Way spilling down from the night sky. They glittered with the radiance of silver and diamonds, bathing the cavern in a hazy glow.
There was a stone table inside, several meditation cushions on the ground, and a stone bed in one corner.
Huang Zonghai returned a little later with a yellowish-brown wooden box in his hands. Solemnly holding it in both hands, he offered it to Bai Xiang Shou. "What you want is inside. Take your time reading here, Brother Bai. This place is very quiet, and no one will disturb you. I have arranged three meals a day; someone will bring them to you... I still have sect affairs to attend to, so I shall take my leave!"
Bai Xiang Shou took the wooden box, its weight settling heavily into his hands. He could not help bowing deeply to Huang Zonghai and thanking him from the heart. "Thank you for granting my wish, Brother Zonghai." Looking up at Huang Zonghai's retreating back, he could not resist calling out, "Brother Zonghai, I have long heard that your Red Mud Green Ant Hall keeps some fine wine. Sorry for the trouble, but please have someone bring some of that too!"
Huang Zonghai laughed heartily and left without looking back.
Bai Xiang Shou opened the sandalwood box and felt a yellowed booklet wrapped in yellow silk inside. Peeling back the silk, he revealed none other than the True Martial Sect's closely guarded secret-the True Martial Scripture.
Following Taihe Mountain's Stairway to Heaven to the summit, one would see the soaring double eaves of Taihe Palace. The main hall stood imposing and solemn, while the side halls had green tiles and upturned corners. A red wall more than a hundred meters long wound along the steep rock face beside the peak, and glazed rooftops glittered against the sky.
The True Martial Sect's Taihe Palace followed the contours of the mountain, its buildings arranged in harmonious tiers. From before the palace, one could gaze into the distance at Little Mirror Lake. Green mountains and emerald waters formed a scene of poetic beauty, and amid the curling clouds and mist, the palace resembled an immortal abode.
At Taihe Mountain's summit, towering precipices gave a sense of standing alone, apart from the world. Above the sheer cliffs, a hundred-meter enclosure of red walls and green tiles overlooked Yunyang Prefecture below. The scene was grand and magnificent, the Han River vast and surging, its splendor taking a thousand forms.
Inside a side hall of Taihe Palace, sunlight slanted inward. Incense smoke curled from a bronze burner, rising hazily through a shaft of light. Two old men sat at a table beside the window. A Go board lay before them, and they were playing with black and white stones in hand.
An old man in a blue robe with a long beard picked up a white stone and placed it on the board. He spoke leisurely. "Sect Master, you lent that lad our sect's closely guarded secret to read? Surely you have something else in mind?"
"Mm... This man vanished from the martial world for more than ten years. Yet upon reappearing, instead of seeking his master, Li Xingzhi, he came to our Taihe Mountain to ask to read the True Martial Scripture. Tingxuan, have you considered why?" The speaker's voice was aged. He was Meng Xinghe, sect master of the True Martial Sect.
This world-renowned sect master appeared to be seventy or eighty years old. He had two long, snow-white eyebrows. Though wrinkles furrowed his cheeks and the corners of his eyes, his gaze remained clear and bright. His sparse white beard trembled as he spoke. His graying hair was meticulously combed back from his forehead and gathered into a long braid that hung behind his head. His white robe spread in broad sleeves, and amid the curling incense smoke, every movement seemed scholarly and easygoing, yet touched with an otherworldly grace.
The long-bearded old man playing against him was the sect elder Lao Tingxuan. Hearing Meng Xinghe's words, he frowned down at the stones on the board. "Sect Master... You mean... Could he have already touched that threshold?"
Meng Xinghe slowly placed a black stone and changed the subject. "What do you think of that lad?"
"Exceptionally gifted, but proud and conceited. Back then, the whole world acknowledged him as the foremost fighter beneath the grandmasters. He cannot be underestimated!" Lao Tingxuan answered, lightly stroking his long beard.
"Indeed. At such a young age, he reached heights many people could never attain in their entire lives. He certainly has the right to be proud. Proud... Heh, that temperament does resemble mine in my younger days. He has stayed away from the martial world for over a decade. For someone so dazzlingly talented and proud, just what could have happened to make him endure in silence like this?"
Meng Xinghe picked another black stone from the bowl and continued slowly, "Tingxuan, do you think that, in the future... any of our True Martial Sect's younger disciples will be able to stand shoulder to shoulder with him?"
Lao Tingxuan placed another white stone. Stroking his long beard, he pondered aloud, "Sect Master, you know the answer better than I do. Our True Martial Sect has recruited disciples every year, and though there are many of them, with no shortage of outstanding, dazzling talents, most cease progressing once they reach the Void Return Realm. A few years later, they fade into the crowd. Among our current disciples, aside from Ling Wenyue, who shows promise, there truly are few outstanding young talents. Alas... On the path of cultivation, once one stands atop a hundred-foot pole, how difficult it is to advance another step!" He shook his head with a sigh and placed another stone in the corner of the board.
"Zonghai has now entered the True Self Realm as well and has been promoted to elder according to our rules. Our sect now has nine elders. Yet it is still us old fellows holding up the sect. The True Martial Sect must have worthy successors... Speaking of which, I truly do envy that old fellow Li Xingzhi a little." Meng Xinghe placed a black stone heavily in the center of the board, then continued, "A hidden dragon lies in the depths, stranded in the wilderness like a fish in a dried-out rut. But one day, that dragon will soar through the heavens. In truth, I want to see just how high this dragon can fly!"
Lao Tingxuan froze at those words. Looking down at the board, he discovered with dismay that Meng Xinghe's latest black stone had quietly linked more than a dozen others into a great dragon. His own cluster of white stones was surrounded, already poised to be strangled...
In the stone chamber, Bai Xiang Shou studied the True Martial Scripture day and night. At times, his brows knitted tightly; at times, his eyes shone and delight lit his face. At other times, he held the booklet motionlessly, like an old monk lost in meditation...
Every day, Huang Zonghai sent someone with food and wine. Bai Xiang Shou could hold his liquor exceedingly well, and the wine jars on the floor gradually piled into a mountain.
Seven days passed in this way. Then a peal of laughter burst from the stone chamber. It surged and rang out, piercing metal and splitting stone, lingering without end. The shrubs outside shook violently, the weeds flattened against the ground, loose rocks rattled down the mountain, and startled birds shot into the air...
Standing outside the chamber, Huang Zonghai watched Bai Xiang Shou slowly emerge through the stone doorway, dragging his crippled leg. In those short seven days, apart from the bloodshot look in his melancholy eyes and the beard that had grown beneath his chin, he seemed unchanged. Yet it also seemed that something indescribable had appeared about him.
He stood quietly there, holding the yellow wooden box containing the True Martial Scripture. He walked over and returned it to Huang Zonghai, then firmly cupped his fist and bowed respectfully before sweeping his sleeve and turning to leave.
Watching Bai Xiang Shou's retreating back, Huang Zonghai's gaze grew uncertain. He understood this man less and less-the once-proud figure who had looked down upon the world, the foremost fighter beneath the grandmasters...
Bai Xiang Shou left Taihe Mountain. As before, he leaned forward and stepped out with his right leg, then dragged his left leg after him and straightened. He repeated the motion, inching slowly onward, step by step.
Suddenly, a sensation rose within him. Far beyond the sky, through the low-hanging clouds, a pair of eyes seemed to be watching and studying him. The feeling of being spied upon made him deeply uncomfortable. Bai Xiang Shou paused and released his spiritual sense to investigate, but the sensation abruptly vanished...
Inside the side hall of Taihe Palace, Meng Xinghe stood by the window with his hands behind his back, gazing into the distance. Below the mountain, the vast Han River rolled eastward. A few dark clouds drifted in from the distant horizon and blocked the sun, and the sky dimmed.
A heavy black cloud hovered over Taihe Mountain's summit. Before long, scattered raindrops began to fall. Rain pattered against the window frame, and the plants outside rustled. The mountain wind swept in with rain and mist, carrying the scent of earth mingled with bamboo leaves.
Meng Xinghe's long white robe slowly billowed in the wind, snapping and fluttering. In this lofty pavilion atop the peak, he looked as though he might ride the wind away...
"Sect Master...!" At some point, Lao Tingxuan had come to stand beside Meng Xinghe. Looking at the wind and rain outside, he said, "Sect Master, the wind is strong out there..."
Meng Xinghe raised a hand to stop Lao Tingxuan from speaking. His white eyebrows lifted as he gazed toward the farthest reaches of the sky, his gaze passing through the heavy clouds over Taihe Mountain's summit and slowly sweeping toward the distant horizon. He watched with quiet absorption...
After a long while, he drew back his gaze, his brows tightly furrowed.
"Sect Master, that man has left! Judging from his laughter, his cultivation... must have advanced another step. It seems he gained some insight during these days of secluded cultivation in our sect," Lao Tingxuan could not help saying.
"Mm... Every sip and every morsel is ordained. Still, Li Xingzhi certainly took in a fine disciple!" Meng Xinghe said.
"Twenty years ago, Li Xingzhi's cultivation was slightly inferior to yours. Over these years, your mastery has reached perfection. They say that in his battle with Han Zongwang back then, Li Xingzhi exhausted his vital energy and was left with a hidden ailment. Among the world's four great grandmasters, you surely deserve the title of foremost under heaven!" Lao Tingxuan said, stroking his beard.
"No. Twenty years ago, Li Xingzhi was already my equal. He is a rare genius seen only once in a century. We have not fought for more than twenty years, and the outcome would be very difficult to predict!" Meng Xinghe shook his head.
By then, the rain had stopped and the dark clouds had dispersed. The rain-washed leaves were green enough to drip emerald, and a brilliant rainbow appeared beside the mountain, inspiring wonder at the miraculous transformations of heaven and earth.
Meng Xinghe turned his gaze once more toward the distant horizon. A breeze rose, and standing in the wind, he murmured to himself, "The Kunpeng spreads its wings and rises with the wind, soaring ninety thousand li into the heavens... Then... let me lend you a wisp of wind..."