Guo Jing and Huang Rong left the Cheng’s residence and were very tired since they have not had any sleep for the rest of the night. They had wanted to go back to the inn to rest, but suddenly heard the sound of hoof beats came galloping fast from the south heading north. The sound was coming near, but suddenly it stopped. Huang Rong’s curiosity was piqued, “There must be something unusual happening. Sounds interesting.” Utilizing her lightness kungfu she immediately went to take a look. Guo Jing followed closely.
To their surprise, what they saw was Yang Kang standing on the roadside, holding a horse’s rein and talking to Ouyang Ke. Guo and Huang did not want to come any closer because they did not want to be detected. They hid themselves quite a distance away; moreover, those two spoke in low voice. So what Huang Rong could hear were bits and pieces. Ouyang Ke mentioned ‘Yue Fei’ and ‘Lin An government office’; while Yang Kang did say ‘my father’. Huang Rong was curious, she wanted to come nearer, but at that time Ouyang Ke cupped his fists and heading east, along with all his female disciples/concubines.
Yang Kang stayed behind. He stared blankly for a while, then let out a long sigh and mounted his horse. “Brother, I am here,” Guo Jing called. Yang Kang heard his voice and he was startled, but stopped his horse anyway. “Elder Brother, you are here as well?” he replied.
“I ran into Miss Huang here and we fought that Ouyang Ke, that’s why we were delayed,” Guo Jing explained. Yang Kang’s face turned red; he felt uneasy since he wasn’t sure if Guo Jing heard his conversation with Ouyang Ke. But Guo Jing’s face remained calm; so Yang Kang felt better. “This man cannot pretend,” he thought, “He wouldn’t be this calm if he heard me.”
“Elder Brother,” he said, “shall we hurry up and continue our trip tonight, or shall we spend the night here? Will Miss Huang go to Beijing with us?”
“It’s not I who go with you, it is you who follow us,” Huang Rong said.
“What’s the difference?” Guo Jing smiled. “Let us go back to that ancestral temple and have some rest. Tomorrow evening we will enjoy the Beggar Clan’s banquet; and then we can continue our trip.”
So the three people walked back to the temple. Huang Rong lighted a candle; grabbing the candlestick she picked up the needles she shot out a moment ago. This time of the year the weather was getting hot, so they took down the doors, and brought the planks outside. They intended to sleep in the courtyard.
Just before they fell asleep, the sound of horses’ hoof beat from a distance can be faintly heard. They tilted their head to listen. The sound was coming fast, sounded like it was more than one horse.
“Three horses in the front, pursued by more than 10 people,” Huang Rong guessed. Guo Jing literally grew up on horseback; he knew exactly the number of the horses.
“There are 16 pursuers altogether,” he said. ”Well, well, well … what do you know?”
“What?” Huang Rong asked.
“The three horses on the front are Mongolian horses, but the pursuers are not,” Guo Jing answered. “What in the world are the Mongolian horses doing in this area?” he wondered.
Huang Rong pulled Guo Jing’s hand and they walked outside the temple gate. Suddenly a swishing sound was heard, and arrow flew above their heads. The three riders rushed toward the temple. An arrow flew from the pursuers and hit the last horse’s thigh. The horse uttered a sad neigh and knelt down on the ground. The rider’s equestrian skill was superb; he managed to leap just before the horse hit the ground. Looked like the rider did not know any lightness kungfu, his step was heavy. The other two riders stopped their horse and turned back.
“I am all right,” shouted the one who fell down. “Quickly, go! I’ll try to block the enemy!”
“I will help you block the enemy. Fourth Prince, you go ahead,” shouted one of the other two.
“How can you do that?” asked the Fourth Prince.
Those three were speaking Mongolians. Guo Jing who was listening thought he knew those voices. They sounded like Toulei, Jebeh, and Bourchu. He was really surprised. “What are they doing here?” he thought.
He wanted to come nearer, but the pursuers had already surrounded the three riders. The three Mongolians were experts in shooting arrows; so the pursuers did not dare to come too close; they only shot their own arrows from a distance.
“Let’s go up!” one of the Mongolian shouted, his hand pointing to a flagpole. Three people scurried to the flagpole and climbed up. They were trying to gain a better position.
The pursuers dismounted their horses and surrounded the flagpole on all directions. Somebody shouted an order and four soldiers lifted high their shields; came near the flagpole and tried to chop it down with their swords.
“You are wrong,” Huang Rong whispered, “There are only 15 pursuers.”
“No, I can’t be wrong,” Guo Jing countered. “Maybe one of them was shot dead.” He just closed his mouth when a horse came wandering, there was a rider on it, but he was dead; his foot was stuck on the stirrup so the horse was dragging him along, an arrow sticking out from his chest.
Guo Jing crawled toward that corpse. He drew the arrow out. As soon as he traced his fingers on the arrow, he could feel that it was made of wrought iron, and had an engraving of a leopard head. It was the arrow used by the Master Archer Jebeh; heavier than average arrows. His suspicion was gone; he called out, “On the flagpole, are you Master Jebeh, Brother Toulei and Master Bourchu? This is Guo Jing!”
The three people were delighted. “How can you be here?” they asked.
“Who pursued you?” Guo Jing asked.
“The Jin soldiers!” Toulei answered.
Guo Jing took the dead Jin soldier’s body, lifted it up and rushed forward. He threw the corpse toward the soldiers at the foot of the flagpole. The corpse did knock down two soldiers that the other two was scared and ran away.
Out of the blue two white shadows swooped down to Guo Jing. He recognized those were his two condors, which together Huazheng and he raised back in Mongolia. Those two birds also recognized their master amidst the dark night, so they uttered a loud cry and came down on Guo Jing’s shoulder.
Huang Rong had heard Guo Jing’s story on how he had shot down an eagle, and how he raised a pair of condors as his playmates; and now suddenly saw the white condors she ignored the surrounding soldiers. She came running toward Guo Jing and called out, “Let me play with them!” She held out her hand to stroke the condor’s feather. But the condor did not know Huang Rong, so it moved its head to hit Huang Rong’s hand with its beak. Luckily Huang Rong was quick; if not, the back of her hand would be injured.
Guo Jing hurriedly pulled the birds away. Huang Rong sulked, “Your pet birds are bad!” But actually she was happy, she leaned her head to take a closer look at the birds.
“Rong’er, watch out!” suddenly Guo Jing shouted. Two fast arrows flew toward Huang Rong’s chest. She ignored the arrows, nonchalantly reached toward the dead soldier’s pocket. The arrows. .h.i.t were right on target, but they hit the soft hedgehog armor and simply fell down near her foot. Huang Rong continued groping the pocket until she found some dried meat and fed them to the birds.