mander General Lu Wende and Defense Official General Wang Jian offering toasts to the heroes. The people in the banquet hall talked about the Mongols’ cruelty and how they invaded Song territory and killed its citizens. All the heroes expressed their indignation and their will to fight the invaders. That night everyone unanimously elected Guo Jing to chair the Meet and they swore to kill the invaders.

Guo Xiang and her sister argued at the temple the other night and she said she would not attend the ‘Heroes’ Summit. Of course she was absent and was instead dining in her own room alone. She told the servant, “Sister is attending the ‘Heroes’ Summit while I’m here comfortably drinking wine. She may not be as happy as I am.” Guo Jing and Huang Rong were occupied with strategies to defeat the enemy, how could they care about what their daughter was doing? Guo Jing did not even know her whereabouts nor bother to find out. Huang Rong asked around but knew her daughter’s strange character so she could only laugh.

Many of the heroes present had great capacity for liquor and felt that the wine was excellent, their spirits were boosted and they displayed their martial skills. Huang Rong missed her daughter and told Guo Fu, “Go get your sister here to join in the fun. This kind of grand occasion occurs only once in a lifetime.”

Guo Fu said, “No way am I going. Sister is unhappy now and is waiting for any opportunity to argue with me, I’m not going to bang my head against the wall.”

Guo Polu said, “I’ll get her here.” He hurriedly left and walked towards her room.

After a short while Guo Polu returned alone; before he could say anything Guo Fu said, “Didn’t I say she wouldn’t come?”

Huang Rong saw her son’s face was devoid of colour and asked, “What did she say?”

Guo Polu said, “She said she’s hosting a mini ‘Heroes’ Summit in her room, so she won’t be attending the major ‘Heroes’ Summit.”

Huang Rong smiled, “Only your sister can think of such crazy things, leave her alone.”

Guo Polu said, “But she has guests. Five males and two females are drinking inside Sister’s room.”

Huang Rong frowned and thought that this girl was getting more and more out of hand. How could a young girl invite men to her room to dine? Her ‘Little Eastern Heretic’ nickname was indeed fully deserved, but today there were many guests so she could not be punished and spoil the atmosphere. So she told Guo Fu, “Your brother is young and doesn’t know how to entertain guests, you go. Invite your sister’s friends to the banquet as well, so that we can get to know each other.”

Guo Fu was curious to find out what sort of guests her sister had. She knew her sister did not bother about what was proper between males and females and enjoyed making friends with all kinds of people. She thought these people must be thugs or similar characters. When she heard her mother instruct her to do so, she immediately got up and went to Guo Xiang’s room.

As she stood near the door, she heard Guo Xiang say, “Little Wooden Head, tell the kitchen to send another two pots of wine.” ‘Little Wooden Head’ was a maid and Guo Xiang had given her the unusual nickname. The maid acknowledged the order. Then she heard Guo Xiang say again, “Tell the kitchen to cook another two goats’ legs and 20 jin of beef.” The maid replied affirmatively and exited the room. Then from the room came a rough voice saying, “Miss Guo is frank and straightforward, too bad I, Ren Chuzi, didn’t know that before or I’d have been friends with you long ago.” Guo Xiang laughed, “Becoming friends now is not too late.”

Guo Fu frowned and looked through the window slit. She saw a short table in her sister’s room and there were many wine cups on the table. The eight people were sitting on the floor and drinking merrily. There was a fat man facing her with his shirt exposing half his chest, showing his thick and black chest hair. On his left was a scholar with neat clothes and he was fanning himself lightly with his fan, appearing to be refined. His fan had a drawing of a ghost sticking out its tongue. On his left was a woman of about forty years old with a delicate face, but her face had around ten sword scars. Sitting opposite her was a tall and skinny camel-like man with a shiny golden head-dress and his mouth was biting into half a chicken and eating joyously. There were three whose backs were facing the window, so Guo Fu could not see their faces. She saw that two of them were white haired men while the other was a black-clad priestess. Guo Xiang was sitting in between them and her face was red like an apple, her eyes showed signs of her consuming liquor and she was talking merrily. Guo Fu thought they were so happy here, if she invited them to the banquet they looked like they would not go.

Then one of the white-haired men stood up and said, “Today’s feast is almost over, on this lady’s birthday, we shall come and drink again. This old man has a small gift; it might make the lady laugh.” As he said that he took out a box and placed it on the table. The other old man said, “Bai Chaoxian, what are you giving her, let me see.” He then flipped open the box and could not help but draw in his breath sharply, saying, “Ah, this is a thousand-year-old snow Ginseng, did you get it from the bottom of the river?” He placed it in his palm.

Guo Fu saw him holding a foot-long snowy white Ginseng, with its ‘head’, ‘body’ ‘hands’ and ‘feet’ all in place and showing a slight trace of red, indicating that it was a rare and exclusive Ginseng root.

The people all praised it and that old man was very proud; then he said, “This snow Ginseng can cure terminal diseases, neutralize hundreds of poisons; it’s even said to be able to resurrect a person. This lady will live to be a hundred, so she doesn’t have to use it. But on her 100th birthday, she just may need to take it so she can live for another 100 years.” The people all clapped and praised him.

The fat Ren Chuzi took out a money box from his bosom and laughed, “This is a small toy, and hopefully it can amuse the lady.” He opened the box and took out two metal-cast monks of around seven inches tall and activated a mechanism, causing the monks to exchange punches and kicks. The people all laughed as they watched this. The monks displayed strokes from Shaolin’s Luo Han boxing, and exchanged dozens of moves before stopping, then standing at attention, which was the style of highly-skilled Shaolin monks.

The people all stopped laughing when they saw this and their faces changed colour. The scar-faced woman said, “Ren Chuzi, don’t bring trouble to Miss Guo! This is the metal Luo Han from the Shaolin Temple, how could you steal them?”

Ren Chuzi laughed, “Heh-heh, even if I’m not afraid of the sky or the Earth, I wouldn’t dare steal anything from the Shaolin Temple. This was given to me by Reverend Wuse of the Shaolin Temple’s Luo Han Hall. The elder said when this lady celebrates her birthday, quickly go down to Xiangyang to wish her a happy birthday. Eh, this is my gift.” He took off the inner lid from the box and took out a black jade bangle.

The black bangle looked dull and nothing special. Ren Chuzi then drew a thick-backed ghost-headed knife from his waist and chopped down on the bangle. The knife hit the bangle with a ‘dang’ sound and flew upwards, not even leaving a scratch on the bangle. The people all cheered, then the scholar, priestess, Head Camel and the woman all presented their gifts to Guo Xiang, all highlighting how unique their gifts were. Guo Xiang smiled happily as she received the gifts.

Guo Fu was more and more curious and surprised, so she headed back to the banquet hall and told everything to Huang Rong.

When Huang Rong heard this, she was even more surprised than Guo Fu, so she waved to Zhu Ziliu and the three people went to Guo Xiang’s room. Huang Rong told her daughter to repeat the story. Zhu Ziliu was equally surprised and said, “Ren Chuzi and Bai Chaoxian actually came to Xiangyang? That black-robed priestess should be the Merciless Killer Priestess Shenying. The scholar’s fan has a drawing of a ghost, hmm; he should be the Turning Wheel King Zhang Yimang.” As he said this, Huang Rong nodded her head. Zhu Ziliu kept shaking his head instead, saying, “There’s nothing much to this. Miss Guo has never gone beyond 10 li of Xiangyang except for once recently, how could she get to know such strange people? Moreover, I heard Shaolin Temple’s Reverend Wuse has not shown his face in recent years; even eminent people of Wulin who visit the Shaolin Temple don’t get to see him. Why would he come to Xiangyang to wish a girl happy birthday? Hmm, maybe she just wants to fool around with her sister by coming up with this.”

Huang Rong said lowly, “But we seldom mention people like Priestess Shenying and Zhang Yimang, so even if Xiang’er knew, she couldn’t have thought of this.”

Zhu Ziliu said, “Then it must be true. Let’s go take a look and meet them. Since they’re her friends, they wouldn’t have any bad intentions by coming to Xiangyang.”

Huang Rong said, “I think so too, but people like Priestess Shenying and Turning Wheel King Zhang Yimang are hard to classify as good or bad. Although this is not a big problem, it is enough to cause a headache. Here we are defending against the enemy and now we’re not sure how to deal with these weird people…”

Suddenly someone outside the window laughed, saying, “Madam Guo, this group of people are visiting Xiangyang only to convey our birthday wishes, we have no other intentions, why the headache? When the last few words were heard, the voice was already far away. Huang Rong, Zhu Ziliu and Guo Fu went to the window together and saw black shadows flashing out and disappearing behind the wall. Guo Fu wanted to give chase but was held back by Huang Rong, who said, “Don’t bother; you can’t catch up with them!” Then they saw a white fan hanging from a tree branch outside.

That fan was up in the tree about four yards away, Guo Fu knew she couldn’t reach it and called, “Mother!” Huang Rong nodded her head, and lightly leapt forwards and grabbed a branch with her left hand, then flipped around and grabbed another branch with her right hand. She caught the fan and lightly jumped to the ground.

The three people went back indoors and under the candle light, saw the drawing of a ghost sticking out it’s tongue with a silly grin and both hands clutched together. On the side were several words, “Wishing Miss Guo many happy returns and living to a ripe old age.” Huang Rong flipped over the fan and the words said, “Black-robed priestess Shenying, Bai Chaoxian, Jiu Sisen, Dog-meat Head Camel, Han Wugou and Zhang Yimang greet Hero Guo and Madam Guo. We celebrated your daughter’s birthday without permission, we apologize for the offence.”

Zhu Ziliu was an expert in calligraphy, so he praised, “Good, good calligraphy!”

Huang Rong said, “Let’s go see Xiang’er.”

Zhu Ziliu was already quite old and was not suspicious of the girl so they all went into Guo Xiang’s room. They saw Little Wooden Head and another servant clearing the dishes. Guo Xiang said, “Uncle Zhu, Mother, Sister, look at the birthday gifts my guests have given me.”

When Huang Rong and Zhu Ziliu saw the snow Ginseng, twin iron Luo Han statues, black jade bangle and the other presents, they both praised and marveled at them. Guo Xiang activated the mechanism and the two Luo Han statues started to spar, which made her feel really proud. Huang Rong watched the Luo Han perform the Luo Han Boxing. When they had finished she gently asked, “Xiang’er, what’s going on? Tell Mother.”

Guo Xiang laughed and said, “A few new friends knew my birthday is approaching, so they gave me these amusing things.”

Huang Rong asked, “How did you get to know these people?”

Guo Xiang said, “I got to know them only today. I was alone in the room drinking wine, when Sister Han Wugou stood outside the window and asked, ‘Little lady, we’d like to come in and drink with you, alright?’ I said, ‘Nothing could be better, please come in!’ All of them jumped in through the window then said that on the 24th itself they would come and celebrate my birthday. How do they know my birthday? Mother, they are yours and Father’s friends, right? Or why else would they give me such wonderful things?”

Huang Rong said, “Your Father and I don’t know them. You met some strange friends by appointment, true?”

Guo Xiang laughed, “I don’t have any strange friends, unless it’s Brother-in-law.”

Guo Fu angrily said, “Rubbish! How can your brother-in-law be a strange man?”

Guo Xiang stuck out her tongue and laughed, “After he married you, how can he not be strange?” Guo Fu stretched out her hand to hit her but Guo Xiang laughed and evaded to the side.

Huang Rong said, “You two stop it. Xiang’er, let me ask you, did the Turning Wheel King, Bai Chaoxian (Hundred Plants Deity) and the others say anything about attending the ‘Heroes’ Summit?”

Guo Xiang said, “No, but they said they admire and respect Father.”

She asked a few more questions and felt that Guo Xiang was not hiding anything so she said, “OK! Go to sleep.” Then she, Zhu Ziliu and Guo Fu went out.

Guo Xiang ran to the door and said, “Mother, this snow Ginseng seems to be rather useful, you take half and Father can take the other half.”

Huang Rong said, “But this was given to you as a birthday present!”

Guo Xiang said, “After I was born I didn’t do anything much, but you have suffered.” Huang Rong did not want to reject her daughter’s filial wishes so she took the Ginseng and thought back to Guo Xiang’s hardships when she was born and sighed.

The ‘Heroes’ Feast had dispersed happily and Guo Jing returned to his room. He told his wife about the heroes’ determination to drive out the enemy and expressed his joy. Huang Rong then told him about Priestess Shenying, Bai Chaoxian etc. visiting Guo Xiang.

Guo Jing was surprised, saying, “There’s such a thing?” Then he looked at the snow Ginseng and knew that it was a rare and precious gift.

Huang Rong laughed, “Looks like our precious lady’s influence far surpasses her parents’.” Guo Jing remained silent and bowed his head, thinking about the people she mentioned.

Huang Rong said, “Brother Jing, maybe we should host the Beggar Clan Leader’s Selection earlier and not postpone Guo Xiang’s birthday. If those people actually come, we might not be able to deal with them while we’re busy with the Leader’s Selection.”

Guo Jing said, “I have another idea. Let’s hold it on her birthday itself instead. Then if they actually turn up we can invite them to battle the enemy with us, won’t that be great?”

Huang Rong frowned and said, “I’m afraid they’re only using Guo Xiang’s birthday as an excuse to come, but are actually coming here to cause trouble. Just think what could their relationship with Xiang’er be? Could they be here just to celebrate her birthday? ‘A big tree will catch more wind’; there might be many people in Wulin who’re not willing to let you be the Chancellor of Wulin.”

Guo Jing stood up and laughed, saying, “Rong’er, when it comes to fighting the enemy, the more people the better. Someone else being the Chancellor of Wulin, it would still be the same. Moreover, evil cannot triumph over good; if they’re really here to create trouble, we’ll entertain them. Your “Dog Beating” skill and my “Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms” have not seen action for several years but they may not be rusty yet.”

Huang Rong saw that he was in good spirits so she laughed, “OK! We’ll do as you say. You take this Snow Ginseng; I think it’s worth three to five years of training.”

Guo Jing said, “No! You’ve had three children; your internal strength is weakened, so you should take it.”

The husband and wife were very loving and kept pushing the Ginseng to each other for half a day. Guo Jing finally said, “There will be fierce and brutal battles in the coming days and many of our friends will be injured. This snow Ginseng can save many lives, so let’s keep it for then.”