Both of them rode a horse together. After running very fast for a while they scanned around and saw that there were mulberry trees everywhere, in a short time they had already outdistanced the Western Xia warriors and no longer saw any sign of them.

Duan Yu asked: ‘Miss Wang, how do you feel?’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘I’ve been poisoned. There’s not any strength left in my body.’ Hearing the words: ‘Been poisoned’ Duan Yu was startled. He hurriedly asked: ‘Is it serious? How can we find the antidote?’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘I don’t know. You urge the horse on to a safe place then we’ll talk about it again.’ Duan Yu said: ‘Where is safe?’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘I don’t know either.’ Duan Yu thought: ‘What is it? I’ve already promised to keep her safe from dangers, why do I ask her to give directions?’ Without any feasible idea he had no alternative but to ride the horse aimlessly.

After running quickly for a meal’s time they did not hear the sounds of the chasing soldiers anymore and gradually became relax, but the rain started to drip down. Duan Yu kept asking after every short period of time: ‘Miss Wang, how do you feel?’ Wang Yuyan always replied: ‘I’m fine.’ Being able to travel together with the beauty Duan Yu was unspeakably happy, but he also feared that the poison in her body would become more dangerous, therefore he could not help but to smile for a while then to be anxious for a while.

The rain became heavier and heavier, Duan Yu took off his gown and covered Wang Yuyan with it. But that only worked for a short period of time, before long both of them were soaked through. Duan Yu asked again: ‘Miss Wang, how do you feel?’ Wang Yuyan sighed and said: ‘Both cold and wet. Let’s find a place to shelter from the rain.’ To Duan Yu, whatever Wang Yuyan said was like an imperial decree. When she wanted to find a place to shelter from the rain, even though Duan Yu knew clearly that they had not escaped from dangers he still continuously said yes, but he also dazedly thought: ‘The person Miss Wang constantly has in her mind is her biaoge Murong Fu. Today I and she have encountered dangers together I must do my utmost to protect her. Even if I die for her, someday in the rest of her life she’d once in a while remember me a little bit. When she and Murong Fu get married later and have children, when she tells her descendants about the past in leisure time perhaps she’d mention today’s events. At that time her head would be full of white hair, when she mentions the three words ‘Mr. Duan’, her pearly tears would fall down drop by drop…’ He lost in thought and could not prevent his eyes from reddening.

Seeing that he had a distressed look on his face and had not started to look for a shelter, Wang Yuyan asked: ‘What’s wrong? There isn’t any rain shelter?’ Duan Yu said: ‘At that time you’d tell your children…’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘What, my children?’

Duan Yu was startled, only now did he wake up to reality, he smiled and said: ‘Sorry, I was daydreaming.’ He looked around and saw a big mill in the northeast. The water of a rivulet was pushing the wooden wheel. The mill was in the process of pounding rice. He then said: ‘We can shelter from the rain there.’ and rode the horse to the mill. At this time it was raining heavily with cascading noises, all around was haze of water vapor.

He jumped off the horse, seeing that Wang Yuyan looked pale he could not help feeling very sorry for her and asked again: ‘You have a stomach ache? Have a fever? Have a headache?’ Wang Yuyan shook her head, smiled and said: ‘I’m fine.’ Duan Yu said: ‘Alas, I wonder what the poison the Western Xia people used was, let me go find the antidote.’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘It’s raining heavily like this! Help me get off the horse first and go inside. It won’t be late to talk about it later.’ Duan Yu hastily said: ‘Yes, yes! You see, I could be very silly.’ Wang Yuyan smiled and thought: ‘You’re just inherently silly.’

Seeing her smiling expression, Duan Yu could not help but to feel as if he was on cloud nine and almost forgot to go open the door of the mill. After opening the door he came back to help Wang Yuyan to get off the horse. Because his eyes had focused on her lovely face all the time, he did not notice that there was a ditch in front of the mill. His left foot stepped right in the middle of the ditch. Wang Yuyan called: ‘Be careful!’ But it was too late. Duan Yu cried out ‘Ah’ and fell plump into the mud. He climbed up after struggling for a while. His face, his hands, and his body were covered with mud, he continuously said: ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Are you… are you okay?’

Wang Yuyan said: ‘Alas, are you okay? That fall didn’t hurt did it?’ Duan Yu was over the moon when he saw her showing concern for himself. He hastily replied: ‘No, no. Even if it did hurt, there’d still be no problem.’ He held out his hands to help Wang Yuyan get off the horse. All of a sudden, seeing that they were covered with mud, he drew them back and said: ‘Not good! I go clean up first and will come back to help you.’ Wang Yuyan sighed and said: ‘You’re really fussy. My whole body is already drenched, what’s the matter if there’s some more mud?’ Duan Yu smiled apologetically and said: ‘I have only messed things up and haven’t cared for you well.” Still he cleaned the mud off his hands in the rivulet before helping Wang Yuyan get off the horse and walk into the mill.

When the two of them entered the mill, they saw the rice-pounding stone pestle being lifted and dropped, continuously hitting rice grains in the stone mortar, but they did not see anybody. Duan Yu shouted: ‘Is there anyone here?’

Suddenly, in the straw stack in a corner of the room, two people shouted at the same time: ‘A’yo!’ They stood up, one was male and one was female, both were eighteen or nineteen year old young peasants. Their clothes were untidy, their heads were full of straws, and their faces flushed red and looked totally embarrassed. It turned out they were a couple of lovers. The peasant girl had been here to pound rice, the man had followed her here to be close to her. Because it had been raining heavily they had thought that no one would arrive, and had gotten really unbridled to such a degree that they had not heard anything even though Duan Yu and Wang Yuyan had been talking to each other outside for quite a while.

Duan Yu held his fist in his hand and said: ‘Sorry for disturbing, sorry for disturbing! We only come here to shelter from the rain. If the two of you have something to do, please do as you wish and don’t pay attention to us.’

Wang Yuyan thought: ‘This bookworm is talking nonsense again. They are meeting us here, how can they keep cuddling each other?’ But she could not say those two sentences. After suddenly seeing the expression and attitude of that girl and that man, her face had soon reddened, she did not dare to look at them for long.

Duan Yu wholeheartedly focused his mind on Wang Yuyan therefore he did not care about this couple of young peasants. He helped Wang Yuyan sit down on a bench and said: ‘You’re totally drenched, what’s to be done?’

There was a layer of rosy light on Wang Yuyan’s face again. An idea sprung up in her mind. She pulled out from the hair on her temples a gold hairpin in which two big pearls were embedded, turned to the peasant girl and said: ‘Sister, I give you this hairpin, can you please lend me a set of clothes to change?’

Even though that peasant girl did not know that the two pearls were precious, but she recognized gold, in her mind she did not believe this was true, and said: ‘Let me fetch some clothes for you to change, this… this gold hairpin I don’t dare to take.’ As she finished saying she climbed up the wooden ladder beside her.

Wang Yuyan said: ‘Sister, please come here.’ That peasant girl had already climbed up four or five rungs. She quickly went down, walked to and stood before Wang Yuyan. Wang Yuyan put the gold hairpin in her hand and said: ‘I really give you this hairpin. Can you please take me to go change clothes?’

Seeing that Wang Yuyan was beautiful and amiable the peasant girl had already been totally willing to help her, now being given a gold hairpin she felt very happy. She declined unsuccessfully for a few times before finally accepting it then helping Wang Yuyan climb up to the garret above them to change clothes. The garret was stacked with paddy, straws and farm tools such as sieves and bamboo baskets. That peasant girl had some sets of worn-out clothes which she had been sewing and mending. After that young man had arrived, she had thrown them aside and stopped paying attention to them since. Now they were very suitable for Wang Yuyan to use.

That young peasant man timidly peeped at Duan Yu, he was still abashed. Duan Yu smiled and asked: ‘Big brother, what’s your name?’ That young man said: ‘I’m… I’m surnamed Jin.’ Duan Yu said: ‘So you’re big brother Jin.’ That young man said: ‘No. I’m Jin A’er. Jin A’da is my older brother.’ Duan Yu said: ‘Hum, so you’re second brother Jin.’ (T/N: Jin A’er means ‘Jin, the second brother’, Jin A’da means ‘Jin, the big brother.’)

Just saying to here, suddenly they heard horse hoofbeats, more than ten horses was galloping towards the mill. Duan Yu was frightened, he rose to his feet and shouted: ‘Miss Wang, the enemies have chased to here!’

Wang Yuyan was being helped by that young peasant girl. She had taken off her wet clothes, wrung water out of them, and was drying herself. Also hearing the horse hoofbeats, she was worried and frightened, and did not know how to deal with this situation.

The horses ran very fast, in a short period of time they had already arrived at the outside of the door. Someone shouted: ‘This horse is ours. That boy and that girl are inside of here.’ Wang Yuyan and Duan Yu, one being up on the garret, one being downstairs, secretly complained at the same time and thought: ‘Had we led the horse into the mill, it’d have been so much better.’ They heard a crash. Someone had kicked the door open, three or four Western Xia warriors rushed into the mill.

Wholeheartedly wanting to protect Wang Yuyan, Duan Yu rushed up the garret. Wang Yuyan had not dressed therefore she had no alternative but to take a wet gown to put before her chest. After being poisoned she felt very weak, therefore after her left hand had raised the gown to her chest, it dropped down. Duan Yu hastily turned around and said in a panicky manner: ‘I’m sorry for offending you, Miss, pardon me, pardon me.’ Wang Yuyan hurriedly said: ‘What should we do?’

They heard a warrior ask Jin A’er: ‘Is that girl upstairs?’ Jin A’er said: ‘Why do you ask about other people’s daughter?’ A thump was heard, that warrior had thrown a punch which had hit and sent him flying away for more than one zhang then falling down. Jin A’er was very stubborn. He immediately shouted abuse at the warrior.

The peasant girl said: ‘Brother A’er, Brother A’er, don’t exchange insults with other people.’ Caring about her lover, she climbed down to persuade him. Unexpectedly that Western Xia warrior brandished his saber then split Jin A’er head in half. The peasant girl was appalled. She fell and rolled down from the wooden ladder. Another warrior gripped her and said with a hideous grin: ‘This chick gives herself up to me.’ There was a sound of tearing. He had already torn her clothes. That peasant girl stretched out her hand and gave him a fierce claw in the face, immediately creating five streaks of blood. The warrior raged, with all his strength he threw a punch which hit her chest. Her ribs were all broken. She died immediately.

Hearing the agonized cries downstairs Duan Yu stuck his head out to have a look. When he saw that the couple of young peasants had suffered sudden unfortunate deaths, he was very sorry and muttered to himself: ‘It’s totally my fault for dragging the two of you into this so that you suffered horrible deaths.’ Seeing that warrior quickly climbing up the wooden ladder, he hurriedly gave it a shove towards the outside. The wooden ladder was only loosely connected to the floor of the garret therefore it immediately fell outwards. That warrior quickly jumped down on the ground, held and stopped the ladder, then connected it to the garret’s floor again. While Duan Yu was attempting to shove it one more time, another warrior raised his right hand, a sleeve-hidden arrow was shot at him. Duan Yu did not know how to dodge it. A ‘pu’ sound was heard, the sleeve-hidden arrow had stuck into his left shoulder. While Duan Yu was pressing his shoulder with his hand, the first warrior took advantage of that opportunity to connect the ladder to the garret’s floor and climb up. Each of his steps climbed up three rungs.

Wang Yuyan was sitting on a pile of paddy behind Duan Yu, seeing how that warrior have killed the peasant girl with a palm strike (T/N: Something wrong here, cause she was killed w/ a punch) and the lightness skill he had used to jump off and climb up the ladder, she said: ‘You use your left forefinger to press the ‘Xiaguan acupuncture point’ on his belly.’

When he had learned the Beiming Divine Skill (T/N: In Chinese myths, Beiming is the ocean at the northern extremity of the world where sunlight can’t reach) and the Six Meridians Divine Swords in Dali, he had already remembered clearly every acupuncture point on the human body. While he was hearing Wang Yuyan shouting, that warrior had already set his left foot on the edge of the garret. Not having time to think anymore, he extended the forefinger and poked him in the ‘Xiaguan acupuncture point’ on his belly. That warrior was running up, his belly was totally unprotected. He uttered a loud cry, then fell directly backwards on the ground from midair and died immediately.

Duan Yu cried out: ‘This’s strange, this’s strange!’ He saw another shaggy-bearded Western Xia warrior brandishing his long saber to protect his body and climbing up the ladder. Duan Yu asked: ‘Where to poke him, where to poke him?’ Wang Yuyan said in fright: ‘A’yo, this’s bad!’ Duan Yu asked: ‘Why bad?’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘The movements of his saber are too fast, if you wanna poke him in the ‘Shanzhong acupuncture point’ on his chest, when your finger hasn’t touched it, your arm would’ve already been chopped off.’

When she had just said to here, that shaggy-bearded warrior had already reached the edge of the floor. Duan Yu wanted to protect Wang Yuyan with all his heart therefore he did not think about the possibility that his arm might be chopped off. He stretched his right arm, utilized his internal energy, extended his finger and poked the warrior in the ‘Shanzhong acupuncture point’ on his chest. That warrior raised his saber to chop at Duan Yu’s arm, but all of a sudden he screamed out ‘Ah’ then fell down on his back. From a small hole on his chest blood was spouting up to two chi’s (t/n: 1 chi ~ 33.33 cm) high. Wang Yuyan and Duan Yu were both surprised and happy. Neither of them had expected the power of that finger attack to actually be this dangerous.

Because Duan Yu had continuously killed two of them in a very short period of time, the rest of the warriors did not dare to climb up to the garret anymore. They gathered downstairs to discuss.

Wang Yuyan said: ‘Mr. Duan, you should pull the sleeve-hidden arrow out of your shoulder.’ Duan Yu was very happy and thought: ‘So she also cares about the arrow wound on my shoulder.’ He held out his hand and plucked the sleeve-hidden arrow from his shoulder. This arrow had gone one cun (t/n: 1 cun ~ 3.333 cm) into his body and already touched the bone in his shoulder therefore using sheer force to pull it out like this was extremely painful, but because he was happy he did not care about that at all. He said: ‘Miss Wang, if they go up here to attack again, how you think should we deal with them?’ While saying he turned his head to look at Wang Yuyan. Suddenly seeing that she was still loosely dressed he hastily turned around and said: ‘A’yo, I’m sorry.’

Wang Yuyan felt so ashamed that her face became very red, but she did not have any strength to dress. An idea suddenly appeared in her mind. She then got into the stack of straws, only stuck her head out, smiled and said: ‘It’s all right, you can turn around now.’

Duan Yu slowly turned sideways, his whole body was prepared, if he saw that she was still untidily dressed exposing her skin, he would turn away immediately. When he had just turned half of his head around, he caught a glimpse of a Western Xia warrior on the outside of the window. The warrior was standing on a horse’s back, sticking his head in and looking around wanting to jump into the garret. Duan Yu hastily said: ‘There’re enemies on this side.’

Wang Yuyan thought: ‘How are this man’s martial arts?’ She said: ‘You throw the sleeve-hidden arrow at him.’

Duan Yu followed her advice and threw the sleeve-hidden arrow in his hand out. He was totally an amateur in using missiles therefore the sleeve-hidden arrow he threw did not have the least bit of accuracy and was at least two chi’s away from that man’s head. That man at first did not pay attention, but this throw of Duan Yu was extremely powerful, it was just a small sleeve-hidden arrow yet a whizzing sound was heard when it flew out. That man was frightened. He hunkered down to dodge and curled up into a heap on the saddle.

Wang Yuyan stuck her head out and saw clearly. She said: ‘He’s a wrestling expert of Western Xia. Just let him grip you, then hit the top of his skull with your palm, you’ll win.’

Duan Yu said: ‘This’s easy.’ He walked to the window and saw that warrior jumped up from the saddle, broke the window’s lattice and plunged into the garret. Duan Yu said: ‘Why do you come here?’ That warrior did not understand the Han language. He glowered at Duan Yu then held out the left hand and gripped his chest immediately. The movements of this man were really fast, right after gripping Duan Yu he straightened his arm and lifted him in the air. Duan Yu sent backwards a palm strike. There was a plop. He had already hit the top of the man’s head. That warrior had originally wanted to throw Duan Yu on the garret’s floor then wrestle him near dead but he had not expected to be hit by this palm strike. His skull was crushed into pieces. He died immediately.

Duan Yu had killed a man again. He could not help starting to panic. The more he thought the more frightened he got, he shouted: ‘I don’t want to kill anymore! I can’t kill anymore. You guys get away quickly!’ He then used his strength to push the corpse of the wrestling expert downstairs.

In total, there were fifteen Western Xia warriors who had chased him to the mill. At this moment there were twelve left. Four of them were experts of First-class Hall, two being Han, the other two being Western Xia. Those four people saw that Duan Yu’s martial arts seemed to be incomparably excellent for a while then seemed to be laughably childish for another while, which was really suitable to be regarded as ‘being fathomless’, therefore for the moment they did not dare to act rashly and gathered to quietly discuss attacking plans. However those eight Western Xia warriors had a different plan, they put straws inside the mill together and wanted to set fire to everything.

Wang Yuyan said in panic: ‘This is bad. They wanna set fire to the mill!’ Duan Yu stamped his feet and said: ‘What should we do?’ Seeing the big hydraulic wheel of the mill being pushed by the water of the rivulet, ceaselessly moving up and moving down, his mind was also up and down like the movements of the wheel.

He heard a Han man called: ‘General has ordered us to capture that young girl. We can’t kill her. Don’t torch this mill.’ Then he raised his voice and shouted: ‘Hey, little bastard and little puss! Quickly go down here and surrender, or else we’ll torch the mill, burning you alive and turning you into two roast pigs.’ He shouted continuously three times. Duan Yu and Wang Yuyan ignored him. That man took out some tinder, started a fire, then ignited a handful of straws, raised it with his hand and said: ‘If you keep resisting, I’ll start burning.’ As he finished saying he raised the kindling and assumed a posture which looked as if he wanted to throw it into the stack of straws.

Seeing that the situation was desperate, Duan Yu said: ‘Let me take them by surprise.’ He climbed on the hydraulic wheel. This wheel was very big, its diameter exceeded two zhang’s (t/n 1 zhang ~ 3.333m), and it was even higher than the roof of the mill. Duan Yu held on to some planks of the wheel, following the rotation of it, he slowly came down.

That man was still shouting noisily and loudly ordering Duan Yu and Wang Yuyan to surrender, not knowing that Duan Yu had quietly come down from the garret and extended his finger to poke him in his back. He was using the Shaoyang sword technique of the Six Meridians Divine Swords. One poke should do the job, however, while sneakily attacking other people he felt very scared, therefore the momenta of his attacks were inadequate and his internal energy could not be shot out. Whether Duan Yu’s internal energy could be shot out or not had merely been a matter of luck and this time he could not shoot it out. That man felt that his back had suddenly been lightly touched by something. He turned his head around and saw Duan Yu poking at his own back with his finger.

The man had seen with his own eyes how Duan Yu had continuously killed three people. Now, seeing Duan Yu moving his right hand in a disorderly manner and perhaps using some kind of evil technique he was rather afraid as well, therefore he hastily jumped leftwards. Duan Yu threw another finger attack, but still nothing happened, which was hard to understand. That man shouted loudly: ‘Stinking boy, what are you sneakily doing?’ He stretched out his left hand and made a grab at the top of Duan Yu’s head. Duan Yu hurriedly shrunk back and made random grabs with his hands. Fortunately he caught hold of the wheel and was immediately moved upwards by it. That man’s grab missed Duan Yu. A ‘pu’ sound was heard. Wood chips were sent flying all around. His grab had broken and created a big gap on a plank of the hydraulic wheel.

Wang Yuyan said: ‘You only need to go around to his back then attack the ‘Zhiyang acupuncture point’ at his seventh vertebra, he’ll be in danger. This man is a disciple of Tiger-clawed School in Jinnan. The Zhiyang acupuncture point isn’t trained by his martial arts practice.’

Duan Yu was in midair, he shouted: ‘That’s very good!’ then climbed up the wooden wheel and jumped into the main room of the mill.

The Western Xia warriors did not wait until his feet touched the ground. Three of them immediately tried to grab him at the same time. Duan Yu continuously shook his right hand and said: ‘I’m being outnumbered, even a brave man can’t beat multiple opponents at the same time, I only wanna fight one-on-one.’ As he finished saying he leaned and advanced on one side, using the footwork of the ‘Wave Treading Exquisite Steps’, after dodging several times, he was already at the back of that man. He shouted loudly: ‘Hit!’ and threw a finger attack, a chi-chi sound was heard, the ‘Zhiyang acupuncture point’ of the man was hit. He could not make even a single sound and died instantly.

After killing that man, Duan Yu wanted to follow the hydraulic wheel again to go up and return to Wang Yuyan’s side. But it was already too late because another Western Xia warrior had blocked his way out and was slashing at him with his saber. Duan Yu shouted: ‘A’yo, how terrible! The Tartar soldiers have severed my route of retreat. All around are ambushes, soldiers are besieging Gaixia, my important business has gone bust!’ He strode leftwards, that slash hit nothing. The other eleven in the mill immediately surrounded Duan Yu and attacked him at the same time with their sabers and swords. (T/n: Gaixia – the location where Xiang Yu was besieged by Liu Bang’s army and eventually committed suicide)

Duan Yu shouted loudly: ‘Miss Wang, see you in the next life. I’ve been besieged on all sides. It’s hard to even protect myself. I have no choice but to wait for you on the way to the Underworld.’ Even though he was shouting in a disorderly manner and looked extremely pathetic, the ‘Wave Treading Exquisite Steps’ footwork that he was using was incomparably masterful.

Wang Yuyan was entranced looking at it. She said: ‘Mr. Duan, you are following the ‘Wave Treading Exquisite Steps’, right? I have heard of it but don’t know its method.’

Duan Yu happily said: ‘Yes, yes! You wanna see it, then I’m gonna perform it from beginning to end one time for you. But I don’t know if I can reach the end before you see my head getting chopped off.’ He then performed the footwork he had learned from the scroll, starting from the first step.

Those eleven Western Xia warriors tried to punch and kick him and brandished their sabers and swords, but they could not touch even a corner of his clothes. All of them shouted: ‘Hey, you block this side!’ ‘You guard the northeast corner, don’t hold back when attacking.’ ‘A’yo, this’s not good, the little turtle egg has slipped away from here.’

Duan Yu kept going forwards one step then going backwards one step, moving around the hydraulic wheel and the stone mortar. Even though Wang Yuyan was smart and learned, she was not able to understand the method. She said: ‘Dodging the enemies is more important to you, don’t perform for me to see.’ Duan Yu said: ‘I can’t miss this good chance! If I don’t perform now, after I die you won’t be able to see it.’

He did not care about his own life and only wished to perform the ‘Wave Treading Exquisite Steps’ from beginning to end for the person he loved to see. Who would have ever expected that a love-smitten person had their own good luck? If he waited for the enemies’ attacks to come before using the footwork to dodge; firstly, because he did not know martial arts while the enemies were experts, and their stances were seemingly false and real at the same time and very unpredictable, he would not be able to dodge when he wanted to; secondly, the enemies had eleven people in total, if he successfully dodged the first man, he would not be able to dodge the second one, even if he successfully dodge the second man, he would not be able to dodge the third one. But he only focused on his own footwork and paid absolutely no attention to the enemies, therefore eleven people of them all pursued and attacked him. Every step of this ‘Wave Treading Exquisite Steps’ went to places that were definitely not expected by other people. They saw his left foot striding eastwards, but to their surprise, in fact his body had moved to the northwest corner. The eleven people attacked faster and faster, but ninety percent of their stances had ended up attacking the people on their own side, the remaining ten percent had totally missed.

Seeing Duan Yu standing beside the hydraulic wheel, the first, the second, and the third immediately attacked the place where they thought he would move to with their fists, legs, sabers and swords. The fourth, the fifth and the sixth used their weapons to attack the place where he was standing. While Duan Yu was dodging, he suddenly changed direction. Bang bang bing bing, ding dang clang clang, the weapons of the first, the second, the third, the fourth… had all hit the same place. You blocked and fought me, I blocked and fought you. Some Western Xia warriors had been a little bit slow and had been injured by the people on the own side.

After seeing just a few stances Wang Yuyan already knew the principle, she shouted: ‘Mr. Duan, your footsteps are very clever and complicated, for the moment I can’t understand them clearly. It’d be best if after finishing this round you perform another round.’ Duan Yu said: ‘Okay, I’ll always follow your instructions.’ Once he finished stepping according to eight times eight equaling sixty four hexagrams, he restarted from the first step of the technique.

Wang Yuyan considered: ‘For the moment Mr. Duan’s life is not in doubt, but how to escape from this difficult situation? I haven’t put clothes on my upper body. This really makes me feel ashamed to death. The only choice is to think of a way to give Mr. Duan directions so that he’d kill all the eleven enemies.’ She immediately stopped watching Duan Yu’s footwork and looked carefully at the stances of those eleven people.

Suddenly she heard a clack. Someone had put the wooden ladder against the edge of the garret. A Western Xia warrior wanted to climb up to the garret again. Because all eleven of them had been fighting Duan Yu unsuccessfully for a long time, the leader of the Western Xia people had told his subordinate to capture Wang Yuyan first and talk about it later.

Wang Yuyan panicked. She shouted: ‘A’yo!’

Duan Yu raised his head and saw that Western Xia warrior climbing up to the garret on the ladder. He hastily asked: ‘Where to hit him?’ Wang Yuyan said: ‘You’d best grab his ‘Zhishi acupuncture point’!’ Duan Yu strode forwards and grabbed the ‘Zhishi acupuncture point’ on the back of his waist. Not knowing what he should do next, he conveniently made a throw, by lucky coincidence he threw the warrior into the rice-pounding stone mortar. The stone pestle which weighed two hundred jin’s (t/n: 1 jin = 0.5 kg) was driven by the hydraulic wheel. All the while it had been pounding on the stone mortar unceasingly. The grains in the stone mortar had been turned into very fine rice powder for a long time, but because there was no one to look after the mill, the stone pestle still kept pounding as usual. After that Western Xia warrior had fell into the stone mortar, the stone pestle went down, a ‘peng’ was heard, it had burst his brain open, his blood splashed on the rice powder.

That Western Xia expert repeatedly urged his subordinates fo