IRON BLOODED HEART (Book 1 of Legend Of The Condor Heroes)

Fighting Contest To Find A Suitor Part 1

The Six Freaks of the Jiangnan and Guo Jing took the southeastern direction. The journey promised to be long: many days passed before they even left the steppe.

That day, they were not very far from Kalgan anymore. It was the first time that Guo Jing landed his feet on the Chinese soil, all was new for him, and he was full of enthusiasm. He loosened the bridle of his horse, that ran so quickly that the wind whistled to the ears of the young man and the landscape changed so quickly before his amazed eyes. The little red horse galloped without interruption till the Black River, then Guo Jing stopped in a hostel by the road, in order to wait for his masters.

Seeing that, after this long race, the horse had sweated a lot, Guo Jing had mercy of him and took a handkerchief to wipe it. He was stunned then to see, on the handkerchief traces of blood! Passing the hand on the neck, he withdrew it covered of blood. He almost burst into tears, blaming himself for not stopping his horse and take care of it. He was therefore the responsible of its loss! He embraced the horse, making him one thousand caresses, however the animal seemed to be very healthy, without appearing to suffer from anything.

Impatient to see his Third Shifu, so he may give some care to the horse, he didn't stop stretching the neck toward the road to see him as soon as possible. Suddenly, he heard a warbling tolling of bells: four camels of a snow white color arrived at full speed on the road, each brought by an individual clothed in white. Guo Jing had grown in the desert, but he had never seen any as beautiful camels and could not stop himself from looking fixedly at them. Aged of about twenty years, the "cameleers" had all one face of fine lines and attractive, of a beauty that one rarely could see in Mongolia. They got down with agility of their settings to enter in the hostel. Guo Jing could not leave them of the eyes.

One of the cameleers, embarrassed by the fixity of this look, blushed and lowered the head. Another, on the other hand, got in anger, "Little stun! What do you have to look like that?"

Guo Jing, taken on the fact, diverted the head with embarrassment. The newcomers whispered in a low voice and one heard them to laugh.

"Congratulations!" seemed to say one among them. "You really hit that little stun!"

Guo Jing understood that one ridiculed him and felt all ashamed. The red to the cheeks, he wondered if he had to remain or leave, when Han Baoju arrived on his stallion "Pursuit of wind". The young man hastened to tell to his Shifu of his misadventure.

"How is this possible?" wondered Han Baoju.

He approached the horse, caressed it, examined its hand attentively, and exploded to laugh.

"It is not blood," he says, "it is sweat!"

"Sweat?" stammers Guo Jing, speechless. "Red sweat?"

"My small Jing, it is a horse to the sweat of blood, a rare beast and of an inestimable value!"

Guo Jing was in heaven to learn that his setting was not wounded.

"Third Shifu," did he asked, "how sweat can it look like blood?"

"I heard about it from my deceased Shifu, that it existed in the kingdom of Ferghana (central AsiaValley, shared today between Uzbekistan, the Kirghizstan and Taczhikistan.), in the Territories of the west, celestial horses, whose sweat was red as blood. Its gallop looked like he was going to fly, and it could browse more one thousand li per day. But it was a legend, no one ever saw one, and I didn't believe myself in it too much. However, here is that this legendary animal let himself be tamed by you!"

In the meantime, the other Freaks had also arrived. All took place in the hostel and ordered to eat. Zhu Cong, whose learning was incomparable, said while nodding the head: