Chapter 75: The Mystery of Birth

Seeing so many people arrive, Qiao Feng was greatly astonished.

The four great elders of the Beggars’ Sect were present, as well as Elder Xu, whose seniority was exceedingly high despite his retirement. There were also countless friends from the martial world—no matter where they went, their presence was enough to make the world tremble. Why had they all come to this humble apricot grove?

Tang Xuan and the many game players of the Beggars’ Sect saw clearly what was happening. As expected, Madam Ma, the widow of Ma Dayuan, stepped forward first. She declared that while sorting through Ma Dayuan’s belongings, she had discovered his last testament and a letter. The testament specified that, should Ma Dayuan die an unnatural death, the letter was to be immediately handed to the elders of the Beggars’ Sect for joint reading.

The matter was of great importance, so Madam Ma entrusted the letter to Elder Xu, whose rank was high despite his retirement. Elder Xu opened the letter and found the handwriting bold and forceful. The recipient was Wang Jiantong, former chief of the Eastern Beggars’ Sect. The contents of the letter were read aloud by Master Zhiguang himself.

Master Zhiguang had been retired for decades and his name was no longer widely known in the martial world. Many of the younger generation had never heard of him, but Qiao Feng and the Beggars’ Sect elders treated him with utmost respect. They knew that, years ago, Master Zhiguang had vowed to cross the sea, venturing to distant lands to collect rare tree bark that cured countless people in southern provinces suffering from swamp fever. Because of this, he fell gravely ill twice, losing his martial arts, but his merit to the world was immeasurable.

Thus, Qiao Feng trusted Master Zhiguang’s character deeply and valued it highly. With Master Zhiguang narrating, and several others who knew the inside story, together they revealed a secret more than thirty years old:

Over thirty years ago, outside the Yanmen Pass, before the Valley of Fallen Rocks, a bloody battle took place. At that time, the heroes of the martial world in Song received word that a large group of warriors from Liao were planning a surprise attack on Shaolin Temple, intending to seize martial arts manuals that had been hidden for centuries.

The martial artists of Song feared that the Khitan people of Liao would acquire these secrets and train their armies, making Song’s soldiers helpless on the battlefield. They sent warnings to Shaolin Temple to tighten defenses and selected elite fighters to rush to Yanmen Pass to intercept the enemy.

Upon arrival, twenty-one top martial artists of Song, led by the “Big Brother,” lay in ambush.

When the Khitan warriors arrived, the ambushers unleashed a volley of hidden weapons, annihilating all of them. Shortly after, a Khitan man and woman, carrying an infant, rode over. The group attacked, killing the woman. Unexpectedly, the Khitan warrior possessed unfathomable martial arts—he was a master at the highest echelon, rarely seen in the world. His skill was so great that he slew most of Song’s martial artists, then carved his last words onto a stone wall and leapt off a cliff, leaving only the infant behind.

After this Yanmen tragedy, Shaolin Temple stayed on high alert. Three months passed with no activity, and only then did people realize they had been deceived.

At that time, the “Big Brother,” Wang Jiantong, the previous deputy chief of the Beggars’ Sect, Master Zhiguang, and Zhao Qiansun managed to escape. They took a rubbing of the last words from the stone, found someone to translate, and understood at last that they had wrongly killed innocents.

The Khitan infant was then handed to Qiao Sanhuai and his wife to raise, named Qiao Feng. At seven, Master Xuanku taught him martial arts; at sixteen, Wang Jiantong accepted him as a disciple. After the Mount Tai Assembly, he was taught the Dog-Beating Staff technique and appointed chief of the Eastern Beggars’ Sect.

This old tale was recounted slowly. Aside from Tang Xuan and the game players of the Beggars’ Sect, who already knew, everyone else listened intently, their expressions changing constantly. Their gazes at Qiao Feng grew strange and uneasy.

Qiao Feng roared in fury, “No! No! You’re talking nonsense! Fabricating this ghost story to slander me! I am a true Han—how could I be a Khitan barbarian? Sanhuai is my real father—stop your lies…”

Qiao Feng had lost all reason. With a sudden movement, he lunged to Master Zhiguang and seized his chest.

Elder Xu cried, “Stop!” This elder, with immense seniority and having retired from the Beggars’ Sect, was a top master of level fifty or sixty, surpassing even the current first-rate experts of level forty or fifty. Even in the martial world, such prowess was rare—as rare as the chief abbots of Shaolin or the Four Dharma Kings of Ming Sect, each able to walk the martial world alone.

Elder Xu shouted as he rushed forward to intervene, but his top-tier martial arts were nothing compared to Qiao Feng.

Qiao Feng was a superlative master—even those at level sixty or seventy could not match him. He moved so swiftly, taking Master Zhiguang with him, that Elder Xu could not keep up.

Elder Xu hurriedly called out, “Chief Qiao, Master Zhiguang is respected by all! You must not harm him!”

Qiao Feng roared, “I have always revered Master Zhiguang’s character! If you wish to remove me from the chief’s seat, so be it—I’ll step aside! Why concoct such a tale to defame me?”

By the end, his voice was hoarse, and he muttered, “What wrong have I done, that you press me so cruelly?”

Hearing this, many felt sympathy for him. Some of the Beggars’ Sect players from “Grand Wuxia” game could barely restrain themselves from stepping forward to defend Qiao Feng. Yet, as mere ordinary disciples, this occasion offered no place for their voices.

Tang Xuan suddenly interjected in a calm tone, “Brother, Han people are not necessarily superior, nor are the Khitan necessarily beneath us. This is merely the stance between two nations—why cling so stubbornly?”

Though Qiao Feng acknowledged the logic in Tang Xuan’s words, he still roared, “Tang, are you saying I am a Khitan too?”

Tang Xuan replied, “With Master Zhiguang’s character, why would he lie? Master Zhiguang and Zhao Qiansun, those who were present, have confessed in public to being the murderers of your parents—is this not handing themselves over? With your skill, killing them would be effortless—are they not courting death?”

Zhao Qiansun said coldly, “Indeed! On that day outside Yanmen Pass, the Khitan warrior’s appearance and stature were identical to yours, Qiao Feng! I admit to having taken part in your parents’ death—what benefit is there for me?”

Qiao Feng’s face turned pale. With his wisdom, he could not fail to grasp the truth; in his heart, he was nearly convinced.

He was, in fact, a Khitan.

It seemed he could no longer serve as chief of the Eastern Beggars’ Sect.

For power and prestige, Qiao Feng cared little. Yet from childhood, he had been raised as a Han, fighting for Song against foreign threats—just as the Guo couple guarded Xiangyang against Mongol invasion. Qiao Feng had always traveled east and west, defending against Western Xia, Tubo, Liao, and others. Tomorrow morning, he was scheduled for a duel with Western Xia.

All these years, his beliefs had suddenly collapsed. One could imagine his turmoil.

Yet he did not know that, though his origins had been exposed, today’s events were far from over.