Qin Mu withdrew and made for the next chamber. Within sat a bewitching woman, her breath like orchid fragrance, who spoke softly: "Your swordplay is peerless, young master — to have wounded the sword fiend. I am full of admiration. But my frame is frail. I beg you to be gentle."
Qin Mu blinked. "Elder Sister, I'm only eleven. I can't make out a word you're saying."
She stiffened, then burst out laughing. "I took you for one of those filthy men outside and meant to beguile you, forgetting you're still a boy. I am the Brothel Hall Master of the Holy Sect, bred among the painted quarters. In this chamber I'll match you in footwork."
She opened a rouge case. "This is my dearest cardamom rouge. We'll stain our fingertips and pit our footwork — we may only daub the other's face; whoever bears more rouge marks loses. What say you?"
Qin Mu nodded, smiling sweetly. "Deal. Elder Sister will be going easy on me."
"Charming!"
The Brothel Hall Master was pleased as could be; she cast him a sidelong glance, dyed her ten slender fingers with the rouge, then handed him the case. Qin Mu stained his own fingers likewise. Suddenly she moved, her body gliding like a snake, her qi a great serpent's tail that whipped about Qin Mu's legs.
He started — he had seen this art before. On the Grandmother Temple's stage he had beaten a girl who used just such a stance with the Thousand-Hand Buddha. "Was that girl this hall master's disciple?" He braced and heaved; she came loose. With a light laugh the woman crept up the wall, her serpent tail catching the ridgepole, and struck with exquisitely fine fingerwork. Her arms bent like sleek serpents, her digits growing short or long at will — and then, stranger still, her whole body stretched thin, boneless, hanging from the ceiling like a woman-serpent!
Qin Mu's legwork shifted about the floor, moving now like a dragon, now a serpent, while she roamed the ceiling upside-down, attacking without cease. Then his qi erupted, the Green Dragon coiling about his form, claws seizing the wall; his stance unfolded, skimming wall and ceiling as he turned defense to offense, hurling the Thousand-Hand Buddha at her.
In the tiny room the two came and went like wind and lightning, wall or ceiling all level ground to them, as though a dragon and a serpent were locked in combat, in coil, in a dance. Then the Brothel Hall Master felt Qin Mu's touch — four fingerprints appearing on her face. Worry seized her; his palm spread wide, palm thunder burst forth, and with a thunderous boom she was blasted dizzy.
When she came to, her face was smeared full of rouge.
"No more — I concede," she said, sliding down from the ceiling. "You've ruined my makeup. Your footwork's too strange; I can't catch you."
Qin Mu slid down after her. "Elder Sister yields."
Looking at this fair-faced lad, she could not help planting a kiss on his cheek. "There — two rouge marks for you, so I won't lose too badly."
Qin Mu's face flushed crimson, his heart thumping like a startled fawn; dazed and tipsy, he swayed out.
She laughed. "Had I known that was how to beat you, I'd have kissed you long ago! If ever you fall on hard times, find any flower-house and say you've come for Fu Qingyun."
Qin Mu stood silent at the next door until his composure returned, thinking: "No wonder the Blind One said women are demons' work — one kiss near sucked my heart out..."
This chamber held a female butcher, wild-faced, fiercer than any slaughterer, scraping a butcher knife with an idle rasp, a bone toothpick clamped between her teeth. No sooner had he stepped in than she came at him blade-first, without a word. A torrent of knife-light poured forth, the little room kicking up a gale, every stroke a gut-spilling, murderous art — no mercy at all!
Qin Mu snatched up his own knife to parry. Ding-ding-ding-ding — a storm of clangs like pearls on a jade plate!
The two broke apart; the female butcher spun her blades half a circle, gripped back-handed, eyes alight. "Fine knife-work!"
Qin Mu gripped back-handed too, and said warily: "Elder Sister, when we both hold our blades back-handed, the next stroke from each of us must be a move to kill. A knife is merciless after all; better that we use our bare hands as knives and stop the moment it's decided."
She flung her butcher knife into the wall. "True enough. Were I to kill you, the Cult Master's Wife would have me killed in turn. Come — bare hands for blades!"
Qin Mu's qi spun his knife back into its sheath; both hands trembled, fire blazing up — two flame knives leapt into his palms. Her palms shook, blade-edges growing along their rims — the razor-keen White Tiger qi. "Young master, nothing is sharper than White Tiger qi!" She pounced.
Qin Mu's gaze flickered; the fire over his palms ran to his forearms, like a back-handed knife. The third form of the butcher-knife art: Draining the Sword from the Prohibited Halls!
The two fought body pressed to body, barely using their eyes, sensing the other only through the force carried in the rival's frame. Back-handed grip meant closeness — small arcs, blinding speed, awkward angles — the highest order of battle-skills combat; any magic-arts or divine-power fighter a battle-skills master closed on to this degree was as good as dead. Every muscle of Qin Mu's body quivered — six hundred and forty muscles driving the greatest burst of force over the shortest distance. In that brief spell both were drenched in sweat.
Then Qin Mu slipped his hand-as-blade into her opening, lunged, and sliced clean through her greasy apron.
She stepped back, let the White Tiger qi bleed from her hands, tore off the greasy apron now split in two, and flung it aside with a hearty laugh. "I concede — you win. Your knife-work is no small thing. If you don't see yourself through all three hundred and sixty chambers, come butchery with me; a pig-knife will support a household too."
Qin Mu liked this plump elder sister. "I also know medicines; I could be a physician who cures the ailing."
The female butcher sneered. "A physician? Heal a man to death and the kin will bankrupt you! Butchery is steady gains. Come — I'll feed you well!"
Qin Mu's head ached; he hurried out, mumbling he was still young. "Young master!" She pulled both knives from the wall, speaking in earnest: "Tell the Cult Master's Wife that Biyao misses her dearly." Qin Mu nodded.
As Biyao walked downstairs into the courtyard, a great crash rang out: one wall of the building burst, and the Snake-Catching Hall Master pitched out head-first, his skull burying him in the earth and shattering the flagstones. She hurried over, when another boom flew a man flailing from the wall to slam flat against the wall opposite. Boom — the Divination Hall Master flew out through a broken wall; before he landed, a demonic mantra howled from within: "Prajna prajna samaya!" A violent tremor raced out, and the Merchant Hall Master came flying after him.
Biyao dragged out the Snake-Catching Hall Master, peered about, and muttered: "The young master's done warming up — he's getting serious..."