The things of this world are not so simple as they appear to mortal, fleshly eyes. What an ordinary man sees and what an opened-eyed martial artist sees are two entirely different worlds. The village stone idols looked ordinary, yet the opened-eyed martial artist could see gods within them. The traces of gods and demons lay everywhere, and the opened-eyed could behold dreadful beings; in temples, where a common man saw Buddha statues, the opened-eyed could behold a peerless great Buddha that crushed the heart!
Were a martial artist without a strong heart, he would sooner or later be frightened to death by what his own eyes revealed. That was why the Blind One, teaching Qin Mu to train his eyes, first taught him to train his heart—to break the god within him, so he would not be frightened and might one day achieve something.
The Buddhist teaching holds that he whose heart harbors the Buddha can hardly become the Buddha. The State Preceptor of Yankang says it is easy to break the god in a temple, but hard to break the god in one's heart. Both these sayings, and the Blind One's pissing on the stone idol, teach the same truth. The first two demand patient tempering of the heart; the Blind One's way was blunt and crude, even mad—yet it worked.
When the Village Chief first met the Blind One, the man had carried an overpowering aura, still a furious dragon sweeping the eight directions—but his eyes had been gouged out, and he was broken. Now that God of the Spear had come back. This could not but be credited to Qin Mu: since this whole-limbed boy had arrived, the villagers' rancor had gradually been dispelled. To teach Qin Mu the Nine-Layer Heaven Eye Art, the Blind One first had to awaken his "spirit eye"—but that eye had been plucked out, and only his mind's eye remained. Even as he taught, the Chief sensed the awakening of that "spirit eye"; that was the heart-spirit eye!
He had no eyes, so he replaced them with his heart.
The Chief closed his eyes and basked, thinking: "The heart-spirit eye will surpass the spirit eye, and the God of the Spear will surpass the God of the Spear of old. Blind One, when you leave the Great Ruins, your enemies will tremble..."
After his pissing Qin Mu shuddered, and felt mind and body at ease. The stone idol could no longer oppress his heart. Looking at it again, he saw many things he had never seen before, as though a veil over his eyes had been stripped away to reveal the world's true colors. He drank in those colors greedily, moved almost to tears.
He walked before the other three village idols, and his heart shook again—all blazed with intense divine light, radiating an otherworldly bearing. But he could now look upon them with an ordinary heart; they no longer swayed his spirit.
The Nine-Layer Heaven Eye Art: he had cultivated only the first layer and was already overjoyed. What heights would the remaining layers lift his eyes, and what beauties reveal?
Qin Mu took out his bronze mirror. In its depths his pupils differed from usual—deep within floated a ring of strange patterns like interwoven lightning. Slowly the ring dimmed and faded. He closed his eyes, built the Shenxiao Celestial Array Pattern in his pupils with care, and opened them again—and saw the ring return. That ring was the shadow of Shenxiao Heaven.
"Were I to complete the Nine-Layer Heaven Eye Art, my eyes should hold nine rings nested within one another, like ten stacked pupils." He thought this to himself.
The Blind One guided him until he mastered the full array pattern.
"Mu'er, have you rested enough?" The Butcher "leaped down" from the millstone, seizing his pair of pig-slaughtering knives. "Then it's time to train with the blade!"
Qin Mu answered, took up the knife, and charged at the Butcher. Before long Old Ma and the Cripple returned from the hunt and took the Butcher's place, drilling him until he could not move a limb.
In the afternoon Qin Mu went to the forge under the Mute. The Mute gestured and went "ah, ah"; Qin Mu nodded, thoughtful. The Mute taught that cultivation is like forging iron: mind the slow, gentle flame and the fierce roaring one, and besides these, the quenching—tempering with water. One civil, one martial; one soft, one hard; one dragon, one tiger. The more Qin Mu savored it, the more sense it made, and he was full of admiration, for the Mute's words spared him many detours.
As they hammered iron, the Mute taught him to read the fire in the furnace, then demonstrated. Qin Mu's eyes brightened. Following the lesson, he studied the flame while marshaling his qi, driving the Supreme Body Three-Dan Art. His qi ran like a little furnace hidden in his chest, then was ferried through his body; he felt it had caught fire, a wondrous thing.
At the same time, in his Spirit Womb Divine Treasury, his Spirit Womb drew energy from the sea of light and breathed in just such a rhythm—and, to his astonishment, it was gradually changing, the qi it exhaled kindled into flame that coiled about it until it seemed bathed in a furnace. His Spirit Womb was tempering itself too! Merely watching the furnace fire had wrought such a change, beyond all imagining. The Mute marvelled, studying him. After a while Qin Mu felt the blaze had reached his Spirit Womb's limit and stopped watching.
"Ah, ah!" The Mute gestured, plunged the red-hot iron into water—tssssss, a wisp of steam—and gestured more.
Qin Mu's eyes lit; he studied the vat, thoughtful. Soon from his chest came the sound of water, and the gurgling qi flowed into his Spirit Womb Divine Treasury, turned to a trickling stream that touched his Spirit Womb. Something marvellous happened: his qi was tempering his Spirit Womb, and his Spirit Womb, quenched by water and fire alike, fairly revelled in it!
He rose the next morning fresh and brimming with vigor. The Mute's method truly won twice the result for half the effort.
"I'm off to fight that demon ape again!" He swallowed a Qi-Foundation Pill, and the powerful medicinal force sent him charging out of the village to vent it—while beneath the cliff the demon ape had long been waiting.
"Little runt, down!" Having practiced the Eight Thunder Moves Qin Mu taught it, the demon ape felt its strength grown, dropped the twig from its mouth, took its stance, and chuckled: "Down, squash you!"
Qin Mu rushed forward. The demon ape, like a moving mountain, barreled to meet him, then suddenly unleashed Alone in the Eastern Sea Wielding Spring Thunder, roaring with a rushing wind that grew ever louder, the gale setting the trees reeling!
Qin Mu's eyes lit. He gave a long battle cry and also executed Alone in the Eastern Sea Wielding Spring Thunder, crashing thunderously against the ape!
Dong! A dull explosion resounded, and both were hurled back by their own forces. The ape landed and charged again, its enormous fist smashing the air, which buzzed and shook about it as it moved and punched at once.
Qin Mu was astonished. The Thousand-Hand Buddha—the demon ape had mastered that move too! It was still awkward, its subtleties not yet grasped, but it had caught the move's divine bearing, and coupled with the beast's boundless strength, in raw power alone the Thousand-Hand Buddha in its hands surpassed Qin Mu's own. The demon ape's body was unbelievably robust, and the Eight Thunder Moves had made it stronger still; every punch carried terrifying force.
Yesterday Qin Mu's cultivation had surged and his strength grown; today he had swallowed another Qi-Foundation Pill, expecting to beat the ape half to death. Instead he gained not the least advantage—indeed, it seemed he was being pressed onto the back foot!