[Water Margin] Hu Sanniang with her delicate hands - Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Since returning from the night of defeat in the secluded valley, Hu Sanniang’s state of mind had undergone an unprecedented upheaval. Dǎlǐbō’s phrase, “fight for yourself,” echoed in her mind day and night. She began to re-examine everything in her past—living for her family, enduring for revenge—and now, why was she still trapped here? Where was the will and desire belonging to “Hu Sanniang” herself?
She still polished her double sabers daily and kept to her compound, but deep within her eyes, something was quietly changing. The “Xuanlian” armor was no longer seen as a pure shackle. Occasionally, in the dead of night, she would put it on and silently adapt to it in the courtyard, feeling the power flowing beneath the plates, contemplating Dǎlǐbō’s words about “shackles” and “power.”
A few days later, one afternoon, the Khitan maid arrived again. This time, she brought a neatly folded set of dark-blue riding attire, similar to Dǎlǐbō’s, and a new parchment map. It no longer marked the secluded valley but a more open riverbank suitable for galloping horses near the marsh’s edge.
No arrow, no soft leather, just clothing for ease of movement and a definite location.
Hu Sanniang felt the tough texture and wind-weathered scent of the riding attire, and she hesitated little. She changed out of her skirt and hairpin, donned the foreign garments, and tied her long hair back neatly. She felt a lightness all over, as if a certain invisible burden had been lifted.
When she followed the map’s guidance and rode her horse (Song Jiang had provided her with a good horse to show his favor) to the riverbank, Dǎlǐbō was already waiting there. She was casually leaning against her own mount—an unusually magnificent black Khitan horse. Seeing Hu Sanniang in the riding attire, an undisguised look of admiration flashed in her eyes again.
“Very good,” she straightened up and clapped her hands. “This is more like it. Confined to a courtyard all day, even the best eagle will have its wings wasted.”
She led over another horse, a brown steed that was somewhat more docile, and handed the reins to Hu Sanniang: “Today, no fighting. I’ll teach you something else.”
What Dǎlǐbō wanted to teach was mounted archery.
“You Central Plains people rely on long weapons and heavy armor for cavalry battles. That’s sufficient for frontal charges, but it lacks agility,” Dǎlǐbō fluidly mounted her horse. “A pack of wolves on the grassland hunts by relying on speed, patience, and precise, fatal strikes. Mounted archery is the fusion of horsemanship and archery, transforming into a wolf pack, coming and going like the wind.”
She demonstrated how to stabilize one’s posture on a galloping horse, how to use the rhythm of the horse’s gait to draw and release an arrow, and how to predict the wind direction and target movement. Her movements were full of power and grace. The person and horse seemed integrated, and with every twang of the bowstring, the arrow struck the bullseye of the grass target a hundred paces away as if it had eyes.
Hu Sanniang had learned horsemanship since childhood, but it was mostly for open-field charges. She had never seen such a sophisticated combination of mobility and long-range striking. She was captivated and followed her instruction, initially shooting wide, her arrows flying aimlessly.
Dǎlǐbō was not impatient. She rode close, personally correcting Hu Sanniang’s posture. Her hand held Hu Sanniang’s drawing wrist, adjusting the angle; her voice was by Hu Sanniang’s ear, guiding her breathing and the coordination of effort. The scent of grass and cold spices lingered, and the steady, powerful touch transmitted through the thin riding attire made Hu Sanniang’s heartbeat involuntarily quicken, her cheeks slightly warm.
“Relax. You are not hacking at someone; you are guiding the arrow,” Dǎlǐbō whispered, her breath brushing Hu Sanniang’s earlobe. “Trust your horse, trust your bow, and most importantly, trust yourself.”
Trust myself…
Hu Sanniang closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to discard all distracting thoughts, focusing only on the rhythm of the horse beneath her and the tension of the bowstring in her hand. She drew the bow again, aimed, and released the string!
“Shuu—!”
The arrow cut through the air. Although it didn’t hit the bullseye, it was firmly embedded in the edge of the target!
“Progress!” Dǎlǐbō praised, a smile in her eyes. “Remember that feeling.”
The entire afternoon, the two galloped across the riverbank, the sound of arrows slicing the air constant. Hu Sanniang was naturally intelligent and made rapid progress. She gradually grasped the trick, and although far from Dǎlǐbō’s accuracy, she could consistently hit the target. Sweat drenched her temples, and her riding attire was dusted with dirt, but she felt a long-lost, satisfying exhilaration. It was as if the pent-up frustrations in her heart were thrown behind her with the galloping horse and the released arrows.
During a rest, the two stood side-by-side by the water, watching the sunset paint the surface a golden-red.
“Your shackles,” Dǎlǐbō suddenly spoke, her gaze fixed on the distance, her tone flat. “Besides Liangshan, besides trash like Wang Ying, there are others, right?”
Hu Sanniang’s heart tightened. She did not answer.
Dǎlǐbō turned her head. Her light brown eyes looked exceptionally deep in the sunset, as if they could pierce the human heart: “You still carry many people in your heart. Your father, the deceased manor residents, even… Li Kui, who massacred your manor. Hatred, duty, guilt—these things are like vines clinging to you.”
Her words precisely struck the most hidden pain in Hu Sanniang’s heart. She truly could not let go! Whenever the night was quiet, the sky-high flames of the Hu Family Manor, the tragic cries of her clansmen before death, Li Kui’s grotesque face… would reappear like nightmares. This bl00d feud, this guilt for failing to protect her home, was the nightmare she could not escape.
“Letting go is not forgetting,” Dǎlǐbō’s voice deepened, carrying a clarity that was almost ruthless, unlike her usual arrogance. “It is not letting them become your sole motivation, or even… an obstacle. A true warrior remembers the past, but their gaze is always forward. A wolf blinded by hatred will fall into the hunter’s trap.”
She paused, looking at Hu Sanniang, her gaze sharp as an eagle’s: “Li Kui is just a knife. The person holding the knife is the key. If you only focus on the knife, you will never harm the person holding it, and you may even be harmed by other knives hidden in the shadows.”
The person holding the knife… Song Jiang? Wu Yong? Or the entire world that treats human life as worthless grass?
Hu Sanniang was thunderstruck, frozen on the spot. She had never thought about it from this angle! All along, she had focused all her hatred on Li Kui, ignoring the deeper, destiny-manipulating dark hand behind him.
Dǎlǐbō said no more, letting her digest the words. She picked up her waterskin, tilted her head back to drink, her neck forming graceful and strong lines.
The sun gradually sank below the horizon, and twilight gathered.
“It is time to return,” Dǎlǐbō turned her horse. “Remember what I said today, and… the feeling of mounted archery.”
On the way back, Hu Sanniang was silent. Dǎlǐbō’s words were like opening a new window in her closed heart, allowing her to see a completely different landscape. Those heavy shackles… seemed not entirely insurmountable.
However, just as their horses were about to enter the patrolling range of the Liangshan stockade gate, Dǎlǐbō suddenly pulled hard on the reins, her eyes like lightning, shooting toward a thick patch of reeds to the side!
“Who’s there? Sneaking around!” she shouted sharply, her hand already on her saber at her waist.
Hu Sanniang instantly became alert, following her gaze. The reeds rustled slightly, and a short, stocky figure stumbled out, flustered—it was Wang Ying! His face was a mix of panic and resentment at being discovered. He glared maliciously at Hu Sanniang, then looked fearfully at the cold-blooded Dǎlǐbō with the drawn saber. Not daring to say anything, he turned and ran, quickly disappearing into the twilight.
He had followed them all this way!
Hu Sanniang felt a shiver of fear. If Dǎlǐbō hadn’t been alert…
Dǎlǐbō watched Wang Ying disappear, let out a cold snort, and withdrew her hand from her saber. She said to Hu Sanniang: “Did you see? The ground mice in the shadows will never give up. Strength alone is not enough; you also need the eyes of an eagle.”
She turned her horse to face Hu Sanniang. In the gathering darkness, her gaze was startlingly bright: “I helped you see your shackles. The path ahead is up to you—if you dare, and if you are willing, to cut them off with your own blade.”
With that, she kicked her horse’s flank, and the black steed shot forward like an arrow from a bow, riding toward the stockade.
Hu Sanniang watched her figure disappear into the twilight, then looked back at the direction Wang Ying had fled, tightly gripping her reins.
The shackles on her heart, after repeated impacts, seemed to have finally cracked.
And those sharp, eagle-like eyes had illuminated the hidden thorns and the direction of the road ahead for her.