Chapter Ninety: Profiteering

Just as they were about to reach the foot of the mountain, Xiao Ding and the others suddenly heard the sounds of a fierce struggle from a clearing in the woods.

They exchanged glances and quickened their pace.

When they reached the edge of the clearing, they saw two men locked in an exuberant fight upon it.

One was a short, stout fellow wielding a small iron pot and its lid as weapons.

Do not be fooled by his squat, plump frame; his movements were remarkably agile. The iron pot in his hand seemed to be forged from some unknown material, making it an excellent defensive weapon. Like a shield, it could block every assault his opponent hurled at him. The pot lid in his other hand also had a short handle, and its rim was razor-sharp, allowing him to strike back whenever an opening appeared.

His opponent was a broad-shouldered middle-aged man with a thick beard, brandishing a jujube-wood staff. With clanging thuds he kept smashing at the iron pot, yet he could not lay a hand on the short, stout man at all.

Not far away from their fight stood a group of onlookers. Among them was a middle-aged beauty crying out in a frantic voice for them to stop, her face full of anxiety.

Beside her stood two half-grown children.

At a glance, Xiao Ding recognized them all.

The short, stout man using the iron pot as a weapon was none other than Fan Three-Fat, whom he had not seen for many days. The bearded man fighting him was the second leader of Flying Cloud Stronghold, Sun Loud Voice. The middle-aged beauty trying to break up the fight was the famed beauty of Shu, Luo Daphnia. And the two half-grown children beside her were naturally the young master and young lady of the Sword-Riding Manor, Ou Muchen and Ou Mulin.

Among the crowd of spectators there were also five or six ragged figures, and Xiao Ding found them familiar as well. They were the mountain bandits from Flying Cloud Stronghold.

How had Fan Three-Fat and Sun Loud Voice ended up fighting one another?

With a question in his mind, Xiao Ding hastily called out to stop them. "Fan Three-Fat, Sun Loud Voice, stop this at once! Do not fight!"

Xiao Ding's voice rang out loud and clear. Since the two were both familiar with his voice, they immediately ceased fighting and turned to look at him.

"Huh? Brother Xiao Ding, you're not dead? How did you come out alive?" Fan Three-Fat asked with a lewd grin.

"Brother Xiao Ding, you've come back too? Hurry and help me..." Sun Loud Voice also shouted.

Xiao Ding looked from one to the other, then withdrew his gaze from them and asked, "Why did you two start fighting?"

At that moment, Luo Daphnia, the middle-aged beauty, came forward with the two children and said, "Wasn't it all because of that iron rod..." As she spoke, she pointed to the iron rod beside a large bundle off to the side. It was the very rod Xiao Ding had lost when entering the mountain.

"Brother Xiao Ding, when this bearded fellow saw the iron rod, he insisted it was his and wanted to seize it. I knew that the rod belonged to you, so I would not give it to him. That is how the fight started..." Fan Three-Fat said, glaring at Sun Loud Voice.

"This iron rod was originally mine. If Brother Xiao Ding is using it, I have nothing to say, but if you want it, that won't do..." Sun Loud Voice also felt utterly in the right.

It turned out that on the night they were chased by the bear, after Fan Three-Fat had separated from Xiao Ding, he somehow wandered back near the giant boulder where they had rested. There he found this iron rod. Knowing that Xiao Ding had been using it all along, he took it with him, planning to return it when he met Xiao Ding again.

However, after waiting by the boulder for a day and a night without seeing Xiao Ding or the Mu uncle and nephew, and lacking the courage to venture into the mountain alone, Fan Three-Fat chose instead to descend.

As for Sun Loud Voice and Luo Daphnia, they had taken the Ou siblings down the mountain in accordance with Xiao Ding's instructions. Because Ou Mulin's leg injury had only just healed, their pace was slow. Along the way they encountered the bandits of Flying Cloud Stronghold.

These bandits were in tatters, poor to the bone, so impoverished that even the robbers who lived by murder and plunder looked down on them and could not be bothered to rob them. At that moment, their chief, Stone Tempering, was nowhere to be found, and their second chief, Sun Loud Voice, had also vanished without returning. With no leader, they were all discussing their future when they suddenly saw Sun Loud Voice.

But Sun Loud Voice made clear to them that he would no longer be a mountain bandit, nor would he remain their second chief.

As soon as the bandits heard this, six of them immediately declared that they too would quit banditry and follow Sun Loud Voice from then on. The other seven or eight, however, said nothing. They were close to Stone Tempering and were old hands of the stronghold, petty ruffians who had roamed the underworld with him in the past.

Sun Loud Voice and Luo Daphnia led these bandits along with many stops and starts, and only today had they reached this place, where they happened upon Fan Three-Fat. Seeing the iron rod in Fan Three-Fat's possession, Sun Loud Voice wanted to take it, and the two of them came to blows after a single ill-matched exchange. Luo Daphnia knew that both men recognized Xiao Ding, so she could not take sides and could only try to talk them down. But the two were fighting with such relish that neither paid her any mind.

"Say, Fan Three-Fat, after all these days, how have you only just made it here?" Xiao Ding asked curiously.

"I actually left the mountain a long time ago. I've just been waiting for you all at the foot of the mountain. These past few days, I've even made a little fortune..." Fan Three-Fat said with a sly chuckle.

"This iron rod originally belonged to Sun Loud Voice. I made a wager with him before: so long as he lived to make it down the mountain, I'd return the rod to him. You see..." Xiao Ding said, looking at Fan Three-Fat.

Fan Three-Fat turned, bent down, and lifted the iron rod into Xiao Ding's hands. "Brother Xiao Ding, I'm only responsible for handing this to you. It's yours. Once it's in your hands, you may dispose of it however you like. I have no right to interfere."

"Very well, then thank you, Brother Fan!" Xiao Ding said with cupped hands.

Then Xiao Ding carried the iron rod over to Sun Loud Voice and said, "Brother Sun has safely made it down the mountain now. I lost our wager, so I return this iron rod to you!" With that, he placed the rod into Sun Loud Voice's hands.

"This, this..." Sun Loud Voice was an upright, straightforward man. Xiao Ding returned the iron rod to him, and he found himself at a loss for words.

By then, the Ou siblings had also run up to Xiao Ding, calling, "Brother Xiao Ding! Brother Xiao Ding!"

Xiao Ding quickly turned, lowered his head, and asked with a smile, "Have you been well these past few days? Has Mulin's leg injury healed yet?"

"Brother Xiao Ding, my leg is completely healed now. Thank you so much!" Ou Mulin said, lifting her little face to look at him.

"Brother Xiao Ding, if we hadn't met you, my little sister would have been in real danger!" Ou Muchen also thanked him from the side.

"All right, all right. From now on we're family, so there's no need to keep thanking each other every day." Xiao Ding patted the Ou siblings on the shoulders and said.

The quarrel between Fan Three-Fat and Sun Loud Voice had been resolved, and everyone gathered together. Xiao Ding introduced each of them to one another in turn, and the whole group prepared cheerfully to descend the mountain.

At that moment, however, Fan Three-Fat stopped Xiao Ding and said, "Brother Xiao Ding, wait a moment. I've prepared a great gift for you." He finished speaking and, without waiting for Xiao Ding to ask, turned and slipped into the woods.

Before long, they heard the thunder of hoofbeats in the mountains, and then saw Fan Three-Fat driving out fifty or sixty horses from the forest...

It turned out that during these days after descending the mountain, he had not been idle. Seeing that many people who came riding up on horseback were unable to ride their horses into the mountain and simply abandoned them in the foothill area, he had noticed that many of those who entered the mountain never emerged again.

Those horses were better off if left to roam free; they could seek out grass and nibble at green shoots on their own. But many had been tied to trees, and after a long time they would grow hungry and thirsty, nearly dying of starvation and dehydration.

Fan Three-Fat knew that many of those horses' owners had already perished within Falling Glow Mountain. Having nothing better to do, he gathered more than a hundred horses in the vicinity and took charge of them.

Whenever a wandering hero or martial artist descended the mountain and could identify his own horse, Fan Three-Fat returned it. If someone had no horse and wanted to buy one, he sold them a mount and made a bit of money on the side.

And so, even to this day, there were still fifty or sixty horses in his herd.

At the sight of this, everyone burst into laughter and praised Fan Three-Fat for his talent at profiteering and shady dealing.

Each person chose a horse and mounted it, then all set off joyfully galloping down from Falling Glow Mountain...

Thus goes the saying:

They rush headlong into the mountain, eager and unrestrained;
how many who enter are ever seen again?
For treasure and marvels they kill and plunder in vain;
what marvelous thing has ever truly been seen?
Futile effort and wrongful death come to nothing;
such unjust deaths are but an instant's span.
If men knew their limits and the depth of things,
why should fate be spent to fill the bottomless abyss?