One of the most popular books in China when my parents were growing up was a series of 4 novels called A Hero Born, a prequel to The Legend of the Condor Heroes. The novel is set in the Jin Dynasty, during the Jin-Song Wars, where the Jin dynasty invaded the neighboring Song empire. So far, only the first book has been translated. The story starts out with two Song Patriots, Ironheart Yang and Skyfury Guo, two expert martial artists, whose wives are pregnant. They often joke around that if their children are the same gender, then they shall be sworn siblings, but if they are the opposite gender, then they will be married. One night, everything changes for them, Ironheart and Skyfury fight, but then befriend a mysterious Taoist monk, Qiu Chuji (who in fact is an extremely advanced martial artist), promises to one day return to the village and help train their unborn children. After the Taoist leaves, however, Ironheart and Skyfury are accosted by a search party led by the traitor Justice Duan, and later are killed in the fight. Charity Bao(Ironheart's wife), is subsequently taken by the Jin prince Wanyan Honglie (who in fact ordered to attack, after becoming fascinated with Charity after she had inadvertently saved his life from Qiu Chuji), while Lily Li(Skyfury's wife) is kidnapped by Justice Duan. Qiu Chuji, after finding out about the deaths of the two patriots, fruitlessly tries to convince a martial family, the 7 freaks of the south (the seven freaks are: Ke Zhen'e (blind, but can fight based on his enhanced hearing, uses flying devilnuts, Zhu Cong, extremely fast, has extensive knowledge of opponents' acupressure points, Ryder Han, a short yet formidable fighter on horseback, Woodcutter Nan, fights with an iron-tipped shoulder pole, Zhang Asheng, fights with a butcher knife, Gilden Quan, utilizes a set of scales, and Jade Han, trained in the Yue sword). to try to rescue the two women, being forced to fight all of them before they become aware of Duan's treachery. Meanwhile, Duan and Lily Li keep trying to evade the 7 freaks, until they are ultimately separated, and Lily Li gives birth to Guo Jing. The seven freaks and Qiu Chuji devise a contest, Qiu Chuji will look for Charity Bao, while the seven freaks shall go find Lily Li, they will train their children.
For the next six(?) years, Lily Li and Guo Jing live along the countryside in peace, until fate has it that Guo Jing comes across an bloody battle with a young Genghis Khan (called Temujin in the book), that leads to Guo Jing looking after the archer Jebe, and Temujin's army searching the entire house; In the end, Jebe joins Khan, and Temujin takes in Guo Jing, and treats him as if he were his son. Meanwhile, the freaks' search for Guo Jing eventually leads them to the Mongols, who allow them to train the boy. On the night Guo Jing starts training however, the seven freaks come across a horrifying sight, a pyramid of skulls with holes punctured in them; as it turns out, this was the work of two evil martial artists, Copper Corpse, and Iron Corpse, seemingly mastering a deadly technique known as the "Nine Yin Skeleton claw". As it turns out, the duo were responsible for the death of Ke Zhen'e's brother. During the freaks' fight against the duo, Iron corpse's head is pierced by Ke Zhen'e's devilnuts (which could serve as poetic justice, given Ke Zhen'e's brother was killed in a similar manner), however, the duo proves too powerful for the seven freaks, and many of them are severely injured in the process, Zhang Asheng being killed in the process. It is at this point that Guo Jing shows up, and although he is overpowered and about to be killed by Copper Corpse, he manages to score a lucky shot with a dagger right in Copper's gut, subsequently killing him. For the next 10 years, Guo Jing, with Temujin's consent, is trained by all *six* freaks. Though he initially has a difficult time trying to master the fighting styles of each of his Shifus, particularly with Ryder Han's whip-based combat, he meets a mysterious old man (the Taoist Ma Yu), who tells him to meet him on the top of an extremely tall mountain. Rather than teaching Guo Jing any martial arts, he teaches him meditation, neigong, which makes him much more nimble and agile, and greatly boosting his fighting skills. In this time, Temujin manages to fight off any opposition from other Northeast Asian tribes and manages to bring them them together as one massive tribe, potentially matching the power of the Jin empire. After all those years of training Guo Jing, it is now time for the freaks to meet up with Qiu Chuji. Taking some gold ingots provided by Temujin, Guo Jing sets out to search for master eternal spring and his disciple.
So you might be wondering at this point, where is Yang Kang? Well as it turns out, when Charity gave birth to him, Wanyan Honglie took him in as a sort of son. Unlike Guo Jing, who grew up in a desolate mountain, Yang Kang was raised as the son of prince Wanyan Honglie, growing up in luxury and comfort in the royal court of the Jin. Throughout the book, it can be heavily implied Yang Kang spoiled by his "father", given his narcissistic, condescending attitude. Meanwhile, Guo Jing's journey has taken him to Jin territory, where he meets and befriends a mysterious beggar Lotus Huang, she is, surprisingly, also quite skilled in martial arts. After coming across a Jin prince mocking and beating a father (named Mu Yi), and his daughter (named Mercy), Guo Jing and the prince end up in a long and brutal brawl, until both men are taken to the castle and the prince is revealed to be none other than Yang Kang! In the meantime, Mu Yi and Mercy are subsequently locked up.
Guo Jing and Lotus Huang eventually go to rescue Mu Yi and Mercy. During the rescue, Mu Yi alludes to having been brothers-in-arms with Guo Jing's father(sounds suspiciously like Ironheart Yang), and eventually, Mu Yi admits he is indeed Ironheart Yang! Apparently, during Duan's raid, Ironheart was wounded, and, with the Jin soldiers assuming him to be dead, Ironheart managed to escape and take on the disguise of being a traveling performer (hosting a strange tournament where people would fight a girl, and the winner would marry her). The first book ends with Ironheart, Guo Jing, and Charity Bao escaping, but before that, being forced into a confrontation with Yang Kang, who still believes his real father is the Jin prince.
Despite the relatively simple plot of the first book, I HIGHLY, HIGHLY recommend reading this book, as it blends together history and fantasy, creating a sort of alternate version of ancient China. For starters, A war between the Jin and Song empires did indeed happen, and Temujin (Genghis Khan) was in fact present at the time, uniting many of the nomadic tribes of northeast Asia. On the other hand, the book does bring in some fantasy elements. The representation of fighting in A Hero Born is very unreal, especially considering there are characters capable of catching, deflecting, or dodging objects in the blink of an eye. Imagine being able to climb a mountain that passes through the clouds, or being able to incapacitate opponents by hitting a certain area. This gives a sense of unpredictability and mysticism to the book. It's unfortunate that so far, only the first book has been translated into English, because I want to read further.
