Awesome / Qian Qiu

Feel first the world then oneself; forget first oneself then the world. Only by doing so, a person can forget both the world and themselves and then become truly unaffected by all ups and downs in life.

"You all regard me as a tiger trapped in a flat field whom anyone can bully and thus treat me however you want, as if I'm just a fly in a web. If this is the case, how can I not pull myself together? Even if I don't become the oppressor, at least I shouldn't let myself be oppressed by others."

— Shen Qiao

Qian Qiu indulges in the fact that it's a wuxia tale, with Meng Xishi not holding back in the world-building and the way she describes the fight scenes.

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Introductory Arc

• The donghua's depiction of the (albeit rigged) fight between Shen Qiao and Kunye, especially since it shows the former at his prime. Before the poison starts taking effect, it becomes obvious to the viewer that in a fair duel, Shen Qiao would have trounced Kunye and won.
• Shen Qiao being able to discern that Yan Wushi and Yu Shengyan were lying to him based solely on how they behave differently towards him and how they decided to take him — who's blind, injured, and nearly powerless — on an assassination mission. Even Yu Shengyan admits that he underestimated how clever Shen Qiao would be.

Funing District

• When a group of beggars attempt to mug Shen Qiao, Shen Qiao recalls his swordsmanship skills and beats them soundly with nothing more than his bamboo stick, even though he's still as blind as a bat.
  Shen Qiao: I'm already showing mercy to all of you, yet you are still not leaving. Are you waiting for me to stab your eyes, so that you will be blind like me?

Xuandu Mountain

• Once Shen Qiao realizes that Yu Ai poisoned him and why, he absolutely refuses to hear anything else his shidi has to say and tries to leave, even as Yu Ai's attempts to stop him become more and more violent. The only reason Yu Ai is even able to overpower Shen Qiao is because of the latter's injuries and the fact that Shen Qiao never once goes on the offensive.
• Although he was spending most of the time watching from the shadows and is only intervening for his own amusement, it's still exalting when Yan Wushi reveals himself to Yu Ai and completely curb-stomps him in a fight, all the while casually deriding the latter.
  Yu Ai: It's rather impolite for you to pay a visit in the middle of the night without being invited. I still have some private affairs that need to be taken care of, so please excuse me for not keeping you company before seeing you off!
  Yan Wushi: [laughs] What a joke! I can come and go as I wish, and there is yet to be a place in this world that can stop me. If Qi Fengge had said those words today, I might have to give him some face still, but who the hell are you?
  • The donghua also gets to show in detail how their fight goes. Yu Ai throws almost everything he has at Yan Wushi, who casually deflects or blocks each and every attack with only either a swipe of his hand or the tips of his fingers. Yan Wushi decisively ends their duel by disrupting Yu Ai's qi flow, leaving the latter catching his breath while the former just brushes the dust off his clothes, as if the fight didn't have him break a single sweat.
• When Yan Wushi forces Shen Qiao to fight one round with him right after they left Xuandu Mountain, Shen Qiao is able to hold on against Yan Wushi despite being injured and having used up some of his qi. In fact, being exhausted past his limits in the fight is what allows him to ascend from the stage of Jianqi and achieve Jianyi.

En Route to Chang'an

• Shen Qiao being enraged enough at how much of a sadistic and depraved Serial Killer Huo Xijing is that he takes him on in a fight with every intent to kill, and succeeds in finishing him off by stabbing him in the chest, with his bamboo stick.

Birthday Banquet at Su Manor

• After Duan Wenyang takes the time to insult Shen Qiao not once, but twice, for being disgraced by his loss to Kunye, when Shen Qiao takes him on to protect the Su family, Duan Wenyang finds himself being fought to a standstill by the blind and still-injured Daoist. Although part of the reason for the draw is because Duan Wenyang had already exhausted some of his qi from his fight with Su Qiao and Li Qingyu, the fight nevertheless made it dawn on him that looking down on Shen Qiao was a huge mistake.

Escort Mission to Southern Chen

• This only happens in the donghua, when Yuan Xiuxiu tries to finish where she left off and attempts another attack on Shen Qiao, Yan Wushi harms her with the needle that she used to poison him. And just to anger her further, Yan Wushi smugly retorts that he's only returning the "favor" she gave him, causing her to storm off.

Bailong Temple

• When Chen Gong orders some of his men to deliver some donkey meat burgers to Shen Qiao as repayment for his kindness in the past, the servants decided to indulge in some cruelty and threw them all to the ground, rendering them inedible. Shen Qiao doesn't let them get away with it in the most befitting way possible: by threatening them to finish every last burger they dropped, and they're not allowed to neglect even a single, dirt-covered morsel. The men have no choice but to comply.
• After Shen Qiao is betrayed by Yan Wushi and handed over to Sang Jingxing, while he's gutted by the breach of trust, he doesn't give in to despair and fights back against Sang Jingxing. But midway through their fight, Shen Qiao realizes that Yan Wushi had implanted a demonic core in him, which is bound to kill him as it clashes with his own Daoist core. In spite of this, Shen Qiao decides that he won't go down without a fight and destroys his core to ensure that if he's going to die, he could at least make sure that Sang Jingxing dies with him. While he wasn't completely successful, he still managed to badly injure Sang Jingxing enough for the entire Hehuan Sect to regard Shen Qiao as one of their biggest threats. And that's before what happens at Chang'an later in the story.
• Zhu Lengquan's Last Stand against the Hehuan Sect. Even though he's outnumbered three-to-one and he's aware that he won't be able to defeat them all at once, he still puts up the best fight he can and refuses to reveal Shen Qiao's whereabouts to them no matter what. While he ends up dying for it, Shen Qiao makes sure that he doesn't die in vain by fulfilling his last wish (which is to bring Shiwu to the Bixia Sect). Not only that, he manages to avenge him later on.

Bixia Sect

• Zhao Chiying's debut sees her swiftly defeating two armed opponents with her bare hands, saving what's left of her sect and Shen Qiao. It's apparent why she was ranked among the top ten best martial artists of her generation.
• Shen Qiao's rematch with Kunye, with him winning the fight and finally avenging his defeat to the latter. This time, no one is poisoned, and the resulting battle further proves that Shen Qiao would have won against Kunye had he not been crippled prior to their first duel. However, this time, even without the poison, he still has a long way to go before he can fully recover, which soon puts him at a disadvantage the longer the fight goes on. However, when he's nearly exhausted all of his qi, he remembers Qi Fengge's teachings, leading to a moment of realization that allows him to achieve Jianxin, earning him a decisive victory.
  • After revealing to Shen Qiao the plot to have Yan Wushi ambushed and killed, he takes advantage of the moment to try and kill Shen Qiao while the latter's guard is down. Unfortunately for him, Shen Qiao has learned his lesson of dealing with Combat Pragmatists and immediately retaliates by fatally stabbing Kunye in the chest. To put salt in the literal wound, Shen Qiao caps off with a brutal Pre-Mortem One-Liner.
    Shen Qiao: I am very disappointed in you. My shizun once said that Hulugu was a respectful opponent. You, however, as his disciple, are not even one tenth of his character. You're unworthy to be his disciple.

The Coiling Dragon Conference

• There is a reason why Yan Wushi is one of the most powerful wugong masters of his generation; it takes the combined efforts of five other masters to take him down, and even then they had to play dirty by damaging his qi before they could even badly wound him. Had it not been for his overconfidence — which prevented him from fighting them seriously from the beginning — he would have eventually beaten them all into the ground.
  • The donghua just shows how Yan Wushi is taking on four of them at once, and even as he's suffering a qi deviation, the others are not having an easy time trying to kill him, whether they're attacking him at once or individually. When he was taking on only Duan Wenyang and Xueting, it becomes obvious that had he been serious with them both from the start, they would have already been dead, and the other three would already be easy pickings for him.
  • One has to give credit where it's due; among the five masters that participated in the ambush, it's Guang Lingsan who's giving Yan Wushi the hardest time. Part of it due to may be due to the fact that he's making the wise move of fighting Yan Wushi from a distance rather than facing him head-on, but there's also how it's his attacks that's destroying the other's qi flow. Without him, it's highly likely that the others wouldn't have stood a chance.
  • While his own arrogance contributed to his defeat, Yan Wushi doesn't go down begging for mercy. Instead, he falls sneering at his enemies, and you wouldn't expect anything else from him.
• Thanks to the adaptation taking a few divergences from the original plot, in the donghua Shen Qiao ends up arriving right in the middle of the ambush rather than the aftermath. With the exception of Dou Yanshan, who doesn't fight him at all, Shen Qiao proves to be more than a match to the other four masters.
  • Naturally, the first master he takes on is Yu Ai. Like in the novel, he calls out his shidi on his betrayal before denouncing him as a disciple of Qi Fengge. For half the duration of their fight, Shen Qiao's sword is sheathed and he doesn't exert too much effort in blocking or deflecting the other's attacks. But once Shen Qiao unsheathes Shan He Tong Bei and directly crosses blades with Yu Ai, the fight quickly ends with Shen Qiao not breaking a single sweat, whereas Yu Ai is keeling over with his own sword broken in half. The cherry on top is Shen Qiao telling Yu Ai that even if he no longer considers himself a part of Xuandu Mountain, he will always be Qi Fengge's disciple and walks past him without saying anything else. Yu Ai gets the message and bitterly leaves the stage, leaving the broken remains of Jun Zi Bu Qi behind.
  • The second master that Shen Qiao takes on is Duan Wenyang, who he quickly takes out the fight by deflecting an attack and pushing him down the ledge of the temple with a single palm strike. Compared to their fight before, Shen Qiao has recovered enough of his strength to defeat Duan Wenyang in less than ten seconds.
  • While the last two prove to be a greater challenge since both are facing him at the same time, Shen Qiao still remarkably holds his ground against them. Keep in mind that Xueting is considered to be one of the foremost wugong masters of the current generation, yet Shen Qiao is able to fend off his attacks without much difficulty. Had it not been for Guang Lingsan providing backup, there was a good chance Shen Qiao might have been able to defeat Xueting in a one-on-one fight.
  • When Yan Wushi sees that Shen Qiao won't be able to hold on for much longer, in spite of the damage in his own core he musters all of his qi to cast the Fenglin Yuandian once more, with him letting out a powerful roar as the fiery creature rises up from behind him. He then charges forward to obliterate Xueting's attack, even though it damages his core further and nearly costs him his life.

Refuge in Tuyuhun

• When Shen Qiao and Yu Ai cross paths once again, Yu Ai makes the irrational move of confronting Shen Qiao in public in an attempt to get him to return to Xuandu Mountain. But unlike the last time, where Shen Qiao refrained from saying anything so as to not tarnish Xuandu Mountain's standing and because he had no proof of Yu Ai's betrayal, nothing is holding him back from laying everything out in the open this time.
  Shen Qiao: Yu Ai, everyone knows that the Tujue people are ambitious like wild wolves, yet you, for the sake of your own fame and prospects, willingly took favors from them. You even forced Xuandu Mountain onto your chariot. I can't stop you now, but it doesn't mean that I approve of this result nor that I agree to join your evil deeds.
  Yu Ai: You...
  Shen Qiao: Since we have come to this point, we might as well ask the people here to be our witnesses. As Qi Fengge's mantle disciple, I hereby announce: from now on, you are no longer a disciple of Qi Fengge. We will henceforth walk our own paths and will no longer have anything to do with each other.
  Yu Ai: How dare you! Shizun has already passed away. How can you speak like that in his name?!
  Shen Qiao: I was the only one at Shizun's side when he passed away, and I am his only mantle disciple. What I say represents what he desires. The reason I have endured silently up till now is to take into consideration the interests of all— I didn't want to see Xuandu Mountain divided by internal strife. However, you have pressed on, and you even willingly accepted the Tujue's conferment. This is against Shizun's teachings, and therefore I am obliged to expel you. Yu Ai, you listen to me. You have no right to punish me, because no forefather of Xuandu Mountain will ever acknowledge you as the sect leader. I hope you stay responsible to yourself. If you insist on having things your way and do not repent, I will come back one day to deal with you!
  • And even with everything that Shen Qiao said, Yu Ai fails to take the hint and attacks Shen Qiao again in an attempt to drag him back to Xuandu Mountain by force. Unlike before, Shen Qiao completely trounces him and fights his shidi to a standstill, and gives this glorious Badass Boast.
    Shen Qiao: You should understand that if you and I fight, you may not be able to win, and I may not be defeated. Don't think you can hold me in the palm of your hand and have me at your disposal. Even though I am no longer the sect leader of Xuandu Mountain, I am still Shen Qiao, and I am still Qi Fengge's disciple.
  • Immediately after, when Yu Ai still persists in persuading Shen Qiao to return to Xuandu Mountain, Shen Qiao firmly refuses and lets him off with one final warning.
    Shen Qiao: There's no meaning in saying it now. The damage is done, and it's impossible to make up for it. What you call a remedy is nothing but self-deception. The reason I'm not going back to Xuandu Mountain is because I don't want Xuandu Mountain to fall apart, much less having all the painstaking efforts of our forefathers go up in smoke. Now that you have taken the step together with Xuandu Mountain's disciples, you should be prepared to bear all the consequences. When you're no longer able to do so, I'll go find you myself.
• Before leaving the inn once he'd settled his altercation with Yu Ai, Shen Qiao gives all the onlookers (including Dou Yanshan) one final warning before making a show of force that shows them that he can easily cut them into pieces like he just did with the bamboo pole that he struck at.
  Shen Qiao: Your mouth is yours. You can talk about me however you like and I will not interfere. If you are discontent with me, you can come to me at any time. However, if I hear anyone insult my shizun or Xuandu Mountain, then they shall excuse the sword in my hand for speaking no mercy.
• In spite of everything Shen Qiao went through, including suffering the ultimate betrayal, in the end, Shen Qiao refused to give up on his ideals and finally managed to prove Yan Wushi's belief that all Humans Are Bastards wrong once and for all. To his credit, Yan Wushi graciously admits defeat.
  Shen Qiao: Yan Wushi, I know you want to destroy me. You believe that there is no kindness in this world, that a softhearted person like me has no reason to exist. You want to open my eyes and show me the cruelty of human hearts, to make me sink and struggle in hell until I finally become a part of it.
  Yan Wushi: But, I didn't expect... that you could rise up once again... even in that kind of extreme desperation.

Uprising in the Yuwen Clan

• When Chen Gong tries to get Shen Qiao to step aside by mentioning their "past friendship", Shen Qiao shuts him down fairly quickly with a blunt response that immediately makes Chen Gong lose face.
  Shen Qiao: Friendship? Could you explain what sort of friendship we shared? Was it the friendship in which you indulged Mu Tipo and betrayed me for your prosperous life now, forcing disaster upon me as you did?
• Shen Qiao taking on Chen Gong, Baoyun, and Yan Shou at the same time, all the while shielding Yuwen Song and Dou Yan. While the three aren't so careless as to underestimate him like many others had before, they still made the mistake of thinking that he won't be able to fight all of them at once. Shen Qiao proves them wrong, with the fight ending with Baoyun and Yan Shou's deaths, and Chen Gong having no choice but to flee empty-handed lest he ends up being another casualty. While the fight did take Shen Qiao almost everything he had, one has to keep in mind that his meridians are still not yet fully recovered and yet he has already managed to make so much progress with his wugong that in one day, he had felled two elders of the Hehuan Sect.
  • What makes this better is that almost everyone in the city of Chang'an gets to see Shen Qiao prove what he's truly capable of. More than fifty chapters ago, Shen Qiao was the subject of several kinds of slanderous rumors about how he's fallen from grace and his skills do not match his once-stellar reputation. Today, even if it was far from his intention, he immediately quells those rumors and shows the crowd that there's a reason Qi Fengge chose him as his successor.
  • Between both deaths, while Baoyun was a deplorable man who wouldn't be missed by anyone, it's especially hard not to cheer when Yan Shou bit the dust, considering what happened at Bailong Temple. With him gone, Shen Qiao was finally able to avenge Zhu Lengquan and Chuyi's deaths.

Sword Trial Conference

• Yuan Zixiao, a member of Liuli Palace, is introduced as the judge of the Sword Trial Conference. She's immediately dismissed by others on the basis that she's a woman, of course. Her response? She starts pointing out everyone's fighting style and their strengths and flaws, and explains in such meticulous detail that it quickly washes off any doubt from her detractors, especially since they become afraid that if she says anymore, she would end up revealing their weaknesses for the rest of the competitors to exploit.
• When Hulugu is revealed to be alive the entire time, he sets his sights on Shen Qiao and plans to avenge Kunye's death. While Shen Qiao puts up a good fight, Hulugu is the one with the upper hand the entire time. Just as he's about to close in on Shen Qiao for the kill, Yan Wushi arrives at the very last second to save Shen Qiao in the most epic manner possible, with his qi flowing through the room and his voice echoing around the walls. A moment later, he and Shen Qiao have already vanished.

Infiltrating the Imperial Palace

• Yan Wushi makes an unexpected appearance when the mission goes slightly awry, revealing to have also disguised himself as a handmaiden. He immediately takes on Xueting, leaving the latter with no opportunity to defend Yuwen Yun. While the fight caused the damage in his core to reopen, Yan Wushi manages to make the old monk pay for last time and defeats him both soundly and squarely. It's only a shame that the rest of the fight happened offscreen.
• Yan Wushi gets another moment when, some time before infiltrating the palace, he's revealed to have poisoned Dou Yanshan as payback for his participation in the ambush. Just as he had told Shen Qiao beforehand, he planned to use the enmity between Dou Yanshan and Yun Fuyi to have the former get rid of and letting the latter take his place as the leader of the Liuhe Organization, before providing evidence of her collusion with Tujue to the other members of the sect to force an internal dissension with the group, which would allow him to step in and make a profitable deal with them. It all went exactly as he had planned, and it reminds the viewer that Yan Wushi's standing in the jianghu isn't attributed solely to his martial skill.
• Shen Qiao permanently crippling Chen Gong's meridians, telling him that he had the chance to be where he is today because he met Shen Qiao, and as such it's his responsibility to decide Chen Gong's fate once and for all. To cap it off, Shen Qiao tells Chen Gong that his ambition and greed has deemed him a danger and unworthy of practicing martial arts.
  • This is immediately followed by Puliuru Ying, with no hesitation whatsoever, grabs a sword and rams it through Chen Gong's chest, spitting curses at the poor bastard as the latter draws his last breath.
• Bian Yanmei gets an Offscreen Moment of Awesome for defeating Murong Qin. Even though he neglected his training due to having his hands full with handling various political affairs in his shizun's stead, Bian Yanmei isn't deemed a worthy disciple of the Huanyue Sect for his brains alone.

Return to Xuandu Mountain

• Shen Qiao learns that Tan Yuanchun is the real mastermind behind his poisoning and his deposition from Xuandu Mountain, all because he was resentful of him for being Qi Fengge's favorite disciple. While interrogating him, Shen Qiao calmly listens to his shixiong's entire Motive Rant... before immediately destroying Tan Yuanchun's wugong and sentencing him to their sect's burial tombs for the remainder of his life, without ever being able to leave the place. Worse yet, from then on, he's now a dead man in Shen Qiao's eyes. While bittersweet, considering that Shen Qiao suffered the loss of a brother and the betrayal of yet another, it still feels cathartic to see Tan Yuanchun get his comeuppance and lose everything because of his petty desire to spite both Shen Qiao and Qi Fengge.

Battle at Banbu Peak

• The Final Battle between Yan Wushi and Hulugu, where Yan Wushi finishes where Qi Fengge left off and defeats Hulugu, this time for good. This also allows him to cement his position as the strongest martial arts master of the current generation. It was as Qi Fengge had predicted: the day would come when Yan Wushi's strength would become unparalleled and reached unsurpassed heights.
• Shen Qiao taking the most direct — albeit also the most difficult route — to reach the top of Banbu Peak and save Yan Wushi. What makes this feat so remarkable is that it requires an extremely high level of martial arts to even attempt to pull it off.

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For the ideal that I hold dear to my heart, I'd not regret dying a thousand times.