A bloody man charges into the Mystic Metropolis Abbey with a secret treasure map that’s been missing for years, a map that purportedly leads to a secret martial arts manual called Return to the Origin, said to contain the world’s greatest martial arts. Whoever possesses the manual will be number one in the martial world.

And so a storm is brewing as masters from all the Nine Major Martial Arts Schools—Wudang, Shaolin, Mount Hua, Kunlun, Emei, Mount Snow, Diancang, Kongtong, and Qingcheng—convene in northern Hunan, looking to track down the treasure map that leads to the Return to the Origin manual.

Yang Menghuan, young disciple of Kunlun master One Yang, is tasked with escorting his junior sectsister Shen Xialin to Kunlun so she will be safe from the danger approaching. But the major martial arts schools, as well as the increasingly powerful Heavenly Dragon Gang, want them as a hostage, to force One Yang to hand over the treasure map…

Note: This novel consists of 50 chapters total.

Chapters

Chapter 1: Part 1 · Part 2 · Part 3 · Part 4 · Part 5 · Part 6
Chapter 2: Part 1 · Part 2 · Part 3 · Part 4 · Part 5
Chapter 3: Part 1 · Part 2 · Part 3 · Part 4 · Part 5 · Part 6 · Part 7 · Part 8
Chapter 4: Part 1 · Part 2 · Part 3 · Part 4 · Part 5 · Part 6
Chapter 5: Part 1

Novel Updates: https://www.novelupdates.com/series/soaring-swallows-startle-dragons/

Context

Soaring Swallows Startle Dragons《飛燕驚龍》is the third novel from wuxia author Wolong Sheng 臥龍生. It began serializing in Taipei’s Great China Evening News《大華晚報》on August 16, 1958 and finished July 8, 1961. This is the novel that established the Nine Major Martial Arts Schools, and it established the trope of a villain trying to conquer and consolidate the martial world which became one of, if not the most common plotline in wuxia novels in the 1960s and 1970s. This novel did a lot to shape the genre. It also popularized the trope of the whole martial world vying for a martial arts manual.

Soaring Swallows Startle Dragons is one of the most important novels in the genre, which is why I’ve chosen to translate it. We need more examples of wuxia for people to read in English that aren’t Jin Yong and Gu Long, the two most well-known wuxia authors and whose signature styles are really outliers in the genre. Soaring Swallows is more the norm, or perhaps it’s better to say that it influenced what became the norm.

Also, this novel is somewhat of a transition between the “Old School” and the “New School”. That is, between the mainland China wuxia of the 1920s-1940s and the Hong Kong-Taiwan wuxia of the 1950s-1980s. There are still traces of Huanzhu Louzhu‘s influence here, such as fantastic beasts, like a crane that you can ride, and a snake whose skin makes for good armor.

Wolong Sheng was naturally influenced by the Old School writers, but he’s already forming his own style with Soaring Swallows Startle Dragons. A nice bridge between old and new. Lots of action and what are now familiar wuxia tropes.

And it’s the women who shine in this novel, even though the MC is male. The “swallows” in the title refer to the four major female leads. The “dragons” refer to the main antagonist, the Heavenly Dragon Gang.

This is the novel that made him famous and got him a spot in Taiwan’s biggest newspaper at the time, the Central Daily News《中央日報》 where he serialized his next novel, Jade Hairpin Oath (Oct. 1, 1960 – July 3, 1963), which made Wolong Sheng a household name.

Soaring Swallows was also serialized in Wuxia World magazine beginning in 1959 under the title《仙鶴神針》(Immortal Crane, Divine Needle). This is the title Hong Kong readers and viewers will likely know it as. The character names were all changed for this version as well, though otherwise the text is the same (as far as I know).

It was adapted several times to TV and film. The most well-known one nowadays probably is The Magic Crane film starring Tong Leung and Anita Mui, written and produced by Tsui Hark.

Glossary