It really depends on what they preach and their ultimate goal in cultivating their abilities. If it is merely to be the best, then they would be wary of imparting all their knowledge. But if they are out in search for the martial arts that is invincible, then they would not want to waste their years of research and experimenting to develop such a skill.
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That’s a good point. Imagine someone who devotes their life to becoming the best. Would they prefer to let the knowledge die with them? Or find someone who is able to inherit it and pass it down? Finding a suitable successor would be quite a feat too.
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That’s a very good question. If they devote their lives to becoming the best, then it might not be possible to find someone who would show the same devotion. And even if they do, they need to invest the time to impart that knowledge.
That said, a good example is Dugu Qiubai and Feng Qingyang. But from Dugu to Feng, a lot of knowledge had already been lost. Yang Guo had to try to work it out on his own and he had a physical disadvantage to overcome.
Even the Twenty-eight Palms of Dragon Subduing that Xiao Feng inherited, Guo Jing only learnt eighteen. Of course, there’s speculation that Guo Jing distilled it and merged certain moves so he only needed eighteen. But that’s pure speculation.
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A good and interesting point. Instead of passing it on, Dugu leaves it behind for someone to come and interpret it. Dugu’s different styles were different phases in his road to sword enlightenment. Yang Guo and Feng Qingyang just picked up different phases.
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Becoming famous would help. If they are famous, people would want to learn from them and they would have more options to choose their successors from.
I remember reading somewhere that it was because Xuzhu only managed to learn 18 out of the 28.
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I looked it up. It was distilled by Xiao Feng, so he only taught Xuzhu 18 stances.
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I believe this is only in the 3rd edition
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Yes, my bad. I stand corrected. It was Xiao Feng who said that Xuzhu only needs to know eighteen. Xiao Feng was the one who distilled it, not Guo Jing.