SPW, while a popular work in Jin Yong's canon of wuxia stories, is an odd duck that's out of place with the rest of the author's creative universe. DGSD, the CONDOR HEROES TRILOGY, and even the stories set during or immediately before the Qing Dynasty follow a consistent set of ground rules in terms of how martial arts work, but SPW pretty much disregards those ground rules. SPW sometimes feels like it's set in an alternate timeline wherein DGSD and the CONDOR HEROES TRILOGY either never happened or happened *very* differently from the official canon, or the story was ghostwritten by another author in Jin Yong's universe with Jin Yong's blessing. It's just not a comfortable fit with the rest of the canon.