A crescent moon hung like a hook. Several old crows picked clean the cold branches yet refused to roost, crying out mournfully through the night.
On Mass Grave Hill, two thin figures moved among crude grave mounds piled from yellow earth. A ragged youth carried a girl about his own age on his back. The girl clinging to his back had a sallow face; battered by hunger and cold, only her eyes retained a trace of spirit. The youth bore a worried look, keeping his hands from touching the wound on her thigh where a wild dog had bitten her. They were both beggar children from dozens of miles away. By day, they begged along the roads; by night, they searched grave offerings to fill their bellies. Such was the custom in the Shu Region: on the day of burial, steamed buns and pastries were placed atop graves. Some said they were for the newly departed soul to eat on the road to the Yellow Springs; others said they were bribes for the wandering ghosts and wild spirits nearby, so they would not make things difficult for the buried person's soul.
"When a kingdom rises, the people suffer, all turned to earth. When it falls, the people suffer, all turned to earth." Surrounded by layer upon layer of desolate graves, the girl could only bolster her courage with her voice. Though her face was pale, her voice was extraordinarily clear and light. She had heard those words spill from someone's mouth once, and in a flash of inspiration, sang them in her own soft, glutinous lilt. At such a tender age, trapped in troubled times, she did not understand grand principles like better to be a dog in peaceful times than a person in chaotic ones. She had merely mashed together fragments of Lishan Huai Gu and Zhang Yanghao's Shan Po Yang that she had picked up here and there. Yet sung from her childish lips, they would surely carry a different kind of bitter sorrow to anyone who truly listened.
The youth had carried her for a long while, and sweat had blurred his vision. The grim ghostly aura hanging amid the wild graves and scattered mounds made his skin crawl, yet he did not even dare breathe too heavily, concealing his fear and exhaustion as best he could. But this girl had lived with him day and night, and she herself was clever and perceptive. How could she not know what was in his heart? After gently helping him wipe away his sweat, she looked over Mass Grave Hill before them and could not help asking softly, "Will we die too?"
"We won't." The youth forced out a smile and comforted her.
"They say in plays that no one can escape death. Grandpa Wu died too," the girl said sadly. She was a very clever child. Though she had no chance to learn the zither, chess, calligraphy, and painting like children from wealthy households, any poem or lyric she heard even once could roll smoothly from her tongue. The Grandpa Wu she spoke of was a fortune-teller who had spent some time with them. Whenever he was free, the old man told tales of immortals and strange spirits, or taught the girl songs and verses he had mixed up and misattributed. In the end, he froze to death on a night of whirling snow, leaving the young woman with a bone-deep dread of death.
"Immortals don't die." The youth opened his mouth, his cracked lips splitting and bleeding. He quietly licked away the blood. His teeth were snow-white, a sharp contrast to his dark face. He held the young woman tighter and looked toward the pitch-black mountains in the distance. "Grandpa Wu said there are immortals in those mountains. When you get better, I'll take you there. Maybe if we meet immortals, we won't die."
Seeking immortals for freedom from death—those few words sounded simple, yet they were more difficult than the Shu roads by a thousandfold. Perhaps the old man had merely said it casually, to satisfy the curiosity of two children. Even cultivators seeking immortality and the Dao stood far beyond the reach of poor folk, let alone illusory immortal gods.
"Found it!" Suddenly, the youth's eyes lit up. After searching bitterly for offerings for most of the night, he finally spotted a bowl of pastries set atop a fresh grave. The bowl was broken, and the pastries were bound to be cold and hard, yet to him they were more precious than anything. He did not know whether she on his back could hold on if she went hungry any longer.
He carefully set her down far from the fresh grave, found a stone, spread several handfuls of dry grass over it, and helped her sit down. Then he limped toward the grave. Old people said stealing food from a living soul was a great taboo, one that shortened a person's life. Though the youth had been alone and miserable since childhood, and hardship had tempered him into a resilient person, he still feared ghosts and gods. Thus, he kowtowed nine times solidly before the grave. As though that was not enough, he knocked his head another nine times before taking the steamed buns from the bowl. Turning toward the girl, he secretly took tiny, nearly invisible bites from four or five buns and muttered, "I took these buns. If demons and ghosts want someone, they can come for me alone. I bit them too, so they're mine now. If a life has to be shortened, shorten mine alone."
He ran back to the girl, crouched beside her, and placed all the steamed buns in her hands.
"There are four," the young woman said happily.
She handed three back to him, keeping one for herself. Her smile bloomed brilliantly like summer flowers as she said, "My appetite is small. One is enough to fill me. You eat two, and we'll save the last one for the road."
Looking at the cold, hard steamed buns the girl had pressed into his hands, the youth felt as though he were holding the rarest delicacies in the world.
"Eat." The girl took small bites of her bun. Seeing the youth standing there foolishly without moving, she let out a soft laugh.
The youth was starving as well. Looking at the young woman's smiling face, he deliberately opened wide and took a huge, fierce bite from his steamed bun. Though he had not yet swallowed it, his stomach, writhing with hunger, already seemed much more comfortable. He raised his head, about to smile at the girl, when his eyes suddenly flew wide open.
He suddenly saw a seven-colored radiance streaking over from the distant horizon. From afar, it resembled a meteor, but within moments it had drawn much closer to where the youth and girl stood. And the nearer it came, the brighter that seven-colored splendor grew. Even the girl, whose back faced the light, noticed it. "What is that?" Filled with shock, she stretched out a finger. Then, in utter disbelief, she clapped a hand over her mouth. Both she and the youth saw that the seven-colored light was actually a Seven-Colored Dragon Boat flying through the air!
The dragon boat appeared to be carved entirely from purple jade, emitting a soft purple gleam from every inch of its body. It was several zhang long. The dragon head at its prow held a fist-sized red pearl in its mouth, while gemstones of every color were embedded along the hull. Those seven-colored rays came from these very gems.
The incomparably magnificent Seven-Colored Dragon Boat cleaved through the air!
Neither the youth nor the girl had ever witnessed such a sight. For a time, merely looking at it made them hold their breath.
Yet what shocked them even more was that women stood upon the radiant Seven-Colored Dragon Boat. The one on the left wore purple palace attire, with an emerald-green hairpin in her hair and skin fairer than snow. The one on the right wore goose-yellow palace attire, with a dab of yellow floral paint between her brows. Both had bright eyes and white teeth, their beauty beyond compare.
The youth and the girl stared blankly at the dragon boat before them. "Just two wild children from the mountains," said the palace-clad beauty on the left. She seemed not to have noticed them at all, knitting her brows as though no one else were present. "Senior sister, let's go. He probably isn't hiding in a place like this."
The goose-yellow palace-attired woman on the right nodded. "I don't think he would flee anywhere near Shushan either. Yet Master insisted that we investigate this place."
"Senior Sister, is that thing really so important? It has made us stir up such a fuss and send so many people searching for it?" the woman in palace attire on the left asked.
"When have you ever seen Master take something this seriously?" the woman in palace attire on the right said. "Let's go, before Shushan disciples spot us and refuse to let the matter rest."
"Ah!" The girl had begun to wonder whether she was dreaming, dreaming of a dragon boat and fairy maidens. She unconsciously tried to rub her eyes, but accidentally tugged at the wound on her leg and cried out.
"Hm?" The two women in palace attire aboard the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat, who had been about to leave, both gave soft exclamations at once. Though the girl was sallow and emaciated, her bones were exquisitely formed, remarkably like the body of a Nine-Chakra Xuan Nü of supreme aptitude described in physiognomy manuals. After exchanging a glance, the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat abruptly descended. "Little sister, would you like to come with us?"
"Go with you?" The little girl's inborn temperament took hold. After crying out in incomparable delight, she looked at the two women in palace attire and asked, "You two sisters are so pretty, and your clothes are pretty too. Are you fairies?"
The two women in palace attire smiled faintly. "We'll take you to a very good place. In the future, you'll become as beautiful as us and wear equally beautiful clothes."
"Really?!" The girl nearly jumped up, but then seemed to remember something. Pointing at the youth beside her, she said, "Then he's coming with us too, right?"
"Him?" The two women in palace attire looked at the youth, then both shook their heads. "His aptitude is too poor. We can't take him with us."
"Then I'm not going either." The girl froze for a moment, then grew frantic. When she turned to look at the youth beside her, tears were already welling in her eyes. "Idiot. Hurry up and agree to them." When the youth heard the two women in palace attire say they could not take him, his mind had buzzed blankly as well. But when he heard the girl say she would not go, he grew even more anxious than she was. For the first time in his life, he angrily rebuked her.
The young woman was about to say again that she would not go, but the woman in palace attire on the left had already grown impatient. With a sweep of her long sleeve, she said, "Go!" The girl felt as though she were soaring through clouds and riding mist. By the time she came to her senses, she was already aboard the dragon boat high in the sky. The youth below had shrunk to the size of an ant, too tiny to see clearly. "Put me down!" Panic filled the girl's heart, and she immediately burst into loud sobs. The purple-clad woman in palace attire on the left ignored her completely. The goose-yellow palace-attired woman, however, felt somewhat pity for her and consoled her, "Little sister, don't be sad. When you are older, you can come fetch him yourself."
Within the youth's sight, the radiant trail of the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat flew farther and farther away until it finally vanished.
"His aptitude is too poor. We can't take him with us... His aptitude is too poor. We can't take him with us..." The woman in palace attire's voice echoed again and again in the youth's mind. Though his nature had long been tempered to extraordinary toughness, he was still only a twelve- or thirteen-year-old mountain child. The dragon boat and the women in palace attire were even more real than the fairy maidens he had imagined. Brimming with hope, he had been cast aside with contempt. They had not even given him a chance to say another word. Then he thought of all the times he and the girl had depended on one another, thought of how he might never see her again, and saw the several cold, hard steamed buns in his hands. Sorrow surged from his heart, and he could not help bursting into loud sobs.
"Hmph. Who would have thought that a famous righteous sect that claims to lead the world's orthodox path would behave like bandits?" Suddenly, a sinister voice sounded beside the youth's ear. "But don't worry. Since they have taken a fancy to that little girl, it is a blessing others could beg for and never obtain."
That voice had actually come from a wild grave nearby. The sobbing youth immediately shuddered.
The grave had collapsed into ruin, exposing half a coffin. With a crack, a gray-white hand suddenly stretched out from the battered coffin.
With a bang, the coffin lid flew open, and a person sat up from within. He had a hooked nose, narrow eyes, and a face so deathly pale that not a trace of blood remained in it. Even his pupils seemed to have no black in them at all, only grayish white. A scarlet robe, red as fresh blood, enveloped his entire body.
"Hm?" Seeing that tears still streaked the youth's face after he stopped crying, yet he had not fled as expected, the coffin-dweller's gray-white eyes rolled as he looked at the youth. "What, aren't you afraid of me?"
"I'm not." The youth shook his head.
"Why aren't you afraid? Are you not scared of ghosts?" The coffin-dweller looked curiously at the ragged youth.
"You have a shadow. Ghosts don't have shadows."
"Hm?" He lowered his head to glance at his faint shadow in the night, then carefully examined the ragged little beggar. With a snort, he said, "I never expected that though your innate aptitude is so poor, your nerve would be rather considerable."
Hearing the coffin-dweller call his aptitude poor, the youth shuddered all over again and could not help looking toward the direction where the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat had vanished.
"Little one." Seeing the youth's pained, grief-stricken expression, the coffin-dweller suddenly smiled. "From the looks of you, you haven't had a full meal in many days, have you?"
The youth nodded. Had he not already been hungry for so many days that he lacked even the strength to run, and had the girl not vanished from his side, filling him with sorrow, then even after realizing the figure sitting up in the coffin was human rather than ghost, the mere sight of that blood-red-robed, deathly pale man would likely have made him turn and flee long ago instead of remaining here.
"Then do you want never to suffer the misery of hunger again? Never again to come to these desolate graves and barren hills to eat such things? Or perhaps to come and go as freely as those women, and see that little girl again?" The coffin-dweller's gray-white pupils shifted. As he spoke, he pointed a finger, and a threadlike red beam suddenly struck the dry, cold, hardened steamed bun in the youth's hand. The youth felt his palm burn. Before he could react, the bun had become fine black ash, scattering down from his hand.
For a little beggar who might go days without a single full meal, nothing was more tempting than having his fill at every meal. Besides, there was something in this world that shook the heart even more: power. The women in palace attire who could ride the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat upon the wind had displayed the strength of immortals as he imagined them. Cast aside and ignored, the youth now saw the coffin-dweller demonstrate such power as well. And now this coffin-dweller said he could help him travel as freely as they did and see the girl again. The youth was frightened and overjoyed at once. Staring at the strange red-robed man, his thin body trembled faintly, but he could not utter a word.
The coffin-dweller, who had effortlessly created the effect of willows darkening only for another village to bloom into view, was not at all surprised by the youth's reaction. The corner of his mouth curled slightly. "Buddha said that those who cultivated no good karmic ties in their former lives suffer the karmic retribution of hunger and cold in this one. But do you believe I can help you escape this bitter sea of worldly bonds?"
The youth looked at the coffin-dweller. Everything that had happened since the Seven-Colored Dragon Boat appeared was unspeakably bizarre and fantastical to him. He was not particularly quick-witted to begin with, and after standing dazed for a while, he could not help asking, "You... who are you? Why are you inside a coffin?"
"People of this world are often blinded by hollow illusions. What does it matter who I am, or why I am inside a coffin?" The coffin-dweller glanced at the youth. Still sitting motionlessly in the ruined coffin, he extended his right hand, palm up. The youth unconsciously followed his hand with his eyes. At a distance of only a few feet, the space before him suddenly lit up. A bead the size of a thumbnail shimmered with flowing radiance, releasing wave after wave of azure light from the coffin-dweller's hand. Looking closely, one could see ring after ring of ripples constantly spreading within the smooth bead, while its jade-like surface occasionally glimmered with a faint red light.
Watching the youth's bleak shadow stretch long beneath the radiance of the bead in his hand, the coffin-dweller said calmly, "As long as you eat this bead, you will never suffer hunger or cold again for all eternity. Nothing under heaven escapes the two words cause and affinity. I am here, and you are here—this is affinity. As long as you agree to do one thing for me, I will give you this bead."