The End Was Also a Beginning

His blurred vision gradually cleared, and he saw sunlight spilling through the window into the hospital room, bringing a trace of warmth.

He wanted to tear off the oxygen mask over his face and the uncomfortable tubes running everywhere, but his entire body was too weak to lift an arm. As his vision slowly focused, he saw the room packed with relatives. His parents, stooped and white-haired, looked over with tears streaming down their aged faces, their lips trembling. His little sister crouched beside the bed, struggling to wipe away her tears, but no matter how she wiped, they would not stop—just like when she had fallen as a child, crying from the pain no matter how much anyone tried to comfort her.

The monitor's waveform grew fainter and fainter. Happy memories from childhood flashed past like slides. Was he... about to leave?

In a daze, he wanted to go home—to that poor, shabby home filled with warm memories. But no words came from his throat.

His breathing grew more labored, his lungs like a broken bellows. Somehow, he found the strength to raise a trembling hand and stroke that little tear-streaked face, forcing himself to smile.

"No... sob..."

Her tears were warm against his palm. The little girl still loved to cry so much.

The doctor turned and whispered four words to the two elderly people. At last, they could no longer hold back their tears.

His temples were frosted with age; before white-haired parents, there was nowhere to speak of sorrow. As their child, he had failed to repay the grace of their upbringing beneath that hall. Scene after scene from his childhood surged into his mind, and he felt all the more ashamed before them.

The body that had been tormented by terminal illness for so long suddenly found strength again, and his face grew hot.

Every relative in the hospital room was crying. He, too, heard what the doctor had said: a final burst of vitality.

People had their sorrows and joys, their partings and reunions. Yet he still could not believe that his days were numbered. Fear, unwillingness, reluctance to part, attachment, regret, love that pierced his heart and could not be torn away—every feeling swept through him. Forget it. Let go. Let go of everything. His entire body relaxed, no longer exhausted. Thinking back on a life spent busy day and night, worn to the bone, crushed breathless beneath the pressure of living, if there was another life, he wished not to be human again.

"My child... don't worry about us... go in peace..."

His father's lips trembled as he cried out. Those few words seemed to drain the last of his spirit, making him look even more grief-stricken.

A thread of warmth slipped from the corner of his eye. Strength began to drain from his body. He wanted to say something, but his dry, hoarse throat would not produce a sound. If he did not say it now, he would never have another chance.

"I'm... sorry..."

He breathed out his last breath, and his hand slid weakly from his little sister's face.

At last, he was free...

The sky was blue, the wind gentle, the trees green, the flowers bright, and birds sang sweetly.

The monitor's waveform became a straight line and emitted an alarm. His once rebellious little sister threw herself onto the bed, and no one could pull her away. Their relatives supported the two elders, whose bodies had gone limp and could barely stand. Doctors and nurses stepped forward. His sister screamed desperately and tried to stop them from pulling out the IV lines and removing the monitors. A nurse sighed, reached out to remove the oxygen mask, then drew up the white sheet...

Autumn leaves drifted down, returning to silence. Looking back took but an instant; floating clouds vanished in a moment.

Death was an ending, but also a new beginning. Flowers bloomed and withered in endless cycles of rebirth. All the countless living beings could do was let go of their obsessions and follow the natural course.

Time flew by, and twenty long years passed.

Hundred Thousand Mountains.

Mist drifted through mountain ravines, splashing ink across a painted landscape.

The clouds were green-green, ready to rain; the waters pale-pale, giving rise to mist.

The heavens suddenly cleared, and the mountains rolled up their curtains; the clouds still held their poses, and the stones wore their robes.

Layer upon layer of green mountains and towering crags hid the sky and blotted out the sun, verdant and steep. Clouds and mist wound around them, streams curled onward, waterfalls scattered spray. Apes cried, fish leaped, and white egrets soared into the blue heavens. It was like a painting, like a fairyland.

By a stream, a four-meter-long White Snake slithered through the grass. She was white as jade, her snake scales sleek and fine, her body bonelessly supple and sinuous.

Her forked tongue flicked out, catching the faint scent of food in the air. She rounded a huge boulder, raised her head, and used her heat-sensing organs to search. Suddenly, she accelerated, darting into tangled weeds and startling birds into flight. Her upper and lower jaws opened as she swallowed five bird eggs the size of goose eggs. Then, without a backward glance, she left the nest and continued searching for food to fill her belly.

Survival was what mattered most in the mountains and forests: hunting, eating, and maintaining bodily functions.

After a long while, White Snake had filled her stomach. She twisted into a pile of boulders to digest her meal, staring blankly at the sky outside the den with snake eyes. In truth, snake eyes could not see far at all; she was practically severely nearsighted. She also had no outer ears. She used her tongue to capture scents, her heat-sensing organs to detect temperatures and locate targets, while her hearing relied on feeling vibrations through her underside.

The reason she stared blankly at the sky was merely a habit from her previous life. Perhaps her dying wish not to be human again had caused her to be reborn as a snake.

The discomfort of her early days had gradually faded with time. Twenty years of spring and autumn had worn away her humanity. Memories of her past life were gradually suppressed by beastly nature. Only when she occasionally stared into space did she remember the sorrowful faces of her family beside that hospital bed. Whenever she had nothing to do, she tried her hardest to recall her previous life, afraid that one day she might forget everything and be left with only the instinct to survive, her hot blood gone, completely transformed into a cold-blooded creature.

The first thing she deliberately forgot was the name that had accompanied her throughout her former life. As a snake in this life, she no longer needed her old identity.

It was not that she deliberately wanted to forget her past life and abandon her humanity. After twenty years of eating raw meat and drinking blood, constantly fighting natural enemies to survive, how could she have the mood for sentimental melancholy? The painting-like fairyland was only an outer shell. The real forest was cruel.

White Snake had summarized four Laws of Survival.

First: wait for opportunities with sufficient patience.

Second: attack the weak and avoid the strong.

Third: regardless of whether an enemy was strong or weak, attack with all one's strength, cruelly and bloodthirstily.

Fourth: when danger came, flee for one's life with all one's strength.

Relying on these Laws of Survival, she had struggled from hatching out of her shell to grow into her current four-meter length. All kinds of natural enemies had always followed her like a shadow, including the goshawk with a two-meter wingspan that constantly circled overhead. She still remembered the time she had been careless and nearly torn apart by its talons. There were also the wildcats roaming nearby, as well as the most fearless animal of all—the honey badger.

Countless fights and bloody battles with natural enemies had made White Snake even more cold-blooded and savage. Even covered in wounds and drenched in blood, she would still fight madly for her life, seizing every opportunity to pierce an opponent's skin with her two sharp fangs and inject venom.

Her body was well-proportioned, and her venom was not strong. She did not have the triangular head and slender neck of a venomous snake. More often, she relied on constriction to strangle prey to death; venom was merely an aid.

Mountain weather was like a child's face—it changed the moment it wanted to. In the blink of an eye, dark clouds blanketed the sky, lightning flashed, and thunder roared.

Lightning raged, frightening every beast. When the flashes ceased, raindrops the size of beans began pattering onto the ground, and in an instant, rain poured down in sheets. White Snake shifted farther inside to avoid getting drenched. Rainwater would lower her body temperature. Snakes were cold-blooded creatures, unlike mammals that could maintain a constant temperature. Once the rain stopped and the sun rose, she would have to go out and bask in the sunlight to raise her temperature and remain agile.

She watched the curtain of rain outside the den, coiled into a motionless spiral.

White Snake's severe nearsightedness and terrible hearing had just caused her to miss an incredible sight. The other animals saw it clearly. Leaden clouds, black as ink, swirled without dispersing, while lightning struck one Mountain Peak with frantic fury. A black-and-yellow striped tiger, with hanging eyes and a white brow, stood atop the peak and roared amid the lightning. Its roar was filled with fury and unwillingness. No matter how severe its wounds, it remained proud and refused to lower its head. A lightning bolt as thick as a water bucket crashed down. Its wounds charred black, blood streaming everywhere, and it collapsed, never rising again, until at last no sound remained.

That stubborn, unyielding figure was deeply branded into the eyes of the other animals. The ignorant beasts and birds did not understand. They did not understand why the tiger had been struck by lightning, yet they grew even more fearful of the heavens overhead. That was normal. Wild animals all possessed the instinct to seek fortune and avoid calamity; instinct drove them away from danger.

Only a few animals fixed their beastly eyes upon the towering Mountain Peak amid the vast white curtain of rain. Animal roars rose and fell without end...