Yun'er

Yun'er was married off.

There was no fanfare, no wedding feast. A concubine ranked only a little above a maidservant. Though the mountain folk were poor, they were free people; a concubine was a man's plaything, little more than half a slave.

A small sedan chair came to take Yun'er away. All she brought with her was a tiny bundle.

Yun'er's parents wept bitter tears and refused to let go...

The White Snake turned her head and saw a young man kneeling on the hillside not far from Yun'er's home, wailing his heart out. It was the Brother Wang Yun'er had spoken of. Perhaps he was secretly cursing himself for being useless, unable to even keep Yun'er fed. Perhaps he hated Steward Guo for ruining a good girl. But there was nothing he could do except watch helplessly as the sedan chair carried away the girl he loved.

Her serpentine body parted the rice stalks as she followed the sedan chair, seeing Yun'er off on her marriage.

A hand reached from inside the sedan chair and lifted the curtain. Her gaze fell upon the long white figure in the rice fields, and a joyful smile appeared on her lovely face, still streaked with tears...

Past the stone bridge at the village entrance, past the ridges between the fields, the sedan chair carried away the little girl she had once been, carrying with it her dream of eating her fill as it left the mountain village.

Green Bamboo swayed. Inside the sedan chair, the girl watched the familiar scenery gradually recede. She vaguely heard familiar voices from the village behind her crying out her name, and a line of tears slid down her face.

Perhaps she had regretted it before, but whenever she recalled the bitter taste of grass roots and tree bark during the famine years, her resolve immediately hardened.

Perhaps she had betrayed Brother Wang, who loved her deeply, and marrying an old steward as a concubine was wrong. But so what? Fate had tormented her for more than a decade. She did not want to starve herself to death just to leave food for her children. She only wanted not to go hungry; she only wanted to live. The only blame lay with this world, with this fate.

The White Snake followed all the way, merely wanting to know where Yun'er would live from now on. The sedan chair jolted along the mountain road until, around noon, it arrived at an estate outside the town.

The White Snake climbed a large tree and watched from afar as the sedan chair entered through the estate's rear gate.

A concubine's status was too low for her to enter by the front gate, much less bow to Heaven and Earth or hold a wedding feast. They called it taking a concubine, but bluntly put, it was just finding a tool to toy with at will. The White Snake hoped Yun'er could be happy.

She watched from the tree for a long while, until the sun sank in the west.

Lanterns were hung throughout the estate. The White Snake tried hard to remember this place before turning away, returning to the Hundred Thousand Mountains that belonged to her, silently praying for the girl who had once been so innocent and carefree.

Beneath the Ginkgo Tree, the White Snake recalled that lovely face, smiling despite being covered in tear tracks.

There was nothing the White Snake could do about the fates of the human world. Yun'er had chosen her own fate; whether it was right or wrong, it had already become a foregone conclusion. Could Yun'er, who had grown up in the mountains, guard herself against the open and hidden struggles within a great household?

Clouds rose and fell, while the valley remained as it had always been.

Because of what happened to Yun'er, the White Snake hoped cultivation could change her own fate. She no longer wanted only two choices; she wanted to forge her own destiny. Who knew what year or month she might become immortal? A hundred years? A thousand? It did not matter. Even if it took ten thousand years, she would persist. If one day she became strong enough, she could seize the reins of her own fate.

Time flowed on silently as always.

A year later.

The White Snake, cultivating beneath the Ginkgo Tree, saw a staggering figure run into the valley. His clothes were torn, his body was covered in scrapes, and his face was streaked with blood. He ran as if mad, and an inexplicable sense of dread rose within her.

Perhaps the man was shouting something, but he was too far away for the White Snake to hear.

Only when he came closer did she recognize him: Yun'er's Brother Wang. The White Snake's heart turned cold...

"Snake Immortal... Snake Immortal, please, I beg you, save Yun'er..."

In a flash, the White Snake, who had just been beneath the old Ginkgo Tree, transformed into a streak of white light and darted toward the mountains. A white Snake Scale appeared in the arms of the young man surnamed Wang. It carried the White Snake's aura and would allow him to pass safely through the forest and leave the mountains.

Regret. If she had known, she should have stopped Yun'er back then...

A white figure raced through the forest, whipping up fallen leaves. Her six-meter-long body moved through the mountains faster than a horse, crossing ridges and streams without pausing for even a moment.

It was still that same hillside. Yun'er's parents and the mountain villagers were gathered around the girl, who was barely clinging to life.

A white flash streaked past, and the huge White Snake appeared beside them.

Everyone except Yun'er dropped to their knees in a rustling wave. Lying on a mat, Yun'er looked at the familiar White Snake and smiled, a smile so relaxed, so heartbreakingly beautiful.

The snake eyes swept over her. Yun'er, long since married, was covered in injuries. They had likely been inflicted by clubs and staffs.

"Snake Immortal, please save our Yun'er..."

The old couple knelt and begged the White Snake, their hearts full of hope.

Unfortunately, the White Snake did not know how to save people. The beating had been too vicious and had damaged Yun'er's internal organs; even medicine could not cure her. The White Snake shook her head, and the wailing on the hillside grew even more anguished. To them, if the Snake Immortal could not save her, then she truly could not be saved.

Yun'er waved her hand, signaling that there was no need for such trouble.

"Big Snake, I want to... cough, cough... I want to lie on you and watch the clouds in the sky."

The White Snake nodded. Her tail gently lifted Yun'er's weak body onto herself, then coiled into a ring to shelter her. Together, they raised their heads to look at the sky.

"Thank you..."

Her pale, lovely face smiled, so heartbreakingly beautiful.

Yun'er was gone...

Life was so fragile, yet so resilient. Life was fleeting, yet eternal.

It was still that quiet hillside. A new grave stood there, its fresh earth smelling so clean. The White Snake coiled beside it, simply watching the new mound. Yun'er had left the mountain village, only to return in the end. This was where she belonged.

The young man surnamed Wang, his body covered in scrapes and abrasions, sat before the grave.

"Yun'er had a terrible life in that household. That old bastard never treated her like a person. The first wife bullied Yun'er every day and often beat and cursed her for no reason. She wanted to come home so badly, but Steward Guo would not let her go."

"A few days ago, Steward Guo wanted to trade Yun'er with Master Zhao of the Zhao Family for another concubine. Yun'er refused no matter what, so that first wife ordered the servants to beat her savagely with clubs. By the time Yun'er's father and I arrived, Yun'er was already dying. She had only held on to one breath to make it back."

The White Snake could not make an expression, but only she knew the fury within her.

In these times, a concubine was nothing more than a tool for pleasure. Trading concubines, even giving them away for free, was an old custom; it was merely a group of old men who had grown tired of one and wanted something fresh. They had no status whatsoever. Even if a principal wife beat one to death, reporting it to the authorities would result in nothing more than a fine of ten taels of silver. Yes, that was what a concubine was.

The White Snake decided to do something.

She lifted her snake head and looked at Brother Wang, then crawled toward the distance before looking back again.

The young man surnamed Wang looked at the White Snake, then in the direction she was heading.

"You want to avenge Yun'er?"

The snake head nodded twice.

Brother Wang froze for a moment, then a struggle appeared on his face. But soon, gritting his teeth until they creaked, he picked up a woodcutter's blade and strapped it to his back.

"I'm going too! I'll kill that Guo bastard's entire family!"

One man and one snake headed toward the town...

The White Snake was not afraid of killing people, much less of becoming entangled in karma. Those people had killed her friend Yun'er. She had the right to seek vengeance from them. That was right—this was revenge. If one did not even dare avenge a grudge while alive, one might as well be reborn as a stone. A snake's life could not be lived in such a cowardly, suffocating way!

That night.

Not a single person of status remained alive in the Guo Family landlord's compound, apart from the laborers, low-ranking servants, and maidservants. Neither the steward nor the higher-ranking maidservants escaped. A principal wife's personal maidservants actually ranked higher than concubines, and being snobbish and sharp-tongued, they had bullied the helpless Yun'er plenty. The White Snake knew all too well about the filthy intrigue and sordid affairs of the inner courtyard, so she could not possibly spare them. Every wound was a snakebite. A drop of venom was enough to kill a living person. The White Snake did not want Brother Wang to be troubled because of this, and she refused to believe those people would dare enter the Hundred Thousand Mountains to capture a snake.

When the White Snake's fury erupted, blood splashed across the ground.

After returning to the mountain village, Brother Wang told Yun'er that her revenge had been taken. In the future, he too would find a girl, marry, and have children.