A few years later.
Kong Nian Temple.
Dawn was just breaking.
The young woman slowly opened her eyes.
She was no longer a little girl.
Now grown, her figure filled out, and her shirt traced the graceful curves of her body.
Her skin was as delicate as freshly fallen snow, touched with a faint blush, like warm jade beneath March peach blossoms. Her brows were slender as the new moon, naturally graceful and needing no touch of makeup.
Most striking of all were her eyes, deep and clear as autumn waters. Her irises were black as ink, while the whites were as pure as a mountain spring. Her gaze held both a young girl's innocent naivety and the faintest hint of tenderness.
Her eyes were beautiful, but few dared meet her gaze, afraid she might see straight through to their thoughts.
She got out of bed, put on her monk's robe, and left her room to wash up before heading to the main hall for morning prayers.
As the first woman in the world to cultivate Buddhist teachings, she lived far from the others to avoid suspicion, and was seldom disturbed.
She moved through the mountain woods as lightly as a swallow. Every gesture carried a natural, untainted grace, like the first lotus bud at dawn, still beaded with dew—bright and pure, untouched by the dust of the world.
She had walked this little path at the foot of the mountain countless times, and knew every plant and tree along the way.
By the time she entered the temple and stepped into the main hall of Kong Nian Temple, most of the monks had already arrived.
At the very front of the hall sat an old man. His body was aged, but his back remained straight.
He was Xu Jing,