Chapter 606: A First Visit, A Return

The Daoist walked ahead with the aid of his staff, climbing yet another mountain.

Behind him followed a little girl dressed in a tri-colored robe. She carried a stalk of sugarcane nearly as tall as herself, using it like a walking stick. She smacked her lips noisily as she walked behind the Daoist, looking off into the distance as he did.

“We should be in Zhao Commandery by now, shouldn’t we?” The Daoist’s voice drifted from ahead.

Smack smack...

The girl’s mouth was full, so she didn’t respond.

“Lady Calico, how many days have you been eating sugarcane now? If you eat too much, your mouth’s going to rot.”

At that, the girl simply turned her head and...

Ptoeey...

She spat out the chewed-up sugarcane pulp, then shoved the stalk back into her mouth, took another loud bite with a crunch, and continued chewing relentlessly.

“If you keep eating like this, you’re going to get fat.”

Crunch crunch...

“There might not be sugarcane for sale ahead. You should save some.”

Ptooey...

“...”

The Daoist shook his head and continued forward.

The mountains held vast stretches of flat land, scattered with houses. The sky was clear, but what was rare was the thick, layered clouds above that cast patches of shadow across the earth. Through the gaps, sunlight spilled down, dotting the fields and mountains with spots of light and shade that shifted and flowed with the wind.

As the Daoist and the girl walked along the mountain path, they were often bathed in sunlight, and just as often cloaked in shadow. Sometimes, the shadows slid swiftly over the ground, startling Lady Calico into pausing mid-step. She would then raise her sugarcane and look up at the clouds overhead, give her head a shake, and resume walking and chewing as she caught up to the Daoist in front.

By the roadside were homes and tea stalls.

Song You chose a spot with a great view. The surrounding landscape was all countryside and golden fields. He thought basking in the sun here, resting and sipping tea, would be just perfect, so he stepped inside.

“One bowl of tea.”

“Coming right up!”

“Do you have anything to eat?”

“Grilled

erkuai

[1], roasted

rushan

[2].”

“What are those?”

“One’s made from rice, the other from milk.”

“Bring me one of each to try.”

“You got it!”

The shopkeeper’s smile instantly grew even brighter.

Meanwhile, Song You stepped back outside to unload the horse’s packs. As he worked, he asked, “May I ask, how far is Xianning from here?”

“This is Xianning,” the shopkeeper replied. “But we’re at the outskirts. If you’re heading to the county town, just follow the road to the right, it’s about thirty li from here, and you’ll be there.”

“Thank you.”

There was another group of people sitting at the tea stall.

They looked like merchants. Their horses, mules, and goods were resting in the shade outside. Perhaps the sun was too strong, so they’d stopped here to take tea as well. One of them was even slumped over the table, dozing off. When they heard the Daoist speak, they turned toward him, and seeing he was a Daoist, someone grew curious and struck up a conversation.

“Where are you from?”

“From Yizhou,” Song You replied while unloading the baggage. The little girl followed closely behind him, still holding her sugarcane.

“What brings you to Xianning?”

“I’m a wandering Daoist. I travel wherever the scenery calls.”

“Now, you’re living the life.”

“And what about you gentlemen?”

“We’re just poor souls making a hard living,” one of them sighed. “Been running up and down this route for years, trading and hauling goods. Not like you, free and easy.”

“Then you must be well-acquainted with Xianning?” Song You asked as he returned to his seat.

“We are.”

“I’ve heard of a strange affair in Xianning,” Song You continued. “They say people show up out of nowhere, claiming to live here. The landscape and scenery are familiar to them, yet no locals know who they are, nor does anyone recognize them. Is there any truth to that?”

“There are plenty of strange things in Xianning,” the merchant said. “What you’re talking about is one of the older oddities. When word first got out, even the county and district magistrates came to investigate. Turned out to be true.”

“And those people?”

“Why, they stayed in Xianning, of course. Many of them are still alive today. Folks hear about the legend and go find them to ask questions out of curiosity. They’ll answer, too,” the merchant said with a yawn.

He added, “The most recent case was a woman, who suddenly appeared in Xianning, scared out of her wits. Thankfully, a kind soul reported it to the authorities. The government has handled these kinds of incidents before, so they suspected right away she was just like the others, who popped up from who-knows-where, and helped settle her in.”

The merchant’s tone was casual, like he was recounting a true event.

“She even got married later, right in the city. Married quite well, actually. People call her Lady Chai. If you don’t believe it, you can go to town and ask. Just mention you’re looking for where Lady Chai lives, and everyone will know.”

“Lady Chai...”

“That’s her!”

“When did this happen?”

“Must’ve been seven or eight years ago now.”

Song You’s gaze flickered, and he murmured to himself, “What a bizarre tale...”

“Hahaha...”

The merchant burst into hearty laughter, loud enough to wake his companion, who muttered a few words of complaint.

But he paid it no mind and smiled as he spoke to Song You, “Truth be told, we’re not from Zhao Commandery either. We come here for trade. When we first heard of this strange affair, we were utterly shocked that no one could figure out where those people had come from. Could it be that there’s another world besides this one of ours? Any outsider who hears about it finds it equally astonishing.

“Many scholars and officials make a point of going to seek these people out and ask them questions. Some of those who appeared had nowhere to live and didn’t know how to make a living, but just by answering questions about their hometowns from these visiting scholars, they’d earn enough in tips and gifts to get by. After hearing enough of these stories, though, we got used to it.”

“I’ll be looking into it myself,” Song You said.

“I’ve seen that Lady Chai myself,” the merchant continued. “She’s quite the beauty. She became a concubine to the son of a well-known cloth merchant in town. He dotes on her a great deal, and I hear they even have a child now...”

Just then, the stall owner brought Song You a bowl of tea. Unfortunately, it had just been brewed and was still hot, not a cooled herbal tea.

The Daoist cupped the bowl in both hands, waiting for it to cool as he chatted with the merchant. The little girl sat beside him, right leg stretched out straight, left leg draped over it. Hugging her sugarcane, she gnawed at it with intense focus. This position even let her lean slightly against the Daoist while basking in the sun. With every bite, her eyes would narrow contentedly, as though perfectly happy and satisfied.

The sugarcane pulp she chewed was tossed far off to the side.

The grilled

erkuai

and roasted

rushan

were soon brought over as well.

The

erkuai

, made from rice, resembled a thin pancake, and it was lightly charred and smeared with savory sauce. The

rushan

, on the other hand, seemed to be made with milk, egg, and flour, and was served with a layer of brown sugar, so it was sweet.

Song You ate slowly, and once the food had cooled a bit, he broke off a piece of each and handed them to the child.

“Sir, you seem very interested in this matter,” the merchant remarked.

“Indeed. In all my years of roaming the land, I’ve seen no shortage of demons and ghosts, and I’ve heard countless stories of spirits and gods, but something as strange as this is rare,” Song You replied. “Would you care to try some of this

erkuai

and

rushan

?”

“You go ahead, sir, we’ve already eaten. Honestly, we’re not too fond of this kind of food. But Zhao Commandery’s rice vermicelli are quite good.”

“I see...”

“There’s another curious detail to this tale,” the merchant added.

“Oh? Would you be willing to share it with me?”

“Why not? This is just a casual chat anyway,” the merchant said generously. “According to those people who appeared out of nowhere, in the place where they lived, people would sometimes come in unexpectedly, and sometimes others would vanish without a trace. No one ever knew where the vanished had gone. Most assumed they’d died or met with misfortune... never expecting they might have come here, to our world.”

The merchant paused, his voice lowering into something more mysterious. “But according to Lady Chai, although people sometimes arrived or disappeared, no one had ever both arrived and disappeared again. Only once.”

“Ah...” The roadside stall was drenched in golden sunlight. A breeze drifted by as the Daoist sat quietly, surrounded by the soft sound of a child chewing sugarcane. A trace of reminiscence flickered in his eyes.

“And when was that?”

“They say there was once a young Daoist who suddenly appeared in that place, and that he came from ‘outside.’ But in that place, only a few of the elders even knew what ‘outside’ meant. When that Daoist arrived in the village, the people found him very strange, just as we find those who show up here to be strange. Many came to see him, asking questions about the outside world, and one after another invited him into their homes as a guest, treating him with great hospitality. The first home he visited was actually Lady Chai’s. He was brought there by her grandfather, who had encountered him while out working.”

The merchant paused, thinking for a moment. “They say this Daoist had some real skills. People there could tell he wasn’t ordinary. Why? Because unlike others who had come from outside, his reaction upon arriving was entirely different.”

“Oh?” murmured Song You, still deep in thought.

“There was another thing, too, something that really proved that Daoist was no ordinary man,” the merchant went on. “That place didn’t have any peach trees before. But one day, the Daoist went up the mountain to a Daoist temple, and it’s said he somehow made a peach tree appear out of thin air, bearing an abundance of fruit.

“Because her family had once hosted him, the Daoist asked the monks at the mountain temple to share the peaches with them. They ate the fruit and planted the pits back in the village, and that’s how they came to have peach trees. But unfortunately, not long after that, Lady Chai ended up in our world, before she ever got to taste those peaches.”

The dozing merchant beside him stirred and muttered lazily, “It was drawn...”

“Yes, yes! A peach tree drawn into existence!” the first merchant said with a laugh.

These tales of immortals and magic weren’t particularly thrilling or dramatic, but they were full of charm. Even if it wasn’t the first time hearing or telling them, just remembering and recounting them brought delight.

The Daoist listened to him with a smile on his face. He had become the subject of someone else’s story. How many years would such stories be told for?

“....”

He shook his head with a quiet chuckle. While keeping up the conversation with the merchant, he slowly sank deeper into memory.

How many years ago had that been? Was that his first time in Changjing? It must have been ten years ago by now.

At his side, Lady Calico was still happily gnawing on her sugarcane, making rhythmic and content

chomp chomp

and

crack crunch

sounds. She seemed to be listening to the story, or perhaps not. In any case, she wasn’t lost in memories or weighed down by nostalgia. She was simply chewing the sweet juice from the sugarcane, basking in the sun, enjoying this worry-free moment in time.

The Daoist’s heart slowly settled as well.

After finishing his tea and food and resting enough, he reloaded the pack onto the horse, took his leave of the merchants, and continued on his way.

Ding ding ding...

The sound of bells grew fainter and fainter, and a tall and a small figure walked off into the distance.

The merchant yawned, rolled his neck, and said to his companion, “Funny thing is, I don’t think Xianning has any peach trees either.”

“Now that you mention it... never seen any,” his companion mumbled sleepily.

The merchant glanced again at the fading silhouettes and thought to himself that this Daoist was probably just like the one Lady Chai had spoken of, a true master of the Dao.

***

Not far ahead, almost just around a bend, a vast lake suddenly came into view.

The sky was veiled in layers of cloud, muting the light, and the lake surface stretched wide and still under the dim sky. Yet a single shaft of sunlight broke through a gap in the clouds and shone down upon the dark, tranquil waters. And right where the light touched, a small boat drifted slowly across the lake, becoming the finishing touch to the entire scene.

The Daoist walked along the lakeshore, leaning on his staff. Behind him followed Lady Calico and the jujube-red horse. Whether it was the person, the cat, or the horse, each of them walked and took in the view as they went.

On the other side of the lakeside path, the land was blanketed in golden fields, shrouded in shifting patterns of light and shadow. Countless houses stood among a crisscross of small paths, and in the far distance, a line of blue-green mountains rose like a heavenly wall. Though their peaks varied, they shared a rough alignment, forming a distinct ridgeline.

The lake’s banks were thick with reeds, which had just begun to plume. From within the lake came frequent birdsong, with each call different from the last.

It was a scene drenched in the essence of autumn. A scene that truly felt like a painting.

Even the little girl couldn't help but lower the last piece of sugarcane in her hand. She turned her head side to side, surveying the landscape with a solemn expression, and said to the Daoist, “Have we been here before?”

“We have... and we haven’t.”

“What do you mean, have and haven’t, oh! You mean that!”

“Lady Calicao, you remember.”

“I’m very clever!”

“Of course...”

This view before them was unmistakably familiar.

It was late afternoon, nearing dusk, that ambiguous hour when it was neither fully light nor fully dark. Wisps of cooking smoke were beginning to rise at the foot of the mountain. It was autumn once more, and some were burning crop stalks.

The burning created a continuous plume of blue-gray smoke.

In the deepening twilight, the smoke looked gray, sometimes tinged with blue. But it didn’t rise straight upward; instead, it was either pressed flat by the wind or failed to reach the mountaintop due to the distance between the village and the heights. So it hovered above the rooftops at the foot of the mountain, tugged and stretched by the evening breeze into a long ribbon, spreading out close to the ground like a thin veil draped over the village below.

The Daoist did not pause, instead he walked slowly onward.

“

Chirp! Chirp!

” There was a sudden burst of bird cries. Suddenly, a flock of gulls burst out from the reeds, startling Lady Calico.

She looked up, holding her sugarcane, watching the birds with narrowed eyes and thinking silently,

You're lucky. If the swallow wasn’t around, I would’ve salted you into jerky and kept you stored away.

“This place is the painting!”

“The painting is this place.”

“The painting is this place!”

“Lady Calico, did you notice? The village has changed.”

“I noticed.”

“Lady Calico, you’re truly clever, with an exceptional memory.”

“That’s right.”

“Since you’re so clever and remember everything so well, why don’t you think about it, take a guess. Do you think they grow sugarcane here?”

“...!”

The little girl’s expression tightened. She sensed this matter was not so simple.

The Daoist only smiled, brushing his hand over the reeds as he walked on.

The green mountains truly had not changed, nor had the lake. It was the Daoist’s first time arriving in Zhao Commandery County’s Xianning, yet it felt as if he had returned to a place he had long known.

1. Erkuai is a type of rice cake particular to the Yunnan Province of southwest China. The name literally means "ear piece," a reference to the shape of one of its common forms. It is often served stir-fried with vegetables, and málà (麻辣) sauce, which is a mixture of dried red chilis, Sichuan pepper, and salt. ☜

2. Rushan is a cow's milk cheese of Yunnan, China. Freshly made cows’ milk curds are pulled and stretched into thin sheets, wrapped around long bamboo sticks and hung up until yellow and leather dry. Rushan are served in a number of ways. One method uses a charcoal grill to warm and soften the milk fan. Traditionally the inside is spread with rose petal jam. Alternatively, the rushan is simply deep fried until golden and crisp. ☜