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The brocade carp did not know how to put on clothes, so he wrapped himself in
Jing Lin's clothes. A good part of the hem was dragged on the floor as he ran
bare-footed along the porch. A copper bell under the eaves swayed in the wind.
Between each chime of the bell, the brocade carp – with a headful of messy hair – skipped and jumped around.
The small stone figure chased after him and picked up the hem of the clothes
trailing behind on the floor. The brocade carp ran to the end of the porch. There
was a small pond with a hundred-year-old ginkgo tree planted beside it. He
crouched down and cupped the water up with his hands. It was so freezing he
shivered from the cold.
"Being a human, feels like this." The brocade carp mumbled to himself. After a
night, he could speak a lot more fluently.
The small stone figure kicked his buttocks. The brocade carp was caught
unaware and fell over into a kneeling position on the wooden plank. Instead of
being angry, he laughed and raised his palms to examine them over and over
again.
"Falling down, hurts this much!" He exclaimed.
He had learned to run only a short while ago. Before that, he always wanted to
lie on the ground and swish his tail around. He needed to get used to using his
hands, not fins. He sat down with his legs crossed and gathered up his shirt. His
white, chubby feet were red from the cold. Lowering his head, he buried it under
the shirt to observe his own body. Then he popped his head out and muttered
softly to the little stone figure.
"Do humans have other parts besides arms and legs? This is so strange."
The little stone figure could not speak, so it squeezed its head in beside the
brocade carp's and watched with him for a brief moment. Seeing the brocade
carp's confused face, it did not know how to explain to him either.
The brocade carp grabbed hold of the small stone figure, looked beneath it and
asked out of curiosity. "Why don't you have it?"
The little stone figure was embarrassed. It covered its head and kicked the
brocade carp. The brocade carp immediately bared his teeth and threatened, "If
you kick me again, I'll throw you away! You will never see Jing Lin again!"
The small stone figure took several steps back and turned to run indoors. The
brocade carp was afraid it would tell on him, so he hurriedly got up to chase
after it. His movement was light when he entered the door as Jing Lin was
resting. When they returned last night, Jing Lin had coughed for half the night
and only fell asleep when it was nearing dawn.
The brocade carp stepped onto a small table and climbed onto a chair before he
jumped onto the bed and kneel beside Jing Lin's pillow. Jing Lin's face was
paler than the night before. He looked like a person with a chronic illness, as if
being bedridden was the norm for him. His ink black hair was spread out over
the pillow mat. The brocade carp carefully scooped up a handful of his hair, but
they flowed through the gaps between his fingers. The brocade carp mustered up the courage to lean over to listen to Jing Lin's breathing. He extended a finger to touch Jing Lin's cheeks and neck. Astonished, he withdrew his finger. Then he stretched his finger out again to probe him.
He was warm.
Jing Lin was warm. And he felt smooth to the touch.
This differed entirely from what the brocade carp had known before. Did it mean
that even his sense of touch would become different when he turned human?
The brocade carp lay down beside Jing Lin. In this way, he sized Jing Lin up and
realized something different about him. He had never looked at Jing Lin from
this direction before. He never knew that Jing Lin's nose was this straight, Jing
Lin's lips were this thin, and Jing Lin's… Jing Lin was this beautiful, as if he
was some exquisite porcelain that would shatter with just a grasp.
The brocade carp pinched his own nose and touched his own cheeks. He
thought, I won't look better than Jing Lin in the future, because the world needs
only one of him. It'd be better for me to be more powerful and stronger than him.
As he was thinking about it, he felt a pain in his back. He looked back and saw
the small stone figure sitting at the edge looking at him unhappily. With a snort,
the brocade carp drew closer to Jing Lin and pushed the little stone figure away
with his foot. But the small stone figure held on to his calf, wanting to drag him
off the bed. Anxious, the brocade carp turned around to grab onto the front of
Jing Lin's shirt and wrapped his arms around Jing Lin's neck, refusing to let go.
The small stone figure stomped his foot in annoyance, but the brocade carp
ignored it. The brocade carp was so near to Jing Lin that he subconsciously
absorbed his spiritual energy. Jing Lin's spiritual energy now was near-depleted
and erratic. He gradually furrowed his brows, vaguely looking as if he could not
withstand his spiritual energy being absorbed. For some reason, the small stone
figure stopped moving and turned into two pieces of stones rolling around at one
side.
Jing Lin did not wake up for a long time. The brocade carp gulped down a
mouthful of saliva.
This was a good opportunity to devour Jing Lin.
Jing Lin's consciousness drifted atop an empty stone platform. He walked alone,
lost. The restoration of his broken body was slow, and lustrous light was
scattered all over, making it hard to form a human figure. His breathing grew
labored as if he was being strangled in the throat. His chest felt heavy, and the
feeling of being pinned down made him feel exhausted.
Even so, when the wind rose on the porch under the eaves, he opened his eyes
instantly. He saw a fluffy head pressed against his cheek. The brocade carp was
sleeping soundly while hugging him tightly.
Jing Lin looked at the roof and closed his eyes as he let out a breath of air. When
he reopened his eyes, he had regained his composure.
"What is it?" His voice has always been without emotion.
Someone knelt down on the porch and said softly, "My younger brother is willful and has distracted my Lord from your solitary cultivation [1] He deserved
to die for his sins. I'm here to apologize and beg for forgiveness. My Lord,
please punish him as you deem fit and do not hold back."
Jing Lin was silent for a moment before he remembered who was kneeling
outside the door.
"I'm not your lord." Jing Lin said.
The prostrate body of the person outside the door remained still. After a
moment, the person said, "I'm under the command of Lord Lin Song of the
Ninth Heaven. Everyone knows this. Even if Can Li Tree is now under the
control of the Demarcation Division, my heart remains like a rock, firm and unswerving."
Saying so, she raised her head, straightened up to face the door, and made
another bow.
"Don't call me lord." Jing Lin paused after each word, his hatred engulfing his
frostiness.
The maiden outside was quiet for a long time before she said in a low voice:
"…Jiu Ge." [2]
Jing Lin felt smothered, and his hands and feet grew cold. He raised a hand to
cover his eyes as his Adam's apple bobbed silently. His chest heaved up and
down unsteadily as he forced down the urge to choke on his blood.
Don't call me.
His eyes were submerged under the shadow of his hand as if he would never
struggle out of the darkness. This "Jiu Ge" was like a bramble of thorns, pricking
him until he was drenched all over in blood.
The maiden beyond the door took only a moment to calm her mind. Even when
her eyes were red, her voice remained stable. She raised a hand to haul her
younger brother up. Ah Yi was bound and had already changed back into his
original form. He thrashed around on the ground.
"Ah Yi has been pampered and spoiled by me at Can Li Tree, that's why he is now so arrogant and disobedient. Since he has done something wrong, he must
bear the consequences on his own. I'm handing him over to Jiu Ge. Whether he
lives or dies, I'll let Jiu Ge decide."
Having said so, she kowtowed again in obeisance and turned to go. On seeing
this, Ah Yi banged his head until it broke and stared at his Ah Jie, looking as if
he would cry. When his Ah Jie – Fu Li – was about to descend the stairs, she
stopped.
"I know Jiu Ge does not want to see me." Fu Li's eyelashes drooped as she
gazed into the night. "But I'm content to know that Jiu Ge is still alive. On the
day when the True Buddha raised his finger and the Ninth Heaven shook, I was overwhelmed with grief on hearing of Jiu Ge's death. No matter what the others
said, Jiu Ge is still Jiu Ge. Although I don't know the past feud between you and
father, I'm not willing to believe that you are such a bloodthirsty person. Jiu
Ge…"
"You're wrong." Jing Lin said. "Killing him was a long-cherished wish of mine.
It was not because of principles, or for righteousness. I wanted to kill him, so I
killed him. It has nothing to do with you. I am not your Jiu Ge. Lord Lin Song
died at the Ninth Heaven Terrace, and the person you see now is also but a dead
man. Take him away. Scram."
Ah Yi understood nothing about Lord Lin Song, nor did he know anything about
Jiu Ge. The only thing he heard was Jing Lin telling his Ah Jie to scram. This
made him burned with anger. When he was born, there was no longer any five colored bird left in Can Li Tree. Fu Li was his sister, and could even be
considered his mother. Although he was a jerk and a bully, he could not tolerate
anyone dissing his sister.
He instantly opened his mouth to rail at him, "Jing Lin! How dare you tell my
Ah Jie to 'scram'?! Who do you think you are?! You're just an invalid hiding in
the mountains. Who's afraid of you?! Just a mere sea serpent can make you
bedridden, so what kind of hero are you pretending to be now?! You are only…"
Fu Li turned around at once and hollered, "Shut up!"
The copper bell under the eaves on the porch rang abruptly as the sound of wind
whistling among ten thousand pines in the mountains rose and fell. A strong
wind rose from among the trees and sent Ah Yi tumbling down the porch towards the mountains.
Ah Yi was still tied up and could not break free. He could only stubbornly shout
into the air. "Just you wait!"
Fu Li still wanted to say something when the door of the inner chamber closed,
shutting out her voice. Not getting to say what she wanted to say, she could only
stand silently for half a night before she finally left.
Jing Lin waited for her to leave before he gave a muffled cough and spat out
blood. The small stone figure stuffed a handkerchief in his palm. Jing Lin
covered his mouth and wiped away the bloodstains before he asked, "Still not
awake?"
The brocade carp tentatively opened an eye and rubbed it as he pretended to be
roused from sleep. He sat up like a ball of soft dough, still clinging on to Jing
Lin's neck. Revealing his little white teeth, the brocade carp flashed Jing Lin an
adorable smile.
Jing Lin raised his eyebrows slightly and stared at the brocade carp with an
extremely oppressive aura. He said coldly, "To eat someone, you must be fast
and ruthless. You keep dallying. What are you hesitating for?"
His lips were stained with blood earlier, giving them a reddish tinge.
The brocade carp innocently withdrew his hand, looking scared. Jing Lin looked
up slightly, his chin almost touching the brocade carp's forehead. His eyes were
lifeless, as if he was just relating the life and death of someone else, not his own.
"If you miss the chance, you have to wait for a year, a hundred years, or even a
thousand years." What was cold was not his skin, but his soul. He drew closer to
the brocade carp, like an awakened mammoth beast arising from its sleep. This
was a deterrent far more overpowering and daunting than the baring of sharp
fangs.
The brocade carp was keenly aware that Jing Lin was not his usual self. He
wanted to shrink back. But Jing Lin grabbed him by the arm, planting him under
the shadow of the beast. The brocade carp found it getting harder to bear. This
was not pain, but the immense pressure of being towered over as he was being
scrutinized. The mounting pressure pushed against the vulnerable boundary of
his limits, and he trembled involuntarily.
"Jing… Jing Lin…" The brocade carp painfully called out Jing Lin's name. His
internal organs felt like they were being crushed by something heavy. Even his
breathing grew ragged.
Jing Lin looked at him for a moment and released his grip on him. The brocade
carp swung backward and rolled several times on the quilt, feeling as if he had
been granted amnesty. Silence descended upon the inner chamber. Inwardly, the
brocade carp was gnashing his teeth, but he still put on a pitiful expression on his
face. Teardrops tumbled from his eyes as he pressed down on the back of his
hand and sobbed softly.
Jing Lin turned his head and gazed at the snow against the backdrop of the night
sky. He sat for a long time looking on with little interest before he looked back
at the brocade carp.
"Come here."
The brocade carp was wary, but he still crawled back like a small animal. The
more compliant he looked on the surface, the more composed he was. Hiding in
the body of this child, he yearned to dissolve Jing Lin's guardedness of him. But
to his disappointment, Jing Lin seemed to see through him and paid it no mind.
The brocade carp crawled beside Jing Lin. Jing Lin raised his hand to stroke his
head but stopped midway and reached over to take a clean handkerchief from the
little stone figure instead. He wiped away the brocade carp's snots and tears.
Then he lay down again without saying a word more.
The next day, the sky was clear after an entire night of snow, and the sound of
clothes being laundered [3] broke through the morning. Jing Lin had obtained an
outfit for the brocade carp. The brocade carp pushed his head against the cuff of
a sleeve, but he could not get his head through no matter how hard he pushed.
The small stone figure grabbed the clothes, corrected it, and put it on for him. It
even wrapped a small velvet cloak around him. A pair of carps were
embroidered on his shoes, and the brocade carp could not help but keep touching
them when he was putting them on.
Then Jing Lin stood up and went down the stairs. As usual, he was flimsily
dressed. He stood at the foot of the steps and looked back. His eyes were cold
and empty.
The little stone figure led the brocade carp by the hand down the steps and
followed Jing Lin down the mountain. The mountain was enveloped by the
morning fog, and the mountain steps were wet and slippery. The little stone
figure fell several times. The brocade carp kept a straight face initially, but then
he started to run and frolic in the snow with the small stone figure until he had a
head full of snow from all the tumbling. Jing Lin never looked back once, his
eyes remained half-closed as if he was dreaming.
At the foot of the mountain, the brocade carp ran a few steps ahead. But when he
did not see the small stone figure, he turned his head back. He saw the little
stone figure sitting on Jing Lin's shoulder, waving its arm at him.
Before he could understand what it meant, he heard Jing Lin say:
"Leave."
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FOOTNOTES:
[1] solitary cultivation, or more literally translated as quiet cultivation. Unlike sects cultivation, it refers to the practice of silence as one cultivates his own morals and innermost being, letting things take their own courses. In Buddhism, it also refers to cultivation at home or self-cultivation.
[2] literally 'Ninth Brother'.
[3] the sound of laundering clothes by pounding them with a stick or rod.
People in those days wash clothes that way by the river or other water
sources.