Volume One: The Modern World
He Couldn’t Quite See That Person’s Appearance; He Only Saw His Long Hair, Like a Black Banner, Moving With the Wind and Putting Any Onlooker Into a Trance
The moving bus passed several county seats and small towns, and the chaotic passengers had also gradually lessened.
After it passed the last small town, only two passengers remained – a youth wearing glasses who appeared very academic and a man who motionlessly fell asleep the moment he got on the bus at the back row.
The driver got off the bus to relieve himself. When he came back, he belted out in Mandarin to the vehicle’s remaining two people with a strong accent, “Hey, those who want to get off can here. I’ll be enterin’ the mountains up ahead, and it’ll take more than seven hours to get to the next station. After that station, there’ll be nowhere else to get off to.”
The youth was sitting by the entrance, his hands clutching onto a big dusty suitcase. He appeared slightly uncomfortable, looking as if he wanted to get off, yet also as if he was somewhat hesitant about it. His overcautiousness made it seem as if he was currently standing at a crossroads in his life.
After a while, he softly asked the driver, “Shifu1, isn’t it inconvenient for the people living in the mountains to come out?”
The driver responded loudly, “We’re not going to the countryside, just the county seat. Of course it’s easier for those living in the county seats. There’s a mountain over there – have ye heard that there are a lot of caves there…?”
The youth shook his head absently.
The driver scratched his bird-nest hair. “Ai, I can’t remember what it’s called. Anyways, it’s a tourist attraction – people from the city would drive there for fun. Lots of people, actually.”
The youth asked tremblingly, “Then… Then what about the village?”
“Aiyo, you don’t know how many countrysides are under a county seat and how many villages are under the countryside. It’s the same as sheep dung – they’re everywhere. There are usually no buses from the villages to the county seats; people would drive their own donkey carts or climb the mountain. If they can’t climb well and their feet slip – ka-bang! – they’ll fall to their deaths.”
After the youth heard the brutal ‘ka-bang’, his face suddenly turned ghostly pale.
The driver was worthy of being the driver of Mount Pan’s winding road; to him, no words were taboo. “Not to mention walkin’; if we were to walk to the county seat from here and encounter even the slightest drizzle of rain, a stone would fall from the mountain and – ka-bang! – we’ll all die together. That’s why there’s some mud over there and nobody would sweep it even if the road becomes slippery. If we’re not careful enough and the head of the vehicle rushes off the cliff – ka-bang! – we’d die together again.”
The driver could be considered an eloquent and fluent speaker; with just a few words, the youth who’d died and came back to life three times finally broke. He carried his big suitcase, got off the bus while pissing his pants in fear, and ran away.
The driver was pleased with himself. “That pretty boy from the city, runnin’ away faster than a brat. Hey, the fellow sitting in the back row, ye must be here for the county seat, right? If yer not getting off, then I’m gonna continue driving!”
The man in the back row said nothing, seeming to have died in his sleep.
He was wearing a dark trench coat, its collar lifted up high enough to almost cover his entire face, making the driver unable to make out what he looked like. He had a tall stature and one hand exposed with a platinum ring on the middle finger; his fingers were slender but also very fair, so no matter how he appeared, with this kind of dressing style, he looked nothing like those mountain people.
Don’t just look at how the driver was a slippery old fellow who’d regularly travel long distances; he’d actually encountered independent or grouped young male hitchhikers. The journey was long and there weren’t any other passengers, so he couldn’t help but feel nervous.
The driver started the vehicle hesitantly, still trying to converse with the person in the back row. “Are ye visiting relatives?”
No answer.
The driver turned his head with embarrassment, not daring to talk anymore, and silently followed the established route to drive the bus away.
During the several-hours-long drive on Mount Pan, from dawn to dusk, the passenger in the back row never got up once nor did he request for the bus to stop so he could get down and relieve himself.
There were a few sections in between their journey where the roads were in poor condition and were extremely bumpy; the passenger would bounce and hit his head on the window with a ‘dong’ before his seatbelt strapped him back into his seat. He groaned, but the noise coming from the bus in motion was too loud for the driver to hear.
It wasn’t until twilight darkened that the bus finally arrived at its destination.
The old driver was just as exhausted as the vehicle; he parked it in the parking lot and turned off the engines before he daringly walked to the back row to call out that strange, motionless passenger.
The driver tentatively patted his shoulder. “Young fella? Young fella, we’ve arrived at the station… Yer sleeping is much too death-like.”
The man didn’t respond at first; he was pushed several more times before the hand hanging on one side fluttered with a twitch.
“Wake up, we’ve arrived at the station,” the old driver yelled in his ears. “Come down now, yer makin’ me go hungry to death.”
The passenger in the back row struggled to sit upright and unfastened his seatbelt with difficulty. He slightly moved a little and looked around him, a sudden look of confusion appearing in his eyes as if he didn’t know exactly what tonight was2 – as if he’d slept himself stupid.
After a moment, the passenger took off the glasses from the bridge of his nose and lowered his head to wipe it using the corner of his clothes; his eyes had also finally become clearer. The hand he used to hold onto the back of the seat in front of him exposed his bony physique. As if exhausting his entire body’s strength, he stood up with difficulty; at the same time, he suppressed his breathing as much as possible, trying to make it seem as light as possible.
“Yer hands and feet must be numb from sleeping so long, right?” Now that the old driver could clearly see the other’s appearance, he felt that this person was quite good-looking and somewhat refined – unlike a bad person – so he put down his worries and shouted whilst checking the luggage racks, “Hey, where’s yer luggage? Is it below? Or did someone accidentally take it?”
The passenger hoarsely spoke up. “Didn’t bring- Cough… Luggage.”
His voice seemed to break after he spoke the first two words, so he had to clear his throat before continuing.
The old driver asked in surprise, “Why didn’t ye bring it? Travellin’ so far alone, why didn’t ye bring yer luggage?”
The passenger was silent for a while before replying in a very weak voice. “I’ll not hide it from you then. I’ve been cultivating for a whole 250 years and have come out specifically to complete heaven’s trials. If I don’t become an immortal, then I’ll become a ghost, which is why I didn’t bring any luggage.”
The old driver: “…”
The driver knew that the other was joking around, but after the passenger finished speaking and smiled at him with a turn of his head, he saw the young fellow’s pale complexion, his haggard cheeks, and the light reflected from his lenses – everything about him appeared ghostly. In addition to his slowly-spreading smile, a dense ghostly aura suddenly surrounded them, causing goosebumps to immediately rise all over the driver’s body; he even almost believed in the other’s nonsense.
The crude manner of speaking he used to frighten the young man during the day suddenly vanished and he asked carefully, “Then how do you see us?”
The passenger turned his body and passed the old driver, using a low and wispy tone to reply. “An enchanting scenery… En, kind of fragrant.”
The old driver keenly smelt something bloody from him; this time, his complexion really changed, and he even began stammering. “G-g-great Immortal, w-what’s fragrant?"
The passenger turned his head back around; the driver was afraid he would say ‘it’s been five hundred years since I’ve last eaten such fragrant human flesh’ or something. He was scared to the point his thighs were trembling, prepared to run away.
But the passenger just glanced at him and gently smiled; he slightly lowered his head and tucked his chin into the collar of his trench coat.
“Perhaps the osmanthus’ have begun blooming,” he said.
The passenger was Chu Huan; unfortunately, his brain committed a moment of brain-deadness whilst he was hanging from the tree, so he somehow let go. Just like that, he took the first step as the to-be-peerless-master protagonist of a wuxia3 novel – the glory of falling off a cliff.
Chu Huan rolled off the cliff, his entire body bruised and even his ankle dislocated.
Fortunately, like all standard swordsmen, his skin was hard, his blood thick, and his body resistant to beatings. He didn't die.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a prophet named Gongyang waiting to pass his life skills over to him under the mountain – just a group of actual frightened rams4 bellowing with baa’s as they gallowed away. One of them even trampled mercilessly on his wounds with its iron hooves.
Chu Huan didn’t know how long he’d been lying there before he regained a little bit of his strength and miserably suspended his ankle joints to hastily treat his injury.
Chu Huan had absolutely no idea how he was going to explain this to others in the future – did he fall or did he jump down himself?
He compared the two over and over, pondering over which was more shameful than the other, and felt that in his dark history, this was the thickest and heaviest moment of them all; Chu Huan decided to bring this secret to his grave, so he didn’t rush to contact Old Wang and the others.
After he regained his mobility, the first thing Chu Huan did was raise his hand and slap himself – what the hell? You betrayed your own words.
Under the stimulation of pain, his will to survive and his mental state finally wobbled back to normal.
He found a plank to fix his legs and dragged his pierced shoulder to refresh himself with a cigarette; following the delightfully-contrasting sheep dung gathered in groups of two or three, he walked several kilometres of mountain roads before finally finding a place with people.
Chu Huan made up some nonsense about accidentally overturning his car and successfully gained the sympathy and trust of the local farmers; he borrowed a room for a night, washed his ashen face, took out a small first aid kit he conveniently carried with him to treat each of his injuries and recuperated a little before he asked the locals about the mode of transportation around here. He took a ride on an ox cart and travelled several miles on the road, passing several villages, until he finally sat on this bus that could take him to the nearest county seat.
Chu Huan had intended to get off at the first county seat they would’ve arrived at so he could find a place to stay for a while – a place where he could settle down for a bit. He wanted to pretend he’d experienced a fierce battle, yet still appear at ease.
Chu Huan finally had to admit that the moment he lost control on the cliff must’ve been caused by something outside of his control.
During these three years of retirement, Chu Huan lived like he was serving a sentence. He practically had no close friends – the only contacts he had only included Old Wang and Chu Aiguo and his three nurses – and he hadn’t seen any living things or spoken to anyone for a very long time. Perhaps only the cat that lived with him could somewhat be considered a companion.
But Chu Huan could tell that the cat wasn’t affectionate with him; it was even a little scared of him.
Chu Huan couldn’t understand what was so scary about him; although he didn’t make a hobby of sitting down with the cat and conversing about life philosophies with it, he never abused it either. What the original owner fed, he fed; when it first arrived at his home and felt upset in the unfamiliar environment, causing it to run around the house smashing things for a while, Chu Huan would only silently clean up after it, never scolding it. He thought that since this fellow was already an old cat that would only continue getting older, he should give it some dignity.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough; in any case, he’d never seen anyone taking care of a pet differently from taking care of a roommate.
My cat died. Before it died, it acknowledged me. On the bumpy bus ride, Chu Huan suddenly thought of this. He was like a slow-witted person; many days had passed already, yet he only just realised what happened with the small corpse he’d buried.
The loss of blood made his entire body feel chilly; in his inexplicable depression, Chu Huan leaned on the air-leaking bus that had air leaking everywhere and fell asleep.
During the bumpy sections, Chu Huan’s wounds would reopen. He didn’t expect to groggily stay asleep until they reached the terminal station deep within the mountains – he didn’t even know how many stops they took.
He got off the bus feeling heavy-headed yet light-footed; the early Autumn wind blowing through the mountains made him shiver. He looked around, only to see that this so-called ‘station’ was actually just a large open space. There was a street sign standing upright beside him, its text no longer visible, and several vehicles parked around that appeared to be tourist buses.
It was said that a landscape scenic spot was around here, neither large nor small, so although there were underperformances in development progress and the transportation was inconvenient due to necessary bus changes, this poor and remote lil' county seat actually had a large population flow going in and out, having its very own liveliness.
Chu Huan was quite open-minded; right now, county seats were all the same to him – since he passed the stops, then let them pass.
He looked up, only to find a building next to the station with the sign ‘Guest House’ hung on it. It seemed to be the highest star accommodation in this area, the words were even wrapped with retro-like neon lights; however, half of them were broken, so from a distance, only the words 'Zhao Si’5 remained, making it appear like a place where one could enjoy incense.
Chu Huan pursed his dry lips and walked toward the guest house. He felt an urgent need for a glass of lightly salted water.
Suddenly, he heard someone shout out to him, stopping him.
At this time, Chu Huan’s eyes were already becoming blurry. He tilted his head to see two men standing beside the street sign, both of them quite tall.
The fellow that called out to him was in his forties, a cardboard sign in his hands, his eyes as big as a cow’s, and his weedy hair twisted into a long braid that hung down his chest; if Chu Huan was to ignore the beard, hair, and Li Kui-like6 face, just the way the man dressed reminded him of these lyrics – in the village lived a maiden called Xiao Fang, both beautiful and kind-hearted with a pair of big and attractive eyes, her braids both thick and long7
However, this fellow’s expression was very sullen and his eyes didn’t look very friendly either. He looked as if Xiao Fang changed her career to robbery.
The other person looked very young and was standing slightly further away. Since Chu Huan’s vision wasn’t very clear, he couldn’t quite see that person’s appearance; he only saw his long hair, like a black banner, moving with the wind and putting any onlooker in a trance.
The two people were both standing by the edge of the platform, appearing to be there to pick someone up, but it was very late already so the station had very few people. Only one bus came into the station just then and Chu Huan was its only passenger.
‘Brother Xiao Fang’ was the first to walk towards him. He was big and tall, his face as big as a basin; his appearance was like a recipe from a homestay townhouse.
He didn’t know which mountainous ravine this person came from, but his Mandarin was practically like an alien’s – if he was a neighbour of Earth's, even if his words weren’t understandable there were body languages he could use that’d still be understandable at an international level, but even though this person jabbered out a whole load of things, Chu Huan could only understand the stare that had been directed at him from the very beginning.
The meaning of that stare most likely was, fuck, you made Lao-zi wait so long for you – why didn’t you just die halfway?
Two people stood, one with big eyes and the other with small eyes, in a dilemma of not being able to communicate.
Suddenly, ‘Brother Xiao Fang’ seemed to remember something and stuffed the cardboard into Chu Huan’s hands, sternly staring at him like a debt collector and using his knuckles to knock on the text.
Chu Huan vigorously blinked his tired eyes and only managed to feel how the words recognised him, but he couldn’t recognise the words.
He knew he was an arrow at the end of its flight and it wouldn’t be good for him to continue entangling himself with this minority brother, hence he strugglingly squeezed out a slightly unpleasant smile and pointed at the cardboard before pointing to himself, waving his hands and shaking his head – you got the wrong person.
‘Xiao Fang’ was taken aback; seeing how the other ignored him and continued walking forward, he was about to raise his hand and pat his shoulders before his pupils suddenly shrunk.
Who knew which occupation this minority brother came out from, but his night vision was very good; in such a pitch-dark area, he could actually accurately figure out that the inconspicuous stain on Chu Huan’s dark trench coat was a large bloodstain. He whispered something to the companion behind him.
At this moment, Chu Huan’s feet suddenly staggered; he finally couldn’t handle it anymore and fell head-first.
In the haze, there seemed to be something supporting him; in his last few moments of consciousness, Chu Huan caught a glimpse of someone's long hair.
In the night came a distant and vague scent of sweet osmanthus.
Translator's Notes
- Although ‘Shifu’ commonly refers to teachers/masters, it can be used for qualified workers of an occupation, including bus drivers
- Didn’t know exactly what tonight was – ‘今夕何夕’, a line from a poem called ‘绸缪’ (‘chou mou’) (lit. translation ‘to be sentimentally attached to’). This line was used to express one’s psychological state of not remembering the day due to momentary surprise
- a fictional Chinese genre focused on the adventures of martial artists in Ancient China
- ‘Gongyang’ (公羊) can also refer to 'ram'
- one of the ways ‘guesthouse’ is written in Chinese is ‘招待所’. Because of the broken lights, it looks like this: ‘召寺’ (Zhao Si) which is the name of a temple.
- a character from ‘Water Margin’. The character is depicted as being very ferocious-looking.
- these lyrics are from a song called ‘村里有个姑娘叫小芳‘ (There is a Maiden Called Xiao Fang in this Village'.