The winter wind was cold. Mr. Chen always lit a stove for warmth. Back then, the Southern Garden held not only Mr. Chen but also a Taoist who often sat ditating. This Taoist was his disciple.
A red fox spent all day lying asleep by the stove, while Mr. Chen usually read books and rarely spoke.
“That year, you taught many things. But when late spring arrived the next year, you said you had to journey far away. And you were gone for over two years.”
“I thought you wouldn’t co back. But then, when sumr ca, you returned to the Taoist Temple with the young Yu Xuan.”
Chen Changsheng thought aloud, “Yu Xuan…”
Hu Yu said, “It was you who brought her to the Southern Garden and took her as your disciple.”
Hearing this, Chen Changsheng pondered and murmured softly, “So… it was the back then who found her…”
Hu Yu opened her mouth as if to say sothing, but after a mont’s thought, she changed her mind and continued.
“You often went out traveling, but you also ca back often, especially in the early spring to the Southern Garden, catching the best season. After returning to the Southern Garden, you seldom went outside again, staying until the next early spring.”
“In those days, I often lay by the table watching you. But your eyes were only on your books. You would read for days without knowing any rest…”
These past events seed especially ordinary, but for Hu Yu, they were the most peaceful days she had ever known.
Ti spent with Mr. Chen always made her feel at ease.
“Years pass unnoticed in the mountains. In the blink of an eye, Zhao Yuqing had mastered the Daoist Arts and then went down the mountain. Only Yu Xuan, you, and I remained on the mountain.”
“Yu Xuan was a foolish girl. Everything she tried to learn, she couldn’t grasp. Yet you were always patient, willing to spend ti teaching her. I had slightly better understanding, so you paid very little attention to . That made quite uncomfortable.”
Hu Yu smiled, rembering those tis.
“So I decided to pretend to be foolish too. I acted like I couldn’t do things, just to get to talk with you more.”
“Before we knew it, a sexagenary cycle had passed.”
“Yu Xuan had grown into a graceful woman, and I had also transford into human form. But then, one day, you suddenly found us and said you were going on another journey.”
“Both she and I thought it would be just like before, a trip lasting a couple of years. But you never returned to the Southern Garden again.”
It all sounded very peaceful, yet this very tranquility made Yu Xuan and Hu Yu rember it deeply for so long.
“Yu Xuan went down the mountain to search for you. And I waited at the Southern Garden. I waited another full sixty years. Seeing that Yu Xuan hadn’t returned, I finally headed down the mountain too.”
Hu Yu looked at Chen Changsheng and said, “I was luckier than Yu Xuan. Just one year after leaving the mountain, I found you at the Southern Sea Mountains.”
“But the you back then seed to have forgotten many things. All the past events were gone from your mory. You yourself… were like a blank page.”
Chen Changsheng paused at this. “A blank page?”
“Your Magical Power, your Cultivation… it was all gone. You were just like an ordinary mortal.”
Hu Yu said, “I only learned afterward that you beca that way because you tried practicing the Sutra of Rebirth.”
“Sutra of Rebirth…”
Chen Changsheng frowned in thought. Could his past mory loss be connected to this Sutra?
“I know what you want to ask,” Hu Yu said, eting his eyes. “But I must tell you the reason you don’t rember anything now is absolutely not because of practicing the Sutra of Rebirth.”
Chen Changsheng was taken aback. “Then why…?”
Hu Yu looked at him steadily. “The Sutra of Rebirth might be incomplete, but even if sothing went wrong, after rebirth, fragnts of past life mories should still return, triggered by people or events.”
“I brought you from the Southern Sea Mountains into the Mortal World. That year, I traveled the Mortal World by your side. Passing through each place, fragnts of your mory would resurface.”
“You, once a blank slate, were no longer as silent and withdrawn as before. That special favor… that partiality… now fell upon . But then, one day, you suddenly spoke the na ‘Yu Xuan.’ I panicked…”
“So I avoided everything and everyone connected to Yu Xuan. That way, you wouldn’t rember Yu Xuan. You wouldn’t rember the Southern Garden. You would only rember . Then I could stay by your side, and that special favor would belong to alone.”
Hu Yu’s voice suddenly dropped. She sighed. “But nothing in this world is absolute.”
“You still t her in the end.”
“One glance was all it took. You rembered everything.”
“Everything beca like yesterday’s vanished dream. Gone, never to return. You beca the silent, withdrawn Mr. Chen once more.”
“And even though you knew it was I who had been by your side during that lost year, even though you knew those mories, those shared monts… none of it changed how you viewed . In your eyes, I remained just… that little fox.”
Hu Yu gave a bitter laugh. “Only I was the self-deluded one.”
Chen Changsheng asked softly, “Did you never… ask?”
Hu Yu lifted her head. “I did. But the you back then, you didn’t answer. You avoided the question. I guessed the answer then, and I left the Southern Garden. I never went back after that.”
Her gaze held a deep, complex nostalgia. “Those years all seem so tranquil now. But honestly, in the beginning, I wasn’t even sure myself. Was what I felt admiration? Affection? You were as dull as wood! You only knew reading books and sitting silently. But whenever you left the garden, I couldn’t stop thinking of you.”
“Thoughts of you finding on that snowy night. Thoughts of the things you taught . Thoughts of how I used to lie beside the table, watching your face…”
“Every ti I closed my eyes, and every ti I opened them, it was only you.”
Hu Yu lowered her head. “It wasn’t until later, when I decided to hide the truth from everyone… that’s when I finally knew what lay in my heart.”
She raised her eyes to et Chen Changsheng’s. “That… is the unresolved bond between you and .”
Chen Changsheng stayed silent, absorbing everything Hu Yu had just revealed about the past.
It carried no intense passions he might have imagined. Instead, it felt almost muted. Yet, within that very quietude lay the foundation for what was to co.
Chen Changsheng lifted his gaze. “May I ask… what question did you pose back then?”
Hu Yu looked back at him. “I asked two things.”
“The first was only about love, or the lack of it. The second… was a demand to choose.”
“Choose one… between and Yu Xuan.”
Hu Yu stated quietly, “You chose neither nor Yu Xuan. And the first question… went unanswered too.”
“Had you chosen Yu Xuan then, perhaps I wouldn’t have clung so fiercely to the mory of those tis.”
She sighed softly, a whisper in the quiet. “Now, recalling that year wandering the Mortal World together… it seems like the moon reflected in water. Ultimately… just an empty reflection. Beautiful, untouchable, gone the mont you reach for it.”
Chen Changsheng’s thoughts were tangled. He remained silent for a long ti, uncertain what to say.
Hu Yu offered a sad, wan smile. “If you can’t say it, then don’t. I understand. The you of now… you aren’t him.”
Her voice dropped, heavy with an ancient sorrow. “I was just thinking…”
“How good it would have been… if I had died that day in the deep, deep snow.”
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