Chapter Text
Repetition on the road was not quite monotony, but rather a form of meditation. The scenery unfolded like a roll of patterned cloth, lending him a strange sense of familiarity. Each grove of trees looked so much like the last, that he began to believe he’d seen it all before. This left Binghe in a state of both recognizing his surroundings and being utterly lost.
At the mountain’s waist, the trees grew in dense clusters and the moss was soft underfoot. Sometimes they would travel half a day without seeing their own shadows. It was their stomachs, not the sun, which told the time. Before they ever reached the top, they seemed to be descending again. Shen-daozhang told him that it was because of an optical illusion. The dense cover obscured the horizon so that his feet told him he was descending, while his eyes believed the exact opposite was true.
Because they followed the river, they had no trouble accessing fresh water. The fact there had been actual bodies in this body of water didn’t bother Shen-daozhang, so Binghe tried not to think about it either. In any case, he didn’t have the ability to identify which section was corpse water and which was not corpse water, so ruminating over it would only be tormenting himself.
Oddly enough, the snow they were warned about never appeared, and neither were those promised villages. The weather only grew milder. He had at first assumed it was Shen-daozhang’s talismans doing the work, but they hadn’t used any since a few days ago when he counted.
The sound of birds was in his ears. Even in the darkness, he never felt alone. Binghe felt his way to the waterfront, where the surface reflected the light in rippling scales. He stopped to refill the water bag with what he hoped was fresh water from a section of clean moss. Ropes of light looped around his wrists as his hands slipped beneath the surface and released him when they reemerged.
He hung it back on his waist when he was done. As he stood and turned, he saw a peek of cloth from behind a tree. The corner of the cloth was white, much like the pale robes Shen-daozhang liked to wear. The undergrowth was overcome with moss and bracken. Binghe felt himself slipping down the muddy fern as he approached, all while he gazed upwards at the shrouded figure.
Binghe walked as he spoke. “Daozhang, did I take too long?”
He came to a hard stop. The figure was indeed dressed in Shen-daozhang’s clothes while the face was anything but. Once, in a lick of lightning and the crash of thunder, Binghe had been tossed to the ground, where he rolled a distance. He’d seen Qiu Jianluo dressed in fine brocade, but this face most resembled the ravaged visage that appeared amidst smoke and fire. Like the deafening silence that descended upon him the moment he fell into his dream, Binghe blinked and the sight before him disappeared.
“Back in Qiu Manor, the spider spirit made a puppet of you.”
On his way back, Binghe had settled on this innocuous start to the conversation.
Their blankets and supplies still lay around the small cave in which Shen Yuan rested. Binghe hadn’t had the chance to pack them before collecting water, but there was a clear system of organization. The cooking tools were kept separate from the cleaning implements. Washed clothes had been hung to dry near the fire. Readying them for travel wouldn’t take long.
Shen Yuan slowly opened his eyes from his meditation. He glanced at the water bag in Binghe’s hands. Binghe read his intent and poured the water into the cap, which served as a cup.
Once Shen Yuan began to drink, Binghe resumed testing the waters. “This puppet…Is it possible to control one from a great distance?”
Shen Yuan’s movements were leisurely, even as Binghe waited for his answer. He was lighting up a heating talisman for the water, to which he added dried jasmine leaves from a pouch in his sleeve. Every mannerism perfectly recalled that of a sage master. His hair was in a simple bun with the rest flowing down his back. The neatness of it was proof that Shen-daozhang hadn’t laid down for even a moment during the night. Despite this, his skin was dewy, fresh, and luminous. Binghe was quite convinced that Shen-daozhang was his own light source. Not even a shadow existed under his eyes. This was the difference between mortals and immortals. Shen Yuan lifted his eyes. Binghe averted his gaze.
“What you just described is either demonic magic or possession. There are plenty of ways to do something like this. A demon or demonic cultivator could insert a bit of lingqi into the core meridians of a living being or use xuan thread to influence the limbs. This is a bit clumsy and can easily be seen through. In terms of possession, a blood cultivator or ghost is harder to detect, but more easily expelled without maiming the subject.”
Binghe picked at the pink scab on the palm of his hand. Three crescent shapes were faintly outlined in white. Because they were healing, the marks he’d once inflicted on himself itched. “What about if the creator has already been exorcized?”
“Only a Mahayana stage entity might accomplish something like that. Each soul has three hun and seven po. The heavenly soul wants to return to heaven, the human soul wants to return to the body, and the earth soul wants to return to the underworld. Trapping a spirit in an unfamiliar vessel requires a heaven-defying will.”
Binghe leaned closer in concentration. Spiritual comprehension was the least of his talents, if they could be called that.
“Those existences are akin to earth deities. There might not even be one or two in this world. It’s not something you need to worry about.” Shen Yuan finished unceremoniously. He saw the fall in expression on Binghe’s face and found it funny. Then he poked Binghe’s forehead with the guard of his fan. “If we ever face a Mahayana cultivator, neither you nor I will be able to survive. In that case, what’s there to worry about?”
Shen-daozhang had quite a relaxed attitude towards many things. There was nothing wrong with his reasoning. In fact, it was unusually persuasive. Trapping a lingering soul in a dream array was enough to exhaust a powerful dream yao. The natural course of a human life was to live, grow old, and then die. Even the intermediate stage was not guaranteed. What awaited that soul in the end was reincarnation or destruction. Every living creature abided by this law, and so it was an instinctive understanding that defying reincarnation was a violation of nature. Escaping that cycle was the feat only accomplished by a deity.
Shen Yuan tilted his head to peer at Binghe. “Why did you suddenly ask about this?”
“No special reason. I was just curious.” Binghe touched his forehead, before casting his gaze aside from the palm hovering above his eyes. Those three white marks on the inside of his palm burned. He didn’t know when the nail wounds had opened again. “Daozhang, do you particularly hate unclean things?”
“Why do you think so?” After wetting his throat with tea, Shen Yuan’s slightly hoarse voice smoothed out.
“You come across dirty things everyday.”
“Yao, mo, gui, guai all act on their base instincts. Killing is their truest expression of self. This is a truth that cannot be changed. There’s no need to measure their acts with common standards of morality. They cause harm to humans and thus must be eliminated. This is all you need to remember. They wish to kill us. We wish to eliminate them. This is nature, not hatred.”
“Then what if an existence is not evil by nature, but chooses to commit evil. Will Daozhang hate them then?”
Shen Yuan’s response was to fish around in his sleeve and stick the first talisman he found on Binghe’s forehead. He didn’t even bother to pause and note the sigil on it before pasting it on him. Binghe caught it when it fluttered down a moment later and turned it over in his hand, doing what Shen-daozhang neglected to do.
While Binghe was studying it, Shen Yuan calmly noted. “This talisman is for cleansing evil spirits. It will expel all the evil energy around you.”
Binghe pouted while pocketing the item. His tone was filled with complaints. “This is a talisman that can reduce humidity in the air and clear fog. You taught Binghe this yourself a few days ago.”
Shen Yuan slapped his knee with his fan. His dark eyes were shining. “Binghe has learned a lot!”
“Daozhang is making fun of Binghe again.”
Shen Yuan laughed heartlessly, not hiding the fact that he was making fun or that he was having plenty of it. He wasn’t at all afraid of being found out. He even clapped his hands. “Then are you still scared?”
Binghe waited for Shen Yuan to stop laughing before dryly saying, “I think Daozhang is the scariest.”
Shen Yuan’s capacity to entertain himself was something to be admired and envied. His sense of humor was scary, because it defied common tastes. The scariest thing about him though, was probably how captivating he was when he laughed.
But Shen-daozhang was right. Binghe didn’t seem to be as afraid anymore. When Binghe closed his eyes, he could sometimes see fine black hairs crawl along the thin white skin above a person’s throat. He could see the blooming rose, soft as smoke, emerge from a black mouth. He also saw the crumpled puppet swaying quietly, a piece of prey caught in a larger web.
His dreams the following night were less discernible. Amidst the chaos of fire and ash, he thought he saw Shen-daozhang’s face. Binghe saw Shen-daozhang in his dreams, and he saw him when he woke up. There was nothing as comforting as this.
While the more spiritual aspects of Dao eluded him, Binghe was quickly taking to the practical spells, talismans, and arrays Shen Yuan shared. Shen Yuan was haphazard with his teachings. One morning, he would impart a tracing spell for locating demonic energy. Four days later, he would abruptly share the knotting technique for a protection amulet used for pregnant women. He might also teach Binghe six different arrays along with each of their twelve different variations and the most appropriate situations to use them in within a single day.
Shen-daozhang was willing to interrupt his lessons for whatever Binghe asked. But since he did not know what was possible, he did not know what to ask for. For the most part, he was at the mercy of whatever popped into Shen Yuan’s mind at any given time. Binghe discovered his methodology when they once encountered a fruit tree, and Shen Yuan spent the following day reciting various immortal fruits and their effects. Binghe performed best when there was some level of organization to grapple with, but he did his best to keep up.
When Binghe wasn’t scrambling to memorize these things, it became a pasttime for him to guess which object in their surroundings would catch Shen-daozhang’s eye and where his mind would take them. He wasn’t very proficient in the latter half, but he trained his ears for the little hum Shen Yuan made when something grasped his attention.
Shen-daozhang had enough trust in him that it was Binghe who set up the protection wards each night and took them down in the morning. The ones he used were simple implements consisting of chimes on a rope. The chimes would scare off ghosts, while the talismans on the rope would ward off malevolent spirits. Binghe still couldn’t differentiate a passing ghost from idle wind. Shen Yuan did not tell him how to either. Perhaps they were all just the wind. Perhaps every last noise was a hungry ghost.
Binghe was in the middle of winding up the loose end of the rope when he nearly stepped on a dead crow. Its eyes were white. The feathers had been plucked from its bald body. He swallowed and reversed his steps. When the back of his heels touched a large tree, he held up the rope to where he previously tied it.
This crow had been inside the protection ward.
There were no errors in Binghe’s work. It wasn’t possible. There was something else at play.
A patchwork of shadows swayed at his feet. The shadow of these elongated leaves were indistinct. With his back against the tree trunk, he turned his head up. Feathered black wings formed a halo around a white mask of bleached-white beaks. Dead crows had been strung from the boughs of this tree. None of this was present when he set the protection wards the previous night. Binghe wound up the remainder of the rope before returning to camp.
“Daozhang, there’s something you should see.”
Shen Yuan finished drinking his tea, then snuffed the heating talisman he’d used for it. He nodded at Binghe.
Binghe breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing the effigy unchanged from where he left it. It was the same now as what he’d seen earlier. Shen-daozhang could see it too. “This was inside the wards I set. What is it?”
Shen Yuan did not touch the mask. “I’ve never seen this before. Keep your guard up.”
They followed the river all the way to this point. Past cleaning up the Luo Tou Shi, a scavenger in the world of spirits, there were no hints of what they were chasing. What Binghe felt was anticipation, not apprehension.
Shen Yuan reached towards Binghe. “The rope.”
Binghe watched curiously as Shen Yuan first tied one end around Binghe’s wrist, before looping the other end around his own.
“If we encounter another confusion array, we won’t get separated,” Shen Yuan offered as explanation.
Shen-daozhang stepped around the effigy and its litter of dead crows without much reaction. The string tied to his wrist pulled taut much sooner than expected, limiting his movements. Although he fiddled with the string, he ultimately didn’t spare any slack.
“Do you have the red coral I gave you? How many talismans are you carrying?”
“Thirty-two.”
Not only did Binghe have the red coral, but he also had the talismans, the coin purse, the supplies, the water bag, and the peach wood daggers. Shen-daozhang had forgotten all about this. The other could be forgetful at times. Binghe was not surprised that he would be tricked into overpaying for a servant’s indenture. He smiled secretly to himself as he reversed his grip on the rope.
“Why did you make so many?” Shen Yuan blinked in confusion. No sooner did he ask than the question resolve on its own. “Never mind, it’s good that you have them.”
His plan was to sell the extras for coin. He didn’t explain because there was no need for Shen-daozhang to worry about their finances. These were all things Binghe would take care of. It was a personal failure if Shen-daozhang ever had to ask about matters of housing or food. In his eyes, he still hadn't made enough. Charlatans were plentiful. At the very least, Binghe’s sloppy talismans would have real use, even if they were not worth the ten coppers he planned on charging for them. Binghe’s debt was more than a bag of silver. It was a lifetime.
With the fog shrouding his senses and moss dampening the noise, the silence was palpable. Even the bird calls were gone. A person would always tune into the senses that were present when some were removed. Every so often, the rope at his wrist would pull. That was how Binghe knew Shen Yuan was still there through the fog.
“The chimes aren’t making any sound.” Binghe shook his wrist and heard nothing in return.
“There are no ghosts here.”
Binghe felt the muggy air clinging to his cheeks and a wet breeze streaming past his ears. He maneuvered around the dense tree roots. They tensed like veins above the ground. “What about the wind?”
“I said that because I thought you would be scared. These chimes only ring when a ghost is nearby.”
If that were true, that would mean every noise Binghe heard at night was indeed a passing ghost. His footsteps stalled. He probed his memory. This abandoned wilderness actually had one, two, three dozen, over a hundred…not just that, but more ghosts? This place was a mass grave.
“Daozhang doesn’t think I’ll be scared now?”
“Scared of what? I’m still here,” Shen Yuan said thoughtlessly.
That’s right. Shen-daozhang was still the scariest. There was nothing more frightening than his careless kindness. At that moment, he wanted the world to know the person he admired. He also wanted to hide him from the world.
Binghe swallowed the lump in his throat. “How many of them are malevolent?”
“You asked the wrong question. Every ghost is malevolent. The dead are pure yin. To remain here, it must consume the energy of the living. It’s only a matter of time.”
He suddenly felt a hand touching him where there was neither sight, nor sensation before. His skin prickled with sensitivity. Blood flooded his cheeks. It was Shen-daozhang reaching into Binghe's collars without an ounce of awareness, because he didn’t know the thoughts Binghe was harboring. This was an innocence Binghe renounced the moment his desires came to light. It was also this exact quality of Shen-daozhang’s that made it impossible for Binghe to relax around outsiders. He held himself in panic. He died and came back to life.
Shen Yuan hummed softly when he found his target—the fog-clearing talisman. A moment later, Shen Yuan’s face appeared in his sight. A beautiful grove of golden trees emerged behind him as the hazy edges sharpened into discernibility. The lavish foliage was layered in minute variations of yellow flirting with amber, abundant enough to block out the sky. So too was the forest floor paved in a chorus of glittering gold. No curl of decay touched these fallen leaves, and they were preserved at the peak of beauty. There was only the impression of sunlight with none of its harshness. Soft light painted the clearing. Only the good remained.
A soft breeze danced around them, strong enough to stir his heart but not the leaves. The wind recalled xun music as it traveled through the white ornaments decorating every visible bough—a hundred bone ocarinas formed from the clean sockets and pristine nares in each bird skull. They gleamed as brightly as mutton fat jade.
“Are we at a peak or a valley?”
They descended while looking upwards at the sky. They ascended while glancing at the forest floor. Now they were suspended inside the world’s egg. This must be a fairy valley.
The rope between them suddenly restricted around their wrists. The attached chimes were violently pulled every which way. Their screams cleaved into the gentle melody within the grove with discordant notes. The noise assaulted his ears. But just above the din, he could still make out the sound of metal.
Shen-daozhang forgot they were still attached, and tripped Binghe when he abruptly pulled in one direction without telegraphing his intent. Shen Yuan managed to catch him before he could drag them both down.
As it turned out, the noise came from an older man wildly waving a saber about in a clearing much like the one they just departed. He was at the prime of his life, when strength and acuity should have been at its peak. His uncoordinated motions and anxious behavior testified otherwise.
The man’s patchwork robes were loosely draped about himself, in a manner Binghe’s mother would’ve scolded him for. The original clothing was made from a rich brocade fabric that was dangerously close to imperial yellow, but had been poorly repaired so many times that the real risk he was taking was one of common decency. With his saber in one hand, he chopped at the tree branches and with the other, he performed a shamanistic dance with an uncapped hulu gourd. The enemy that inspired his frenzy was nowhere to be seen. Binghe coughed and thought that they should avoid crazy people. It was impossible to predict what they would do next.
Somehow, in the midst of his hysteria, the man spied their approach. Shooting them sidelong glance and in a tone full of impatience, he scolded, “Well don’t just stand there, help!”
Shen Yuan leisurely loosened the rope from his wrist. “Binghe, you go.”
He hesitated.
“What’s wrong? You’re not confident?”
This was one of the rare times when the thoughts in Shen-daozhang’s mind were easy to interpret. He could read a combination of arrogance and boredom. After all, Binghe was a student Shen-daozhang taught himself. How could he not be confident?
However, it wasn’t that Binghe wasn’t confident. He would never challenge one of Shen-daozhang’s orders but, “There’s nothing there…”
Shen Yuan stopped massaging his wrist and glanced up. “I know. Doing about half or three-fourths of it should be enough.”
“Oh!” At last, Binghe understood.
He smoothly wrapped the loose end of the rope around his left fist while withdrawing three peach wood daggers from the qiankun pouch. Even though it was just going through the motions for show, he executed the maneuvers for a low-level sealing array perfectly.
When the last dagger was in place, the man who was fighting air heaved a sigh of exertion in Binghe’s direction. The man opened his eyes wide and said all in a single exhale, “That was a fierce battle with the deep and profound. It must have been shocking to witness. It was your blessing that you encountered a Taoist master like me haha haha ha—ack, uggh, gug…”
Then he choked and his laugh became a coughing fit.
Binghe bit his lip and breathed backwards, nearing choking on an air bubble lodged in his throat. Soon after, he was forced to witness Shen-daozhang clasp his hands in a respectful greeting and humbly say, “It is our honor meeting you.”
It wasn’t that Shen-daozhang did not know how to perform social niceties, but rather that he had esoteric parameters for exercising them. Binghe reluctantly followed his lead.
The man rudely did not immediately return the gesture. He waved his arm dramatically in a yin-yang shape, drawing his hulu gourd in a wide arc and striking each star in an imaginary big dipper constellation. From the Star Gate to the Celestial Scales, not one position was correct.
After a lengthy period of time, Binghe cautiously raised his head. Shen Yuan was still patiently performing his greeting bow. Not a hint of emotion was on his face. Slowly, Binghe lowered his head again.
The man finished his rampage off with a loose interpretation of Bagua, before finally miming some performance of trapping an entity within his gourd. He was thoroughly spent when the act concluded.
The man in faded yellow dusted himself off and swaggered arrogantly. “Let us proceed.”
Shen Yuan delicately patted the front of his robes. Why? Because all of the latent dust, grime, and soot shaken loose by this new stranger had flown off and landed right on the Shen-daozhang standing in front of him. When Shen Yuan was done, Binghe discretely shook out his lower hems. Why? Because the loose dirt lifted from Shen Yuan’s robes settled on the Binghe standing right behind him.
Binghe could see a small soot stain unnoticed on the inside of Shen-daozhang’s collar. He swallowed a mouthful of fiery vitriol. Studying Shen-daozhang’s reaction towards this stranger, Binghe was unable to say anything.
The man swaggered off, but not before throwing his arm up and dismissively signaling them to follow. “Keep close. If you fall behind, I can’t be blamed for not protecting you!”
Just who wanted whose protection!
Meanwhile, Shen-daozhang happily clasped his hands within his sleeves and followed the stranger’s lead. He didn’t forget to glance behind him to urge Binghe to follow. Binghe very unhappily joined the little line of pilgrims.
An insane yellow duck led the charge, a cheerful white swan followed in the middle, and a grumpy little blackbird trailed from behind.
Two people were a pair. Three just barely could be called a procession. Binghe was displeased.