The Great King Ordered Me to Marry – Chapter 4
by Little PandaSpeaking of the Kind-hearted Goddess in the Mountains
The old woman was new to being a ghost and had no idea how to tell her own kind apart. She looked Zhuoxue up and down, saw that this pretty young lady was also floating, and was thoroughly taken in.
The old woman hesitated for a long moment before asking, puzzled, “What do you want with me?”
“Ask the way,” Zhuoxue repeated.
“What deer1?” The old woman tilted her ear.
Zhuoxue had never met anyone more hard of hearing than herself. She cleared her throat. “Ask the way!”
The old woman had a sudden flash of understanding and shook her head with a muffled sigh. “Why ask the way? When a person dies, the Black and White Impermanence2 will guide you. Don’t go wandering off.”
“What sausage? Plain cured sausage3?” Zhuoxue had listened to the old woman prattle on for ages, and didn’t even think she’d misheard.
Guide the way? Using the aroma of food to lead you along — how was that not guiding?
The old woman gaped. “Such a young lady, and deafer than this old gal.”
Zhuoxue bristled, but she still needed the old woman to show her the way, so she swallowed her pride. “What do you know? Great wit invites its own wounds4 — the mind grows sharp, and other parts suffer for it. Only fair.”
The old woman had lived ninety years, making her the longest-lived person in town, and she had never heard of brilliance wounding someone quite like that.
“So what road are you looking for?” the old woman asked.
Zhuoxue pointed downward. “The road to the underworld.”
“Ah.” The old woman let out a short sigh, her clouded eyes full of reluctance. “I don’t want to go.”
“Do you know the way or not?” Zhuoxue pressed.
“I don’t,” the old woman said, waving her hand. “Just wait for the Impermanence to come. Wouldn’t that be fine?”
“Who?”
“The Impermanence deities, of course,” the old woman said again.
Zhuoxue finally heard it clearly. So it wasn’t sausage after all.
“What, haven’t they come to take you yet?” The old woman lowered her voice, uneasy. “I heard that once the seven-day deadline is up, you’ll have to go whether you want to or not.”
Zhuoxue spun a lie. “Maybe they’re neglecting their duties.”
“That ought to cost them their salaries,” the old woman mused.
“Exactly. I’ll go before King Yan5 and report them severely. How could they abandon me and shirk their duties?” Zhuoxue feigned indignation.
“No matter. Wait for me seven days, and the Impermanence will come to take me. Then we can go together,” the old woman offered kindly.
That suited Zhuoxue perfectly. She nodded. “I’ve been wandering for days, and only you, ma’am, have been kind enough to help.”
Except those seven days…
She couldn’t possibly stay in the mortal world for seven days.
Within five days, Lan Hui would surely discover she’d sneaked down the mountain again.
Zhuoxue panicked inwardly and looked at the old woman. “But do we have to wait the full seven days? Can’t the Impermanence come sooner?”
“I wouldn’t know,” the old woman said.
“Ma’am, do you know anyone who knows the way?” Zhuoxue pressed further.
The old woman gave her a strange look over her shoulder. “It’s my first time being dead too. Everyone I know is alive. Who would know?”
“Seven days is too long,” Zhuoxue muttered.
The old woman, on the other hand, was cheerful. “How wonderful. I can stay in my house a few more days.”
Never mind, Zhuoxue thought. Seven days it is. She’d find some excuse to fob off Auntie Lan when the time came.
Worst case, she’d take a few strikes from the disciplinary ruler.
Hiss. Just thinking about it hurt.
“Then I’ll wait the full seven days.” Zhuoxue made up her mind. The Yellow Springs Bureau6 — she absolutely had to go there.
She was genuinely curious whether those countless streets and bustling alleys that surfaced in her mind from time to time were truly the mortal Imperial City, and whether that place was still as it was in her dreams — the lights of ten thousand homes burning bright, a ten-li7 avenue ablaze with brilliance.
She remembered it so clearly. If it wasn’t a past life, what else could it be? She could even recall the stone figures on the upturned eaves, the windows framing peach branches, the walls wreathed in vine tendrils.
Her past life must have been a happy one. She wondered whose family she’d been born into, what her surname had been, whether she’d had a white tiger by her side.
She’d better not have been that white tiger. Being a beast for two lifetimes would be pitiful.
The old woman, a lone ghost, was glad for the company. She beckoned. “Good. No one else can see me, but you can. Seems we’re fated. I’ll guide you on the road to the Yellow Springs, for certain.”
“Isn’t it the Black and White Impermanence who guide the way?” Zhuoxue was suspicious.
The old woman smacked her lips. “Well, I’ll still have a part to play, won’t I?”
Zhuoxue couldn’t exactly say no. She drifted around and all but turned the entire town inside out.
The townsfolk were few to begin with, and the only one who’d died recently was this old woman. Beyond the town, in the wild hills and barren ridges, she couldn’t find a single wandering soul.
She was too lazy to go farther afield. By the time she found another ghost, the old woman would probably have already moved on to her next life.
Never mind. Better to just wait seven days.
“You’re so young. Why do you keep sighing?” The old woman empathized. “Life has its wonders, and death has its consolations. Look at me — if I hadn’t died, I’d never have known how many people were eyeing every inch of space inside and outside my house. If I were still alive, I wouldn’t have parted with a hair of it.”
Zhuoxue hadn’t expected the old woman — deaf as she was — to hear her sighing.
What she was sighing about was that when she went back, it might not be just a beating. Lan Hui might actually dump her on Lingkong Mountain. Then she’d be done for.
“What’s the matter? Tell me about it,” the old woman said, ever the warmhearted sort.
“Trying to get to my next life, but it seems I can’t rush it now.” Zhuoxue’s eyes shifted. She didn’t want to talk about it anymore. She glanced at the portrait and asked, “Ma’am, what deity is this you’re praying to? Quite good-looking, too.”
The old woman perked up at the question and said cheerfully, “I don’t know, really. When I was young, I was chased by bandits and stumbled into Lingkong Mountain. It was full of illusions and mists. I walked for days and couldn’t find my way out — that’s when I realized I’d run into ghost walls8.”
Lingkong Mountain — that was no joke. A mortal stumbling in there and surviving was already the best possible outcome.
“She saved you?” Zhuoxue immediately saw the connection.
A look of fond remembrance came over the old woman’s face, and she smiled. “I nearly starved to death in there. This goddess descended from the heavens, gave me a full meal, and pointed me to a way out.”
Zhuoxue thought to herself: there were no goddesses on Lingkong Mountain. This beauty was most likely a demon.
To think there was such a kindhearted demon in the world, one who’d give a mortal directions and a meal. How extraordinary. This must be the good fortune the old woman had accumulated over three lifetimes.
“No wonder you worship her,” Zhuoxue said, clicking her tongue in wonder.
The old woman blushed. “Truth is, I didn’t dare look at her directly that day. I only caught a frantic glimpse, so I’m not even sure her features are quite like this.”
Demons accepted offerings too; the more offerings they received, the more it boosted their merit and cultivation. No wonder so many demons and spirits impersonated gods and immortals to deceive people.
“No matter. She reaped the benefit — why would she fault you?” Zhuoxue studied the portrait. The more she looked, the more remarkable she found it. How could a demon like this be unknown?
And yet the only famous name on Lingkong Mountain was the demon lord of Cangqiong Mountain Realm — Longming.
“True enough! She has a kind heart. She’d surely understand!” the old woman said with a smile.
“So how did this demon save you?” Zhuoxue found it fascinating.
“She’s a goddess!” The old woman pursed her lips.
“Oh, a goddess,” Zhuoxue said, not meaning a word of it.
The old woman scolded, “You’re so young, and not only are you hard of hearing, your tongue slips too.”
“I haven’t seen much of the world, and I’m young besides. Naturally I can’t compare to you, ma’am,” Zhuoxue said, hastily covering her tracks.
The old woman liked the sound of that. She beamed. “This goddess stepped slowly out of the fog, with a leopard at her side. I thought to myself, she must be the mountain god of Lingkong Mountain.”
“So she didn’t descend from the heavens this time?” Zhuoxue wondered if she’d misheard.
“Well, she had to descend from the heavens first before she could step slowly out of the fog, didn’t she?” The old woman glared at her.
It did sound rather like the bearing of an immortal. The old woman’s mistake was understandable.
Zhuoxue reckoned that if she got dumped on Lingkong Mountain, she might be able to seek refuge with this one.
If she’d save a mortal, she’d surely help one of her own kind without hesitation.
“And then?” Zhuoxue asked.
“And then.” The old woman gazed back into the past, her eyes softening like melting snow. “She asked me, ‘Mortal, why have you come here? Are you not here to seek death?'”
Zhuoxue wanted to speak, then stopped, then spoke anyway. “That doesn’t sound very kind.”
“I told her I wasn’t seeking death. I was seeking life,” the old woman said.
“So she just gave you a meal?” Zhuoxue was dumbfounded.
Even the demons on Qiufeng Ridge wouldn’t necessarily lift a finger to help. They’d more likely look the other way.
“She conjured a whole table of food and drink out of thin air. Truly the heart of a goddess!” The old woman licked her lips, as if she could still taste that day’s meal.
“Did she ever tell you her name?” This time, Zhuoxue’s interest was no longer about seeking refuge — it was pure curiosity.
Footnotes
- A comic mishearing: 'lù' (路, road/way) and 'lù' (鹿, deer) are homophones in Mandarin. The old woman hears 'ask the way' as 'ask about deer.'
- Two underworld deities in Chinese folk religion who escort the souls of the dead to the afterlife. Their name 'Wuchang' literally means 'impermanence.'
- A comic mishearing: 'Wuchang' (Impermanence) sounds similar to 'lachang' (cured sausage) in Mandarin, especially to someone with hearing difficulties.
- A Chinese literary saying, often associated with commentary on 'Dream of the Red Chamber,' meaning that supreme intelligence or talent inevitably brings suffering — a cosmic trade-off between brilliance and wellbeing.
- The Chinese ruler of the underworld, equivalent to Yama in Buddhist tradition, who judges the souls of the dead.
- The Chinese underworld, named after the Yellow Springs — a term from ancient Chinese mythology for the subterranean realm of the dead.
- A traditional Chinese unit of distance, roughly half a kilometer.
- A Chinese folk belief describing a supernatural phenomenon where a person walks in circles, unable to find their way out, as if ghosts are blocking every path.
0 Comments