Chapter 1
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Empty Mountain Birdsong
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In the deep mountain village of Yunnan, amid a dense bamboo forest, stood a dilapidated thatched hut on the verge of collapse.
Through the open door, the lonely silhouette of an old man sitting silently came into view.
His wife had died today.
He had sat there all day without moving, holding the hand of his wife laid straight out on the bamboo bed.
Her hand grew steadily colder, stiffer. And heavier.
He didn't know how much time had passed, but through the window of the simple bamboo hut, the long rays of late afternoon sun were now stretching in.
No bird calls could be heard, leaving both him and his wife in profound solitude.
Suddenly, he turned his head from his wife's reclining form and gazed out the open door toward the courtyard.
Beneath the brilliant afternoon sunlight of early spring, petals of all kinds were drifting about.
The petals from the peach, pear, and cherry trees planted around the house fluttered in the spring breeze.
"Dear. You're still as beautiful as ever. We had our ups and downs, but wasn't this a good life we lived?"
There was no reply from her.
A moment later.
"You think we lived well?"
"I'm sorry. Because of my stubbornness, I made you suffer so much. If we meet again in the next life..."
"Oh, enough. Next life? What face would I have to..."
"On your way out, must you be so harsh..."
"Anyway. Let's not meet in the next life. I want to live a little wild, have some fun."
"Live wild?"
"You live wild too. What is this? Hiding in these mountains for sixty years..."
"Hiding? But what do you mean by living wild? How did you want to live?"
"Oh, just eat what I want, do what I want, follow my heart... Not make our kids end up like this... Sigh, our poor kids..."
The old man fell silent, and she lost the strength to continue.
"Anyway, you live wild too. In the next life..."
A moment later, the old woman, having briefly gathered her strength, uttered these final words and breathed her last.
The old man, lost in thought, quietly extended one empty hand toward the courtyard.
Then, the colorful petals that had been slowly falling toward the ground halted their descent and began to swirl.
The pink and white petals gathered in the air, spinning round and round, then slowly entered the bamboo hut's door and approached the bed where his wife lay.
As he lowered the palm he had opened toward the swirl, the petals fluttering above the bed gently settled over where his wife lay.
Pink and white petals now blanketed the face, hair, and body of her, who lay as if asleep.
He reached out and slowly brushed away the petals that had fallen onto the deep wrinkles of her face.
Her sleeping face was serene.
In the small courtyard of the hut nestled amid the bamboo grove, firewood was neatly stacked.
Atop it lay her body, face covered with plain cloth.
He knelt before the woodpile and began tuning the strings of the seven-stringed zither he had brought from the hut.
Its length: six feet, six inches, six cun.
He quietly tuned the instrument made of ebony, then slowly plucked the strings.
The piece he played was Empty Mountain Birdsong.
The song of birds crying in an empty mountain.
Soon, birds began flying in to the tune of his playing.
They perched here and there around him and began to cry in time with the seven-stringed zither.
It was a sorrowful melody, and the birds' cries were mournful.
As the bamboo swayed and the music raced toward its climax, small creatures around began falling, followed by birds dropping one by one from the trees.
Exhausted by the weeping, they fainted.
The sound of the seven-stringed zither filled heaven and earth, the surrounding bamboo grove sobbing along, until darkness fully enveloped everything and the full moon rose.
Starting with Empty Mountain Birdsong, his zither wailed without end.
After several hours of ceaseless playing, his hands finally stilled, and heaven and earth returned to silence.
Only then did the birds break free from the zither's spell and fly off each to their own paths.
"Dear. Go in peace. I'll follow soon. I have many sins, so no guarantee I'll reach your side, but wherever you go, I'll go there too and atone for this life's wrongs."
With these words, he let out a deep sigh and raised his right hand, igniting a small Samadhi True Fire and sending it toward the woodpile.
The well-dried stack blazed up in an instant.
And her body atop it slowly withered away in the roaring flames.
He watched her end for a moment, then began playing the zither once more.
This time, the piece was Three Plum Blossoms.
The song she had loved most in life.
The blaze that had consumed the woodpile had now died down, leaving only embers quietly glowing.
Faint dawn began to break over the distant eastern ridge.
The hour when the world awakened in shades of blue.
It was time for him to depart as well.
The old man harbored no attachment to worldly life; this hellish existence held no meaning now.
He set aside the zither on his lap and let out a deep sigh.
Seating himself in the lotus position, he began circulating his energy slowly.
He completed One Circuit of Heaven gently and calmly.
Releasing the hands gathered at his dantian, he raised his right hand overhead, palm facing the sky, and extended his left palm toward the earth.
"All my life, I received this precious gift from heaven and earth and used it well. Now I return it cleanly and depart."
Murmuring this, he began circulating the energy that had quietly flowed within his body in the reverse direction.
The vast inner energy filling his body began to move slowly.
His inner energy, which he had never reversed in life, hesitated briefly before beginning to flow backward from the dantian.
It had been over a hundred years since he had opened the Ren and Du meridians.
Even longer since achieving Five Qi Return to Origin and Three Flowers Gather at the Summit.
All his cultivation, rare in the mortal world, now reversed its accumulation, stepping into the phase of dispersing it.
As he had said, he was returning everything he had built in life to the cosmos according to the principles of heaven, earth, yin-yang, and the five elements.
His apparent age was already over a hundred and forty.
He had long grown weary of counting years, so even that was imprecise.
With his wife—the sole reason for his existence—gone from the world, he no longer needed to remain.
The only way he could choose to leave this world was complete dissipation of his功.
He was a being who could not die without dismantling the inner energy sustaining his muscles, bones, and meridians, and he willingly embraced that path.
The inner energy, circulating in reverse through his great heavenly cycle, now began pouring out through his palms extended toward sky and earth.
Vibrant energies of five colors echoed skyward, while dark ink-black qi seeped into the ground.
As the energy grew stronger, the immense inner power filling his body gradually faded.
His meridians thinned and dried up; his muscles and bones began to crumble.
First, his white hair began crumbling away.
The eyelids of his closed eyes sank deeper.
His skin shriveled severely, and his once-sturdy teeth loosened and fell out one by one.
The energy emanating from his palms now weakened.
His meridians had all dried up, his dantian empty.
Now, the last vestiges from his upper and lower dantians began to flow out.
Unlike before, the primal true energies from his palms shone in brilliant red and blue.
The energies of the upper and lower dantians manifested in different colors.
Finally, red and blue primal true energies drained from his palms as death drew near.
His hair vanished entirely, his face now that of an infant.
The coarse hemp robes on his body crumbled to dust, revealing his emaciated, withered frame.
His form was no longer human.
His dissipation reached its end.
He slowly, arduously opened his eyes.
His pupils had lost all light, fading away.
He forced his mouth open.
"It... is... done..."
With these faint words, he expelled the last of his primal true energy through his palms.
Two small, luminous red and blue orbs—like spirit pills—burst from his hands.
This was his return to brilliance before death, and his very end.
With that, his arms fell limp, and his head drooped.
He had returned all he was to the cosmos, exactly as desired.
Tears fell one from each eye of his infant-like face.
Yet a faint, satisfied smile lingered on his lips.
The distant eastern sky now brightened to blue, revealing the surrounding bamboo grove.
The faint embers fully extinguished, and somewhere, joyful morning birdsong echoed.
It was a peaceful dawn.
His shriveled, naked corpse turning to dust would fit perfectly in the scene.
Yet wondrously, the two spirit essences of primal true energy he had released last did not return to nature but lingered around him.
As if unable to depart, they traced gentle circles a yard from his body.
Moments later, they began shrinking the circles, drawing nearer.
The blue essence orbited his head, the red his waist.
But their glow faded ever so gently.
Sunlight now bathed the quiet courtyard.
The purest yang energy of the day filled the air.
Then it began.
The fading blue and red lights regained strength.
As if absorbing the sun's power, they shone more brilliantly, growing larger.
They spun around him ever faster.
Soon, a vortex of light formed centered on his body.
The light vortex blazed dazzlingly, even repelling the surrounding sunlight.
In an instant, all birdsong ceased.
It was as if approaching dawn had halted.
Hummm~~~~!
A resonant hum echoed from the vortex spinning at tremendous speed.
The blue-and-red vortex began purple, then shifted to white, now a blinding radiance devouring all light around.
Moments later, five-colored halos gathered above the light vortex.
Like those from Five Qi Return to Origin, but vastly larger and clearer, they formed in sequence.
Below, dense ink-black energy gathered into form, supporting the base of the glorious light vortex.
Now the dazzling light vortex slowly rose.
Ink-black energy buoyed from below, five brilliant halos of red, blue, yellow, green, purple enveloped from above.
Wondrously, three yards up, his collapsed body was gone from beneath.
His form had merged with the light vortex, floating together in the air.