Today marks one month since the Ding Xiaocuo crossing-the-portal incident. In the evening, Jiu Jue came to my "Unceasing" again to freeload a meal.
"Yue Lao asked you to take care of Ding Xiaocuo for nine hundred years?" I know this chap Jiu Jue. After a few drinks, he'll gossip about anything with me.
"That old guy is one of the very few old ba*tards in the heavens who don't annoy me," Jiu Jue nodded, nibbling on honey-glazed chicken wings in his hand. "He treasures that girl Ding Xiaocuo a lot."
"Yue Lao also tampered with the Lingxi sword." I smiled.
"Ding Xiaocuo messed with the red threads and disrupted mortal love affairs. She definitely couldn't continue to stay in the heavens. If we didn't send her to take refuge in the human world, she would have been caught and jailed in Heavenly Prison for the rest of her life sooner or later. But fortunately, Yue Lao sealed all of Ding Xiaocuo's memories about Beitang Ken in that Lingxi sword she brought back. Otherwise, with this level of emotional trauma, Ding Xiaocuo would definitely have become a tragic figure in front of me for nine hundred years. Who can bear that?" He happily chewed on, "However, no matter what, if it weren't for Yue Lao's showing mercy and taking away her memories, this girl, even if not severely punished by the heavens, would have been tormented to death by her own actions. You know, no matter how severe a wound is, it'll heal one day. But regrets are different; they will follow you until the end of your life. Nine hundred years ago, watching her beloved man die in front of her, this kind of pain and regret is hard for anyone to bear."
I took a sip of wine and said, "Ding Xiaocuo has more than just Yue Lao to thank; there's also you, the pervert."
"I haven't done much. Just borrowed the Vermilion Bird Lamp from the Time-observing Fairy to let my stupid disciple play around with time travel," he shrugged indifferently, attacking the spicy ribs. "If, in the end, she still refuses to use her true self to appear in front of him, I can only sigh over my failed experiment and admit that fate is unalterable."
I may not be from the heavens, but I know that the Vermilion Bird Lamp in the hands of the Time-observing Fairy, capable of traversing time, only lights up once every nine hundred years. If one wants to use it, they need two things: first, friendship and second, the cost. Although he had a good relationship with the fairy, extracting the magic power of time-reversal from the Vermilion Bird Lamp, disguising it as a charm, and borrowing my hand to quietly send Ding Xiaocuo back nine hundred years required him to expend not only time but also at least a century of cultivation. "Is it worth doing all this for a stupid disciple?" I chuckled, "You don't look like such a kind person at all."
"I told you, I'm just conducting an experiment. I just want to see if events that have already happened, the so-called predetermined fate, can really be changed." Jiu Jue wiped his mouth and burped, "Besides, Yue Lao told me that the woman connected to Beiting Ken's original red thread that was cut off... is that idiot Ding Xiaocuo! Fated union between a demon and a mortal only happens once every five hundred years! Tell me, how can someone be so foolish that they cut their own marriage thread without even looking at it, causing so much trouble!"
"Are you sure Ding Xiaocuo's current situation is as you expect?" I asked the most crucial question. Jiu Jue's usual sly smile appeared on his lips, "I'm not sure. I only know that if this stupid disciple continues to be like she was nine hundred years ago, choosing to retreat rather than advance because of her appearance, then her subsequent fate won't change. She'll be taken back by Yue Lao and end up in my hands again. But you see, she still hasn't come back until now."
"Since the moment you sent her back, you haven't thought about bringing her back, have you?" I snatched the last piece of ribs from the plate, "You, this shifu, are destined to be cast beyond the clouds[1]."
"So what. She has been making my bed, folding my blankets, cooking, and doing my laundry for so many years. There's still a bit of sentiment there. This..." he heaved a sigh, glanced at the calendar, and said self-deprecatingly, "Let's just treat this as the last Children's Day gift from teacher to disciple."
"Well, to compensate for the sadness in your heart over losing your disciple, I won't charge you for hiring me as an accomplice." I raised my glass to him, "To the most perverse and kind shifu in history; cheers!"
Northern Song Dynasty, the fifth year of Qianxing[2], a ranch twenty miles north of Yanmen Pass.
"Gave birth! Gave birth! Little Black gave birth!!" A young woman dressed as a female farm worker, jubilantly shouted in the stable.
"Hush! Why so noisy!" A man with a felt hat and handsome features, crouched in front of a mare that had just given birth, and glared at the woman, "You're going to scare them!"
"Oh, sorry." The woman quickly covered her mouth, squatting down beside the man, "Husband, I'm just too happy! It's like I gave birth to a child myself!"
"Er..." The man looked at his wife very seriously, "I don't know if the child born to a demon and a mortal will be what you often say... a half-demon[3]?"
"Who curses their own child like that!" The woman grabbed a handful of hay and threw it at her husband's head, angrily saying, "If I had known earlier, I would've never come back to you! Perhaps the heavens should have just let a heartless guy like you be scared to death by my appearance back then!"
"Have you forgotten what my title was back then? The Jade-Faced Ghost King, not afraid of even the fugly and formidable centipede demon, would be afraid of you, a foolish lingxi who is incompetent in both pen and sword?" The man gave her a disdainful look, then smiled, pulling her into his arms. His tone suddenly softened, "Fortunately, you came back."
Ding Xiaocuo still had lingering fears. On that snowy night, she could only vaguely feel that she had to find him, and had to appear in front of him. However, after she changed back to her true form, she almost chose to retreat, just like nine hundred years ago. She was afraid that her love would be ruined by her ugly appearance, and the sudden and deep inferiority complex made her panic. However, a voice in her heart kept shouting — Go over! Go over! It doesn't matter if he dislikes me, it's okay if he's repulsed, I just want him to live well! Beiting Ken's anxious calls finally stopped her from retreating. She appeared in front of him, in her true form, before he encountered the real enemy.
He instinctively raised his sword. "I am... Ding Xiaocuo," she looked into his eyes and said only this. Her shifu had said, "Heart has eyes; eyes have heart." The two stared at each other for a long time. He lowered his Lingxi sword and walked toward her. In his eyes, she saw herself; not an ugly lingxi, but her own winsomely smiling face.
When Zhao Zhi's subordinates led the Khitan people back to the original location, the snowy landscape was desolate, with only the unconscious Ye Nichang lying there.
Three years later, she regained her human form and became his wife. A ranch, livestock, a free life under the vast sky; the fantasies on the haystack that day became a reality.
The Lingxi sword went from being one sword to two. In fact, it was originally a pair of male and female swords fused together. Beiting Ken and Ding Xiaocuo opened it not for the key to the treasure but for the convenience of the couple having one sword each for chopping down trees for firewood. This sword was truly fast and proved to be a handy tool for farm work!
Oh, by the way, the last point in "Yue Lao's Guide to Love" says — no matter what you become, in the eyes of the one who truly loves you, you will always see yourself at your most beautiful moment. As long as you're alive, there's a chance for change. People who reject themselves before others do are the most foolish. Cast away your feelings of inferiority, take one more step, and you'll be able to see how beautiful the sunset over the desert is.
The above is Ding Xiaocuo's insight learned through experience.
Footnotes:
[1] Completely abandoned, neglected, or left far away.
[2] 1022 A.D.
[3] Beitang uses the word 人妖 which literally translates to human-demon. This term is often used colloquially in (modern) Chinese to refer to transgender individuals. This term is generally derogatory and can mean bad/strange person, man-made disaster, tranny, she-male.
Translator:
In case you're confused with the timeline:
DX goes to the mortal realm-> She meets BK, uses her powers to learn about him-> Returns to Heaven, cuts BK's red thread and ties it to YN(the person Baitang Ken hates the most)-> She has interfered in mortal affairs so Yue Lao sends her to the mortal realm to correct her mistake-> She meets the grownup BK. She turns into her true form (a lingxi) because of using her powers. So she doesn't respond to BK when he's looking for her. BK dies. She returns to Heaven along with the Lingxi sword-> Yue Lao seals her memories in the Lingxi sword and sends her to Jiu Jue. She becomes his disciple and stays with him for 900 years-> Jiu Jue sends her back in time-> She faces BK in her true form and stays with him this time around.
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