The Past

Chapter 17

Ming Wen felt a growing interest in this fellow practitioner. Honggu had lived at least six hundred years ago, and in such an era, her ability to transform from a mortal into a deity spoke volumes of her power.

Ming Wen explored other areas of the temple, hoping to learn more about her predecessor.

She soon understood why Sha Niu was so convinced she was the Immortal Lady in disguise.

“In the eighth year of Qingli¹, a great drought struck. A woman arrived at Xinghua Village. Passing the Hu family home, she heard the sound of weeping… the wrath of thunder…”

Some of the characters were faded. Ming Wen looked closer, gradually piecing together the story.

This passage described the first time the Immortal Lady returned to Xinghua Village after ascending to godhood.

At that time, there was a family in Xinghua Village whose ancestor had been a disciple of Honggu during her days as a physician. After several generations of accumulation, they had built up a decent fortune. By the current generation, however, the family wealth had been squandered and their reputation was in tatters.

One day, a young woman arrived at Xinghua Village. As she passed this family’s house, she happened to hear crying.

The young woman inquired about the situation. The one crying was the wife of the Hu family. She said she had failed to produce an heir in three years of marriage, so her husband beat her daily. Her parents-in-law were already looking for a buyer to sell her off to an old man who had previously beaten a wife to death.

As for her own family, her parents were long dead, and she had no idea where her only sister was. She had intended to end her life, but the thought of her lost sister filled her with such grief that she couldn’t help but cry.

Upon hearing this, the young woman was furious. “Take me to them! Is there no law left in this world?”

The young wife was initially reluctant, but the young woman insisted on confronting the husband and mother-in-law to demand justice.

The master of the house was a lecherous man. He demanded that this strange woman stay and bear him a son, promising that if she did, he wouldn’t sell his wife.

When the young woman refused, the family seized her and locked her in the woodshed.

During the night, the Hu wife secretly found the woman, intending to let her go.

She escorted the stranger to the gate. “Run quickly, and whatever you do, don’t come back.”

To her surprise, the stranger spoke first. “The one who needs to leave isn’t me, it’s you. Head north. Just keep walking.”

The Hu wife was baffled. She was the one helping the woman escape, so why was the woman giving her directions?

At that moment, a thick fog rose, clouding the wife’s vision. When the mist cleared, the young woman had vanished, leaving only a piece of red cloth on the ground.

Red cloth! It was the red cloth of the Immortal Lady from the cliffside. The Hu wife finally realized that the young woman had been the Immortal Lady herself.

It seemed that because the world was in chaos, the Immortal Lady had descended to save the people, only to encounter such injustice and be so insulted by mortals the moment she arrived.

The Hu wife knew in her heart that trouble was coming for the Hu family. She quickly followed the Immortal Lady’s instructions and walked north.

She walked and walked, not stopping even when her feet were covered in bloody blisters, until she reached a hillside.

Someone was lying there.

Though the Hu wife was afraid, she believed the Immortal Lady must have had a reason for sending her here. She stepped forward to check on the person.

It was a young woman with a bruised face. She looked familiar. Once the wife revived her and asked a few questions, it turned out to be her long-lost sister! The sister had heard her elder sister was in Xinghua Village and had come looking for her. Unexpectedly, she had encountered a venomous snake on the road and fled in terror, eventually falling down the slope. Exhausted, hungry, and injured from the fall, she had fainted.

She had found her sister! The two sisters recognized each other and wept in each other’s arms.

Once the joy subsided, the two women had nowhere to go. Thinking back on the Hu family and the Immortal Lady, the wife decided to take her sister back to her husband’s house to see what had happened.

When she returned, she found her husband’s entire family had gone mad, foaming at the mouth and convulsing.

By then, the respected elders of the village had all gathered. Initially, they had wanted to help, but once the woman told her story and showed them the red cloth, everyone understood. This was a punishment sent by the Immortal Lady. No one dared to step forward.

Ming Wen looked at these records thoughtfully, unable to help but admire the cleverness behind them.

She knew very well that what was recorded here wasn’t an actual descent of the Immortal Lady.

Clearly, that young woman hadn’t been a goddess, but the wife’s sister. During the great drought, the sister had come to her elder sister’s home to seek a living, only to find that the man her sister married was a monster who wanted to sell the wife and force himself on the sister.

Driven to a dead end, the two sisters had used poison—perhaps from the venomous snake mentioned earlier.

When the villagers arrived, the sisters pinned everything on the Immortal Lady, blending truth with lies.

The two subsequent records followed the same pattern.

Usually, there was a great villain in the village who committed all sorts of evils while the people suffered in silence. Typically, such a villain had a victim in their household who endured everything.

Then one day, the Immortal Lady would appear in the guise of an ordinary woman. The villain, unaware of her identity, would recklessly offend her. Consequently, the Immortal Lady would grow angry and use her divine power to punish those who disrespected her. They would either die foaming at the mouth or drown in a water vat.

In every instance, the kind-hearted victim who respected the Immortal Lady would survive to tell the tale of the goddess’s deeds to those around them.

No one ever doubted the stories. After all, the deceased were indeed people hated by everyone.

Ming Wen finished reading the records carefully. Every word spoke of the Immortal Lady, yet within those words, one could see the resistance of victims hidden under the goddess’s name.

No matter the environment, there were always those who could break through the darkness and find a way to survive.

Sha Niu was foolishly eating the offerings left for the Immortal Lady, but Li Qingqing was different. She kept her eyes fixed on Ming Wen.

While Ming Wen studied the text, Li Qingqing was watching her. Ming Wen possessed a serene aura that made it impossible to look away.

The entire temple seemed to sway gently, as if everything around them belonged to the woman before her.

Something light and airy drifted up from beneath the cliff. The red cloths in front of the temple fluttered softly, and one drifted down to land on Ming Wen’s shoulder.

Under the sunlight, Ming Wen seemed to be glowing.

Li Qingqing gazed at her, a thought welling up in her heart.

She withdrew her gaze and suppressed the thought, but soon, she could not help but steal another glance at Ming Wen. It was just like when she was a child and was first taken to the temple; while everyone knelt before the temple to worship the Immortal Lady, she could not resist peeking at the goddess.

Li Qingqing thought that if the Immortal Lady ever came to the world of mortals, she might truly look like Ming Wen.

She quickly asked the Immortal Lady for forgiveness for her thoughts, and once again, the result was the Shengbei².

The Immortal Lady did not blame them at all. It was wonderful.

The three of them did not stay in the temple for long. They soon headed back to the village, picking up firewood along the way with their baskets on their backs.

On the way down, Ming Wen carried a load, which made the trek even more difficult. By the time they reached home, the sky was nearly dark.

She placed the firewood under the eaves while Madman Zhang’s mother continued her constant stream of curses.

Ming Wen ignored her. She felt somewhat unwell, likely because she had walked for so long today, sweated heavily, and then caught a chill from the cold wind on the cliff.

If it were her old body, this bit of exercise would have been nothing.

But things were different now.

In the end, this was just a mortal body of flesh and blood. Having been locked up for so long and fed poorly, it really could not withstand such physical strain.

In the evening, Ming Wen limped as she carried water, preparing to wash sweet potatoes. Her stomach began to feel upset, and she started to dry heave.

The Zhang family woman stared at her for a while, then suddenly broke into a smile.

Ming Wen saw her go out, and soon another woman arrived. The two of them whispered together, growing more delighted the more they spoke.

“I bet she’s expecting.”

“She must be. She looks like the fertile type.”

“It’s been three months; it’s about time for a child.”

“Sister Zhang, it looks like your family is about to have another joyous occasion.”

Ming Wen could not understand what they were saying. She could feel that she had caught a cold and needed to drink some hot water to soothe herself.

A moment later, the Zhang family man returned. His mother was overjoyed, pulling him aside to whisper urgently. As she spoke, she smiled and pointed toward Ming Wen inside.

The man’s face darkened, and he quickly stormed inside.

Ming Wen did not understand their speech, but the man’s expression was wrong. He looked as if he were pushed to the brink of extreme rage, as if he intended to beat her to death.

Something was wrong, very wrong. What was the matter with him now? Was he going to start his madness again?

The young deity turned her head and picked up the iron tongs from the ground.

Translator’s Notes