Though Chen Ping'an looked thin and frail, when he settled those scholar-tree branches across both shoulders, he walked down Mud Vase Lane with effortless ease—leaving the little girl in the red cotton-padded jacket behind with her jaw hanging open. Had she not insisted, he would have taken the branch from her slender shoulders as well.
At the mouth of the lane stood a girl with twin pigtails, her cheeks probably chapped from the winter cold, the rosy flush on each side quite striking. Upon seeing the girl in the red jacket swaggering along with her branches, she muttered unhappily: "Li Baoping, didn't we agree that once you dropped off the branches, you'd come straight to the schoolhouse with me? You have no idea—Old Ma is acting strange today. He's dressed just like Mr. Qi, says he'll be leading us on our travels, going to that Cliff Academy. When Old Ma scolds us later, don't blame me."
The girl in the red jacket was not listening at all. She plucked a green scholar-tree leaf—gifted by Chen Ping'an—from the embroidered pouch at her waist and twirled it before her companion's face, triumphant.
Her expression said: You don't have these, but I have lots.
The girl with the pigtails found this utterly baffling—a dead leaf, what was there to show off?—but she simply could not stand Li Baoping's smug demeanor. It begged for a beating. The trouble was, not even the fieriest children in the schoolhouse could match Li Baoping. Li Huai had once been pinned to the ground by her, playing dead, but Li Baoping was not satisfied—she pulled off his trousers and tossed them high into a tree. Bare-bottomed Li Huai had wailed all the way home. His mother was no one to trifle with; without a word she dragged Li Huai charging toward Fulu Street. But before they even reached the Li family gate, taking in the imposing stone lions, the painted door gods, and the towering walls on either side, the woman's anger died on her lips. She gave Li Huai another beating instead, never knocked on the Li family door, and hauled her son by the ear back to their shabby house on the far western edge of town. That evening, however, she slaughtered a chicken and stewed it. Li Huai stood bare-bottomed on a stool, swaying back and forth, eating more happily than anyone—having long forgotten the humiliation of being pinned down and slapped on the head by Li Baoping.
The girl with the pigtails held out both hands to indicate a length and said with disdain: "It's just a scholar-tree leaf—what's there to brag about? My father gave me a golden abacus last night. A real gold abacus, this big!"
But the girl in the red jacket was entirely immersed in her own world and cared nothing for any golden abacus. She continued gently waving the leaf before her companion, lifting her pointed chin to point at Chen Ping'an up ahead. "He gave it to me. I still have more in my pouch."
The pigtails girl sighed. From the very first day she had met Li Baoping, the girl had been this insufferable. She said only what she wanted to say, listened only to what she wanted to hear, and did only what she wanted to do.
If there had been more children her age near Qilong Lane, the pigtails girl would never have agreed to play with her. Often, even Mr. Qi had been helpless against Li Baoping, because the girl would ask the strangest questions—and Mr. Qi would always answer them earnestly, but could seldom give an answer that satisfied her. Sometimes, when Mr. Qi had just worked out an exciting answer to a problem and planned to teach it to her the next day, Li Baoping had already forgotten what she had asked. The thought of catching loaches, catching crickets, or flying kites sent her running off, leaving Mr. Qi standing there alone.
Chen Ping'an, his shoulders full of branches, could not turn his head. He raised his voice slightly: "How many people are in the schoolhouse now?"
Li Baoping was struggling to shift the branches to her other shoulder—she had already switched many times, and the skin burned.
The pigtails girl held up one hand: "Only five left now. Me, Li Baoping, Li Huai, Lin Shouyi, and Dong Shuijing."
Idle and willing to talk, she poured out the schoolhouse's situation in a single breath: "Mr. Qi had promised to take us traveling, and we would end up studying at Cliff Academy. Back then there were fourteen or fifteen of us, and all our families agreed. Later, most of the well-off children from Fulu Street and Taoye Lane started claiming illness and skipping school. Then, according to Li Baoping, they left the town altogether—went to stay with distant relatives. When they first heard about Cliff Academy, this lot had been the most excited. I couldn't understand what they were so excited about. Walking that far with Mr. Qi—wouldn't they be exhausted?"
The girl spoke in a childish voice but with clear reasoning. She was precocious and mild-tempered, like a miniature adult. Chen Ping'an thought, for no particular reason, of Gu Can—though she was quite different from that hedgehog-like snotty brat.
Chen Ping'an smiled and asked: "What's your name?"
The girl with the twin pigtails answered coolly: "Me? My name is Shi Chunjia. So you can call me Miss Shi."
Chen Ping'an was rendered speechless.
Li Baoping undercut her: "Just call her Little Stone."
Shi Chunjia bristled like a cat whose fur had been stood on end. "Don't call me Little Stone! And you can't either, Li Baoping!"
Li Baoping, whose thoughts tended to wander all day long, had already let her mind drift far from her companion's nickname, and did not bother responding to Shi Chunjia's protest.
Shi Chunjia, however, was the type who liked to be precise. She tirelessly explained and persuaded Li Baoping, determined to rid herself of the unflattering nickname "Little Stone," because she knew that once they reached Mr. Qi's Cliff Academy, if Li Baoping called her that even once, the name would stick forever.
Listening to the two girls arguing past each other behind him, Chen Ping'an asked as they approached Fulu Street: "There are many Li-family houses on Fulu Street. Which one is yours?"
He was thinking that as long as it was not one of the four great Li-family houses, it would be fine.
After all, he had once used the descendant tree on Fulu Street to climb the wall of the great Li compound in order to lure the elder ape from Zhengyang Mountain out. He had also used a slingshot to shatter two of the Li family's bird-feeding bowls.
Shi Chunjia said irritably: "Hers is the house with the scholar tree outside the wall. Whenever her family wouldn't let her go out for fear she'd run wild, she would secretly set up a ladder against the wall and climb down the tree onto Fulu Street. One time her parents were so angry they removed the ladder and insisted she come in through the front gate. So she simply jumped. After that, she didn't come to school for a month, and for the two months after that she arrived on crutches."
Li Baoping did not find this embarrassing in the slightest. She said with perfect seriousness: "I reflected afterward—my landing posture was wrong. I shouldn't have stabbed straight down with both feet. So once my leg healed, I tried again, and—"
Shi Chunjia said furiously: "You mean you missed another half-month of school?"
Li Baoping curled her lip: "The third time was fine."
Shi Chunjia seethed: "That was because a year had passed and you'd grown taller, so your body could take the impact! It had absolutely nothing to do with whether your landing posture was correct!"
Chen Ping'an did not intervene in the girls' bickering. On one hand, he was already worrying about whether the Li family would recognize him when he arrived, and in a rage set the dogs on him. On the other hand, deep in his heart, he envied them—envied their happy, stable lives, with elders at home to look after them and a schoolhouse where they could study.
Despite his worry, he still resolved to help Li Baoping carry the branches to her front door.
Perhaps this was instant karma. He had just told this girl in the red jacket that a promise must be kept, and now he had to swallow his fears and walk straight into the Li compound like a lamb to the slaughter.
Whether it was heaven finally opening its eyes from a doze and deciding Chen Ping'an was due for some good fortune, or not—the gatekeeper did not recognize him, and Li Baoping did not ask him to carry the branches inside. Relieved, Chen Ping'an was about to turn and leave when Li Baoping placed the branch from her own shoulder into his hands, saying this was her thanks.
He did not refuse the girl's kindness. He slung it casually over his shoulder and waved goodbye.
The gatekeeper was long accustomed to the young lady's peculiar temperament. Even bringing home an armful of branches too poor to burn did not surprise him—he merely worried about the red cotton-padded jacket on her back, which was worth more than all the branches combined. This young lady, before she was even five, had gone to the creek to catch a large crab by herself. She had come home crying, but held her small hand high, and on it was a crab that refused to loosen its pincer even in death. Her parents and the family matriarch had been heartbroken. That very crab, with its blue-black shell and crimson pincers, still lived in her large fish tank. The young lady, who detested studying, spent her idle moments chatting with it.
He watched Chen Ping'an's departing figure.
Shi Chunjia glanced at Li Baoping beside her and giggled: "So that's him—the one who made you knock out your front tooth?"
Li Baoping suddenly stepped behind Shi Chunjia and grabbed both of her pigtails, preparing to pull upward. "Trust me, this time it'll work."
Shi Chunjia crouched in terror, squeezing her eyes shut, flailing her hands wildly above her head to prevent Li Baoping from grabbing her braids and "pulling weeds" again.
Li Baoping crouched beside her, who was a head shorter, and said with full confidence: "Little Stone, it doesn't hurt. You haven't tried a second time—how do you know it won't work? Right?"
Shi Chunjia burst into tears.
The gatekeeper, unable to bear it, came to the rescue of the little shopkeeper from Qilong Lane. "A moment ago, a schoolteacher named Ma sent Li Huai with a message: the household should prepare a horse carriage. The young lady is to bring her luggage, go to the schoolhouse first, then leave the town and travel with Miss Shi to Cliff Academy. Of course, before going to the schoolhouse, the young lady could stop by Qilong Lane to load Miss Shi's things into the carriage."
Li Baoping had to release Shi Chunjia first, her face full of disappointment. As they walked through the gate together, she did not forget to express her regret for Shi Chunjia.
The surviving pigtails girl silently resolved to undo her braids that very day.
"Hm?"
Li Baoping looked up in surprise.
Shi Chunjia followed her gaze and frowned: "It's not going to rain, is it?"
A massive black cloud drifted across the sky above the town.
From north to south.
The straw-sandaled young man, who had just stepped off Fulu Street, also looked up.
In that instant, he was struck speechless.
It was no black cloud. It was a dense mass of flying swords—countless immortals riding their blades through the sky.
The young man slowly turned his head, his gaze tracking the sword-cloud as it moved southward.
Then, without warning.
A single black speck raced from south to north, against the flow of the flying sword-immortals.
The speck grew larger and larger.
At last, with eyes sharp enough to see the finest detail, the straw-sandaled young man stared wide-eyed as though he had seen a ghost in broad daylight. Above the southern edge of town, a figure rode a descending flying sword at a steep angle. At roughly a hundred zhang above the ground, it paused. The rider looked down upon the town, sweeping their gaze in every direction, then plunged straight toward Fulu Street.
In the blink of an eye—a flight of millions of miles in a single day, accompanied by a shriek of wind and thunder—the figure landed before Chen Ping'an.
The sword hovered half a zhang above the ground. Upon its blade stood a young woman in a dark green robe, her boots resting lightly on the flat of the steel.
Travel-worn and dusty, she grinned, arms crossed over her chest, radiating martial spirit: "I thought I should say goodbye. So I came."
But before the branch-laden young man could speak, the sword-rider's mind turned, the tip of her blade tilted upward, and in a flash she vanished.
The young man reached out instinctively, but the girl and her flying sword were already gone.
Embarrassed, he withdrew his hand and scratched his head as he walked toward Mud Vase Lane, glancing upward from time to time.
At first the straw-sandaled youth felt a pang of loss, but it quickly gave way to joy. So Ning Yao was an immortal!
He was so elated that when he passed a shop on Qilong Lane, he splurged on a stick of candied haws for the first time ever, eating as he walked.
Eating and eating, for reasons the young man could not quite explain, a certain emptiness crept in.
He thought about it carefully. Could it be that he was grieving over the copper coins?