“Mother, the Zhao family is a prominent household with ties to the county magistrate. If they come to ask for Yu’er’s hand in marriage, how could ordinary people like us possibly refuse? Besides, Yu’er is already eighteen this year. At her age…”
Cough, cough.
“I know what I’m doing when it comes to Yu’er’s marriage. Young Master Zhao is no suitable match. Don’t bring it up again.”
“But…”
“But what? Cough, cough. Do you know why Yu’er is already eighteen and still unmarried?”
“This daughter-in-law knows she is partly at fault for delaying Yu’er’s prospects. But the Zhao family is powerful. I’m only thinking of what’s best for her…”
Wu Xiu was about to continue persuading her when the curtain was lifted, and the Yu’er they had been discussing entered carrying a bowl of medicine.
It was already late spring, edging into early summer. Su Yu had just come from tending the medicinal stove. The fire’s heat had flushed her cheeks a rosy red. At first glance, she resembled a ripe peach hanging from a branch, so tender it seemed one could squeeze juice from her skin.
Wu Xiu silently admired her beauty. The girl was truly blessed by heaven. Her face looked as if it had stepped straight out of a painting, and her graceful figure had inherited all the charms of her missing mother. No wonder the men from every village within ten miles couldn’t help but steal glances at Su Yu. Even her own son was no exception.
Thinking of this only irritated Wu Xiu further. Widowed when she was still young, she had remarried into the Su family with her son in tow. She had endured countless hardships to raise and educate him. Fortunately, her son had lived up to expectations. He was now a proper xiucai (licensed scholar) and would soon sit for the provincial examinations. His future was bright beyond measure. How could a son like that marry a woman who had nothing but beauty and offered no advantage to his ambitions?
To extinguish her son’s infatuation, Wu Xiu had secretly slipped gifts to several servant women from the Zhao household, making sure stories of Su Yu’s beauty reached Young Master Zhao’s ears. As expected, the young master immediately sent a carriage inviting Su Yu to meet him. Even now, that carriage waited outside the gate.
Unfortunately, although her mother-in-law was bedridden with illness, she remained stubbornly unmoved and refused to agree to what was very likely a promising marriage match.
Su Yu noticed Aunt Wu’s gaze sweep over her body, from her face to her chest, then down to her waist and hips, circling back again and again. The scrutiny made her deeply uncomfortable. Instinctively, she turned slightly and stepped forward, offering the bowl of medicine to her grandmother, propped against the headboard. “Grandmother, it’s time for your medicine.”
Cough, cough.
The old woman accepted the bowl and drained it in a few gulps. After a moment, as the bitter taste faded somewhat from her mouth, she turned her eyes toward Wu Xiu, who still lingered beside the bed. “I’ve already made myself clear. I won’t agree to this marriage with the Zhao family.”
After speaking, she covered her mouth and coughed again. “Go. Tell the Zhao family to leave.”
Seeing her mother-in-law be so blunt, Wu Xiu could no longer keep up her smile. “Then please get some rest. I’ll send the Zhao family’s people away.”
Su Yu escorted Wu Xiu out through the courtyard gate.
During the short walk from the house to the entrance, Wu Xiu seized her hand and again listed all the supposed benefits of marrying into the Zhao family, embellishing every point as she spoke.
Unfortunately, Su Yu remained silent from beginning to end.
Wu Xiu cursed inwardly. Still, she plastered on a smile for the Zhao family’s coachman waiting outside. Only after the carriage finally departed did she turn and leave as well.
Seeing Wu Xiu’s figure gradually disappear around the alley corner, Su Yu quietly returned to the house. She found her grandmother still gazing out the window, her brows knitted in concern.
“Grandmother, this medicine will make you drowsy. Lie down and rest for a while. Your granddaughter is going into the mountains to gather herbs.”
Su Yu had been raised by her grandmother. When she was still an infant, swaddled in blankets, her father had been bitten by a venomous snake while in the mountains and died despite treatment. Barely a month after she was born, her mother went out one day and never returned.
People in town said her mother couldn’t bear the loneliness and had run away with another man.
When Su Yu was younger and too innocent to understand, she had asked her grandmother several times where her mother had gone. Her grandmother would only sigh and shake her head, so eventually Su Yu stopped asking.
Fortunately, her grandmother treated her extremely well. Few girls in the countryside had the chance to learn to read or write, but her grandmother patiently taught her by hand. As she grew older, her grandmother also passed on all her knowledge of identifying and gathering medicinal herbs.
The two of them made a living by collecting herbs and selling them for money. Though their lives were modest and frugal, they were peaceful enough.
When she saw Su Yu enter, her grandmother withdrew her gaze from the window and spoke. “Don’t listen to what your Aunt Wu says. The Zhao family may be wealthy, but Young Master Zhao is notoriously lustful. They say every few days a maidservant is carried out of his room half-dead after being tormented by him. If you married into that household, would you even survive?”
“And as for Su Yansong, although you two grew up together, your Aunt Wu’s attitude has changed now. Don’t keep thinking about him anymore…”
Su Yu nodded. With her eyes lowered, she looked exceptionally obedient. “I understand, Grandmother.”
Seeing how readily she agreed, her grandmother’s expression softened somewhat. “The mountains are cold. Put on another layer before you leave. Take your dagger for protection. Don’t wander too deep into remote areas, and come back early.”
Su Yu left home with her herb basket strapped to her back.
Those who live by the mountains depend on the mountains; those who live by the water depend on the water.
Many families in Lingyin Village made their living gathering medicinal herbs from Spirit Snake Mountain, which stood right beside the village.
According to the village elders, the mountain had originally been called South Mountain. Back then, however, demons would occasionally appear in the forests. Nearly half the people who ventured into the mountains to gather herbs would disappear without a trace. The Demon Suppression Bureau investigated once, yet strangely reported that they had seen no demons. The villagers believed them, but people still vanished from time to time.
Later, one villager risked entering the mountain alone. When he returned, he had lost his sanity. Over and over, he spoke only of having seen an enormous black python.
Strangely enough, after that incident, the demons in the mountains gradually disappeared. The villagers could move freely through the forests without suffering any further accidents.
Everyone said that the black python must have exterminated the great demons dwelling in the mountains and protected the region in peace.
Out of gratitude, the villagers built a Spirit Snake Temple at the foot of the mountain. The mountain itself was also renamed Spirit Snake Mountain.
Su Yu stood before the Spirit Snake Temple.
The temple sat along the only path leading into the mountains. Before entering, everyone burned an incense stick and prayed for the protection of the Great Immortal Black Python. It was an unspoken custom observed by all who ventured into the mountain.
She pushed open the door and stepped inside. The temple interior was dimly lit. Only an eternal lamp burned before the statue, its faint flame flickering softly and casting shifting shadows across the black python’s image.
The snake’s head was raised high, while its tail coiled beneath it like a small mountain. Its eyes were set with golden-colored glass jewels. Reflected in the lamplight, they seemed almost alive, staring directly at anyone who entered.
Su Yu paid her respects every time she entered the mountain. Yet even after all these years, the statue still unsettled her. She quickly averted her eyes, knelt, bowed, and offered incense before backing out of the temple.
At the foot of the mountain, the village still basked in brilliant sunshine. But once she entered the deep forest, a chill seemed to seep from every direction. Fortunately, she encountered plenty of other villagers gathering herbs along the way. Every now and then, around a bend in the path, she could spot a distant figure moving among the trees, making the mountain feel far less lonely.
Su Yu spent quite some time searching where she had found a stalk of Wufeng Grass on her last visit. Unfortunately, she couldn’t find a second one.
Wufeng Grass was exceptionally valuable. A single stalk could sell for half a tael of silver. If she could find just one more, her grandmother’s medicine expenses for the month would no longer be a concern, and she might even have enough left over to buy rice.
Her grandmother did, in fact, have another son. However, after Su Yu’s father died, mother and son had fallen into a serious dispute over the old house they currently lived in.
At the time, Second Uncle Su had wanted to sell the property and have his mother bring Su Yu to live with his family instead. But Grandmother refused. She would not live under someone else’s roof, nor would she allow Su Yu to grow up enduring other people’s scorn and judgment.
After several heated arguments, Second Uncle Su finally declared that if she refused to sell the house, he would not support her in her old age. Because of those words, the two had barely spoken for years.
Grandmother never truly relied on him anyway. Stubborn and proud as ever, she spent those years taking Su Yu into the mountains to gather herbs and doing sewing and mending work for others. Somehow, the grandmother and granddaughter survived.
Later, Wu Xiu repeatedly tried to mediate between them. Through holiday visits and occasional exchanges over the years, relations had gradually improved.
Lost in thought, Su Yu continued searching for quite some time, but still failed to find any Wufeng Grass. She had not even come across many ordinary medicinal herbs. Straightening up, she looked around. Not far away, several women and children already had baskets nearly full of gathered herbs.
Looks like I came too late today. Her gaze drifted toward the forest’s deeper reaches. Thinking of her grandmother lying ill in bed, she eventually gritted her teeth and headed farther in.
Spirit Snake Mountain was not a single mountain, but the collective name for an entire mountain range. Its dense canopy blotted out the sun and stretched for dozens of miles. Most herb gatherers only searched around the one or two peaks closest to the village. Few people ventured deeper into the wilderness beyond.
Though stories said the Spirit Snake protected them, these were troubled times. Reports of demons and monsters preying upon humans surfaced one after another. As a result, people still instinctively feared the dark, untouched forests.
Su Yu was afraid as well. But concern for her grandmother’s condition outweighed that fear. She told herself she would go only a little farther in and have another look. The deeper she traveled, the dimmer the forest became.
The air was thick with the damp scent of vegetation, mingled with a strangely sweet, metallic odor she couldn’t quite identify. Cool air slipped into her nostrils with every breath. As she walked, she stirred aside fallen leaves with a stick. She found a few common medicinal plants, but still saw no sign of Wufeng Grass.
The farther she went, the quieter everything became. The vegetation grew thicker and denser. Shadows swayed beneath the trees. The forest was becoming truly unsettling.
Just as her nerves tightened, a sudden clap of thunder boomed overhead. Moments later, bean-sized raindrops crashed down. The storm arrived swiftly and violently. There was nowhere to hide.
Within moments, Su Yu was soaked from head to toe, shivering in the cold wind. Worse still, she still hadn’t found any trace of Wufeng Grass.
Under the torrential rain, the ground quickly became slick and treacherous.
She held up her herb basket as a makeshift shield against the rain while the other hand struggled to keep her balance. Praying for the downpour to end soon, she suddenly stepped on something slippery. Her foot shot out beneath her. In an instant, she lost her balance and tumbled down a steep ravine. The rain swallowed her cry.
The world spun wildly around her. She had no idea how many times she rolled before she finally slammed into the bottom, her descent at last coming to a halt. She lay on her side among the weeds, motionless for a long while. Her basket had long since disappeared.
Her head was spinning. Beneath her lay something hard and cold, stone or something else; she could not tell. The impact had left her back aching. A burning pain throbbed along her arm where a branch had sliced open her skin during the fall.
Rain continued to pour relentlessly. Her clothes were drenched, her dark hair hung in tangled disarray, and she looked utterly miserable. After lying there for a while, she finally regained some clarity.
Wonderful. Not only had she failed to gather any herbs, but she’d also even lost her basket. The thought left her thoroughly dejected.
Bracing herself with a hand on the ground, she tried to push herself upright. The moment her palm pressed down, however, she realized something was wrong. The surface beneath her hand was cold and hard. It did not feel like stone. It did not feel like grass.
Frowning, she lowered her gaze instinctively. The instant she saw what was beneath her hand, every drop of blood in her body seemed to freeze.
Scales. Beneath her palm were dark, gleaming scales, and her fingers were hooked between several overlapping plates of armor-like hide. Her gaze moved stiffly along the trail of scales.
A pitch-black tail, as thick as her waist, coiled and wound through her field of vision. Farther ahead, an enormous serpent’s head rested in the grass. Its body was completely black, covered in dense, finely layered scales.
Su Yu could barely breathe. This… this was… The black python.
The moment she realized what she was sitting on, her whole body trembled. As if burned, she jerked her hand back. At the same time, the serpent’s tail beneath her shifted slightly, as though her touch had finally roused it. Cold scales slid lightly against her rain-soaked calf, sending a fine shiver through her body.
The massive head coiled in the grass slowly lifted and turned toward her through the hazy curtain of rain.
Golden eyes. At their centers were narrow, black, vertical pupils. That icy gaze locked firmly onto her trembling figure.
The instant their eyes met, the statue enshrined in the Spirit Snake Temple flashed across Su Yu’s mind. That clay idol had always rested high upon its altar, its head lowered, gazing down at every mortal who entered to kowtow before it with its pair of golden glass eyes.
She had worshipped there since childhood. Not once had she dared look directly at it. And now the statue had come to life.
I’m going to die. If it opened its mouth, she would become food for this black python, buried forever in the remote mountain wilderness where no one would ever find even her bones.
Su Yu sat frozen atop that dark, massive tail. She could feel herself shaking uncontrollably. Her body had understood the truth before her mind could catch up. She was trapped in a hopeless situation.
The torrential rain had already soaked her through. Against the backdrop of that enormous black tail, she looked like a flower battered from its stem by the storm, pale, fragile, and on the verge of collapse.
Rainwater mixed with cold sweat and the blood flowing from her injured arm, dripping one drop at a time into the tightly packed black scales beneath her.
Time stretched endlessly under the weight of her fear.
The rain continued to pour. Yet the black python never moved. Beyond the veil of rain, those cold, gold-colored eyes simply watched her quietly. Its tail did not coil around her. Its fangs did not pierce her flesh. Not even its immense body shifted an inch. It merely watched. Watched her curl up on its tail, shaking with fear.
Only then did a realization slowly dawn on Su Yu. It didn’t seem to want to eat her. The moment the thought surfaced, all the stories she had heard throughout her life came rushing back in fragments: The Great Spirit Snake, the Spirit Snake Temple, its protection over the region.
She did not know where she found the courage. Using every ounce of strength she possessed, she forced her trembling legs upright and clumsily scrambled off the coiled tail. Ignoring how bedraggled she looked, she crawled and stumbled up the slope on hands and knees. Throughout the entire escape, she never once dared look back. Only after crossing the ravine and climbing over a low ridge, when those golden slit pupils were finally hidden behind layers of dense forest, did her strength leave her. She collapsed onto the mountain path.
The frail figure staggered away and vanished behind the rain curtain.
Silence returned. Only the soft patter of rainfall remained among the flattened grass.
The black python stayed where it was. Its golden vertical pupils continued to stare in the direction Su Yu had disappeared. After a long while, it slowly blinked. A translucent inner eyelid swept across its eyes and slid back again, leaving those cold golden pupils shining even brighter. Its long, thick body glided among the scattered rocks. Lowering its head, it stopped at the section of tail where that fragile human had been sitting moments before. Several muddy smudges remained on the black scales, left behind in her panicked struggle.
A crimson forked tongue slipped from its mouth. It touched a faint reddish stain lodged between the scales, where rainwater had mingled with the blood she had shed. Gently, it licked the spot once. The tongue withdrew. In the rain, those golden slit pupils narrowed slightly.