Chapter 24 - Act 4. The Bamboo Tube Beauty (5)

“That seems a little too drastic... We should report this to our superiors first.”

Yise agreed with Seol Ryeong’s suggestion. Just then, the Bamboo Tube Beauty broke into their conversation.

“Honored elders! Would you please hear me out?!”

“About what?”

“Please... grant me a favor. I beg you.”

Yise had a feeling this was about to become troublesome. He had taken the mission hoping to advance his training. He had no wish to get embroiled in something that offered nothing but trouble and little to gain.

The problem was that he had a tenderhearted companion who would be moved by the desperate yearning in her voice.

“Hmm... Shall we at least hear her out?”

Yise nodded as though he had expected as much. The Bamboo Tube Beauty immediately began speaking, as if she had been waiting for her chance.

“I am looking for a human. Someone I must see again.”

A long tale poured from her tiny mouth.

“When I naturally acquired spirituality and first became conscious, the forest on the immortal mountain where I lived was deep in the mountains, untouched by human feet. There were no humans, and I was the only spiritual being there. For three hundred years, I never once spoke to anyone or anything. Then I met a human. He was a neat, well-groomed scholar with finely defined features... and such a kind man.”

A dreamy expression came over her face, as though she were recalling a distant memory.

“He told me he was a wandering scholar who had come to the southern coast to recuperate. When he discovered me, he gave me a radiant smile. I had never seen a smile so beautiful.”

There seemed to be happiness in that dreamy expression, and her description was as vivid as if she were recounting something from only a few days ago.

“Every day, he would spend an hour talking with me before leaving. He taught me letters, composed poems for me, and sang to me. Those days were such a joy. I was truly... happy. I was no longer alone.”

Yet the two listeners already sensed something strangely wrong with her story.

An ordinary scholar, a mere mortal, had happened upon a guardian spirit deep in the mountains?

That was as improbable as a bamboo plant acquiring spirituality and becoming a spiritual being.

“A Cultivator.”

“Seems like it.”

They exchanged the words silently, moving only their lips.

And once a Cultivator met a spiritual being, disaster was surely the inevitable outcome.

“I gave him little pieces of my spirituality to help him recover. Fortunately, he seemed to regain his health bit by bit. Then... he told me he had to return to his hometown.”

[“Will you come with me?”]

[“Where do you mean?”]

[“To my hometown.”]

[“Your hometown? What is it like?”]

[“It’s a bustling place. Full of life and all sorts of delightful things. Every day brings something new.”]

[“If I go with you... will you still talk with me as you do now?”]

[“Of course.”]

[“Then will you still compose poems for me?”]

[“Certainly.”]

[“Will you stay by my side so I won’t be lonely?”]

[“As long as I live, I will always be your friend. I promise.”]

[“Then I do not wish to part from you either.”]

“I went with him.”

The Bamboo Tube Beauty had followed him north.

“I did not want to be alone again...”

And she had received a name.

Though the environment was unsuitable for her, and her spirituality dwindled little by little as she restored the scholar’s health, she was happy nonetheless.

When the scholar finished his daily work, he would set her by the window and talk with her every night. By day, she watched the human world beyond the shuttered window; by night, she listened to his stories until he went to sleep.

For seven years, she could not have been happier.

But out of more than three hundred years, she had been allowed only seven years of happiness.

On the very day that marked seven years since she had met the human—

“I was left here without knowing why.”

She added that she had waited here for him for fifty years. The emotions steeped so deeply in her voice were resentment and longing.

By then, her spirituality had already been exhausted. To survive until she could see the scholar again, she had created this bamboo grove.

At the cost of her own lifespan.

“At first, I simply missed him. But before long, I began to resent him.”

The Bamboo Tube Beauty had likely become a guardian spirit out of a desire to protect the bamboo grove. But as her resentment grew, she must have lost her Principle and set foot on the path of Corruption.

“I felt I would soon succumb completely to Corruption, lose my reason, and become a Demon that did nothing but harm humans... That was why I caught ordinary people and frightened them. I thought perhaps rumors of me would reach him. Perhaps he would hear of me and come back...”

All alone, she had kept crying out unheard.

For fifty long years.

Time had stopped for her fifty years ago. The Bamboo Tube Beauty’s voice became a desolate echo, drifting feebly among the bamboo.

“I wanted to ask him. Why did you abandon me? Why won’t you come to see me...?”

Silence engulfed the grove. Neither could say a word. Stifled by helpless frustration, Yise tipped his head back toward the sky.

Flowers were blooming on the Bamboo Tube Beauty’s head. Flowering sickness.

Bamboo did not normally flower. On the rare occasions it did, it died not long after the blossoms faded.

For ordinary bamboo, this would mean giving way to the next generation. The flowers on her head, however, likely meant that her life as a spiritual being was nearing its end.

She would become a Demon entirely.

“You should have just stayed on your immortal mountain.”

He murmured the words under his breath. Understanding what he meant, the Bamboo Tube Beauty smiled gently. Her eyes said, I have no regrets.

“That scholar must be a Cultivator. He probably brought you here to—”

“Let’s help her.”

Seol Ryeong cut him off. Even at the resolute look in her eyes, Yise shook his head.

“We’re dealing with a Cultivator. One who has been training for at least fifty years. This will be several times more dangerous than a mission to exorcise a low-grade evil spirit.”

“I know. But... we can at least find out the truth. We can’t be certain he meant her harm. Something might have happened to him, or circumstances beyond his control might have kept him away.”

“Even so, merely encountering a Cultivator of a high realm can be dangerous. Have you forgotten the Daemudo Basic Handbook?”

Seol Ryeong flinched briefly before arguing back.

“I know. I know that. But...”

“If you want, we can soothe her soul with a Consolation Ceremony instead of an exorcism. But nothing beyond that. It’s too dangerous.”

“Yise.”

Seol Ryeong’s voice was quiet. In place of her usual light, lively tone was utter gravity.

“Don’t forget. We are Daoists.”

“...”

“Cultivation is a path that defies heaven. If you abandon Principle at every crossroads and seek only the easy way, you will never escape a tremendous heavenly tribulation. Its severity depends on how far the path you have climbed has strayed from Principle.”

Yise listened to her in silence.

“Cultivation is not the goal, but the outcome of a process. Remember that what we must do now is not pursue Cultivation, but follow the Dao.”

She was a fellow Cultivator of his own age who seemed so very young, yet the intelligence in her words was unmistakable.

Striving to find a way for a spiritual being with a painful past and depleted spirituality to avoid Corruption—that, she was insisting, was Principle.

A brief silence followed.

Yise closed his eyes in thought, while Seol Ryeong tilted her head toward the sky and jingled the spell-bell orb in her hand. It was almost as though she were reading heaven’s secrets, or casting a fortune.

After some time, Yise asked her,

“So. What do you want to do?”

“Let’s spend just seven days looking for news of the scholar she told us about. If we still can’t find him, I’ll give up.”

Seven days.

Could they achieve anything meaningful in just seven days and seven nights?

He judged it impossible. Besides, the heavenly tribulation Seol Ryeong spoke of had little bearing on his constitution.

But she was a companion he owed gratitude to, someone who had readily joined him on a dangerous mission for friendship’s sake alone. Her opinion deserved at least to be respected.

Yise let out a faint sigh and asked the Bamboo Tube Beauty,

“Is there any hope of reversing this?”

“My last hope... is for him to call me by the name he bestowed on me. If I reclaim my name... perhaps I can halt the Corruption.”

“What’s your name?”

“Ah... I’m sorry, but the scholar must speak it himself. Please call me the Bamboo Tube Beauty instead.”

“All right, Bamboo Tube. How long can you hold out?”

“...”

“You need to answer.”

“If you mean the Corruption... I think I have about a month.”

“Conserve your strength, and stay out of ordinary people’s sight. If you’ve become a Demon by the time we return, I’ll exorcise you.”

“Yes...”

“Write the scholar’s name here, and draw his features and appearance. As close a likeness as you can. Everything you remember.”

Yise handed the Bamboo Tube Beauty a brush and ink paper, then turned back to Seol Ryeong.

“First, we report to the sect. If they accept our proposal, then we look for the Cultivator.”

“All right.”

“One week. We’ll spend exactly that long on this, as you said. And if he’s alive and turns out to be in a higher realm than us, we absolutely must not antagonize him.”

“I promise.”