Chapter One: A Thousand Years in the Blink of an Eye
In the first year of Wude, Yang Guang was slain by Yuwen Huaji in Jiangdu. In that same year, Li Yuan kicked aside the Sui Emperor Yang You and founded the great Tang dynasty, which would last for three centuries. It was also in this very year that, somewhere in the Central Plains, an unexpected visitor descended from the heavens, turning the world upside down.
After a fresh rain upon the empty mountains, the air was tinged with the coolness of autumn as evening approached. Endless peaks stretched beyond sight, and the chill of the season carried a faint sorrow. On an unnamed summit, which should have been alive with birdsong and the fragrance of flowers, an unusual stillness prevailed today. Suddenly, a group of uninvited guests shattered the peace without warning.
There were two parties—one of five people fleeing, the other, a hundred in pursuit.
Abruptly, the five riders fleeing ahead halted their horses.
“Young master! Take the young lady and escape quickly! The three of us will hold them off for a while!” one of the guards, dressed in the livery of a retainer, urged the young man beside him, who wore the uniform of a general.
The young man narrowed his eyes, glanced at the enemy nearly upon them, and made a swift decision: “No! If this goes on, none of us will escape! Their true target is me. My lady, take our son and go—I'll stay behind and cover your retreat!”
Tears streamed down the woman’s face as she cried out, “No! Brother Jiang, we promised to live and die together!”
The young man smiled resolutely. “My lady, what is our promise compared to the life of our child? Let me break my word just this once! Raise our son well, and let him live a peaceful life—that is enough for me.”
“Brother Jiang…”
The woman tried to protest, but the young man interrupted her without hesitation. “Go!”
With one last anguished look at him, she bit down so hard on her lip that blood welled at her mouth. Then, with a final swing of her whip, she rode off, not daring to look back—she knew his fate, and feared that if she turned, she would never find the strength to leave.
But life seldom goes as one wishes, and fate is always fickle. Neither the young man nor the woman had imagined that their pursuers also had their eyes on the child.
Twenty of the hundred split off to give chase to the woman. No matter how the young man roared, how he raged, how desperately he fought, it was all in vain.
The woman, seeing the pursuers approach, grew frantic, lashing her horse with wild abandon. Suddenly, her mount stumbled, throwing her to the ground, and the child tumbled from her grasp into a clump of weeds. She meant to scramble back for her child, but hearing hoofbeats thundering behind her and seeing her horse’s broken leg, she cast a forlorn look at her son. She quickly stripped off her outer robe, bundled it to mimic the shape of a child in her arms, and ran forward with grim resolve.
Two legs could never outrun four. Yet fortune, in its way, smiled—she managed to reach her destination: a cliff’s edge. Hearing the pounding hooves ever closer, she managed a bitter smile, closed her eyes, and leapt into the abyss. Even as she fell, a single thought filled her mind: “Yi’er, whatever happens, do not make a sound!”
In truth, the woman did not know that her fall had already severed her son’s thread of life. Yet perhaps this very scene moved the God who had slipped away from his duties. At the very instant she leapt, a flash of violet light streaked across the sky, and miraculously, the child amidst the weeds began to breathe once more.
An hour later, an elderly Taoist priest appeared at the spot. He looked at the child in the tall grass, then cast a thoughtful glance at the distant cliff. With a sigh, he murmured, “Ah, a world in chaos! So be it. Since fate has brought us together, you and I share a bond. I shall take you as my disciple.”