Greed (one of the three poisons)

Chapter 2

The difference between us is that I obtained it through clever means, while you seized it by force.

She quietly closed her eyes. I never stopped you.

Her body, cool and soft, lay in my arms, at my mercy. Coolness is a characteristic that no inhuman woman can conceal, but in Azi's arms, that coolness possessed an exotic and spicy scent, like musk—a burning cold. In the frenzied rush of passion, a dizzying, intoxicating feeling gradually arose, like flowers falling from the sky. Intoxicated.

Even if all the flowers in the Heavenly Palace fell, they could not conceal the fact that Ah Zi was merely a fox. She possessed piercing eyes, hooked teeth, sharp claws, a pointed snout, and a fox's pungent stench that even the strongest musk could not mask. I kept my mind clear, not letting myself forget the purpose of what I was doing to her at this moment.

Amidst the turmoil, a wisp of heat gradually emerged from her icy body, as if squeezed from nothingness. I held my breath. It was like a soft caterpillar, crawling up her lower body to her abdomen, coiling around. Finally, it curled up into a heap and settled in her dantian. It stopped moving. I tried with all my might to squeeze out the last warm golden thread from the deepest part of her body.

Her eyes opened a crack. Tears shone stubbornly. A few glimmers of emerald light flickered in the woman's dark eyes.

Her red lips were lightly bitten. Tiny ripples appeared, forming delicate, deep teeth marks. I stared at her lips with a hint of malice, watching them gradually fade, layer by layer, like peeling away layers of veiled decoration, until finally, a greyish-white like the distant dawn.

Ah Zi, do you hate me?

You're wrong. There's no love or hate between us, only strength and weakness. This is a dog-eat-dog world. Ah Zi said. It's that simple.

You're the one in the wrong. You've forgotten that there's something in this world called retribution. When you seduced and murdered those young men two hundred years ago, did you ever imagine that now you'd be under someone else's body, stealing their vital energy bit by bit, only to have it drained away again? Your two hundred years of cultivation have merely become a conduit, circulating some mortal essence for me.

---hqszs

Reply [11]: As I spoke, I intensified my thrusts on her body. The true yang energy of a living person was gradually drawn away from her. Azi's weary face became almost transparent in the dawn light. Yet she still smiled. Nothing in this world comes without a price. When those mortals found pleasure in me, they paid their price. That's fair. Even my present situation has its fairness. Because everything you gain comes at a price.

I finally understand that a beast will always be a beast. Ah Zi, you have no heart. Besides harming others for your own benefit, besides the consequences, what else do you think about? You don't understand human emotions. Did you ever consider that some of the boys you killed might have been truly sincere to you, and you merely used them as repositories to drain their life force, letting them wither and die after you left? You are the most hypocritical beast. Those sweet vows made in bed are utterly chilling. Everything was a lie.

"And what about you, Xu Xingzhi? Did you mate with me for pleasure? Wasn't it also to drain my life force?" Cold sweat began to bead on her forehead, her face softening into an almost idiotic expression. Her eyes gradually lost their luster, a sharp glint of green remaining. "Why do you refuse to admit that you and I were originally the same thing?"

I violently assaulted her, pushing her to the brink of confusion and pain. Ah Zi, you're talking nonsense. These are two completely different things. You don't love me.

The sun rose crimson. Ah Zi glanced at me absentmindedly.

Yes. I don't love you.

She added at the end, "There's no love or hate between us. It's just the survival of the fittest."

I left her body. Drained of all her life force, Azi transformed into purple smoke and vanished into the gourd. This bewitching demon, unable to face the sun, returned once more to the prison I had prepared for her.

Only the cool sweat remained on the bed. It evaporated as soon as it was exposed to the sun.

And so, with the gourd that sealed beauty and death hanging from my waist, year after year, I drifted through countless towns and villages. Covered in apricot yellow, like a vast, thick plain, no one could see the secrets beneath. Even if they did, they could not understand. They were merely gourds the size of fingernails. The beauty within was unimaginable, just as the death within was unimaginable.

In truth, I have no intention of causing too much death. Man-made death is an indelible weight. I know that if I cause too many deaths that are not ordained by God, they will eventually weigh heavily on my head. Graves smell of gloom. So I usually don't stay in one place for long. And when I leave, there are only a few bloodless, sickly men left, continuing to live on like withered branches. I never want to kill anyone, even though those men may never recover or lose the ability to procreate.

I believe this will lessen my sins. If the sins are too heavy, the direct consequence is divine retribution. I do not wish to suffer that.

I don't want to be shattered to pieces, I don't want to be doomed forever. I don't want to die.

Yes. I don't want to die. I think the fear of death is innate in all living beings. It's a fear of inherent opposition: life and death. Even as a spiritual practitioner, I know that death is merely like lifting a veil. This seemingly solid physical body in which we temporarily reside is ultimately nothing but an illusion. Just like a veil, gently blown away by the wind. But when life and death are like a game of football, everyone instinctively dodges, unwilling to be hit by that exquisite ball, completely forgetting the original rules of the game. In the end, perhaps only blindness remains.

---hqszs

Reply [12]: Even knowing it's just a veil. I refuse to confront the truth nakedly. Therefore, I do not want to kill, nor do I want to force innocent women in the world to engage in the practice of yin-yang replenishment. Since I am already in this predicament of going against the heavens and committing sins, I choose the lighter option and prolong my life. I just don't want to die. Cowardly and foolishly, I simply don't want to die. In the end, I become an inexplicable entanglement in this life. This youthful face hidden under white hair needs the essence of the living to continue. Imprisoning and driving demons is nothing more than robbing to help thieves. Ah Zi said, I am just a big fish eating a small fish.

I don't know why, but the fox spirit Azi, whose lips are always brimming with a thousand lies, has always been consistently sharp and naked towards me. She tears away all pretense of peace and harmony, showing neither mercy nor leniency. Only the raw, bloody flesh hisses in the air. This fox spirit, the most hypocritical and treacherous of all beasts in the world, insists on facing me, her imprisoner, with uncompromising truth. Two hundred years wasted, efforts futile, reasons for bitter hatred. She, with her cunning, probably secretly planned this way to wound me. There's no way to prove it now.

But I've always kept her imprisoned by my side. Hidden close to my body in the gourd is her resentment and my possessiveness. Beauty is an illusion. I only believe that Azi's significance is merely a conduit for me to circulate the essence of living beings. Her existence is nothing more than that. Even though her radiant face has traversed countless enigmatic legends.

I need Azi to go out and have intercourse with other men, absorbing their essence to maintain my immortality. My rosy, ageless face is hidden in the shadows of tangled white hair and beard. Even though my heart and internal organs have long since rotted in sin, only this face remains immortal. And my immortality through harming others for personal gain. But in the long, long wandering, I gradually forgot why I lived, until finally immortality became a numb, blind existence. I live only to avoid death.

Just as men and women are to me as food and drink, merely a means to survive. Eating without tasting, and even intercourse, is just a refinement, a way to prolong life. I've forgotten why I desire immortality. I don't know how long this will last. It was like this before Azi arrived. And it remains like this after she came.

I kept her by my side, for the sake of immortality. I had become as numb and blind as immortality itself.

Thirty years like this.

The donkeys were quickly sold at the market, fetching only a small amount of loose silver. Five of them. I sold them for a low price, and in the noisy crowd, I seemed to see a resentful glare as the donkeys were led away. But they obediently followed their buyers, their submission as rough and foolish as the straw ropes tied around their necks. They didn't care whether they were going to the slaughterhouse. To be an animal, one has no choice but to accept one's fate. Even though sometimes this fate is just a sudden, unexpected disaster.

That night, I stood by the well, still remembering the contented, chubby face of the innkeeper, Le Tian. That amiable, money-making man with the small mustache was probably snoring soundly beside his wife. With this inn, he figured he could live comfortably for the rest of his life; he wouldn't get rich, nor did he dare dream of it. The good thing was that he didn't have to worry much about the accounts; he had hardly any money. Like today, the inn only had four guests. That strange old Taoist priest didn't need anyone to serve him tea or water; he was happy with his leisure… He was a content innkeeper. He thought he could spend his whole life with this humble, dusty business and his robust wife, snoring away like this.

Under the cool starlight, I watched the white powder drift from between my fingers, leaving not a ripple on the water's surface.

Later, I still couldn't figure out the difference between humans and animals. I wanted to know if it was predetermined at birth. But it was all in vain.

More than sixty years have passed since she left.

---hqszs

Reply [13]: My life continued as before after she left. I still carried around my waist a dazzling array of beauties that left me speechless and unable to imagine, wandering the roads of the world, continuing my debauched and sinful immortal life. White hair and rosy cheeks always need the maintenance of essence and blood. The secret in my room remained the same, with beauties offering their pillows every night, and bees and butterflies swarming at dawn, indulging in endless pleasure. Ah Zi, she was never my only bedmate.

But I will always remain a wandering Taoist priest, watching the sunset alone.

After she left, I started a new form of entertainment.

Every time I watch the powdered medicine fall into the well, I feel a detached pleasure. This feeling is neither good nor bad, as if I have been isolated and still, detached from the workings of the world.

I saw my own soft, gray-haired face reflected in the well. Calm and still. No expression whatsoever. If there was any, it was only blankness.

Different powders resulted in the emergence of different kinds of livestock: cows, horses, donkeys, and pigs. Each conformed to its conventional purpose in the human world. Although the powder sprinkled into the wells all appeared to be the same ordinary white powder, and although those different animals were all the same human beings just a night before, I never relied on this to make a living. Any kind of magic was far easier and more exciting than selling livestock cheaply in the market. I could acquire vast wealth at will if I wanted. It was merely a game without joy or anger. One night, I turned an entire village of children into foals, and I remember the next day when I set off, those foals' dark eyes were as quiet and weary as mine.

A face reflected in the well. An ageless face, the powdered medicine falling like fine snowflakes, so light it made no sound. Unmoved. When immortality has become a numbness, even the reflection no longer shows wrinkles. I have lost my own shadow.

Many things are like this on a night like this: a well, a handful of fine powder—the difference between humans and animals is only a fine line. That difference is so subtle, seeping in silently with the wind, unnoticed. Unnoticed at all. By the time it's noticed, it's already too late.

By the time I realized I could no longer control her, it was too late.

In truth, throughout those years, Azi always upheld her duty as a fox slave, obeying my commands. She would go out after dusk to seduce men, draining their life essence, and return before dawn to let me extract all that she had gained. Her obedience was out of necessity. My strength was far inferior to yours, so I had to obey you. Just as her own words suggested, this beautiful woman consistently followed the animalistic rule that strength was the sole standard.

If power were the sole criterion for everything, I think my control over her would continue indefinitely. Within my cage, she had no chance to increase her magical power; she was always too far behind me. Even if she had the will to retaliate, she lacked the power. But suddenly, one day I discovered I could no longer control Azi. Everything happened without warning. I simply realized abruptly that I could not tolerate her relationships with other men. It was like a raging inferno filling my heart, burning until my internal organs and flesh cracked, peeling away dry and painfully. I could not bear it, even knowing it was merely a method used by demons to absorb true yang, as commonplace in this world of cultivation as condensing an inner core into a bright bead and exhaling it towards the full moon. But I don't know when all of this began.

It turns out that many things are really like the dark night, some separations and changes, so subtle, seeping in with the wind, silent, and unnoticed.

One day, my imprisoned fox slave, Azi, lost her purpose as a fox slave. She was no longer released to seduce ignorant mortals. The thousand lies hidden beneath her innocent face, and the seductive arts in bed capable of killing men, no longer had a chance to be used. But if a fox spirit does none of these things, what else can she do? I couldn't find the answer for Azi. And I myself no longer had intercourse with her, because upon realizing I could no longer let her go out and drain the lifeblood of mortals, I also realized that I, too, could no longer drain her lifeblood.

To engage in sexual intercourse with a fox spirit without the intention of absorbing its essence would be an extremely foolish and dangerous act. These alluring women are like vast black holes, their breaths sizzling as they greedily and indiscriminately drain away all essence, energy, spirit, and blood, until the very body that sustains its existence in the mortal world is completely withered and destroyed. This is the way of survival for their kind. Instinct. I am well aware of this danger. But I can no longer face Azi's gradually fading, translucent face beneath me in the pale morning light. Watching her lips, like languid flowers indifferent to worldly success or failure, fade from a warm, radiant red, bit by bit, into decay and decay. Suddenly, I lose the ability to do as I please with Azi.

If nothing has changed, then only your heart has changed. But everything is different from now on. In truth, she has always been a mere wild spirit with such shallow cultivation. In truth, what truly defeated me was not her, but myself. And the one who led me all the way to the final outcome was only myself. But I never admitted any of this to Azi.

---hqszs

Reply [14]: I just couldn't let her lie in another man's arms. I just couldn't let her lie in my arms. I didn't know what the fox spirit Azi could do when she was no longer seductive, so later, I just imprisoned her like that, no longer releasing her with the other spirits in the gourd. Just like that, imprisoned her.

I didn't tell myself the truth, but actually, I just wanted to keep her by my side.

And so I dwell in this gourd, hidden close to my flesh. Day and night. This woman who shattered my heart and paralyzed my spiritual power. My secret.

Every night I sleep with a different woman. But I no longer sleep with her.

Her existence existed only in the warmth of her body pressed against mine. Unattainable. I've collected countless beauties, but she was never my only one. Yet why, every night when I lay panting heavily on top of any stunning woman, did I only see those eyes, filled with a faint mockery? Ah Zi sobbed softly inside the gourd. What wrong had I done? Why was I locked up? Then she began to howl uncontrollably, the sound like shattered blades, sharp and piercing my heart.

Ah Zi, because I hate your mocking eyes. Those mocking eyes that seem to see the end. I want you to know that in this game, you are not the one who can always control everything.

Because over two hundred and seventy men have died because of your tenderness and debauchery. And every night before tonight, at my urging, you rolled through the beds of different men, your lips trembling with thin lies and malicious coquetry. In truth, you would have done the same even without my urging. Because you are a vixen, promiscuous and alluring, even though your clear beauty pierces through my riddled magic… because I hate your wicked seduction… Ah Zi. Because I want you to stay by my side.

But I said nothing. From then on, I never spoke to Azi again. I ignored her howls and pleas. I embraced every body that writhed beneath me in the greyish morning light, except for Azi.

I don't know what the difference is between not seeing her like this and letting her go. But I can't imagine letting her go. Even now, all that represents her is a gourd the size of a fingernail... I can no longer see her feigned innocent face. Finally, I realize that for me, Azi has become a cruel blindness, like immortality. I live only to avoid death. I keep Azi by my side only so that she can be by my side.

The bright red ribbon on the gourd's lid tied the knot in my heart. The warmth pressed against my skin couldn't warm this distance. I stroked the gourd. I began to miss Azi intensely.

Day after day.

Just like after Azi really left, I missed her on every road I wandered, at every sunset. Just missing her. Missing someone is something you can only do alone, so there are no words.

I find it strange that I often think of Azi at any time. And so I begin to miss her. So many years have passed. I think if Azi were to see me again, she would still recognize me. Because my appearance hasn't changed at all. All these years, I've remained that childlike face hidden in white hair, just as Azi has always been an invisible phantom. A phantom is emptiness, and emptiness is always emptiness, so Azi hasn't changed at all over the years. I'm content. But I always think—if Azi were to see me again—I often forget that she can no longer see me, and I can no longer see her.

I always forget about this, even though I buried her last remaining form in this world with my own hands sixty-eight years ago. Only occasionally, when I gently brush the dust off my apricot-yellow Taoist robe, do I suddenly remember that Azi will never come back.

I used to think that missing someone was a complicated thing. Later I realized it's actually incredibly simple. Missing someone is simply because you can no longer see them. It's that simple.

---hqszs

Reply [15]: The weeping and howling of Azi during her imprisonment never ceased during those days and nights, occasionally interspersed with sharp claws scratching, like some rough broken tiles scraping across, leaving wide red marks in the air, seeping blood. After being put into the gourd, her voice seemed to shrink along with her body, becoming a metallic whimper, like a fly fluttering its wings in the sweltering afternoon of a hot summer, a single mournful string, sharp and cracking open the heart.

Even when cornered, she still possessed an innate silver tongue. This cunning and aloof creature knew no bounds of sanity; she could always see every opportune moment. In a world where strength and weakness, life and death, had been sharply divided for millions of years, for a frail beast, cunning was its only means of survival. In her predicament, Azi used all her sharpness and pitiful charm.

Please, let me out. What did I do wrong? Tell me, and I'll change.

Let me out. I'll do whatever you say... Haven't I always listened to you? Just let me out... Xu Xingzhi, I know you can hear me... Don't ignore me. Let me out, and I'll do whatever you want... Xu Xingzhi, even if you don't let me out, at least tell me why! You can't just lock me up like this until I die... Tell me, why? Why are you afraid to talk to me? You're hiding something... I know what you're thinking.

Did you hear me? Don't think I don't know what you're thinking.

What do you think I'm thinking?

What do you think? Like a greedy vine grasping at the base of a pillar, she climbed up swiftly. Meticulously. What you're thinking is what I'm thinking too.

Through the pale yellow gourd skin, I could almost see the little fox's maliciously sweet smile. A smile I hadn't seen in so long… Suddenly, the thirst-quenching sweetness, like the mirage of a lake, became a seductive allure, tempting one to their doom.

"Am I wrong?" Azi suddenly detached from all her anxiety and anguish, speaking calmly. "Let me tell you, Xu Xingzhi, as long as you let me out, I promise to be loyal to you and never betray you. You just want to possess me all to yourself... What's the point of keeping me locked up like this?"

Her voice grew sweeter. Slowly, with a calm confidence, as if victory was assured.

I swear I will never betray you. Otherwise, may all my centuries of cultivation be lost, may my body be reduced to ashes—don't you believe me? Let me out, I beg you.

I've always known about her thousand lies… I think no one understands this beast's fickleness better than me. Her vows, like spilled blood, easily change color and dry up. In the blink of an eye, everything changes. But finally, when I lifted the dust-covered seal from the gourd lid, I finally understood that all I longed for was to see her like this, before me. I just wanted to see her. To turn her head and smile. This feeling, this scene.

I think I haven't regretted it since that moment. I haven't had time to regret it.

Azi stood on the ground, her face pale, yet she smiled faintly. The wisps of grayish-purple smoke condensed into a substance that seemed even more ethereal and elusive.

It's been a long time since we last saw each other, hasn't it?

She said. That day marked the end of her long and arduous imprisonment. Ten years. I had never even counted; it had already been ten years without me realizing it.

But her warm smile remained as radiant and unfettered as ever, like a flower in full bloom. There was no resentment whatsoever. From that day on, Ah Zi and I were inseparable. Just as she herself had said, "Let me out, and I'll do whatever you say." Ah Zi, seeing the light of day again, suddenly became more obedient and understanding than ever before. Her clear and innocent face now seemed to finally reflect her true self. Once freed from her life of seduction, even the pungent odor she possessed seemed to have vanished without a trace. Now, Ah Zi was simply a sweet, transparent droplet of water, radiating a crystal-clear glow from the inside out. I was amazed at how this woman possessed such a beautiful appearance; every smile and frown had a tenderness that tugged at the heartstrings. So tender, yet so unpredictable, like a cloud that, if not held tightly, might scatter; yet like a cloud, it had to be watched closely, lest the slightest glance reveal its new beauty. She possessed a thousand charms and a hundred allurees; every look was captivating.

---hqszs

Reply [16]: I never leave my room, like the ancients who abandoned farming and weaving, day and night, greedy and never satisfied. What is the essence of refining qi, what is the yin-yang replenishment, those things are probably forgotten even if they are thousands of miles away. For the first time in my life, my hands, which only know how to draw red and yellow talismans, picked up the ink brush and carefully outlined her eyebrows like spring mountains. But I clumsily drew two hard lines, which aroused her scolding and annoyance. Unexpectedly, Azi's ten fingers were much more nimble than mine. She cut bamboo into hairpins and combed my messy white hair, and trimmed the weeds under my chin into three neat and long beards.

"You look much better like this now. You're not allowed to be sloppy anymore." She stroked my clean face and held up a bronze mirror in front of me. Only then did I realize that the person in the mirror also had such a handsome face; I had never imagined it for so many years.

But with such a young face, won't people find it strange?

Azi pouted. Let them wonder! Why should I care about others? I only care about you. Xu Xingzhi, I just love you the way you are!

She still calls me by my full name. It's a habit. It's hard to change, yet it carries a childlike intimacy. I don't want her to call me anything else. I feel that as we are now, we are like a pair of lovebirds, inseparable and eternal. I don't want anything to change, I don't want any further alteration to disrupt this moment of reunion. I'm apprehensive about this sudden happiness, cherishing this very moment, unwilling to let it pass.

That day I finally understood that some things don't matter who the recipient is; when they befall me, no matter how turbulent the world, no matter how wicked the villain, I'm still just as helpless. Startled and overjoyed, I lost my composure. The dream, fulfilled in an instant, left me with a fear of loss, a fear that it was an illusion, a fear that it would end, a fear that it wouldn't last. My long life has been filled with countless sins. Looking back on this vast and desolate journey, it's too far, I can't even see where I started. I don't even remember ever being young. It's as if I was born such a gloomy and treacherous sorcerer. A white-haired, ruddy-faced old monster. Yet, in this house, a place of wandering on a journey, it's as if I've picked up a youth I never possessed. Before her, I laughably unfold this unexpected, youthful innocence. I thought it would never happen.

I myself cannot imagine that, day and night, dawn and dusk, we faced each other, yet I never violated her in the slightest. I cannot even imagine that this woman before me was the concubine I had possessed for twenty years, the one I had slept with, the one I had repeatedly penetrated to the deepest part of her body, draining her of her life essence. I had already seen her body completely.

But this woman before me, at this moment, I only feel her purity, like ice and snow. To me, she is like the rosy clouds of the high sky, mysterious and untouchable. Everything she gives me is new, so new that it erases the past twenty years of sharing a bed, ten years of imprisonment and resentment. If only life could be like our first meeting.

I have no intention of violating her. Even though we rise together in the morning and sleep together at night, after so many years of practicing sexual cultivation, the pleasures of men and women are no longer a great joy for me. I have no desires. I only wish for this harmonious companionship, for her beautiful face to always be by my side, forever and ever.

"Ah Zi," I said. "Let's start over. I only want to start over with you."

She smiled slightly. "Of course. We've only known each other for three days."