Chapter 5: The book Snowy Mountain with a Peach Blossom Tree Volume I

During winter, the days were short and the nights were long. As the sunlight began to drain away, the skies overhead bled briefly with pink and violet hues, signalling to street vendors and shopkeepers alike that it was time to light up their lanterns.

The crowded market street teeming with people from all walks of life was flanked by two rows of shops and street vendors. Herds of martial artists from various factions and alliances roamed about makeshift booths, fancy restaurants and teahouses, as well as shops selling weaponry, jewellery and local specialities. As the martial arts convention was the next day, excitement and anticipation lingered in the air, which also carried the savoury aroma of food.

My feet dragged wearily across the dusty and gritty bazaar ground while my arms ached under the weight of a stack of parcels piled mountain high. The back of my neck ached from craning sideways to peer around the obstruction to my vision. Having walked all afternoon, I was famished and footsore. Blisters had formed at the sides and back of my feet. The boots that Xiao Lan gave were hard and rough, and were not at all like the comfortable trainers that modern society was blessed with.

A cool, crisp breeze wafted the fragrance of meat buns towards us. Searching for the source, I did not have to look far before I caught sight of a street vendor lifting a wooden lid off a stack of bamboo baskets. A cloud of white steam gushed out before dissipating into the icy air. My mouth started to water at the sight of the fluffy white steamed buns cradled comfortably in the bamboo steamer which would give them a subtle woody scent. I could already imagine biting into the juicy savoury meat at the centre of the soft warm bun and the lingering aftertaste of warmth and homeliness.

"Young lady! Come try our steamed buns!" The street vendor noticed my longing gaze and called out with a broad smile. I swallowed and gave an awkward smile.

"Can we get that?" I raised my voice above the noise, hoping to get Mo Yue's attention. But he did not seem to have heard me and kept going. My heart sank at the lost opportunity to satiate my hunger and I shuffled after him begrudgingly. How could he continue to remain unmoved and not be tempted by the wide array of food that had passed us by? The entire afternoon, we had not stopped at a single food place. All we did was enter shops after shops for Mo Yue to purchase useless items like clothes, weapon accessories, writing materials. Claiming that they were going to be souvenirs, he also bought boxes of local delicacies and snacks but never opened a single one to taste.

Weaving deftly through the crowd, Mo Yue turned off the street and entered a fan shop. I hurried to follow him, and narrowly avoided crashing into an exiting customer as I navigated the steps leading up to the entrance.

Fans of different designs, shapes and sizes stood on countertops and on tall shelves against the wall. A few extraordinarily large folding fans made of silk were proudly displayed in the most prominent location of the shop for customers to admire the intricate and detailed paintings on them. One fan had a painting of bright yellow chrysanthemums accompanied by a poem in illegible scrawls; and another had a landscape of mountains and rivers painted on its white silk.

To avoid bumping into the well-dressed and scholarly martial heroes who steadily streamed into the shop, I stood against the wall of the shop, next to a standing lamp. The slight warmth from the candle flame permeated the lampshade and spread to my cheeks, a contrast against the chill air. Jolting out of my introspective idleness, I search around the shop for Mo Yue. He was busy studying a handheld folding fan with four characters on it written in calligraphy pen. I sighed internally, feeling the blood in my temples. He was taking too long to window shop for fans.

I limped slightly to lessen the pain as I moved towards him. "Why are you looking at fans? Are you buying one as a souvenir for a member of your organisation?"

"I am thinking of getting on for myself," he said without looking up from his inspection. "I can use it for when I feel warm."

I stared at him, brows tightly knitted. Was he being serious about using such an elegant and status-defining fan to create wind? Should it not be more appropriate to use it as an accessory to complement his tall, handsome and genteel image instead?

"Are you done yet?" I asked Mo Yue, trailing behind him. A sharp pain shot up the back of my right feet and leg as I took a step forward. Shivers ran through my spine. Flinching, my grip on the parcels weakened and the items that Mo Yue had bought tumbled onto the stone floor.

"What's wrong?" He turned around from his browsing, startled.

"I'm hungry, tired and in a lot of pain."

Mo Yue returned the sandalwood fan in his hand back to the shelf as his mouth twitched. "Already hungry? Did you not eat merely four hours ago?"[1]

I squatted down, hugged my legs close to my body and groaned pitifully, "my arms and feet hurt. I think I scraped the skin on my feet and shin. There may be bleeding." After walking all day, my socks had come untied and had slipped down to my ankles. The friction of the rough boots on my tender skin had definitely given me abrasions.

Seeing that I remained unmoved and did not scramble to retrieve the fallen objects despite the strange looks that people were throwing at us, Mo Yue took a deep breath, passed his sword to me and bent down to pick the packages up. He stacked them neatly on a wooden countertop before lifting them up effortlessly.

"Let's go." He pursed his lips together, a subtle tinge of guilt in his tone. "Can you still walk?"

I stood up, slightly reddened. Would he think that I was throwing a tantrum? I tried to console myself with the thought that I had not complained for the past few hours and had dutifully given helpful comments on the souvenirs that he purchased. I was pretty much an excellent shopping companion. "Yes," I said after a pause, "where are we going?"

"To have dinner," he replied vaguely and turned to walk out of the shop. "Be careful of the threshold and steps."

My face lit up instantly and my eyebrows shot up in surprise. It was on the tip of my tongue to remark that he should be the one to be careful instead and not trip over the uneven cobblestone steps, but I was too taken aback by his sudden change in behaviour. Did he just show me some concern?

A single step forward ignited the searing pain in my lower limbs and I clutched tightly onto the metal sheath, my palms damp with perspiration. Wincing, I bore with the pain and hobbled alongside Mo Yue.

Noticing that I was limping, he offered gently. "You can hold onto my arm if it helps you to walk better."

I shot him a sideway glance. "But shouldn't you be more concerned that men and women should keep their distance?"[2]

"And were you concerned about that earlier when you were tugging at me on the street, in the middle of a scuffle?"

"Indeed I wasn't," I smiled and rested one cold hand on his forearm, over his sleeves. His clothes felt thicker than they looked. "Many thanks."

***

After much difficulty in supporting me up the stairs to the second floor of a rather lavish and upscale restaurant, Mo Yue and I followed a waiter who led us to a quieter section, away from the rowdy patrons who were giddy with alcohol. The restaurant was adorned with red ribbons and red lanterns that were brightly lit up to chase the darkness of the night away. The waiter, dressed in coarse dark brown clothing with a towel hanging over one shoulder, slowed down his pace as he turned around repeatedly to look at us with considerate eyes. He sat us down before running off quickly.

Slumping into a chair, a wave of relief washed over me as the weight on my aching feet lightened considerably. Mo Yue deposited the gains from his shopping spree on the ground and took his sword from me. I eyed the pile of boxes and bundles, a laugh escaped from my lips. Once, Ji Kai mentioned that he had gone window shopping with Chen Yunyi and he could not understand how females could walk around the mall all day without getting exhausted. What an irony it was now that the tables have turned. Never would I have imagined a day where I would be accompanying Ji Kai on his shopping adventures.

Although I was Ji Kai's childhood friend, our relationship dynamic was rather strange and unnecessarily complicated. Even if people knew that Ji Kai and I had known each other for years, they would not have thought that we were close friends after observing our interactions. In fact, we barely hung out together and spoke to one another in front of others. It was common knowledge that Ji Kai had few friends in his inner circle, but it was lesser known that I was one of them—at least up till last year.

People generally knew that he was good friends with Xu Hanwen and Chen Yunyi, both of whom were ranked second and third academically in school. Not only did they occupy the top ranks in terms of their grades and smarts, they were also sporty, outgoing and beautiful people. When the trio ate together in the cafeteria, it would look just like a scene from an idol drama. Chen Yunyi was just like the reddest of roses among the greenest of (two blades of) grass. People would speculate that there was a love triangle between them: Hanwen fancied Yunyi but the latter held an unrequited love for Ji Kai, who seemed to have someone else in his guarded heart. But the various theories and rumours were never accurate on who that someone in his heart was. That was because only I, as Ji Kai's childhood friend, knew about another strange and unnecessarily complicated relationship that he had with Shen Qi, a girl who had emigrated last summer.

"Are you ready to order, sir?" The waiter returned with two empty cups and a pot of freshly brewed tea.

I looked at Mo Yue blankly. Where was the menu? How were we supposed to order without knowing what the restaurant served?

"Do you have any preferences?" He turned to me and asked, at the same time resting his hands on the table.

I shook my head quickly to indicate that he could take the lead in ordering the dishes. Scratching his nose, Mo Yue thought for a split second before reciting a list of fancy dish names that I did not recognise apart from individual words like 'tofu' and 'vegetables'. "I would have to trouble you to get me some cloth bindings," he said as he took out a small silver nugget and gave it to the waiter whose eyes lit up instantly.

"Why do you need cloth?" I asked after the waiter left. Lifting up the teapot to pour us some tea, my weak arms trembled under its heavy weight.

"Let me do it."

"Thank you." I retracted my hand and pushed my cup across the table. Mo Yue gracefully poured the clear golden-coloured tea into the cups without spilling a single drop. I stared at the wisps of steam rising from the surface of the tea and wondered if he would respond to my question. But there was only long moment of silence. I placed my hands around the sides of the cup to warm them up but the ceramic cup was scalding to the touch.

Mo Yue lifted up his cup with both hands, one wrapped around its side and one supporting the base, and carefully sipped from the rim. I watched him curiously. A feeling of deja vu swept over me as flashbacks of the times when I had watched intently and intensely as book characters downed the awareness-erasing tea surfaced in my mind.

"Xiaoyu." He placed his cup down and his attention fell on my untouched tea. "Drink some tea to warm yourself. The weather is cold."

I stiffened as my face warmed. Calling me by my nickname and with a tone so gentle felt unusual.

I suppressed and concealed the quiet contentment that filled my trembling heart. "I wanted to wait for it to cool," I replied indifferently but acquiesced. Even if the person in front of me was likely to be Ji Kai who encountered a freak transmigration, he was now Mo Yue with no memories of his real life. After all, I did introduce myself as Xiaoyu when we met earlier. If I had told him that my name was "Fang Xiaoyu", he would certainly have addressed me in a strait-laced manner, such as calling me "Fang-guniang".

Mo Yue nodded approvingly when I lifted the cup to my lips. Blowing on the bits of floating tea leaves on the surface before taking a sip, I inhaled the warm fragrance and let the steam provide some relief to my cold stinging nose.

We managed to have a short discussion about tea and tea leaves before the food arrived. After two steamed buns came tofu with minced pork drenched in gravy, followed by sautéed Chinese yams with mixed vegetables, and finally rich mutton soup to warm the body up. I insisted that Mo Yue introduce the dishes before we started eating. Although I was not a fan of how mutton tasted, I could not stop drinking it. Despite being part of a fantasy novel, this restaurant surprisingly served appetising and delectable food. I had the impression that the food would be bland and without much flavour. The universes within books were quite interesting.

I stared down at the last bits and pieces of food on the plates before looking up at Mo Yue who had already placed his chopsticks down and was watching me. He sat unmoving, with prim straight back and hands on his lap. Another flashback of the rare instances when I had lunch with Ji Kai came to mind, but I brushed the memories away.

"You're not eating anymore?" I washed down a morsel of steamed bun coated with gravy with some tea.

The corners of his mouth quirking up, Mo Yue shook his head. "You can have the rest."

"I'm good," I said, resting my chopsticks on my bowl. With my stomach satiated, I felt my mood elevate. I should make arrangements to meet with Mo Yue tomorrow. After which I would be able to return to my lodging and rest for the night. But before all that, how should the bill be split? My hand rubbed against the outline of a silver ingot through the cloth of my bag. I did not know how much this meal would cost, but if Mo Yue wanted to go dutch I should have sufficient money.

"Shall we get the bill?"

"Hold on," Mo Yue interjected and pulled out a roll of greyish-white cloth. "You mentioned that your feet hurt. You can use this cloth to bandage up your wound."

I glanced downwards at the black tip of the boot that peeped from my long draperies. Taking the cloth binding from his hand, I examined it curiously. The fabric was a far cry from the crepe bandages that we had, but it was soft and long enough to wrap around my feet, shins and calves. Without a second thought, I lifted the hem of my gown and started to remove my shoes very gingerly.

"Wait—"

Mo Yue suddenly rose from his seat and hastily stood in front of me, shielding me from public view. I looked up at him with short-lived confusion. Ignoring his protests that I should act modestly in public, I proceeded to remove my shoes and socks, exposing the broken blisters and bleeding cuts on the sides and back of my feet.

"I'm a male," I laughed at Mo Yue's flustered reactions. Eyes darting about wildly, he snapped his head to one side.

"No, you are not," he rejoined.

I unrolled the cloth and began wrapping it around my injuries in a circular motion, starting from my feet and moving up towards my knee. Reaching the end of its length, I tied a knot over my shin. I placed my leg down onto the ground and was about to bandage my other leg when the bindings came apart loosely. "Even if there is no elasticity, it shouldn't fall apart!"

Mo Yue glanced at me, drawing his brows together. I could not pinpoint his exact emotions but his expression was a mixture of bemusement, embarrassment and amusement. "Pardon my lack of manners."

He bent down in a half-squat, gently unwounded the cloth on my leg, applied some ointment on my wounds, before applying the bandage on me again. My heart started racing as I watched Mo Yue. The technique that he used was one that was taught to us during first aid lessons in school.

Last year, before the incident with Shen Qi, Ji Kai and I had to attend first aid lessons when we volunteered to be first aiders for the annual sports meet. During the training sessions, we even paired up to practice bandaging on each other. Being a first aider, I would not have to participate in the events and I could also hang out with Shen Qi. Perhaps, he was simply uninterested in taking part in a boring school event. Every time there was a school-wide event, Ji Kai and his two followers would remain uninvolved and simply have fun among themselves. But that would not explain his sudden desire to volunteer as a first aider, especially since he was never certified in the first place. Perhaps, a more logical explanation would be that after Ji Kai knew that Shen Qi would be on first aid duty, he volunteered to be a first aider as well.

"Do you not know how to wear socks?" Mo Yue asked flatly after bandaging both my legs. He picked up my socks without any trace of disgust.

"I, Of course I do—not know," I stammered, my face flushing all of a sudden for no reason. "I usually know, but not now."

Wordlessly, he slipped the long socks onto my feet and lower legs before tying them securely in place. "Did you watch how I did it?"

I bit my lower lip and nodded rapidly. "Thank you for the lesson and for helping me with the bandaging."

"It's nothing. I hope I didn't offend you." Mo Yue straightened up and returned to his side of the table. He took out a few pieces of silver and placed them on the table before calling for the waiter.

"I can pay for half of my share." I offered eagerly. I could not sit back and watch him pay for the whole meal. Ji Kai had never treated me before. We would always split costs two ways or purchase our own food. In my mind, there was after all only a kind of transactional friendship between us and there was no reason for him to treat me to a meal, even if he could afford it.

But Mo Yue held up a hand, indicating that I did not have to. A feeling of warmth dilated in my heart. "Xiaoyu, you seem like a young miss from a good family and it is probably your first time going around jianghu. You don't look like you have martial arts training and you also don't seem to know the value of money around here. You wouldn't even know if you got scammed."

"What do you mean? I would never fall prey to a scam. I'm intelligent." I faked a gasp and gave a half shrug. Back home, we were educated on so many different types of scams: people pretending to be victims of a road accident, online scams involving banking details, fake police, fake court documents, and more. I had been immensely educated in identifying scams and cautioning others against scams too. How could I ever be cheated?

"You gave a whole ingot to the innkeeper at the inn earlier, but did you collect the keys to the room?"

"No, but I will get it later."

"If the innkeeper were dishonest, he would have pocketed your money and let out the room to another customer by now." Mo Yue mechanically picked up his sword and handed it to me as if out of habit.

"But he looked like an honest person to me!" A dark abyss seemed to grow before me as I tried to recall the innkeeper's words and mannerisms, evaluating for myself whether he was truly deceitful.

"There is no use attempting to deceive yourself and others.[3] We will find out sooner or later," he rejoined with a smile, gathering up his belongings and signalling with his head for me to move ahead of him.

I stood up with a long sigh. What was I going to do if the innkeeper denied me a room later? After an entire day, my initial worry was back to bug me. Maybe I should return back to the Garden tonight—since I had already discovered some clues in Mo Yue. "Wait, did you already notice me when I entered the inn?"

Mo Yue looked at me with uncertain eyes as we went out from the restaurant into the wintry night. "Brother Bai and I took notice of all the people who entered the inn," he paused for a second with hesitation. "But more strikingly, you stood out because you looked like a weird character dressed like that."

***

We stood huddled under an umbrella, in the middle of the now quiet and dimly lit street, our backs facing the entrance of the inn where a sign saying "Full Occupancy" was set out in the light drizzle. The reddish clouds in the dark sky shrouded the pale silver moon that had exposed itself for a brief moment hours ago.

I chewed on the inside of my cheek, my face still warm from the mortifying situation minutes ago. First, I was embarrassed at myself, for letting myself be cheated by an innkeeper from a fictional universe. Secondly, I was too much of a coward to ask for my money back that Mo Yue had to intervene by threatening the innkeeper. Thirdly, it was humiliating to be chased out into the streets after making such a din, especially when most of the visitors to this town had already retired peacefully for the night.

"Thank you for helping me get my money back," I laughed nervously and looked down at the damp ground. "You were right after all."

"So what are your plans now? Where will you go for the night?" Mo Yue asked, adjusting the angle of the umbrella to shield us from the rain blown in our direction by the freezing wind.

"I'll probably leave right now, for home," I said at length with a despairing shrug. "Even though I would have wanted to watch the tournament with you."

Having found Mo Yue, who looked identical to Ji Kai, was the greatest gain from my maiden journey into this book. The only thing I was not sure about is whether the boatman was ready to set off right now.

"If you do not mind," he turned towards me and spoke kindly in a quiet voice, "there is a spare bedroom in my temporary residence in this town. You can stay there until the Convention ends."

My ears perked up instantly as happiness raced through my thoughts. "Alright then. Seeing that it is getting late, I'll help you to carry your items back to your residence and impose on your kindness for the night. Thank you for your hospitality in advance."

***

[1]: Interestingly, in ancient China, a day and a night (24 hours) was divided into 12 time periods, each period is known as a 时辰 (shichen ) and equals to the modern day 2 hours. 

[2]: Men and woman should keep a distance, 男女授受不亲 (nán nǚ shòu shòu bù qīn): There is a societal norm in traditional Chinese society that men and women should not have physical contact at all, eg, their hands should not touch when they give or receive things.

[3]:  自欺欺人 (zì qī qī rén): Meaning self-deception while deceiving others.

Thanks for reading!! :D