CHAPTER 1
TANG JIAN
The sun was just setting behind a long mountain range, barely visible. There were a few small villages in the valley of the mountains with only around a few hundred people living in them.
Two young boys around twelve or thirteen could be seen walking down one of the mountains towards one of the villages. One was a little chubby while the other was skinny. They both had two rabbits each on their shoulders.
“We got really lucky today.” said the skinny one with a wide smile on his face. “Usually we can only find two, but thanks to your hunting skills we both got two delicious rabbits.” he said while caressing one of the rabbits with a strange shine in his eyes.
“Don’t do that, it’s creepy.” said the chubby one with a slightly disgusted face.
“Want to come and play with the other guys after dinner? I don’t think my father needs my help anymore for today.”, the skinny one said. His father was a carpenter in the village whom he often helped out.
“I heard Old man Cui Ah was supposed to come back today from collecting the medicinal plants, I think I’ll go see him.” the chubby one said with a look of anticipation. At this point, they had reached their village.
“You shouldn’t listen to his nonsensical stories, Tang Jian. My mother says he’s just a senile old man who likes to cook up fairytales.” Saying that, the skinny boy left Tang Jian to go to his house.
Tang Jian just stood in his place staring at his friend’s back.
“But what if it’s all true? A magical world with immortals. A world beyond this tiny village.” Tang Jian thought out loud with wonderment in his voice.
With that thought in mind, Tang Jian also went back to his home.
Old man Cui Ah was a villager who often ventured out in the mountains like many others. Some villagers thought of him as a wise man, some thought of him as a hogwash spouting idiot. There were also those who thought he had great imagination for the stories he came up with. The reason why he had come to have such a reputation was that some years ago he had accidentally ventured out of the mountains.
He wasn’t the first one to do so, but he was the first one to return. The reason why others didn’t, was that the mountains were filled with wild animals and dangerous terrains that it was nearly impossible for anyone to survive and return to the village. However, Old man Kui Ah had done just that. He actually returned.
What was even more shocking to the villagers, and even to himself, was that when he disappeared he was sixty-odd years old, but when he returned, he looked ten years younger! The things he told about his experiences were even more shocking to believe!
Tang Jian had always been a curious child who always thought of leaving the tiny village and going out on adventure and seeing the world. He dreamed of going to the Sea, a large body of water even bigger than the lake near his village where there’s only water as far as eyes can see. He wanted to see the Desert, a land filled with only sand and no tree in sight. Tang Jian had learned about them from the anecdotal stories passed down in the village.
This insatiable curiosity of his had also landed him in trouble on a number of occasions when he travelled far too deep in the mountains as a child and gotten lost frequently and had to be rescued by the villagers. He was also considered to be quite a lucky fellow by the villagers for not being eaten alive by the wild beasts.
When the ever-curious Tang Jian found out that the old man who had disappeared had returned and had mysteriously aged ten years backwards, he couldn’t help but be excited to find out what laid beyond the tiny world that he had been living in and immediately ran to Old man Kui Ah.
The villagers were also curious about the old man’s survival and especially his change in appearance, age wise. Even the people from the nearby villages were curious and came to see for themselves. Old man Kui Ah was also quite exhilarated to tell his tale. He explained that when he got lost in the mountains he was attacked by a giant hawk which snatched him in its claws and took to air. “The suddenness of the event was quite shocking for an old man like me and I couldn’t help but pass out.” he said.
“When I woke up, I found myself in a huge bird nest the size of a small house. There were also three human sized eggs that were shaking as if they could hatch at any moment. I realized that if I didn’t escape, I would end up being the first meal of some new born monster birds.” Everyone was listening carefully.
“But then I noticed a commotion nearby and saw a sight that would be never erased from my mind. I saw the giant hawk that had taken me attacking a group of five youngsters. I kept staring at them until I came to the shocking realization that it wasn’t the bird attacking the youngsters, it was the other way around! The group of youngsters were actually fighting the bird and seemed to be winning! What was event more astounding was their method of fighting the hawk.”
“It was magic!” the old man said with sparkling eyes, as if he was seeing it all over again.
“One of them could summon a hundred knives out of the air and shoot at the bird. One could summon a rope made of fire, there was also one who could make his fist the size of a boulder and punch with tremendous strength.”
“For a moment I couldn’t believe what I was looking at and kept waiting to wake up from a dream. By that point they had already killed the bird. One of them approached the corpse and extended a hand with several rings on its fingers and the corpse just vanished!”
“After that they approached me, or rather they approached the nest. It seemed like they were hunting for the bird and whatever it had accumulated in its nest. I had not noticed it at first, but there were some really strange things in the nest that are really difficult to describe in words.”
“They seemed to have known about my existence in the nest even before I gained consciousness. They collected the things in the nest, including the shaking eggs. Whatever they touched, it disappeared. They did all this while completely ignoring me, but as they were leaving, one of them who seemed to be the leader of the group instructed the one who could summon knives to take me back to where I had come from. All this time I was too stunned to even speak a word and just bowed in gratitude to the backs of the four walking away.”
“The truth was that I was too wounded to in walk, so I was unsure of how the one that remained would help me. He looked at my wounds and gave me a pill that seemed ordinary at first glance, but when I smelled it, there was only one word to describe the feeling.”
“Rejuvenation!”
“And that pill not only healed all my wounds, but it even gave me strength that I had lost over the years. It made me feel younger! Once I told him where the village was, it only took him half a day to bring me back. The wild beasts were like little puppies to him. As for the dangerous terrains, he seemed to have many magical items to aid him. One of those items was a toy bridge that once he tinkered with actually grew to the size of an actual bridge. He didn’t talk much on the journey back. Barely a few words, in fact. I asked him if he was a god. He just laughed at me and told that they were no gods. Just Immortal Cultivators striving to be gods.”
“I invited him to come to the village and allow me to show my gratitude, but before I could even finish my sentence he had disappeared as if he had never even been there.” Old man Kui Ah had finished his story.
“Perhaps he had truly never been there.” someone snickered in the crowd.
“Perhaps he never even existed” someone else mocked.
The crowd soon dispersed after he had finished his story. Some believed he was just lonely and wanted some attention and felt pity for him. There were a few who actually believed him, but did not voice their thoughts for fear of being mocked as well.
The commotion that the old man’s return had caused died down after some time. Most thought his story seemed too fantastical to be true. But one fact remained that he truly had regressed ten years in age. Nobody could refute that fact, nor anyone had any explanation for it.
Tang Jian had also been in the crowd that day. He was one of those who thought that the old man was telling the truth. Not because he had some deep-rooted trust in the old man or something. But because, in his heart, he wanted it to be true.
After that day, he had repeatedly gone back to the old man to listen to the same story over and over again. It reached a point where even the old man was starting to get annoyed.
Back home, Tang Jian skinned the two rabbits and put them on a flame to cook. As he was doing this, his father also returned home.
“Smells wonderful.” Tang Song said as he smelled the aroma. “You didn’t get lost again, did you?” he said with a teasing tone.
“I was with Tian Cai. We didn’t go too far. And it only happened five times, okay?” Tang Jian replied, a bit embarrassed.
“Getting lost in the mountains five times is unusual for even someone who’s lived his entire life, let alone someone who’s not even thirteen yet.” his father said, poking fun at his son with a smile on his face.
Tang Jian just humphed and focused on the rabbits while his father started sharpening an axe.
Tang Jian’s mother had died of a sickness when he was still an infant. He had no memories of her. His father, Tang Song, was a relatively good looking man with tall frame and was in his thirties, still quite young himself. Tang Song’s grief over losing his wife at a young age was so deep that he never took a second wife, even though there were quite a few women in the village who would have chosen to be his wife without a second thought. Tang Song was a blacksmith, and a skilled one at that. He had made weapons for several people in the village and he was also well respected by them. That’s why he was considered an ideal companion for the single women. But he believed that a second wife would always act unfairly towards Tang Jian if he ever fathered more children. That’s why he decided to raise his son all own his own as he grew up. Whenever Tang Jian got lost, it would make his father extremely anxious, so much so that when he was found again, Tang Song would cry openly, which he otherwise would never do as the men in the village rarely showed their emotions. Tang Jian was the child that his beloved wife had given him.
After dinner Tang Jian headed for Old man Kui Ah’s house.
On the way, he saw some other kids fooling around and at the same time they also saw him.
“Hey Tang Jian, you’ve come at just the right time,” one of the kids said, “Kong Mu said he saw a tiger cub near the lake. We’re going to catch it, come on let’s go.”
“No, not tonight, I’m busy.” Tang Jian said as he walked past them.
“Don’t tell me you’re going to that lunatic’s house again,” that kid said,” how many times do you want to hear the same fairytale again and again.”
Tang Jian just ignored him as he kept on walking.
Once he reached his destination, Tang Jian knocked on the old man’s door and waited, but no one came to open it. He knocked again, a bit more forcefully this time, but there was still no response. “Hey Old man Kui Ah, it’s me, Tang Jian, open the door.” he shouted.
This is strange. Is he not back yet? Tang Jian thought to himself.
The old man had indeed come back and was standing behind the very door that Tang Jian was knocking on. The truth was that Tang Jian had bothered him so many times that he wasn’t even planning on meeting Tang Jian this time and pretend that he wasn’t home.
“I would rather he think of me as a bumbling idiot like the others.” he whispered under his breath with a frustrated look on his face, “Just go away and leave me alone, you devil”
He’s probably not back yet; I’ll just come back tomorrow, Tang Jian was left disappointed. Maybe I should go look for that tiger cub with the others.
Thinking that, he left to go look for his friends as Old man Kui Ah breathed a sigh of relief.
Tang Jian was unaware of the fact it was going to be his last night in the village for a long long time because his entire life was about to change; along with the lives of several others whom he had not even crossed paths with yet. Change- for better or worse, was yet to be seen.
This is my first attempt at writing, so please let me know if I can improve on anything.
