Notes on Longevity

Chapter 172 The Pain of Life and Death, Fallen Leaves Returning to Their Roots, The Bitterness of Separation and Unbearable Longing

Taihua was somewhat moved by the green-clad woman's expression, but there were some things he needed to clarify with her. He sighed and slowly said, "Do you know if there are any arts in this world that can be used for divination and to predict the future of others?"

With tears welling in her eyes, Green Robe choked out, “I’ve heard my grandmother talk about it before, and later after I came down the mountain, I met some Taoist practitioners who also told me these things.”

"That's good," Taihua said, suddenly raising the silver sword in his hand. In an instant, the silver sword turned into a cloud of white smoke, swirling around the two of them.

Upon seeing this, the woman in green was initially startled, then her expression changed to one of disbelief. Looking at the smoke formed by the silver sword, she asked in bewilderment, "What is this?"

Taihua's expression was initially somewhat helpless, but after hearing the green-clad woman's question, it turned serious: "This is a method of glimpsing the future that an immortal taught me when I was studying Taoism in Kunlun Mountain. It is called the Water Mirror."

As Taihua spoke, he waved his hand at the smoke, which began to change shape, eventually transforming into a double mirror. The woman in green stared at her reflection, momentarily lost in thought, while Taihua remained serious.

"Before I descended the mountain, I used a water mirror to observe the process and outcome of this descent," Taihua said, looking at his reflection in the mirror.

"What was the result?" asked the man in green.

"you are dead."

"Am I dead?"

Taihua's tone was calm, yet it stirred a storm in Green Robe's heart. She couldn't believe it. Although he had previously suspected something like this, he had considered other scenarios, never imagining that he would die.

"Before arriving in Yu'an, I used a water mirror to look into your surroundings once, but the process changed, yet the result remained the same. Therefore, I knew you were destined to die, which is why I left Dao Yisheng behind to have you take care of him."

Taihua's tone was no longer as calm as before, but rather tinged with sadness and regret.

"You can say whatever you want to say." Green Robe sensed something unspoken in Taihua's tone, so she stopped being coy and spoke frankly.

Taihua sighed and then said, "Just this afternoon, I used the Water Mirror again by a river to see how Daoyisheng and you were doing. However, I didn't expect the Water Mirror to show a new process and ending."

A new ending? The woman in green was puzzled and quickly asked, "What ending?"

Green Robe trembled with fear after hearing the different ending from Water Mirror. She wondered if she hadn't died, but Taihua's version left her heartbroken.
"The course of events and the ending given by the Water Mirror is that you died, I lost all my magic power, and almost died as well. However, many of the processes in between were very blurry, and I couldn't see them clearly either."

As Taihua spoke, he waved towards the water mirror again. The instant his hand fell, the image of Green Robe lying in a sea of ​​flowers began to appear. Seeing Dao Yisheng holding her and crying his heart out, Green Robe felt her own heart breaking. Then, she saw Taihua, his hair completely white and his face aged, appear in the water mirror. It was a quiet night; she saw Taihua standing on the edge of a cliff, where snowflakes were falling heavily, Taihua looking up at the sky and howling, tears streaming down his face.

Taihua saw the scene abruptly stop here, and the image of him in the mirror, with snow falling at night and his aged appearance, returned to his current appearance: sorrowful, grief-stricken, and speechless.

On the contrary, the green-clad figure remained silent in the scene still reflected in the water mirror.

After the snow fell heavily, she saw Taihua leave the mountain, leaving Daoyisheng lying quietly at its foot, as if he were dead. Then the scene changed again, and she saw the still young Daoyisheng walking among the people with the aged Taihua. They traveled across mountains and rivers, seemingly searching for something, but they returned disappointed, once again to the blooming sea of ​​flowers, to the wooden house that looked like it had been uninhabited for a long time.

Finally, the water mirror showed her a very short scene, but that scene caused her immense pain.

In the water mirror, Dao Yisheng spoke to Taihua: "A thousand years have passed, and we still haven't found her. Do you think she's really dead?"

In the water mirror, the aged Taihua answered weakly, "Perhaps. A thousand years have passed, and her three souls and seven spirits may have already transformed into stars in the sky, no longer on earth."

Dao Yisheng remained silent. Taihua, seeing his sorrowful appearance, comforted him, saying, "Whether human or demon, everyone must die eventually. Since we can't find it, then it's time to end it."

Dao Yisheng turned his head to look at Taihua, his eyes moist. "I understand."

The scene abruptly ended there, but the woman in green remained stunned for a long time. It turned out that the so-called changed ending didn't involve her; it was Taihua and Daoyi who were involved.

What she didn't expect was that after her death, Dao Yisheng actually searched for a thousand years, and even the Immortal Master Taihua did the same.

She looked at these scenes with a sense of loss, yet she also chuckled, as if she found the base reasons he was searching for ridiculous.

Before seeing the scene in the water mirror, she had thought about spending more time with him, thinking about taking him around Yu'an City before she died: taking him to the noodle stall she often went to, and also spending more time with her mother-in-law. Anyway, she was going to die soon, and she could tell her mother-in-law about her past and the story of Dao Yisheng.

However, in retrospect, all her previous ideas seem so ridiculous.

Just as she was lost in deep self-pity, she heard Taihua's voice. She was jolted back to reality, tears already welling up in her eyes, which then flowed down like a flood breaking through a riverbank.

As the smoke dissipated, the silver sword returned to Taihua's hand. He frowned at the sight of the woman in green, assuming she was weeping because she saw Daoyisheng holding her and weeping after her death, but he hadn't realized she had seen more than he had. After taking a deep breath, he said, "This is everything I saw in the water mirror."

Green-clad girl's eyes were red from crying. Even when Taihua spoke to her, she couldn't bring herself to answer or ask anything. She could only cry helplessly, choking back sobs.

The sight of the woman in green made him feel helpless. If it weren't to explain the dangers to her, he would never have shown her these things. Seeing that she remained silent, he could only continue, "The reason I'm in such a hurry to take him away is because I'm afraid that the longer he stays here, the more danger he will face. You are a dying man, and I have no way to prolong your life, so I hope you can understand that."

“I have known him for hundreds of years, and over the years I have also tried to tell him everything I have seen during my travels, just like you have. Although I know about your past, there is nothing we can do now, and I hope you will not blame me.” The woman in green sobbed, turning her head away and saying in a low, hoarse voice, “I understand.”

Having said that, Green Robe's mind completely collapsed, like a boulder falling from a mountain, unstoppable by anyone. Although her emotions were in turmoil, tears streaming down her face, she still remembered that Dao Yisheng was still alive, and dared not cry out loud, but could only continue to suppress her emotions, which caused her to clench her fists and her body to tremble continuously.

Seeing this, Taihua remained silent. He looked at the woman in green, unsure what to say. However, he had already promised Daoyisheng to wait for the woman in green to finish the clothes before leaving, and he couldn't go back on his word. Showing her these things today was only to prevent her from seeking other partners and to keep Daoyisheng around.

However, after witnessing all of this, the woman in green said, "Immortal Master Taihua, after tonight, take him and leave."

The sobs and choked voices of the woman in green made him even more worried. "But I've already promised him I'd wait for you to finish making the clothes."

Before Taihua could continue, the woman in green interrupted him: "I understand why you showed me these things, and I don't want him to neglect his cultivation because of me."

“You should know how difficult it is for a tree spirit to cultivate into a human form. Although I don’t know what happened to him after he left Jiangnan, I don’t want him to turn back into a tree because of me.”

The woman in green choked back tears, took a deep breath, and said, "He and I are destined to be together but not to stay together. Since that's the case, I don't want my death to delay him."

“I remember you once told me that the laws of nature, destiny, and the laws of nature are all uncertain, and everything is both knowable and unknowable. You said that the Water Mirror gave different endings to your and Dao Yisheng’s journey to Yu’an. Will there be other changes after tonight? I think you can’t say for sure. Rather than being anxious, it’s better to leave now. I won’t make those clothes anymore.”

Taihua remained silent, but the woman in green showed no sign of stopping, "Later, when it gets late and he's asleep, I'll take the flowers and leave. I'll leave Yu'an, which I haven't finished seeing yet, and leave this place I love to go back to Jiangnan, back to Grandma's side."

"Although I don't know much about my grandmother's past, I have heard her say that she saw everything in the world before she finally went up the mountain. My grandmother always said that the pain of death is easy to bear, but the hardest thing is to return to one's roots; of all the pain of separation, the most unbearable is the longing for loved ones. I think that when I die, I will eventually return to the place where I first came from, and most importantly, I will bring the flowers back to Jiangnan."

"When I left, I promised my grandmother that I would protect them, but Yingchun died. I failed to do so."

As Green Robe's voice faded, Taihua looked down at her tearful eyes. He knew he was being selfish, but Daoyisheng was very important to him. Besides, Green Robe was already beyond saving. Although he was ruthless, he was ultimately acting in Daoyisheng's best interest, and he didn't want the tragedy in the Water Mirror to repeat itself.

He only hoped that both Green Robe and Dao Yisheng would understand his good intentions in the future.

However, as he himself said, everything in the world is uncertain.

Dao Yisheng was watching the steamer in the wooden house. After a quarter of an hour, he used magic to extinguish the rootless fire and then went out to find the green clothes used to make dye.

However, after walking around the flower field towards the forest, he couldn't find Green Robe, and even Taihua was nowhere to be seen. So, he curiously searched for the two of them, but unexpectedly, they were standing behind the wooden house.

When he saw the two of them, he wanted to go up and ask what was wrong, but he overheard Green Robe saying she knew him, and Taihua also knew about his past with Green Robe. He was immediately confused, thinking that if Green Robe knew him, why didn't he know her? And if Taihua knew Green Robe, why hadn't he told him since they met?

He only understood everything after he heard everything the two people behind him said.

It turned out that Taihua had insisted on dragging him away today because Green Robe was dying, and the reason given was that he didn't want Green Robe's death to affect his future cultivation. He was angry.

Once the two were standing still and silent, Dao Yisheng walked towards them from beside the wooden house. They heard a rustling sound, and both felt a pang of panic, instinctively looking in the direction from which the sound came.

Dao Yisheng looked at them with a puzzled expression, and walked slowly but clumsily toward them.

Seeing this, Taihua felt a little flustered, but still put on a smile as if nothing had happened and quickly went over: "What's wrong? Is the food in the steamer ready? Let's go back."

After he finished speaking, he tried to pull Dao Yisheng back, but unexpectedly, Dao Yisheng shook him off. He looked at the green-clad man with red, tear-filled eyes, wanting to speak, "You..."

But the words wouldn't come out. Taihua thought to himself, "This is bad." He knew that Dao Yisheng must have heard what he just said, otherwise he wouldn't have acted this way towards him for no reason. He wanted to step forward and pull Dao Yisheng back again, but found that the two of them were already staring at each other, standing there in silence.

Dao Yisheng remained silent for a while, trying to calm his disbelief. However, Green Robe, who had already looked pitiful from crying, suddenly became very aggrieved when she saw Dao Yisheng standing in front of her and heard her conversation with Taihua. She ended up hugging him tightly.

It was warm, very comforting, especially his heartbeat, which seemed to have said so much for him. Finally, the woman in green, nestled in Dao Yisheng's arms, couldn't hold back her tears any longer and burst into sobs.

As night deepened, a pale, waning moon hung high in the sky, seemingly telling a story.

It was unclear how long Green Robe had cried in Dao Yisheng's arms; her eyes were already very red and swollen. Her already adorable appearance now made her look even more pitiful and heartbreaking. Seeing her like this, Dao Yisheng felt a sharp pain in his heart, as if someone were grabbing his heart and constantly pulling at it, causing him immense agony.

Do we really know each other?

This was the first thing Green Robe said when she lifted her head from his embrace.

Although he already knew this from their previous conversation, he didn't know why he didn't remember her.

“I know him,” Green-clad said without hesitation, “but back then you were still a tree.”

"Do you remember when I asked you before, is there such a thing as wanting to see someone but not being able to, even though that person is right in front of you, but you don't recognize them?"

(End of this chapter)