Sea of Flowers Chapter 1 Part2

Seeing as Suzhao had already moved position, the snow had stopped. But it was still close to the moon, and now deep into the night, I could still see the most beautiful moonlight in the world. The magnificent blue light shone over all the land, and the snow had not vanished, but piled upon a world made from jade. If we did not mention what had happened, no one would know that the king of this place was no longer here. I ran madly to the luoshui, searching for Father’s soul by the coast, but could only see the wind blow at the snow, the reflection of the waves in moonlight, the withered reeds, and weeds being blown around.

I didn’t think that Father would deceive me. 

When I was young, he would take me for walks here, and once said to me that all of the past kings of Suzhao would become souls here, forever blessing us through the generations. But apart from a peacefully blue-green steam of luoshui, and the swaying reeds on the cliff, all that was left was the endless night. The extreme cold made it hard to breathe, and I knelt on the ground, and pain seeped into every bone in my body, but waves of numbness overtook my brain. So heavy. At this moment, a thousand jin of stone weighed upon my back, and I could not stand up again.

Mother deceived me too.

She once said that she was always be with me, always be by my side.

“Father… Mother…” I put my hands into the snowy ground, choking until I almost fainted.

At this moment, it was as if shining lights lit up ahead. I breathed in, and raised my head to look. Unexpectedly,  in the centre of the luoshui, appeared the silhouette of a man. He held a white ink-painted umbrella, with black hair to his knees, and dark blue robes hanging down to the surface of the water. Cold light blossomed beneath his feet.

Even now, if I see a black-haired person, it’ll cause me a lot of alarm. I said: “Who, who are you…”

With the turn of his umbrella, that person turned around.

As if he had foreseen that the person he would see was me, he smiled faintly at me from beneath the umbrella. It wasn’t any brilliant smile, even more distant than the moon, and colder than the snow. But it was the most gentle smile in the world.

In an instant, the wind and rain was as beautiful as a dream, as if the return of spring was all held within this person’s recollections.

And this path of light originated from the light in his hand. Ripples rose from where he lightly stepped. I gradually saw clearly that he held in his hand, the bud of a lotus. Within the flower was a glowing seed, and even if the petals opened, light would still leak out from within.

I said: “It’s… it’s you? Why are you here?”

That’s right, this is the person who twenty-seven years ago, called a yinglong to return me to Suzhao. He did not answer me, and crouched down in front of me, and opened his hand. With this motion, the lotus slowly blossomed, and hundreds of lotuses rose from within, small and brilliant, gold light glistening, like the fireflies in July, illuminating the night sky one by one.

This sight was simply too pleasing, and I couldn’t help but reach out my hand to touch the lotus seed, but then had to jerk my scalded hand back. The youth shook his head, and put the lotus seed on the surface of the water, and held my hand, walking me to the centre of the luoshui, and held up his umbrella to cover my head. I was curiously wondering how it was that I was standing on the surface of the water, when he let go of my hand and raised his palm. A wonderful thing happened: on the entire surface of the luoshui appeared millions of little lotus buds, and then like the first lotus, bloomed in the darkness, releasing firefly-like lotuses…

The night wind was chilly, the scent of lotus blossoms. A drizzling rain floated by, a glorious golden lotus rain.

“So, so beautiful…” I rubbed my sore eyes, I had watched until I was dazed.

After waiting a long time, I still had not received a reply from him. I couldn’t help but raise my head to look at him. In the same way, he also turned to gaze at me. He didn’t have too much expression on his face, and yet it was still more gentle than any person’s smile. It was only that his gentle eyes were more sorrowful than tears. The way he looked at me made me strangely sad, and I unconsciously reached out my hand to touch him. But within a moment, he became ten thousand pieces of golden light, blown about by the wind, like the firefly lotuses.

Only the golden lotuses floating in mid-air proved that what had just happened was not a dream. I carefully stepped on the surface of the water, returning to the sh.o.r.e, and could feel the heat of the lotus seeds. Although I was still very sad, it wasn’t the suffocating despair like before. Just what was this youth’s background, for him to come and go without a trace, he’s probably an immortal. But someone so gentle had to be completely different from those two immortals.

No matter how beautiful this scene was, I still had to go back and face my parents’ death. Whenever I thought that in this life, I wouldn’t be able to be with them again, my heart ached.

However, I never would have thought that when I returned to Zichao Palace, I would see Elder Brother and Kai Xuan Jun. At the centre of Zhaohua Hall were a few people, and Elder Sister stood in front of the throne, glaring coldly at Elder Brother.* Elder Brother was held back by two guards, and his hands were held humiliatingly behind his hack, but the expression on his face was unyielding and disbelieving. Kai Xuan Jun stood beside Elder Brother, looking back and forth from Elder Brother and Elder Sister, like he was worried.

*Luo Wei calls her sister w.a.n.gjie (royal elder sister), and Fu Chenzhi gege.

“Elder Sister!” I ran forward, and stood on Elder Brother’s other side, “What’s going on here?”

Elder Sister said coldly: “Ask him yourself.”

I looked at Elder Brother, but he didn’t look at me, and his expression didn’t change, like he had not plans of explaining. He and Elder Sister stared at each other silently for a while, and it was Kai Xuan Jun that said: “Luo Wei, go talk to your Elder Sister, let her not be so hasty.”

I looked at Elder Sister again. “Elder Sister?”

Elder Sister said: “Elder Brother, tell her what you have done.”

Elder Brother said: “I have done nothing.”

“All the evidence is here, how long do you want to keep lying for?” Elder Sister pulled out a sheet of paper, and said through gritted teeth, “You ingrate! Father and Mother treated you so well, but you… you…”

Elder Brother said with the same att.i.tude: “I’ve said, I didn’t write this letter.”

Elder Sister was so angry she was shaking, and marched down the jade steps to the throne, raised that piece of paper and held it in front of him. “If this isn’t your handwriting, then whose is it?”

Elder Brother said: “The handwriting is exactly the same as mine. I am devoted to Father and Mother and show it every day, I have never done such a thing.”

“Your mouth is full of lies!”

Elder Sister viciously threw that piece of paper out, and Elder Brother turned his head to avoid it. I hurriedly took that letter, and finished reading it quickly, suddenly feeling shocked. This was a letter to Xianjun: it was dispatched to Huangdao-xianjun, from the son of the demon king of the North Sea. A traitor, conducting evils, and colluding with demons, throwing the North Sea into dangerous upheaval. Two daughters, the younger kept a beastly qiongqi, and the other daughter was an accomplice, seducing immortals to l.u.s.t.

“Apart from my keeping Xuanyue, the rest of this is nonsense!” I said indignantly, and then looked at the word ‘tiger’ again. “Wait, Elder Brother, I remember that when you write the word ‘tiger,’ the you always have an especially long hook in that bottom stoke. Elder Sister, this might really be a letter that was faked by someone else…”

Elder Sister said: “Weiwei, don’t interrupt. I know that you don’t want to believe that he would do such a thing, and I was almost deceived by him before. Do you know where he went in these years away from Suzhao?”

“Didn’t he go to be apprenticed to a master?”

“Do you know who his master is?”

“I don’t know…”

“Huangdao-xianjun.” At this point, Elder Sister threw another hate-filled look towards him.

Elder Brother said: “My Master is not him.”

“Then who is your master?”

In response to Elder Sister’s aggressive questioning, Elder Brother wrinkled his brows, but did not say a word. It was as cold as before outside, and within the hall the candlelight flickered, illuminating Elder Sister’s face. She smiled lightly: “You can’t answer, Chenzhi, then I’ll change the question: If you’re a human, then why have you lived for almost fifty years without your appearance changing in the slightest?”

Elder Brother did not speak.

Actually, he was not my biological brother. I remember when I was young, Father ran into an old Taoist while travelling through the land. This person told him that he once adopted a son named Fu Chenzhi, who was extremely intelligent and quick-witted, and seemed to stopped ageing after the age of twenty, and this child’s appearance had caused talk among the surrounding people. Father wondered if this child was not human, and asked to see him. After seeing him, Father discovered that Fu Chenzhi was really only a human, and could not use magic, but he was as others said: intelligent but not cruel, cool but not arrogant, and righteous as a sky full of stars. Father really liked him, and without hesitation, adopted him as a son, and brought him back to Suzhao, and by doing so lightening that Taoist’s load. Just like that, we grew up studying together, until the last few years when Elder Brother left Suzhao for the outside world to be apprenticed to a master, and rarely returned. But in my heart, he was still the cute little steamed bun-faced boy that I first saw, and the Royal Elder Brother that I most depended on.

I said: “Elder Sister, you’re really making things difficult for Elder Brother. His slow growth rate was the entire reason that Father brought him here.”

“That’s because he isn’t even a human!”  Elder Sister raised her voice, grabbing Elder Brother’s collar. “Fu Chenzhi, in the presence of all, in front of your younger sister, answer this question– are you a human or an immortal?!”

What…

I looked disbelievingly at Elder Brother, and suddenly remembered the time when he had been bitten by a spider, but by the next day, there was not even a scar left. Elder Brother glanced at me, then his long slender fox-like eyes closed for a moment, his lips were white: “I am an immortal.”

My heart stopped for a beat. My mouth and tongue went dry, and forced myself to swallow: “When did you realise?”

Elder Sister laughed coldly: “He wrote it all down very clearly in that letter, he was ordered to infiltrate Suzhao, and you’re still asking him when he realised? If you don’t believe it, read this.”

She took another piece of a paper from a guard, and pa.s.sed it to me. I swept my eyes over the contents, and saw that it was a poem that Elder Brother wrote in his childhood:

In the North there is a vast ocean, can no longer swim.

A wise and beautiful woman there, can no longer seek.

To look at the nine boundaries from above, I have become ill.

Cloud dragon wind tiger, the swallow will rightfully return.*

*To be honest, I’m bad with poems so I’m not 100% sure this is correct.

This poem was written on the day I first met Elder Brother.

It was already something that had happened over twenty years ago. That day, a new child had come to the Xuan Study Room, looking around at the splendour. His smooth-skinned appearance was even more delicate than a little girl, and more enticing than a fox spirit in the mountains of Youdu. But his chubby cheeks turned him into a cute steamed  bun. His appearance alone was enough to leave him imprinted in one’s memory, but more importantly, he was not of the Suzhao Clan– because his hair was black. You need to know that my Suzhao Clan are born with dark blue-green hair, and as we age, the colour becomes lighter and lighter, and becomes moon-white at the end. Those who had powerful magic, their hair would become pure white.

When we first started taking lessons, Teacher said: “Humans and demons have black hair.” At that time, I had never seen an immortal before, and did not know that immortals could also have black hair.  Therefore, I was convinced that he was either a human or demon. As expected, Elder Brother replied then: “I lost my parents at a young age, and was taken in by a Taoist of the Fu Clan, and grew up in the Nine Provinces.”

The Nine Provinces, from the most southern sky to the most northern sea, all that lay under heaven. From that moment forth, all of us were certain that Elder Brother was human. At that time, Teacher did not know that Elder Brother had been adopted by Father, and said: “Chenzhi, there is no s.p.a.ce left for you here, you will have to stand during this cla.s.s.”

I patted the empty s.p.a.ce next to me: “Who says, there’s a s.p.a.ce right here.”

Teacher did not look happy: “This… Younger Princess, it may be difficult for me to explain this to His Majesty…”

“No matter, it’s only for today.” I hooked my fingers towards Fu Chenzhi. “You, sit over here.”

I was used to ruling over the Xuan Study Room, for me, the Younger Princess who had no equal, this matter could not be more normal. Elder Brother was startled at first, then he began to smile, and sat down beside me. I propped up my chin, looked at him, and thought that he really did not look like a human.

The humans we saw most often in Suzhao were the Xuanqiu People of the Daxuan Mountain, or the Chijing People of Dayou Country.  These people had coa.r.s.e appearances, with simple personalities and ungraceful names. But Elder Brother not only had a particularly refined name, but looked so lovely. The custom of Suzhao was that girls bound their hair, and boys wore their hair down, and he was no exception to that rule. His shining black hair draped over her soldiers, with a single ribbon at the back of his head, framing his white lotus-like little face. It was simply too beautiful. Noticing where I was looking, he turned to meet my eyes and said a little bashfully: “Please treat me favourably.”

“Do the Han people all look like you?” I murmured.

“Like me?”

“White and soft like a steamed bun.” I laughed. “Are you happy, you’re cuter than all the girls in Suzhao put together.”

Hearing that, his little steamed-bun cheeks became pink. But he knitted his eyebrows together, and said solemnly: “This isn’t a compliment. I’m not white, and Han people are not white.”

After teasing him for a bit, Teacher let us copy down some famous pieces of writing. The students opened the bottle of water on their tables in unison, and concentrated. The water rose from the bottle in a steady pillar, and began to revolve around the ink stick. After a moment, ink dripped down into the ink-stone. I thought, this is my time to show off! I can use this chance to exhibit my magic, and create a spectacular sight. I rolled up my sleeves to my shoulder, ready to start, but who knew that Elder Brother had also rolled up his sleeves, and poured the water in the bottle onto the ink-stone, picked up the ink stick, and slowly began to grind ink.

After seeing that, all the students were left stupefied. When they saw that Elder Brother had written a page of calligraphy, his words as fine as snow, they were left entranced. One of the little scholars looked at Elder Brother’s words, and said thoughtfully: “Your handwriting is very good, it’s just that you do not know even the most basic of water magic, so how will you be able to partake in future cla.s.ses? What a shame, to be unable to use your talent to the fullest.”

Another student said: “So what if his handwriting is good? He’s a mere human, how can he attend the same school as us. I wonder who was it that pushed him into the Xuan Study Room. He probably can’t even compose a poem.”

After being provoked by this self-important child, Elder Brother composed a poem. This poem was called “Vast Ocean in the North,” and was the poem that Elder Sister held out now. After Teacher read this poem, he had a puzzling a.s.sessment: “Fu Chenzhi, you are still young, and being full of beautiful things is good. But your heart is full of many thoughts, I’m afraid that…”

Connecting it to everything that had happened to today, I realised that Elder Brother was like his words, different from my loud personality, and he hid everything inside his heart. And that poem, the meaning of those last two lines was: Every day I look up and long for my home in the Nine Skies, and my neck has become sore. Cloud comes from dragons, wind comes from tigers, wait for me to complete this task with great merit, and then I shall return.

So it turns out that he was long aware that he was not a human.

“Weiwei, Father and Mother’s death is all because of our brother. He and Huangdao-xianjun have been colluding for a long time, wanting to take over Suzhao, and to make our Suzhao Clan the slaves of the Immortal Realm for all eternity. I won’t give him a chance to do that. Thus, I will succeed the throne tomorrow, and become Suzhao’s new Emperor.” Elder Sister’s face was like frost as she looked at Elder Brother, and said word by word: “Immortal soldiers who were captured within the city, and those who was betrayed Suzhao, kill them without mercy.”

I became frantic, and shook Elder Brother’s sleeve. “Elder Brother, explain quickly.”

Yet as he was lead out, he still had not said a single word. After Elder Sister explained, I found out the person who had informed was Elder Brother’s personal attendant. His attendant had always been loyal and devoted to him, but could not believe he would do something so dishonest and unjust. Father and Mother had just pa.s.sed away, and he hurried back to Suzhao under the guise of wanting to comfort us, then doing away with us sisters and making himself king. But no matter what they said, I was unwilling to believe that Royal Elder Brother was this sort of person.

In the middle of the night, I was in my room alone unable to sleep when I suddenly heard someone knock on the door. I jumped down from my bed and opened the door, a gust of cold wind hit me, and Kai Xuan Jun stood underneath the cold moon, looking downcast: “I have come to humbly offer an apology.”

I pulled open the door. “Come inside to sit.”

“No, it’s fine here. I still want to be your brother-in-law, so best not let the fireflies misunderstand.” He laughed, mist coming from his mouth, but was quickly solemn again. “Actually, the person who brought Fu Chenzhi back to Suzhao was me.”

“…You?”

“Yes. After I left Suzhao, I met Master Fu, and after learning that he was the adopted son of King Tuoba, accompanied him back to the Immortal Realm. I have a friend who is close with Ru Yueweng, and so I heard that he had come to the North Sea to exerminate demons with Huangdao-xianjun. I never imagined that by the time we got here, it was too late, and Master Fu has been framed…”

“You also think my Elder Brother was framed?”

Kai Xuan Jun said resolutely: “Of course. Master Fu is so n.o.ble, how could he cause the deaths of those who were like his parents?”

“But, Elder Sister doesn’t believe him at all…”

“Your Elder Sister looks gentle, but has an impulsive personality. People cannot rise from the dead, and I fear that if she mistakenly kills a good person, it’ll be a lifetime of endless regret.”

I said painfully: “Then what should we do?”

Kai Xuan Jun looked around, then took out a key and placed it in my hand: “This is the key to Master Fu’s prison cell. I stole it.”

I said, alarmed: “A right and proper immortal, doing something this low!”

“This is for the sake of your Elder Sister.” Kai Xuan Jun shook his head helplessly, “Okay, go see your brother quickly, and I’ll try persuade your sister again. Oh, and I’ve dug a whole in the floor of the prison. If there’s no news from me by midnight, it means that I have failed in convincing your sister. You can let Master Fu escape first, and we can talk it over later.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “A right and proper immortal, doing something dirty as this. Okay, you’ve pa.s.sed your little sister-in-law’s test. I’ll allow you to marry my sister.”

Kai Xuan Jun smiled: “Don’t waste your words, just go.”

Notes:

I’ve only ever listened to the audiobook, and this is my first time actually reading the book, and reading it carefully… some of these lines are so beautiful and evocative they genuinely leave me breathless. I hope I was able to convey that in translation!

So now we have most of Luo Wei’s backstory (but I have to warn you, the tragedy in this part isn’t over yet). Both male leads have been introduced now– which one do you like more so far?