NOVPUBA’Yue.
Every day, she accompanied Yong Gui during his meditation in the back mountain, chatting about random things before leaving.
Day after day, just as Yong Gui grew accustomed to her presence, A’Yue suddenly disappeared.
When she reappeared, she was once again covered in wounds.
“Are you… alright?”
A’Yue wiped away the bloodstains and gave him a bright smile. “Long time no see!”
Yong Gui carried her back to the temple, his robe stained with blood.
Life returned to its unchanging rhythm again.
Until an epidemic broke out in the Northern City, causing temples and Taoist temples to mobilize for relief efforts.
The situation was dire, with local officials doing nothing but sealing off the area, effectively keeping the outbreak hidden. The Northern City was already home to the poor, and now it was turning into a ghost town.
No amount of prayers or rituals could alleviate their suffering.
Seeing so many lives lost, Yong Gui felt a deep pain like never before.
It was A’Yue’s first time witnessing such a scene as well.
“Young Monk, the Buddha saved me. If I show mercy to others in the Buddha’s name, will he see my suffering?”
In that moment, Yong Gui felt like he was seeing A’Yue for the first time.
He suddenly remembered that this little girl named A’Yue, small in both stature and age, always had a smile on her face. Yet, she often spent long periods kneeling in front of the Buddha statue when no one else was around.
A’Yue disappeared again.
As the smallpox epidemic in the Northern City gradually improved, people started to recover, and the skies began to clear.
But A’Yue never returned. Yong Gui remembered all the wonderful things A’Yue had once mentioned to him and began searching for the places she had talked about, almost unintentionally.
