He Yi sat up from the ground. When the dust ahead finally settled, what entered his sight was a snow leopard with snowy white fur patterned in black. It stood tall and dashing amid the wreckage, its slightly turned face strikingly heroic, while two great furry forepaws planted firmly on the giant python’s vital spot. It looked thoroughly imposing.
“…” Even well-traveled and knowledgeable as He Yi was, he still had trouble processing the sight. The villagers said there were tigers on Yaluo Mountain. Could they have mistaken this snow leopard for a tiger? But this was the south, where winter might pass without a single snowfall, and the elevation was not especially high. Why would a snow leopard appear in a place like this…?
Still, seeing was believing. Besides, he himself had already transmigrated into this unfamiliar world. Compared with that, perhaps this was not so bizarre after all.
He Yi quickly calmed down. At the same time, the snow leopard turned around, abandoning the python that had gone from thrashing violently to lying breathless and still, and slowly padded toward him.
…Wait. Did snow leopards eat people?
He Yi watched the snow leopard draw closer and closer, his head filling with the question of whether snow leopards ate humans. He could not remember ever seeing news about a snow leopard eating or attacking someone, but with a living snow leopard walking directly toward him, he was suddenly much less certain.
If it did not want to eat him, why was it approaching? Snow leopards were supposed to fear people and habitually avoid them.
This was not normal.
He could not detect any intent to attack in the snow leopard’s movements or eyes, however, so he did not retreat.
He considered himself fairly composed, but the moment that big round head came right up beside his face, his heart still began pounding violently and he instinctively held his breath.
The snow leopard sniffed He Yi from one side and then the other, as though trying to identify something. Then, completely unexpectedly, its gray-blue eyes went perfectly round. It opened its mouth, let out a long Urghk—! and actually dry-heaved.
He Yi: “…” ???
Why? Did he smell that bad?
Thinking about it, he had spent the past few days feverish and sick, sweating beneath a quilt. A bath had been out of the question, but he had not even had time to wipe himself down. He Yi had somehow failed to realize that he had been filthy and disheveled this entire time. In his own mind, he had still pictured himself as the person he was before the car crash in his previous life, somewhat gloomy perhaps, but generally neat, clean, and presentable.
He Yi’s face went wooden, his eyes slightly unfocused as heat crept into his cheeks. Belated shame wrapped tightly around him. Half out of his mind, he also began calculating the odds that he could defeat the snow leopard in front of him with a sliding tackle.
After dry-heaving, the snow leopard did not actually look disgusted. It merely backed away a little and regarded He Yi, then turned around and half-carried, half-dragged the giant python over to him.
The enormous snake’s head suddenly thudded down in front of him, shocking He Yi fully back to his senses. His legs seemed to work again at once. He rolled sideways on the spot and put several meters between himself and the python’s corpse.
Before he could recover, the snow leopard looked at him and tilted its head as though puzzled. Then it picked the python up again, dragged it over, and dropped it in front of He Yi.
He Yi squeezed his eyes shut and backed away as he shouted, “Don’t… don’t bring it over here!”
Who knew whether the snow leopard understood him, but at least it stopped dragging the snake after him. Instead it suddenly began calling, Aow-ow, aow-ow! Its round eyes fixed on He Yi as one thick furry paw pressed down on the python, as though it were complaining about something. There was something unmistakably aggrieved in the strange cries.
He Yi certainly could not understand it, but meeting the snow leopard’s gaze gave rise to an absurd thought. Those two pats on the python seemed deliberate. Could the snow leopard be telling him to eat it? Was it complaining because he refused?
The more He Yi thought about it, the more plausible it seemed, yet common sense and reason told him he was letting his imagination run too far. An animal was not a human being. He could not judge its behavior by human patterns of thought.
In other words, he did not believe a snow leopard could behave with quite this much human understanding.
Looking at the fluffy tail behind the snow leopard, nearly as long as its body, He Yi abruptly remembered the enormous thick tail he had seen outside the hut window yesterday morning. They looked extremely similar… The light had been poor at the time, but his instincts told him it was the very same tail. So had this snow leopard been outside the hunter’s hut then? The rabbit and pheasant from earlier apparently had not appeared by accident, nor had they been meant to threaten him. Perhaps this snow leopard had actually been trying to feed him. Seeing him bedridden, it might have decided he was incapable of hunting and taken pity on him, bringing him game instead.
The idea was absurd, yet somehow it made sense. He Yi nearly convinced himself. Even the snow leopard before him began to look friendly and endearing, and half his wariness fell away.
Without his noticing, the forest had been painted orange-red by the setting sun, and the snow leopard’s fur was rimmed with a fiery glow. Only then did He Yi realize how late it had become. He had already spent so much time here that if he did not leave to find someone soon, night would fall.
He Yi decided to get moving. Before setting off again, he turned back and said to the snow leopard, “Thank you.”
He knew the snow leopard could not understand him, but that did not matter. He was the one who wanted to say it. With that, he stopped paying attention to the leopard and continued climbing uphill.
The forest was thick with plants and jagged rocks, making the ground difficult both to traverse and to read. He Yi kept moving in a single direction, always uphill, and at least managed not to circle back on himself.
The person he was determined to find was the hunter grandson of Granny Zhang whom A’ma had mentioned earlier. He remembered that the man’s surname was Xu, so he followed the direction A’ma had indicated and continued deeper into the mountain. To his surprise, he really did find the place before sunset.
From a distance, several small houses stood surrounded by towering trees heavy with foliage. They had stone walls and tiled roofs, while thatched sheds and wooden walkways threaded between them. Channels had been dug beneath the walkways, their water glittering with reflected light.
There was an open patch in front of the houses. To the left, a bamboo fence enclosed melons, fruits, and vegetables, vivid red and pure white scattered amid thriving green. To the right stood a simple row of wooden posts, and a sleek black sighthound lay on the ground nearby. Before He Yi even came close, it sensed the stranger, sprang to its feet, and barked loudly in his direction.
He Yi had no intention of approaching any farther. He was carrying an epidemic, so getting too close was inappropriate to begin with. And with the dog barking, there was probably no need for him to call out. Its owner would likely be drawn outside soon enough.
While he waited, He Yi studied the place.
So this was where Hunter Xu lived? It was far more refined than He Yi had imagined. Because Xu was a hunter who seldom mixed with the villagers, He Yi had assumed he would be somewhat reclusive, without neighbors or friends to lend a hand, spending his days killing game and therefore living rather roughly. He had never expected the man’s home to be arranged with such poetic charm. Clearly, he had standards for his way of life and no small amount of taste.
The dog’s barking startled birds from the nearby trees. As their calls faded into the distance, He Yi heard footsteps drawing closer. Then a tall, powerfully built man appeared in the front yard with a gleaming axe in one hand and an unfriendly expression on his face.
Standing three or four meters away, He Yi bowed to the newcomer, then delivered the speech he had rehearsed repeatedly in his head in the local dialect. “Forgive the disturbance. Might you be Hunter Xu? My surname is He and my given name is Yi. I’m from Chongzi Village, and I’ve come because I have an important favor to ask.”
The man did not deny He Yi’s question, so it seemed he truly was Hunter Xu. Hunter Xu did not drive him away, but neither did he answer. He simply watched He Yi with a grave expression.
Fortunately, He Yi was not thin-skinned. After briefly explaining that he was staying on the mountain because of the epidemic, he came to the point. “Hunter Xu, my A’ma came up the mountain to care for me, but she caught a chill in the heavy rain two days ago and at noon today… she passed away. Her body is still in the cattle shed halfway down the mountain. In my condition, I can’t return to the village, and I truly couldn’t think of another way, so I had to impose on you and ask for help. Would you be willing to take my A’ma’s body back to the He household? If that’s inconvenient, you could also notify the village head and ask my eldest uncle to come collect her. Once I’ve recovered, I’ll certainly visit with a gift to thank you. I would be deeply grateful.”
After hearing this, a strange expression appeared on Hunter Xu’s face. He stared at He Yi for a moment. Just as He Yi began to wonder whether his dialect had been so terrible and his grammar so strange that the man had failed to understand him, Hunter Xu abruptly asked an odd question. “You came here by yourself?”
He Yi nodded.
While he was still wondering why Hunter Xu had asked, the man spoke again. “You came all the way up here with one little knife? No other weapon or farm tool?”
“Mm. Just this.” He Yi raised the kitchen knife in his hand so Hunter Xu could see it clearly.
Calling it a kitchen knife was somewhat generous. It was not the broad rectangular cleaver He Yi was used to. The blade in his hand was only about ten centimeters long, narrow, with a rolled and blunted edge.
Iron was expensive in this dynasty, so farming households generally would not pay a blacksmith to forge a broad-bladed kitchen cleaver. The original He Yi could not count on eating meat even once a week in the He household, much less having bones to chop through. Around here, a small iron blade like this serving as a kitchen knife was far more common.
Hunter Xu’s expression grew even stranger. Still not quite convinced, he asked one last question. “You’re not injured?”
He Yi looked down at the red rash on his skin, which had faded somewhat, then at the straw sandals whose soles were so thin that his feet ached despite there being no chafing. He still shook his head.
Hunter Xu had nothing left to say. He turned and went inside. The sighthound had obediently lain down the moment its master appeared. Now, seeing its master return indoors while the stranger remained, it stayed where it was and continued staring vigilantly at He Yi.
By then, half the red sun had sunk beneath the horizon and the new moon had risen. Warm light spread across one side of the forest while the other side drank in the cool glow.
He Yi was nowhere near as calm inside as he appeared. Waiting made him increasingly anxious and restless, but fortunately Hunter Xu had no intention of leaving him there. The man went inside for a longbow and long saber, then came back out and tossed a sickle at He Yi’s feet. A small lift of his chin was enough for He Yi to understand that he was meant to bring it along for protection.
He Yi thanked him again. Hunter Xu was now dressed in close-fitting clothes, with a hood and cloth covering his face. A longbow rested across his back, while a quiver, a tube of pellets, and a bulging satchel hung at his waist. The scent of insect-repelling mugwort clung to him from head to toe. He was armed to the teeth.
After instructing the sighthound to guard the house, Hunter Xu took a sharp long saber and walked ahead, clearing the way. He glanced back once as he went, signaling He Yi to follow. He Yi picked up the sickle and trailed behind him at a careful distance.
He Yi recognized that Hunter Xu was not taking the route he had used to come up. This seemed to be a shortcut. They encountered no wild animals along the way, but the ground was rougher and harder to traverse. Had He Yi been alone, he would never have known where to place his feet or how to find a path through it.
The mountain was so still that only a few insect calls remained. It had taken He Yi more than two hours to climb up, but less than an hour to descend. The sky had only just gone fully dark when the two of them reached the area near the abandoned hunter’s hut.
Hunter Xu remained silent, but when they reached the cattle shed and he saw A’ma’s body, he unexpectedly bowed deeply. After a long moment, he took hold of the handcart and pushed it down the mountain beneath the cover of night.
He did not ask He Yi to return the sickle before leaving, so He Yi could only keep it for now. Once Hunter Xu came back, he would ask what had happened and return the sickle at the same time.
He Yi watched the man and handcart gradually recede into the distance. Lowering his eyes, he silently recited in his heart:
If there is another life, may you be safe, may all go smoothly, and may you know joy.