Black Fur tried to lift the little wildcat off the broken branch. But the instant it slipped a paw beneath the cub’s waist and raised it slightly, the cold, damp body shook violently, and blood trickled from the corner of its parted mouth.
In a panic, Black Fur slapped the wildcat’s face, trying to make the bleeding stop. Of course, it only made matters worse. More blood spilled out and stuck thickly to the wood.
Black Fur lowered its head and licked the clotted blood from the wildcat’s face. This undefeated little beast, which had once trampled wolf, fox, and bear spirits until they coughed blood, felt the urge to vomit for the very first time at the rank, desperate taste.
It crouched down and looked helplessly around at the white expanse of water stretching to the horizon.
After sitting stunned for a while, it gently tucked the unconscious wildcat’s head beneath its own belly and held it in both forepaws.
Even under that gentle sunlight it felt cold through to the bone. The log rocked with every wave, making its head swim, until finally exhaustion overcame it and its head drooped little by little.
Splash! Roar!
Black Fur had no idea how long it had drifted in a daze before the growing thunder of water woke it. Raising its head blearily, it saw a distant shining-white line across the horizon.
Night had fallen. The moon hovered where water and sky met, casting golden glitter over the rippling surface, just like the light in the wildcat’s tear-filled eyes.
Black Fur stared blankly for a time, then instinctively bent down to lick the wildcat’s closed eyes, as though it might coax those bright golden eyes to move again.
The white line drew nearer and nearer. Deafening thunder overwhelmed its senses, and the drifting log pitched through the rushing current. Only when it swept over the edge of a vast waterfall did Black Fur look down into the dreamlike clouds of spray below and, as though struck by lightning, understand that death had arrived.
It came so lightly, so dreamily, like a beautiful dream from which one need never wake.
In the last instant before the endless fall, it held the wildcat with all its strength. Even on the road to heaven, a rabbit had to take its companion along.
Crash! Boom!
* * *
Black Fur awoke on cold stone in the misty dawn, where the feeble sunlight barely penetrated. Opening his eyes, he saw a golden sea of flowers in the distance. His left hand twitched as though seized by a cramp. Puzzled, he raised it before his eyes and discovered five long fingers like those of the green-robed immortal.
He curled his body, bent his newly lengthened legs and painfully sat up, looking down at the wildcat he was still holding tightly in his arms.
The wildcat lay deathly still. The branch that had pierced its chest was gone, dislodged either in the plunge or during their drifting. It had left behind a dreadful, mangled wound. Black Fur’s right hand was pressed beside that injury, and thin purple, translucent threads were wound around both his palm and the wound.
He hesitated and moved his hand away slightly. A succession of little cracking sounds followed; the translucent threads dissolved into drifting smoke. The wildcat gave an unconscious spasm, and with that barrier gone, blood and torn tissue slowly began to spill from the wound in its belly.
Black Fur quickly pressed his hand back. This time nothing happened. Blood continued to well from the terrible wound. Growing frantic, he clutched the wildcat closer and looked helplessly around. Just then, a sharp, startled voice called down from somewhere above, using the language of the world beyond the mountain that tourists had spoken at the shrine.
“Good heavens! Aren’t you a rabbit spirit? How on earth did you end up taking in a wildcat? You’ve got more nerve than is good for you!”
He looked up. Perched on a branch was a cat-eyed teenage boy in a feathered coat patterned much like the wildcat’s fur. He wore spotless white boots, and there was blood on the corner of his mouth. In one hand he held a half-eaten mountain mouse.
Black Fur watched him warily and drew the wildcat closer into the shelter of his arms.
The cat-eyed boy jumped from the tree without a trace of shyness. Landing with a thud, he circled them twice, slapped his palm, and announced, “This wildcat’s about to die!”
Black Fur could see that the boy had no killing intent and appeared even more foolish than the little wildcat. He ignored him, lowered his head, and licked the wound on the wildcat’s chest, spitting out the rotten-tasting clotted blood that came away on his tongue.
“Hey!” The busybody cat-eyed boy slapped his palm again. “You have to get it treated! I’ll find Second Brother Ma for you. He’s the cleverest! He’ll know what to do!” He jumped, transformed into a small dark shape, and turned out to be a half-grown, mottled owl. Flapping its wings, it caught the wind and flew away.
By the time the young owl returned, dragging its dawdling Second Brother Ma along, Black Fur had just finished digging a pit.
The hands he had gained on taking human form still bore sharp nails, but the long, furious digging had worn them all down. Every finger was bloody.
Then he pushed the silent little wildcat from his arms into the pit, following the principle he had always lived by: if your companion was no use anymore, dig a hole and bury it.
Yet after lying at the edge and looking down for a while, Black Fur climbed into the hole himself. Curling up, he gathered the wildcat in his arms. The useless little fool clung to him so much that if it died and could no longer see him, surely it would start bawling again.
Closing his eyes, he smelled the freshness of the earth, just as he had when he was a half-starved little rabbit first crawling out of his burrow. He felt not the slightest sorrow at the thought of death. After all, he considered himself a heartless rabbit lord.
He lowered his head to kiss the soft tuft of fur on the wildcat’s ear and tucked its head beneath his belly.
Then he lay there in silence, waiting to die.
Instead, he heard a contemptuous click of the tongue from the edge of the pit. A slightly hoarse voice said, “And here I thought it was something serious. Just a rabbit! Don’t you know digging holes and dumping bodies here pollutes the environment? Do you even know what environmental pollution means?”
Black Fur looked up impatiently and saw a tiny creature perched on the cat-eyed boy’s shoulder. It was a small, neat-looking sparrow.
Second Brother Ma stood on the owl’s shoulder in a comical one-legged pose, a sparrow’s parody of the ‘golden rooster stands on one leg’ pose. In the claws of his raised foot he pinched an unlit cigarette, holding it near his beak.
The cat-eyed boy supplied an explanation, shy but admiring. “Second Brother Ma has been to the city. He knows every fashionable new word.”
With a flap of his wings, Second Brother Ma landed on the ground and transformed into a tall, thin young man with round eyes and single eyelids. Cigarette in hand, he reached casually toward the wildcat, examined it for a moment, and pronounced, “No saving it.”
Black Fur slapped his hand away.
“Well, well!” Second Brother Ma stared at the claw marks on his hand. “What a fierce rabbit! Fine. Do whatever you like. I’m not getting involved.”
The cat-eyed boy grabbed him. “Second Brother Ma, don’t be like that! Didn’t you say you wanted to cultivate immortality? You have to do good deeds!”
“Good deeds? In that state?” Second Brother Ma spread his hands, cigarette trapped between two fingers. He took a few steps, paused, and seemed to remember something. After mulling it over with an amused expression, he came back. “Hey, rabbit. I know a way to save it, but you’ll have to pay a price. And from then on, the two of you will have to help me every day…”
He could not finish. The world flashed and turned upside down; somehow he had been kicked flat onto the ground. Staring in shock at his inverted surroundings, he found a black-clad man planting a foot on his throat. Between two bloodied fingers, Black Fur held the cigarette he had stolen, looking every inch a practiced tyrant. “Stop talking nonsense. Spit it out!”
Second Brother Ma was stunned, then struggled in furious embarrassment, coughing around the pressure on his throat. “You! You rotten rabbit! What if I refuse to tell you?”
Then he watched with his own eyes as that rabbit King of Hell reached out, seized the stunned cat-eyed youth by the neck, and yanked him into his arms. The tone was utterly righteous: “Talk or I’ll fuck your wife!”
“…” Even worldly Second Brother Ma was struck dumb. After a pause, he said, “…He’s not my mate.”
The cat-eyed boy burst into tears. “You promised Mommy you’d take care of me! Waaaah…”
* * *
In a dim haze, the little wildcat smelled fresh blood. Instinctively it stretched out its tongue and tasted it. Its mouth filled with the sweet, fresh flavor it loved.
With a satisfied whimper, it went on licking weakly and without opening its eyes. Its tongue brushed fresh meat, but it had not the strength to bite off a piece.
A touch of warmth brushed its eyelids, almost like a kiss. Then someone opened its mouth and placed tiny strips of torn meat inside.
The will to live made it slowly and laboriously chew. It swallowed with immense difficulty, smacked its lips in satisfaction, and received another morsel. Then another.
It ate little by little for what seemed an age. Warmth gradually spread through its body and feeling returned to its numb limbs. Only then did it become aware of the pain in its belly. It hurt terribly, as though that great brute Black Fur had kicked it again.
Bastard… you bastard… it thought fuzzily, a single tear rolling from its eye.
Warmth touched its face again. Someone gently licked away the tear from the corner of its eye.
It moved a paw unconsciously, and one of its broken claws hooked a piece of cloth close beside it. The paw stayed there. A warmth seemed to circulate slowly through its body, and it fell into a deep sleep once more.
When it next woke, the sky appeared not to have brightened. Everything around it was black.
It wrestled its head free and lifted it a little, only to discover that it had been covered beneath a thick pile of banana leaves, so dense that it had nearly suffocated.
It looked around in bewilderment. The place was a crude stone hut, with brilliant sunshine and luxuriant green grass outside.
Weakly it reached a paw toward the light, but a shadow blocked the doorway. A human in a long black coat bent down and entered, holding a mountain mouse in his right hand.
The wildcat shrank back warily. The man froze too, then strode over, seized it firmly by the scruff, and gathered it into his arms. In a hoarse voice he asked, “Little fool, you’re awake?”
The cub raised its head and stared at him for a long while. With effort, it stretched its neck and licked his face. Only when it tasted a familiar rabbit scent did it seem to recognize him. It whimpered affectionately and burrowed its head into his arms.
Suddenly it jerked its head back up. That familiar rabbit scent!
The things it had eaten while it was barely conscious…
Its golden eyes went wide in panic. Reaching with feeble paws, it fumbled at Black Fur’s empty left sleeve. It bit the fabric open and saw the scabbed remains of a shoulder from which the entire left arm was missing, with a jagged wound where it had been torn away.
The little wildcat went rigid. Suddenly it let out a shriek of such misery that its eyes turned bloodred in an instant.
It was about to smash its head against the stone when Black Fur grabbed it with his one hand and hauled it back. A slap landed on its backside. “Little idiot! What are you doing?”
The cub struggled desperately in his embrace. Its mind was a thunderous roar. It ate it, ate it, ate it…
Pa! Another pa sound came down.
The little wildcat finally went still. Exhausted, it lay motionless in Black Fur’s arms, trembling and sobbing as it pressed close and frantically licked his newly flattened human face.
“Well, look who’s awake.” A little sparrow fluttered through the doorway. “Where are the mice you promised to catch for our owlet every day?”
Black Fur casually tossed him the half-dead mountain mouse. The sparrow swooped down and effortlessly caught it in his claws, lifting a mouse two or three times his own size. As he flew, he could not help commenting, “Do something about that one. It’s crying itself to pieces.”
Black Fur picked up a pebble and hurled it at him. With one flap, the sparrow flew out of range, his voice trailing from the trees. “You rotten rabbit! Don’t think I can’t beat you!”
Only after driving him off did Black Fur bend down and impatiently tug the longer tuft of fur on the wildcat’s ear. “What the hell are you crying about? You’re driving me mad. Keep crying and I’ll kick you.”
The little wildcat whimpered and gave his chest a feeble scratch.
Black Fur opened his coat and tucked the cub inside.
Beyond the little hut, lush vegetation stretched through the forest toward the distant azure sky. Under the sunshine the southern countryside spread out in unbroken green, the Jiangnan landscape alive with grasses and birds in June.
Thus the extra about Black Fur, the little beast, came to an abrupt end.
If there is to be any continuation…
Several months later.
The continuous pa-pa-pa-pa sounds from the little stone hut were unbroken; the man’s hoarse moans came only in fits and starts.
“Ah… ah… you… idiot… gentler… ah! Ah…”
The half-grown wildcat lying on top of him licked his face in impatient excitement. The man, who had been thrust into for nearly the entire night, weakly clawed with one hand at the black clothes beneath him, soaked with sweat and fluids. His head was driven against the stone wall with every impact; his long legs hung limp beside the wildcat’s, trembling faintly with each thrust.
At last the man could stand no more. “Get out!” he cursed, drawing back his leg to kick the wildcat away.
“Aowu!” Seeing it was about to lose its chance at the little wildcat, it roared in desperation. Its eyes flashed blood-red and in almost the same instant it shed its form into a full-grown body as robust as a tiger’s! The stick still buried in the swollen entrance suddenly swelled thicker and began to hammer like a woodpecker boring into wood!
“Aaaah—! You, get out! Ah! Ah! You… you damned… idiot! Wuah… ah! Ah! Ah…”
His ears were filled with his own screams that could only be called wretched, mixed with the fierce, wet slap of flesh. Unable to draw a single breath, the man’s brown eyes rolled back and he passed out once more.
At noon the following day, the little sparrow hopped to the doorway of the stone hut and nearly fell from his perch when a heartrending howl sounded from inside.
“Awooooo!”
“Wuahhh…” The little wildcat, returned to its half-grown form, huddled in the corner clutching its stick and balls, wailing itself hoarse. “It hurts… wuwuwu… kicked it until it broke, wuahhh…”
“Get out!” the man in black roared, clutching his backside. “Don’t touch me again until you can take human form!”
“Waaah… You bastard… You bastard…” the little wildcat sobbed until its voice was hoarse, heartbroken and aggrieved.
The sparrow shook his head and sighed. That rabbit was bullying its pet wildcat again. Strange. The wildcat was big and agile, and it chased wild boars and wolves through the woods with murderous energy every day, so how could it still be unable to stand up to that tyrannical rabbit, even after the rabbit had lost an arm?
What an outrageous, overbearing Rabbit King of Hell!Who in all the world could possibly bring that creature to heel?
And this time, Black Fur’s extra really was over.