Chapter Two: Where the Petals Fell in Dreams
Four hours earlier.
In the town at the mountain's base, pear blossoms bloomed like snow.
Children danced beneath the tree, hand in hand, humming a rhyme as old as the wind:
"Beneath the pear tree, blossoms fly,
Once you planted, once you sighed.
Wait you home, wait you near,
Smile beneath the blooming year.
Wind will blow, petals fall—
Still I wait by Gui Mountain's wall.
Sun and moon trade countless turns,
I remain, until your return."
They went round and round, voices sweet and light. It was just a song to them. But to others—it sounded like a summons.
Nearby, adults were busy preparing for the Festival of Return: writing wishes, wrapping offerings, checking supplies.
The village blacksmith and present-day Guide, had already packed the tools for the mountain climb. Now, he moved down Huafang Street, looking for someone.
Someone who should have stood beside him.
His name was Gui Tian, born into the ancient bloodline of mountain Guides.
But this generation… the title of Guide was not meant to be his. It belonged to his younger brother.
That brother had once been brilliant—
Until he suddenly vanished from home, and wandered for years, and returned—wandering, half-drunk, healing herbs in his coat, strange mutterings on his lips.
They called him The Mad Doctor Ye.
Today, on the day of the festival of returning, Tian hoped to bring his brother home.
Not just to climb. But to return—for real.
He found him behind a butcher's stall, lying in a pile of straw, one foot bare, a crooked sign above his head:
"Doctor who saves the world (Cheap Consults – No Refunds.)"
"Gui Ye!" Gui Tian snapped. "Wake up! You're sleeping in garbage?"
A tousled head popped out from under the straw—hair like a bird's nest, robe like a rag.
Ye sat up, blinking at the light, swatting flies from his face.
"I remember now! You're …
oh wait, no, you're my brother!" he grinned.
"Welcome, welcome! So honored by your visit! My humble home is suddenly blessed!"
He yanked some hay out of his hair and muttered, "Almost had it… just a little more and I would've remembered…"
Gui Tian's jaw clenched.
"You call this a home? You have an ancestral house stands empty, and you—what, playing street quack?"
He pulled out a clean towel and flung it over.
"Wipe your damn face. What did you forget, huh? Your family? Your name? Or that you're a Guide?"
"I'm resting my spirit in here!"
Gui Ye caught the towel, and for a moment, something softened in his eyes.
Then he scrubbed his face with wild abandon. Dust, wine, even pear petals fell off like old memories.
The towel turned black.
He beamed, eyes gleaming:
"This place is great, brother. Meat on the left, girls on the right, wine at the back. Life's perfect!"
"Over at the old place? It's all roots and relics, they faces tighter than tomb doors."
Gui Tian sighed. "Your words are still poison."
A shaft of sunlight slipped through the alley gap and struck Ye's face.
Sharp brows, high nose, sleepy eyes—messy but annoyingly likable.
The kind of face that said: Never trust me… but you'll still happy even you know I lied.
Gui Ye flopped back into the hay.
"I had a dream," he said softly.
"The same dream from when we were kids. I almost remembered her name this time.
Never mind. You wouldn't believe me anyway."
He tossed the ruined towel back. Tian caught it—
and nearly gagged at the smell and holes caused by stubble.
"There is a rumour spreading in the town," he muttered.
"Rumors say Mount Gui eats people. Was that you, again?"
"Slender slander! I only told Pi-zi about the dream."
Gui Ye raised his hands dramatically.
"I said a girl flew into the mountain.
He ran off shouting, 'oh my god! It eats human!' Not my fault."
He mimicked Pi-zi's high-pitched shriek:
"Guuuiii Mountain eats peeeooople! It's a girl! Tell everyone!"
He laughed, then reached into the hay and pulled out a slab of aged meat like it was a holy relic.
He took a bite, still chewing, added, "I was asking her name when you woke me."
Tian's tone dropped.
"If you came home, the title would be yours.
Something's not right this year…
I want you to come with me. Just this once."
He turned to leave.
"I have been to Mount Gui plenty of times," Ye mumbled around the meat.
"Just this morning I climbed it, picked two herbs, traded them for wine and this pork."
Tian paused mid-step.
His mouth twitched. He was about to snap back when—
A stifled laugh echoed behind them.
Both men turned.
An old man ducked out of sight, barely holding in his wheezing.
Ye's eyes lit up.
He was on his feet in an instant—barefoot, wild, charging like a bandit.
"Old Li! Laugh again and I'll tell your wife where you *really* were last night!"
He chased him around the corner, slapping on his loose sandals mid-run, shouting threats and jokes like falling petals.
Tian turned away from the square, pretending he wasn't angry. But he was. Not just angry—hurt.
His little brother didn't understand what it meant to be a Guide. But he did. He knew the weight of the mountain, the hopes people carried up with every prayer. He had carried it alone for too long.
The alley fell quiet again.
Not long after, Ye returned alone.
He didn't go far. Just curled back into the hay.
To nap.
And to dream.
But this time, it came slower.
The mist didn't swallow him whole—it curled at his ankles, then rose to his knees, then shoulders, until the world around him faded like paint in water.
In his dream, there was no path—only fog.
The ground was cold.
The air held a faint scent of pear blossoms.
He was little in the dream. So little he couldn't form full words.
And there she stood.
Atop a broken stone stele, white robes swaying like snow in fog.
She didn't move, but somehow the entire mountain seemed to turn around her.
"You came back," she said.
Her voice rang like a chime in mist—soft, distant, sorrowful.
She turned her face, but the fog swallowed it.
Yet in that moment, something struck Gui Ye in the chest.
Not wind. Not fear.
Her eyes.
Eyes full of memory, quiet and sad.
And in her gaze, even her shadow trembled.
"…You shouldn't have come," she said.
Little Gui Ye looked up, blinking.
"Are you… a angel?" he asked.
She didn't answer. Just stared, searching his child-face like looking for something lost.
Then, she whispered:
"Do you remember my name?"
He shook his head. Then nodded. Unsure.
She smiled.
"I don't quite remember either.
But I dreamed of you.
You said you remembered me."
"And in that dream, I feared—
if you returned again,
I might never be able to let you go."
She reached out and brushed his hair.
A gesture lighter than petals.
And her voice was almost a breath:
"If you do remember my name,
keep it in your heart."
"Don't look for me again.
Don't comeback to Mount Gui again."
The wind stirred.
The fog parted.
And she was gone.
Ye jolted upright in the hay, heart pounding.
He almost shouted—
"I remember! You're ———!"
But a wind swept past.
The word blew away before it left his mouth.
He sat there, stunned.
It felt like a dozen silent wind chimes had been hung in his chest.
Not one made a sound.
But all of them trembled.
He looked toward the mountain.
Fog.
Just fog.
As if nothing had happened.
Then he leapt up, eyes wide.
"…Oh No—!!"