The third year brought an unexpected change in the simplest form.
Li Yuan woke up one morning with a feeling that something had shifted in his sleep, though he couldn't explain what. Qinglu was still lying in its usual spot next to the house, the plants in the formation still vibrated with a familiar rhythm, and the small spring still flowed with a soothing sound.
However, there was something different in the way he felt everything.
Li Yuan got up and performed his usual morning routine—greeting Qinglu, checking on the plants, walking around a part of the island. But throughout the journey, he kept feeling a strange sensation that he was seeing everything for the first time.
It wasn't because anything had physically changed. It was because something inside him had changed.
As he sat at the edge of the small spring, watching how the morning light reflected on the water's surface, an understanding began to crystallize.
He was no longer trying to understand the island.
For the past two years, despite enjoying the simple life here, a part of his consciousness was always in "learning" mode—observing, analyzing, searching for lessons and meaning. Even in the silence, he was still seeking understanding.
But this morning, for the first time, he was just... existing. Without an agenda. Without the desire to understand or learn anything.
"This," he whispered to himself, "this is what it means to truly rest."
Li Yuan spent the next few weeks exploring this new mental state. He did the same activities—tending to the house, observing nature, interacting with Qinglu and the plants—but with a different quality of attention.
It wasn't an attention that sought meaning, but a simple and direct attention. Like the way a child sees the world—with wonder, but without the need to explain or categorize.
This change brought a surprising effect on his interactions with the island's ecosystem. The plants in his formation began to resonate at a different frequency—more spontaneous, more free. Qinglu seemed more relaxed around him, as if it sensed that the burden of being "the always-observing teacher" had lifted from Li Yuan.
Even the spiritual spring in the cave gave a different response when he visited. The water in the pool looked clearer, its spiritual vibration purer, as if it also felt a freedom from expectations.
"Apparently," Li Yuan mused while sitting in the cave, "presence without purpose is the purest form of presence."
The dry season of the third year brought a new challenge, but Li Yuan faced it with a different attitude than in previous years. When water became scarce, he didn't seek lessons about scarcity or generosity. He just responded naturally—conserving water, sharing with Qinglu and the plants, looking for alternative sources.
There was no internal drama about the meaning of hardship. No philosophical analysis of the cycles of nature. Just a right and spontaneous response to the situation at hand.
And in the simplicity of that response, Li Yuan found a surprising effectiveness. Without the distraction of a mind that was always analyzing, he could see solutions more clearly, move more efficiently, and make better decisions.
"A mind that seeks nothing," he realized, "sees everything."
The middle of the third year brought a new discovery when Li Yuan, on one of his purposeless journeys, found a part of the island he had never explored—a small bay on the southern side hidden behind a formation of coral reefs.
The bay was beautiful in a simple way—fine white sand, clear turquoise seawater, and a few coconut trees growing at an angle toward the sea. But what made it special was not its physical beauty.
In this bay, Li Yuan felt a different kind of silence from the rest of the island. Not a silence filled with life as in the forest or near the spring. But an empty silence—in a positive sense.
A silence that contained nothing, and precisely because of that, could contain everything.
Li Yuan began to visit this bay regularly, usually in the afternoon when the sun began to dip to the west. He would sit on the sand, looking at the endless ocean horizon, allowing his mind to become as empty as possible.
Qinglu sometimes came along, but more often the deer chose to stay near the house. As if it understood that this was something Li Yuan needed to do alone.
In the emptiness of that bay, Li Yuan began to understand a new aspect of cultivation—or perhaps, an aspect that transcended cultivation.
For thousands of years, he had been accumulating understandings, developing abilities, and deepening consciousness. But now he began to see the value of letting go, of emptying, of being nothing.
"Cultivation has two directions," he mused while drawing patterns in the sand with his finger. "Accumulating and letting go. Becoming and not becoming."
He began to experiment with "emptiness" meditation—not the silent consciousness he had practiced all this time, but an effort to be truly empty. Not thinking of anything, not feeling anything, not being anything.
It was difficult at first. A mind that had cultivated for thousands of years had its own momentum, always moving, always searching, always processing. But slowly, in the stillness of the bay and with the help of the hypnotic sound of the waves, Li Yuan began to achieve moments of genuine emptiness.
And in that emptiness, something strange happened.
He began to feel... everything. Not in a spiritual or mystical sense, but in a very direct and simple sense. He felt himself as a part of the sand, of the water, of the wind, of the sunlight.
It wasn't because he was using a specific cultivation ability or Understanding. But because when the "Li Yuan" who thought and analyzed was gone, all that was left was a pure consciousness that was not separate from anything.
"This," he realized in one of those moments of emptiness, "this is what all cultivators are searching for without even realizing it."
Not power or abilities or even wisdom. But freedom from the illusion of separation. Freedom from the burden of being "someone."
The rainy season of the third year came with a softer intensity than in previous years, as if nature also felt the change in Li Yuan's attitude. He spent a lot of time inside the house, not doing anything in particular—just sitting, listening to the rain, occasionally talking to Qinglu or the plants.
His conversations also changed. He no longer "taught" or even "learned" from them. Communication became simpler—greeting each other, sharing presence, enjoying companionship without an agenda.
"True friendship," he realized, "requires no exchange. Just a sincere presence."
Toward the end of the third year, Li Yuan sat in his yard on a clear night, surrounded by Qinglu and the plants in the formation. The stars shone brightly in the sky, and the sound of the waves provided a constant soundtrack.
He felt a deep satisfaction, but not the satisfaction of an achievement or a new understanding. The satisfaction of letting go of the need to achieve or understand anything.
"Three years," he said to Qinglu who was lying with its head on his lap. "Three years to learn how to stop learning."
The deer looked up as if it understood, then laid its head back down with a contented purr.
Li Yuan closed his eyes and allowed his consciousness to merge with the silence of the night. Not searching for anything, not analyzing anything, not being anything.
Just being, in the purity of a presence unburdened by purpose or meaning.
And in that state, he felt a peace deeper than anything he had ever achieved through even the most intense spiritual cultivation.
The peace of not needing to be anyone.
The peace of not needing to go anywhere.
The peace of not needing to look for anything.
The third year ended with Li Yuan truly, for the first time in his thousands of years of existence, feeling complete without needing to add anything to himself.