Soul of the Zither, Soul of the Zither

A fireball streaks across the sky, breaking the quiet of Hongya Danjing. The zither player Guo Hui descends the mountain to travel the world. When he encounters a dispute between Daoists and monks, he uses his music to turn conflict into peace. The occultist Guo Pu flees south to escape the turmoil and uses magic to swindle a maid. The zither player Guo Hui and the occultist Guo Pu meet at an old roadside pavilion, where poetry and music bring them together, one as pure as unpolished jade and the other as solid as gold. Later, Guo Pu dies in the Wang Dun Rebellion, just as he himself had predicted: fate is fixed. Guo Hui returns to Hongya Danjing, reflecting on the past as his heart becomes a river flowing against the current.