An Old Friend Sleeps in the Spring of Years Past

He carved her a pearwood hairpin, and she embroidered him a pear blossom sachet.

That year, while out enjoying the spring, they carved their surnames into a nameless stele. She said, "When we're old, we'll be buried here too." He said, "All right."

Later, she died in the ancestral hall, never knowing she was carrying his child. Later, in a dream, he saw himself kneeling before an immortal, trading an eternity without reincarnation for the chance to give her another life.

In their third life, they were both alive. She married Prince Rong, and he married his cousin.

Every spring, she went up the mountain, and he went down. The same road, the same hour. She never looked back, and neither did he.

Pear blossoms bloomed season after season. He waited from black hair to white, while she went from young wife to matriarch surrounded by children and grandchildren.

The wooden hairpin lay at the very bottom of her dressing case, and she never once took the sachet from her waist.

She never said she forgave him. But he was still alive.

The pear blossoms bloomed year after year.

Suddenly, he felt that this was the answer.

Theme: Love is the only salvation, and the final answer.