Fragile, Sickly Young Master vs. Simple, Obsessive Little Flower Spirit
Shen Xiumo was a young master who had grown up steeped in medicine. When he turned twenty-four, he came down with an exceptionally rare illness. His family was helpless, so they sought out a Taoist priest from Yaoshan.
The priest performed a ritual, touched the spot between Shen Xiumo's brows, and shouted, "Break!"
Shen Xiumo woke up with a cryptic prophecy: "On the third day of the third month, at the City God Temple, the heart of the woman with blood on her brow. Take it, and you will live."
He went there. Beneath a sky full of peach blossoms, a woman in pink fell from above into his arms. She clung tightly to him and murmured in his ear, "I've finally waited for you."
After more than twenty years of suffering, Shen Xiumo had become cold and heartless. He knew nothing of love. Yet whenever this woman was near, his heart, which had seemed ready to die from illness, felt as though it had come back to life.
They met beneath a peach tree at the City God Temple, and he named her "Taohua."
Taohua knew nothing of the world, and he devoted all the patience he had saved up over half a lifetime to her.
But his frail body would not last. When he saw the Taoist priest from Yaoshan again, he was gravely ill once more.
Old Daoist Mukun watched Madam Shen walk away, then said gravely, "She owes you this. Why not take it back? Your life essence is nearly exhausted. You don't have much time left."
"Take her heart?" Shen Xiumo forced a weak smile. "That would be like cutting out my own."
P.S. Part of a short-story series.
Theme: The cycle of cause and effect
