Master Mingyou of Ciyin Temple was a gentle young monk who loved to smile.
He always swept the pagoda at dusk, his back serene and still.
No one knew that he kept half a jade pendant close against his chest. Eight years ago, he had torn it from a child amid the towering flames that engulfed Yunzhen City.
At nineteen, Yun You had traveled across mountains and rivers, collecting all sorts of strange stories and unusual happenings.
Half a jade pendant hung around her neck. She often woke with a start at night, always dreaming of a fire that would never burn itself out.
That spring, she arrived in the capital and stayed at Ciyin Temple.
“Young Master, have you ever heard of Yunzhen?”
she asked casually while they sheltered from the rain beneath the corridor.
Mingyou paused. “I have not.”
The days passed, one after another.
She helped him lay out the scriptures to dry, and he taught her to recognize the stars.
Then she came across that half of a jade pendant, and the prayer beads in his hand suddenly snapped apart.
She stared at him, her voice trembling. “What is this?”
He lowered his eyes. After a long silence, he finally asked, “Where did your jade pendant come from?”
“My mother gave it to me.” She stepped closer. “Where did yours come from?”
The cries of Yunzhen City pierced through eight years of time and swallowed him once more.
What was he supposed to say?
That on the day he massacred the city, he had picked it up beside a child on the verge of death?
That for eight years, he had lit a lamp every night for the souls who would never see the light again?
In the end, he said, “I am Pei Zhan. I led the troops that massacred Yunzhen City.”
When the entire truth was laid bare, when all the missed chances across three lifetimes came rushing before them, he took off his monk's robes and chose to return to secular life.
And she stood at the ferry crossing he could never see again, holding the last letter.
It contained only one sentence.
“Keep going. This time, don't look back.”
Theme: A person's choices define their dignity
