Luo Fu Lang

During the Sui dynasty, Zhao Shixiong passed through Mount Luofu in Guangdong and fell asleep leaning against a plum tree. He dreamed of meeting a plum blossom spirit, giving rise to the name "Dream of Luofu."

A white plum tree stretched its branches diagonally to the window, its pearl-like buds holding snow, its elegant charm serene, and its cool, secluded fragrance lingering in the air. She slowly closed her eyes. In her dream, she seemed to see her former self in the Valley of Return, free of desire and delusion. She had left the mountains in her father's place only to obey his wishes.

With no distracting thoughts and untouched by worldly concerns, her fate was to remain forever on a road without end: pausing beside simple, graceful mountain towns and riverside villages, letting herself be drenched in apricot-blossom rain; passing through prosperous cities thronged with carriages and horses, letting the bustle fill her ears; lodging in an ancient convent hidden beneath lush greenery, playing the qin in harmony on a long, rainy night; climbing a solitary, precipitous mountain among the drifting clouds beyond the frontier, scooping up the snow of all living things, unchanged since time immemorial, as it melted between her fingers. When her youth had faded and her black hair turned white, she would become a handful of dust in some quiet little village, vanishing from the world.

How simple and peaceful the world of flowers was. Between heaven and earth, there was only a wisp of fragrance from birth to death. The eyelashes of the green-clad woman curled up asleep by the window trembled; a tear fell in silence. Love, once begun, ran deep...