Sword Immortal, Not a True Immortal
The fox had shown him the path, but cultivation depended on oneself. One day, Xu Zhong realized that the method of cultivation he had learned from the fox could truly grant him immortality.
Night deepened. Xu Zhong closed the window, and the lamplight grew brighter.
A sheet of rice paper lay open before him, still blank. His right hand, holding a brush, rested thoughtfully against his chin, while his left tapped absently at a thick stack of books on the desk, lost in contemplation.
“Chii chii chii!” A strange call broke the silence, and Xu Zhong’s face lit with delight as he hastened to open the window.
But before he could reach it, a white, sharp-snouted little head had already nudged the window open. With a flex of its forepaws, the creature leapt to the desk, landing squarely on the rice paper.
It shook itself, scattering snow everywhere.
It was a small fox, its fur pure white as new-fallen snow.
“Why are you so late today?” Xu Zhong brushed the snow from the rice paper, then used his wide sleeve to wipe the melting flakes from the little fox’s fur.
“Chii chii…” The fox could not speak, but its lively eyes seemed to say the snow was too deep—so deep that it sank entirely into the drifts and was thus much slower than usual.
“Are you cold?” Xu Zhong asked gently.
The little fox nodded first, then shook its head.
Xu Zhong cradled it in his arms, then pondered aloud, “Perhaps it’s the Yellow Emperor’s Inner Classic.”
The fox, brimming with intelligence, was like one of those magical creatures from tales of the strange—except, regrettably, it could not speak, nor transform into a beautiful maiden.
When they had first met, Xu Zhong mistook it for a mischievous spirit and tried to catch it,