6: Chapter 6 The "Stumbling Block" by the Stream

As the wooden door of the ancestral hall creaked shut behind them, the mountain wind, carrying the dampness from the bottom of the cliff, surged down the slope.

Chen Jie hunched his shoulders; the strap of his canvas tool bag slapped against his back in the wind, and the wrenches inside clattered from time to time, as if echoing the roar of the distant waterfall.

Uncle Liu walked ahead with a pipe in his mouth, suddenly gesturing with his chin toward the valley: "Have you ever heard of the origin of 'Suiyu Slope'?"

Zhao Kai was wiping water stains off his phone screen and didn't even look up when he heard this: "Isn't it just a hillside that produces jade stone? What else could there be to it?"

"That's where you're wrong."

Uncle Liu blew a smoke ring that dissipated into fine mist in the wind. "The elders say that in the early years, a Jade God lived in the mountains who could turn stones into treasures. One year, when a flash flood broke out, he threw all the jade stone he had refined into the creek to plug the breach. Those broken jade pieces sank to the bottom and turned into all the stones covering this mountain."

He tapped a pebble on the side of the road with his pipe. "Look at these stones; they feel smoother to the touch than those elsewhere because they are imbued with the Spiritual Qi of the Jade God."

Chen Jie's gaze fell into the creek. The pebbles at the bottom were indeed glowing with a soft light, as if covered by a thin veil.

He squatted down to wash his hands. The creek water was bone-chillingly cold, making him shiver. Just as his fingertips touched a piece of broken blue-and-white porcelain, he heard Zhao Kai let out an "Ouch"—he had slipped on the moss and was toppling into the water.

When Chen Jie grabbed him, his own knee slammed hard against an ink-green stone. "Hiss—" He winced in pain.

As his gaze fell onto that stone, his heart suddenly skipped a beat: the patterns on the surface of the stone were perfectly horizontal and vertical, looking just like someone had meticulously carved them with a chisel. The curves at the corners were perfectly rounded, looking almost like a Talismanic Incantation left behind by the Jade God.

"What are you still staring at?"

Zhao Kai rubbed his sprained ankle, his tone fiery. "Is this damn stone more valuable than my new phone? I almost fell into the water to feed the fish just now—do you know that the old folks in the mountains say there are water ghosts in this creek that drag away city folk who don't watch where they're walking?"

"Could the Jade God that Uncle Liu mentioned have left behind some kind of mark?"

Chen Jie ignored his complaints and traced the patterns on the stone with his fingertips, suddenly recalling myths he had heard in his childhood. "In my hometown, there's a saying that items belonging to immortals all bear spiritual patterns, and they will manifest their power when they encounter someone fated."

Uncle Liu leaned over to take a look and tapped the stone gently with his pipe:

"You know, you might be onto something. These patterns really look like the 'Water-Suppressing Talisman' drawn in our village's old genealogy. Legend has it that the Jade God used this talisman to suppress the flash flood back then, and later, the talisman paper dissolved in the water and imprinted itself onto the stones."

He pointed toward the upper reaches of the creek. "There's a large bluestone over there with similar patterns on its surface. The elders say that is the base of the Jade God's Pill Furnace."

Zhao Kai scoffed and took out his phone to take a picture of the stone. "I think you two have listened to too many fairy tales. This is clearly formed naturally by wind and sun. When I go back and analyze it with software, I guarantee it's just a regular granite pattern—besides, if there really were a Jade God, why wouldn't he drop a gold brick for me?"

Chen Jie didn't respond. When he pried the stone out, the machine oil on its surface began to spread along the patterns. Just then, those lines suddenly lit up with a faint blue light, like fireflies crawling along the talismanic markings, glowing evenly and vividly.

He was so startled he almost dropped it. The legend Uncle Liu had spoken of seemed to echo in his ears: the Talismanic Incantation of the Jade God would emit a spiritual light when it encountered someone who understood it.

"Look!"

Chen Jie held the stone up in front of Zhao Kai. The blue light happened to crawl across a circular node, like the most crucial stroke in a talismanic character.

Just as Zhao Kai leaned in, the light vanished abruptly. He froze for a moment, then curled his lip:

"What was that? A reflection from the sun? I think you've been brainwashed by Uncle Liu's fairy tales. Let's go, hurry up; if we're any later, the wild pheasants will be snatched away by weasels."

"This stone might really have been left behind by the Jade God."

Chen Jie stuffed the stone into his tool bag, his fingertips still retaining a faint warmth, as if the Spiritual Qi of the Jade God was drilling into him through his fingertips. He thought of the Water-Suppressing Talisman Uncle Liu had mentioned and suddenly felt that this trip into the mountains wasn't to find some Republic-era radio, but to encounter this stone bearing the mark of a myth.

As the wind swept through the bamboo forest, Chen Jie touched the outside of the tool bag and could clearly feel the outline of the stone. Sunlight pierced through the clouds, spilling onto the surface of the creek and shimmering with golden-red ripples. The terraced fields in the distance were a vibrant, shining green, looking just like the fairyland where immortals lived in myths.

He looked at Zhao Kai's hurried back and smiled, understanding in his heart: some legends might not be false. Just like the stones in these mountains, which hide so many unknown secrets, only those who are truly willing to lower their heads and look closely can catch a glimpse of them.