Pursuit of the Truth

The girl was a child whose mother had died and whose father did not love her.

Since birth, she had never seen her father smile, and she had never had any sort of paternal love. From the moment she could remember herself, she had to cover her body and face with blankets during the nights, and in the morning, she had to be careful and avoid the rooms in which her father stayed. If she ran into him, she would only see his aloof gaze.

It seemed to be resenting her for not dying, and while she was still just a child, she understood what it meant…

She did not have many friends. There was only the son of her teacher who had grown up with her, and he was her childhood friend. If she was to add another person as her friend, then it would be the teacher. He taught her to perform good deeds and taught her how to read. He shouldered all the tasks that a father should take up.

As she gradually grew up, she stopped crying at night, because she knew why her father did not love her. It was because she had killed her mother. She had died because of her.

The girl seldom left her yard. She did not want to go anywhere, since every single time she did so, her father’s gaze when she returned would seem to contain resentment. It would seem to question her why she still came back and why… she had not died outside!

She lived in this sort of environment since her birth, and she was incredibly afraid of her surroundings, which led to her timid nature. However, on that day, she decided to venture outside, because she heard from her teacher during her lessons that saving a life was an act of kindness. She wanted to be like her childhood friend and ask the fisherman to let a fish go.

That was why even if faint signs of dark shadows appeared in the sky, which seemed to promise that rain would pour for several days once it came, she still snuck out and appeared on the fishing platform beside the lake. She saw the fisherman sitting there while a fishing net hung on a pillar beside him. There was a big fish struggling inside it.

“Grandpa, could you give me that fish?” the little girl asked in a whisper of the fisherman who had his back turned towards her.

“Grandpa, that fish is really pitiful. Please don’t eat it and give it to me…” the little girl pleaded.

The fisherman turned around. It was an old man who had an amiable and kindly face. He stared at the girl and smiled.

“Ah, what am I to do with you children? A few days ago, a young lad came and asked me to free my fish. Today, you’re here as well. But if I let all the fish go, how am I supposed to live?” The old fisherman pulled his fishing rod back with a smile. Once he fixed the bait on the hook, he threw the line back into the water.

“Grandpa, the person you mentioned just now is my older brother. You released the fish you caught for him, so please do it for me too! It’s so pitiful, and its parents must definitely be feeling anxious…”

The little girl took a few steps forward and lowered her head to stare at the fish in the net beside the pillar.

“Who said I let the fish go? When that lad saw that I didn’t agree, he ran off, discouraged,” the old man said with a smile.

The little girl was momentarily stunned, but determination soon appeared on her face. She went behind the fisherman and raised her little hands to tap his back, giving him a massage. She looked incredibly adorable.

“Grandpa, come on, please?”

Time trickled by. The little girl’s pleas lasted for more than two hours. The fisherman smiled and shook his head, looking resigned. He got up and moved to the pillar where the net was, then opened it. The fish instantly swam into the lake, diving into the depths, and disappeared without a trace.

“Alright, I released it. This should be enough, right?” The fisherman smiled and patted the girl’s head. As she beamed at him, he turned around and continued fishing.

A happy smile appeared on the girl’s face. With a tinkling laughter, she ran away.

The young girl did not know that when she left, the fisherman raised his fishing rod, and a big fish was caught. No one could say whether it was the one which he had released moments earlier or whether it was another one. In the end, the fact was that the fisherman caught another fish. He put it in the net and hung it on the pillar again.

With excitement on her face, the little girl ran back to the county town. On her way, she passed by the noodle stall without noticing an old man sitting on the large rock. With a complicated gaze, he stared at the little girl leaving into the distance while tapping the tobacco pipe gently against the ground.

When he tapped the ground, the little girl who had already ran into the distance suddenly came to a stop. She saw the world in front of her suddenly shatter before they were swept up to form a vortex. It pulled her in, and after an unknown amount of time passed, the fragments regrouped, forming a deep lake.

Fish swam within its depths, and no one could say where it came from. One particular fish moved in the water and seemed to swim about without any sentience.

It was a fish which had lived for an unknown number of years in the lake, but it did not have many memories. Whatever it could remember only lasted for seven breaths. Everything else was a blank slate.

The days repeated themselves, and every year passed by in the same manner. The fish swam in the lake, occasionally surfacing to stare at the scenery beyond. It watched the passing of seasons. There were times in the past where it wanted to rush out of the water and take a look at the sky and earth, but the moment this thought appeared in its head and it could take action, it had already lost that thought. This was because that thought had come from surpassed the span of seven breaths… and because of it, the fish forgot it.

However, with only the memories worth the time of seven breaths, the fish did not know grief, and neither did it know joy. Seven breaths were too short, so short that even its grief would only last for at most seven breath. Then, it would forget why it had been sad.

Its joy would last for at most seven breaths as well, since it would forget why it was happy.

With its memory like that, the fish’s mind was blank most of the time. It had no memories and thoughts. It would only swim about in the lake based on its instinct. It would stare at its companions, at the darkness, and the distance where no future existed.

One day, when a fish bait sank into the lake, it entered the fish’s line of vision.

It knew what it was, but it still went up to bite it. When it was pulled up by the fish hook and flung onto the platform, it saw the blue sky and the world beyond the water, but a pity… it only had seven breaths worth of memories. When it was placed in a net and the net was hung beside a pillar, it could only struggle against the net. During that time, it would only struggle for seven breaths… because after that time, it would have forgotten that it had been caught by someone…

It also forgot that the lake where it was should not be this small and that it should not have a net which it could not leave. Because of that, it would swim about in the net in a carefree manner.

When the net was lifted out of the water and the fish struggled with the pain of suffocation, it saw a little girl. That girl had raised the net, bringing it such great agony.

The fish glared at the little girl, and as it continued struggling, several breaths passed. It forgot why the little girl had lifted the net. The fish only remembered that the girl was the one who had caused it great pain.

Its memories only lasted for seven breaths, so when it struggled free through a gap that had suddenly opened up in the net, it forgot that it had once been caught and brought out of the lake by someone. It forgot that it had been placed in a net, and it forgot that the net was not its home. It only remembered that during the first breath of its memories, the girl had brought it pain. Because of that, when it returned to the water, it leaped up again. It did not know why its body would instantly turn big, but with a single bite, it dragged the little girl into the lake…

Time seemed to continue trickling by. The fish could never know how much of it had passed. Perhaps it had just been seven breaths, but… at that instant, it saw another hook falling into the lake.

It had already forgotten about the dangers of the hook, yet it seemed to know what that hook was. Once it bit it again, it was brought out of the water again, and it was put into a net again before being placed into the water with only a limited area of movement. Then, just like before, it forgot the start of the story and only remembered the ending.

This time, the fish did not see the girl. Instead, after an unknown amount of time passed, the net was opened and it swam out to return to the lake. Upon being freed, it cast the fishing platform a glance. On it stood an old man, and by his side was a little girl who seemed to be staring at it…

When seven breaths passed, the fish started swimming about in the lake, but this time, it seemed to be trying hard to think of something, and it continued thinking even when it bit down on another fish hook and was brought out of the water…

It still continued thinking when night fell and it was taken out of the lake the second time. It had already forgotten the start and the ending. The fisherman took it and sent it to the noodle stall where it opened its eyes to see an old man holding a tobacco pipe through the net. He was using grass to weave grass puppets while staring at it.

“You are my sixth reincarnation…” he said.

There was an ancient air to his words, and the one sentence was spoken so slowly that he spent a total of seven breaths to finish speaking it. This allowed the fish to hear the full sentence, thereby allowing it to be recorded in its memories for all time.

It turned into a loud rumble, and the fish seemed to have remembered something. As its world crumbled, the fragments of the shattered world turned into a vortex. With a howl, it took away the final shred of thought in the fish’s mind. It could not see the fragments regrouping, and it could not see another world appearing before its eyes.

Zhang Wen Zhang [1] was his name. It was a name that looked very common, but in truth held a hint of a poetic flair. His father had given him that name, and as the son of a teacher, Zhang Wen Zhang thought that this was quite a good name.

At the very least, based on the name alone, the others would know that he was an educated person.

Yet in reality, he did not like studying. He liked personally cooking good food, such as brewing soup or making noodles. Perhaps it was due to this hobby that as he gradually grew up, he was no longer as gentle and frail as his name suggested, which meant that he was an article written in a book. Instead, he turned into a young man who leaned slightly on the plump side.

His round face looked rather honest, but the light occasionally shining in his eyes would allow other people to tell that he was rather cunning. Yet that was all that they could see. After all, the cunning that others could see was usually something intentionally shown, and it was all due to a person’s ego of not wanting other people to think that they were not smart.

Translato’s Note:

Zhang Wen Zhang: Zhang is a family name, while Wen Zhang means essay. A long time ago in China, only the rich can study, and the poor did grunt work or hard labor. So, the rich do not need to do hard work, which means they easily get sick compared to the boys who learn martial arts or do hard work, which means they are frail and gentle. Since essay is associated with studies, that’s why we have frail and gentle.