Annual Ceremony

Chapter 73 The Great Cold (Final)

From that day on, Zhan Mei stopped advising Zhenyi and instead helped her organize her studies. Zhenyi organized astronomy, geography, medicine, and mathematics, while he helped her organize her poetry collection.

Zhan Mei could recite many of his wife's poems by heart, and within half a year he compiled more than ten volumes. He asked Zhenyi to name the collection of poems, and Zhenyi thought for a moment and wrote down four characters: "Defengting Collection".

Afterwards, Zhenyi picked up another blank sheet of paper and wrote down four characters. Ju Zi stared at them intently but couldn't recognize them. If the cat could read, it would know that the four characters were pronounced as "Chen Ke Yi Yu" (沉疴嘓语).

These four words also perfectly describe the state of the orange: the sounds it hears are getting fainter and fainter, its eyes are blurry, its mind is in a mess, it can't remember things, it can't tell the days, and it no longer grooms its fur.

All that was known was that it snowed again. On a snowy night, Zhenyi suddenly began burning the manuscripts she had painstakingly reorganized, burning stack after stack and throwing them into a copper basin.

When Zhan Mei returned from outside, he was shocked to see the scene and hurriedly tried to dissuade her, but Zhenyi just smiled and said, "Don't worry, what was burned was all useless. Looking at it again after several years, we will find that some of it was wrong and some was ambiguous. Leaving it would only mislead the younger generation."

Truth is never ambiguous; once it recognizes shortcomings, it will not be attached to any amount of effort.

Zhan Mei embraced his wife, feeling both love and respect for her. He pressed his forehead against hers and said with tears in his eyes, "There's plenty of time in the future. We'll be able to write the correct version again."

When the Great Cold solar term arrived again, Zhenyi leaned against the couch and instructed him: "After I leave, remember to give all these things to Sister Jiuying of the Qian family... I already agreed to this in the letter."

Only the Qian and Kuai families can better arrange their fate, and if they are lucky, they can pass them down.

Sitting by the couch, Zhan Mei gripped Zhenyi's hand tightly: "Where are you going? Stop talking nonsense."

"I'm going to a place to verify one last thing..." Zhenyi smiled weakly, "I have to go and see if people have souls after they die, and if there is an afterlife."

Zhan Mei, her eyes brimming with tears, was at a loss for words, only wanting to bind her with her words: "What if there is? What if there is an afterlife... Zhen'er, Zhen'er, what do you want to do?"

Zhenyi gazed at him, or perhaps at some unknown place, and slowly said, "I wish to transform into the wind and roam the nine heavens..."

Zhan Mei was suddenly gripped by a sharp pain in his heart. This kind and carefree man was now filled with endless hatred for the world. He bent his trembling back and lowered his head, his forehead resting against the slender, cold fingers he held in his hands.

After a long while, Zhan Mei almost burst into tears, looked up and asked, "Then I will turn into a cloud, and wherever you swim, I will drift there... When you are tired from swimming, you can stop on me to rest for a while, do you think that's alright?"

Zhenyi gently grasped his fingers with her own and said with a smile, "Then wouldn't I be a burden to you even more..."

“How could I be a burden?” Zhan Mei burst into tears, but managed a smile: “How could I be a burden? I’ve never been a burden.”

Zhenyi slowly raised her other hand to wipe his tears and teased him, "You're even more bitter than that bubbling medicine pot."

Zhan Mei snapped out of his reverie and remembered that the medicine was still being decocted in the kitchen. Look how alert his wife was! She was still so organized and clear-headed. It was clear that... it was clear that the day of parting was still far off!
Zhan Mei felt extremely fortunate, as if a period of time had been stolen. After tucking Zhenyi in, he hurried to see the medicine.

A solitary, snow-white figure, barefoot, stepped off the bed, pushed open the window, and let in the cold wind, carrying with it the pale snow.

Zhenyi stared blankly out the window at the heavy snow falling all around.

Orange, moving slowly, crawled over, wanting to close the window for Zhenyi, but saw that Zhenyi was too weak to support herself and slowly sat down in the old chair by the window, but still turned her head to look at the starless and moonless night outside the window.

Orange finally crawled to Zhenyi's cold, bare feet. Zhenyi lowered her eyes, blinked slowly, and just like when she was a child, bent down, picked up Orange, and placed her on her lap.

Her knees were very thin, all bone. Orange suddenly felt extremely guilty, panicked and confused, not knowing why it had failed to take good care of Zhenyi.

The orange, whose sense of smell had been lost, smelled the scent of parting. If parting was inevitable, it wanted to make a promise with Zhenyi. It wanted to invite Zhenyi to visit the place it came from, a place where one could travel through the heavens and explore the universe without having to turn into the wind!

But how could they make an agreement? Seeing Zhenyi slowly close her eyes, Orange had never been so anxious. It had no other choice but to bite Zhenyi's hand, leaving two bloody teeth marks.

Zhenyi's eyelashes trembled slightly, then she opened her eyes a little wider, revealing a very soft smile, and said, "Okay..."

She seemed to understand, and tears welled up in Orange's eyes. Zhenyi could understand; Zhenyi had been able to understand cats since she was little!
Orange's fluffy head drooped limply. It pressed against Zhenyi's hand and licked the faint bloodstain, trying to help relieve her pain.

The wind and snow howled, swirling up the "Collection of Explanations of the Seventy-Two Seasonal Phenomena" on the desk beside him.

The wind turned the old book to its last page, marking the seventy-second pentad, the third pentad of the Great Cold.

Zhan Mei walked in, the medicine bowl shattered at his feet, and he almost fell down as well. He staggered to his knees in front of the chair and hugged the man and cat, who were quickly chilled by the wind and snow.

……

In spring, the frozen soil thaws.

Not far from the stream where Zhenyi and Zhanmei once walked, a new grave has been erected; that is Zhenyi's grave.

To the left of Zhenyi, there is a small grave mound; that is Zhenyi's cat.

Several years later, spring will come again.

To the right of Zhenyi, there was another grave, that of Zhenyi's husband.

In front of the three graves, two large and one small, stand two peach trees, planted by Zhan Mei three years ago, their branches and leaves still tender.

Who knew the seasons would change, when suddenly spring arrived on the little peach branches?

But all that can be seen is the ice melting at the bottom of the ravine; no one knows that spring has come to bloom on the branches

A new cycle of solar terms has begun in the world.

……

……

《正文完》——非10于2025年7月31日凌晨3:11分。

……

postscript:

As Zhenyi's seventy-two phenological events came to their final page, her life also reached its final act, and the story ended with Chapter Seventy-Two.

Writing this book was undoubtedly a painful process. I initially claimed it was written out of love, but later I told a friend that it wasn't just about love, it was about bleeding for love. In short, writing it was "laborious and thankless," and it affected my mental state. At one point, I regretted writing it, but once I finished it, I felt no regret at all. It felt like I had fulfilled a destiny, as if it was my duty to write it. (I'm not saying I wrote it very well, but I hope it's a starting point, and that more people will know about Zhenyi, and that more people better than me will write about her.)
Let this mark the end of Zhenyi's life, though not perfect, it is still complete.

There will be a fictional side story, but I'll have to wait a while before writing it.

I am extremely grateful to all the friends who have been reading this book. Thank you.

Himalaya has produced an audiobook of "The Seasonal Ceremony," which you can listen to if you're interested.