Chapter 1: Crossing Worlds and Seizing the Fairy's Destiny

Midnight is the hour when something will emerge from beneath this stone slab!

These words were spoken by Li Lao’er, the current master of the Liulin Temple, as he descended the mountain. Lin Xiaosu didn’t believe a single punctuation mark in that statement. A university graduate, educated and preparing for his second attempt at the civil service exam, he simply couldn’t accept the idea that something could crawl out from inside a solid slab of green stone.

But so what? He agreed to help Li Lao’er keep watch at the Liulin Temple for one night.

It all began when Li Lao’er’s wife fell ill. Whenever she had one of her episodes, she would seek out Lin Xiaosu’s mother and weep, pouring out stories that never ended. She could recount, with tears and trembling voice, how Li Lao’er had once spied on Widow Feng bathing, even though it had happened twenty years ago.

Out of neighborly duty, out of gratitude for the treats his aunt always shared, and perhaps because he’d grown up playing naked with her daughter, Tiger Girl, Lin Xiaosu went to find his uncle.

Never would he have imagined that he’d come up the mountain in good spirits, only to find he couldn’t go back down.

His uncle insisted today was a “Celestial Pivot Day,” and that someone had to stay in the temple to guard the “Mystic Gate.” Otherwise, at midnight, something would emerge from beneath the stone. Lin Xiaosu voiced his objections, but the old man was stubborn as a mule.

Thinking of Tiger Girl’s growing figure, Lin Xiaosu’s impulsiveness got the better of him. He slapped his chest and declared, “Uncle, stop fussing. I’ll guard the temple for you!”

With that promise, his uncle happily went home to comfort his wife’s decades-old wounds, leaving Lin Xiaosu alone atop the mountain amid the swirling winds.

Fortunately, his uncle had a daughter.

As soon as he left, Tiger Girl climbed up, carrying a basket of dinner for Lin Xiaosu.

Lin Xiaosu had always felt uneasy about Tiger Girl’s meals. She was eccentric—catching rabbits on the mountain, frogs in the fields, dragging huge snakes out from rock crevices by their tails, poking wild boars with massive sticks, sending sows fleeing from her as if she were a ghost, and embarrassing the boars beyond measure.

All these wild creatures inevitably ended up in her cooking pot. Lin Xiaosu had eaten who knows how many of them, often tricked into it. Now, whenever he ate her food, he habitually inspected the bones to make sure the meal was legitimate.

Tonight’s chicken seemed proper enough.

But at that moment, Tiger Girl lay sprawled on the stone slab, limbs splayed, her clothes half askew—was her posture proper? That, he couldn’t say.

Lin Xiaosu glanced at his phone.

There was only one minute left until midnight.

He switched off his phone and looked at Tiger Girl, sprawled on the ground. He told himself, “Once midnight passes, I’ve fulfilled my uncle’s request. I’ll carry her to the bed in the back. It’s cold on the floor…”

Midnight arrived.

The mountain did not shake; the earth did not move.

As expected, his uncle had spun a proper yarn.

Just as Lin Xiaosu confirmed this in his heart, a faint light flashed by.

It was very weak, like starlight from the heavens, or perhaps a firefly sneaking into the temple.

It came from beneath the stone slab he was sitting on.

Lin Xiaosu took three steps and stood above the glowing spot. He crouched down, pressing one eye to the light, trying to see what lay inside the stone.

What he saw left him utterly petrified.

The stone, so ordinary by day, now opened like a skylight.

Looking through this “skylight,” he saw—

Within the stone, there was an endless river of stars.

Among the stars stood an ancient stone stele.

On top of the stele grew a bare little tree, with a single branch. On the branch were more than ten leaves, each radiating a rainbow glow, each unique, each like a miniature universe.

Beneath the stele lay a crystal coffin, with clouds and mist swirling inside.

When Lin Xiaosu’s gaze landed in the coffin, his soul trembled—there was someone inside, a woman’s corpse, lying silently.

Her neck and below were veiled by clouds and mist, only her face exposed. Even with just her face visible, Lin Xiaosu was shaken to his core.

Words like “beauty that makes fish sink and birds fall, moon hide and flowers blush” were inadequate.

She did not seem dead.

It was as though, beneath this boundless starry sky, she was simply sleeping.

Her posture was a beauty no artist could ever capture.

At some point, Lin Xiaosu felt his consciousness shift—as if he’d become a small silver fish, swimming above that exquisite face, quietly watching the sleeping immortal.

Suddenly, a leaf from the tree atop the stele flicked, and a droplet of dew fell.

This dew shimmered with rainbow colors, as if traversing endless space and time, descending toward the woman’s eyelid.

Lin Xiaosu, startled, instinctively reached out to block it.

At that moment, a chill pierced his mind, and a mysterious message entered his consciousness: “Heavenly wisdom eye, perceiving the subtlest, reversing through time and space…”