The Tale Never Ends Chapter 24 Hawker Stalls

Old Man Chen had grown up an orphan boy since his youth, knowing only his teacher as a parent figure. Since his boyhood, his teacher had meticulously trained him in the skills of divination and had provided him with the essential fundamentals for his future. He would watch from the side and quietly test his skills whenever his teacher worked his magic for clients and patrons. As time pa.s.sed, the boy grew up, and so did his skills. He began feeling more and more confident in his abilities and was proud of himself, until Fate grew jealous and vengeful. Old Man Chen was a boy of 12 that year, still an apprentice who followed his teacher everywhere. They had taken up lodging one night at a Taoist monastery when a call roused them from their rest.

　　Religious faiths were viewed as one of the elements of the Four Olds during the height of the Cultural Revolution. A rowdy mob marched up the hills, each brandis.h.i.+ng flaming brands in their hands, and arrived at the monastery to burn it to the ground. Even though the unruly crowd was not specifically there for the seer and his student, the teacher and his apprentice could not help feeling afraid by the sudden commotion, and they swiftly fled. Noticing people escaping from the monastery, the agitated and frenzied mob gave chase. The teacher and his student split up to try shaking off their pursuers but instead, the teacher fell off the crest of a precipice and plunged to his death while the rabid and raving riot captured the boy.

　　Upon realizing that their quarry was only the child, the bunch of agitators could not help feeling disgruntled. Their leader, a man called Zheng Haoshan, had a sobriquet called the Living Yama for his ruthlessness and inhuman methods! He came up with a cruel plan and said to everyone, "Let me take him back and torture him for the truth!" He brought the child home to his son. Unbeknownst to everyone else, his son was badly ill, and through fen and thickets he had searched, still, the Living Yama had yet to find his child a cure for his disease. Hence the reason for him bringing the young Old Man Chen back to his home. He needed him to divine the whereabouts of the cure! He said to the boy, "Find out the problem with my son and I'll let you go! But if you fail, you will be judged before the public before being beaten alive!" Being only a boy of 12, Old Man Chen was frightened and did as he was told. After some calculations, he told Zheng Haoshan, "You must prepare for the worst!" This filled the Living Yama with nothing but rage, "Tell me something I don't know! I want a solution!" But Old Man Chen retorted with impertinence, an act that he would later regret for the rest of his life, "I cannot help you! You need to seek someone else!" Apparently, Old Man Chen had found out that the Living Yama had another soothsayer imprison. With various means and methods, this soothsayer was tortured and forced to impart his faculties to his captor. But the Living Yama was a most cunning, if not shrewd, person. Whenever he learned anything new from his prisoner, he would first put it to the test. Any failures which warranted suspicion that the soothsayer had been trying to trick him would result in further reprisals from the cruel man. Therefore, when Old Man Chen had inadvertently mentioned about the soothsayer, Zheng Haoshan immediately realized that his captive had been withholding information from him. The poor hostage was then subjected to another gruesome round of excruciating torment to loosen his tongue. In the end, the soothsayer was coerced into helping Zheng Haoshan by looking for another boy who shared the exact same birthdate as his son to die in his place. The details of the hateful methods would best be left out, I heard, since it was nothing but a method so heinous and hateful that no man should know about it.

　　As a token of grat.i.tude, Old Man Chen was brought to a village where he was given to the care of a family who had no child of their own. This family, under the Chinese government social initiative, was one of the childless households which were promised welfare perks and benefits. Many in the village would secretly come to him for help and the young Old Man Chen, proud of his ability, used his skills without restraint. Without his teacher at his side to guide him and steer him in the right direction, Old Man Chen's hubris and arrogance in his abilities became his undoing when his eyesight was robbed from him decades later. He came to my father afterward, who helped him divine the reason of this divine retribution. My father said to him, "You have wrought a heinous monstrosity in your younger days. A technique, so evil and d.a.m.nable in the eyes of Heaven. You had used a child to die in the place of another; have you not?" It was only then he fully understood the gravity of his sins: with his ability to decipher the secrets of Fate, Old Man Chen had inadvertently caused the death of another child! Old Man Chen finally realized the blood of the boy who had died in place of Zheng Haoshan's child in his hands. From since then, he became extremely reluctant to unravel the truths of Fate fully. But that was hardly the primary reason for the impairment of his vision. During his days in the village, Old Man Chen had provided several insights to pregnant mothers on the gender of their babies. This had caused many mothers to abort their child to hope for a boy. Much blood of countless baby girls had been spilled in his account. The deaths of the unborn babies were all upon his head, and thus the penances of the Five Detriments and Three Dearths had been visited upon him until now.

　　It was already evening when my father and Uncle Quan came back. Walking through the door, my father asked me, "Not bad. Do you enjoy watching Old Man Chen displaying his skills?" I finally understood! I asked my father, "I must be remissed if you are behind all this farce to avoid unanswering the call!" My father giggled, indicating a tacit approval. I peered into their basket and the things they were holding, and saw that both men had only their fis.h.i.+ng rods, but they had returned with no fish. Feeling strange, I asked, "Did you not go fis.h.i.+ng? Where's your bounty?" Instead, my father snickered playfully and said, "We'd let them all go." What he said had caught me with so much surprise that I nearly vomited the drink I had taken. "You had released the fishes that you've caught, Father?" I asked incredulously, "Then what are we having for dinner?"

　　But Father gave me no reply. Instead, he dropped his fis.h.i.+ng equipment at a corner and yelled loudly into the corridors of the Inst.i.tute, "Hey there! Who else is still here? Let's go to the stalls for food!" But the Inst.i.tute would usually be empty at this hour, with only Aunt Fen, the Blind Master and his apprentice, and another old man. Aunt Fen made no indication of replying; she usually ate at home. But a door at the end of the corridor swung opened suddenly, and the Blind Master came stepping out of his room with his disciple in tow. He hurried over to my father and uttered, "Let's go!" Looking from the side, Lin Feng and I could only take in the old man's shenanigans with unbelieving stares. He had appeared a frail and blind old man who needed his student's help to walk when we first saw him earlier. But here he was now, walking quickly with the vim and verve of a young man! What was wrong with him?

　　Even my father could hardly suppress an amused smile by his whimsical behavior, as he applauded Old Man Chen for his vigor. "Still energetic I see, Old Chen!" Father than peered at his clothing and said, "I say, Old Chen... We're going to the stalls nearby for food... Your clothing..." The Blind Master was wearing a long robe, looking as if he was a true seer from the fables and tales of old. Dressing up like this would surely stand out especially if we were going to a seafood barbecue.

　　It was six in the evening when my father and I, Uncle Quan and his son, with Old Man Chen, now finally with a more appropriate set of clothing, and his apprentice came to a row of food stalls called the "No. 1 Street for Barbecue Streetfood". It was a place we frequented a lot; hence the proprietors there were familiar with us. One of them came to us when we found a seat with two dozens beer, saying, "The usual, everyone?" My father had wanted to speak, but Old Man Chen beat him to it by saying, "Aye, and two more lamb loins!" I nearly burst out laughing as I said, "My goodness, Blind Master. You are, by all accounts, one of the counselors of the Inst.i.tute! Surely you realize that you should behave your part, rather like some crackpot fortune teller!" But instead, the old man retorted indignantly, "Why should I? Your father wields greater abilities and responsibilities that I do. Why should I put up a more respectable facade when he is so unbecoming of himself too?" Indeed, in some ways and time, the manner in which my father behave did seem unfitting for a person of his stature. One could even liken him to a man who has yet to grow up. As if a testament to Old Man Chen's grumbles, my father turned his head around, looking dubiously at everyone with his own finger pointing at himself with disbelief. "Am I? Am I such an unbecoming person?" Everyone around the table nodded meekly in silence, peering at him as if expecting a sudden tantrum, when suddenly everyone erupted into laughter.

　　It was a meal of joyous merriment as we talked and chatted over the mouthwatering aroma of the barbecue feast. We plodded through the epicurean delights of grilled seafood as we went through a recap of how Old Man Chen had resolved Mr. Lee's predicament and Lin Feng suddenly expressed his admiration for Yuan Chongxi, "You secretive rascal. For so long you have refrained from showing your skills... Spectacular, I must say!" Beside Yuan Chongxi, his teacher chortled loudly with pride. But his outward display of satisfaction in the prowess of his student faded swiftly suddenly like a punctured balloon. Out of the blue, he sighed suddenly and said, "But you know nothing... He makes a good seer... But that is also as far as he can get to..." Lin Feng, failing to read between the lines, asked the old man, "But what do you mean, Blind Master?" The old man sighed again and muttered, "Alas... Chongxi... If only he has half of the wits that you and s.h.i.+yan has..." Yuan Chongxi's head hung over his shoulder as he quietly gnawed at his grilled meat.

　　A man arrived with a little girl with him at our table suddenly. Recognizing them both, my father rose from his seat to shake hands with them, and they began talking. The little girl was one of the students from my zither cla.s.s, and the man was her grandfather. The little girl's grandfather said, "What coincidence that you are all here. My granddaughter wanted some barbecue skewers suddenly, and she's been pestering me to bring her here..." I called for some additional stools and invited them both to sit with us. With good food to lubricate the conversation, we began talking some more. It appeared that the grandfather of the girl was the owner of a chain store just opposite the street. The scent of the barbecue food had wafted over and tingled the little girl's tastebuds; hence her overwhelming badgering of her grandfather to bring her here. Like how all children would behave when encountering their teacher, the little girl was nervous when she first saw me, although all signs of jittery and shyness quickly vanished under the charm of the sumptuous food.

　　As we ate and talk, the smell of the food complimented the flavor of the wine we sipped. Unexpectedly, the grandfather was also an avid enthusiast of fis.h.i.+ng himself. Hearing my father and Uncle Quan had gone fis.h.i.+ng earlier, the three immediately plunged into a deeper discussion about their common interest. "Just two months ago, I had caught a fat carp at one of the fis.h.i.+ng ponds. Heh heh heh..." I heard the girl's grandfather bragging proudly. At the other half of the table, Yuan Chongxi, Lin Feng, and I, without any interest in fis.h.i.+ng, began talking about our students and our craze in computer gaming. But our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a middle-aged woman who had come straight to us. She asked the grandfather of the girl sharply, "Did you saw my graduation certificate which I received years ago?" Confused at first, I then knew, this woman was the little girl's grandmother. She needed her old graduation certificate for authentication purposes, and she needed it by tomorrow. But through every corner of her house she had delved and scoured, still, the certificate had evaded her sight. Therefore, with no other options left, she came to the little girl's grandfather for help. "Was it not in your cabinet all the time?" The old man asked, "Have you lost the box which you stored the certificate with?" The child's grandmother replied, "I found the box, but the certificate is missing!" The little girl's grandfather gulped some beer and remarked, "Why the anxiety and fear? Look at who we have here! We have these wizards here! They can help you divine the whereabouts of your missing certificate!" As he spoke, he turned to stare at us...