After dinner, I went ahead and used the last hours of sunlight to process the rest of the duck. I made a small blood sausage with some cooked barley, duck blood, duck fat, onion, and a mixture of garlic and Sichuan peppercorns from Grandma’s stash of wild edibles. I didn’t have any sausage casings, so I made a cylinder from a bamboo leaf. I steamed the sausage, it would be pretty nice fried in the morning. It would be great to have some other spices. Then again, I didn’t know where I was, much less a market. And money was one of the few things that didn’t grow on the trees outside.

While the little sausage steamed, I rendered fat from the skin and fatty bits. Oil is something I took for granted back in my old life. Just a little slick of duck fat with those greens and barley increased the deliciousness quotient exponentially. I put all the bits of fat and skin together in the wok and added a little bit of water. After the fat rendered, I skimmed it into a bowl. I didn’t throw away the remaining duck skin. Tomorrow I’ll crisp up those bits of duck skin. Crispy, salty duck skin, tiny potatoes from the garden, and green garlic shoots….. My mouth was watering again.

I tidied up the kitchen, wiped out the wok, and let the fire gutter before heading out towards the woodshed. Crickets and tree frogs were making a racket out in the trees. Even with the racket, I heard a sound like a small whimper. I went over to the rough branch-and-stick gate. Nestled right outside was a tiny lump of fur. The hairs were matted and there were some dark streaks. At first I thought it was dirt, but the metallic smell said otherwise. “Hey, little guy, it’s ok,” I whispered. I couldn’t quite tell what it was, so I went and got the jacket from my ninja-style outfit. The fabric seemed pretty thick.

Out of the shadow of the wall, I got a clearer look at the little creature. It looked like a puppy, or maybe a fox cub. The poor little guy had a wide grimace and was panting weakly. A big gash slanted across its chest. It was a neat cut, more from a knife than from the teeth of an animal.

I always thought that when someone comes across your path needing help, that’s the universe putting you in a place to do something. In the long run, it’s hard to know what you ought to do, but in some moments, you know exactly what you’re supposed to do.

I used a finger to gently stroke the little fox’s ears. “You’re lucky you met me, little guy.”

Shang Cheng City was neither big nor prosperous, but Dou-Lei was pretty sure that Wu compound would look opulent even in the wealthy capital city. Last week, something had been stolen by a black figure that vanished like a ghost after killing several guards and jumping off a cliff. A feeling of tension an a sense of being followed by unknown numbers of watching eyes still lingered in the compound. The officials didn't tell the guards exactly what was stolen, but it was clearly something of great value.

Dou-Lei still had mixed feelings about his promotion to Captain of Section Two. He couldn't deny the relief about a wage increase that would help save for Dou-Dou's future dowry, send little Dou-Jin to school, and maybe even put a bit of meat on the table. But he also felt twinges of guilt about benefitting from such a situation.

All week, the higher-ups had been conducting frenzied meetings, sending and receiving messenger birds, and Immortals from one sect or another visited every day. Immortals rarely entered the Mortal world. After ascending, they lost all interest or care in the mundanities of human life, and instead focused on gaining power and immortality. Dou-Lei's own grandmother had only seen one glimpse of an Immortal in her life. Dou-Lei probably saw more Immortals in the past week than his ancestors had seen in several centuries.

Dou-Lei scratched one ear as he thought about those Immortals with their perfect features and spotless, expensive robes that fluttered on an unknown wind. As a child, the plump neighborhood bullies teased him mercilessly about how his ears stuck out. Every morning, his wife grabbed his ears to plant a firm goodbye kiss before he walked out the door. After work, when he carried Dou-Dou down the street on his shoulders, she kicked her legs and cackled gleefully while using them as a handle to turn left and right. He wouldn't want to replace them with a pair of ears from even the most beautiful Immortal cultivator. Dou-Lei smiled to himself and sped up his pace as he turned off the main road to take a shortcut back to the armory.

There was no “him,” only the mission, and the name “Ah-Ba.” He had no memory of what, or how many, missions he’d done before. Perhaps months, perhaps centuries. The Memory Elixir erased all previous memories, attachments, distractions. Only the mission remained.

Ah-Ba strode into Wu compound’s armory. He looked nondescript, like any other guard in the compound. Over the uniform rust-colored robe and trousers, he put on a breastplate, arm guards, and helmet. The other guards didn’t give him a second look. Ah-Ba put on a well-practiced expression, part dim-witted, part curious, part gossipy. Mortals were too easy to manipulate, he scoffed to himself. The same people who kept their lips sealed under interrogation would whisper freely to their comrades.

The guards gradually went to their posts. Ah-Ba left the armory and slowly made his way deeper into the compound, concealing his cultivation level. There were times to use internal energy and times to stick to mortal powers. Who knew how many sects were spying on Wu compound to discover who had broken the truce and stolen the Dragon Pills. Mortals had their own blind spots, but Immortals had theirs too.

Ah-Ba started down a narrow alley next to the internal wall. He was just preparing to propel over the wall when he heard a startled voice behind him, “What are you doing?”

Ah-Ba turned around with his finely calibrated, dim-witted expression, speedily reviewing the guards' schedule in his head. No-one was supposed to be in this path right now. Another guard stood not far away. He had a round face, with somewhat goofy protruding ears, and a firm, authoritative expression.

“I am doing a round for the Section Two. I heard a suspicious sound on the other side of the wall and was just investigating.”

The guard looked slightly confused and took a step closer. “What section?”

Ah-Ba tilted his head slightly, sensing a note of tension in the other man’s voice. At this point, if he could feel any emotions, he would have felt nervous.

The man’s face shifted from confusion to resolution as he inhaled sharply, getting ready to shout.

But it was too late. Ah-Ba leapt over the wall, leaving the round-faced guard slumped on the other side, air and blood hissing quietly from the gash on his neck, fingers spastically clutching the grass that grew between the cobblestones.

Ah-Ba inspected the central study and surrounding courtyards. Nothing, as expected. Nothing was easier to interpret than something. Any clue would either be real or deliberate misdirection, and every possibility would have to be explored and guarded against.

The nondescript-looking figure in a guard’s uniform completed the scheduled circuit and headed back to the armory.

Dou-Dou waited outside the gate for what was supposed to be just a moment but felt like hours. After the gatekeeper told her to wait inside next to the armory, since her dad would get back there sooner or later, she waited for another of what adults called moments. They always seemed to be longer when you wanted them short, and shorter when you wanted them long.

She twisted her scrawny fingers in the fabric which was wrapped around a lunchbox containing fresh steamed buns, pickles, and one tantalizing egg. Dou-Dou sneakily lifted the lunchbox to her nose and gave it a sniff, swallowing her saliva at the sweet, yeasty smell of the warm steamed buns.

Daddy never used to be late, but then again he was now promoted to Section Two’s Captain. Dou-Dou felt a burst of pride at the thought. Something had happened last week, but her parents’ anxiety was mixed with joy at the new promotion. Hence the egg. Whenever Dou-Dou brought lunch, Daddy always sneaked her half of the best bits. Dou-Dou sighed, and looked around again, wiggling her loose tooth with the tip of her tongue. She crept closer to the armory and bumped into a rust-colored uniform.

Ah-Ba looked down at the little girl. She had a round face, protruding ears, and a conspicuous gap in her front teeth. The little girl smiled nervously and clutched a small fabric bundle. Ah-Ba elicited the information that she was bringing lunch to her father. After hearing that he was too busy, she reluctantly handed over the bundle to deliver. She gave a shy, tooth-gapped smile, and cast one longing glance at the lunchbox before walking away dejectedly.

Ah-Ba waited a few moments and headed out of Wu compound. His rust-clad figure walked into a blind alley. With a slight sneer, he scattered the meager food on the ground and tossed the packaging into a pile of refuse. Moments later, he emerged from the alley in a sky-blue costume, his demeanor completely different. Fanning himself languidly, Ah-Ba made his way towards the forest path. Time to inspect the cliff where Ah-Jiu disappeared.

Time is a funny thing. For short-lived creatures, periods such as minutes, days, and months have great significance. Humans live longer, and contentedly waste small periods such as seconds and minutes, but give years, decades, and centuries great import. For Immortals, centuries seem like days, and life is measured in millennia.

At first, the epochs seem meaningful. Mortal kings rise and fall in decades. Dynasties, in centuries. Celestial kings follow the same cycles, but measured by millennia. A song, a glance, youths fall in love, families start, power and descendants increasing with each generation, before feuds or wars extinguish them.

Beyond immortality, long periods of time lose their meaning, but short periods seem longer. A day has morning and night; a year has spring, summer, fall, and winter. A breath has inhale and exhale. A firefly twinkles, then the light passes. Mortals cultivate to become Immortals, passing from attachment to detachment. Beyond immortality, they pass back to attachment. A moment’s passing on the street, a century eating from the same pot, all are part of the subtle balance of existence.

Grandma lay under the thin quilt with her frail, wrinkled hands clasped over her comfortably full stomach. Outside the chorus of tree frogs, crickets, and wind sang in the tree branches. A profound smile played on the corners of her lips.

I wonder what we’ll have for breakfast.