Empress of Blue Flower Mountain - Chapter 2：Xuiying the Wandering Spirit

Humans came again. This time, they were not hunters. There were women and children, as well as men. Rather than the skins of animals, they wore woven pieces from plants, dyed and many colored. I’m afraid I was mostly focused on their clothes at the time, so I did not pay much attention to the reason they were there.

Later, much later, I learned they had been chased from their home country. A new ruler came to power through the sword and was slaughtering all those who had been loyal to the prior leadership. Several high ranking families saw the writing on the wall and fled. But the new ruler was not keen on letting them escape, so he sent his armies to chase them down.

Many died before they reached the mountains. There was a great deal of sorrow. What kept them going was, at night, they saw a great light in the distance. Beautiful and blue, it called to them like bees to flowers.

Yes, my beautiful flower trees lit their way. A light in their darkest hour. I still like the thought of it.

My experience with humans was limited, but I knew they liked food and would eat plants as well as meat. So I instructed my fairy children, who had a physical substance I did not, to guide the humans to good fruits and vegetables.

It was the human children that led the way. Though my fairy children had a physical body, for some reason the adults could not see them while the children could. To this day I have no idea why. Perhaps it’s the way children view the world, I don’t know.

At some point the armies came to the mountain too. They intended on entering, but neither my brother or I would allow it. This was not because my brother was interested in saving the humans I’d taken an interest in. Truthfully, that was not why I stopped them either.

They radiated evil. It poured out of them in waves.

Up until that point, no evil thing came near our mountains. We did not even know what evil was until it was at our doorstep. But the moment we sensed it, our repulsion was so strong that we shook with both rage and disgust. It was an instinctual hatred. We would never allow evil to come into our home.

The hunters and the fleeing families also had evil in them. All humans do. They are tainted with evil when they’re born. But humans are also touched with goodness as well. The good is quite powerful, strong enough to smother the evil. If humans are careful, the goodness will lead them to redemption. If they are foolish…

…they end up like that army.

Though I did not know it at the time, many humans are foolish. The army was not really an exception. The hunters and the fleeing families were the exception. Goodness is often neglected among mankind for the quick and easy pleasures that come from evil. But back then, I did not know that, and assumed humans were generally of the good sort.

Anyway, we did not let the army enter. We are spirits, we have no physical form, but that doesn’t make us weak. The mountain is our body, the creatures on it our hands and feet. When the army tried to enter, every living and none living thing sought to stop them. From the mountain lions to foxes, bees to tree roots, even the very dirt under their feet, impeded them.

My brother’s fairy children fought them directly, using their hands and teeth like the animals to kill them. Some of my fairy children fought them too, but most stayed with the hiding families in the forest. They liked the little human children and, seeing them afraid, wanted to comfort them.

Many men died that day, human blood soaking the mountain for the first time. The army eventually retreated, screaming that the forest they’d entered was cursed and filled with demons. The devastation of the army must have been enough to convince their new ruler the truth of their statements, because no one from that country ever came near the mountains again.

My brother’s opinion of humanity reached a whole new low that day. The fact that we’d met many humans who’d not succumbed to such evil in the past did not sooth his fears. That they could, at any time, be totally taken over by evil was enough. The potential and the capacity for such vileness put him on edge. He did not want even the possibility of that kind of thing happening in his home.

His eyes turned to the families my fairy children had been protecting. He wanted them dead, every last one of them. Even the infant children who, by some miracle, had been born and survived the long trek to our mountains.

For the first time, my brother and I had a serious disagreement. We could not reconcile our viewpoints. He viewed humans with fear, I viewed them with potential.

In the end, it was only his love for me that stopped them from being slaughtered. I actually begged him, something that I’d never done before, to spare their lives. For my sake, he stayed his hand. He did not like it, but he also could not say no.

We were brother and sister. The only two of our kind in the whole world. We spoiled each other in many ways because of that. This was an instance where my brother spoiled me, against his better judgment.

So the humans stayed. And my little fairy children and I watched over them.

The mountains are not an easy place to live under normal circumstances, and it was made worse for them because the animals were impossible to catch. To solve this problem, I guided them to streams, ponds, and rivers. My brother and I never paid any mind to fish and water crawlies, so they never gained any intelligence. The only benefit the fishes had was from being on our mountain, absorbing our power from the very water. It made them stronger, bigger, and healthier. Perfect for eating, for which the bears rejoiced, but not much else.

The humans also domesticated many different creatures: mountain goats and sheep, for milk and clothing. The yak for heavy loads. The ducks and geese for eggs and feathers. When these animals grew old or were seriously injured, only then would they kill and eat them. This was counted as mercy killing, by the animals and the people.

They figured out rather quickly that something was helping them survive. Their children saw or heard things, and had knowledge of the mountains that just wasn’t natural. The fairies, the humans called them, were helping them. The fairies had chased away the army, and the fairies guided them to food and clean water. The human adults had no idea why they attracted such goodwill from the fairies, which in their homeland were viewed as malicious spirits, but they were careful not to lose it.

The fairies told the human children all about me, how I was beautiful and strong, and how the blue flowers that glowed at night had been made by me. They even called me “mother”, once they understood what that meant among the humans. The children naturally told their parents as well.

Hearing this, the first thing the adults thought to do was worship me as a goddess. But I would not allow it. When they carved images of me in wood and then bowed to them, I saw evil grow in their hearts and it brought a chill to my soul. I did not understand what a goddess was at the time, but anything that grew evil in humans should not be encouraged.

They ignored my warnings through the fairies, so I found the biggest bear on the mountain and instructed it to destroy the ugly wood carvings of me and chase those who made them. Any time they attempted such worshipful nonsense, I’d call the giant bear in to punish them. No one died or was seriously hurt, but it gave them a good scare.

After that, the adults listened to the children, and by proxy the fairies, who’d warned them against trying to worship me as a goddess. Still, this left the adults dissatisfied. So the fairy mother would not allow worshiping, but some sign of respect should be made. It was her land, and her good graces, that allowed them to live after all.

After a lot of arguing and discussion, they bestowed upon me the name Xuiying (beautiful flower) and reverently called me the Empress of the Blue Mountains, Mother of the Fairies, Keeper of the Blue Lights. If they ever thought I might be near by, they would get on their hands and knees and bow, wishing me a long life several times in a row.

I thought the whole process was odd, especially if they bowed in the wrong direction or when I wasn’t even there. I’d never asked for such respect, never demanded it, but they forced it on me regardless. I did like the name though, and referred to myself as that ever after.

While I was learning all kinds of fascinating things from the humans, my brother kept his distance from their settlement. He did not like them and would only visit me if I left them for a time to tend my trees, usually during the spring.

When I told him of my newly acquired name, he did not see the point in it. We’d never needed names before, so why get excited about it now? I then shared the human concept of family, and how he and I were like that: brother and sister, a family.

I thought that would at least catch his interest, but instead it seemed to upset him. When I asked him why, he got befuddled and eventually said he didn’t really know why and then left in a huff. His confusion must have been immense, for I did not see him for quite some time after that.

That was the second time I suspected my brother had a problem.

Just as humans domesticate animals, I domesticated humans. This was not intentional at first. I was mostly meddling because I found human relationships very moving and wanted to help where I could. It’s just that, the human children that saw fairies for the longest were easiest to interact with, and more receptive to my ideas.

As time passed, I realized that by pairing those with long-lasting “fairy sight” together, their children would see my fairies for an even longer time. It was in very small intervals, undetectable to humans who lived such short lives, but I noticed. So then I began doing it on purpose.

I also cultivated their spirits as I did my trees. I noticed that humans had very flexible spirits, that had plenty of room to grow. But for some reason, they were unaware of this themselves. A strong spirit resisted evil, and also gave them healthier and longer lives, so it seemed a good idea to strengthen their spirit as well.

In their dreams, or when they meditated, I would come by and nudge them here or there. Pay attention to this, focus on that, concentrate there… I did not have a name for what I was doing, but they did. They combined it with their own belief system, something called “xia”, “qi”, and even “mystical arts”.

The teachings that come from this were called the Blue Flower Mountain Arts, and those who focused on the more lethal (fighting) aspects called themselves the Blue Flower Mountain Sect. I did not expect the development of a fighting unit, but I quite liked their passion and perseverance. And anyway, they protected the weaker members of the community and were charitable. Their hearts were very pure and evil had no room to grow, so I saw no need to stop them.

A very curious thing happened after generations of my meddling, their eyes turned blue and they saw me. They also became very fair to look at, with an almost other-worldly beauty and strength. The blue eyes and exquisite looks always went hand-in-hand, to this day I have no idea why.

The humans I’d started with were, by comparison, small and rather plain and fragile. Straight black hair, narrow brown eyes, and lightly tanned skin. The only thing that made them stand out was their cute round faces and their fantastic sense of clothing and jewelry style, which I liked immensely and encouraged where ever I could.

When the blue eyes became dominate, they grew very tall, became very strong, and their hair and skin began to take on very contrasting colors. Sometimes they had very pale skin, sometimes very dark. Their hair could be white, or blond, or any number of colors. The combinations were endless, and I loved it all. How like my flowers they became in those moments.

As to the eyes… they were not normal blue eyes. They were like my flowering trees: they glowed. I think, though I don’t know for sure, that generations of living on the mountain and my constant nearness effected not just their bodies but their spirits. They became a bit like my fairy children, and so they could see me.

By then, I had already begun taking the form of a human. Even though I was a spirit, and I never thought they’d see me, I wanted to look a little like them for my own enjoyment. I was branded a female, so I took on the most lovely appearances of the human women I watched. I even gave myself clothes, often changing them to stay with the latest trends.

In short, I was gorgeous. It was unfortunate the first one who saw me was just a baby. If it’d been an adult, I’d have left them speechless. As it was, the baby simply cooed at me happily.

I loved that little baby. He was the first to see me, and he saw me no matter how old he got. While I’d watched humans for a very long time, I had always kept a type of clinical distance from them. But now that I was seen, and heard, it became personal.

I guided that little baby boy into manhood. Because he was the first, he was thought of as special. He was given a place of honor with the Sect and the community. In short, he became the leader.

He grew old very slowly, to the point that his family and friends all died well before he did. I had seen people die before, but now that I had a personal connection to those who died, I suddenly understood what death really meant. In the human sense. I mourned with him for each passing.

I wish I had known then, what I know now. He was an ordinary person on the inside. Despite his looks, powers, and abilities, he was actually a very simple man. A home, familiar faces, and someone to hold, was all he really wanted. When he buried his great-great-great grandchild, who had died of old age, while not looking a day over thirty, he could take no more of it.

He left. Not just the Sect or the community, but the mountains. From me. I felt his disappearance from the mountain. There was no darkness growing in him, so I knew he’d not done me any evil. But I wish he’d said goodbye or explained exactly why he left so I didn’t have to spend time guessing.

On that day, I, a spirit, wept.

So overwhelming was my sorrow that my brother took notice. He came by less and less to see me because of how much I’d changed myself. But distance didn’t weaken our familial connection. When my heart broke, he felt it.

When I tried to explain why I was hurting, he could not understand. A human held no more value to him than a bird, and was far more threatening. If one left, that was perfectly fine by him. But, in a moment of surprising maturity, he did not speak his thoughts. He simply held me and let me cry.

It was one of the last times he was gentle to me.

I did learn, eventually, what happened to my first human friend. He traveled the world, keeping to his own sense of justice. He never stayed in one place long, but many were interested in his martial arts and tried to be his student. They imitated what they saw, hoping to gain the same longevity.

I don’t know if he ever took on a student, for many claim their Martial Arts Sects started from him when they clearly did not. The teaching of the Blue Flower Mountain Sect spread freely among the population regardless. It was never a secretive belief system to begin with. It mutated and changed with the passage of time, creating fighting styles and philosophies I’d never even dreamed of.

My friend disappeared. They say he “ascended” to the plane of the gods, but I don’t know. He could have simply died as well. He was not immortal. Much of what they say about him is just legend and myth, and it’s difficult to ascertain the truth behind those tales. I hope, where ever he is, he’s found peace.

He was the first, but he was not the last. Successive generations began displaying his same qualities. Soon, more children were born with blue eyes, than without. To the point that ordinary brown eyes were looked down upon by many. It was my constant struggle to prevent those adorable little brown eyed children from being bullied.

At least those with blue eyes finally had other children that were like them. They would live long lives, but now they had companions. For some reason, those who lived a long time had fewer children. The size of the community dwindled because of this and eventually flat-lined. Two children homes became the norm, unless they were born with brown eyes. Then the parents would have another child, knowing the brown eyed one would live a short life and need a replacement.

My blue eyed children, why must you be so cold hearted? I wished they’d be a little kinder. Despite my best efforts, children born with brown eyes began leaving the mountains. They knew they did not belong and growing old so quickly compared to everyone else was extremely disheartening.

Those who left formed their own villages and towns near the base of the mountains. They found regular humans and had families with them. They had many more children, so their population exploded as long as no sickness or disaster hit. They quickly outnumbered their arrogant blue eyed relatives.

Their view of the mountain village was filled with both bitterness and longing. They hated being rejected for what they could not control, while at the same time desperately wishing they’d been born differently. The tales they told of the mountains, the fairies, and even me ended up being very distorted because of that.

At this point, I understood the concept of time. And a lot of it had passed since we kicked that evil army off the mountain. I began to write down everything I could remember, all the lessons I’d learned, because I found out that humans liked to record things. I created a little cave house to store my diaries and all the interesting bits and bobbles I’d collected from humans over the years.

When a lost traveler stumbled to my door step one day, I took him and helped him recover before sending him on his way. He was not someone from the Blue Flower Village, he was an ordinary folk. He could not see me, but my spirit was so condensed in the cave he knew something was there. He spoke of things I’d never heard about, in an accent I’d never come across before. I absolutely loved hearing him talk, imagining a world outside the mountains through his words.

From then on, I made my little cave house a way-station for the lost. A Traveler’s Cave. Anyone crossing over the mountain without malicious intentions, could stop by my place for a rest if they needed it. I used my power to enchant a path that would always lead to my place, no matter how far away from the entrance they started.

A surprising amount of lost hikers found their way to my doorstep. I couldn’t question them directly, but I always got information about the world outside the mountains regardless. I kept improving my little cave, so there was always food and water and a warm blanket to wrap themselves in.

I really never thought anything would change. Really. When the change came, it was quite sudden.

My brother flew into a rage. The mountains actually shook from his anger, and I’m fairly sure a volcano in the far north went off. I immediately rushed over to see what was wrong.

His most beloved stag had died. And he insisted a human had maliciously killed it. When I went to investigate, there was indeed a (now dead) stag with a long clearly-human-made knife sticking out of it. But upon examination, something was not right. The human had stabbed the stag in the heart, with a surprising amount of precision. The death had been quick, almost instant for the stag.

How had this human got so close to the stag? That should not have been possible. Even my blue eyed children struggled to get near one of my brother’s stags. It was as if the stag let this foreign human come near him. In fact, it looked suspiciously like the stag had wanted to die, that he’d let the human kill him on purpose.

And where was the so-called murdering human? My brother sensed the stags death almost instantly, yet there was not even a strand of hair left behind from the human. That also should not be possible. Had the stag done something before it died, to allow the human to escape? My brother’s deers were quite powerful and wise, so it very well could have.

When I mentioned this, my brother would not believe it. What reason had the stag for wanting to kill itself? Had not he purposefully attended and cared for it?

But I knew why. That stag was very old. Even with my brother pouring his power into it, age had caught up to it. Deer were not meant to be that smart or live that long. Like my human friend, how many of it’s own kind had it said goodbye to? And unlike me, my brother would not let the stag go and allow it to die a natural death.

This idea that death comes to all things mortal, and that they may even yearn for it after a time, did not sit well with my brother. Even more, he was furious with me for “siding with the human”, despite the fact I was doing nothing of the sort. I was simply pointing out there were flaws in his accusations.

Trying to further explain didn’t help, it just made things worse. He accused me of being more human than spirit. That all I needed was a body and no one would be able to tell the difference. Naturally I disagreed!

I don’t know how, I really don’t, but his fury turned to the Blue Flower Village. The human who’d killed the stag hadn’t even been from there, the knife not being one of their designs, but for some reason my brother lumped all humans together. He couldn’t tell them apart. As far as he was concerned, the Blue Flower Village was guilty for simply being human, and therefore related to the killer (however distantly).

That was when I realized, without a shadow of a doubt, my brother had lost his mind.

If you were to ask me when it started, it was probably when those first humans showed up. And as to why… I think he was jealous. He loved me and didn’t want to share me with anyone. He loved the stag, so never wanted to let it go. The problem is that possessiveness of that sort is actually rooted in evil.

To hate evil but to do evil, that contradiction is something only humans can live with and remain sane. Perhaps that was the real reason he stayed away from me all those years; he knew something was wrong but he could not control it when he was around me. He’d escaped to his deer, thinking himself safe, only to have them “betray” him too. In the end, he was driven insane by it.

He charged toward the Blue Flower Village, intent on destroying it and slaughtering every last person there.

I sent my fairy children ahead, telling them to evacuate everyone. I could stop my brother for a time, but not forever. With his mind gone, he was even more dangerous than usual. The best I could do was give my blue eyed children the chance to escape.

Preventing him from satisfying his blood-lust obviously did not help anything. Our fighting could be seen for miles around. Despite the Blue Flower Mountain Sect being the strongest fighting group in the world, even they cowered at the sound of our blows. In the face of the power of the very mountain, all they could do was bow their heads and run.

The battle lasted for days.

He was a sword, I was the shield.

No matter how he slashed and pierced, I could not be moved. But no matter how unmovable I was, I could not attack. We were at a stand-off.

The only people left were the family of my first human friend. I don’t know where they got the silly idea, but they decided to stay and sacrifice themselves for my sake. They actually tried to fight my brother. They could see him just as well as they could see me, after all.

My brother, who’d not paid a single bit of attention to anything I’d told him for years, was taken off guard. He did not know humans could see him. They actually landed a few hits on him before he realized what was happening. But, of course, this was akin to having a child kick him in the shins. It was shocking, but didn’t do much damage.

He immediately focused on them, to murder them right in front of me.

I could not allow it.

So I did something I’ve never done before, because right up until that moment I didn’t even know I could do it.

I rushed forward and hit my brother. Hard.

This shocked us both, and for a moment we were still. And then he began to wail, a piercing cry like I’ve never heard before and hope to never hear again.

He looked at me, and in a sorrowful rage, he yelled: “You dare strike me? You dare? Did you not call me brother? Did you not say I was family? Yet you raise that human shaped hand to smite me? Is this what being like a human has done to you? Turned you violent? You were never meant to hit, to harm, only to defend! That is your sole and only nature! Look what they have warped you into! How they’ve tainted you! If you are really my sister, choose! Them or me! Who do you care for?!”

After watching generations of human toddlers, I knew exactly what this was: A tantrum. He’d been violently hitting me for days without a care, and I strike him once and he was acting like it was the end of the world. In that moment, I’m afraid I lost my temper.

“If you really want to know, right now I’d rather live with humans than with you!”

Ah, that was the wrong thing to say. Even now, I wish I’d phrased it differently. It’s not that I’d stopped loving my brother, I was just angry. He was being very unpleasant, so I don’t think anyone could blame me.

“You’d rather humans than me? You’d rather them… than me… Ah! Ah!! Hahahaha! Fine then! Stay with your humans! With those filthy little monkeys! Who needs you! If you take even one more step on this mountain, I swear by it—”

“—brother, no!”

“—I’ll kill every last human. Even the ones at the foot of the mountains, even the ones so far out I can’t sense them. I’ll set every volcano in the mountain chain off, until the air is thick with poison and rains down on their crops and on their houses, fills their drinking water. Covered in the ash, they’ll die. Every. Last. One.”

There is something you need to know about fairies, about us spirits. We are bound by our word. It’s not that the words have power, but that they express a reality. If we say something, we mean it. We can’t lie or fudge the truth.

To set off every volcano in the range was akin to committing suicide. Not only would it kill humans, plus animals and plants, it very likely would kill us too. After all, we were the mountains. If he destroyed them, we both might very well cease to exist.

My option was to immediately withdraw from the mountain, along with every human, or stay there and have my brother literally self destruct.

He had truly lost his mind. I could not save him. I could not talk sense into him. So I did the only thing I could: I left.

It’s a good thing I’m a spirit, it took only one leap to get me out of the mountain. I knew exactly where the mountain range ended too. I could feel my connection to it get cut off. From then on, the only power I had was what was within me. I could never refill myself.

My fairy children followed me. The part of the mountain they drew power from was me, so they had no choice. But at the same time, I could not sustain them like I had before, as I had no access to the vast power of the mountain. In short, they would die. It would take a while, as I was quite powerful all on my own, but one-by-one they’d weaken and pass into nothingness.

Is there a heaven for fairies? If there is, I hope my beautiful fairy children go there. It would be better than turning into nothingness.

The fairy made from my brother’s soul tried to follow too. The poor little fellow. He could not come. His power was from my brother, not me. If he’d try to leave the mountain, he’d die instantly.

To ease his suffering, I gave him a mission: stay and watch over my cave house. Help humans who got lost. And be there for my brother. If he ever got in his right mind again, the guilt he’d suffer for his folly would be immense. He would need a companion who was not a mindless foot-soldier. Though he cried, the little fairy child stayed, promising to do exactly as I’d instructed.

I didn’t know how long it’d take for my brother to gain his mind again. There was no way for me to check and find out, without possibly setting him off and making things worse. But I hoped… I hoped some day he would remember me without anger or jealousy. That he’d remember our youth and think fondly of me again.

I became a wandering spirit.