I am not Ximen Qing.

The first to feel a strange sense of loss upon learning of her father's passing was Hongmei. With her aunt no longer around, Hongmei secretly wept alone in the Mingxin Cottage. Hongmei was Sirui's darling, a beauty from a young age. Her eldest sister, Hongyu, was too flirtatious; her second sister, Hongying, too conservative; and her third sister, Honghua, too vulgar. They lacked the carefree elegance of those depicted in paintings—the kind of graceful, ethereal beauty depicted against a backdrop of banana leaves resembling elephant ears, like a Bodhi tree in full bloom, or a lotus fairy floating in the air, ethereal and dreamlike, with a delicate fragrance permeating the soul, a subtle floral scent wafting through the air. Do you understand? From a young age, Hongmei loved to sit quietly on the kang (heated brick bed), listening silently to her parents chat about everyday matters. Hongyu is too passionate; Hongying is too sad; Honghua is too talkative; only Hongmei, my father said, is the most beautiful. Our Changbai Mountain has the most beautiful azaleas, the azaleas that bloom in spring in the snow country are the most beautiful.

Hongmei had a dream for seven days straight, during which Huang Yupei invited a shaman to perform a seven-day, seven-night ritual. This is a tradition in Northeast China, and shamanic dances are also a Manchu and Jurchen tradition. Northeast China has countless folk traditions; the region is filled with the ritualistic atmosphere of various festivals throughout the year. Qingming Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Ghost Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, Spring Festival, Lantern Festival—the strong sense of ritual has its own charm, reflecting the beauty of traditional Chinese culture. No matter how difficult life may be, Chinese culture is the most positive and optimistic; during festivals, all worries vanish. The Lunar New Year's Eve, the Lunar New Year's Day, and New Year's Eve mark the beginning of a new year; after the New Year, everything is renewed, and we can bid farewell to the old and welcome the new.

Death is of paramount importance; the ritual of death is far greater and more solemn than the significance of life. The Liao, Jin, and Yuan dynasties left almost no trace of the grandeur of death. The Khitans, Jurchens, and Mongols, however, migrated south from Beijing like wild geese, leaving behind at least the former capitals of the Yuan and Jin dynasties, and the Liao cypress trees of Beijing—truly a cool and refreshing summer retreat. At least Tongzhou still has the ruins of the Xiao Taihou Bridge. The Ming and Qing dynasties had a profound and unforgettable awareness of death, fearing that history would forget these emperors within the Forbidden City.

The Ming Dynasty, not to mention Zhu Yuanzhang's Xiaoling Mausoleum in Nanjing and the Ming Tombs in Beijing, were equally magnificent. The Qing Dynasty was no less impressive, with its Eastern and Western Tombs. In the Records of the Grand Historian, Sima Qian specifically described the wonders of Qin Shi Huang's underworld: rivers, lakes, seas, the sun, moon, stars, and countless rare treasures. Even to protect the peace of his underworld, Qin Shi Huang could summon wind and rain, and have ghostly soldiers pass through his territory. The ritual of death was passed down from generation to generation, and this ritual was far more significant and important than the meaning of life itself.

Life is like a play, and death is a rather expensive one. The funeral was conducted in a relatively traditional manner. The first seven days, from the first seven days to the forty-ninth day, cannot be taken lightly. The children, however, wished that the forty-nine days were too short, preferably eighty-one days. The old tradition is to observe a three-year mourning period. The children don't feel much grief or sorrow over death; they see it as a lively and joyous occasion. They are born with Lao Tzu, Zhuangzi, monks, and Taoists, born Confucian scholars. Although they value science more, the funeral's significance lies in embodying humanistic care and the progressive spirit of traditional Chinese values ​​passed down for thousands of years.

The old folks sighed; funerals were becoming increasingly haphazard. So, Huang Yupei was a woman driven mad by her love for Zhang Sirui, giving everything for this most glorious funeral. Such glorious funerals will never exist again; it's better to die young and be blessed, isn't it? At least there's a proper grand tomb, a stele carved from the finest stone, with calligraphy by a great painter, its characters vibrant and spirited. Too many tombs lack stele markers; over time, they become desolate mounds, disappearing in ten or twenty years. The character in *The Story of the Stone* should be Emperor Qianlong. Look, throughout the Forbidden City, inside and outside the Great Wall, in and out of the mountains, at the famous historical sites around Beijing, everywhere are inscriptions written by Emperor Qianlong. He must be the Heavenly Stone Attendant from Heaven; the Crimson Pearl Fairies all live in his vermilion courtyards with wooden tiles in the Forbidden City. An emperor who loved studying Baoyu, inadvertently, also dreamed of a life of solitude amidst the harem of three thousand beauties.

Now, not only was Hongmei secretly crying, but even the two sisters, Heitie, Hongli, and Hongqi, felt that their father was in his coffin—this was a terrible thing! They sensed that they might not be able to play and joke around carefree anymore, and finally realized that losing their father was just as terrifying as losing their mother; the consequences would be severe. Honglin was immediately barred from freely entering and leaving the Shanghai painter's studio in the trade union; after all, many movements, especially cultural movements, were taking place in the Forestry Bureau. The eldest sister, Hongyu, shamelessly declared that their father was free, which angered the second sister, who accused the eldest sister of cursing their father.

Stop joking, they're all pregnant and about to become mothers. Mother Huang Yupei and her two eldest and second daughters are all heavily pregnant. The family hierarchy for these three children is already set: if they're all boys, there will be one uncle and two nephews. This uncle is quite lucky; he'll have two nephews to play with from birth, go to school together, get married together, and play mahjong and drink together.

Sudden changes can abruptly alter the fates of many. Honglin seemed to have gone mad, acting somewhat incoherently. His father, Zhang Sirui, was still protecting his son, leaving him a path forward. The bureau leaders were also concerned about the secretary's son; at least Honglin could smoothly take over his father's position without worrying about work—a huge deal in the past, much like the hereditary system of the Eight Banners princes. However, this wasn't permanent. Generally, a prince would become a duke, and eventually a princely nobleman; promotions were rare, demotions were common. After three generations, even noble sons had to rely on the imperial examinations for officialdom. Succession usually lasted about two generations. Honglin, this artist, truly understood some things; this was the biggest crisis of his father's passing. Before his father's death, his mind was filled with artistic visions: the azaleas in the mountains were beauties, mountain spirits and goddesses; the sunflowers in the fields were sun gods; and the forest was a mountain god. At night, owls would fly to Mingxin Hall where Honglin lived, their cat eyes looking like ghostly eyes in the darkness. Dad was very artistic; he borrowed books for Honglin from Xinhua Bookstore or the bureau's library so she could study and improve her literary skills, all thanks to the influence of the painter and writer Lu Shitou.

Now, Honglin hates the crows that used to drink water, but now they're always cawing in front of and behind the house. And the rooster has become strange since Dad left; it flies to the big pear tree every day. Oh dear, even in Northeast China, sycamore trees don't grow. Is this rooster going to become a spirit? It just needs a sycamore tree. But if this big pear tree can help the rooster become a phoenix, it's all a consequence of Dad's death.

The pears from the big pear tree her father planted were the best in autumn, and Honglin loved the blossoms of those pear trees in spring. After her father's death, the artist suddenly had an epiphany. Now, her father's funeral had drained the family's savings, and her mother, wanting to save face, had even borrowed money. Now the house is filled with an overly artistic atmosphere, but the family of over ten people needs money even more. Before, Honglin had never thought about money, because with her father around, the beauty, love, passion, spirit, and romance of art filled her mind; the magic of art lay in transforming ugliness into beauty.

The eldest son, Honglin, insisted on driving a Dongfanghong tractor in the large forest farm in the mountains, hauling timber downhill. It was a dangerous and challenging job, but the pay was good. The highest-paid worker in the bureau was a grade eight worker, and driving a tractor could earn him the equivalent of that grade eight worker's salary. Driving a powerful, imposing, bright red tractor in the mountain forest farm seemed like a wild job. The ubiquitous roar of the bright red diesel tractors climbing mountains and ridges was exhilarating. Away from this oppressive world, the roar of the tractors constantly echoed in his ears.

His key salary was three times that of the heavy workers in the lumber mill, timber yard, and plywood factory! If he drove a tractor in the mountain forest farm, he'd be beaming, perfectly embodying the image of the hardworking, great worker in propaganda posters—a choice that aligned with the artist's aesthetic. His second and eldest brother-in-laws would have to bow and scrape before him, because his salary would exceed that of theirs.

The talkative third sister, Honghua, was a complete hothead and artistic type. Her brain, which Huang Yupei had always criticized as being a bit slow, was now vehemently criticizing her eldest brother, telling him to have backbone and not drive a tractor, to never give up art, to become a painter, not to work in the mountains, but to go to the trade union and become a painter. She even suggested that her second sister use connections to get a job in the forestry bureau, saying it would offer better prospects than earning a lowly eighth-grade worker's salary in the mountains. How could their mother, Huang Yupei, not feel heartache for her own flesh and blood? She earnestly advised her son, Honglin, who was very polite and respectful to his mother. Yupei said, "Son, never go to the mountains again. Your father insisted on going to the forestry bureau to be a worker, so that Hongyu and Hongying could have a good education. Your father gave you all an education, but what about your mother? She lost her husband. Honglin, do you listen to my intuition? Don't worry about anything else, go to your master's place. The salary may be lower, but find a good girl in the forestry bureau, understand?"

"Mother, what are you going to do?"

"Son, your mother has her own way of doing things."

"Mother, Father is gone, I need to take care of you."

“Son, I’m happy to support your mother. Look at your two older sisters, they can barely support themselves. I’m about to give birth, another mouth to feed. I can’t count on your two older sisters anymore. You still have Hongmei, Hongying, Hongli, and Hongqi, and your younger siblings need to go to school. You need to be realistic about supporting them! How can we afford to support them? It hurts my heart. Your father is more ambitious than anyone else, otherwise he wouldn’t have been so ahead of his time and let you study art. I know very well that art used to be something that nobles did when they had nothing better to do. It was just a money pit. I know everything.”

Honglin's conversation with his mother began to become clearer. His father was a loving father; if he were selfish, he would have stayed in that small Jiangnan region by the Yalu River, letting his children have their own lives, whether they studied or not, it didn't matter, they would all live the same life. His father's temperament was somewhat similar to his third uncle, Sizhe, who went to Beijing; both wanted to make something of themselves and didn't want to fall into poverty. Could his mother possibly say to her son, "Why don't you go to the mountains to earn money for the family?" Like his father, everything his mother did was for her children to succeed, to pass the imperial examinations, to escape the mountains for the big city, to become intellectuals, to fly out of the mountains and become cultured people. But his mother, constantly having and raising children, had placed him in a surreal state, caught between reality and fantasy, caught in the chaotic fall of the old and new eras. His mother loved to hang out with the shamanic women, puffing on her long pipe, returning to the outdated customs of the past. Wasn't smoking a long pipe a helpless form of solace? The world is always like this, like a devil, forever forcing people to make contradictory choices, offering them both the bear's paw and the carp. Reality has no perfection; that's perfectly normal. In truth, every choice is wrong. Life offers no choice; this is a tragedy of our times, but also an inevitability.

Honglin's mind has lost all philosophical and logical thinking. Hegel, Rousseau, Kant, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer—logic is utterly useless in real life. Honglin finds art too illusory and unattainable. The journey from the Yalu River to this desolate, wild forest of the forestry bureau, from a warm place to this freezing, miserable existence, is utterly absurd. His two older sisters have become other men's wives, heavily pregnant—it's all so absurd. They received an education, yet they became other men's wives, good wives, and tools for others to continue their family line, while their father, for their future, sleeps in the distant coniferous forest. He's confused. He actually chose to go into the mountains to suffer—it's absurd! Why did he choose Nekhlyudov's self-destructive path? Where did the problem lie? His mother, on the other hand, disagrees with his sacrifice. How can he judge right and wrong between those in the mountains and those outside? Does making money necessarily mean going to the mountains? Does a future require staying in the forestry bureau?

Honglin was about to graduate when his father died. Li Yuqing and Li Liwen, a Shanghai intellectual couple, offered him much insight and advice. Li Yuqing was from Shanghai, and her husband had worked in historical research in Beijing; both were worldly-wise. Staying in Shanghai or Beijing wouldn't have meant missing out on opportunities, but in the face of historical choices, even those who didn't understand the revolutionary spirit of the Six Gentlemen of the Hundred Days' Reform were ultimately thwarted. Empress Dowager Cixi angrily beheaded the Six Gentlemen with a blunt knife; their souls were later appeased at Fayuan Temple.