I am not Ximen Qing.

Actually, I've been searching all along, searching in this world, in dreams and in reality! True love is always so cruel to human nature. The immortal beauty in our hearts is colder than that of Christophe Anna. Both men and women have that secret in their hearts—this is love of secrets!

People eventually become strangers, even the closest friends! I remember on the way to Fragrant Hills—not just any road, but the subway line—on the subway, I never imagined that after more than a decade, meeting Xia Jinshi, it seemed Xia Jinshi remained stuck in the past portrait. Xia Jinshi is an eternally youthful portrait, just like in the city, like a meteorite rather than a planet in space. The Big City hardens humanity, robbing us of the warmth of love, because there are too many dead souls, too many dead souls adrift in the Big City, unable to return home! Because of the Big City's immense energy field, too many ghosts can neither go to heaven nor hell, only becoming part of the city's space and time. The Immortal Soul Show—souls without reincarnation are the most tormented, a thousand times, a hundred million times more painful than the six realms of reincarnation. We may have known each other in the past, but past and future acquaintances don't guarantee future longing. In any case, strangers are the best human relationship! Who would have thought that Xia Jinshi would become Zhang Sheng's bridge of love and immortal beauty? Who would have thought? A scary meeting is okay, no worries in the big city, I've always wanted to find the immortal beauty love that once existed in this big city! The big city scared him, filled him with fear, the fear that close friends would eventually become the best strangers! Just as Faust sought help from the devil to find immortal beauty, life without love and romance is too lonely and helpless. Dante could enter Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise in his trilogy to find the more beautiful beauty. Xia Jinshi and Zhang Sheng drank a lot of tequila and then traveled together, yearning for immortal beauty and love. In fact, the birth of beauty is no different from love in myths. If Ximen Qing in "Jin Ping Mei" were as detached from worldly affairs as Jia Baoyu, he could go to Wutai Mountain, Lingyin Temple, or Wudang Mountain, any sacred mountain in the world, whether Buddhist or Taoist. The final destination of "The Peach Blossom Fan" is a Taoist. The ultimate fates in *Jin Ping Mei* are all rooted in human nature; the characters are essentially reborn as humans. It can be seen as a nirvana after suffering, a rebirth after destruction—an immortal beauty like dreams. In *Dream of the Red Chamber*, the immortal beauty is Qin Keqing, Baoyu's dreamlike figure. There are twelve beauties, and then another twelve beauties in the painting—is this a plausible interpretation? In Ximen Qing's world, there is no pretense of love or romance. Ximen Qing pursues any woman swiftly and decisively, like a knife cutting through a tangled mess, expressing his feelings directly: money, houses, silk clothes, jewelry, gold and silver treasures. Therefore, whether they are beauties or courtesans, Ximen Qing always possesses a powerful and attractive aura. For men, the highest level of love is when the woman pursues the man. Love is always swift and decisive; true love is like that, judged solely by intuition as love passions.

At least regardless of Xia Jinshi's actions, it was Zhang Sheng's dreamlike night. Mephistopheles' immortal beauty meeting was merely Goethe's split personality; Faust was just Goethe's shadow. Faust plus the devil equals Goethe's immortal beauty dream! The prototype of immortal beauty isn't the mythical goddess Helen, but the trouble of young Werther. Werther was captivated by the noblewoman Lotte, a melancholic and beautiful young man who fell into Lotte's love trap. Love is often irrational; that green field is the embodiment of immortal beauty. The green field is pure immortal beauty. Daisy is Gatsby's immortal beauty, Juliet is Romeo's immortal beauty, Desdemona is Othello's immortal beauty, Carmen is Tannhäuser's immortal beauty. But this immortal beauty, love, has destructive power. For love, death is the highest realm of tragic beauty!

Xia Jinshi is still the same Xia Jinshi from over a decade ago. His portrait hasn't changed. Just like when he first joined the company in the summer, he was already quite experienced and mature. Now, this has become an advantage of his youthful appearance. Think about it, Xia Jinshi has never been young. More than a decade later, he is still the same as before. No, he has never been young, nor has he grown old. Most of his old friends are the same. More than a decade later, they are all strangers. The same goes for relatives and friends. This phenomenon can be explained by urban evolution. Because in the city, human nature becomes cold, cold-blooded, and ruthless. In the world of capitalism, human nature is nakedly exposed. Dead Soulshow, who can breathe air, Dead Soulshow, who has a physical body, why can't he ever forget Xia Jinshi's Being? There was no reason, no why, because there was more to beauty than dreams. Immortal beauty was the most beautiful, yet forever an immortal beauty in dreams. She hated Zhang Sheng the most because Zhang Sheng made motor beauty ugly, to the point that Zhang Sheng painfully couldn't enter Immortal beauty's dreams. The energy and power of beauty are enough to create crazyness. To conquer a motor beauty's love, one can only use the power of Zeus's black mist, not Leda's swan. Moreover, Immortal beauty has the most perfect golden ratio shape in the world. The beauty she displays is impressive. She can endure the coldness of the room; she chose to wear Juliet's veil. At least at the Broken Bridge on the White Causeway, beauty was truly warm. A pure stranger, because of the business meeting at the Hangzhou company, because immortal beauty was too beautiful. She even asked Zhang Sheng if he wanted to come to the company for a while. The weather was often cloudy or sunny, but he liked this gloomy weather. It was a bit chaotic. We were busy at the bank, talking about our ideals and our understanding of insurance, banking, and stocks. Immortal Beauty had to go back to the company, what a pity! But Beauty said she'd continue working in the afternoon, so at least he could still meet with Immortal Beauty. She always bestows love. An artist's loneliness is innate. Immortal Beauty is like a dream. Immortal Beauty will appear in Difference Dreams. Zhang Sheng even chose a Japanese restaurant near the bank. He had to drink some Japanese sake and eat some tuna. The taste of Japanese food is truly pure art, imagination, and taste. Why not invite Immortal Beauty to this kind of feast? Always making crucial mistakes at crucial moments! Although he talked a lot with Immortal Beauty, Zhang Sheng was still unwilling to give up. Just as Immortal Beauty's attitude towards Zhang Sheng was quite friendly and open, Zhang Sheng felt that Immortal Beauty was the most beautiful in the world. The beauty of West Lake is an open beauty, and the soul of West Lake is a free and unrestrained soul. He died in the pavilion on the Broken Bridge, just to admire the West Lake dream created by the Bai Causeway. The bridge under the Broken Bridge connects the two sides of the West Lake on the Bai Causeway. Oh, the dreamlike West Lake, at least the blue waves of West Lake have unveiled the Immortal beauty that Zhang Sheng was searching for!

She just wouldn't remove Nami's veil, simply because "Immortalbeauty scary" means that without her presence, the halo and rainbow of beauty she displays is called "Immortalbeauty rainbow"! The "love rainbow" of West Lake, so far, is found in the Summer Palace, on the Su Causeway, in the lotus pond, especially in the height of summer, with its boundless expanse of lotus flowers, green petals and red blossoms, shimmering and dancing, emerald green and pink! The lotus-picking girls' "Immortal beauty"—they pick lotus flowers amidst the boundless greenery and red blossoms, picking lotus flowers, picking lotus flowers, picking lotus flowers, but they walk along the Bai Causeway, singing and dancing, on one side of the lotus pond. What's the difference between this and the lotus flowers in the Summer Palace? The lotus flowers in West Lake. Lotus, lotus leaves, lotus flowers—the paintings of Bada Shanren are also like this. Bada Shanren was skilled at painting birds, fish, and lotus flowers, quite in line with the subtle methods of Laozi and Zhuangzi. Xiaoyaozi (a famous Chinese painter) found the spirit, soul, and charm of the West Lake lotus in his paintings. The highest realm of painting is materialization, like Zhuangzi's butterfly dream, where the human spirit and nature unite. Whether in the Old Summer Palace or the Summer Palace, the lotus is a unique and beautiful presence; how much more so in the West Lake, where it brings light and brilliance to everything. Ah, the beauty of the pure spirit pursued in the *Analects* is not the dazzling, superficial beauty of Tang and Song poetry. This is the greatness of the *Analects*' beauty—the root of aesthetics. If Bai Juyi, Su Dongpo, the poet Li Bai, the poet Du Fu, lacked the soul of the *Analects*, this root of beauty would be lost. Like jade that cannot be made into a vessel without carving, the spirit and soul of jade are bestowed by people. The *Analects* is the soil from which the flowers of the Tang and Song dynasties bloom. Without good soil, the most beautiful peony cannot bloom; the same is true of culture. This is why we have the poetry of the Tang Dynasty and the lyrics of the Song Dynasty—beauty accumulated little by little through cultural practice!

Just as the *Zuo Zhuan* (Commentary of Zuo) is the root and *Jin Ping Mei* (The Plum in the Golden Vase) is the blooming flower, this is the role of Bai Causeway in the beauty of West Lake, like the Big Dipper! Yan Hui's ambition, unwavering even in humble surroundings, is the soul and spirit of West Lake's beauty, as is the spirit of the plum blossoms and cranes on Gushan Island, the legacy of the famous Northern Song Dynasty poet Tao Yuanming. I only pursue the pure integrity and spirit of literati, and have always wanted to climb Gushan Island because it holds so much historical and cultural heritage. Although I haven't climbed Gushan, the ruins of Qianlong's imperial palaces at the foot of Gushan are somewhat similar to the Yuanmingyuan (Old Summer Palace). The palaces were destroyed because Qianlong had too many, which can be called the overabundance of Qianlong's aesthetics. It also exposes Qianlong's gluttonous ambition for Chinese culture, but his aesthetic standards seem somewhat out of place under the grandeur of this prosperous empire, let alone the soul and beauty of the Tang Dynasty. In contrast, beauty could only be hidden in Qianlong's private gardens, the Imperial Garden, the Wenyuan Pavilion, and the Three Hills and Five Gardens within the Forbidden City, as well as the Western Hills Garden. Qianlong was a self-admiring aesthetician, artist, and emperor. If possible, he would have liked to bring West Lake into the Forbidden City as well, making him no different from the female ruler of the Jin Dynasty in this respect. Qianlong's fervor for aesthetics and art seemed somewhat obsessive and even perverse, to the point that China produced a large number of artists, painters, and scholars, both old and young, during the Republic of China period. Now, Zhang Sheng regrets not inviting a "motor beauty" to have Japanese food and sake. Perhaps "immortal beauty" would have allowed him to unveil the veil of "immortal beauty"?

"Your love is so overflowing that you actually want to forget her beauty completely, perfect goddess. Like dreams."

"You've misunderstood, or else,"

"I need to go back to the company now,"

Time was running out, otherwise I would have definitely climbed to the top of Gushan Island for a panoramic view of West Lake! Ah, my mind was filled with images of unparalleled beauty, as if she were right before my eyes, in the pavilion by the Broken Bridge amidst the lingering snow. West Lake is the best place to dream, the most beautiful place to dream!