RIIDMDR chapter 148

Making Tuckahoe cake wasn’t difficult, only a few details differed from Nanxu’s memory. Nanxu learned quickly. By the time Tingshu returned with the ingredients, Nanxu had become quite familiar with his aunt and was chatting with her enthusiastically. He had eaten most of the several batches of Tuckahoe cake that came out of the oven.

When he saw Tingshu, Nanxu smiled and waved, but before he could speak, he let out a satisfied burp.

Tingshu: …

For the next few days, Nan Xu stayed on West Mountain, never leaving his sachet behind. During the day, he visited his aunt to discuss what to cook or wandered around with Ting Shu to admire the flowers and scenery.

West Mountain wasn’t as dazzling as the surrounding South Sea with its gold, silver, and jade, nor as imposing as the towering walls of the Northern Border. It was simple. As far as the eye could see, there were medicinal herb fields, flower gardens, and rows of thatched and wooden houses—very rustic.

However, Ting Shu was busy. Besides treating patients who came to the mountain for medical help, he also tended to the precious herbs in his garden and pondered difficult cases. Seeing his concentration, Nan Xu naturally didn’t want to disturb him. Since he didn’t know anyone else on the mountain, though, he went to the kitchen to find his aunt.

The demons on West Mountain didn’t care much for food or drink, so the kitchen was mostly used to cook porridge and medicine for the sick. His aunt was in charge of these tasks.

Nanxu stayed on the mountain for five or six days, gaining a deeper understanding of the social anxiety experienced by the Bai clan demons of Xishan. Although he met many of them, he didn’t have a chance to speak with any of the Bai clan members. Whenever he encountered them and tried to chat, they quickly left. After this happened several times, Nanxu began to wonder if he had offended them in some way. However, whenever they met again, they would still give him a friendly smile.

Nanxu asked Tingshu about his concerns. After pausing for a moment, Tingshu smiled and said, “It’s not because of you. They’re not familiar with you, that’s why they act this way.”

Then, Nanxu thought of Zhixing, who couldn’t say a word in front of strangers. He suddenly realized that, compared to them, Tingshu was one of the more outgoing types among the Bai clan demons.

Unlike the other demons on the mountain, Auntie was warm and talkative. Nanxu didn’t feel any awkwardness due to their age difference, and they chatted harmoniously.

Nanxu loved food, and Tingshu went down the mountain every day or two to buy ingredients from nearby villages. Having little to do in the kitchen, the aunt was happy to cook for Nanxu. Several of her specialty pastries contained herbs, such as Eight Treasures Cake¹Bazhen Gao (八珍糕) — “Eight-Treasure Cake” : A traditional Chinese nourishing pastry made from a blend of eight nutritious ingredients—commonly things like rice flour, sesame, walnuts, lotus seeds, red beans, Chinese yam powder, poria (fu ling), and coix seeds. and Yam Cake²Shanyao Gao (山药糕) — “Yam Cake” : A soft, slightly chewy cake made from Chinese yam (Dioscorea opposita)—not the orange sweet potato but a white medicinal yam often used in Chinese cooking and medicine., and they all tasted delicious. Nanxu learned to cook quickly and mastered the recipes within a few days.

Although Nanxu had enjoyed a few relaxed and pleasant days, he hadn’t forgotten that he wasn’t really there. He had expected to suddenly and unexpectedly be ejected from the formation like last time. However, five or six days had passed peacefully, and he remained within the formation. He didn’t mind, though. After all, he wanted to spend more time with Ting Shu.

But this clear-headedness was the hardest to endure because, every time he was with Ting Shu, he was reminded that this humble gentleman had died more than two thousand years ago.

Although he hadn’t regained his memories, he still felt regret knowing this outcome.

Their earliest memory of this was when they weren’t very familiar with each other. Ting Shu had only taken him in at Yun Yi’s request. However, Ting Shu showed no sign of perfunctory behavior. On the contrary, he took great care of him, revealing his character.

After staying for about ten days, Nan Xu saw mostly herbs and medical books on the mountain. Worried that he might be bored, Ting Shu would occasionally accompany him for a stroll after finishing his work, explaining the habits and effects of various medicinal herbs. Most of the time, however, Ting Shu would gradually lower his voice as he spoke, eventually quietly walking alongside Nan Xu for a while.

Nan Xu knew that Ting Shu loved every plant and tree on the mountain and was very knowledgeable about these herbs. Therefore, Ting Shu was the only person he could tell these things to. He wanted to make his recollections more interesting so that even a layman like himself could enjoy the story. However, he rarely communicated with others, nor was he a particularly witty demon, so he couldn’t express what he wanted to say. He could only remain silent, lest his words make Nan Xu find the herbs even less interesting.

Most of the herbs here were cultivated by Ting Shu’s clan, and there are many different kinds. Zhixing’s small herb garden pales in comparison. If he could write down everything Ting Shu said and take it back to Zhixing, Zhixing would treasure it. However, he was just an ordinary person with no medical knowledge, and his memory had worsened since entering the formation. Sometimes, he would forget what he was about to do. He could only let Ting Shu’s descriptions go in one ear and out the other, admiring the plants’ appearance at most.

Nan Xu felt guilty about this. He wanted to force himself to remember Ting Shu’s words, but putting it into practice was incredibly difficult.

Nan Xu remembered that his mind had been quite sharp before joining the formation, and he hadn’t encountered any obstacles learning to make pastries afterward. But why did his mind freeze when he was with Ting Shu? Was he perhaps just not destined to be a pharmacist?

A month passed, and Nan Xu still didn’t know the key to this formation. However, thinking that he might never have the chance to spend time with Ting Shu again, he wasn’t in such a hurry. However, he was also worried that staying in the formation for too long would cause him to lose his memories from before joining, because he occasionally felt that a memory was a dream from the previous night.

He tried writing down what he could remember, but when he woke up the next morning, there wasn’t a trace of ink left. Nan Xu felt a chill run down his spine when he finally realized the seriousness of the problem.

The memories within this array were just that—memories. They were a small barrier he had erected over three thousand years ago. Its storage capacity was limited. If he stayed too long, the array would confuse all his memories to prevent him from noticing anything amiss. It would slowly consume them until he forgot where he came from and why. Ultimately, he would be trapped forever in this small world, endlessly repeating that same memory.

Nanxu wasn’t sure if his guess was right, but he was certain that he shouldn’t stay any longer. Tingchuan was waiting for him outside the formation, perhaps already anxious.

He searched everywhere every day, trying to find the key to breaking the formation, from the grand mountain roads to the smallest blade of grass. After several days, however, he found nothing.

One day, Nanxu saw Tingshu bring back a basket of crayfish from the foot of the mountain. Tingshu thought Nanxu was afraid of insects and scorpions, so he naturally assumed that Nanxu would be afraid of these clawed creatures. He deliberately avoided Nanxu when he returned with them, but unexpectedly, Nanxu’s eyes lit up as Tingshu approached. His mouth practically watered as he spoke.

“Where did you get such plump crayfish? Spicy or garlic, they’d be delicious,” Nanxu said.

After saying that, Nanxu paused, momentarily stunned. Tingshu looked at Nanxu with a puzzled expression. “I ran into a demon friend I helped before when I came down the mountain. He insisted on giving me some, saying the shrimp meat is especially tender this time of year and tastes great boiled and dipped in spicy powder. What about the spicy garlic sauce you mentioned?”

Upon seeing the crayfish, Nan Xu had just blurted out the recipe, wanting to launch into a detailed explanation. However, he then found something stuck in his head, preventing him from saying anything. He was speechless for a moment.

“First, let’s wash the shrimp. Let me think. Any recipe I remember must be delicious,” said Nan Xu confidently, knowing he had forgotten something again.

Ting Shu didn’t seem to notice anything amiss. His aunt chimed in with a smile, saying that Nan Xu had quite the discerning palate.

After they worked together to clean the crayfish, Nan Xu stood by the stove, acting on instinct. He chopped a few cloves of garlic and sautéed them in oil until fragrant. Then he added the crayfish, star anise, cinnamon, rock sugar, and other seasonings.

His movements went from hesitant at first to much smoother as he found his rhythm. He couldn’t remember the exact steps, so he added the seasonings by feel, relying on muscle memory.

He wasn’t sure if he was doing it right. But when the crayfish were ready and drizzled with garlic sauce, a large bowl of bright red crayfish was served. Nan Xu inhaled the enticing aroma and felt a strange sense of temporal displacement. He could clearly sense that this plate of crayfish didn’t belong there, yet he had made it and placed it right in front of him.

The aroma of garlic filled his nostrils, and his stomach rumbled incessantly. After the three demons sat down, Nanxu placed two crayfish in each of his aunt’s and Ting Shu’s bowls and urged them to try them. When he reached for his own crayfish, that inexplicable headache returned.

Nan Xu pressed his forehead, keeping a smile that carried a trace of bitterness.

So this was how the great formation was supposed to be broken. After being constantly eroded and assimilated by the formation, the appearance of something within it that shouldn’t have been already violated the formation’s intent.

Had Nan Xu not realized this early on and constantly reminded himself that he was trapped within the formation, searching for a way to break it day after day, he might have unknowingly forgotten that he needed to escape.

After searching fruitlessly for over a month, he was about to give up. Who would have thought that a single plate of crayfish would disrupt the formation’s balance?

Nanxu looked at Tingshu, who was sitting to his right. He noticed that Tingshu wasn’t in a hurry to eat the crayfish; instead, he looked at Nanxu with concern. Tingshu’s mouth opened and closed as if he were saying something, but Nanxu couldn’t hear anything. The silence was terrifying, and the light before his eyes slowly darkened until, like the end of a movie, the scene before him began to distort and warp. Finally, it plunged into darkness.

When Nan Xu groggily opened his eyes again, he found himself sitting by the roadside. The place looked familiar, seemingly at the foot of Western Mountain. He got up, preparing to head uphill. After taking two steps, however, he suddenly realized something and stopped. He turned around and walked in the opposite direction.

In the blink of an eye, the scene before him abruptly changed. His consciousness blurred, and he saw Tingchuan walking toward him but didn’t react.

The great formation behind him collapsed, and his memories, which had been obscured, slowly returned. Scenes flashed before his eyes, and everything seemed like a dream. He couldn’t be sure if it had actually happened because it all felt unreal. He had intended to enter the formation to retrieve his memories from three thousand years ago but had almost lost his memories from three thousand years in the future as well. Tingchuan’s brows were furrowed with worry. He called Nan Xu’s name several times but received no response. Nanxu stood there like a wooden stake, his eyes glazed over as if his soul had been captured.

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• 1
  Bazhen Gao (八珍糕) — “Eight-Treasure Cake” : A traditional Chinese nourishing pastry made from a blend of eight nutritious ingredients—commonly things like rice flour, sesame, walnuts, lotus seeds, red beans, Chinese yam powder, poria (fu ling), and coix seeds.
• 2
  Shanyao Gao (山药糕) — “Yam Cake” : A soft, slightly chewy cake made from Chinese yam (Dioscorea opposita)—not the orange sweet potato but a white medicinal yam often used in Chinese cooking and medicine.