Humans had the tendency to visualize the nature of the source of inexplicable, unseen agony within their bodies. Most of the time, their imagination failed to capture the true essence of it, but sometimes – very rarely – they managed to envision what exactly within them was clawing, cutting, pinching, or pulling, perfectly.
Yun Jieshi couldn't tell where exactly it was within his being, but he recognized its shape.
It was something like a peach pit – the stone inside the fruit. It was circular, with hard welts over its surface. A pastel-blue hue coated it, growing darker as it dug between the swollen, bumpy parts.
Perched in a plane Yun Jieshi couldn't recognize, it was perfectly still, but something was orbiting around it. It might have been the wind. It might have been some other invisible force, rotating around the pit furiously.
There wasn't much of whatever this was. In truth, Yun Jieshi could hardly perceive it.
The pit swelled in size right then and Yun Jieshi almost bit his tongue as he hastily let loose a shrill cry. His agony mounted and he shuddered.
Many somber questions blared in his mind as he tried not to collapse in on himself.
What was this? What was this pit growing inside of him?
What had happened to Feng Jie Hong? Why did he suddenly…?
"ARRRGH!" Sweat poured from Yun Jieshi like rain. He hissed. The pain brought on the illusion that he was growing heavy. For a moment, Yun Jieshi found it difficult to lift his torso.
But he had no choice but to soldier through the illusion.
He couldn't stay here, groaning and grunting, indulging his… misfortune, as he thought it was. He had to get to the other side of the Great Gap before giving in completely to the harrowing pain.
Thus, with all the effort a little mystical monkey could afford, he deadlifted his upper torso, teeth gritted, and started crawling onward. Each swing of the arm forward he managed while applying the magnetic property of his ruan (for better motion) was exhausting.
Perhaps if his mind wasn't burdened with confusion, a hint of grief, and an ominous sinking feeling, he might not have felt as bad, but…
Yun Jieshi grunted aloud.
He couldn't accept his agony any more than he could accept Feng Jie Hong's sudden demise.
He had been sure he and the phantom were off on a new adventure together. He had finally gotten someone to connect to – a true representation of the friends we make along the way – but then…
'Why… why did Feng Jie Hong realizing that he was a ghost drive him mad? How did he not realize it to begin with?' the little monkey thought as he struggled onward. But then his face sank, even as it contorted from the pulling pain from the pit. 'Did I cause that too?'
Feng Jie Hong had suddenly become afraid of failing, afraid of facing the fairy he loved as a ghost.
The look on his face when he presumed that Yun Jieshi thought the same was becoming the ultimate haunt for the Discount Sage. That, coupled with how the phantom suddenly grew darker and darker, all hope fading from him…
'Could I have done something about it?'
Could he have stopped that… Disharmony?
Yun Jieshi glanced at the yellow string of his ruan, enlarged beyond belief.
The Harmonising Psalm of Zhan Hao. Could it have delivered Feng Jie Hong if he could play it?
What about the sap in the wineskin?
Yun Jieshi didn't know.
And that not knowing was a haunting curse on par with the agony caused by the pit.
'Damn you!' he cursed no one in particular.
Was he to just forget the armored phantom now and head towards the golden lights?
He forged on.
Was he to accept that even as a Discount Sage, Equal to None, he had failed to help someone?
He clawed towards the Gap's edge.
A sudden shock struck from his abdomen, and Yun Jieshi split the air with a scream.
He remembered Feng Jie Hong calling him Sage at the end.
Why did the phantom suddenly recognize him by that title?
None of this made sense!
The air grew cooler the further he went. At first, it couldn't breach his protective layer of fur, but a few hundred meters later, Yun Jieshi could feel it stinging the skin beneath. That was not a good sign.
'Should I go back?' Yun Jieshi considered. 'Should I take the longer way Hua Dongmei suggested?'
Yes, the cold was great.
And yes, there was the possibility of encountering some powerful monster stronger than the Imp King.
…But Yun Jieshi didn't want to turn back.
What would that accomplish?
Going back to where he started certainly didn't do Feng Jie Hong any good, did it?
But the frightening cold and the potential monster were reasonable reasons to go back though? Yun Jieshi knew. What would he do about those?
He grumbled in frustration.
'Once I arrive, I'll settle on the edge and wait for this pain to subside before I make a decision,' the little monkey thought, trying to muster courage and wit. 'It will subside!'
It was just pain. It had a purpose. Whatever that purpose was, he would weather through it. After all, didn't the saying go, "Enduring pain is how man succeeds"?
It took what felt like an eternity, but Yun Jieshi finally reached the other end of the Great Gap. He rolled off the ruan and plummeted onto a hard, stabbing mixture of flaky snow and ice. A fiercer wind, raging with louder whispers, blasted against him along with a tide of hail.
It was cold on this side indeed. Yun Jieshi was already shivering.
He hissed and had his ruan diminish. Right after it turned travel-sized, he hugged it desperately.
Forcing his eyes open, he studied the surroundings. Everything was white and constantly getting pelted by the snow and ice. He could hardly see as much as he would have liked, but a few things registered in his vision.
A woodland spread ahead of him. It was filled with bowing, frozen trees. Some were assortments of pine and others might have been plum trees, Yun Jieshi could not have cared enough. The ice-crusted canopies of these trees intersected at points, creating spaces where the snow and ice didn't hit as hard.
Yun Jieshi crawled over to one and battled his agony there. He took a few minutes to settle.
When he felt he could, he continued to survey his surroundings.
And that was when he noticed them.
Great feathers as large as the average human were strewn about, frozen solid, and washed white with snow. Their original color was masked. Yun Jieshi couldn't tell if they were originally such a pristine pretty white or not. Some were lying on the ground a dozen meters away from him and others were stuck on the branches of the trees.
They hardly looked freshly frozen though. They might have frozen for decades.
But Yun Jieshi couldn't have given ten Buddha's Secrets about that.
Soon, his eyes lost focus and he was back envisioning the look of the pit growing inside of him. He loathed the pastel-blue stone with a passion.
What was its purpose?
Was it a last curse from Feng Jie Hong?
Did the phantom curse Yun Jieshi in his last moments and become this thing?
All manner of irrational thoughts crowded the little monkey's mind.
One second, he sympathized with Feng Jie Hong, and in another…
In another, he hated the phantom. The old sagely voice had implied that it wasn't the real Feng Jie Hong, hadn't it? It was a phantom belonging to the warrior who hailed from the natural world. Surely then, Yun Jieshi could hate the phantom and love the warrior, couldn't he?
"ARRRRGH!" Yun Jieshi struck the hard ice under him and it exploded with a boom.
In the end, he mourned the phantom but said nothing.
Nearly a quarter of an hour passed before he attempted to rise from the snow and ice again. The pain didn't subside, as he had hoped. He simply got used to it – somewhat.
The little monkey must have mustered even the strength he would earn later in life to manage to stand on his two feet. He had his ruan engorge slightly, just enough to where it could act as a walking stick.
This must have been what it felt like to have ulcers.
Hunched and with the burden of his arrows, wineskin, sack, and bow, the little monkey looked towards the Great Gap, and then away from it.
'I can't remain too idle. I have to investigate this area a little and get my bearings straight,' the little monkey thought dejectedly. 'Or I just turn back, damn it!'
He had to admit, his emotions had played him.
His decision to cross the Great Gap immediately had been spurred by Feng Jie Hong. Yun Jieshi had wanted to help the phantom so desperately that he threw away the caution that had been dictating his actions until now.
To his shame, he could also admit that midway through his trek with Feng Jie Hong, he had started to hope that the phantom would help him with the problem of the great cold here. He was a ghost, unaffected by the harsh weather. He could go ahead of Yun Jieshi and help him find shelter or anything the little monkey could use to stave off frostbite and death.
As for the monster, the ghost could have helped in making sure Yun Jieshi never met it. He would be invaluable as a scout.
But damn it!
The little monkey was now alone.
He had no choice now. He would die if he continued on.
He had to turn back.
Yun Jieshi cursed and inched towards the Great Gap.
…But then the golden spots of light in the distance called to him. They would not suffer being ignored.