"You should be familiar with this place, right?"
Tu Nan slowly brought her gaze back to the man in front of her, pulling her thoughts back with it.
His head dipped slightly as he looked at her, an unmistakable, quietly asking posture.
"More or less."
Shi Qinglin didn't say much. He simply lifted a hand, gesturing for her to go first.
Tu Nan naturally stepped forward to lead the way.
She wasn't obligated to, but there was no reason to refuse either, especially after she'd just thanked him.
Because of the renovations, now and then they passed piles of cement and mortar by the roadside. Stacks of glazed roof tiles waited to be used, flashing with reflected sunlight.
In the temple grounds, "five trees and six flowers" grew in abundance. In the release pond, lotus leaves curled at the edges. Cicadas cried from the branches.
Tu Nan climbed the steps to the Guanyin Hall. Remembering there were still two others, she turned back and asked, "Shouldn't we wait for them?"
Shi Qinglin walked closer under the blazing sun, his eyes narrowing slightly. "No need. We don't have much time. It's faster if we split up."
Ling Tan Temple was a Ming-dynasty temple, hardly ancient by comparison, and not a famous historical site either. Locals rarely came here for sightseeing, much less made time to visit on purpose. Tu Nan drew a conclusion.
"You're not from here, are you?"
Shi Qinglin said, "I'm not. I just came back from overseas. A lot of places don't feel familiar anymore."
Tu Nan thought: so even returned overseas Chinese had hobbies like temple visits now. The world was vast, nothing was too strange.
"And you?" he asked.
The sudden question caught her off guard, and then she realized he was simply returning the question. She nodded. "Yes. I'm local."
"Then that explains it," Shi Qinglin said, a trace of amusement in the tail end of his voice.
Tu Nan looked at him. "Explains what?"
"Why you dared to do that last night."
"…"
He meant: she'd dared to stand her ground at midnight because she was on her own turf, bold because she felt protected by familiarity. Tu Nan understood his meaning almost instantly.
Shi Qinglin's steps were unhurried. He came up the stairs beside her, reached out, and pushed open the hall doors.
"Going in?"
Last night, he'd used the same tone when he asked her, Coming or not?
Tu Nan pressed her lips together and stepped over the threshold.
If there was one place in the temple worth seeing, it was probably this Guanyin Hall.
Inside were statues, a wooden fish drum, prayer cushions, incense tables, things every hall had, nothing special.
But one entire wall was covered in painted murals, something like the temple's crown jewel.
The moment Tu Nan entered, she heard a phone vibrating. When she turned, she saw Shi Qinglin holding his phone, already heading back out.
"Sorry, work call. I'll step outside to take it."
She truly didn't understand. If work was so busy, why come at all?
Ming-dynasty temple murals differed from earlier eras. A unified empire tended to be more inclusive; under a painter's brush, different religions and sects could blend.
On the Guanyin Hall wall were painted banners and jeweled canopies, strange celestial palaces, three tiers from top to bottom, filled with gods and Buddhas, divine beasts and altars, everything you could imagine.
It had to be the work of folk artisans. There was none of that lavish raised-gold technique, only bold, free brushwork, like the Shuilu style: unrestrained, drifting, alive.
Sometimes Tu Nan felt only the ancients could paint like this, Dao within Buddhism, Confucian spirit within Dao. Later generations could only grope toward the painter's intent through copying: wracking their brains to guess and restore, stepping neatly into someone else's footprints, never allowed to stray even half a step.
She leaned against a pillar, staring for who knew how long. Her eyes were on the mural, but her mind had gone somewhere else entirely.
She lost track of time.
Only when the noise outside grew louder did she come back to herself, realizing the hall's light had turned dimmer, shadowy, as if the day had darkened.
She walked to the doorway and looked out...
and froze.
A layer of protective netting had already been set up across the entrance. Several workers were outside the net, busy fixing scaffolding into place.
"Wait, someone's inside!"
The moment Tu Nan spoke, she was discovered.
One worker shouted in surprise. "How is there still someone in here? How did you get in? Isn't the temple closed?"
Tu Nan didn't bother explaining. She pushed at the net. "Can you let me out first?"
"What is wrong with you..." The workers didn't know whether to blame her for sneaking in or blame themselves for not checking before starting. Either way, the net had just gone up, and now they had to undo it.
Tu Nan couldn't help. She could only wait by the door.
After a long while, her eyes shifted and she spotted Shi Qinglin standing slightly off to the side.
He had clearly just returned. His phone was still in his hand. Seeing the scene, he looked mildly surprised. He paused, glanced at Tu Nan, then walked over.
Luckily, the work wasn't finished yet. The workers quickly opened a narrow gap in the net.
Tu Nan squeezed through. The ground was littered with debris, she stumbled, unsteady, just then...
and a hand reached out and closed firmly around her wrist.
That hand was solid, strong. With one pull, he yanked her safely out.
"I came back late," Shi Qinglin said, releasing her. "You okay?"
Tu Nan dusted ash off her clothes and glanced up at him. Somehow, she felt there was a hint of amusement tucked in his brows and eyes.
"I'm fine."
"Good." He nodded. "Let's find somewhere to rest."
And for some reason, Tu Nan suddenly felt stifled, irritated in a way she couldn't quite name.
Fang Ruan wandered the temple for two or three hours without seeing Tu Nan. Finally, he started to worry and began searching through corridors and winding paths.
He still couldn't find her. Just as he pulled out his phone to call, he saw the "employer girl" stepping out of a hall across the way. They looked at each other and spoke at the same time:
"Have you seen..."
Right. So they were both looking.
They searched together, and outside the Manjushri Hall, they finally saw someone inside.
The girl jogged in and complained the moment she entered, "I'm so disappointed. There's basically nothing to see."
Shi Qinglin stood with his arms crossed against a wall, looking for a moment. Then he shook his head. "Yeah. Nothing much."
Fang Ruan moved behind a pillar.
Tu Nan was sitting on the base of a column, drinking water.
He muttered, "I gave you money for incense and you pocketed it to buy water."
"Do you have to be this stingy? You make me run errands and I can't even buy a bottle of water?" Tu Nan sounded exhausted, body and mind worn down.
"You definitely bought more than one bottle. Hand it over." Fang Ruan turned her around, searching to see if she'd hidden any.
"I didn't," Tu Nan said. "That's all."
Fang Ruan took the bottle from her hand and screwed the cap back on. "Good. You didn't drink much, shouldn't be obvious."
Before Tu Nan could figure out what he was doing, he carried the bottle around the pillar and went straight to the girl.
"Here, here, it's hot. Drink some water."
"I'm not thirsty." Even though she didn't look pleased, she still took it, then immediately turned and handed it to Shi Qinglin.
Shi Qinglin accepted it, only then pulling his eyes off the wall. He twisted the cap open, lifted it to his mouth...
paused...
and held it up in front of his eyes as if inspecting it.
Tu Nan flicked a glance over and forced herself to look away.
It was the water she'd just bought. There was no way they wouldn't notice whose bottle it was.
But after a few seconds, he still drank, tilting his head back to pour a mouthful in, without letting the bottle touch his lips.
Then he capped it again and handed it back to Fang Ruan.
Fang Ruan failed to impress the girl and trudged back, sulky.
Tu Nan shot him a look and said nothing.
Fang Ruan acted like nothing happened as he returned the bottle to her. "Where'd you go? Taking people on a tour and all?"
"Don't ask. I don't want to talk about it." Tu Nan was simmering.
She'd told him she didn't want to come. This was all his fault.
Fang Ruan was about to press her when Shi Qinglin asked, "Is there anything… different we can see?"
Fang Ruan blinked. "What do you mean 'different'?"
"Something more… old-fashioned. More ancient."
Fang Ruan still didn't get it, but the girl did.
"You mean the murals and statues all look too new? I noticed that too. We went through several halls, everything inside is so brightly colored. If you call it a mural, it feels more like New Year prints."
Shi Qinglin nodded.
That stumped Fang Ruan. He scratched his head. "Aren't they all like that? Aren't murals just… like this?" As he spoke, he looked toward the professional.
Tu Nan didn't want to get involved. But once Fang Ruan looked at her, the other two turned to her as well. So she stood, brushed her clothes, and said:
"Of course they look new. There was a big fire in the temple years ago. Except for the Guanyin Hall, everything else was recreated later. The oldest ones are probably from the 1960s."
Her father had told her that when she was a child. Maybe kids were more frightened by fire, because she remembered it clearly.
Otherwise, why would she have taken Shi Qinglin straight to the Guanyin Hall first?
Too bad he hadn't seen it.
Shi Qinglin looked at Tu Nan, she couldn't tell if he was confirming her words, or recalling the Guanyin Hall.
The Guanyin Hall…
Tu Nan's temples started to ache again.
After a moment, Shi Qinglin suddenly said, "Let's go, An Pei."
The girl answered softly and followed him out.
Fang Ruan looked at Tu Nan. "What's going on? We're leaving already?"
Tu Nan snapped, "How would I know?"
By the time Tu Nan reached the foot of the mountain, the car was already waiting on the road.
Seeing Fang Ruan head straight for the driver's side, she naturally pulled open the passenger door only to find An Pei sitting there.
And when she looked again, Shi Qinglin was in the driver's seat.
"I'll drive back to the city," he said.
Fang Ruan had no choice but to climb into the back.
Tu Nan slid in beside him and, seeing he was still sulking, kicked him.
"…?" Fang Ruan looked completely baffled.
What had he done now?!
As the car started moving, Shi Qinglin suddenly asked, "Can you still see the original murals?"
Fang Ruan nudged Tu Nan to answer.
Tu Nan looked forward and met Shi Qinglin's eyes in the rearview mirror. So he'd been asking her.
Instinctively, she looked away. Her gaze fell on the hand gripping the steering wheel.
Long fingers.
Not long ago, those fingers had wrapped around her wrist.
"Unless there are copybooks left," she said, "you can't see them anymore."
"Copybooks?"
"Copies made by professionals, based on the originals. But the Ling Tan Temple fire happened too long ago. There probably aren't any surviving copies." She thought: back then, there might not even have been professional copyists.
Shi Qinglin murmured, "Mm," and fell silent.
The car drove steadily forward.
Tu Nan didn't know why he was asking, and it had nothing to do with her anyway, they weren't close enough for her to pry.
After a long time, only An Pei sighed.
"Bad luck. This trip was basically a waste."