Chapter 1: Chapter One: Past Life, Present Life

Li Xuewu frowned, his eyes dull as he stared at the ceiling.

The sounds of bugle calls, drill commands, and artillery blasts still echoed in his ears.

He tilted his head to glance at the calendar on the wall.

November 15, 1965, Friday.

If he remembered correctly, another page should have been torn off.

That would be November 16, 1965, Saturday.

He still wasn’t used to lacking phone alerts for date and time; his right hand groped uselessly beside the pillow.

Though it was only November, Beijing had already seen two snowfalls, and it was bitterly cold.

Elders had told him this era was colder than the future.

Listening to the wind howling through the window cracks, he cherished the meager warmth of his quilt.

It wasn’t that Li Xuewu didn’t want to get up—he was literally held captive by the cotton quilt.

Outside, the sky was still dark; he couldn’t tell what time it was.

Since getting off the train, he didn’t know how long he’d slept, but the kang still swayed like the train had.

Li Xuewu knew he’d grown accustomed to the train’s rhythm; it would take a day or two to adapt.

He was no longer the dazed man he’d been when he first crossed over; memories dripped like rainwater from the eaves, slowly filling his mind with the life of this body.

He had been in this world for over two months; this was his first morning home after being discharged. Most of those two months had been spent on a hospital bed.

The original owner of this body was also named Li Xuewu, nineteen years old, who enlisted in 1962 and served somewhere in the southwest.

Li Xuewu knew the original Li Xuewu was already gone.

All that remained was a scar on his face.

He himself was a transplant—a middle-aged man who’d drifted through state enterprises, aimless and mediocre, dabbling in everything but mastering nothing.

Fortunately, some of the body’s memories had merged with his own; others were recounted to him by comrades.

Li Xuewu realized he had somehow landed in the very story he both hated and longed for.

Considering Li Xuewu’s condition made continued service unsuitable, the military consulted him and arranged a small award ceremony and discharge ritual.

Li Xuewu returned home, carrying his luggage and his household registration, and found his family’s residence in Beijing.

Since he arrived at night, little was said; he ate a bowl of rice porridge and went straight to bed.

The original body lived in a courtyard house near Nanluoguxiang in Beijing, with three rooms totaling over sixty square meters, housing nine members of the Li family.

Li Xuewu scanned the room—it was a side chamber of a sihe courtyard, divided into three rooms. The northern room had two kangs built east and west; the east kang housed Li’s father, mother, and younger sister; the west kang housed Li’s grandmother, third brother, and his mother’s father, Liu Jia Master. Li Xuewu’s sudden return had displaced his grandmother to the east kang.

The middle room served as living room, dining area, and kitchen; the southern room had originally been Li Xuewen and Li Xuewu’s room, but now housed Li’s eldest brother and his wife.

Last night, Li’s mother had scolded him at length upon seeing her second son return.

Li Xuewu’s father, Li Shun, had frowned and said, “Good-for-nothing. Get some rest. Tomorrow we’ll arrange your job.”

Li Xuewu now understood his family’s situation.

His father, Li Shun, was forty, a physician at Beijing’s Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, who had joined in 1954 after submitting medical formulas, and supported the entire household on a salary of Grade 12, Level 4, 79.5 yuan.

His mother, Liu Yin, had no job; she managed the household and cared for the elders.

From his mother, Li Xuewu learned many things had happened this year; she also complained that he hadn’t told the family what had happened to him in the military.

This year, the eldest son, Li Xuewen, graduated and stayed on at school as a physics instructor, began drawing a salary, and married his classmate Zhao Yafang, who also stayed on as a math instructor.

Whenever she mentioned her eldest son and daughter-in-law, Li’s mother’s pride and joy shone plainly.

Li’s father also held his head slightly higher.

His third son, Li Xuecai, had also excelled this year, gaining admission to medical university—bringing great honor to Li’s father, who for the first time showed a look of satisfaction.

Of the three sons, the eldest was absorbed in scholarship and uninterested in medicine; the second was troublemaking, injured many, and was useless at healing; the third, though mischievous, had succeeded by entering medical school, ensuring the family’s medical legacy continued.

His younger sister, Li Xue, was in her second year of high school and an outstanding student; his mother was immensely proud.

No wonder his mother was proud—in this era, who could afford to support four students, two already university-educated and one about to be?

Even the least accomplished second son had graduated high school.

And now their eldest daughter-in-law was a university graduate too; both were university teachers, and everyone who met them praised Li’s mother for her capability.

This had largely restored the family’s reputation, tarnished by Li Xuewu’s earlier misdeeds.

In July, a letter came from their hometown: his mother had passed away. Li’s mother took the whole family home for the funeral, and seeing her father alone and destitute, she could only weep.

Since his marriage, Li Shun had never managed household affairs, leaving everything to Liu Yin, who raised four children and cared for his mother, keeping the home in perfect order.

Li Shun didn’t know where his salary went or whether there was any surplus, yet his wife never complained, even when money ran short.

Liu’s father was to be brought to live in the city home.

Liu’s father, when Li Shun spoke, flatly refused—he wouldn’t go to live with his son-in-law; it would shame his daughter.

Only when Li Shun insisted firmly, and Li Xuewen and Li Xuecai physically carried him out, did he finally agree to follow his daughter and son-in-law into the city.

Liu’s father was a carpenter from the village; for this move, Li Shun brought home a whole cartload of carpentry tools.

Liu’s father intended that as long as he could still move his legs, he’d never be a burden to his daughter or son-in-law.

Thus, the Li family now lived in the side chambers of the sihe courtyard’s front yard.

Due to Li Xuewu’s special circumstances—discharged because of injury, and a combat hero—the military entrusted local authorities to properly settle him; the neighborhood coordinated with the Armed Forces Department to place him in a factory.

Li Xuewu raised his hand to touch the scar on his face, then, under the dim light, examined the room again.

The ceiling was covered with yellowed, old newspapers; the walls were speckled with grime; the windowpanes were small and grimy.

Between the two kangs stood a row of cabinets, atop which sat a small alarm clock, a mirror, and several bottles and jars—probably not medicine, since Li’s father’s herbs and books were kept in the southern room.

The southern room had only one kang on the east side; the west side held several cabinets and a desk.

In the middle room, near the southern chamber, stood a stove; thus, the kang in Xuewen’s room warmed up when cooking, while the two kangs in the northern room were heated by the door stove.

The Marvelous Roots of Immortal Wood

In the main room stood an eight-legged table; against the wall ran a row of cabinets, and in the corner stood a sewing machine.

Li Xuewu simply couldn’t sleep; his third brother, Xuecai, snored under his quilt.

Li Xuewu called Liu’s father “Lao Ye”; everyone in the family called him “Da Lao.”

Da Lao slept lightly; he was probably awake now, coughed twice, and got up to dress.

Li Xuewu looked at the brightening window and finally overcame the quilt’s hold, rose, pulled on his cotton coat, and got off the kang with Da Lao.