Chapter 80: My Heart Cannot Turn

Pan Yun wiped her mouth; she was no longer the Pan Yun from three days ago.

Having studied history, she was immensely strong; she lifted her head and regarded Zhou Fu with seriousness: "Master Zhou, natural feet are in accord with nature and the Dao. How many women in this Zhou Village have bound feet, and how many have natural feet?"

"Marriage alliances are postnatal interests—we set those aside. Just look: which is healthier, women with natural feet or bound feet? Who bears healthier children, who raises them better, who raises smarter children?"

Since that night when Sun Xianniang silenced her, Pan Yun had been reviewing historical records in the Spirit Realm; these past days, every time she saw Sun Xianniang, she wanted to debate her again—but Sun Xianniang was wholly absorbed in her child, and Pan Yun kept suffering bad luck.

Yet Pan Yun rarely failed; she could not let go of this matter, and even in her dreams at night, she relived that moment to argue it all over again.

She felt it was unhealthy—too strong a desire to win was not a good thing.

But now Master Zhou had laid the issue right before her; if she did not seize it firmly, she would be betraying all her hard work and obsessive thoughts these past days.

"Master Zhou also knows it's the women with natural feet, right?"

Zhou Fu fell silent; Zhou Mu fell silent; even the couple from the Zhou family's second branch, who had rushed over, fell silent.

Indeed, very few households in Zhou Village bound feet; the vast majority of women had natural feet.

Rural women, besides spinning and weaving, also worked the fields.

They planted vegetables, carried water, transplanted rice seedlings, fertilized, and harvested—all required participation. With bound feet, their legs had no strength; even walking required leaning against walls—how could they do farmwork? How could they support their families?

Even the Zhou family had mostly women with natural feet.

Sun Xianniang herself had natural feet, but because her family had accumulated wealth over three generations, their money kept growing.

After marrying Sun Xianniang, the Zhou family bought two more fields and hired several more long-term laborers; their women no longer needed to work the fields, and only then did they consider binding their granddaughters' feet—to secure them better marriages and allow the Zhou family to transcend social classes and reach a higher tier.

Zhou Chao and his brother had studied literature, but their talents were average; they hoped to cultivate their descendants to study for the imperial examinations and achieve the transition from farmer to scholar.

They feared their future sons—born and unborn—might also have average talent, so they sought to increase their leverage through their daughters' marriages.

Zhou Fu's emotions were complex: he worried about his granddaughters' health, yet also felt that sacrificing them for the family's future was only proper—if not for Sun Xianniang's firm assertion that bound feet harmed children's bodies and ruined the Zhou family's feng shui, thereby obstructing the family's prospects, he might have considered taking the gamble.

Failure meant losing a few granddaughters—but children were hard to raise anyway; infant mortality was common.

But if they succeeded, the Zhou family would enter an entirely new class, benefiting countless descendants.

"Master Wang, will Mei Niang's bound feet ruin our Zhou family's feng shui?"

Pan Yun was about to speak when Wang Feiyin suddenly said: "Master Zhou, it is not Mei Niang's bound feet that ruin your feng shui—it is any bound-footed person in your household that ruins it."

"Look at the ditch before your gate—your door opens to water. Water is yin; this land favors women, and women strengthen the household. But binding feet, no matter the justification, always begins with harming women to gain advantage. Advantage and harm oppose each other; when they collide, they become a battle."

Wang Feiyin paused, waiting until Master Zhou had absorbed it, then said: "Other families could relocate or fill in the ditch to resolve this—but yours bears the surname Zhou."

"The character 'Zhou' in oracle bone script is surrounded on all sides, representing farmland, with crisscrossing paths. Even in modern small seal script, though an opening appears, the meaning remains the same: farmland, filled with crops. Master Zhou, you've spent your life farming—you know how vital water is to farmland and crops."

Master Zhou of course knew; he clenched his tobacco pipe tightly, "So this residence?"

Wang Feiyin: "Extremely favorable to the Zhou family."

Master Zhou's heart surged with emotion; he was excited, yet couldn't help feeling regret—it meant his family had lost a shortcut to advancement through daughters.

Wang Feiyin spoke calmly: "This land favors the Zhou family; this ditch favors Zhou women; Zhou women in turn favor the Zhou family—mutual reinforcement, mutual success. Whether born into the Zhou family or married into it, any woman with bound feet, whose body is damaged postnatally, will harm the Zhou family's feng shui."

Master Zhou asked: "If I hire you at great cost to perform rituals…"

Wang Feiyin refused outright: "This cannot be resolved by rituals."

He paused, then smiled: "But if you changed your surname, that might work."

Pan Yun had a whole storehouse of words to say, but feared interrupting would damage her senior brother's reputation; her face had turned slightly pale, she opened her mouth to speak—then Master Xuanmiao stepped forward, tapped her shoulder, and sealed her vocal cords.

Pan Yun was silent.

Master Zhou was speechless—he could never change his surname. That would be forgetting one's ancestors.

He bound his granddaughters' feet, married them well—wasn't that precisely to benefit descendants and glorify the ancestral name?

What meaning would changing the surname hold?

Master Zhou immediately said: "Thank you, Master Wang, for clarifying this. I understand. From now on, I will strictly restrain my family—no child shall have bound feet. You must also remember: not only must you not bind your children's feet, but you must never marry a woman with bound feet." Zhou Chao and his brother Zhou Wen both solemnly agreed, vowing to defend the Zhou family's feng shui to the death.

With Master Zhou's decision, the entire Zhou household's attitude toward the Three Pure Ones Monastery Daoists changed drastically; they no longer glared coldly at Zhou Chao and his wife.

Zhou Wen said: "Father, what about Lan Niang's binding cloths…"

The Zhou family had two granddaughters: Zhou Meiniang was the youngest daughter of the first branch, Zhou Chao; Zhou Lan Niang was the eldest daughter of the second branch, Zhou Wen—two years younger than Mei Niang, and now beginning to bind her feet, though not yet to the point of breaking the foot bones, since she was still young.

After seeing Mei Niang's bound feet, Zhou Wen's wife feared her daughter's feet would grow too large in two years and cause suffering, so she had already wrapped her in cloth strips to restrict growth.

Master Zhou said: "Untie them. From now on, our family forbids bound feet."

Zhou Wen immediately agreed; his wife exhaled deeply, lowered her head, and retreated to immediately return to her room and remove and discard her daughter's binding cloths.

She had long disliked these strips; if not for her sister-in-law starting the practice and her father-in-law insisting they secure better marriages, she would never have bound her child's feet.

She had seen bound-footed women—some could stagger a short distance, others couldn't walk a li even leaning on walls—what meaning was there in living like that?

Wang Feiyin bid farewell to the Zhou family, planning to leave early the next morning, leaving Tao Ji and Pan Yun behind.

He led everyone back to the room, ready to unseal Pan Yun's vocal cords, but she turned her head away: "I unsealed them myself."

!. Read

Wang Feiyin smiled: "Good. You've learned to hold your tongue this time."

Pan Yun: "Senior Brother, why limit this matter only to the Zhou family? Bound feet truly harm the nation and its people—I've verified everything. I can start from the fall of the Southern Song and explain to them just how vile bound feet are."

"What good would that do?" Wang Feiyin said. "They don't care. Even if they did, they wouldn't truly care—they care only about their own family's rise and fall, their own interests."

Pan Yun fell silent.

"Little sister," Wang Feiyin said, "even immortals cannot instantly kill every bandit in the world just because they see one commit murder—how much less can we? You wanted the Zhou family to stop binding feet—you've achieved that. You want the world, after this Zhou incident, to understand the evil of bound feet and eradicate it entirely? That is an impossible task."

"Since the law began, the moral understanding that killing demands retribution has existed in people's hearts—but this world has never stopped killing. Do killers not know this law?" Wang Feiyin said. "They know. It's just that profit and desire drive them."

After a pause, Pan Yun said: "So all we can do is deal with one case when we see it?"

Wang Feiyin said: "If not for your insistence, this would have been nothing but healing and saving lives—there would be no need to tie it to feng shui. Do you think I enjoyed crafting those words without effort?"

I worked hard to link bound feet to feng shui, didn't I?

Pan Yun: "But bound feet really do ruin feng shui."

Wang Feiyin: "The world is foolish. If you told them the human body is a universe governed by cyclical feng shui principles, would they understand?"

"Little sister, it's not that we're deliberately deceiving people—ordinary folks' minds and horizons are simply this limited. They don't understand, and they don't want to understand. If you say foot-binding ruins feng shui, they'll think: there are so many women with bound feet in the world—how could it possibly ruin feng shui? Even if it truly did, it would ruin everyone's feng shui together; but if you say it only ruins their family's feng shui and not others', then they'll take notice."

Wang Feiyin: "You think you can use feng shui to stop people from binding feet? It's impossible. Foot-binding has reigned for three hundred years—how could a few words from you change that?"

Tao Ji said: "Little sister, if this spreads, those with a preference for lotus feet will grow resentful toward the Three Pure Ones Monastery. Once the scholar-gentry and wealthy elites take notice, they may turn hostile toward our monastery—and that would harm us."

Pan Yun pressed her lips shut.

Wang Feiyin looked at her and asked: "Even so, will you still loudly proclaim that foot-binding ruins feng shui and harms families and the nation?"

Pan Yun clenched her teeth, then after a moment said: "I understand. I won't say anymore about how the Southern Song fell, how the Yuan fell—how foot-binding harms families and the nation."

Wang Feiyin: "Next time you see a child with bound feet, what will you do?"

Pan Yun fell silent for a while, then said: "Big brother, I can let go of the issue of foot-binding so that worldly turmoil doesn't disturb the Three Pure Ones Monastery. But I cannot turn a blind eye to suffering right before my eyes. When I see such a child again, I will still help her unbind her feet—though I will no longer use the excuse that foot-binding harms the nation or ruins feng shui, nor will I tie it to our monastery's Daoist teachings."

Wang Feiyin stared at her: "Why? You only need to turn your head to pretend you don't see. If she falls ill or gets hurt, you can learn medicine and earn money treating injuries. Didn't we just earn money by healing and saving lives this time?"

Pan Yun: "But I can't turn my face away. My eyes won't look elsewhere. I saw it."

Wang Feiyin smiled slightly and said to her: "We won't take the hundred taels Old Sun mentioned. You and Third Brother wait until her wounds heal, then return to the monastery. Get back soon—the others are waiting for you to harvest the rice."

Today's lucky number is any number ending in 6, screenshot as proof.

(End of Chapter)