The Librarian and the Fox Princess: a Donghua Dijun and Bai Fengjiu story, V.I

Chapter 156 - Where The Sun Doesn't Shine

(Image credit - Isaac N.C. at Unsplash.com)

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(from previous chapter)

"Hmm ... Uncle Ye Hua needs to learn too. We can't have two prince consorts always needing interpreters. Hey, wouldn't it be fun if you and him learn together?" She gathered some of his hair and playfully swiped the ends under his chin. "Like fox school."

His face became a block of stone.

"Learn with him? I'd rather have a mortal trial," he replied coldly.

This caught her interest. "Oh. Mortal trials! Have you ever had one?"

"No. Why would I want to have one? I hear they're wretched."

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"Hmmm ..." She appeared very thoughtful and was obviously mulling something over in her head.

While she pondered over whatever she was pondering, Dong Hua decided to go excavating under the blanket that was piled around her legs. She had shifted her seating position and sat sideways in his lap while leaning back on the strong frame of his bent knee.

His fingers had stealthily traversed skillfully over the bells that were tied over her ankle so no sound was made. Obviously, fondling the bells what not his true objective. His fingers lightly made the incline up her leg over the silky softness of her long white socks. He was fascinated by the socks that fit over her slender legs like a glove.

Her soft voice brought him back to the matter at hand though he found that he much rather continue his exploration of what was literally under his hand.

"Mortals suffer a lot."

"You're right. They do. It is what the Buddha taught. Birth, aging, illness, and death. None of them can escape that. Then there's the pain and suffering of being separating from loved ones, the suffering of having to deal with that which one dislikes or hates, and the suffering of not getting what one wants. Then there's the suffering that comes from being alive in a physical body, with all the uncomfortable thoughts and sensations that contribute to existence."

"We experience some of that, too Dijun, but not always in the same way like mortals."

"No, not in the same way. Though there is a special kind of suffering that supposed immortality brings. We struggle to fully appreciate what we have because often we get to have it for a very long time. We fall under the misconception that we'll always have it or that we should always have it. With ego, this is universal. While their lives as mortals are but specks in time, their sense of entitlement is almost as vast as the universe."

She nodded. "If they knew that they all suffer, and no one wants to suffer, perhaps they would be a little nicer and more forgiving to each other." She twisted a section of his long white hair around her forefinger.

"You would think that they would know this by now. Suffering is unavoidable but not everyone learns to accept that. If they'd put their energies towards learning how to minimize, cope with and then transform their suffering and minimize making others suffer, perhaps all that energy spent on trying to avoid the inevitable would have yielded a more meaningful and satisfying existence. Their lives are short. They don't have a lot of time to waste. Often, when they've come to learn these lessons, there's often not much time left for them."

"We might have time, but we're a lot like them in some ways. We both suffered a lot when you were in seclusion. But, I understand now what you thought you had to do."

He softly squeezed her knee as he remembered their painful separation. The squeeze was nothing compared to the strain he felt in his heart.

Mo Yuan was right. He was far too moody. If he wasn't bored and indifferent, he was brooding.