# Chapter Eight | The Woman by the Lotus Pond
Ever since the thick fog, Lin Yuanxi and Jiang Yingze had grown increasingly comfortable around each other. The unspoken understanding between them had gradually become an open secret in the Floating City. Jiang Yingze, however, seemed to have gotten busy again these past few days. He said the Floating City was about to move to a new body of water and that he needed to take care of some vague “preparations” ahead of time. Lin Yuanxi was curious, but she didn’t press him. Instead, whenever he wasn’t around, she continued completing the daily tasks assigned to her.
That afternoon, Lin Yuanxi was assigned to the lotus pond to help remove several lotus leaves marked by insects.
The lotus pond was the liveliest pond in the Floating City. Layer upon layer of pink-and-white blossoms covered most of its surface. Dragonflies circled low among the buds, and bees occasionally buzzed past. The air was filled with a rich but not overpowering floral fragrance mingled with the damp breath of the water. Crouching at the pond’s edge, Lin Yuanxi carefully identified which leaves had been eaten through beyond saving. Her movements were much more practiced than before.
“You’re certainly thorough.”
A soft woman’s voice suddenly came from beside her, gentle in precisely the way that made a person feel as though they were basking in a spring breeze.
Lin Yuanxi looked up and saw an exceptionally beautiful woman standing not far away. Her pale pink dress set off her snow-white skin, while her long black hair was loosely pinned up, with a few wisps falling beside her neck and adding a touch of languid charm. Lin Yuanxi recognized her—the woman from the night of Fish Selection, who had recited a spell and summoned a handsome young man, only to catch a trace of remorse in his eyes.
“You’re… Shen Heyin?” Lin Yuanxi asked tentatively.
“You remember my name.” Shen Heyin smiled, just the right amount of surprise in her expression. She gracefully crouched down in the open space beside Lin Yuanxi and reached over to help pluck a few yellowed leaves. “You’re Lin Yuanxi, right? Who in the Floating City hasn’t heard your name lately?”
Lin Yuanxi smiled awkwardly, unsure how to respond to the implication of a “First-Sound Bond” hidden in those words.
“Don’t be nervous.” Shen Heyin seemed to see her embarrassment and smoothly changed the subject. “I don’t mean anything by it. I just figured that since you’ve only recently arrived in the Floating City, there must be a lot you haven’t figured out yet. I thought I might as well help a little.”
Her manner was warm and natural, and her eyes were clear when she spoke, carrying an openness that made it difficult to feel wary of her. The trace of caution Lin Yuanxi had felt because of the “First-Sound Bond” gradually eased.
“Actually, there is a lot I don’t understand,” Lin Yuanxi admitted honestly. “There are too many rules in the Floating City, and everyone always says half of what they mean and leaves the other half unsaid. Half the time, I’m completely lost.”
“Everyone here is like that.” Shen Heyin let out a soft laugh, her tone carrying a hint of helpless agreement. “Once people have lived in the Floating City long enough, they all get used to holding something back. They always feel that saying certain things too plainly is unlucky. If there’s anything you don’t understand, just ask me. I’ve lived here long enough. I know at least as much as Zhiqing.”
As they picked the insect-marked leaves, the two of them chatted casually. Shen Heyin was poised and articulate, and she always managed to steer the conversation toward things that interested Lin Yuanxi. They talked about the personalities of the various ponds in the Floating City, then moved on to all sorts of amusing stories about the shapeshifting ritual on full-moon nights. Every so often, Shen Heyin tossed in a self-deprecating joke that made Lin Yuanxi laugh despite herself.
“You know, when I first came to the Floating City, I was even clumsier than you,” Shen Heyin said with a smile, a trace of nostalgia in her voice. “The first time I cleaned the water-lily pond, I accidentally made too much noise and frightened the water spirit there so badly that it refused to show itself for an entire month. Zhiqing lectured me about it for ages.”
“Seriously?” Lin Yuanxi laughed. “I thought you’d always been this composed.”
“Who doesn’t start out all thumbs?” Shen Heyin gazed at the lotus flowers blooming across the water, a soft look of remembrance in her eyes. “After living in the Floating City for a long time, you naturally learn how to coexist with everything here. You’re only just getting started. There’s no need to rush—take your time.”
Her words were gentle and sincere, and Lin Yuanxi’s fondness for her grew. She had always assumed that a woman like Shen Heyin—so beautiful and apparently of no low standing—would carry a certain aloofness and refinement. She hadn’t expected her to be so approachable.
“You’re really nice,” Lin Yuanxi said sincerely. “I thought someone like you…” She paused, unsure how to describe it. “Someone as popular as you wouldn’t be so easygoing. But talking to you makes me feel completely at ease.”
At those words, a complicated emotion flashed through Shen Heyin’s eyes, so quickly that it was almost impossible to notice. The smile on her face, however, remained flawlessly in place.
“What good is being popular?” she said softly, a lingering melancholy in her voice that was impossible to define. “In the Floating City, fate between two people still comes down to whether they’re truly right for each other.”
Lin Yuanxi didn’t fully grasp the meaning behind those words. She took them as an ordinary expression of feeling and didn’t think much of them.
After they finished picking the leaves, the two sat side by side on the stone steps at the pond’s edge to rest. Gazing at the lotus flowers blooming on the water, Shen Heyin suddenly asked, seemingly offhandedly,
“How are things between you and Jiang Yingze?”
Lin Yuanxi’s movements paused.
“Pretty… pretty good.” She considered her answer. “He’s a good person. He takes great care of me.”
“He’s always been that kind of person.” Shen Heyin’s voice was soft, her even tone revealing nothing Lin Yuanxi could read. “Gentle, considerate, and patient with everyone.”
“Are you close with him?” Lin Yuanxi couldn’t help asking the question that had been bothering her.
Shen Heyin was silent for a moment before slowly speaking.
“The Floating City isn’t large. Once people have lived here long enough, everyone is familiar with everyone else.” Her answer sounded casual, almost dismissive, but Lin Yuanxi inexplicably felt that something was carefully hidden beneath that nonchalance.
“Do you know about the ‘First-Sound Bond’?” Lin Yuanxi gathered her courage and finally asked the question she had kept buried for so long. “I mean… the thing where Jiang Yingze took human form on his own before he was summoned. Li Zhiqing said it meant there was something unfinished hidden in that bond, but I can’t remember anything. Do you know what that ‘unfinished’ thing is?”
Shen Heyin looked at her. This time, the complicated emotion in her eyes wasn’t completely concealed. It flashed by like a tiny crack, gone in an instant. She lowered her eyes to the speck of dirt on her fingertips and remained silent for a long while before slowly answering.
“I don’t know.” Her voice was several degrees quieter than before. “I’m afraid that’s something only he knows.”
“You don’t seem like you want to talk about this.” Lin Yuanxi keenly sensed something strange in her tone and asked cautiously, “Did I ask about something I shouldn’t have?”
“No.” Shen Heyin quickly shook her head and raised another practiced smile. “It’s nothing. Things involving the past always make people a little wistful. Don’t overthink it.”
Although Lin Yuanxi noticed the oddness in her tone, she didn’t dwell on it. She simply assumed the subject was difficult to investigate and tactfully didn’t ask any further.
“Do you really not remember him at all?” Shen Heyin suddenly asked. Her gaze fixed tightly on Lin Yuanxi’s face, as if she wanted to catch some definite answer in her expression.
Lin Yuanxi shook her head, an rueful smile on her face.
“I only remember that I seem to have saved a fish when I was little,” she answered honestly. “But that memory is so blurry that I can’t even remember the details. All that’s left are a few scattered images—the torrential rain, the smell of mud, and a very, very faint tremor that once stirred in my palm. Other than that, I can’t remember anything.”
The instant she said this, Lin Yuanxi clearly saw a tiny crack finally appear in the perfectly maintained smile on Shen Heyin’s face. It wasn’t anger, nor was it jealousy. It seemed more like a complicated emotion tangled with disappointment and resignation—something even Shen Heyin herself might not have been able to explain.
Shen Heyin’s fingers unconsciously tightened around her skirt. The movement was so quick that almost no one would have noticed, but Lin Yuanxi still faintly sensed something wrong in that moment. She remembered the memory she had just described. She had spoken of it as lightly as though it were an insignificant little incident, yet the woman before her had reacted as if it carried a weight far beyond anything ordinary.
“So that’s how it is.” Shen Heyin spoke softly, her voice so low it was almost a murmur. “That really is… a bond to envy.”
“What do you mean?” Lin Yuanxi asked, bewildered.
Shen Heyin quickly rearranged her expression. Her smile once again became gentle and polished, as though the crack that had appeared moments ago had merely been Lin Yuanxi’s imagination.
“It’s nothing.” She rose and brushed the flower petals from her skirt, her tone returning to its earlier lightness. “It’s getting late. I’ll head back first. If there’s anything you don’t understand, come find me anytime. I’d be happy to help.”
“Thank you,” Lin Yuanxi said sincerely.
Shen Heyin smiled and waved, then turned and walked away along the hidden path beside the pond. Her figure gradually disappeared into the shadows cast by the lotus leaves.
Lin Yuanxi watched her leave, a complicated feeling she couldn’t put into words welling up inside her. Shen Heyin truly was warm and natural in the way she treated people, but her remark about a “bond to envy,” along with the strange emotions that had flickered through her words several times, stirred an indistinct unease in Lin Yuanxi’s heart.
She lowered her head to look at the lotus leaves she had yet to finish picking and suddenly remembered the detail of Jiang Yingze unconsciously slowing his pace by half a beat when he saw Shen Heyin that day. The two things connected, like faint clues quietly weaving together somewhere beyond her awareness into a web whose full shape she had yet to see.
She remained by the lotus pond and removed the remaining insect-eaten leaves one by one, but her mind kept circling back to the conversation. Every word Shen Heyin had spoken was considerate and polished, yet when Lin Yuanxi thought about them carefully, it seemed there was another layer of meaning hidden behind each one—especially that remark about a “bond to envy.” It sounded like praise, but it also carried an indescribable bitterness.
Lin Yuanxi sighed, temporarily setting aside the doubt she couldn’t explain. She stood, patted the dirt from her knees, and turned toward her own little courtyard. The last glow of the setting sun—or if the word “sunset” could still be used in the Floating City—was slowly spilling across the lotus pond, dyeing the entire body of water a warm golden red. It was beautiful enough to make anyone almost forget how many unknown feelings had been concealed within that seemingly ordinary chat.
And somewhere beyond Lin Yuanxi’s sight, Shen Heyin stopped and glanced back at Lin Yuanxi’s crouching figure beside the lotus pond. The emotion she had forcibly suppressed finally surfaced in full during that moment when no one was watching. It was a mixture of grievance, resentment, and a deep jealousy she herself refused to admit.
She remembered the night she had first seen Jiang Yingze take human form. His eyes had still held the bewilderment and unease of someone who had only just acquired a human body. She had patiently stayed by his side, step by step, teaching him how to walk, how to speak, and how to interact with people in the Floating City. During that time, she had believed that genuine feelings were gradually building between them—until one day, she accidentally came upon him standing alone by the pond, staring blankly at the water. His eyes held a sorrow she had never seen on his face before, a sorrow bordering on obsession.
She had once asked him what he was waiting for.
He hadn’t answered. He had only said that it was something from a long time ago—so long ago that even he sometimes wondered whether that waiting was worth it.
At first, she had thought that if she stayed by his side long enough, her gentleness would slowly wear down that stubborn fixation, and she would eventually become the harbor where he chose to remain. But now, the person he had waited twelve years for had finally appeared. She couldn’t even remember his name without someone else reminding her, yet he had still chosen to wait without hesitation, choosing that past as thin as water, a past that could hardly even be called a bond.
Shen Heyin had accompanied Jiang Yingze through far too many full moons in the Floating City, watching him endure the torment of waiting alone time and time again. Now the person he had waited twelve years for had finally appeared, yet she couldn’t even remember his name without someone else reminding her.
The unfairness of it was like a tiny but razor-sharp thorn driven deep into the softest part of her heart. It throbbed faintly, impossible to pull free.
Shen Heyin drew a deep breath and forced the surging emotions back into the deepest corner of her heart. Then she turned and continued toward her home. Night gradually enveloped the lotus pond. The flowers covering the water slowly folded their petals in the dusk, as though they, too, were bowing their heads in silence for this secret sorrow known to no one, quietly keeping her company as they guarded a secret no one had ever noticed.