Rite of Renewal

Throughout history, many people have always questioned the idea of of ‘what, if anything, happens after death?’. This is a story with many possibilities and many names, all of which have asked that question once. Luckily, I have began recording some of my history to share with you, so that you, too, can also experience the wonderful life that these people were given shortly after death.

Yours Truly,

Chen Si Xiang

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It had just been the most bitingly cold season of spring that he had ever seen. One day it was bright and sunny with the light draping through the sleeping, bare tree branches; buds growing on the temple’s many rose bushes; and the sound of worrying mourning doves ‘oooh-woo’ing through the graveyard. And in a flash, the weather dropped from pleasantly warm to frigid in a matter of moments, leaving the temple wrapped in a thick comforter of snow.

Chen Si had woken up early, expecting it to be warm enough that he could leave his home without slipping his boots on, but fate would have no such luck in his favor. His little servant, the King of Opulence, lovingly just shortened to ‘King’, had warmed his embalmed heart towards the idea of spring, and always encouraged him to try something new, even if it were something as small as leaving without his boots on for once.

As usual when he gave into King’s constant nagging over his rigid demeanor, he was met with reality drifting its cold snow onto his pale, lifeless toes. King always had his best interest at heart, but he mostly had the tendency to overlook some key things, the most obvious of the present scenario being the weather forecast.

King introduced a lot of things when he came to Chen Si’s temple. The first being electricity, one of Chen Si’s personal favorites; it kept the temple warm in instances like this, and provided King his own form of entertainment–so much so it was very easy to find him when he was needed: whether that be drifting about on his crystalline lantern and overseeing the temple’s finances to laying on a futon in the room he claimed as his own watching hours of opera and theatre through a small play box that King called a television.

Chen Si’s eyes drifted closed and he let out a puff of air in an exasperated sigh before turning on the balls of his feet and silently hopping back into the temple.

“What’s going on, Chief?” King mumbled, rounding the hallway corner as Chen Si had reached the threshold of his room.

“I forgot my boots.” he spoke. “Do you care to help me put them on?”

“Anytime, Boss.” King’s tiny round body padded into the room, his body making a light tong-tong noise as he walked. “So I take it that it snowed like the lady down the street said.” King had already pushed open the door to Chen Si’s clothing closet and started to line them up a few hops away from his patron’s feet.

“Of course it did, she’s very seldom wrong. Of all the miracles in that delightful little shadow box and it cannot predict the weather? I find that just a little suspect.”

“Well, y’know. Weathermen have their days, I suppose.”

Chen Si could tell by the tone of his voice that King was embarrassed by not even thinking to check the weather forecast, and just made something up on the spot.

“Alrighties, Boss, boots are lined up and ready for your feet.”

He obliged and hopped forward a few paces, his feet landing into his boots just as they had done a hundred times before and quickly, with all the skills of a trained servant, King zipped up the sides of his boots, securing them to his calves.

“Going out to pray to the ancestors?” King inquired just as Chen Si started to hop towards the rooms door.

“Yes, they mentioned a newcomer that would be making their way out to us soon and I wanted to thank them for their fortune.”

“Good, good.” King pulled a whistle from inside his orb shaped body and blew it lightly. Soon enough, his trusty lantern came hovering in. “Before you go, I wanted to discuss some potential financial costs regarding the shrine.” King ducked down and flung his legs out as hard as he could, propelling his small body upwards and onto the lantern that was hovering shoulder height to Chen Si. He rustled for a few moments in the contents located within the lantern before plopping his round body down and flipping through a small wooden clipboard. “So, I’ve been wanting to tell you this for awhile, Chief. There’s a big leak in the shrine room just as you walk in. Personally, I don’t think the ancestors want to be drizzled on during shrine time either, and I was inspecting the supply closet and noticed we were just about out of incense–how do you feel about Vanilla Rootbeer fragrance? I’m sure they’re sick of all the same stuffy perfume smells, and vanilla makes the whole temple just…” he inhaled deeply and let out a sigh of relief.

“I’m sure vanilla would be an excellent fragrance, but I’m not so sure about the beer part. I don’t think the ancestors want their shrine to smell like a bar.”

“No-no-no. It’s a soda not a real beer. We’re going to have to go to an import store and get some fountain drinks for you to try sometime. It’ll make you feel loads better, I’m sure of it.”

“King, thank you for your assistance as always.” Chen Si spoke, clearly wanting to change the subject. “I will see you shortly after I finish my duties in the shrine. Afterwards, please update me on the finances and the modifications you want to start implementing in the temple.”

“Yessir!” King put the clipboard under his arm and gave him a little salute. “I’m going to be going out to town to see if we can get any help with cleaning duties and whatnot, so I’ll be factoring the payments in…” King started mumbling to himself, and scribbling on his clipboard frantically, capturing any and all ideas he could have to make the temple more amicable towards visitors.

This was Chen Si’s cue to turn and make his way towards the shrine once more without having to worry about the frigid snow nibbling at his toes. By now, and after all of King’s ramblings, it was well into the late hours of the morning and the snow that had previously been a problem had now mostly melted off the stone pathways. He hopped his way down the wooden stairs to the cobblestone path, mentally tsking himself for not waiting a few moments. As soon as his feet breached the porch of the shrine, he felt his limbs loosen enough that he could bend his elbows and his knees.

He sighed with relief and trusted his rigor mortis fatigued body to kneel where the ancestor’s shrine sat half-bathed in the morning light. He took a deep breath, filling his loosened lungs with relief and gratitude for the momentary levity his ancestors had given him.

“I’m here.” he announced to them, loud enough for them to hear but soft enough that the birds were still tapping their beaks on the roof. He reached inside his robe and withdrew a small handful of cinnamon candies, the ones coated in hot pepper; the ones his Father liked and laid out some of the more tamer mints for the older folks who came in. He didn’t know his Grandfather or Great Grandfather, but judging by the way the old people reacted to the harsh burning of the candy made for the young kids, they wouldn’t be too fond of them, and as far as luck goes, he didn’t want any more repair damages to come up. He picked up the mallet for the wooden fish next to the shrine and tapped on it before singing some opera tunes for the ancestors to enjoy. The falsetto that opera singers normally sang in didn’t exactly come naturally to him, but he did his best to emulate it. He could imagine the will-o-the-wisps of the ancestors bobbling and tumbling with laughter at his poor singing, but it filled him with joy. Whatever made them happy, made him happy.

After finishing his song, he repeated the report of finances that King had repeated to him before; something he’d slowly gotten used to as King started to respectfully take over finances at the Temple. Once that was done, he pulled an incense stick from the holding vase and lit it before blowing the flame down to an ember and nestling the incense in its holder.

The scent of vanilla wafted upwards in a thin stream of concentrated smoke, filling the shrine space with it's wonderful scent. Perhaps King was right, the smell of root beer would be an exciting change of pace for the ancestors. As his eyes drifted closed and his breathing deepened, he let his mind wander as he nestled into a comfortable meditative headspace.

There was a soft jingling next to him. “Hey, Chief.”

Chen Si’s eyes snapped open in surprise before he turned his head to see King hovering on his lantern next to him. “Oh, it’s you, King. I’ve already repeated the finance record for the day in your stead. You can continue your duties about the Temple if you need to.”

“That’s not exactly why I’m here. I don’t normally interrupt Shrine Time unless I have to, but I feel as though this might be enough of an emergency that it warrants it.”

“Emergency? What happened?”

“There’s a corpse in the gardens, Chief, and they’re certainly not from around here, either.”

Chen Si was on his feet before King had finished his sentence. He rushed over to the threshold of the Shrine and upon his body returning to its previous boardlike state, continued to hop his way to the garden. King started moving alongside him, his lantern putting as fast as it could go, keeping pace and leading Chen Si to the garden.

King was right, it wasn’t pretty; but it was certainly a lot better than Chen Si had anticipated. When he arrived in the garden, he expected viscera and decay scattered everywhere–but instead it was only a nearly unblemished corpse lying face up in the garden. Chen Si knew that it was a fresh corpse–he and King were incredibly meticulous in the care of the garden. He surmised that sometime between last night and this morning when they had first woken up, this corpse was dumped here.

“Well, Chief, what do we do?”

“There’s only one thing we can do, King. We need to go to the village and recruit help to carry this body to the Shrine. We may be able to save his life.”

“You’re going to reanimate him?” King inquired, awe sparking in the little golden flames that were his eyes.

“It’s the only thing I can think to do. He isn’t from here, clearly…” he looked down at the peaceful corpse, mind blank with possibilities as to where the body could have called an origin.

The body had dark skin, and not the dark kind of skin you would see on a traveler of many lands, either–he wasn’t so xenophobic to be ignorant of other races in the world–the body’s skin was dark like someone would call nighttime dark, and had hair the color of the finest white silks worn by emperors and empresses that was pulled back in a messy ponytail, wherewhich beneath were two long pointed ears. The only injury he could tell, as far as looking the body over, was a stab wound to the right eye, at which might also double as the cause of death, and with the other eye closed, he couldn’t tell the hue, but could only imagine it was some color that wasn’t natural even among the supernatural such as he.

“Please, King, reinforce my decision. I know it’s only in utmost emergency that I bring the dead back to life in the form of a jiangshi.”

“Yes. That is true, Chief. You promised the emperor you wouldn’t harm any villagers and you wouldn’t propagate your condition. If you make another jiangshi, you could face prison-time or even death, and trust me, Chief, you don’t deserve being locked away in a cell like a criminal.”

“Hear me out, King. We don’t know the importance of this victim. If they’re from some place far from here, imagine the repercussions if they were a royal diplomat? At that point, we could have the potential for military retaliation.”

“Understandable, Chief. Either way it looks like you’re caught between a rock and a hard place, but know that whatever it is that you choose, you’ll have me to be there with you.” King stood up on his lantern and gave a salute to Chen Si with his clipboard before sitting back down. “Regardless of what ends up happening, you do realize we have an investigation to fulfill, yes?”

“I’m well aware, King, but I think I may be prepared for it. Come along–we need to get that help before the bugs get to the body.” he promptly turned and began hopping away with King puttering behind him.

His mind was ablaze with questions–today, of all days, when the ancestors were to send an important visitor his way. 'I suppose they’ll just have to wait', he thought to himself, sending mental apologies to his ancestors for squandering the chance for new companionship between him and King. Chen Si didn’t mind the loneliness and quiet mornings, but King was an incredibly extroverted little creature, finding anything that would respond back to him to talk to.

“Chen Si, do you even have an idea as to where we’re going for help?”

“Anywhere with muscle–”

King floated in front of him. “No, think clearly. Instead of panicking and running to the first place that will listen, let’s go to the Palace and speak to some guards. They can dispatch out our way, and–” King let out a sigh, seeing Chen Si’s expression turn sour at the idea of interacting with the Emperor, directly. “--hey, listen for a sec. If we go to the Emperor directly, there could be a chance that we would have a chance to explain what you’re planning to do with the corpse. You might even get a special order from the Emperor to allow the resurrection to take place.”

Chen Si stopped for a moment and gave King a look as if he had suddenly grown arms out of his little globular body.

“Come on, Chief, take a King’s advice. I think I might know a little something about talking to important people–I have traveled the world you know. I’m not the only King in the Kingdom, and the Emperor is no different than any other King I’ve met. You just gotta tell them what they want to hear, like any normal human wants.”

“But King, you’re not human; neither of us are–”

King stood up on his lantern, and for once Chen Si thought he looked a little intimidating, as if the title “King of Opulence” wasn’t just a name he’d given himself. “Chen Si, I’m going to give you advice as a friend and as your advisor–do your best to unlearn that ‘human’ and ‘non-human’ binary that was taught to you your whole life, and what you keep hearing from everyone around here. Truth is we all have souls–chi, as this country calls it–and we all think, act, react, and have lives and relationships, no matter how different they are. I know humans can frighten you, but humans are just as volatile and dramatic as any other thinking or reacting being out there. If the Emperor wants to frame you as a monster for giving a soul a chance at life when it was prematurely taken from them, then he’ll have to go through me to put you in prison.” King plopped back down on his lantern, and gave Chen Si a confident smile which was a characteristically different smile than his usual ‘just trust me, Chief’ smile.

Chen Si felt a small well of light glowing in his unbeating heart, and felt as though, for once, King knew what he was talking about.