Ya She—Stories That Mustn’t Be Spoken

When I was very young, there was an alley near my home. From one end to the other, it was lined with open-air stalls that sold all manner of strange and fascinating items. There were coins and mantel clocks, matchboxes and rosewood furniture—an endless assortment of curiosities.

I loved walking through that alley, always weaving from one side to the other in a zigzag, never skipping a single stall. I would peer closely at every item, never tiring of the search, always leaving reluctantly, as if I hadn’t yet seen enough.

Some things were inexpensive. Others, to my child’s eyes, were priced like treasures beyond reach. But they all had one thing in common, none of them was new.

It was only later that I learned the word for such things—antiques.

From then on, my fascination with them grew without end.

My friends often looked down on this peculiar interest. They preferred bright, pristine things—objects brand-new and untouched, wholly their own from the moment they were made.

They believed antiques were merely discarded items, things others no longer wanted.

But I never thought of them that way.

To me, these pieces, though dulled by dust, still possessed a beauty of their own. They had survived the passing of countless years without breaking or disappearing. That endurance made them all the more special. They shone with a brilliance that refused to be ignored.

Unlike modern, mass-produced goods, every antique had once belonged to someone. Each carried a story, a memory. No two were exactly alike. Even the cracks and missing fragments bore silent witness to a history that was theirs alone.

Whenever I touched one, it felt as though I might slip through time itself and glimpse the moment it was created. Of course, the stall owners often exaggerated their tales, weaving fanciful histories, but that never bothered me. If anything, it only stirred my imagination further.

Perhaps what they sold weren’t truly antiques, only old belongings. Even so, I believed they held stories worth telling.

Later, I learned that true antiques were kept in museums. From then on, wherever I traveled, I would always visit the local museum first.

The Ru Ware in the Palace Museum in Beijing, the Jade Pig-dragon of the Liaoning Provincial Museum, the Warring States crystal cup at the Hangzhou History Museum, the calligraphy bearing the “Tuan”(团) seal in the Shanghai Museum, the staggering sacrificial horse pit of the Hubei Provincial Museum, the jade burial suit threaded with gold at the National Palace Museum in Taipei, the bronze masks of the Sanxingdui Museum in Sichuan…

Behind those layers of glass, entire eras revealed themselves, intact and unflinching. I could feel the weight of history pressing close.

For a long time, I dreamed of writing a novel about antiques. The stories rose up in my mind like bubbles from a deep spring, too many to count.

Could an ancient mirror allow two people, separated by two millennia, to fall in love?

Could a bracelet grant one wish for each of its gems, helping someone retrieve what they had once lost?

Could a candle have burned for a thousand years, its wax dripping slowly, waiting all the while for the one it loved?

Could a porcelain pillow bring forth sweet dreams—or unleash nightmares?

Could a sharp blade carry a curse and yet remain true to a promise made thousands of years ago?

Might a bamboo scroll seal away an ancient and terrible beast, even though the scroll itself is so fragile it could be torn with a breath?

Could a jade figurine possess the power to exchange souls, turning two lives entirely upside down?

Could a wooden effigy hold two millennia of love and longing, able to conjure a world its master desires?

Could a single seed still sprout after two millennia, if watered with blood and tears?

Could an oil-paper umbrella carry the resentful spirit of the dead, quietly proving that reality is never quite as beautiful as the legend?

Could a crimson dragon robe truly protect a child’s life and grant them a century of longevity?

Could that same crimson dragon robe preserve the human body for a thousand years, granting immortality?

And so, Ya She was born.

A shop filled with rare and curious treasures, and a mysterious owner who watches over them all.

In the blink of an eye, Ya She has grown into 12 stories. Looking back, it is hard to believe it has been nearly a year since I began this journey.

When I typed the final character of the conclusion, I couldn’t shake a sense of lingering reluctance.

Each story in Ya She carries a message I wish to convey, and I believe every reader who has come to love the series will draw something different from it. In truth, the real protagonists of this story aren’t the owner or the doctor, but the antiques who never spoke of their own pasts.

The Ancient Mirror story had been sitting on my computer for years, only a rough outline for the longest time, never fully written. In fact, it was this tale that first inspired Ya She. One day, perhaps spurred by fate, I finally wrote it all in one breath. When I finished, even I was deeply moved.

Originally, the story of the ancient mirror was intended to span at least 500,000 words. But after compressing it into 100,000, I found that the abbreviated acquaintance and growing bond between the protagonists became even more poignant and compelling.

The Fragrant Concubine’s Bracelet was born from my own frustration with losing things. Though I’m not especially careless, I often put things down in odd places, and once I lose track of them, it feels as though they are truly gone.

Heaven knows how much I wish I could search for them the way one uses Baidu(Chinese Wikipedia). Just type in a word, and a little map would show exactly where the lost item is… Ahem… Just a passing complaint.

This bracelet was inspired by the feeling that lost things are often the most precious. That quiet ache of regret lingers in the heart, yet when one tries too hard to recover what was lost, it rarely matches the beauty of memory.

The Mermaid Candle was the most time-consuming to write. I wanted it to carry the rhythm and spirit of Buddhist scripture, and so I spent days in the library, flipping through dozens of sutras. In the end, only a few lines made it into the story, but that period of immersion in Buddhist thought left me deeply enriched.

I also adore the writing style of Gu Long(a novelist and screenwriter), with its faint, drifting sorrow, like the candle smoke of the mermaid itself, lingering between the lines, filling the page with a wistful haze.

“How long do you think a human life truly is?” That one line, full of quiet philosophy, threads through the entire tale. The young monk’s shifting answers reflect his growth and changing heart. 

How long is a person’s life, really?

How would you answer?

The idea for The Yellow Millet Pillow came from my own dreams. Perhaps due to an overactive imagination, my dreams are always wild and vivid—sometimes they are horror films, sometimes American blockbusters, sometimes tragic Korean dramas…

So I often wonder—is it better to dream sweet dreams or to have nightmares?

If beautiful dreams could come true, that would be wonderful. But what if nightmares became reality?

Erm… So I decided to let the doctor test that question on my behalf. 

The outcome was not bad~

The bottom line is, best not to daydream too much~

Also, those porcelain pillows they used in ancient times? Absolutely terrible for sleeping…

Speaking of it, the story of The Sword of Goujian truly embodies the overarching theme I wished to convey throughout Ya She. Every antique possesses its own spirit—one could even say that every object is special in its own way. 

We must cherish the things we use. Never waste them, and never throw them away carelessly.

I have a small celadon teapot that I use every day for brewing tea. I cherish it dearly. But one day, while washing it, I accidentally let it slip from my hand. It fell to the ground. Thankfully, it didn’t shatter, but several tiny chips broke off the edge. My heart ached terribly at the sight.

That night, I dreamt of a little boy—his cheek scraped and bruised—coming toward me, tearfully complaining about the pain.

Seriously… sigh… Even though it’s still usable, I regret it so much… Waaah… Fine, I admit it—it was a classic case of what’s on my mind at noon shows up in my dreams at night…

On a side note, a museum is genuinely terrifying when there are no people around…

As for the Classic of Mountains and Seas arc, it could easily serve as the foundation for a much larger story, given its expansive structure. But I chose to scale it down for Ya She.

After all, Qiongqi, the arrogant yet endearing, and Huán Gǒu, that sly, lazy troublemaker of a celestial dog, not to mention the lovely and elegant Three-Legged Green Bird… I grew far too fond of them.

I wanted to raise them myself…~

Which is why I had them appear again at the end of the Crimson Dragon Robe arc for a final flourish.

Of course, in the context of modern society, the idea of divine beasts still roaming the earth completely defies the natural order… but then again, the premise of Ya She is fantastical to begin with. So perhaps they fit right in… Cough…

The opening of the Aqua-Celadon Nephrite arc was inspired by a real nightmare I once had.

In it, I opened my eyes and saw my own corpse lying before me… That dream left a deep impression, though I could never quite recall what happened next. So I used it as the foundation for a mystery-driven story.

However… my sincerest apologies to Detective Conan, which I’ve watched for over ten years!!

I am, sadly, an absolute idiot when it comes to writing mysteries!

Thankfully, with the help of my editor Su Ying, I managed to stitch the story together…

I remember joking with her about who should be the murderer, and offhandedly suggested, “How about the editor kills the novelist?”

Su Ying immediately snapped back, “Then the motive must be delayed manuscripts!”

I was speechless… (I no longer dare go karaoke with her! =口=…)

For The Witchcraft Effigy, it was inspired by those once-trendy little charm dolls. I thought back to Empress Chen Ajiao’s era and the concept of cursed dolls. It seemed like the most common use of such dolls was for women who wished for their man to return to them.

But is a love already lost truly worth sacrificing everything to retrieve?

In the story, it is the witchcraft effigy itself that is the most pitiful. It performs a one-man show that only one person can see, whether in the Han dynasty or in modern times. This tale began with tragedy in mind, and so naturally it ends in sorrow as well. But for the doll, perhaps that ending was the best it could have hoped for.

Who said the antiques in Ya She were lifeless?

The seeds of Papaver Rhoeas held life and bloomed after two millennia, creating a story not of beast-and-human romance, but human-and-flower romance… Ahem… Did that satire land?

We’ve turned the mighty General Xiang Yu into a secretly gentle farmer type. Maybe the beautiful Consort Yu wasn’t a woman at all, but a flower… 

Hey! This is my playful retelling of history—don’t take it as an actual historical fact!

Remember this, like seriously… General Xiang Yu truly was a formidable warrior… Really…

Now then…

For readers who are a bit older, they may still remember The Legend of the White Snake, that classic television drama. Though watching it today, one might cringe at the sudden bursts of Huangmei opera scattered throughout, when I was a child, it was one of the most popular television shows. Later, the film Green Snake followed, and by then, the tale of the White Snake had become a household legend.

But within this seemingly happy ending, one detail has always struck me—perhaps even unsettled me.

The first to betray the relationship was none other than Xu Xian, the man who made his wife drink realgar wine. A man who laid poison before the woman who loved him. Perhaps fairy tales aren’t as pure as they seem.

Perhaps legends, too, aren’t always as beautiful…

The two stories, The Crimson Dragon Robe and The Longevity Lock, were tied closely to the history of the Qin dynasty.

I once read a book by Mr. Cheng Bu, who offered an alternative approach to understanding history. 

In truth, what we call “history”—as recorded in our chronicles—is nothing more than news from the past. And what we call “news” today may well become history tomorrow.

That’s why stories recorded in historical texts are worth pondering, especially the Qin dynasty, so distant from our time.

From the owner’s perspective in the story, Emperor Qin Shi Huang was seen as a wise and noble emperor. From a modern point of view, he’s more often portrayed as a tyrant.

What sort of man was Emperor Qin Shi Huang, truly? Opinions vary widely.

But every example mentioned in my story has been thoroughly researched. For those interested, I encourage you to delve into the records. Discover for yourself whether it is true that, throughout all 37 years of his reign, he didn’t unjustly execute a single general or high official. Investigate the true role the Great Wall of China played in shaping Chinese civilization. Examine the legal codes, governmental structure, and legislative systems implemented under the Qin…

From 221 BCE to the present day, the unified centralized state founded by Emperor Qin Shi Huang has endured for over two millennia. 

In the whole of human history, no other nation has demonstrated such lasting strength and resilience.

Did the Qin dynasty perish?

In a sense, perhaps not.

If one sets aside the concept of rule by bloodline and looks instead to the evolution of governance, it becomes clear—though dynasties rose and fell, China has never once toppled. It stands to this day.

As for the climax of the mausoleum at Mount Li and the underground palace, of course, they were products of my imagination. Tomb-raiding has become a rather popular genre in recent years, so I thought I should try my hand at it as well, and it felt surprisingly fun~

While researching burial legends, I came across an image of a Mojin Talisman, and it looked strangely familiar.

Only then did I remember that a friend had given me one a few years ago, telling me it was a charm to ward off evil. I rummaged through my drawers and found it… It really was quite similar…

The talisman was made from pangolin claws, with a silver-carved seal dangling from the end. 

Historically, the Mojin Talisman was a protective charm used by tomb raiders. Legend has it that it served as the official insignia of the Mojin Xiaowei, tomb-raiding officers from the ancient Mojin Sect… Heh… Imma to keep it well~

The 12 stories in Ya She each explore a different theme with a wide range of genres—romance, fantasy, historical fiction, mystery, even horror and supernatural tomb-raiding.

I experimented with a range of narrative voices and various storytelling techniques. It was a thoroughly enjoyable writing experience.

I must give a special thanks to my editor-in-chief, Yang Xiaoxie. Without his exacting standards, Ya She wouldn’t be as rich and diverse as it is now. His feedback was a true inspiration. I also owe deep gratitude to my editor, Su Ying, for her tireless reminders and patient discussions about the plot, without which Ya She wouldn’t have met readers so soon.

A very special thanks to our illustrator, Xiaobo. From the very first illustration of the antique mirror to the exquisite cover of Ya She, you can clearly see how far he has come. It wasn’t easy transforming someone who only knew how to draw beautiful girls into someone who can now draw handsome young men too!

And of course, many thanks to our graphic designer, Yangguang(Sunshine), who helped me nudge him along the way…

Thank you to Manke Fiction Painting(漫客·小说绘) for giving Ya She a home…

Thank you, dear readers, for your love and support—Ya She wouldn’t exist without you.

I hope these stories will spark something in you. I hope they awaken your interest in our country’s long history, inspire a love for the antiques left behind by time, and eventually help you treasure the small things around you every day.

This volume of Ya She may have come to a close, but the shop still stands. The owner is still there. And perhaps, before long, Ya She 2 will open its doors…

What of Huhai, who has lived for over two thousand years?

What was his ultimate goal?

Hey, I’ve mentioned before that these were stories that mustn’t be spoken!

Want to know more?

The antiques that have endured through centuries will only reveal their truths with time~~~

Everything lies within Ya She…

Every item in Ya She has its own story, one that has been carried through the years but remains unheard.

Because it is impossible for them to talk…

Shh…