In this world, everything seems to be in motion.
Clouds drift slowly across the sky.
Water flows in the rivers.
Leaves fall and settle on the ground.
Even stillness, in truth, is a motion so subtle, it escapes the eye.
But on that day,
in a quiet crevice deep in the forest,
Li Yuan found something
even quieter than silence itself:
A breath that did not move.
He sat cross-legged on a moss-covered stone.
His body upright, neither tense nor relaxed.
His eyes closed.
His fingers rested lightly upon his knees.
As if his body were asleep,
but his awareness fully awake.
He had been there for two days,
not hunting,
not walking,
not thinking of where to go.
He was only breathing.
Or more precisely: trying not to breathe.
Not in the sense of holding his breath,
nor rejecting the air,
but rather...
going beyond the breath itself.
He had long noticed something:
That within every breath he took,
there was a tether.
One inhale brought the world into him.
One exhale returned it outward.
But that meant he was connected.
And to be connected is to be bound.
"If I wish to truly understand tranquility,
should I not reach the point where the world no longer touches me… not even through my breath?"
And so here he was.
Trying to be within the world,
without drawing it into his chest,
without pushing it out from his body.
He did not force his body to be still.
He simply let go, one by one:
the rise of his chest,
the subtle vibration in his throat,
and slowly…
even the beat of his heart seemed to fade.
Time became irrelevant.
There was no day, no night.
The sun might have risen and set,
but for Li Yuan, deep within himself,
all was the same.
Silent.
Yet in that silence,
he began to hear something.
Not an outer sound,
but a faint inner echo…
like the trace of a breath that once was.
"Does every breath leave an imprint in my body?"
"Am I the sum of all the breaths I have ever taken?"
If so,
then to stop breathing is not to stop living,
but to return to the source—
the source before air,
before form,
before motion.
And there,
for the first time,
he truly did not breathe.
No inhalation.
No exhalation.
Yet he was conscious.
He existed.
And in that moment,
like mist lifting,
he saw something.
Not with eyes.
But with awareness.
Within him,
there was space.
A space without walls,
without boundaries.
And within it, a small cluster of light,
glowing steadily without oxygen,
without flame,
without anything.
That light was the core of his being.
The source of all his understanding.
The origin of every question and every answer.
"So this is me… without breath… without the world… only understanding remains."
The light did not speak,
but its presence answered much.
It did not move,
for it was not part of time.
It did not shine brightly,
for it did not wish to be seen only felt.
Slowly, Li Yuan inhaled once more.
A soft breath,
that felt like the first he had ever taken.
The world entered him again,
but now it felt different.
The air touched his lungs,
but did not bind him.
The wind kissed his skin,
but did not pierce.
He had passed the boundary.
And returned.
Now, every breath he took
was no longer a necessity,
but a choice.
A choice to live,
a choice to remain,
a choice to walk forward
without ever forgetting
the breath that did not move.
In that one breath,
I felt as if I didn't exist.
As if I were erased from time.
As if I vanished from the world.
Not because I wanted to...
but because I had gone too deep.
When Li Yuan opened his eyes,
the sky hadn't changed.
The clouds were the same.
The trees around him still stood motionless,
as if time had paused briefly.
Yet his heart trembled.
"How long have I been here?"
He touched his chest.
The heartbeat was still there… but it felt foreign.
As if he had just returned from a place
where heartbeats didn't exist,
and the world was unknown.
His body felt stiff
not from the cold,
but because time had flowed far beyond him.
As he stood,
fallen leaves were scattered around him.
More than before.
A small bud had emerged from a branch
that had been bare.
He knew.
Something had changed.
"I only took a breath… only exhaled it slowly…"
"But why does it feel as if I've been gone for a month?"
He walked to the river,
looked at his reflection.
Even his own image did not recognize him.
His eyes were deeper.
His gaze calmer—
but there was something behind it.
Something that made his own body
shiver.
Fear.
"I'm afraid…?"
Li Yuan fell silent.
The feeling came like a whisper.
Not a scream,
not panic,
but a subtle tremor slipping through his skin.
Fear not from danger.
But from the realization:
he had passed through something beyond explanation.
He sat again in the place from before.
This time, not to meditate.
But to understand.
"What is time?"
"Why does it feel like just one breath…
…but the world has moved a month forward?"
He tried to recall,
but there was nothing to remember.
Only one thing remained:
a silence too deep.
And from that silence…
a new understanding was born.
"Fear is not about shadows, not about death."
"Fear is when your own understanding fails to explain what you have experienced."
Li Yuan hugged his knees.
Not from fatigue.
Not from the cold.
But because,
for the first time in his life,
he felt small.
He had walked the path of understanding,
mastered breath,
comprehended stillness,
passed beyond the bounds of form and time.
But now,
one small question made his heart tremble:
"What if I never came back?"
"What if… time keeps moving…
while I sink into it forever?"
It was the first time
Li Yuan was truly
afraid.
Not afraid of pain,
not afraid of failure,
but afraid because
he realized this world
is too deep to grasp alone.
And in the midst of that fear,
a quiet understanding began to take shape:
Fear is a door.
A door into greater depth.
"If I reject fear…"
"…I reject the path that might lead me further."
Li Yuan closed his eyes again.
Not to go inward.
But to listen to that fear once more.
Not to fight it.
But to know it.
Because only by knowing fear
can he move beyond it.
And in that moment,
he understood something:
"When I pass through time…
…time begins to notice me."