For a long and glorious epoch, Ren Zu lived as the undisputed sovereign of the wilderness.
He possessed the perfect union of Strength and Wisdom, the two greatest treasures a living being could aspire to hold. With Strength residing in his flesh, he had the hands to shape the chaotic world into order. With Wisdom residing in his mind, he had the foresight to design a destiny of comfort.
He no longer slept in damp, dripping caves or shivered under the insufficient cover of rotting leaves. He felled the ironwood giants that had stood for ten thousand years and, using the geometry of his mind and the power of his arms, constructed a magnificent palace of wood and stone. It was sturdy enough to withstand the fiercest storms of the nine heavens and warm enough to mock the biting winds of winter.
He no longer ate raw, bloody meat that sickened his stomach and dulled his spirit. He captured the fire that fell from the sky, tamed it within a ring of river stones, and cooked his food, savoring the rich flavors that only a civilized being could appreciate. The smoke of his hearth rose into the sky, a banner of his conquest.
He wore the furs of the beasts he had conquered—tigers, bears, and wolves—stitched with the fibers of the plants he had harvested. He walked through the wilderness not as a survivor, but as a king. The Predicaments still existed, lurking in the shadows, but they were no longer terrors that haunted his nightmares. To the Ren Zu of this era, they were merely puzzles to be solved with a thought, or annoyances to be crushed with a casual wave of his hand.
Ren Zu felt complete. He looked at his strong hands and his sharp mind, and he felt eternal.
But the flow of time is the most ruthless river in existence. It drowns mountains, erodes steel, and grinds empires into dust. It cares nothing for the kings of men, and it cannot be bribed, fought, or deceived.
Ren Zu had made a transaction with the heavens. He had sold his Youth to Strength. He had sold his Middle Age to Wisdom.
He had spent the currency of his life to buy his survival. He had lived lavishly on borrowed power. Now, the debt was due, and his pockets were empty.
The change did not happen in a single day, but it struck with the accumulated weight of a collapsing mountain.
One morning, the sun rose with the same indifferent brilliance as always, casting its golden light over Ren Zu's domain. The birds sang, and the wind blew. Ren Zu opened his eyes, intending to rise and inspect his territory he had done for a thousand mornings before.
He commanded his legs to move, expecting the explosive, spring-loaded power of Strength to propel him upright.
But his legs did not obey. They trembled violently and collapsed, heavy and lifeless as rotten logs.
He tried to summon a plan, to analyze his condition, expecting the crystal-clear clarity of Wisdom to flood his mind and offer a solution.
But his thoughts were sluggish. They moved through a thick, gray fog, fragmenting before they could form a coherent picture. He couldn't remember why he wanted to get up, or what he had planned to do that day. The sharp edge of his intellect had dulled into a rusty blade.
Ren Zu lifted his hands to his face, and a gasp of horror tore from his dry throat.
Where there was once iron-hard muscle, rippling with vitality, there was now withered, sagging flesh. His skin was spotted with age and thin like dried parchment, hanging loosely on a frame of brittle, aching bones. His hair, once a thick, black mane that flowed like a river, had thinned to a few wisps of snow-white straw that barely covered his scalp.
He gasped, his voice a dry, rattling wheeze that sounded like wind passing through a tomb. "What... what is this?"
He was Old.
Panic, primal and terrifying, seized his heart. He instinctively called out to the two forces that had defined his existence, the partners he thought were his eternal servants.
"Strength!" he croaked, his voice cracking. "Strength Gu! Lend me your power! I cannot stand! My legs fail me!"
The air shimmered, and the crimson Strength Gu emerged from his body. But it did not glow with its usual raging fire. It looked dull, lethargic, and unimpressed. It hovered just out of his reach, looking down at the trembling, wrinkled thing on the bed.
"I cannot help you," Strength Gu said, its voice devoid of the thunder it once held. It spoke with the cold indifference of a merchant closing a ledger. "I consume Youth to create power. I burn vitality to forge steel. You have no Youth left. Your muscles are dry, your bones are hollow, and your blood is thin and cold. You are an empty vessel."
"But I fed you!" Ren Zu cried, tears of frustration leaking from his cloudy eyes. "I gave you everything! I gave you my best years! How can you deny me now?"
"You paid for a service, and the service has ended," Strength Gu replied coldly. "Power requires a price, and you are bankrupt. You are weak."
Desperate, Ren Zu turned his eyes to the other side, his heart hammering against his frail ribs. "Wisdom! Wisdom Gu! You are the smartest! Tell me what to do! Find a solution for this! There must be a way to reverse this!"
The crystal-like Wisdom Gu floated out from his forehead. It circled him once, its light dim and flickering, like a candle in the wind.
"There is no solution to the end of a lifespan," Wisdom Gu stated, its voice logical, unfeeling, and cruelly precise. "I consume the vigor of Middle Age to sharpen the mind. I burn the stability of the prime years to fuel the fires of thought. You have no Middle Age left. Your brain is shrinking, your memories are fading like smoke, and your logic is decaying. To ask for wisdom now is like asking a fire to burn without wood."
"Do not leave me!" Ren Zu reached out with a shaking hand, grasping futilely at the air. "I am your master! I built this house! I conquered this land! Without me, you are nothing!"
The two Gu worms hovered higher, drifting toward the open window where the blue sky beckoned—a sky that was vast, eternal, and full of new life.
"You are mistaken," the two Gu spoke in unison, their voices echoing the cruel fairness of the Great Dao. "We are the essence of heaven and earth; you are but a momentary vessel. You were a fertile field, and we harvested your Youth. We harvested your Prime. Now, the soil is exhausted. You are a barren wasteland, filled with nothing but the dust of old age. There is nothing left for us to harvest."
"We are leaving."
"No!" Ren Zu screamed, but the sound was merely a whisper.
With a final buzz that sounded like a mockery of his grief, Strength Gu and Wisdom Gu flew out of the window.
They did not look back.
They ascended into the vast, endless sky, seeking new hosts, new transactions, and fresh lives to consume.
Ren Zu watched them go until they were mere specks against the blinding sun.
He was left alone in the magnificent house he had built, surrounded by the furs of beasts he could no longer hunt, trapped in a body that was failing him in every way.
He had conquered the world, but in doing so, he had spent his life. Now, abandoned by the very powers that made him great, he was just an old, dying man lying in the dust of his own past and legacy.