One heard that people beyond the mountain used a new energy source. One heard that those city dwellers’ houses were like computers; they could talk, they could chat, they would do what you told them to do. One heard that if they were separated by a long and perilous distance, all they had to do was turn on a cellphone, and it would be like the other person was sitting in front of them, real enough to touch. One heard that some scientist was researching…some kind of space…some kind of principle, and in the future, there would come a day when those city dwellers could open their doors and immediately reach a far distant workplace. 

One heard…

But none of this had anything to do with the little mountain village. Though the highway had already gone through here years ago, for reasons of geography, the road conditions were still poor. It was bend after bend. Every year there were many accidents. Goods from the outside coming in or people from the mountain going out were both extremely difficult things. 

The goods and materials that many areas had provided in aid of construction had been delivered here with a great deal of labor in order to build little house after little house for the villagers, even more beautiful than the ones in the city, to repair the highway, and to put new roofs on the school and hospital. But people’s living conditions were still cramped. There were still old people who wouldn’t go to the hospital when they got sick, preferring to stay home and take a folk remedy, ask for blessings. 

So there were many people who didn’t know that the human heart could also become sick, and that its sicknesses could be dreadful. 

In an attic room, a teenage girl waking from a dream sat up, still with some confusion on her face. Just then, the curtains were lightly pulled open, and the evening sun slanted into the room. The man who had opened the curtains lowered his head and leaned against the windowsill with his head down. He took a deep breath of the fragrance of the camellias growing there.  

Then he looked back and narrowed his eyes in a smile. “How are you? Are you awake?” 

This was a very youthful man—not to say that he was young, but that he made you think that even in the future when he was middle-aged, even when he had become an old man with a head full of white hair, he would still be youthful, because he had a pair of especially happy eyes. 

He had a head of short hair that always seemed a little messy. He was tall and long-legged, making him look even skinnier than he was. He had a smile that seemed to sparkle, making people unable to resist smiling along with him when they saw it. He was very likable. 

The girl looked at him and suddenly felt the rims of her eye heat up. For a time she didn’t know how to express herself. She could only instinctively begin to cry. “Dr. Kou…”

Dr. Kou didn’t interrupt. He let her cry to her heart’s content while he quietly put away his equipment. He always had a very retro little satchel with him. When she was about through crying, he took out a small palm-sized box and passed over a package of tissues. “Here, wipe your face. The final treatment is complete. This box contains our hard work during these days. You can keep it as a memento.” 

“A memento?” 

“A memento of you coming back to life.” Dr. Kou winked at her, lifted his big backpack containing the equipment one-handed, and put it over his shoulder, like a long-distance traveler bringing along overweight luggage. Humming a wildly off-key tune, he opened the door and nodded to the girl’s parents, who had been waiting outside the door for a long time. “You can come in and see her.” 

The middle-aged woman abruptly covered her mouth, holding back her sobs. She walked into the room. The girl softly called out “Mom,” and the suppressed sobs turned into weeping in each others’ arms. Dr. Kou stood at the door and nodded to the man who was expressing a thousand thanks. He turned and left, just as if he had never stopped there and had never done anything. 

Kou Tong was an itinerant doctor. 

Ordinarily, “itinerant doctor” has a more common synonym—“swindler.” And Kou Tong seemed a little more like a swindler than even an ordinary itinerant doctor, because he was a psychologist. 

According to the usual understanding of common people, any person who lived on human food would have emotions. There would be times when they wanted to fight, and times when they wanted to curse. It didn’t amount to anything major. How could you determine that there was an illness in their heart? Wasn’t it just whatever the psychologist said? 

If you said there was an illness, then there was illness; if you said it was better, then it was better. If that wasn’t being a swindler, then what was it? 

It was better to have a specialist in shamanic dance. At least these people were the real thing; they hollered and rolled their eyes, jumping around for such a long time. At any rate, they were worth the price of admission. 

But Kou Tong was just this sort of magical person. Rumor had it that he had a job, and that his post was in the world’s most mysterious department—this country’s “relevant department.” 

Dr. Kou’s contributions to the relevant department were great. How great? Well, the relevant department’s business was top secret, so this couldn’t be talked about in detail. 

Anyway, supposedly the top tier psychologists on the market had vastly improved their techniques with a treatment instrument. They could use some means to truly see what was in a person’s consciousness. And this instrument called the Projector had the utmost link to Dr. Kou. He was supposed to be one of the developers. 

It was clear that while Dr. Kou was very low-key, he was quietly awesome. 

But the awesome Dr. Kou didn’t always have so much research work. His work was usually a little leisurely, probably leisurely enough to make him frequently feel a little at a loss. So, imitating the Erlang god on TV, under the glorious name of bringing benefit to the masses, he took general directions but not orders. 

When he had nothing else to do, with this as his excuse, he wandered around everywhere carrying his bag of equipment on his back like a mountebank. He didn’t care. Anyway, his face was thicker than a city wall. If someone trusted him and let him treat them, he would stop over for a while, cure the person, then leave. How much money the patient gave was entirely voluntary—anyway, he was traveling on public money… As for his practice, of course that also couldn’t be talked about in detail. 

Kou Tong left the girl’s house, put a pair of very large sunglasses on his face, whistled, brought his equipment back to his hotel, then got himself ready and happily went to keep an appointment—a group of the village’s half-grown youths had extended the invitation to him, because they greatly revered him. 

In the eyes of the village people, especially of the youths, Dr. Kou was a magical individual. 

They all knew the girl from the Huang family. She was a weirdo. For no reason they knew, she tried to kill herself practically every day. The village people saw it as nothing out of the ordinary, because her suicidal behavior seemed to be even more frequent than menstruation—there were some days of it every month. 

But after Dr. Kou came, he stayed at her house for a month and more, and Miss Huang became much more human-like. She didn’t try to commit suicide as usual. She could go out, and when she went out, she could say hello to people in the street. After another month, Miss Huang had turned over a new leaf. She was even getting along with her parents, who had formerly been like enemies to her. 

To speak factually, Dr. Kou was actually more magical than those who did shamanic dance.

So the youths were prepared to extend to him their highest tribute: they had invited Dr. Kou to the big slope at the south entrance of the village to participate in their traditional activity—racing. 

Of course what they raced were bicycles. The road hadn’t gone through here. There was a natural and precipitous slope. The people from the village didn’t normally pass through here, so it had become the children’s playground. In spring, a mountain full of wild flowers and grasses turned into a carpet. Amidst the carpet was a dirt road made by these “racing drivers” treading throughout the year. It was very smooth. 

Riding a bike from here, taking both feet off the pedals, making all kinds of high-difficulty moves, hollering while charging down, was the first trial by fire for the boys to become “true men”—self-proclaimed, of course. 

The truth was that every year, many brats broke their legs here, so many that parents and guardians used brooms to viciously threaten their children—if you ride down the big slope letting go of the handlebars again, then I’ll break your damn leg! 

Sadly, whether it was getting your leg broken by falling or getting it broken by beating, the final outcome was the same, so the threats failed. The race meets carried on like a raging fire as before. 

When Kou Tong arrived, the boys had already started. 

A short boy saw him and immediately stepped up to welcome him. He wiped sweat from his forehead and shouted, “Dr. Kou is here!”  

Apart from those who were still sliding down the slope and didn’t have attention to spare, the other boys all surged over and talked over each other explaining the rules to him, as well as explaining how awesome they were in front of their idol. 

They were willing to group him as a fellow countryman, because Dr. Kou never acted like a “grown-up,” putting on a fierce look as though he was all that, unfathomably saying don’t do this and don’t do that—even though he really kind of was all that. 

Kou Tong happily squatted to one side, observing a couple of rounds of matches. At last, he couldn’t resist itching to have a go. 

The teenage boys fell over each other to give up their bikes to him. Kou Tong tossed his satchel aside, rolled up his shirtsleeves, and, like an overaged sufferer of middle school syndrome, took his feet off the pedals like the teenagers and whizzed down, crying: “Yahoo—”  

His originally messy hair became even wilder. He raced all the way down to the bottom of the slope. Then, still unsatisfied, he pushed the bike all the way back up and put on an even sunnier smile. “Again. Who will come down with me?” 

The convoy of “wild rabbits” was ready to set out. The boys stretched out their necks and yelled together. This time, Kou Tong even let go of the handlebars. Only his butt was still touching the bicycle. It was a frightening sight. His little fans yelled behind him: “Damn! Dr. Kou, you’re a real man! No mistake!” 

“That was nothing. I’ll show you an even more difficult move.” Kou Tong pushed the bike out for a third time and got on it, panting slightly. The applause of the crowd was making him show off a little. 

This time he held the handlebars. After stabilizing himself, he suddenly raised his feet and put them over the handlebars. Then, like a big bird, he let go with his hands and used his bent knees to send the bike forward. The applause rose to the skies. 

Just at this stirring moment, all of a sudden, the woman from the Zhang family came over leading a crowd of adults. They must have received word and were prepared to encircle and suppress the illegal racing activity. The outcome was, they saw Kou Tong’s performance. 

Zhang-da-jie was instantly scared white-faced. She yelled, “Good grief! Dr. Kou! Dr. Kou, come down! Oh, my goodness, why are you fooling around with this crowd of wretched brats? You’ll break your leg if you fall in this place!” 

Grinning, Kou Tong answered, “No, I won’t.” 

Zhang-da-jie stood on tiptoe. In the midst of many pressing affairs, she didn’t forget to pull over her own unlucky child and give him two fierce slaps on the back of the head. “It’s dangerous, Dr. Kou!” 

Kou Tong said, “Don’t worry!”  

“Gracious, how can I not worry? Come down!” 

Then…

Then Kou Tong really did come down—because his legs were too long, bending them blocked his line of sight. He didn’t see a big stone roll up in front of the wheel and fell down. 

At the time, Kou Tong heard an ominous sound. He lay on his side as he had fallen and buried his face against his knees. On one hand, this was because it hurt so much; on the other, it was because it was so humiliating. 

He thought that perhaps he had very unfortunately…really broken his leg. 

So the story begins with an unreliable itinerant doctor, by an even more unreliable method, breaking his leg.