Guardian Readalong: Chapters 17 and 18

[cathyw]

Welcome to this week’s installment of the Guardian novel readalong!

(If you’re just joining us or need to catch up, here are last week’s chapters and you can find all previous chapter discussions on the schedule post or via the !readalong tag.)

This week we’re looking at:

Chapter 17: Wang Zheng asks for leave. The SID and Professor Shen's students plan separate field trips.
Chapter 18: The separate field trips turn out to be the same field trip. What a coincidence! They join together and start their trip into the cold, snowy mountains.

These events correspond with Chapters 26-28 of the Chinese version on JJWXC and the fan translation.

Excerpts:

1) Wang Zheng has a request

"Director Zhao, I want to ask for some time off," she continued, in her unique, wispy voice. "I want to be laid to rest."

Zhen Yunlan's brow creased. He took out a cigarette. "You--"

Wang Zheng leaned back. Flatly, she said, "Keep your second-hand smoke away from me."

"You're a ghost. What does it matter to you?"

"Ghosts can still smell cigarette smoke. At this rate, sooner or later you'll become a human mosquito coil."
Zhao Yunlan stuffed his lighter back into his pocket unhappily. "Your name is already in the Soul-Guarding Order. You're never going to pass on (note: the Chinese/fan translation has 'You won't be able to reincarnate' here). Even if you're lad to rest, you won't be at peace, so what's the point? And your people don't even do in-ground burials, do they?"

Wang Zheng didn't answer. She just kept her had down and eventually repeated, "I want to go home."


2) Shen Wei is in deep.

Sunlight came in, momentarily blinding him. Shen Wei's hands stilled. Looking down, he saw a golden thread of light hooking in from somewhere outside, wrapping itself around his pendant. He reached to block it, but his fingers passed right through. He couldn't help gripping the radiant little sphere, his heart a tangled mess.

The whole day, it had been as if the sight of Zhao Yunlan leaning against his headboard, eyes closed, had been seared into his retinas. Any time he shut his own eyes, the image floated to the forefront of his mind. It haunted him.

It was as if, after freezing and starving for thousands of years, he had suddenly fallen into an untouchable, tender haven - a haven where everything around him heald deathly temptation and swallowed his reason, no matter how he struggled against it. Every time the words "Zhao Yunlan" drifted into his ear, he sank an inch deeper into the bottomless quagmire. He was already in past his neck. Soon, he would drown...


3) Zhao Yunlan uses his powers for... good?

Zhao Yunlan gauged that they were adequately frightened. "See, it really is fate that we bumped into each other. You should come with us. I have some friends out there, so I'll ask them to have a few cars ready. Since we're all going to the same place, we might as well travel together. That way we can take care of each other. What do you guys think?"

The class leader hesitated. "That... Isn't that too much trouble for you?"

Zhao Yunlan waved dismissively. He slung an arm around Shen Wei's shoulder and winked at her. "Not at all! Do you know what kind of relationship we have?"

"Don't mess--" Shen Wei began.

"Neighbors!" Zhao Yunlan smirked, not letting him go. "Remember this, students. In the future, when you go out into the world, you can't count on distant relatives the way you can count on close neighbors. If you get along, neighbors can be closer than family. Right, Shen-laoshi?"

Shen Wei had nothing to say in response.


4) This was not on the itinerary

The windows had fogged up in the cold. Only the windshield was clear enough to easily see what was approaching: someone carrying a lantern, leading a large group toward the stopped cars. There were men and women among them, but they were outnumbered by children and the elderly. The people's clothing seemed to be in rags, as if they were fleeing a great famine.

How was it possible that so many people were walking along a mountain road intended for cars?

"Who are those people?" the class leader asked. Her trembling voice was very small."

"Those aren't people," Zhao Yunlan murmered. "It's a ghost army passing through."

The girl clapped a hand over her mouth.


(I did not include the big reveal of Wang Zheng's temporary body because it was just too long...)

Questions:
- Is everyone on the Guardian Order cut off from reincarnation/a peaceful afterlife?
- What factors were at play in Shen Wei's reluctance to go ahead with the trip, and his eventual decision to do it?
- Zhao Yunlan's flirtation in the airport: good? bad? ugly?
- Is Zhao Yunlan's non-accidental brother acquisition just a result of his charisma, or is he manipulative about it?
- As careful as he usually is about rationalizing the supernatural for people, why might Yunlan have been so upfront about the lantern-carrier and the people with him being ghosts?

...and of course, share your thoughts and feelings on any part of the reading.

Comments

[cathyw]

there were a lot of differences between the official and fan translation in these chapters. I'm going to post in more depth later, but the one question in my mind now is: the fan translation consistently describes Lin Jing as a fake monk. The official translation seems to present him as more of a terrible monk. Those are very different things, even if neither is especially positive! Is there any indication of which is more correct?

[trepkos]

How interesting! Maybe he got shuffled into a monk-dom by his family, and didn't really want to be one? But my book - which looks official - calls him a fake monk ...

[trobadora]

I looked at the Chinese version I have, and it just calls him 酒肉和尚, which I gather is a fixed expression. Not sure if it necessarily implies he is actually a (real-but-terrible) monk ...

[cathyw]

I'm searching with the help of machine translation, but it looks like it at least at its base does refer to a real monk - it's about hypocrisy/not following Buddhist precepts, not about lying.

Hrm.

[trobadora]

Yeah, that's how I understood it too. We'll have to keep an eye on Lin Jing! *g*

[china_shop]

I would have thought if he were a fake monk, he wouldn't be very effective. You know? So I've been reading it as him being a real but the-opposite-of-devout monk -- one who can effectively chant scripture and do various spiritual things, but who eats meat, drinks alcohol, and is generally lacking morals and diligence. Something like that?

[trobadora]

I guess that depends on whether, worldbuilding-wise, being a monk actually matters for what he can or can't do. But yeah, I did read him as actually being a monk.