Alone in a cave near the top of a hill sat the Golden Buddha in meditation. OK, so he wasn't really a Buddha, and he wasn't golden either, but there he was, anyway. It doesn't matter that much because the story isn't really about him, anyway; not yet at least.

He found he was becoming hungry, so being a practical sort of fellow, he decided to go down the hill to get a bowl of rice.

At the bottom of the hill was a small village. He noticed a villager who was giving out rice. She was exceptionally beautiful, but he didn't pay undue attention to that. He asked her for a bowl of rice, which she dispensed for him. Then, as she handed him the bowl, she brushed his hand softly with her fingers, and looked in his eyes to see what effect the gesture had on him.

Never had he felt such intimacy in his life before. It had changed him, not in a way any entry-level Godlike being could manage -- not an alchemical lead to gold transformation. She had changed him with the touch of her hand from something inert, into living flesh!

Shaken by the transformation, he turned wordlessly and left with his bowl of rice, retreating to his cave, but knowing that he would never be safe there again.

And she? How was she changed by this transformation she had facilitated? Could she ever see herself again as a simple rice peddler? This tale does not say.