story_shu_1_1

Who are you...?

Where did you come from?

You came from nowhere, have no kin, and don't even know who you are...

Could it be that you're a Xian, like in the stories?

Jingzhe, when insects wake.

The weather finally clears up after a few days of early spring rain.

A square platform sits in the center of the public square—it resembles both a stage and altar with a statue silently standing on top.

It is a sculpture of a simply dressed woman with facial features hard to perceive, but one can easily tell where her gaze is looking.

A boy carefully offers a verdant seedling to the statue with a deferential bow.

Shennong, bless us...

Everything has to go smoothly this year...

Laoshi?

I was looking for you and the soil samples I asked for—what are you doing here?

I...

The boy turns sideways, trying to obstruct his 'offering' from the other's view.

We'll be transplanting the seedlings in two days, and this year is the first I'm taking charge of an experimental field. I'm really worried that something might go wrong, or I'll do a bad job...

I've heard from my qianbeis at the Bureau they always come here to pay their respects in moments like these... I'm pretty new, so maybe Shennong will be kinder to me.

What have those elders been teaching you youths...?

Will you stop farming if something does happen?

The mute statue is covered in mud from the past few days of wind and rain, as if it has just returned from a day of work in the fields.

The woman steps forward and gently wipes the mud off the statue.

'Shennong' spent her whole life diligently working the fields, but ended up worshiped as a Xian by you lot, expecting her to solve your problems.

They only come to visit her when they have problems they can't solve, or obstacles they can't overcome.

Was 'Shennong' a real person?

Why do you ask?

She came up with a calendar system and figured the twenty-four solar terms a thousand years ago... she even managed to cultivate such a wide expanse of farmland in a place so perilous...

I honestly can't imagine that being the work of a single woman.

It doesn't matter if you believe it or not—the changes in the seasons and soil beneath our feet are real and true.

Someone must have done these things in the first place, for stories to be passed down about them.

What kind of woman was she to achieve such feats?

Her, huh...? Just an inconsiderate fool, that's all.

What does this continent look like from above?

What...?

You told me your body was once taller than a mountain, and the clouds floating in the sky did not even clear your shoulders—what was the view like up there?

The endless stretch of mounts you see are undulating slopes of earth to me; what you take for towering trees are more or less the seedlings growing by the roadside here.

Dead mounts and still water for a myriad years.

So you couldn't see the flowers and trees clearly, nor make out the cries of the fowlbeasts?

That sounds like a lonely life...

You don't fear me?

Why would I? You don't look like a monster, you look like us.

But we're not the same at all. My lifespan is thousands of times longer than yours, and I could easily reduce you to dust, were you to anger me.

Pfft—

You dare laugh...?

I've heard tall tales like that before. The Xians in these stories always descend to the mortal realm on account of boredom and loneliness.

Why turn yourself into a mortal and come to our realm otherwise? Sure, turn me into dust, but then who are you gonna talk to?

I'm not—

*sigh* Why the violent threats when you've got such power?

If I had a body as big as you did, I'd let people plant crops of all kinds on me! Hey, how about that? Can you make plants grow better too?

That'd be easy. I'll even prove it right now... see?

The girl gently waves her hand, and in the next instant, a green sorghum seedling in the ground ripens, bearing a bountiful harvest of grain.

I could turn this entire snowfield into farmland, if I wanted to.

The farmer's eyes grow wide, and she does not speak for quite a while.

Does it tire you out, doing that?

Doesn't take much effort. Much less than your slow farming techniques.

Then, what do you want from us in return?

What could I even want from you lot? I just did that on a whim, since I'm in a good mood.

Then...

No, no... it's better if you don't do it again.

I can't only think about now. You helped us today, but what if your mood turns sour? You might just leave us.

If we were to depend on you, then wouldn't the crops here vanish once you left? We'd have forgotten how to grow our own food and we'd end up hungry.

So it's best we work hard on our own to cultivate the land, and we'll free ourselves from those anxieties too.

I've met many others who witnessed a shred of my power and immediately started begging me to grant them more.

But you. How much land could you cultivate, even if you were to till the fields until you died?

However much I can, I just have to try my best. I'm sure someone will continue what I started after I'm gone.

That doesn't make sense though? You said you 'can't only think about now', but you changed your tune to 'I just have to try my best'?

Makes sense to me. We mortals can't turn our wishes real like a Xian can. We push ourselves and live with some aspirations unrealized. That's normal, and it keeps us grounded...

Keeps you grounded?

Hmm... here.

What's this about?

I can't learn your supernatural farming techniques, but I can teach you how we mortals do it. It's a bit slow, but it works.

Learn how we farm, and you might just understand how us mortals think and feel too.

Is it tough, being <i>human?</i>

Of course! Just look at the frostbite on my hands... I'm still young, but my back already aches on rainy days.

I could take you somewhere else, a place with picturesque views and spring-like weather all year round. You wouldn't have to labor like this, and there's so much food over there you couldn't finish it all even if you were to live ten times as long.

Haha, I knew it! You're afraid to be alone. You just want some company, right?

But I think I'll pass.

You don't believe me?

Of course I believe you. This great land is so vast I'm sure a place as good as that exists somewhere... but I'm also afraid. Afraid that I'll never want to come back after visiting your utopia.

Our mortal lives are too short. As long as I can grow these crops right here, I'll be satisfied.

Although, going out to have fun with you isn't entirely off the table, if...

Only if you promise me everyone in this world will never go hungry again.

Hmmhmm...♪

You're in a good mood?

Of course!

Look, the seeds I tried planting here have sprouted. Now we have another crop to feed ourselves with.

Give it a few more years, and we'll manage to turn this patch of barren land into fertile fields and grow enough food to sustain several more villages.

Those villages—you know the people there?

No... not at all.

Then why do you care about them?

Well... isn't it normal to worry about others? To help each other out?

You keep yourself alive just on your own, what have <i>they</i> helped you with?

Maybe they can't help me now, but in the future they might...

So you give them food now, in exchange for a possible future payoff?

You can't really put it that way either... Oh! I almost got lost in your questions.

You've lost me too.

I remember a phrase from a book written by the sages—'All men are kin, as with living things'—it roughly means that we should care for everyone and everything, like the plants and trees.

I'm bad with words, I can't explain it well. I just think the plants and trees right here are pretty and want to grow more of them; I don't like how hunger feels, and I don't want anyone else to suffer it either.

*sigh*... A Xian like you couldn't know what starvation feels like, how unbearable it gets...

So what's it like?

Your stomach hurts, your organs feel like someone's twisting them. Your body loses all its strength, and you just feel empty and nonexistent.

As if your body's experiencing every suffering on this land at the same time.

And how does that feel?

Like... when a most beloved relative, or best friend passes away, and you know they'll never come back...

I still don't understand...

You say you don't, but you've been here with me for so long.

Well, I do enjoy our days together. My work feels less tough when I have someone to chat with.

It'll be hard for me if you leave one day, so I'll figure out a way to make you stay here for a while longer.

Oh, I didn't mean you <i>have</i> to stay here... I just remembered that you said you wanted to understand us 'mortals'.

Can you feel happiness now?

You called 'Shennong' a fool...

Have you heard the old farmers saying you can't look up when harvesting?

You have to keep your head down, and courageously reap the crops before you. Once you look up and look out at the fields that stretch to no end, you won't be able to move.

Humans live only a few short decades, and lack the luxury of time to care about what will come after they're gone. Focusing on what's in front of you is tiring enough.

But once you lock in on something, you'll achieve many things before you even realize it.

Can you guess how far Dahuang's fields stretched when Shennong passed?

Maybe half of what we have right now? Or one-third?

See that hillside to the south? Back then, the fields stretched to the foot of that mountain.

That small...?

The conditions then were incomparably worse than what we have right now. We didn't have these Originium devices, and it took so much effort just to pull a proper plow through the fields.

We couldn't dig up the rocks on the mountains, nor the permafrost up north. So Dahuang stretched only from that hillside in the south to the Shennong statue right here.

Where was this recorded? How do you remember it so clearly?

Where exactly...? I've forgotten myself.

The books say Shennong wanted to cultivate the land up north in her later years, but eventually succumbed to illness on her northward search for the 'Shen Gu' super grain.

So why does this statue face southward?

Shennong labored her entire life away just to prevent her fellow man from going hungry and cold. She would've been very attached to the people of her hometown.

That's probably where she was looking, in her final moments.

Actually, what made you decide to become an Nongye Tianshi in the first place?

When I was young, I learned how it felt to starve, once. Since then, I decided I wouldn't let anyone else go through that.

So you also suffered a famine...

Well... that was long, long ago.

Just like Shennong...

Dahuang has many farmers and Nongye Tianshis that have more or less have similar reasons as to why they're here.

The sun gradually rises as the spring breeze blows warmth into the air and onto the people.

The wind pushes the clouds away, letting a slanted ray of sunlight shine onto the statue's face.

I'm suddenly thinking about the various legends we have here, 'Shennong', 'Excavator', 'Yan'...

We still don't know if they were historical people or just myths. Could it be that Shennong wasn't just one woman?

She only hoped for more to follow in her footsteps, instead of remembering who she was, so she hid her identity.

But this way, no one really remembers the person she was...

If someone like that really existed, do you think she'd care if the people here remembered her name at all, if she could see what Dahuang has become?

Or maybe she was just shy and didn't want to leave her name and likeness behind.

Phew...

If you don't behave and go back home, there won't be any meat in your meals for the next few days.

Shu... you shouldn't be bullying the elderly.

Then act your age. Do you think it's romantic to watch the snow fall outside with just one layer on you? Today is Xiaohan, you know.

I knew it. My waist always starts hurting this time of year, right on schedule... how could you expect me to just lie in bed at home?

This winter has been so cold. Will the soil manage to defrost in time for the next spring...?

That's not something you should be worrying about right now. Keep neglecting your health and you'll might not even make it to next spring.

That won't do... I'm planning to go north again when spring comes. I got lost in the northeastern forests last time, so I'll try walking west this time.

You're trying to anger me.

Once you're in the ground, I'll have them build a statue here, looking towards the north that's always on your mind.

I couldn't ask for anything more.

But don't let them carve the statue the way I am now. Too ugly.

And as for the clothes, reference the outfit your brother gave me. I'm quite fond of it.

Oh, speaking of which... I haven't seen him in so many years. I wonder if I'll manage to see him one more time...

Time flies so fast... it feels like I met you just yesterday. Several decades gone, just like that.

Over the course of those decades, Dahuang's fields have tripled in size, and our annual crop yields have more than doubled... everyone calls you <i>Shennong,</i> the godly farmer, why not be content with that?

Humans are always greedy for more. We're never content.

Grow two yields of rice this year, and you'll want three the next; once you have a hundred mu of fields, you'll want two hundred...

Someday, when Dahuang's fields stretch beyond what I can see from here, I wonder if I'll still be able to visit the picturesque place you talked about?

Sure. Once you're well again, I'll bring you there in the spring.

You're lying to me again... I realized it a long time ago, you blink hard whenever you lie.

Shu... you knew this day would come.

Of course. Didn't I say so? I was used to this long before even I met you.

All living things abide the laws of mortality...

I...

Do you feel it now?

Feel what?

Feel like a <i>human...</i>

Feel happiness over something trivial, feel sad knowing how something ends, feel anticipation, reluctance...

I know how you feel... this is how humans connect with one another, through our common feelings.

You spent your entire life just to teach me a single thing... you're a pretty bad teacher, honestly.

So can you stay here in my stead, after I'm gone?

I don't need you to be their patron saint. Just live here, as a human.

Teach the children the farming methods we developed, a woman as bright as you will surely do a better job teaching than me.

They'll remember there was once a woman who spent her entire life on this freezing snowfield just so her people wouldn't go hungry.

Just me alone? I clearly had a Xian in human form at my side this whole time.

But no matter. You live the same way as we do, so no one knows you're a runaway Xian who sneaked into the mortal realm.

I won't get to see it, but perhaps a day will come when Dahuang becomes the place you spoke of... I'm sure there'll be many by your side to admire the scenery, and you won't be lonely anymore.

When the winter jasmines on that hillside bloom next year, will you weave a wreath of them for me?

It's getting late, Laoshi. I'll go prepare the transplanting tools.

I'll give it my all, no matter how this year goes.

Mm, off you go.

See? They still remember you.

An ascetic like you is still on their minds, even after a thousand years... What can I say?

A fowlbeast brings up a small yellow flower in its beak and drops it on the statue's bamboo hat.

It seems to have picked a good nesting spot, and fetches several more flowers with branches in bunches. Yellow flowers soon cover the brim of the hat.

The flowers bloom so beautifully after that parting, I wonder if you still know the way home.