Grandfather Dragon King

In this world, Lianjin Creek stretched nearly a hundred li, its waters vast, cool, and refreshing. Shi Feiyang plunged into it, tumbling and frolicking, drifting downstream or racing against the current, stretching himself to his heart's content. What bliss!

As a dragon, he was delighted, but the people below the mountain suffered for it.

This year's rains were heavier than in years past. Every hollow and valley brimmed with water, and many rivers had risen level with their banks. Floodwaters spilled over both sides, destroying vast stretches of farmland and collapsing houses. The people's wails never ceased.

Shi Feiyang's dragon eyes could see a thousand li, and his dragon ears could hear in every direction. Before long, he heard the cries of the people along both banks.

He was swimming around a bend when he sensed a flash flood erupting in the distance. He hurriedly rose out of the water and flew toward it, wrapped in a bank of cloud and mist.

Not far away lay a small valley inhabited by seven or eight households. When the flash flood struck, it swept away all their homes and fields.

Helping the elderly and carrying the young, these people—more than thirty in all—had become trapped on a patch of high ground. Murky, filthy water surrounded them, and the ground remaining beneath their feet was only the size of two tables.

Watching the water climb higher and higher, young and old huddled together and sobbed aloud.

The rain refused to stop, and the flood grew fiercer. Several torrents from the mountains converged, squeezing through a single valley mouth laden with enormous quantities of mud and sand. Like ten thousand horses charging, they shook the earth and mountains with terrifying force.

When Shi Feiyang arrived, he saw the flood crest rushing down from the mountain, about to sweep everyone on the mound into its embrace. He hurriedly spat out a stream of core breath and called upon the true water primal core in his belly, stopping the flood crest.

The seven households on the mound clung to one another in the heavy rain, certain they would die in the flash flood that day. Who could have imagined that the flood crest would stop several zhang away, as though an invisible wall held it back? Yellow-brown muddy water, carrying dead branches and rotting leaves, formed a wave over a zhang high, frozen firmly in place and unable to advance another step.

Still shaken, the villagers looked around. Suddenly, a little girl pointed. "A dragon! A dragon!"

Everyone looked in the direction she indicated and saw Shi Feiyang.

His thirteen-zhang-long dragon body wound and coiled within a thick bank of mist. Only glimpses of scales and claws showed through, filling anyone who looked upon him with awe and dread.

Meanwhile, streams of water continued to converge upstream. The flood rose higher and higher, and the pressure it exerted grew ever greater.

Shi Feiyang extended his dragon head beyond the clouds and spoke in a human voice. "All of you, run northeast together. Don't stop. Keep running until you reach a towering old elm. The ground there is high, and the water won't reach it."

The villagers stared, dumbstruck. One of the bolder men asked, "Grandfather Dragon King, the ground at Yushu Wei to the northeast is indeed higher, but everything between here and there is flooded too. How can we run across?"

Shi Feiyang did not answer. He merely breathed out a mouthful of bitterly cold core breath. Wherever it passed, the muddy floodwaters swiftly froze, forming an ice bridge two or three zhang wide and more than ten li long, stretching northeast from beneath the villagers' feet.

"Go, now! Don't look back! A cliff up above is about to collapse!" he shouted.

Having witnessed such divine power, the villagers delayed no longer. The able-bodied carried the elderly on their backs and held the children in their arms. Holding one another's hands, they stepped onto the ice bridge and tested it. Finding it harder and sturdier than a stone bridge, they felt reassured and began running forward. Someone called out, "Thank you, Grandfather Dragon King!"

Shi Feiyang watched them hurry away. Once they had put enough distance between themselves and the flood, he released the water-controlling spell in front of him. By then, the flood crest had piled up more than three zhang high. It immediately burst forth, roaring onward with mud, sand, stones, broken timber, and weeds.

Using a true water primal core, Shi Feiyang cast a restraining spell that hemmed the flood in on both sides, creating an invisible channel and forcing it to flow east, straight into Lianjin Creek.

The torrent surged for nearly an hour before gradually subsiding. Shi Feiyang saw that the villagers had already reached the high ground beneath the elm safely. Rather than going over to them, he turned and flew toward the lower reaches of Lianjin Creek.

On the rushing creek, a large tortoise swam upstream. Two children sat on the tortoise's broad shell: an older girl of about seven or eight holding a younger boy. Both were covered in mud and looked utterly bedraggled.

Shi Feiyang went over and asked what had happened.

Red Snake and Black Tortoise were a pair. Red Snake was fiery-tempered and vicious by nature. If anyone disturbed him, human or demon, he would not rest until he had poisoned them to death.

Black Tortoise, however, was kindhearted by nature. She occasionally ate fish, shrimp, shellfish, and other aquatic creatures, but never killed indiscriminately. Whether human or demon, if they possessed enough awareness to ask her for help, she always answered their pleas.

This time, she had rescued two small children swept down from upstream and was carrying them back on her shell.

Shi Feiyang thought she had done well and offered her encouragement. Black Tortoise began wagging her tail like a puppy. "Old Red said humans are all wicked and try to kill us whenever they see us. These human cubs were so tender and fragrant that he wanted to wrap them in Variegated Leaf and eat them dipped in Fennel Sauce. I stopped him, and he called me stupid..."

Her aggrieved expression made Shi Feiyang laugh. "I'll give him a talking-to later."

The old tortoise carried the children upstream. Seeing floodwaters on the opposite bank threatening to burst through, Shi Feiyang flew over to divert them.

He spent several days busily doing this. Many villagers below saw him, and word spread that Mount Xiandu had a Dragon King, with the Turtle and Snake Generals under his command. They had repeatedly displayed Gods' miracles and saved people from the floods.

Among the villagers Shi Feiyang had rescued was a man named Yao Suxiu. He had attended a private school as a child and was reasonably literate. Eloquent words often flowed from his lips, and he enjoyed considerable standing throughout the surrounding villages.

His descriptions of the black dragon were the most vivid. Whenever he told the tales, his animated accounts won applause and praise. Gradually, whenever people wanted to speak of the Dragon King's manifestations, they sought him out to tell the story. He then added oil and vinegar, embellishing his accounts until flowers seemed to rain from the heavens. Without anyone realizing it, he planted impressions in their minds: "He has seen the Dragon King more often," "The Dragon King favors him alone," and "He can invite the Dragon King out of the mountain."

Sensing profit to be made, Yao Suxiu kept spreading stories of his "three encounters with the Dragon King" and "six encounters with the Dragon King" throughout the villages.

One morning, he got up and told everyone that the Long King had visited him in a dream the previous night and taken him to the dragon palace at the bottom of Lianjin Creek as a guest. The Long King had treated him splendidly, giving him plenty of immortal pills and spirit fruits to eat, then made a request: he wanted Yao Suxiu to build him a Long King temple.

"The Dragon King asked me to tell everyone that once this temple is built and he receives our incense offerings, he will be able to protect this land with favorable winds and timely rains. Otherwise, he will bring down an even greater flood and wash away every village for miles around!"

His clansmen chimed in, "Grandfather Dragon King has helped us so much and saved so many of our lives. If we won't even build him a temple, we'd be wolves at heart and dogs in spirit! Never mind Grandfather Dragon King bringing down disaster—we ourselves won't tolerate such coldhearted people living here! We'll drive them out first!"

Many villagers had indeed benefited from the kindness of the "Dragon King" and the Turtle and Snake Generals, and had witnessed their "Gods' miracles." Thus, the proposal to build them a temple met with little resistance.

Building a temple required raising money first. Yao Suxiu assigned quotas to each village and forced them to pay.

The villagers had all suffered from the disaster to some degree, and their households had sustained considerable losses. Finding more money was difficult, especially for those whose homes had collapsed and whose fields had been destroyed. If they truly had no money, Yao Suxiu made them contribute labor, helping transport tiles and stone, build walls, and pave roads.

Someone suggested, "We can't build anything with it raining day after day. Why not ask Grandfather Dragon King to manifest his power and stop the rain first?"

Thank you to "Moldy Lad of Jiangzuo," "Sect Leader_Chen," and "Zhang Amateur" for your generous tips and support! Thanks!