Chapter 1

She Leaves Home Grounds to Reach What Can’t Be Reached

Name is Given — Immortality is Stolen

In ancient times, on the shores of the Eternal Ocean lay the country of Auyasku. The waves of the three seas cherished her sleep. The Silent Western Sea lulled her with whispers, and the Glacial Sea squeezed her tightly in its arms. Even the Sea of Great Storms was quiet off the coast of this cold land.

A white fur coat of snow hid Auyasku from the heat of the sun. On the hottest summer day, the bright beams of Celestial Luminary could not penetrate beneath the blankets and awaken Auyasku from her age-old slumber.

In the middle of the country rose a snowy mountain, and on its top was a wonderful rock. This rock was open to the beaming sun and moonlight, because tall trees did not grow on it; moss alone covered the stones, still barely warm from the sun.

And then, one day, the rock produced a stone egg. Later, a marten hatched from this egg, also made of stone, but endowed with limbs and all five senses.

The stone marten quickly learned to run about and hunt small game that hid in the snow. She also made friends with other animals that inhabited the endless fields of Auyasku: foxes, bears, wolves – even moles. And, of course, with other martens, her relatives. The mountain from which she came was called Marten Mountain because it served as a home to many martens.

One morning, when the sun appeared in the east and slowly rolled across the sky, the martens began to frolic around the rock, chasing one another. Having gamboled enough, they calmed down and, staring at the sun, began to talk – for, as the proverb goes, even animals can talk to each other.

“No one knows what the sun really is,” said the martens. “Is it possible to grab it in the teeth and not get burned?” They all gathered together and climbed to the very top of the cliff, trying to reach the sun. They jumped, but could not reach the sun in any way.

“Now, if there is one among us who can get us the sun, we will make him our ruler!” So said the martens.

The stone marten jumped forward, wagged her tail and called out, “I’ll get you the sun!”

Having said that, the marten jumped towards the sun with all her strength and, of course, crashed down straight into a huge snow pile at the foot of the cliff. But this failure did not upset her at all. She shook off the snow that had stuck to her fur and looked triumphantly at her brothers and sisters as though landing in the snow had been her very intention. She waved her tail and went in the direction from which the sun hung in the sky.

The sun, meanwhile, did not sit still. By evening, it touched the snowy horizon a little to the west of where it rose.

The night passed slowly, but eventually, the sun rose above the horizon again. The marten continued on her way. She already regretted her bragging, but there was nowhere to retreat; she did not want to return with empty paws.

So day after day the marten walked along the snow-covered plains. The further south she moved, the greater the path was that the sun made over the sky between sunrise and sunset. The air became warmer and the snow began to melt. Sheets of ice start to appear through the thawed snow patches, becoming thinner and thinner until they started to break, falling in large pieces into the dark water below.

Finally, the marten reached the edge of the great ice, the place where the Glacial and Silent Seas met. The sun there bathed its reflection in water that spanned all the way to the horizon. Huge pieces of crushed ice pressed against each other, avoiding the waves of the Silent Sea. It was impossible to go any further.

The marten noticed in the distance a large block of ice, which was slowly moving away from the broken line of its brothers, frightened by the sea waves. “For a long journey, you need a suitable ship – and here it is!” so decided the marten. She ran up and jumped onto the ice floe, which swayed in surprise; thus began the sea journey of the stone marten.

Day after day, the marten’s vessel rocked on the waves, slowly moving south. Sea currents did not raise any hurdle, but did not help either; their thoughts were directed to the East.

The waters of the Silent Sea turned out to be warmer than expected by both our travellers, who were more accustomed to the cooler climes of Auyasku.

The marten liked this new appearance of nature. With great pleasure she bathed in soft warming water and dived for small fish. But the feelings of the ice block differed completely. From the bright sun and warm water, it became smaller and smaller. Finally, there was so little ice left that the marten could barely fit on it.

She was worried about her fate and began to shift nervously on the spot. The small remainder of the ice block swayed harder and finally capsized, knocking the marten into the sea.

Snorting, the marten climbed back up, and then noticed a dark line in the west – it was land.

“Hooray!” The marten was delighted and hurried to the shore, paddling with her tail.

The hospitable shore was covered with green vegetation where there thrived various insects and animals that the marten had never seen before. Birds chirped in the crowns of branched trees.

The marten had a good rest and decided to continue her journey south. From a fallen tree, she made herself a raft, climbed onto it and pushed harder with her hind legs.

As soon as the western shore vanished beyond the horizon, clouds came running up from nowhere and a thunderstorm began. The silent sea roared and tossed the tiny raft up and down. The storm continued for a long time, and when it finally ended, a raft of broken wood was thrown onto the golden sands of the country of Chinayindu.

“This is where the sun lives!” so thought the marten, pouring warm sand between her claws. The sun itself loomed right over the marten’s head with a mocking smile – or so it seemed to the marten, and she made a fist at it. “Laugh, laugh!” she called. “The night will come, and I will catch you!”

The marten continued along the coast until she came upon a village inhabited by creatures she had never seen before. They were not like her. They walked on two legs instead of four, and had borrowed the fur of other animals to cover their skin. They spoke in a strange, complicated language, and everything they did seemed to involve tools and other objects that were unfamiliar to the marten. Some fished with nets, others hunted ducks and hares; some sowed fields with rice sprouts, whilst others collected fruits that had fallen from high trees, and others still washed and dried clothes. The marten could not have known that the furless beasts she watched were, in fact, human beings.

So fascinated was she by these strange creatures that she thirsted to know more about them. Approaching the settlement, she began to perform all sorts of tricks, to jump and swing her clawed paws, burrow into the sand and twirl her tail, hoping that her dazzling display would invite friendship and welcome. The locals were no more accustomed to the sight of a marten made of stone than she was to them, and they screamed aloud and fled in fear, leaving behind everything they had come with.

Confused, the marten explored the settlement. She found a basket of fish and ate until she was full. Then, having nothing with which to entertain herself, began to try on the clothes left by the retreating people.

In trousers with a red belt and a light sleeveless jacket, the marten looked just like one of the local residents. Still curious about humans, she used her disguise to visit the towns and villages to see how these people lived. To the surprise of the marten, only a mop of hair on the back of their heads remained from all their fur.

Over time, she learned human customs and language.

It was seven years later that the stone marten finally remembered her goal.

No matter how much she walked around the country of Chinayindu, the marten could not find the damned sun. People only laughed at her questions and said that the sun never touches the earth anywhere, and that it is only in the Heavens that one can meet the Celestial Luminary.

So the marten decided to go to the Heavenly Realm herself, and there she would catch the annoying sun, which every day mercilessly seared the top of her head. To get to the Heavens, the marten resolved to climb the highest mountain. “I’ll certainly be able to jump right to the Heavenly Realm from there,” she decided.

The highest mountain of Chinayindu was named Gunlun. At the very top of this mountain stood the temple of Xiwanmu, the Great Goddess of the West. That’s where the stone marten went.

On the way to the top, the marten heard a human voice that sang a bawdy song about seven dwarfs who decided to climb a horse, but just couldn’t do it. “Here is that goddess,” thought the marten. She was not at all bewildered that the voice was rough and hoarse.

She walked a little further and saw in a clearing a bearded man with a huge basket. “Well, look at that,” the marten said, surprised. “Gods of this land are not only covered with hair on the back of the head, but also on the chin. It must be a sign of their magical power. If so, I must be even stronger than this goddess.”

“Greetings, Goddess Xiwanmu!” cried the marten.

The bearded man stopped his singing and said: “You must be confused, venerable stranger. Why, goddess! I am just a simple hermit who lives on the slopes of this sacred mountain.”

The hermit gathered some mushrooms for his supper and cordially invited the marten to join his meal. Together, they prepared a simple soup. The hermit took cold water from the stream and soaked in it the mushrooms he found. Then he added some herbs and roots, hung the pot over the fire and sat down in front of it. The marten also perched nearby; it was uncomfortable for her to sit on the bare stones, so she dragged a large chunk of wood and clambered up onto it.

At dinner, the marten asked the hermit: “Why did you call this mountain sacred? Does the goddess Xiwanmu live on it?”

“I have been living here for many years, but I have not met the Great Goddess of the West,” the hermit replied. “And what is your need for a goddess? Would you like to ask her for wisdom? Or beauty?”

“I want to climb to the Heavens,” said the marten, unperplexed by the insinuation.

“Only immortal celestials can get there,” the hermit said with a shake of his head. “I myself live on this sacred mountain, far from people, in order to somehow gain immortality.”

“If this is necessary in order to get to the Heavenly Realm,” the marten said, “then I will also settle on this mountain.”

“Is that so?” asked the hermit. “Then I have a request for you. There is a garden of peach trees at the top of the mountain. They say that the peaches in this garden have a taste comparable to nothing else in the Earthen Realm.”

The marten immediately wanted to try these peaches, but out of respect for the hermit, she said nothing.

“I am old and weak,” the hermit continued, “and I don’t have the strength to climb to the very top. And more than anything, I would like to try these peaches. Bring one to me, and then reside with me here in this hut.”

In fact, the hermit was not so simple-minded, for he was not a man at all – he was a demon who had been kicked out of the Heavenly Realm for pouring ink directly into the transparent waters of the spring near the Palace of the Jade Emperor.

The demon dreamed of returning to the Heavens to get even for the long years he’d spent in the world of humans. To do this, he had first to regain the immortality which the gods had taken from him. This could only be done by tasting the sweet fruit of Xiantao, the Peach of Immortality.

Those were the very fruits that grew in the temple of the Wisdom Goddess Xiwanmu, atop the sacred mountain Gunlun. Only those who were destined to become immortal could get into it; the temple’s entrance was closed to the demon, so he needed an accomplice.

That was why the demon was delighted with the sudden appearance of the stone marten, and why he was being so unusually hospitable. He deceived the marten to get him the Xiantao peach, saying nothing of the fruit’s magical properties.

The marten took the words of the demon hermit for pure water and went up the mountain. Deftly clinging to the branches of trees, she made her way higher and higher and finally reached the garden. Without any difficulty, she jumped over the fence and climbed a peach tree.

She picked the biggest, ripest fruit she could see and was about to return to the hermit when something gave her pause. Looking at the succulent peach, she was stricken by a sudden desire to taste its sweetness for herself.

“Just one bite,” she decided.

As soon as the marten plunged her teeth into the softness of the peach pulp, her eyes began to spin. Surprised, she unclenched her paws and fell to the ground. Peach juices ran through her body, penetrating each of her limbs and touching each of her senses. Without knowing it herself, the marten had tasted the fruit of the magical Xiantao tree.

At that moment, Xiwanmu, Goddess of the West, the Divine Mother, herself appeared before the stone marten and uttered the following words, which boomed and echoed throughout the garden in a beautiful, ominous song: “Who dares to enter my divine garden without invitation?”

The stone marten stood up, steadying herself before the divine image of the goddess. “It’s me,” she answered bravely.

The Goddess of the West looked down at the stone marten. “What is your name?” she asked. “What do your parents call you?”

“I have no kind,” replied the marten.

“Is that so?” said the goddess, perplexed. “You didn’t have a father or a mother? How did you manage to appear? Surely you came not out of thin air?”

“The stone rock gave birth to me,” answered the marten, “and the cold air of the country of Auyasku was the first to meet me in this world.”

“You’re lying,” accused Xiwanmu. “The ice cold country of Auyasku is far from us, across two seas, even.”

The marten then told the goddess the story of her journey.

“Well then,” said Xiwanmu. “You should be given a name.”

“I am the king of all martens!” shouted the marten proudly, totally forgetting the condition upon which predicated her crowning.

“Well, you look like the symbol of Tasung. But ‘sung’ means ‘naked’, and that doesn’t suit you at all. Thus only ‘Ta’ remains, which means ‘king’. There are twelve characters that denote names: guan, da, zhi, hui, zhan, zhu, xing, hai, ying, wu, yuan, ju.” The goddess paused for thought, and it seemed that the garden thought with her. “Let us call you Guan.” She nodded in satisfaction. “Your full name will be Ta-Guan.”

The marten jumped up in delight and exclaimed: “What a lovely name!”

If you want to know how the marten Ta-Guan got to the Heavenly Realm and what happened to her there, listen to the full story.