Gods 015: Going into Industry

A major character explores a career change after 40 years cultivating his Dao.

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Welcome to the Chinese Lore Podcast, where I retell classic Chinese stories in English. This is episode 15 of Investiture of the Gods. 

Last time, Nezha got his body back, and the first thing he did was to go settle the score with his father Li Jing for smashing up his temple. He was ready to skewer Li Jing with his spear, but then a Daoist master named Wenshu (2,1) stopped him and gave him a good caning to boot. Then, Nezha’s master, Fairy Primordial, showed up and told his disciple to cut it out and told Li Jing to go on home. But once Li Jing left, Fairy Primordial told Nezha to go on back to his cave and that he would be along shortly. Well, as soon as Nezha was out of earshot of his master, he resumed his quest for vengeance. Soon, he saw Li Jing up ahead.

Li Jing was using the earth element to fast-travel when he suddenly heard Nezha yelling at him from behind. He lamented to himself, “Looks like the priest didn’t keep his word. If he was trying to save me, then he shouldn’t have let Nezha go. Yet, he let Nezha go right after I left. How is this helping me? What should I do?”

Li Jing was panicking when suddenly, he heard someone call out from the top of a hill, “Is that Li Jing down there?” 

Li Jing looked up and saw a Daoist priest leaning against a pine tree and a rock.

“Master, yes, I am Li Jing!”

“Why are you in such a panic?”

“Nezha is hot on my trail. Please save me!”

“Come up here and stand behind me, and I’ll save you,” the priest said.

Li Jing scrambled up the hill and hid behind the priest. While he was still panting, Nezha showed up at the bottom of the hill and saw the two of them. He rushed up the hill, and the priest asked if he was Nezha.

“That’s right. Priest, why did you let Li Jing hide behind you?” Nezha demanded.

“Why are you chasing him?” the priest asked.

Nezha recounted the bad blood between father and son, all the way up through how his master had supposedly settled this family feud just now. 

“Well, since you had agreed to drop this matter, aren’t you going back on your word by chasing him again?” the priest said.

“Mind your own business,” Nezha scoffed. “I’m determined to catch him today to satisfy my hatred.”

The priest now turned to Li Jing and said, “Well, in that case, why don’t you go ahead and trade a few blows with him.”

”Master, that beast is ridiculously strong,” a flabbergasted Li Jing said. “I’m no match for him.”

But the priest spat in his face and slapped him on the back, telling him, “Go fight him. I’m here. It’ll be alright.”

Left with no choice, Li Jing grabbed his halberd and started to trade blows with Nezha on the hill. Now, remember that the last time they fought, Li Jing could barely last a couple exchanges before he was exhausted. But this time, the two of them traded blows for 60 bouts, and it was Nezha who was sweating up a storm and struggling to fend off Li Jing.

“Li Jing should be no match for me,” Nezha thought to himself. “But that priest spat on him and slapped him on the back. That must have something to do with this. Let me go kill that priest first, and then take care of Li Jing.”

So Nezha suddenly leaped away from the fight and stabbed at the priest. But the priest opened his mouth and immediately a white lotus appeared and blocked the spear.

“Li Jing, hold off the spear,” the priest said, and Li Jing immediately did as he said.

The priest turned to Nezha and said, “You wretch. You were fighting with your father. I have no quarrel with you. Why did you try to stab me? Good thing my white lotus blocked it, or I would have fallen for you dirty trick.”

“Li Jing was no match for me before,” Nezha shot back. “Why did you spit on him and slap him on the back when you told him to fight me? You’re obviously playing a trick on me and making it impossible for me to beat him. That’s why I tried to stab you.”

“You wicked brat! How dare you?!” the priest scolded him.

That ticked off Nezha, and he raised his spear and stabbed at the priest’s head again. The priest leaped out of the way and raised his sleeve skyward. Suddenly, clouds gathered and an object came crashing down from the heavens. It was a pagoda, and it landed right over Nezha, trapping him inside. The priest then smacked the pagoda with both hands, and inside the pagoda, flames shot out. Soon, Nezha was screaming for mercy.

“Nezha, are you willing to make peace with your father?” the priest asked.

“I will, master, I will!” Nezha yelled time and again.

“In that case, I’ll spare you,” the priest said. He then retrieved the pagoda. Nezha opened his eyes, felt his body up and down, and could not find so much as a single scorch mark. 

“What strange thing is this?” he thought to himself. “That priest really has some fancy tricks.”

The priest now said, “Nezha, since you’re going to make peace with Li Jing, come kowtow to your father.”

Nezha didn’t want to, but the priest threatened to unleash his pagoda again, so Nezha had no choice but to swallow his anger and pride and kowtow to Li Jing. Still, he didn’t look happy about it at all.

“And you must call him father,” the priest added.

Now THIS was a bridge too far, and Nezha refused. The priest again threatened to drop the pagoda on him, and that forced Nezha to quickly say to Li Jing, “Father, I am sorry.”

But this whole time, Nezha was gritting his teeth and thinking to himself, “Li Jing, you can’t walk around with this priest by your side all the time. Just you wait.”

But then, the priest told Li Jing, “Kneel, and receive my magic pagoda. If Nezha disobeys you, you can use the pagoda to burn him.”

Ah crap. Nezha didn’t see that coming. As he was lamenting his bad luck, the priest said to him, “Nezha, from now on, you and your father must be harmonious with each other. In the future, you will both assist a sage lord and attain success. Do not revisit the past. Alright, you can go on back.”

With things as they are, Nezha had no choice but to leave and go on back to his master’s cave on Qianyuan Mountain. Once he left, Li Jing asked the priest for his name. The priest told him, “I am Master Burning Lamp from the Prime Consciousness Cave on the Divine Hawk Mountain. You failed to attain immortality through the Dao, so you have enjoyed wealth and power in the mortal realm instead. But right now, the Shang court has lost its virtue and the world is in chaos. Give up your government rank and reside in the mountains. Forget about fame and wealth for now. Wait until spoiler spoiler spoiler, and then you can come out and render service and make a name for yourself.”

Li Jing kowtowed and thanked him and returned home, where he indeed followed Master Burning Lamp’s instructions, giving up his post and becoming a recluse.

As it turns out, Master Burning Lamp was a senior member of the Chan school of Daoism, the same sect that Nezha’s master, Fairy Primordial, belonged to. In fact, within the sect, he was second only to the sect’s founder, the Heavenly Primogenitor. Fairy Primordial had specifically asked him to help temper Nezha for the grand task to come, and I guess Master Burning Lamp’s solution was to threaten to repeatedly drop a building on the kid until he fell into line.

So what was this grand task that Nezha and Li Jing were being groomed to undertake, and which various characters in the novel had alluded to? Well, if it was up to the author of the novel, all of that would have been revealed on page 10. But that’s like revealing the plot of “Avengers: End Game” 10 minutes into the first Iron Man movie. That’s why I have done my best to sidestep potential spoilers. Anyway, we’ll get to all that in time, but for now let’s leave our newly harmonized father-and-son duo and go meet another player in the drama to come.

As I have mentioned, the founder of the Chan sect of Daoism was a powerful immortal named Heavenly Primogenitor. He resided in the Jade Emptiness Palace on Kunlun (1,2) Mountain, where he instructed disciples in the ways of the Dao, or the Way. One of those disciples was a man named Jiang (1) Ziya (3,2), a guy who, by all accounts, tried really hard and studied the Dao diligently but, bless his heart, just wasn’t very good at this. 

One day, Heavenly Primogenitor summoned Jiang Ziya and asked him, “How long has it been since you first came here?”

“Your student came here when he was 32,” Jiang Ziya said. “I am now 72.”

“You have a poor lot in life,” Heavenly Primogenitor told him. “It will be difficult for you to attain immortality through cultivation of the Dao. You should instead enjoy the pleasures of the mortal world. Right now, spoiler spoiler spoiler. You should leave the mountain and, more spoiler spoiler spoiler. That would ensure that the 40 years you have spent here don’t go to waste. This is no place for you to stay long-term. Pack up and leave as soon as you can.”

Uhh, no place for me to stay long term, huh? Maybe you could have told me that some time in the last 40 years? 

“Master, I really am committed to pursuing the Way,” Jiang Ziya pleaded. “I have dedicated years to it. Even though my cultivation has been as insignificant as throwing a needle into the ocean, I hope you will exercise compassion and point me in the right direction. I am willing to stay here and continue to do my best to cultivate my Dao. I would not dare to yearn for wealth and rank in the mortal realm. I pray that you will retract your decree.”

But Heavenly Primogenitor told him, “This is what your destiny holds. You must listen to heaven. Do not disobey its will.”

Jiang Ziya, however, still lingered, unwilling to give up the thing he had pursued for decades. But one of the Chan sect’s senior members, Immortal of the South Pole, told him, “This is a rare opportunity and you must not let it go. Besides, this is what heaven has preordained. It is impossible to dodge your destiny. You may be leaving now, but once you have attained success, you can come back.”

Uhh, sure, that’s easy for you to say. You HAVE tenure! But in any case, Jiang Ziya had no choice but to pack up his stuff and go. Before he departed, he kneeled in front of his master and said with tears in his eyes, “I am leaving per your command. Can you tell me what the future holds?”

Heavenly Primogenitor said, “I have eight lines of guidance for you. You will understand when they come to fruition.”

Now, I’m not going to recite the eight lines, because, again, spoilers. But I’ll just say that they start with “Live in poverty for 20 years.” So Heavenly Primogenitor is really giving Jiang Ziya a whole lot to look forward to about life outside the ivory tower, or in this case, outside the Jade Emptiness Palace. But he did tell JIang Ziya, “You will return here one day.”

So Jiang Ziya bid his master and his fellow trainees goodbye and left. Once outside the sanctuary, he thought to himself, “I have no relatives. Where should I go? I’m like a bird that has lost its forest. I don’t even have a branch to perch on.”

Just then, he thought of someone. “I have a sworn brother in the capital named Song (4) Yiren (4,2). I can go stay with him.”

So Jiang Ziya set off for the capital. He might not have been anything close to a Daoist master, but he did learn the entry-level skill of fast-travel via the elements. So riding the earth element, he soon arrived outside the capital. His sworn brother’s residence was about 10 miles outside the south gate of the city. As Jiang Ziya approached, he saw that the compound still looked as he remembered it, but the people all looked different now, and this made him sigh about how long he had been away. He walked up to the front door and asked the doorman if his master was in.

“Please tell him that his old friend Jiang Ziya is calling,” he said.

The message went into the residence. Song Yiren (4,2) was in the middle of balancing his accounts when he got the word, and he rushed out and said, “Brother, why have I not heard from you in decades?!”

The two greeted each other and sat down in the parlor. Song Yiren told Jiang Ziya, “I have often yearned to see you. What great fortune it is to meet you again today.”

Jiang Ziya told him, “After we last parted, I sought to pursue the Way and leave the mortal realm behind. Alas, my lot is poor and I could not attain my goal. It is my fortune to see you again today.”

Song Yiren then told his men to prepare a meal, and he asked Jiang Ziya, “Do you eat meat, or are you vegetarian now?”

“Since I have become a man of religion, how can I eat meat or drink wine?” Jiang Ziya said. “I am a vegetarian.”

“But wine is made of precious essences,” Song Yiren said. “Besides, even immortals have banquets. It’s no big deal to drink a little wine.”

“In that case, I shall obey,” Jiang Ziya relented.

So the two of them sat down to food and drank merrily. Song Yiren asked Jiang Ziya if he had learned anything in his 40 years on Kunlun Mountain.

“Of course! What else would I have been doing?” Jiang Ziya said.

“Then what Daoist magic did  you learn?” 

“I fetched water, watered the trees, planted peach orchards, lit fires, tended the stove …”

Song Yiren cut him off and laughed, “But that’s just servant work. Oh well. In any case, you’re back now. Why don’t you find a profession instead of pursuing religion? There is no need to go anywhere else; just stay at my house. It’s not like we’re just passing acquaintances.”

Jiang Ziya agreed, and then Song Yiren said, “As the old saying goes, ‘Of the three unfilial acts, the greatest offense is not extending your line.’ Brother, since we’re so close, let me find you a wife so you can sire a child to keep your family’s name alive.”

“Well, we can talk about that some other time,” Jiang Ziya said, trying to beg off. The two then kept chatting deep into the night, and from that day forth, Jiang Ziya took up residence in Song Yiren’s home.

The next morning, despite Jiang Ziya’s best efforts the night before to sidestep his friend’s suggestion of marriage, Song Yiren set out to find his friend a wife. He got on his donkey and rode to the home of a local squire named Ma (3). Squire Ma came out to greet him with a big smile and asked what he was doing there.

“I have come to propose a match for your daughter,” Song Yiren told him. 

Squire Ma was delighted, and they sat down to tea. He then asked about the match.

“He is a native of Xuzhou (3, 1) on the coast of the Eastern Sea,” Song Yiren said. “His name is Jiang Ziya and has been a close friend. He would be the perfect match.”

“Well, since you’re proposing it, it must be right,” Squire Ma said.

And so it was agreed. Song Yiren handed over four silver ingots as a betrothal gift. Squire Ma accepted and treated him to a feast. After the feast, Song Yiren went home to tell Jiang Ziya the good news.

Jiang Ziya was just wondering where his friend had gone all day. When Song Yiren got home, the first thing he said to Jiang Ziya was congratulations.

“What are you congratulating me about?” Jiang Ziya asked.

“I found you a perfect match today,” Song Yiren said.

“But today is not an auspicious day,” Jiang Ziya fretted.

“Don’t worry about it; heaven blesses a good man,” Song Yiren reassured him.

“Which family is she from?”

“She is the daughter of Squire Ma (3) Hong (2). She possesses both talent and beauty, a perfect match for you. And at 68, she is still a virgin.”

Song Yiren now laid out wine to congratulate Jiang Ziya. After they drank, he encouraged Jiang Ziya to pick a good date for the wedding. Jiang Ziya dutifully complied, and so it was done. On the selected date, he wed Lady Ma (3). Song Yiren hosted the wedding feast and invited all the neighbors to witness the joining of the couple.

But there were problems to this marriage right from the get-go. Jiang Ziya spent his days lamenting how he had failed in his cultivation of the Dao. That weighed on him heavily, and he was in no mood to romance his new wife. For her part, Lady Ma knew not what troubled her husband, and so she just assumed he was impotent and useless.

Soon, two months had passed, and Lady Ma asked Jiang Ziya, “Is Mr. Song your cousin?”

“No, he’s my sworn brother.”

“Ah, I see. Well, even if he were your relative by blood, every feast has an ending. While he’s still alive, you and I can live here untroubled. But what about when he’s gone? What will we do then? As the saying goes, ‘A person born into the world must be independent and support himself.’ You should do some business, so that we have something to fall back on in case of calamity.”

“You’re quite right,” Jiang Ziya agreed.

“Well, what do you know how to do?” Lady Ma asked him.

“I have been studying Daoism on Kunlun Mountain since I was 32,” he said. “I don’t know how to do any worldly business. The only thing I know how to do is make rakes.”

“Well, that could be a good trade,” she said. “And we have bamboo in our back garden. Cut some stalks and use the splints to make rakes, and then you can sell them in the capital. It would bring in a little bit of money.”

Jiang Ziya did as she suggested. He cut some bamboo, made some rakes, and carried a load of them into the capital to sell. But he sat there on the street from morning to mid-afternoon and did not sell a single one. Figuring that he still had a 10-mile walk ahead of him to get home, Jiang Ziya decided to call it quits for the day. So he carried a load of rakes 20 miles in all that day, and when he got home, his stomach was growling and his shoulder was swollen from carrying the load, and he didn’t have a single sale to show for it. 

When Lady Ma went to greet her husband at the door, she saw that he had brought back the exact same load of rakes that he had taken out that morning. Before she could even ask, Jiang Ziya pointed at her and said, “You’re not a good wife. You were afraid that I would hang around the house all day, so you told me to go sell rakes. They must not need any rakes in the capital. Otherwise, how come I couldn’t sell a single one all day? And my shoulders are all swollen from the load.”

Uhh, really man? You’re going to blame your wife for your failure as a salesman?

Lady Ma, though, was not one to humor such bad behavior from her man. She gave as good as she got. 

“Everyone in the world needs a rake,” she shot back. “Why are you blaming me instead of yourself for being a crappy salesman?!”

The two of them traded some more barbs, and it soon became a full-on quarrel. Song Yiren heard them arguing and hurried over to ask what was wrong. Jiang Ziya recounted his failure at rake-selling, and Song Yiren said, “Look, even if you had a family of 30, I can provide for you, much less just the two of you. There’s no need for this.”

But Lady Ma said, “Brother Song, thank you for your kindness. But we two must have our own means of living. We can’t just depend on you our whole lives.”

“Sister-in-law, you may be right, but there is no need to sell rakes,” Song Yiren said. “I have so much wheat in my barn that it’s starting to sprout. I can have the young men grind some of it into flour, and my brother can go sell that. Won’t that be better than selling rakes?”

So while Jiang Ziya busied himself with disposing of his rakes, some servants busied themselves milling flour. The next day, Jiang Ziya went back into the capital, this time, carrying a load of flour. He walked all around the city, going past all four gates. And yet, once again, he did not make a single sale. By now, his stomach was growling once more, and I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but a load of flour was probably much heavier than a load of bamboo rakes. 

With his shoulder aching, Jiang Ziya left the city through the south gate and sat down against the city wall to take a break, all the while lamenting his terrible lot in life. After a while, he got up to go. But just then, someone said, “Hey you with the flour. Wait up.”

“I have a customer!” Jiang Ziya exclaimed. He set down his load, and the man approached him.

“How much do you want?” Jiang Ziya asked.

“One copper’s worth.”

Well, that’s a pittance, but a sale was a sale, and maybe it just takes this first one to turn his luck around. So Jiang Ziya opened his flour basket and started to scoop out some flour. But just then, he heard someone behind him shout, “Hey, flour peddler. Get out of the way! There’s a horse coming!”

He turned around and saw a horse galloping right at him. As it turns out, Huang the Flying Tiger had been training the army in the nearby camps, and one of the horses was startled by the sound of the explosive signaling the end of training. The horse broke its reins and took off.

Seeing the horse coming right at him, Jiang Ziya quickly stepped out of the way. But when he had set down his load to scoop out flour, he had put the rope that he used to carry the flour baskets on the ground. As the horse dashed by, its hoofs caught the rope, and next thing you know, the two baskets of wheat flour became airborne. When the dust had settled, Jiang Ziya was covered from head to toe in flour. And on top of it, his one would-be customer saw that he was now wearing his merchandise and decided to take his business elsewhere. 

Later that day, Lady Ma saw her husband come home with two empty baskets and was delighted.

“Wow, they must really want flour in the capital,” she said.

But Jiang Ziya angrily tossed the baskets aside and cursed her. “This is all your fault, you meddlesome hussy!”

“Why are you cursing me? It’s a good thing that you sold all your flour.”

“I carried this whole load into the city, and it took until the afternoon to sell a single copper’s worth!”

“But you came back with empty baskets. Did you sell the rest on credit?”

“No! A horse got tangled up in the rope and dragged the baskets and it got all over me. This is all your fault, you hussy!”

Before he finished cursing, Lady Ma spat in his face and scolded him. “Why are you blaming me?! You’re the useless one. You are nothing but a rice bucket and a clothing sack. All you can do is eat and wear out clothes!”

“You hussy! How dare you spit on and curse your husband!” Jiang Ziya fumed.

Honestly dude, you’re getting off easy for being horrible to your wife to cover up your own feelings of inadequacy. And I’ll just say now that the book never really buys it back. We never get a redemptive arc from Jiang Ziya in his dealings with his wife, and in fact, the book seems to end up on his side of the argument. Sigh. What are you going to do? This thing was written some 400 years ago.

As the couple quarreled again, Song Yiren again intervened and asked what happened. Jiang Ziya recounted that day’s misadventure, and Song Yiren laughed and said, “What’s a little bit of flour worth? There’s no need for the two of you to act like this. Brother, come with me.”

So Song Yiren brought Jiang Ziya to his study, and they sat down. Jiang Ziya said, “Brother, thank you for your kindness in helping me. I have such bad luck. I fail at everything. I’m really ashamed.”

“A man is controlled by destiny, and a flower only blooms when the time is right,” Song Yiren said. “As the old saying goes, ‘Even the Yellow River becomes clear at some point, so how can one’s luck not change?’ There is no need for such lamentations. I own about 50 restaurants in the capital. Let me invite my friends so you can meet them. Then, each day, you can go run one of the restaurants. Doesn’t that sound good?”

Jiang Ziya thanked his sworn brother again for his kindness, and Song Yiren set about putting his plan into motion. To see how Jiang Ziya the restaurateur will fare, tune in to the next episode of the Chinese Lore Podcast. Thanks for listening!

Music in This Episode

• “Sao Meo” by Doug Maxwell / Zac Zinger
• “Ravines” by Elphnt (from YouTube audio library)
• “Dark Toys” by SYBS (from YouTube audio library)
• 21:30: take his business elsewhere