I continued reading the Chinese novel from my past entry. It’s called “Heaven Official’s Blessing” (天官賜福) by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu (莫想童秀). The story is really interesting. I always enjoy reading about deities and this book is not the exception. In this quotation, we have the main characters talking. The one referred as “the youth” is young man who was friends with the main character, the one who is a God who was fallen from the heavens multiple times.
In the mortal Realm, it was easy to find books on lore that spoke of the stories of gods and ghosts, the subjects ranging from their kindness and grudges to trivialities. Some were real and some fake. It wasn’t odd that the youth knew so much.
Xie Lian put down his scroll “Then, my friend, you know about gods, but do you know about ghosts too?”
“Which ghost?” the youth asked.
Xie Lian replied, “Crimson Rain Sought Flower, Hua Cheng.” (p.172)
I chose this fragment because of the philosophy it is talking about. Is everything that we read about the gods real? How can we know when it’s not?
This quotation contains the first mention of Hua Chen. He’s relevant for the novel since his first apparition. We could say he’s also one of the main characters.