It is said that Mr. Renhe Ren, of Daochu village, in the province of Quan Shijie, in his forty-second year of life, was seized by a great rage because of his long-standing enemy, who was constantly working to hinder and ruin any of his activities and projects. Faced with the umpteenth abuse, Mr. Renhe Ren felt that his harmony and self-control were going to be lost. He was no longer able to feel the noble sentiments worthy of a superior man.
Then he remembered the words of the wise man. "Sit down along the river bank and wait, sooner or later you will see the corpse of your enemy pass". So, he left the village of Daochu and went down to the river. He found a willow with a wide foliage that bent gently over the water, and sat down in his shadow, determined to wait until the wisdom of the ancestors had brought a solution to his problem.
He awaited for days and nights, meditating. Sun, rain, wind and fog alternated tormenting him, but neither the heat, nor the cold, nor the humidity, nor the insects distracted him from his waiting. Time passed, until one day in late autumn, the stream swollen from the rains brought a corpse to its feet, face down. Mr. Renhe Ren shook himself from his meditation and leaned towards the muddy water, his heart finally calm.
Great was his surprise when he saw…
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The body of a child. His calm quickly turned to anguish as he reached out to the child. He tried to save the boy, dragging him from the murky waters edge. The boy lay face up on the river bank, the mud covered him from head to toe despite this Mr. Renhe Ren recognised the boy. The boy was his childhood best friend, Abrel.
“I don’t understand.”
He whispered over and over to himself until an ethereal creature sprung from the river.
“Why do you cry good sir?”
Renhe looked at the creature in astonishment.
“This is not what I wanted.” He said.
The creature stepped forward, his shape changing to reveal a humanoid figure, his feet never leaving the water.
“My name is xelox, God of the river, you have prayed here for several days and several nights for your enemy to be slain and brought to you, here is the proof. Now be gone.”
Renhe rose to his feet, anger surging through him.
“I wanted the man to be killed, not him as a boy.”
“What difference does it make, your enemy is defeated?”
“He was innocent.”
The child’s cold decaying skin appeared to dissolve within the water, Renhe stepped back in fright.
“You have forgotten your own past, he was no stranger to you, you are your own worst enemy in the hands of friendship.”
The river deity lifted his hands and a wave, larger than a river could produce, leapt up from the bed and drenched Mr. Renhe Ren. Renhe coughed, his lungs filling with water, he dropped to his knees in panic as he fought against the suffocation.
A small hand reached out to him. The instant he took the hand in his own, the water vanished from his lungs, he could breathe clearly again. He looked at the boy and remembered, he remembered the day he had been saved from drowning by a stranger, a stranger who became his best friend, Abrel.
He asked the river God. “Why would you show me this?”
And Xelox responded. “So you would know who your true enemy is, yourself. The man you claim to hate has shown nothing but compassion and loyalty to you, yet you turn away his offers of help, you snub him and force him down into the mud. You betrayed a sacred bond. Return to the Village before the stars appear tonight otherwise this will be your fate.”
He pointed to the body and succinctly vanished.
Mr. Renhe Ren clambered to his feet and set off for his home at the fastest run he could. His aged body struggled under the immense strain, he tired and ached but he persisted.
In the centre of Daochu village, a trial was being held. Abrel, accused of a crime, was seconds away from being hanged. Renhe ran to the stage. He bore witness to Abrel’s true character, retelling the story of their childhood, recounting his bravery and in the process reconciling with his old friend.
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