My name is Shigandang — Stone Dares-To-Stand.
The Han primer Jijiu Zhang has a line: "Master the fierce tiger, the stone dares to stand; let nothing invade, and the dragon endures." Ever since, households set stones by their gates carved with "Taishan Stone Dares-to-Stand" to hold off ill fortune. My father named me for it — hoping that wherever I stood, there would be peace.
I'm nineteen. I learned my fighting from a retired soldier in town, six years of it. He calls me the most death-defying pupil he ever taught — and not as praise. Shigandang, he says, your style wins three times and loses once — and the loss is your life.
I didn't listen. With the plague on us, hunters need escorts, woodcutters travel in groups, Taogu's orchard needs a night watch. Who provides it? Government soldiers live in government paperwork, and the yao can't read. So I organized seven or eight half-grown lads into night patrols and called us the volunteer watch. Bailiff Xu didn't stop me. He said one thing: patrol, yes — but no heroics.
Last month I actually met the thing.
Second watch, west end of the orchard. It came down off the treetops and landed without a sound. I went at it with my staff. Looking back, that wasn't brave — it was stupid. It turned and looked at me, and every hair on my body stood up. It wasn't going to run. It was waiting for me to commit.
You can guess the rest. Six days in bed. If old Liu hadn't arrived banging his brass gong, I'd be fertilizing the orchard.
Those six days taught me something: a stone wards off evil not by charging, but by standing its ground. This stone is going to stand right here — patrols continue, but no more solo charges, no more heroics. New rules: pairs only; on sight, sound the gong first; we don't have to kill it — drive it off, see it clearly, report.
If you're going into the woods after the xiao, count me in. I won't chase glory. I'll guide, bang the gong, and guard your rear.
A stone belongs at the very bottom of the wall.