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Nian history map.
Came into being ~2000 BCE at the mouth of the Yangtze River, right outside of Shanghai. He terrorized villages around the riverside and ocean front during the start of each lunar year, eating cattle, foodstuffs and people whole without an ounce of remorse, before returning to the ocean to slumber.
A god came down to visit the people of these villages, and tell them how to scare away the year monster with the color red and loud noises, that drove the still baby monster back into the ocean to hide and sleep for over two thousand years.
In the ocean the Nian beast aged. His body grew, his brain developed, but his life experiences remained that of a child (in ancient monster terms) until the dragon of the river Yangtze was chased into the ocean by human development and pollution of its river. The dragon came across the sleeping Nian, waking the beast and a battle began. Though the dragon was weakened by the human treatment of its home, it still largely outclassed the Nian beast, and Nian was forced to retreat up the river to safety.
He traveled to the junction of the Yangtze and Minjiang river, and followed the Minjiang all the way up to the town of Zipingpuzhen, at the mountain foothills in the Chengdu province. There the Nian retreated into Longchi National Forest park to lick his wounds and recover, but recovery did not happen. After such an intense battle, and such a long journey the Nian's health continued to decline.
His savior came in the form of a small boy named Luo Yang, who was staying with his grandparents during a holiday. He offered the Nian small scraps of food, which the greedy monster readily inhaled, but even this food couldn't seem to pull Nian into a state of recovery. In a low moment when the young boy lost any initial shyness and approached the dangerous monster's mouth, the Nian debated eating Luo Yang for more sustenance than the small bit of food that was offered to him could provide.
But then something strange happened, the Nian changed his mind. The boy approached, close enough to pet the Nian's large nose, and the Nian closed his mouth and allowed the boy to have his fill of lavishing attention on him, before returning safely home to his grandparents.
Not once in his long life had the Nian ever done something even remotely selfless, and this small act of basic decency was so out of character for the monster that it caught the attention of a goddess, the daughter of the god who had taught humans how to scare off the Nian so long ago. She came down to the foothills of the mountains, and offered Nian a chance to live if he accepted her conditions: he would be given a human form and his beastly powers stripped from him, to be returned only as he proved his own ability to learn empathy and compassion. With no other option available the Nian readily agreed, and the next time he opened his eyes he found himself in a human hospital, in a very human body.
The little boy who had been feeding him when he was a beast had found a young man of indistinct age, and no identification lying half dead where he'd last left his monster friend, and immediately gotten help from his grandparents. Getting the Nian out of the hospital proved to be difficult, not because of his weakened state, but because of his lack of records that proved he belonged in the country in the first place, and his inability to speak in a way that anyone around him understood.
You see, the dialect spoken in Shanghai is very, very different than that spoken in Chengdu area.
Also, the Nian spoke and read the Chinese that people spoke and read thousands of years ago, and the evolution of the language left him sounding like he was speaking a foreign language to the staff, and Luo Yang's family. Still, through a small miracle the Nian was taken in by Luo Yang's family, and even returned with the boy to his mother and father's home in Chongqing where he became both a friend, guardian and student to the little boy. While he watched him and kept him safe from harm, he also learned lessons from him including language, understanding of the modern world, and the basic interactions and behaviors of humans.
Came into being ~2000 BCE at the mouth of the Yangtze River, right outside of Shanghai. He terrorized villages around the riverside and ocean front during the start of each lunar year, eating cattle, foodstuffs and people whole without an ounce of remorse, before returning to the ocean to slumber.
A god came down to visit the people of these villages, and tell them how to scare away the year monster with the color red and loud noises, that drove the still baby monster back into the ocean to hide and sleep for over two thousand years.
In the ocean the Nian beast aged. His body grew, his brain developed, but his life experiences remained that of a child (in ancient monster terms) until the dragon of the river Yangtze was chased into the ocean by human development and pollution of its river. The dragon came across the sleeping Nian, waking the beast and a battle began. Though the dragon was weakened by the human treatment of its home, it still largely outclassed the Nian beast, and Nian was forced to retreat up the river to safety.
He traveled to the junction of the Yangtze and Minjiang river, and followed the Minjiang all the way up to the town of Zipingpuzhen, at the mountain foothills in the Chengdu province. There the Nian retreated into Longchi National Forest park to lick his wounds and recover, but recovery did not happen. After such an intense battle, and such a long journey the Nian's health continued to decline.
His savior came in the form of a small boy named Luo Yang, who was staying with his grandparents during a holiday. He offered the Nian small scraps of food, which the greedy monster readily inhaled, but even this food couldn't seem to pull Nian into a state of recovery. In a low moment when the young boy lost any initial shyness and approached the dangerous monster's mouth, the Nian debated eating Luo Yang for more sustenance than the small bit of food that was offered to him could provide.
But then something strange happened, the Nian changed his mind. The boy approached, close enough to pet the Nian's large nose, and the Nian closed his mouth and allowed the boy to have his fill of lavishing attention on him, before returning safely home to his grandparents.
Not once in his long life had the Nian ever done something even remotely selfless, and this small act of basic decency was so out of character for the monster that it caught the attention of a goddess, the daughter of the god who had taught humans how to scare off the Nian so long ago. She came down to the foothills of the mountains, and offered Nian a chance to live if he accepted her conditions: he would be given a human form and his beastly powers stripped from him, to be returned only as he proved his own ability to learn empathy and compassion. With no other option available the Nian readily agreed, and the next time he opened his eyes he found himself in a human hospital, in a very human body.
The little boy who had been feeding him when he was a beast had found a young man of indistinct age, and no identification lying half dead where he'd last left his monster friend, and immediately gotten help from his grandparents. Getting the Nian out of the hospital proved to be difficult, not because of his weakened state, but because of his lack of records that proved he belonged in the country in the first place, and his inability to speak in a way that anyone around him understood.
You see, the dialect spoken in Shanghai is very, very different than that spoken in Chengdu area.
Also, the Nian spoke and read the Chinese that people spoke and read thousands of years ago, and the evolution of the language left him sounding like he was speaking a foreign language to the staff, and Luo Yang's family. Still, through a small miracle the Nian was taken in by Luo Yang's family, and even returned with the boy to his mother and father's home in Chongqing where he became both a friend, guardian and student to the little boy. While he watched him and kept him safe from harm, he also learned lessons from him including language, understanding of the modern world, and the basic interactions and behaviors of humans.