Yinglong, the Winged Dragon of Rain

What the Shan Hai Jing says

Yinglong appears in Great Wilderness: East, at a mountain in the far northeast called Xiongli Earth Hill. The entry is a small story rather than a description. Yinglong lives at the southern pole. It killed Chiyou and Kuafu, and after that it could not go back up to heaven. Because the rain dragon stayed below, the land often suffered drought, and when drought came, people made images in the shape of Yinglong, and heavy rain followed. It is one of the earliest records in China of making a dragon image to call for rain.

The war against Chiyou

Great Wilderness: North tells the battle in more detail. Chiyou made weapons and attacked the Yellow Emperor, who ordered Yinglong to fight him on the plains of Jizhou. Yinglong stored up the waters, but Chiyou asked the Wind Lord and the Rain Master to unleash a great storm. The Yellow Emperor then sent down a heavenly woman named Ba, the rain stopped, and Chiyou was killed. Ba could not return to heaven either, and wherever she lived no rain fell. The same book says that after killing Chiyou, Yinglong also killed Kuafu, then went to live in the south, which is why the south has so much rain.

A dragon with wings

Guo Pu, whose 4th-century notes are printed with the Shan Hai Jing, explains the name simply: Yinglong is a dragon with wings. Wings set it apart from the long, wingless dragons of most later art. Yinglong also appears in the Tianwen, the Heavenly Questions of the Chuci, which asks what Yinglong traced on the ground. The commentator Wang Yi explained that when Yu the Great was controlling the floods, a winged dragon drew lines on the earth with its tail to show where channels should be dug.

Yinglong in our game

In Beasts of Shanhai Yinglong opens every battle with a storm. We kept both sides of its story: the stored waters that hurt every foe at once, and the rain that weakens fire. It is a Water beast, and it shares the Great Wilderness books with the Torch Dragon, another dragon-like god of the far north. Its high cost reflects its place in the myths: a dragon that once fought beside the Yellow Emperor.

Yinglong, Rain Dragon in Beasts of Shanhai

In our free browser game Beasts of Shanhai, Yinglong, Rain Dragon is a Water beast that costs 3 Gold. Its skill is Rainstorm. At the start of a battle every foe takes damage equal to 10% of its own max HP (at least 1), and Fire foes lose 20% attack (at least 2). At two stars Fire foes lose 30%, and at three stars the damage is 15% and Fire foes lose 40%.

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