In the West, dreams are gifts or omens—Morpheus delivering visions to mortals, or Oneiroi shaping sleep with gentle hands. They guide, warn, or amuse, but rarely do they alter the very fabric of the world.
In the East, dreams are more than visions; they are bridges between reality and the divine, threads of fate spun by unseen hands.
Long ago, before the rivers were charted and mountains named, there existed Hua Shu, the Dream Weaver. She dwelled in a hidden realm, where clouds floated like silk and the stars sang softly in the dark. With fingers like silver mist, she wove the dreams of mortals, each thread shimmering with possibility, sorrow, or joy. The world outside her realm often trembled at the turning of her loom, though few could perceive its hand.
One night, a young scholar wandered into the mountains, lost and exhausted. He collapsed beneath a flowering tree, unaware that he had entered Hua Shu's domain. There, the Dream Weaver appeared, her eyes pools of shifting starlight. She wove a dream around him, at first gentle—a forest of calm rivers and singing birds—but soon, shadows crept into the weave: storms that split mountains, rivers that ran dry, flames licking the skies.
The scholar awoke, trembling, and realized that the dreams were no longer his alone—they were warnings, visions of imbalance between humans and nature. He tried to flee, but Hua Shu's loom continued to hum above him. "To live wisely," she whispered, "is to heed the threads you cannot touch, to respect the paths woven beyond your sight."
When he returned to the world of men, he carried the memory of forests burning and rivers frozen in mist. Villagers later spoke of him as a man who could see the pulse of fate, though they never guessed the Dream Weaver herself had guided him.
Even today, some who wander mountains at dusk speak of fleeting shadows, a silvered figure weaving the stars. It is Hua Shu, the Dream Weaver, whose threads shape both slumber and waking, reminding mortals that dreams are not mere visions—they are echoes of the cosmos itself.