In the West, thunder is the weapon of kings. Zeus hurls his bolts from Olympus; Thor rides his chariot through storm and fire. Their power is dominion—the storm bent to will.
But in the East, thunder is not conquest. It is conscience.
Once, long before mortals learned to write their laws, a city thrived on deceit. Its rulers hoarded grain in hidden cellars while the people starved beneath their golden roofs. Each night, the cries of the hungry rose like smoke—but Heaven was silent.
Until one summer evening, when the air grew thick and still. Clouds gathered without wind. The moon dimmed. From the heart of the storm came a low, pulsing sound—boom… boom… boom—like a drum echoing through the bones of the earth.
The sky split open. A figure descended, vast and terrible: wings of shadow, claws of bronze, and eyes bright as burning metal. His name was Lei Gong, the Thunder Duke. Behind him glimmered Dian Mu, the Lady of Lightning, whose light revealed every hidden sin.
He spoke once, and his voice was the storm:"You have buried your mercy beneath gold. You have stolen from the mouths of the living. Answer to Heaven."
The rulers fled, clutching jewels and scrolls, but the thunder followed. Each drumbeat cracked a roof, each bolt struck a hoard. By dawn, the palaces were ash, and the rain had washed clean the city stones.
When the people woke, they found no corpses, only silence—and in the silence, the scent of iron and rain. A single drummark was burned into the ground, still warm.
Since that day, whenever thunder rolls over the hills, the elders bow toward the sky."Lei Gong is striking his drum," they whisper. "Not in anger, but in remembrance—that justice, though slow as clouds, always comes."