Hou Yi and Queen Mother of the West

After the nine suns had fallen and the scorched ground had not yet cooled, Hou Yi left his people with his bow on his back and went west into Kunlun. He crossed the weak water and the snowfields, asked to be received where the Queen Mother of the West lived, and asked how a mortal might escape death.

The Queen Mother brought out a dose of the elixir of deathlessness and told him that if one person took it all he would rise to heaven, and that if two shared it both would live long. Hou Yi did not take it on Kunlun but hid it in his robe and carried it home, and gave it to Chang’e to keep.

Feng Meng later broke in for it while he was away, and Chang’e in her extremity swallowed the whole dose and rose on the wind into the moon palace. Hou Yi came home to an empty house and saw only the packet lying by the table; the elixir Kunlun had granted had gone with Chang’e into the moon.