诸怀

The Classic of Northern Mountains: three hundred li north is Mount Beiyue, thick with thorny shrubs and iron-hard timber. A beast lives there, shaped like an ox, with four horns, human eyes, and boar ears. Its name is Zhu Huai. Its call is the cry of a wild goose. It eats people. Mount Beiyue is the third peak of the northern range's first chain. The slopes are covered in thorn bushes and "hard wood" you cannot cut. An unfriendly mountain — even the plants have spines. Zhu Huai lives there. Ox body, four horns, human eyes, pig ears, a goose's call, and a taste for people. Take it apart and every component is real. Only the assembly is fiction. Four-horned ox: genuinely occurs. Jacob sheep routinely grow four to six horns; it is a heritable trait, not a legend. Multi-horned cattle are occasionally recorded too. Someone saw one and wrote it down. Human eyes: an ox's eyes are already large and dark, with horizontal pupils. Give one more sclera and a rounder pupil and it reads as human. This is the easiest feature to misjudge. Boar ears: pig ears droop, ox ears stick out sideways. An ox with drooping ears does look like a pig. A goose's call: oxen do not honk. But an injured or rutting ox can produce a high, long note that carries across a valley and sounds remarkably like a waterbird. So Zhu Huai is very likely a deformed ox, observed repeatedly and misremembered in the retelling. Every anomaly has a real counterpart except one — eating people. And that is the only reason anyone remembers it. The northern classic is full of man-eaters: Zhu Huai, the Taotie, the Mafu, the Xiqu. The north is cold, sparsely settled, and full of predators. People vanish. Blaming a specific monster is easier than admitting that in those forests anything can happen. A mountain of thorns, an ox with four horns and human eyes, a goose's cry, and a taste for flesh. If you hear geese at night, do not turn around.

เขเป่ยเยวี่ยเต็มไปด้วยไม้หนามและไม้แข็ง สัตว์ที่นี่รูปร่างเหมือนวัว แต่มีสี่เขา ตาคน หูหมูป่า เสียงร้องเหมือนห่านป่า และกินคน แยกชิ้นส่วนดู ทุกอย่างมีจริงในธรรมชาติ: วัวสี่เขามีอยู่จริง (แกะจาคอบ), ตาวัวใหญ่ดำคล้ายคน, หูหมูป่าน้อย, เสียงวัวบาดเจ็บฟังเหมือนนกน้ำ มีเพียง "กินคน" ที่ตรวจสอบไม่ได้ — และนั่นคือเหตุผลเดียวที่ทำให้มันถูกจดจำ

Gunung Beiyue penuh semak berduri dan kayu keras. Binatangnya macam lembu, empat tanduk, mata manusia, telinga babi hutan, bunyi macam angsa liar, dan makan orang. Setiap bahagian ada dalam alam: lembu empat tanduk wujud (biri-biri Jacob), mata lembu memang besar dan gelap, telinga babi hutan kecil, lembu cedera berbunyi macam burung air. Hanya "makan orang" tak dapat disahkan — dan itulah satu-satunya sebab ia diingati.

Núi Bắc Nhạc đầy cây gai và gỗ cứng. Thú hình trâu, bốn sừng, mắt người, tai lợn, tiếng như ngỗng trời, ăn thịt người. Mỗi bộ phận đều có thật: trâu bốn sừng tồn tại (cừu Jacob), mắt trâu vốn to đen, tai lợn rừng nhỏ, trâu bị thương kêu như chim nước. Chỉ "ăn thịt người" là không kiểm chứng được — và đó là lý do duy nhất nó được nhớ.

Gunung Beiyue penuh semak berduri dan kayu keras. Binatangnya mirip lembu, empat tanduk, mata manusia, telinga babi hutan, suara seperti angsa liar, dan makan orang. Setiap bagian ada di alam: lembu empat tanduk nyata (domba Jacob), mata lembu memang besar dan gelap, telinga babi hutan kecil, lembu terluka bersuara seperti burung air. Hanya "makan orang" tak bisa dipastikan — dan itulah satu-satunya alasan ia diingat.