Week 7 Story: The King of Kings?

There once was a king that lived at home. He wasn't your usual king, but he was a king, nevertheless. His name was Jimmy. Jimmy was a young and thriving 4th grader who loved to play and just have fun. Jimmy was also a massive fan of toys and especially action figures. Jimmy really wanted the new GI Joe action figures for his birthday, but his family had been going through a rough patch and they did not have much money to spend on toys. Jimmy was saddened by the fact that he couldn't get the cool new action figures, but his parents did their best to surprise Jimmy with another toy. Jimmy woke up one Saturday morning to find a bunch of tiny army men standing all around his room. Jimmy couldn't believe what was going on in his room! Jimmy was startled but also intrigued. He began to move around his room, and he noticed something weird. The army men were turning and watching him move throughout his room.

The army men continued for a couple weeks and Jimmy didn't say anything about it. One morning, Jimmy woke up and the army men were closer than they had ever been. Then, out of nowhere, one spoke to Jimmy. "Hello Jimmy, or should I say King Jimmy." said one of the army men. All of the army men then bowed in front of Jimmy and now Jimmy knew the situation that he was. Jimmy began to strut around the house as he was now a King to an infinite amount of army men in his room. Jimmy began to get some ideas about using his army to get what he wants. Jimmy saw the power he had with the army men and began to devise plan to attack another "kingdom" known as his parents. Jimmy saw that if he conquers the house, he can get whatever he wants. Jimmy began to devise a plan to use his army men to train and build the skill to conquer the house. Every day after school Jimmy would come home and begin his training for the army men. He would also begin to do some test runs of his mission to make sure his army men knew the exact plan, so it had zero chance of failing.

Finally, the day came. Jimmy woke up and was ready to take the house for himself. Jimmy got dressed and looked like he was the movie Rambo. He was ready for a long battle, and so was his army men. They were ready with all their training and tactics to take the house with ease. Jimmy stood up in front of his army and gave a small speech. "Today, we take this house for ourselves. We will not serve these people no more. It is our time to rise up and take what is ours!!!" The army men roared and got in formation. Everyone was in their spots and were ready to take on the house. As Jimmy open the door to begin the mission, he woke up. It was still that same Saturday in which the army men had appeared. There was no mission to take over the house and Jimmy just let out a sigh and headed down to the kitchen. He sat at bar, hugged is parents and ate waffles as he has done for the past 3 years. 

A small fraction of Jimmy's Army https://images.app.goo.gl/TvgvJWScxgFn1fNh7

Author's Note: I used the plot structure of "The Dragon King". The Dragon King has a king that has large army that he controls. The Dragon King uses apes as the members of the army compared to my story where I used toy soldiers. The main character of "The Dragon King" begins to train his troops with weapons and other tactics for a battle that will ensue. Jimmy does the same as he begins to train his toys for a battle to takeover his household. The endings of each story go different directions. In "The Dragon King", the main character is in a bind as he has a plan to execute, but all begins to fall apart once he tries to set it in motion but the problem is with the weapons that his army is using and them being too light for the main character. Jimmy's story is ended before it even starts as it just a dream that the battle wants to take place in, but it never gets started and the plan is never put into action. 

Bibliography: http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/06/sun-wu-kung-dragon-king.html

Reading Notes: The Great Saint

Today, I decided to read the story "The Great Saint". The Great was another shorter read than usual but it was, again, packed full of details and a plot that was dynamic and well written. I really have enjoyed the collection of stories that I chose this week and this unit has truly been a great read for the past couple days. This reading had the same main character from yesterday's reading. The first I noticed on my read through was the amount of dialogue that this story has compared to reading from yesterday. The dialogue is awesome to have as dialogue, for me, is easier to follow a conversation and know more about what is going on at that point compared to descriptive pieces with zero dialogue. The dialogue really makes the story pop and get moving. the continuation of the involvement of apes is nice as it keeps the same characters throughout so the author can focus on detail and creating a good story rather than creating background for new characters that are introduced constantly. The Ape King seems very intimidating. He is a king so he must be intimidating to be in power but when he became angry it was scary for me to see the King get angry and begin to raise his voice. Sun Wu Kang seemed nervous and I would be extremely nervous to face a king that is angry, but also has a lot power over his kingdom.

A Picture of the warrior, Sun Wu Kung https://images.app.goo.gl/t3TWPAg4dFfa26qv5

Bibliography:"The Ape Sun Wu Kung" in The Chinese Fairy Book, ed. by R. Wilhelm and translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921). http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/06/sun-wu-kung-great-saint.html

Reading Notes: The Dragon King

This week I decided to read "The Dragon King" after much deliberation on which stories to read for this week. The Dragon King seemed like it would be a good story to read and do some deep thinking on. The story was a little than the rest but I felt that it was well written and had a lot of detail and information as the previous stories do. The Dragon King the beginning of the story was a tad confusing to begin with, but I read it over and over and it finally clicked. The main character had obtained a sacred weapon and also had apes that were warriors. They would train with weapons and had the apes build a camp that would be prepared for any type of attack. To begin this part of the story, it seems interesting to have apes trained for battle and a camp as well. The story is part of a collection so it makes sense that it seems to rapidly start. One of my favorite parts of the story is the four baboons. They are the voices of reason towards Sun Wu Kang. Baboons are not seen as cute or voices of reason to most people across the world. The baboons give Sun Wu Kang advice on how to make his weapons to the next level which would extremely enhance his capability to combat an attack. One part of the story that was surprising was the power Kang had. Throughout the beginning it didn't seem that he had powers or was a special being compared to normal humans. When he took one of his hairs and created countless apes and then cleared out the armory was a shock to me. I was in belief that he was a normal character and didn't have much powers if any. He doubled down on his powers as well when he flew away on a cloud. That was the icing on the cake that Kang was no normal man, but he was as far from normal as he possibly could.

A piece of artwork of the Dragon King from Chinese myth. https://images.app.goo.gl/ByR83bve2URkKCao9

Bibliography: "The Ape Sun Wu Kung" in The Chinese Fairy Book, ed. by R. Wilhelm http://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/06/sun-wu-kung-dragon-king.html