Yan Yong

Three days later a seriously injured Yan Yong returns, wakes hibernating rockmen, and tells a false story that the male immortal wanted to enslave them and take beautiful men as playthings, that they resisted and drove him off, and that the immortal will lead a fox army to annihilate the tribes. Fox groups then attack as he said. After he wakes again he leads counterattacks, inherits Hui Shi tribe leadership and then white rock tribe, and over a month later becomes joint leader of the eight rockmen tribes. He drives out fox groups, then pushes an attack on Dang Hun Mountain using supposed last words of the white rock tribe leader about gutstones. Fang Yuan stages defeat and escape. Yan Yong later kneels in Dang Hun palace and reports that three days of soul strengthening raised the tribes by six thousand little rockmen, to three times the pre-battle population. Fang Yuan orders a great river across the eastern and northern areas in three months, saying over two hundred rockmen will remain, and threatens to tell the tribes the truth and kill Yan Yong if the river is not finished. ^{ch. 413}

Leaving Dang Hun palace, he is hailed as hero and leader while knowing the rockmen will die digging the river three months later. He proposes filling the fire pit and lake with soil so the immortal cannot recover immortal essence, then pivots to digging a river to direct lake water into the fire pit, again citing white stone old tribe leader. He remembers a dissenting old rockman who argued the soil fill is impossible, intending the heaviest dig work for him later. A second old rockman who proposes the river plan he marks for a fox-army defense mission meant to kill him. The tribes agree he should oversee the dig, then leave Dang Hun Mountain when its power makes them dizzy. ^{ch. 414}

At the dig he answers an elderly rockman’s pleas with talk of heroes and a bright future, points to heroic gravestones he ordered built, and keeps the pace. Young rockmen he formed as rock guards report progress, deaths, and sleepers on the job; he orders gravestones for the dead and public criticism for the sleepers. He knows the fox groups, slogans, and rock guards are part of Fang Yuan’s plot, and that he created this scenario himself. Under Fang Yuan’s instructions he later brings the injured and tired hundred or so remaining rockmen back to their southern homes. ^{ch. 415}

When rockmen find many gutstones on Dang Hun Mountain, they cheer to tribe leader Yan Yong that they can establish the world’s largest rockmen tribe. ^{ch. 421}

Fang Yuan uses rank three slavery Gu on crucial rockmen. In the blink of an eye he controls three rockmen tribe leaders including Yan Yong, as well as over a dozen rockmen tribe elders, putting about three hundred thousand rockmen under his control. ^{ch. 422}

Yan Yong walks in front toward the hole earth Gu, calls the opening the demon’s nest, and shouts to Mother Earth. After a woman’s voice from little Hu Immortal claims the immortal hides in her heart, he takes the lead and charges in. Later he and some stonemen elders stand aside in fear with lowered heads while Immortal Crane Sect disciples count and restrain the stonemen shot out onto Fei He mountain. After the transaction he and the other stonemen elders follow the hole earth Gu back to Hu Immortal blessed land under Fang Yuan’s arranged explanation. ^{ch. 424}