The Farmer's Lament
Lui was born to a family of fireseed farmers in southwestern Lochmalan. His lithe form and constant daydreaming were in sharp constrast to the tireless working spirts of his parents. As an only child, Kazi, his father, and Hoji, his mother, were constantly after Lui to learn how to take care of the fireseed fields as his parents would not be here for long. Lui could not find joy in working soil, however, and would allow his mind to lapse back to a world of adventuring and slaying monsters.
Shortly after his twentieth birthday, Kazi and Hoji were bedridden with a terrible illness. They did not survive the winter, leaving the farm in Lui's hands. The next season, Lui planted the fireseeds, but it took him nearly twice as long as the other farmers as his daydreaming slowed his daily progress. Still, the planting was done and he was proud.
As the fireseed fields developed into the shells used by those across the lands to protect homes from burning, Lui found himself even more lost to daydreams. A grand battle against a wizard ran through his head for weeks, and before Lui knew it the other farmers were preparing for their second harvest. Lui was embarrassed and promised himself to harvest the fireseeds the next morning.
In the morning, to his surprise the seeds were in fact hulls that had fell off during the night displaying a brilliant golden grain underneath. He collected some and found they had a powerful citrus scent with a mild, creamy flavor. His fireseeds had turned into the golden rice of northern Lochmalan! The value of this rice was much higher than that of the fireseeds. Lui was very happy with this development while the other farmers were frustrated to see Lui shirking his work had led him to such profits.
Unfortunately, this discovery did little to reduce Lui's daydreaming. Now, his daydreams involved floods of golden rice bringing him to the doorsteps of the Emerald Emperor of Dakshinaatl, a high honor. The other farmers continued to allow their fireseeds to age, until theirs too produced the golden grain weeks later.
Their joy was shortlived, however, as the idle Lui had once more seen a growth in fortune. His rice had blossomed into a wide array of colorful flowers, each hue producing a unique taste when chewed. These beautiful flowers had never been seen before meaning Lui had only to pick them and his crop would be the first and the most enriching. The other farmers again found themselves frustrated but continued to work on their fields.
Even Lui, who had paid so little attention to the teachings of his parents, could see the fortune sitting in front of him. If he split the flowers into their individual hues, he could produce powerful spices that would sell quite handsomely in the market. Yet this work was left undone while Lui dreamed of how these spices would make him so powerful, the Emerald Emperor would be sure to name him the Emerald Prince to keep the wealth from flowing into Lochmalan.
The next week, Lui went out to his fields to daydream amongst his riches only to see a field of barren stems. The delicate flowers had wilted the night before and fallen off into the soil where a mold had taken hold. Not a single petal was left to pull. When the rice sprouted into riceflowers for the other farmers, however, they did not hesitate to pluck their delicate forms, painstakingly separating each hue into its own pile, and drying them in the sun. The farmers of Penfield then sold the first riceflower spices to the market and were made very rich indeed. Some were even invited to the Emerald Emperor's palace in Markat to deliver the spices personally.
Poor Lui had nothing in his fields and had to replant his fields. The growing season was almost over, and so he had to harvest the fireseeds before their riches could unfold once more.
Summary
The myth is the story of a lazy boy farmer named Lui. He has planted fireseeds, the base form of riceflowers in Lochmalan, but fails to harvest them discovering in the process the valuable various crops the seed can produce. His laziness catches up with him in the end though, and he makes nothing while the hard working farmers were able to capitalize on his findings.
The moral of the story is that hard work prevails in the end and was told to children of farmers across Lochmalan to ensure they did their set of chores. As many stories told to children, the results were mixed as some took this to mean that if they kept procrastinating gold would sprout from the ground before them.
Historical Basis
The myth is used to explain how the various steps in the growth of riceflowers, one of the major exports of Lochmalan, were discovered. The actual discovery was likely over generations and potentially even by discovering wild riceflower plants that were not raised in crops that had aged further than the farmers would normally allow.
Variations & Mutation
In some later variations, Lui does do the painstaking work needed to collect the flowers while the farmers are too tired to do so from previous harvests. This deviated from the original work's morals instead teaching that laziness followed by hard work is more valuable than hard work followed by laziness.
In Art
In Penfield there is a statue of a sullen boy carrying a small pouch of fireseeds with a field of riceflowers that are planted behind him to represent his journey through the story.
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