Xiangliu- Chinese CreatureCreature · Monster"Minister of Gonggong"

The Nine-Headed Minister

The Shanhai Jing describes Xiangliu as a nine-headed serpent who served as minister to the water god Gonggong. Each of his nine heads fed upon a different mountain, devouring the soil and vegetation. Wherever he went, the land turned to foul marshland: streams became poisonous, fields reeked with bile, and no creature could inhabit the ground he had touched. The Haiwai Bei Jing (Overseas North) chapter records that the places where he vomited and excreted became marshes so toxic that neither beast nor bird could approach them.

His association with Gonggong places him within the cycle of cosmic rebellion and restoration that structures much of early Chinese mythology. Gonggong, the rebellious water deity who smashed his head against Mount Buzhou and tilted the heavens, represents chaotic, destructive flood power. Xiangliu served as the monstrous instrument of that same destructive force, poisoning the land that the floods had already ravaged.

The Slaying by Yu the Great

After Yu the Great had tamed the floodwaters and restored order to the world, he turned his attention to Xiangliu. The Dahuang Bei Jing (Great Wilderness North) chapter of the Shanhai Jing, which uses the variant name Xiangyao, records that Yu killed the serpent. But the creature's blood was so venomous that it soaked into the earth, rendering the ground permanently barren. Nothing would grow where it fell. Yu tried to fill the corrupted ground, but three times the earth collapsed beneath its own foulness.

Finally, Yu dug out the poisoned soil entirely and used the excavated pit to build a raised terrace, which became the platform of the gods. Some versions identify this as the site where altars to the various divine rulers were erected. The episode completes Xiangliu's narrative arc: his corruption of the land, his destruction by the great civilizer, and the transformation of his poison into sacred ground through heroic labor.