The legend and origin of the night-blooming cereus that blooms but once, only for Veda
The night-blooming cereus was originally a flower goddess; she bloomed every day and was radiant through all four seasons. She also fell in love with the young man who watered and weeded her every day. Later, the Jade Emperor learned of this, flew into a rage, and set out to separate the devoted couple. The Jade Emperor seized the flower goddess, demoted her to a night-blooming cereus that could bloom only for a single instant each year, forbade her ever to see her lover again, and sent the young man to Mount Lingjiu to become a monk, granting him the name Veda and making him forget his past and forget the flower goddess.
Many years passed, and Veda indeed forgot the flower goddess, devoted himself to studying Buddhism, and gradually achieved something. But the flower goddess could never forget the young man who had once cared for her. She knew that every year in late spring, Veda would always come down the mountain to gather morning dew for the Buddha to brew tea. So the night-blooming cereus chose to bloom at that time. She poured the vital essence she had gathered over a whole year into that single instant. She hoped Veda would turn back to look at her once and remember her.
But thousands of years passed, and year after year Veda came down the mountain to gather morning dew. Year after year the night-blooming cereus silently bloomed. Veda never remembered her. Until one day a gaunt, thin man walked past the night-blooming cereus and saw the flower goddess's melancholy and lonely sorrow. He stopped and asked the flower goddess, “Why are you grieving?” The flower goddess was astonished, because mortals cannot see the true form of a flower goddess. If it were a great golden immortal, there would be golden light above his head; yet the one who had just walked past was clearly a mortal, so how could he see her true form? The flower goddess hesitated for a moment, then only answered, “You cannot help me.” She then silently continued waiting for Veda and did not answer the man's words again.
40 years later, that gaunt, thin man walked past the night-blooming cereus again and repeated the same words from 40 years before: “Why are you grieving?” The flower goddess again hesitated for a moment, then only answered, “Perhaps you cannot help me.” The gaunt, thin man smiled and left.
Another 40 years later, a gaunt old man appeared before the flower goddess again, and the once gaunt man now looked even more like he was at death's door. The man from those years ago had become an old man, but he still asked the same words as 80 years before: “Why are you grieving?” The night-blooming cereus answered, “Thank you, mortal, for asking me 3 times in your life. But after all you are a mortal, and you are already at death's door, so how can you help me? I am a flower goddess punished by Heaven because of love.”
The old man smiled and said: “I am of the Yuming clan. I have only come to settle that unresolved thread of fate from 80 years ago. Flower goddess, I have come to give you these lines:
When fate begins and fate ends, fate at last runs out,
Flowers bloom and flowers fall, and flowers return to dust.
Having said this, the old man closed his eyes and sat down. Time gradually passed, and the last ray of the setting sun began to sweep from the old man's hair toward his eyes. The old man laughed and said:
The night-blooming cereus blooms but once, for Veda,
How could such love and fate be wrong?
Heaven's punishment and Earth's execution, I will bear them,
If Heaven is blind, I will open its eyes.
With that, the old man seized the flower goddess. At that moment the setting sun slid into the old man's eyes, and he immediately passed away into nirvana, taking the flower goddess with him to the Buddha realm.
In the Buddha realm, the flower goddess saw Veda. Veda finally remembered the karmic bond from his previous life, and after the Buddha learned of it, he permitted Veda to descend to the mortal world to settle the unfinished karmic bond. Because the old man of the Yuming clan had violated the laws of Heaven, his soul wandered for a lifetime. He could not ride the crane to the Western Paradise, nor could he enter the pure land of the Eastern Buddha realm, and in the end he suffered Heaven's punishment with no reincarnation forever.