Chapter Seventy-One: Made in China

426 AD, Olympia.

“High Priest, High Priest! Something terrible has happened!” A boy of about fifteen, with slightly curly brown hair and a youthful, innocent face, rushed anxiously into the temple.

“Dipanthos, how many times have I told you to maintain silence in the sanctuary? Why are you so flustered?” the High Priest grumbled with displeasure. The old man stood before the statue of Zeus—no longer resplendent as it was eight centuries before. The gold and ivory that once adorned its surface had been stripped away, exposing the mottled wood beneath.

Once, the statue held the Goddess of Victory in its left hand and a golden scepter in its right. Now, both had vanished. Like the now deserted temple, the statue of Zeus emanated a profound sense of desolation and ruin.

With the rise and conquest of Rome in the West, a new god had swept aside the glory of the Olympians and the Norse gods of Asgard alike. Thirty-three years earlier, Emperor Theodosius I had abolished the "athletic games," and since then, Olympia and its temples had fallen into utter desolation.

Only the High Priest and a handful of priests remained.

“Emperor Valentinian has issued an edict for the destruction of all pagan temples!”

“What!” The High Priest staggered at the boy’s words, his legs nearly buckling beneath him. He braced himself against the altar, voice trembling. “Is this true? Where did you hear this?”

“It’s an order sent from Mediolanum, issued personally by the Emperor and the Pope!”

Tears streamed instantly from the old man’s eyes. “I have long foreseen this day, only never thought it would come so soon… Yes, Greece has perished. How much longer can this place endure?”

“Great Zeus, why must Greece suffer such calamity? Why can even your temple not be preserved? Have the gods of Olympus fallen?”

He knelt by the thirteen-meter statue’s feet, tears staining his wrinkled face, wracked by sobs. Suddenly, resolve flashed in his eyes. Rising to his feet, he seized a torch from the altar and cast it upon the statue.

“High Priest?” Dipanthos stared in shock.

“Even if the statue of Zeus must meet its end, it must not fall to the hands of foreigners!”

“Dipanthos,” the High Priest grasped the boy’s arm, his grip impossibly strong for one so frail. “I have a task for you. The statue of Zeus is too large to move, but there is another precious sculpture in this temple… crafted by the great sculptor Alexandros, who spent sixteen years on it.”

As the statue began to burn, the firelight reflected in the old man’s bright eyes.

“The Statue of Yanluo! In the Age of Iron, the only demigod born among mortals. Though his deeds are almost lost to history, I, the High Priest of Zeus, remember! He once bested the wise of Athens in debate, and at the Olympic Games, he won six crowns!”

“He slew the king of Sparta, allowing Athens’ glory to endure. Take the Statue of Yanluo and flee this place!”

“But, High Priest…” The boy’s face was filled with hesitation.

“No buts!” The High Priest’s withered hand clamped down with surprising strength, making the boy wince but not dare to struggle.

“Swear by your life you will safeguard the Statue of Yanluo, that no one shall ever destroy it! You were once an abandoned orphan—now I speak to you not as High Priest, but as your father, who raised you.”

Looking into the wrinkled, tear-streaked, pleading face, Dipanthos finally nodded. “Yes, High Priest!”

Reassured, the old man burst into laughter, and, in a blaze of fire, flung himself upon the burning statue of Zeus. Amidst the rising flames: “So be it. I can accompany this temple, and the King of Gods, into oblivion…”

“Remember, we are the descendants of Greeks. From this day forth, Greek civilization… is ended.”

Half a century passed…

The once youthful boy had become a withered old man. Summoning his son, he said, “I am dying… Yet all these years, I have fulfilled the High Priest’s charge. Even as new gods and religions ruled the land and countless statues were destroyed, I preserved the Statue of Yanluo through every peril.”

“So my life is without regret.”

“Now, I pass this duty to you. My son, as a descendant of Greeks, swear on your life that you will guard this statue, even unto death…”

Dipanthos’s gaze lingered on the two-meter marble statue at his side. “This is the final witness to the greatness of Greek civilization.”

His son Talos guarded the Statue of Yanluo for twenty years before passing it to his grandson, Asuklis. Thus, through fourteen generations, the charge endured. But war severed Dipanthos’s bloodline, and his last descendant’s widow hid the statue, guarded for centuries, in a small cave on the island of Milos.

…

2018, X Month, X Day
North Bank of the Seine, Paris, France
The Louvre Museum

A tour group from China was visiting, most of its members young—around twenty years old. In truth, a university professor was leading his students to Paris to study the Palace of Wonders and its 400,000 artifacts.

“Next, we’ll see the most precious treasure of the Louvre… and one of the world’s greatest!” the female guide announced.

“Do you know what I’m referring to?” she asked.

“Of course,” a student rolled his eyes. “The three treasures of the Louvre: the Winged Victory, the Mona Lisa, and the Armless Yanluo. Who doesn’t know that?”

Led by the guide, the group entered the Greek antiquities hall, where a white marble statue about two meters tall stood before them.

“Wow!”

“A true artistic marvel.”

“How beautiful!”

The students exclaimed in awe as the guide began recounting the statue’s history and legends.

“Yanluo, said to be a demigod hero of ancient Greece. That era is so distant that little is known of his deeds. He apparently won multiple crowns at the ancient Olympic Games, and at one such event, his discus struck and killed the Spartan king… At that time, war between Athens and Sparta was imminent. It can be said, this was the most momentous discus throw in history! It kept civilization and democracy from being supplanted by barbarism and tyranny.”

The guide glanced around at the students’ excited faces and continued:

“The Armless Yanluo found its way to the Louvre by chance. In 1820, a farmer on the Greek island of Milos in the Aegean Sea discovered a small cave, and the statue was found inside—then, it was still complete.”

“Its unearthing sparked fierce competition among Greek officials, the French ambassador, and the British consulate. Warships even clashed at sea over its possession. Amid the chaos, the statue fell and both arms broke off. From then on, Yanluo became the armless demigod.”

“To all who see it, the Armless Yanluo is an immortal milestone of Greek art! Once brought to the Louvre, it instantly became the museum’s crowning treasure. Many artists, lamenting its incompleteness, attempted to restore its arms, but…”

The guide shrugged in a typically French manner. “Everyone failed—even Rodin. People realized Yanluo is more beautiful without arms!”

The students studied the statue: bare-chested, a linen cloth (of marble, of course) draped around its waist. The folds of the garment fell naturally, adding a subtle elegance. The slender yet athletic torso, the flowing musculature of the arms, and a face—unlike typical Greek features—strikingly in line with modern aesthetic ideals, all left them marveling. How did ancient Greece, more than two millennia ago, create such a masterpiece?

“Doesn’t it seem like the Armless Yanluo has a face almost Chinese in appearance?” one student remarked in surprise.

The guide smiled helplessly. “You’re not the first to ask. Just yesterday, a Korean tour group swore up and down that the statue, and the demigod Yanluo, must have been Korean… But the statue has no connection to the East.”

“‘Yanluo’ is simply the Chinese transliteration; the name in letters is Yierro.”

“As for the statue’s androgynous form, it’s likely that Alexandros intentionally blended masculine and feminine qualities, bestowing the demigod with a touch of divinity. The sculpting method was innovative: a face finely wrought with feminine features, and muscles that, unlike other robust Greek statues, are slim and graceful, the figure almost feminine in its elegance. That is why this statue possesses beauty that transcends gender and era!”

“Even without arms, no statue can surpass its beauty.”

She laughed. “Think about it—two thousand years ago, China was still in the Spring and Autumn or Warring States period. How could anyone have traveled to ancient Greece?”

At that moment, screens throughout the Louvre lit up.

“Reporter Catherine here, live from Athens, Greece, where the excavation of the recently discovered Periclean-era site is reaching its climax. I’m bringing you breaking news: a chest has been found at the lowest level of the site.”

The camera panned to a pit where workers, using a crane, were lifting a chest from the earth.

“This chest appears to be clad in bronze! Shields of that era were often bronze-clad, but a bronze chest… Let’s ask Dr. Stiller, our archaeologist on site.”

The microphone turned to a man in his forties, Dr. Stiller, who was visibly excited. “As you can see, this chest is enormous—over two meters long, more than a meter wide and high. Metallurgy in that era was quite primitive, so what could such a carefully forged chest contain?”

Catherine prompted, “Could it be drachma coins?”

“No, no…” Dr. Stiller shook his head, looking mysterious. “Let your imagination soar. This is a Periclean site. Just yesterday, we unearthed a consul’s golden scepter! Yet even such an artifact would not merit a chest like this.”

“Athens of that era was a flourishing center of culture! Socrates, Herodotus, Euripides, Democritus… philosophers, artists, and scientists alike. I have a premonition that within this chest lies something unimaginably world-shaking!”

“Wonderful! I can hardly wait… Doctor, you know this excavation is being watched worldwide. The Greek government is, for the first time, broadcasting live to a global audience. Perhaps hundreds of thousands, even millions, are watching this moment.”

“So let us see what ancient Greece preserved in such a precious chest!”

Inside the Louvre, many—including the Chinese students—focused intently on the screen, murmuring:

“What could it be?”

“A statue, perhaps?”

“What statue could rival the Armless Yanluo? I hope it’s books—manuscripts by ancient sages.”

On screen, with great effort, the archaeologists finally opened the chest.

“What’s this… a discus?” Dr. Stiller cried out, agitated. “Could this be the very discus that struck down King Archidamus II of Sparta, immortalized in history?”

Many viewers marveled. Some experts had doubted the story’s authenticity, calling it too coincidental for the Spartan king to be felled by a discus at the Olympics—surely a tale concocted by the Athenians. But now, the discus had surfaced…

“Wait!” the doctor suddenly exclaimed. “There are textiles! And papers! Don’t touch them; they’re too fragile!”

Ancient paper and cloth easily disintegrate, and even in a sealed bronze chest, Stiller dared not let anyone touch them. The camera zoomed in, showing viewers worldwide the chest’s contents:

Paper;
Trousers;
A leather jacket…

The Chinese students stared wide-eyed—those blue trousers looked remarkably like thermal underwear! And the orange-red leather coat was clearly a modern jacket!

“Incredible that ancient Greeks, over 2,500 years ago, had such textile and dyeing technology. Look—the color of these pants has barely faded in two and a half millennia… And this leather jacket—”

Dr. Stiller was stunned. “To think that ancient Greece had leather jackets? No, in that era, it would have been called leather armor—fashioned in the shape of a modern jacket! The Greeks truly had vision ahead of their time—astonishing!”

“The paper… Wait, are these plays? Manuscripts by Euripides and Sophocles?” The doctor nearly leapt with excitement. “To find the works of two of Greece’s three great tragedians! What plays are these? Helen? Oedipus Rex?”

“Hmm? Here are some sheets of papyrus, Greek script… ‘Dao,’ ‘De’… Well, we’re not sure yet what that means, but clearly, something extraordinary has been found…”

Suddenly, reporter Catherine let out a scream.

Her mouth hung open, her beautiful face twisted in utter shock—terror, disbelief, existential doubt, all mingled together. She pointed with a trembling hand at the leather jacket in the chest.

“What is it?” Dr. Stiller turned to look and fell into a daze.

“Oh my God…” he murmured, tracing a cross over his chest.

The camera faithfully captured the moment, and the line of letters came into view for all watching the live broadcast.

At that instant, all around the world, as viewers watched the discovery, the same expression appeared: disbelief, the suspicion of dreaming, sheer astonishment. The world itself seemed to pause for a heartbeat at the sight of those letters.

“Made in China”