Hou Yi (in simplified Chinese 后羿), or Yi, is the legendary Xia Dongyi tribal leader’s who is very good at archery. According to the legends, Hou Yi was the one who to overthrow the rule of the Xia. However, due to his poor governance, he was soon killed by other people. On the other hand, Hou Yi is also the legendary hero occurred during the Yao’s Period, which is quite far away from the Xia period. Therefore, people always get confused with these two guys and since they are just legendary heroes and there are still no real evidence or remains showing the presence of these two people, their actual identity and also the relationship between these two Hou Yi was still a mystery.

However, talking about the Hou Yi in the Yao Period, we could see a quite interesting story. According to this legend, in the past, the world had actually 10 suns. These suns were responsible for shining the world in different period of time and they were quite obedient indeed. However, one day, they got bored and they were trying to figure out what funny things to do. One of the suns got an idea suddenly and he suggested that all ten of them could rise together and shine the world together. This got the consent of all the suns and thus, they rose together.

As you might have imagined, having 10 times of normal light and 10 times of hotness, everything in the world changed suddenly. The lands cracked due to the thermal attack, and many people could not survive under such hot weather and Hou Yi, the strong man, was very angry with the misbehavior of the suns. Therefore, he tried to use arrows to shoot down the suns. One by one, the suns were shot down and there was only one sun left. He knew his fault and begged for the forgiveness of the people. Actually, people also know that without all the suns, they would not be able to get light for farming and therefore, they forgave the fault of the sun. After that, Hou Yi was praised and chosen to be the leader of the country.