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Cobblestone and Dove's eggHow Mazu saved her brother
According to one legend, Lin Muoniang's father and brothers were fishermen. One day, a terrible typhoon arose while they were out at sea, and the rest of her family feared that those at sea had perished. In the midst of this storm, depending on the version of the legend, she either fell into a trance while praying for the lives of her father and brothers or dreamed of her father and brothers while she was sleeping. In either the trance or the dream, her father and brothers were drowning, and she reached out to them, holding her brothers up with her hands and her father up wtih her mouth. However, Muoniang's mother now discovered her and tried to wake her, but Muoniang was in such a deep trance or dream that it seemed like she was dead. Muoniang's mother, already believing the rest of their family dead, now broke down, crying, believing that Muoniang had also just died. Hearing her mother's cries, in pity, Muoniang gave a small cry to let her mother know she was alive, but in opening her mouth, she was forced to drop her father. Consequently, Muoniang's brothers returned alive (sadly without their father) and told the other villagers that a miracle had happened and that they had somehow being held up in the water as a typhoon raged.
