Legend has it that Pangu created the world and gave the earth sky, oceans, land, mountains, rivers... And Nuwa made humans out of yellow mud. Their joint efforts make the sun, moon and stars perform their duties, the people live and work in peace and contentment, and the world sings and dances in peace.
Later, Gonggong competed with Zhuanxu for the throne. Unexpectedly, Gonggong was defeated and his head touched the mountain of Buzhou, which caused the collapse of the pillars of heaven. All life on the earth except human beings became extinct. The poles of the earth were reversed, the nine states were split, the sky tilted to the northwest, the earth sank to the southeast, floods and fires spread, and people were displaced.
Nuwa was very concerned when she saw that her children were in great disaster, and determined to refine stones to mend the sky. So she traveled around the world and visited mountains, and finally chose Tiantai Mountain, a fairyland on the sea outside the East China Sea. Tiantai Mountain is one of the five fairy mountains in the East China Sea. The five fairy mountains are carried on the backs of divine turtles to prevent them from sinking to the bottom of the sea.
But why did Nuwa choose Tiantai Mountain? It turned out to be because only Tiantai Mountain produced the five-color soil used for refining stones, and it was an excellent place for refining sky-refining stones. So, Nuwa piled huge stones as a furnace on the top of Tiantai Mountain, took five-color soil as material, and borrowed the sun's divine fire. It lasted nine days and nine nights, and she built 36,501 five-color boulders. Then it took nine days and nine nights to repair the sky with 36,500 colorful stones. The remaining piece is left on the top of Tanggu in Tiantai Mountain.