Nameless in Winter

My name is Dong Yu, and I am an orphan. A wandering Daoist found me in the snowy woods at the foot of Mount Lao. I was wrapped in a thin little quilt and not yet four months old. It was the depths of winter, and I had clearly been abandoned there for some time. Somehow, I hadn't frozen to death, and my faint whimpering caught the attention of the Daoist as he passed by. My whole body had turned blue, and I had only the faintest breath left. The Daoist thought he had done all he could, but my last breath lingered on and on. He couldn't very well bury me alive, so he tucked me into his clothes and continued his travels. Along the way, the Daoist tried several times to give me to someone or take me to an orphanage. Although I was a boy, people who wanted a son refused to take me in when they saw how sickly I looked. At the orphanage, whenever I was taken from the Daoist's arms, I would wail with all my might. My tiny body somehow had a voice that could shake the whole place, setting all the babies and young children in the orphanage off in a chorus. After a few tries, the Daoist grew somewhat attached to me, so he tucked me into his clothes and continued wandering the land.