Queen bee

Once upon a time, there were two princes who wanted to learn more about the outside world. Not long after they went out, they lived a corrupt life of spending money and didn't want to go home at all. Their younger brother, an inconspicuous little dwarf, went out to find his two older brothers. When he found them through all kinds of hardships, they laughed at him, saying that he was young and didn't understand world affairs, and should find a way to go out and travel. They were so smart that they sometimes couldn't handle the world. In this way, the three of them embarked on a journey together.

The first thing they encountered was an ant nest. The two older brothers were going to tear it down and dig it up to see how the poor ants were running around in panic and how they were carrying their eggs. But the dwarf said, "Let these poor little creatures live freely, I can't tolerate you causing them trouble and disturbing their peaceful life." Under his strong opposition, the two older brothers had to give up their thoughts and walked past.

Soon, they came to a lake with many wild ducks swimming on the water. The two brothers wanted to catch two ducks and roast them, but the dwarf said, "Let these poor creatures live freely, don't kill them."

Under his objection, they had to leave again.

Then they came to a big tree, and the bees built a big hive in a hole in the trunk, and a lot of honey flowed down the trunk. The two brothers were going to set a fire under the tree and burn all the bees to death in order to get the honey in the hole, but the dwarf stopped them and said, "Let these poor little bees live freely, I can't let you burn them."

Finally, the three brothers came to a castle. When they passed the stables, they saw some horses standing inside, but they were all made of some marble, and there was not a single person in the castle. They passed through house after house, and finally found a door with three locks on it, and there was a window on the door, from which they could see everything in the house. Looking inside, they found an old man with gray hair sitting at a table in the house. They called twice, but the old man didn't hear it. At the third call, he stood up and asked them to open the lock and let him out of the room.

After he came out, he didn't say a word, and he didn't allow them to move, but silently led them to a beautiful table full of all kinds of delicious things. After eating and drinking, he arranged a bedroom for each of them to sleep, and then left without saying a word.

The next morning, he came to the eldest's bedroom and took the eldest out of the room to a marble table. There were three stone tablets next to the table. After reading the inscriptions on the tablets, the eldest knew that the castle was actually controlled by magic, because the inscriptions on the stone tablets were how to free the castle from the control of magic. The first inscription was: Under the moss of the forest, there are a thousand pearls of the princess scattered. All of them must be found. If one is not found before the sun goes down, the one who seeks will turn into marble.

The eldest brother set off. He searched all day, but when night fell, he found less than a hundred pearls, so he turned into stone as the inscription heard.

The next day, the second brother also ventured. But his result was not much better than that of the eldest brother. He only found a hundred pearls, so he was also turned into stone.

At last it was the dwarf's turn, and he rummaged through the moss. But it was so difficult to find the pearls, and the work was too hard and tiring, and he sat sadly on the stone and cried; just when he was in despair, the ant king he had rescued came to help him. He brought five thousand ants, and the ants soon found all the pearls and put them together in a pile;

The second inscription said: The key to the princess' bedroom must be fished out of the lake. The dwarf came to the lake, and the two ducks he rescued were swimming in the lake. When they saw him, they immediately swam over to ask him the purpose of the trip. After understanding his difficulties, the ducks immediately dived into the water and quickly fished the key from the bottom of the lake.

The third and most difficult thing was to find the youngest and most beautiful little princess among the three princesses. But all three of them were equally beautiful and looked exactly the same. The only clue he knew was that the eldest princess had eaten a piece of candy, the second princess had eaten some syrup, and the little princess had eaten a spoonful of honey. He wanted to find out which one had eaten the honey.

Here comes the queen bee who was rescued by the dwarf and survived the fire. It sniffed the mouths of the three princesses, and finally stopped on the mouth of the little princess who had eaten honey, and the dwarf knew that it must be the little princess. The magic was lifted, and all the people who had been turned to stone woke up and returned to their original appearance, and the dwarf married the young and beautiful princess. After the death of the princess' father, the dwarf became king, and his two older brothers took two other princesses as wives.