Huang Chengyan 黃承彥

In Chapter 37 of the Romance, when Liu Bei visits Zhuge Liang a second time amid wind and snow and fails to find him, he leaves a letter with Zhuge Liang's younger brother Zhuge Jun and is about to depart. Just then a page boy calls out from beyond the fence that the old master is coming, and a man in a warm cap and fox-fur coat, riding a donkey and followed by a page boy carrying a gourd of wine, crosses a small bridge chanting a poem about the snow-covered world and the thin plum blossoms. Saying that this must truly be the Sleeping Dragon, Liu Bei dismounts and pays his respects, and the man hastily gets down from his donkey to return the courtesy. Romance, Ch. 37 §36–41

From behind, Zhuge Jun explains that this is not his elder brother but his elder brother's father-in-law, Huang Chengyan. Huang Chengyan says that he had memorized this one piece while reading the 'Liangfu Yin' at his son-in-law's house, and that, moved on seeing the plum blossoms between the fences as he crossed the small bridge, he simply recited it, never thinking an honored guest would hear. When Liu Bei asks whether he has seen his son-in-law, he replies that he too has come to see him, and Liu Bei, after taking leave of him, looks back at Wolong Ridge with regret. Romance, Ch. 37 §42–43

In Chapter 84, Lu Xun, having crushed the Shu army and pursuing it westward, sees a murderous aura rising from the riverbank not far from Kui Pass and pulls his troops back. On inspection there are only eighty or ninety heaps of jumbled stones, and the local people tell him that the place is Yufupu, and that ever since Zhuge Liang, on his way into Xichuan, laid out stones on the sandbank to form a battle array, cloudlike vapors have risen from it. Declaring it a mere trick to bewilder people, Lu Xun leads a few horsemen into the stone formation, but a sudden gale blows up, sand flies and stones roll, and he loses his way out. Just then an old man stands before his horse and asks with a smile whether he wishes to get out of this formation. Romance, Ch. 84 §40–44

Leaning on his staff and walking slowly, the old man passes out of the stone formation without hindrance, escorts Lu Xun up onto the hillside, and reveals that he is Huang Chengyan, father-in-law of Zhuge Kongming. He says that this Eight Formations Diagram, which his son-in-law laid out on his way into Xichuan, has eight gates following the Dunjia sequence of Rest, Life, Harm, Obstruction, View, Death, Alarm and Opening, changing endlessly every day and every hour, and is a match for 100,000 picked troops, and that on leaving, his son-in-law had told him that if a great general of Eastern Wu should one day lose his way in the formation, he was not to lead him out. But he, who has loved goodness all his life, saw Lu Xun entering by the Gate of Death and could not bear to let him perish, so he deliberately led him out through the Gate of Life. Asked whether he has studied this formation, he answers that its changes are endless and cannot be learned, and Lu Xun dismounts, bows and returns. Romance, Ch. 84 §45–47

In Chapter 117, introducing Zhuge Zhan, the Romance reveals that his mother, Lady Huang, was the daughter of Huang Chengyan. Lady Huang was very plain in appearance but had extraordinary talent, and there was no book on astronomy, geography, strategy or Dunjia that she did not know; Zhuge Liang, hearing of her worth while he was in Nanyang, asked for her hand in marriage, and his wife contributed much to his learning. Romance, Ch. 117 §27–28