When one person attains power, status, or success, all those associated with them, even indirectly, benefit and rise along with them. This idiom often carries a sarcastic or critical connotation, implying undeserved benefits.
Era:
Ancient
Frequency:
Synonym:
Story:
During the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Liu An, the King of Huainan, was a devout believer in Taoist cultivation and alchemy. One day, he encountered eight old men with crane hair and youthful faces and took them as his masters to learn the art of cultivating immortality and concocting elixirs.
After the elixir was successfully made, Emperor Wu dispatched men to arrest him. In a moment of desperation, Liu An drank the elixir, transforming into an immortal and ascending to heaven.
His relatives and friends quickly drank the elixir as well, also becoming immortals. Even the chickens and dogs of the Liu family, having eaten the leftover elixir from the cauldron, ascended to immortality with them.