#diyu hell

[ryin-silverfish]

A Guide to the Chinese Underworld (and what it isn't)

As many FSYY and fox posts as there were on my blog, I am actually a huge fan of the Chinese Underworld mythos. Mostly because I was once a morbid little kid that loved reading about the excavations of ancient tombs, and found the statues depicting hellish torture in the Haw Par Villa "super cool".

Apart from the aesthetics, the history of its evolution is also fascinating. Most of us, Chinese or not, only know the most popular version of the Underworld——the "Ten Kings" system, yet that isn't always the case. So today, I'll start off with a short summary of that.

In pre-Qin era, there was already this generic idea of a "Realm of the Dead" called the Yellow Spring, Youdu, or Youming, but we know very little about it.

Then, in the Han dynasty, two ideas start to emerge: 1) the Underworld is a bureaucracy, 2) the God of Mt. Tai ruled over the dead.

This early bureaucracy might not function as an agent of punishment; the main focus was on keeping the dead segregated from the living so they wouldn't bring diseases and misfortune to the latter, as well as using those ghosts to enforce collective punishments upon people for their lineage's wrongdoings while they were still alive.

Post-Han, after Buddhism entered China and took root, its idea of karmic punishments and reincarnation and the figure of King Yama was merged with folk and Daoist ideas of the Underworld bureaucracy, and, came Tang dynasty, resulted in the "Ten Kings" system that first appeared in Dunhuang manuscripts.

It was very rudimentary and far from well-established, as seen in Tang legends, with some adopting the Ten Kings system, some sticking to the Lord of Mt. Tai and some favoring King Yama, and overall little agreements on who's in charge of the Underworld.

But the "Ten Kings" system would become the mainstream version from then onwards, used in Ming vernacular novels and made even more popular by folk religion scrolls like the Jade Records (Yuli Baochao).

As such, most points in the following sections will be based on the fully matured "Ten Kings" system of the Underworld, as seen in the Jade Records and JTTW.

What happens when you die?

(This is a fictionalized walkthrough of the posthumous fate of souls under the "Ten Kings" system. I try to stick to the very broad progression outlined in the Jade Records, but many creative liberties are taken on the details.)

Let's say there's a guy named Xiao Ming, and he had just died of a heart attack. Bummers. What now?

Well, the first thing he saw would be the ghost cops.

There isn't really an unanimous agreement on who these ghost cops are: they may be a pair of ghosts in white and black robes, wearing tall hats (Heibai Wuchang), they may have the heads of farm animals (Ox-Head and Horse-Face), or they can just be generic ghost bureaucrats. For convenience's sake, let's say it was the first scenario.

"Who are you guys and where are you taking me?"

"Glad you asked!" The taller ghost cop, being the cheerful one of the pair, replied. It wasn't very reassuring, considering that his tongue was dangling out of his mouth way further than it should. "I'm the White Impermanence, my sour-looking colleague here is the Black Impermanence, and we are taking you to the City God's office."

This City God, a.k.a. Chenghuang, is just like how it sounds: the divine guardian of a city, who also pulls double duty as the head of the local Dead People Customs Office. They are usually virtuous officials deified posthumously, and in JTTW, they fall under the category of "Ghostly immortals", together with the Earth Gods a.k.a. Tudi.

So Xiao Ming went with the two ghost cops——not like he had much of a choice, made his way through the long queue at the City God's office, and was now standing in front of a gruff old magistrate in traditional robes.

"Name?"

"Wang Xiao Ming."

"Age and birth dates?"

"21, April 16 2003…"

After he was done asking questions, the City God flipped through his ledger, then picked up a brush, ticked off Xiao Ming's name, and told him to go get his pass in the next room. More waiting in a queue. Wonderful.

"I never heard anything about needing a pass to get to the Underworld," the girl in front of Xiao Ming asked the ghost cops, who were standing guard nearby. "Is this a new policy or something?"

"Yeah. In the old days, we'd just drag y'all straight to the Ghost Gate." The ghost cop in black said, then muttered to himself, "Fuckin' paperworks and overpopulation, man…"

(This "Dead People Passport" thing was popularized in the middle-to-late Ming dynasty, as shown by the discovery of such documents inside tombs in southern China. )

(It might have evolved from similar passes to the Western Pure Land in lay Buddhism that recorded their acts of merits. Which, in turn, might be traced back to the "Dead People Belongings List" of Han dynasty, to be shown to Underworld bureaucrats so that no one would take away the dead's private property down there or something.)

Anyways, after he received his pass, Xiao Ming departed together with the rest of the bunch, to be led to the Ghost Gate. It was like the world's most depressing tourist group, where instead of tour guides, you got two ghost cops in funny hats, and the only scenery in sight was the desolation of the Yellow Spring Road.

They weren't the only travellers on the road, though. Xiao Ming noticed other groups moving in the far distance, behind the fog and the flickering ghostfire, led by similar figures in black and white.

It made a lot of sense; realistically, there was no way two ghost cops could fetch hundreds of thousands of dead people all by themselves.

(SEA Tang-ki mediums believed there were multiple Tua Di Ya Peks——Hokkien name for the Black and White Impermanences, working for different Underworld Courts.)

At last, the Ghost Gate stood in front of Xiao Ming, guarded by two towering figures. Normally, they'd be Ox-Head and Horse-Face, like what you see at Haw Par Villa's Underworld entrance.

However, older Han dynasty works like Wang Chong's 论衡·订鬼 also mentioned two gods, Shenshu and Yulei, as guardians of the Ghost Gate, who would use reed ropes to capture malicious ghosts and feed them to tigers, making them possibly the earliest incarnation of "Gate Gods".

So here, they were what Xiao Ming sees, standing side by side like proper doormen, silently watching herds of ghosts being funneled through the entrance.

The place was more crowded than a train station during the CNY Spring Rush; the ghost cops had already said their quick goodbye and left to fetch the next group of dead people, leaving the resident officials of the Underworld proper to maintain order and quell any would-be riots.

Now you started seeing the Ox-Head and Horse-Face guys, poking at unruly ghosts with their pitchforks and dragging away the violent ones in chains. Among their ranks were other monstrous beings, blue-faced yakshas and imps, but also regular dead humans who look 100% done with their jobs, like the lady who stamped Xiao Ming's pass when it was finally his turn.

After this point, Xiao Ming had entered the Underworld proper, and his next destination would be the First Court, led by King Qin'guang. Here, his fate should be decided by what is revealed in the King's magical mirror.

If Xiao Ming was a good guy, or someone who had done an equal amount of good and bad things in life, he'd be sent straight to the Tenth Court for reincarnation. However, if the mirror, while replaying his life events, had displayed more evil deeds than good ones, he'd be sent to one of the 2nd-9th Courts for judgment and then punished inside the Eighteen Hells.

Each of the Ten Kings was also assisted by ghostly judges. Many of them were righteous and just officials in life who had been recruited into the Ten Courts posthumously——Cui Jue from JTTW is one such example, while others were living people working part-time for the Underworld, like how Wei Zheng, Taizong's minister, works part-time for the Celestial Bureaucracy in JTTW.

We decide to be nice to Xiao Ming, so, after reliving some embarrassing childhood incidents and cringy teenage phases in front of a bunch of dead bureaucrats, he was found innocent and sent to the Tenth Court.

The queue here was almost as long as the First Court's, stretching on and on alongside of the banks of the Nai River. King of the Turning Wheel made his judgment without even lifting his head when it was Xiao Ming's turn:

"Path of Humans, male, healthy in body and mind, ordinary family. Next!"

Exiting the Tenth Court building, Xiao Ming saw the Terrace of Forgetfulness, standing tall before six bridges, made of gold, silver, jade, stone, wood, and…some unidentified material. Before he could get a good look at them and the little dots moving across those bridges, he was hurried into the Terrace by the ghostly officials.

Now, both JTTW and the Jade Records mention multiple bridges across the Nai River. In the former, there is 3, and the latter, 6. The bridges made of precious materials are for people who will reincarnate into better lives, as the wealthy, the fortunate, and the divine, while the Naihe Bridge is either the common option or the terribad shitty option.

However, the Naihe Bridge proved to be so iconic, it became THE bridge you walk across to reincarnate in popular legends.

Anyways, back to Xiao Ming. He found himself standing in a giant soup kitchen of sorts, with an old lady at the counter, scooping soup out of her steaming pot and into one cup after another.

This is Mengpo, the amnesia soup granny; according to the Jade Records, she was born in the Western Han era, and a pious cultivator who thought of neither the past nor the future, only knowing that her surname was Meng.

Made into an Underworld god by the Jade Emperor, she cooks a soup of five flavors that will wipe the memory of the dead, making sure they do not remember any of their past lives once they reincarnate.

It tastes awful. Like what you get after pouring corn syrup, coffee, chilli sauce, lemon juice and seawater into the same cup.

Such was Xiao Ming's last thought, as he gulped down the soup, and then he knew no more.

Things you should know about the Chinese Underworld:

1. It's not the Christian Hell.

Rather, the Chinese Underworld functions somewhat like the Purgatory, in that there are a lot of torment, but the torment's not eternal, however long the duration may be. Once you finish your sentence, you get reincarnated as something else, though that "something else" is not a guaranteed good birth.

Other people can also speed up the process via transferring of merits: hiring a priest/monk to chant sutras and perform rituals, for example, or performing good deeds in life in dedication to the dead, or they can pray to a Daoist/Buddhist deity to save their loved ones from a dreadful fate.

Interestingly enough, a thesis paper I read mentions that, whereas Buddhist salvation from the Hells was based on transference of merits——you give monks offerings and pay them to chant sutras, so they can cancel out the sinners' bad karma with good ones, Daoist ideas of salvation tend to involve the priest going down there, sorting it out with the Underworld officials, and taking the dead out of the Hells themselves.

(The paper also stops at the Northern-Southern and Tang dynasties, so the above is likely period-specific.)

2. Nor is it run by evil demons.

Underworld officials are not nice guys and look pretty monstrous and torture the sinful dead, but they are not the embodiment of evil. Rather, the faction as a whole is what I'd call Lawful Neutral, who function on this "An Eye for An Eye" logic, where every harm the sinner caused in life must be returned to them, in order for their karmic debts to be cleansed and move on to their next life.

They can absolutely be corrupt and incompetent and take bribes——Tang dynasty Zhiguai tales and Qing folklore compendiums featured plenty of such cases, but that's a very mundane and human kind of evil, not a cosmic/innate one.

This is just my personal opinion, but if you want to do an "evil" Chinese Underworld? It should be a very bureaucratic evil, whose leaders are bootlickers to the higher-ups, slavedrivers to their rank-and-file workers, and bullies who abuse their power over regular dead people.

Not, y'know, Satan and his infernal legions or conspiring Cthulu cultists.

3. The Ten Kings are not Hades.

Make no mistake, they still have a lot of power over your average dead mortal. But in the grand scheme of things? They are the backwater department of the pantheon, who only show up in JTTW to get pushed around and revive the occasional dead people.

When Taizong made his trip to the Underworld, the Ten Kings greeted him as equals——kings of ghosts to the king of the living. If they see themselves as equal in status to a mortal emperor, then, like any mortal emperors, they are subordinate to the Celestial Host, and the balance of power is not even remotely equal or in their favor.

Also, it isn't said outright, but under the Zhong-Lv classification of immortals JTTW is using, Underworld officials will likely be considered Ghostly immortals, the lowest and weakest of the five types, much like Tudis and Chenghuangs.

Essentially: they are ghosts that are powerful enough to not reincarnate and linger on and on, spirits of pure Yin as opposed to true immortals, who are beings of pure Yang.

It's pretty much the shittiest form of immortality, the result you get when you try to speedrun cultivation (the Zhong-Lv text also made a dig at Buddhist meditation here), and if they don't reincarnate or regain a physical body, there is no chance of progressing any further.

Oh, and fun fact? In the Song dynasty, commoners and literati elites alike believed that virtuous officials in life would get appointed as ghostly officials in death.

However, the latter viewed it as a punishment. Which was strange, considering how they still held the same position and the same amount of authority, just over dead people instead of living ones, so there should be no big losses, right?

Well...it was precisely the "dead people" part that made it a punishment. See, a lot of the power and prestige they had as officials came from the benefits they could bring to their families and kins and native places, as well as the potential wealth and reputation bonuses for themselves.

A job in the Dead People Supreme Court would give them the same workload, but with none of those benefits. Since all the dead people had to reincarnate eventually, they couldn't have a fixed group as their power base, or keep their old familial ties and connections. At most, they could help out an occasional dead relative or two.

Like, working for the Underworld Courts was the kind of deadend (no pun intended) job not even living officials wanted for themselves in the afterlife. That's how hilariously sad and pathetic they are.

4. In JTTW at least, they aren't even the highest authorities of the Underworld.

That would be Bodhisattva Ksitigarbha, who is technically their boss, though he seems to be more of a spiritual leader than someone who is actually involved in running the bureaucracy.

Which makes sense, since he has sworn an oath to not attain Buddhahood until all Hells are empty, and his role is to offer relief and salvation to the suffering souls, not judging and punishing them.

Now, historically...even though Ksitigarbha in early Tang legends was still the savior of the dead, he seemed to be unable to interfere with the judicial process of the Underworld, merely showing up to take people away before they were judged by King Yama.

However, in the mid-Tang apocryphal "Sutra of Bodhisattva Ksitigarbha" (地藏菩萨经), he had evolved into the equal of King Yama, with the power of supervision over his judgements. By the time the Scripture on the Ten Kings came out, in artistic depictions, the Ten Kings had become fully subservient to him.

5. Diyu usually refers to the prison-torture chamber part, not the courthouse, nor is it the entirety of the Underworld.

And for the majority of souls that haven't committed crimes, they'll only see the courthouse part before they are sent to reincarnation. That's why I personally don't like, or use the name Diyu for the Chinese Underworld: I prefer the term Difu ("Earth Mansions"), which encompasses the whole realm better.

Also: even though historical sources like the Scripture on the Ten Kings and Jade Records seem to suggest that the dead were just funneled through this Courthouse-Prison-Reincarnation pipeline with no breaks in between, in practice, that isn't the case.

According to popular folk beliefs, after the dead were done with their trials/sentences, they stayed in the Underworld for a period of time and led regular lives, while functioning as ancestor spirits and receiving offerings.

Which would imply that the Underworld had a civilian district of sorts, populated by regular ghosts, making the whole realm even less of a direct Hell/Purgatory equivalent.

6. It is located in a different realm, but still part of the Six Paths and doesn't exist outside of reality.

In Buddhist cosmology, like the Celestial Realm, the Underworld is part of the Realm of Desires and thus subject to all the woes of samsara.

The pain and misery of the Path of Hell may be the worst and most obvious, but becoming a celestial being isn't the goal of serious Buddhists either: despite all the pleasures and near-infinite lifespan they enjoy, they are not free from samsara and will eventually have to reincarnate.

So if, say, the world is being destroyed at the end of a kalpa, all beings of the Six Paths will perish alongside it, leaving behind a clean slate for the cycle to start anew. The dead won't all end up in the Underworld and face eternal damnation.

7. The Black and White Impermanences would not appear in the Underworld pantheon formally until the Qing dynasty.

The concept that when you die, you get fetched to the Underworld by petty ghost bureaucrats is already well-established in Tang legends, but these were just generic ghost bureaucrats in all sorts of colorful official robes, with yellow being the most common color.

The idea of there being two specific psychopomps in black and white would only become popular in the Qing dynasty. Mengpo is kinda similar: although she existed before the Ming-Qing era as a goddess of wind, venerated by boatmen, her "amnesia soup granny" incarnation came from the Jade Records.

[deadshadowcreature]

More Qiankun Halo 💫

Nezha knows Wukong better than Macaque, which is why he hold no grudges against him when he messed up and I’m all ears for their early brotherly dynamics

I know Nezha didn’t go to Hell when he killed himself but it would be funny if he did in lmk

[romantichoneypie]

Cascate

Pairing: yan luo yang diyu X fem!reader

Theme: Anguish I think

Author's notes: just something I wrote some time ago but I don't think I'll finish it, so posting why I liked it

Warnings: Pain, anguish, agony, sadness, death

Request?: no

Summery: You're dead, Heaven or hell?

Be falling from grace like you're falling in cascade The burning pain in your chest, the feeling of discomfort and the urge to vomit and cry comes full on as you fall into a deep abyss and that makes you feel empty too,That's what it felt like death?,Well you don't know yet but there's something much deeper, but deeper than the cuts on your wrists.

And then you fall, hit the floor just like you hit the waxed wooden floor of your room, that beautiful room with star decoration that you still kept since childhood, the difference is that you were more numb when you hit the wooden floor and now the pain seemed even more real, Your body is weak and bleeding but something happens when you fall into an expressive liquid And then you fall, hit the floor just like you hit the waxed wooden floor of your room, that beautiful room with star decoration that you still kept since childhood, the difference is that you were more numb when you hit the wooden floor and now the pain seemed even more real, Your body is weak and bleeding but something happens when you fall into an Thick liquid and black, maybe that one... Insult? the one they said they burn the skin,Well, you were healed, that's what matters, does it mean that you are after death?, hard to believe, right?

Well you are there fallen when a figure approaches, is it an angel?, it looks so strange, full of eyes, it has no mouth it looks at you, and seems to judge you really, can you hear it?, no, you can't but you know what she wants to tell you and she makes you "poor human being, so miserable, prefer to die than to live and live with your own pain, how much courage, but it's a shame that doesn't really mean anything, just that you sinned once again"

You look at that angel, she has a childish appearance, but she still looks like an angel, her face is dirty and you don't know exactly if what you saw is really what is in front of you, why does the girl disappear quickly, which makes you reflect, Your head hurts but you lean down and see a new being, it looks like an angel too but hm no it's not, it's like a demon then?, you don't know Long straight black hair, white skin, and white eyes beautiful eyes even though you can't even see her pupils,she approaches you she wears a kimono.

"A human... If the little angel didn't want you, you belong to me, well... if you're strong, still follow me" the tall woman looks at you and seeing better you can see the holes in her cheek, the teeth on display, she's not an angel.

You get up and follow her, she doesn't seem to care that you're hurt well, it's not her problem really...

[littleeyesofpallas]

So there's this gigantic scroll of the Buddhist Naraka in the classical style of hell panorama art that was popular in the far east, and a couple years back I posted a big cut up of these images that I had tried to stitch together across a few different versions --some very noticeably lower quality scans or photographs and image resolutions than others. But at the time I had been missing a few sizable chunks, as a lot of the images I'd found online were incomplete collections and photographs and cropped to focus on specific scenes, leaving certain transitional segments of the illustration missing. Well I did at some point track down the missing bits, even if they didn't all stitch into the bigger picture all that cleanly.

unfortunately it's too damn big to post as one image, and by posting it in a format that can be scrolled through contiguously, you actually have to start from the end and go backwards to the front. So starting from the left side of the first image you can see the tortured souls having paid their dues to the karmic cycle being reborn into the material world as babies and as animals. And at the right side of the final image you'll see the world of the living being looked down upon by the divine as the newly dead shuffle into queue to be judged by the first of several kings/judges of the underworld

[touhouweed]

I think the silliest depiction of any hell has to be the one where after you get tortured for your sins in life you get given a soup that wipes your memory before being reincarnated

So whats the point of the hellish torture if im being blanked out and booted back into the world?

[leonsrightarm]

eventually i would like to amass a list of uhhhh idk if there's really a good universal word. i guess supernatural/folk stories that serve as the basis for the horror/supernatural traditions throughout various cultures. because i find it really really frustrating how discussions of the "origins of horror" always go back to gothic english stories which 1) are NOT the basis for the ENTIRE world's horror stories and 2) are themselves fairly obviously based on other inspirations so why are we even acting like this in the first place.

also it would be nice to see christian stories being treated for their supernatural elements in the same way that other cultures' religions are treated for theirs. like dawg your whole ass religion is named after a dude who came back from the dead. yes we are going to read christian texts as proto-horror stories and not just do some hand wavey 'yeah western horror has some christian elements to it.'

to that end my list currently includes:

[artepti]

Lovingly led to Ruin (LLR) - Masterpost

 “Under Command, Over the Line” - Part 4

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Do you think experiencing the icy hell that is the Diyu makes you better at lying?

[lordmushroomkat]

Okay I'm immediately reblogging to elaborate on this and particularly the things I rambled about in the tags. So I'll rehash that real quick (haha just kidding, not real quick, who do you take me for?).

I have a lot of thoughts about this. I originally only meant go highlight the lyrics with colors a little bit. But then the colors acquired narrative themes and symbolism. And now I have a whole concept and vision in my brain.

Elaboration on the color symbolism and my thoughts below the cut.

For reference blue represents the Diyu and the cold creeping influence of the Lady Bone Demon. Because for this my brain has conjured the idea that long before LBD resurrected Macaque she was whispering chilling doubts in his ears the whole time he was dead. And by the time he was brought back to life all of those creeping doubts had already solidified into a belief that Wukong never really cared about him. Which kinda makes sense, actually, because you don't go from being someone's loyal devoted warrior to hating them infinitely without a massive shift in mentality. Especially since the thing he seems most upset about, the thing his argument against Wukong hinges on; isn't his death but rather his abandonment. It would make sense if he grew to hate Wukong for killing him, but that doesn't actually seem to be his problem with Wukong? The way Macaque talks he would have you believe that Wukong's biggest most damning crime is abandoning people; valuing people only by their use to him. He does not talk like a guy who's mad at his murderer, he talks like a guy who's absolutely livid and furious at a manipulative ex who left when he needed him most. He talks like someone angry because of betrayal and heartbreak. Which is a very interesting writing choice, actually. Because it's so much more personal than; you killed me and I'm mad about it so I hate you. It's much closer to; you were everything to me and I would have done anything for you and you tossed me aside like a broken doll straight down to the depths of hell when you decided I wasn't worth having anymore and that broke my heart completely because I thought I meant something to you and this betrayal has hurt me so deeply that I can never look at myself or you the same way ever again and I was yours so now I'm going to be your problem because I won't let you ignore what you did to me and I won't let you send someone else down your path and I hate you so so much because you broke me in ways that no one else ever could have because I loved you. [Obviously I understand that Wukong's part in this is a lot more complex than Macaque understands and there is almost certainly some nuance and complicated influence and just. obviously Macaque was important to him. Obviously. There is more going on here than just what we understand from Macaque's perspective.]

Anyway.

The other colors also have symbolism, but those are somewhat less interesting.

The purple is Macaque. His abilities, his powers, his perspective, his voice. The song is from his perspective, though, so I only really use the purple for particular emphasis.

The orange is Wukong. His voice and his actions. It also represents who Wukong is to Macaque and Macaque's perspective on Wukong.

I used red to imply violence. Literal violence or emotional violence. Not necessarily always acts of violence so much as things that are violent. Feelings so intense they are violent in their desperation. Things that imply past violence. Things that are jarring or tragic. Things that hurt.

I mostly used green to represent other people. Like, just other people in general. Mostly the people they know and their influence. The Brotherhood and the way Macaque felt alienated from them. The way people in general made him feel out of place. It also kinda represents the world at large and the pressures therein; societal expectation. But also the noise of the world and the voices of others. The buzz of everything else. The collective overwhelm.

And then pink is for love. And lovely loving things. Things that were significant to them. Acts of love. Their places in the world together. The things that are just barely tethering Macaque to the concepts of tenderness and affection. The things he is rapidly losing his grip on and his faith in.

Also from the lore I appear to be developing here, I think I'm looking at all of this, this narrative, from the perspective of like, Macaque in the Diyu thinking back on his memories. Looking and listening back on his past and trying to make sense of it all; all the mistakes and the loss. Reflecting on it; trying to look through all the noise and the conflicting influences and the events and the feelings and the glimpses of the now and the slow numbing to find the truth. Trying to understand where it all went wrong while the whispers of doubt creep in and the numbing cold sinks into his bones. The song seems to be spanning his time in the Diyu as he reflects on things and the whispers and the cold sink deeper and deeper into him until he's lost sight of love and lost faith in Wukong and finally goes numb to any warmth in the past. By the end he cannot tell her whispering doubts from his own mind, the doubts have become a part of him and have made a home in his head. From this place of numbness the Lady Bone Demon would then prompt him to rage and vengeance. I presume that it is at this point she would resurrect her "champion". But well, the lack of her constant chill numbing his mind in the world above would warm him up enough to unfreeze his brain until he pieces together that she'd been tormenting him this whole time, at which point he'd make the choice to double-cross her. I imagine in the time he was re-alive before he encountered Wukong again the numb rage warmed up into a burning rage; where the love he didn't believe in stopped feeling like an empty void and started feeling like an agonizing ache. And with his heartbreak no longer on ice (so to speak) -but his mind still convinced by the doubts- all the hurt would quickly turn to hatred. So that when he actually meets Wukong again, instead if a cold unfeeling numb rage, he's worked himself up to a spiteful petty roiling-hot burning incandescent passionate emotional heartbroken violent vengeful fury. Despite this he still hates Lady Bone Demon more, because she tormented him for all that time and released him into the world to use him for the express purpose of destroying that world. He may not feel properly alive again yet, but he wants to live dammit!

I focused in on this way more than I expected to. The thoughts are rotating to be sure. There's actually a lot of cool stuff in here that I sorta pieced together by accident. I really like what I've accidentally developed here but I don't have any clue what or how I would build it into a good proper piece of art. The lyrics are as important as the colors and the symbolism and the imagery. I feel like a traditional animatic, even one in a more slide-show kinda style (the kind I would actually be able to make) wouldn't be able to capture it correctly, and nor would a fanfic. I think this is destined to be a concept rather than an end-product. Maybe the highest form of this is as a concept.

Was just thinking about shadowpeach and I remembered a line from a song that fits them so well in the way that it absolutely cuts to the bone.

So anyway here's the lyrics to Elsa's Song by The Amazing Devil so you can think about it with me.

I can hear the cannons calling as though across a dream

And I can smell the smoke of hell in every stitch and seam

And like flowers, the bodies tumble around this muddied lot

I cannot hear them scream, "Forget me not",

Your voice, it carries over the hubbub and the hum

And it paints the sky and circles high like the beating of a drum

You will scream, "I won't forget you, " but I'll cover my cold ears

It cannot be a lie if no one hears

'Cause although you say good day to me, I know I don't belong

And although you hold my hand and say, "I love you, " you are wrong

Because love does not exist here, in this garden, there's no feeling

And you say the words so often that I barely know the meaning

And when all the flowers are rotten and all the cannons shot

I'll scream, but you won't hear, "Forget me not"

And in years to come, you'll wander to the place up on our hill

And then you'll cry to our painted sky, "I loved him then, I love him still!"

And you'll strew some sage and lilies and roses where I rot

Of all the flowers you picked, I knew you would forget

Forget-me-nots

Just. The war with heaven, the loss, the separation, the death, the mourning, the coming back to life but still feeling dead, the distance, the love that was real but hadn't mattered when it needed to, the grief.

I'm gonna cry, I swear to the gods. If someone doesn't make an animatic for this I'm gonna be so upset. It's perfect!! (I guess I could try??? Ugh I have too many projects already, I don't need this!)

[tanadrin]

the invention of hell money by mortals is a huge problem actually since it’s caused terrible hell hyperinflation. king yan, the ruler of diyu, has repeatedly asked mortal princes to implement reforms to stem the tide of remittances from the living, but the dreams of hideous demons chanting about monetary policy sent to various finance ministers seem to have had no effect. attempts to demonetize various forms of hell money have been fruitless, as burned offerings simply materialize in whatever form is currently legal tender in the underworld. king yan has petitioned the jade emperor for permission to invade the world of the living directly to punish mortals for their lack of macroeconomic knowledge, but the request has been held up in the heavenly bureaucracy since the 1890s. so if you do want to make offerings to your loved ones in the afterlife, you might want to try saying a prayer over a usb stick containing a copy of your bitcoin wallet, then smashing it with a hammer.

[vampirequeenoffan]

Jentry Week 2025:

Day 4

Alternate Universe / Diyu

Slowly getting back in the swing of making comics again, even just ones with super simple backgrounds. I forgot how much work goes into them, haha. At this rate I'm never getting back into work on Predatory Loan. . .

_(:|」∠)_

Anyway, here's an AU I've been mentally kicking around where, once Gugu sticks the Yellow Emperor's powers into Jentry, Moonie and Peng get the hell out of dodge with their newly superpowered baby and Jentry gets to be raised by two career criminals. Maybe I'll flesh this one out more once I'm done with my current project. . .

[rebeltigera]

Heeey! Missed you a lot!

College sucked my life force for almost two whole months. I'm so grateful that it's the holiday season, at least in my country. I'll be able to rest for two weeks before getting back on with everything 😞

How have you been? Last time I was here you were pretty sick, are you okay now or still feeling under the weather?

Your last drawings of Macaque have been amazing, I always tell you this, but the way you draw him is very characteristic of you; you give him a special look that makes him look so majestic, handsome and gorgeous at the same time (and threatening, let's not forget that). I love to see any of your works on my dash anytime I have some free time 💖

Aaand, I don't have questions, or not (it just came to my mind)— the last drawings of Mac and Wu together are after their “wedding” in Diyu, right? :>?

—🐵🐵

Hiii welcome back from hell!

Yea, i'm better , The flu lasted a few days n I'm back to health. Only artblock stayed :'D

The babygirl is just a black cat

And actually no, it's somewhere in the healing arc! By the end/past half of it they are pretty much a couple :3 well at least they are acting like one either way skskskks

I actually didn't draw anything past their wedding in diyu, other than Mac getting actually heavily hurt before. It's better to leave u guys in suspense :3c

[hellkeepers-if]

DEMO (prologue out) UPDATES

Set in an alternate version of Singapore, you're a fresh university graduate bumbling through life as you desperately look for a job.

...Or that's what your mother thinks. In a world where occult ceremonies are as common as an existential crisis, there's no way you were ever going to be a perfectly average office worker. Just like your twin brother, you work for the International Society Of Exorcists (ISOE) which deals with supernatural occurrences, demonic rituals, and the like.

When a tragic event befalls your older sister, it uproots your entire life and everything you ever knew about the supernatural. With it, comes a forced need to come to terms with a family history straight out of the movies. 

After all, how the hell did it take twenty years to find out that you're descended from the freaking king of the underworld?

"I have a duty to myself, but more importantly, my family."

——————

Inspired by Supernatural, Fullmetal Alchemist, Noragami, and the Percy Jackson series, Hellkeepers is a +18 urban fantasy/paranormal interactive fiction, involving elements of Chinese and Southeast-Asian mythology. In every playthrough, you will...

• Play as a female, male, or non-binary Chinese demigod/ess.

• Determine the relationships between you and your family members. After all, they will play a big part in your story...

• Peel apart the full truth behind you and your siblings' birthright. Your parents can't hide it forever.

• Learn more about Chinese and Southeast Asian mythology as you warp into different dimensions, unlike anything you've seen before.

• Learn more about who you were in your past life.

| Nishimura Kazuo (he/him)

Age: 26

Ethnicity: Japanese

With a penchant for mischief and a charm that woos even the most stubborn of grandmas, Kazu is the wildcard of your organization. You think he's an anarchist, and the only reason he's tied down to the ISOE is so that he has an excuse for whatever havoc he wreaks on the supernatural. 

The A-ranked exorcist is your colleague and your brother's mentor, though you rarely ever see him in his office. But if you ever need him for demon fighting, he'll be there. Most of the time.

"Mind taking that pesky thing out for me while I take a quick nap?"

| Quentin Khanh (Quan) (he/him)

Age: 25

Ethnicity: Vietnamese

Quentin, more affectionately known as Quan, was your childhood friend. After he moved overseas, the weekly texts you sent him fizzled into nothing but a lost friendship.

Since then, he's returned to Singapore as a forensics pathologist and researcher under your organisation. Whether you like it or not, you have to no choice but to work with him for most of your investigations.

"If your bribe doesn't involve a penthouse worth of money, don't talk to me."

| Reyna Aliyah Santos (she/her)

Age: 23

Ethnicity: Mixed (Filipino-Chinese)

You've never quite met someone like Reyna. A halfling with a demon mother and a human father. Being raised in Singapore all her life with little knowledge of her parents, it's natural that Reyna would come to the ISOE for help at the mere instance of a fox tail and white fur.

You've been tasked to help her mask and get comfortable with her supernatural powers, but she won't make it easy for you. After all, foxes do bite. 

"Technically, I'm not stealing anything if they don't notice."

| Song Huayun (she/her)

Age: ????

Ethnicity: "Uhh...from Hell?" Chinese

| You don't know too much about Huayun, except for the fact that she lives in Diyu, the Chinese Underworld. As Diyu's gatekeeper, Huayun has seen countless depravities committed by humans before their deaths. That alone has made it hard for her to like them, and the contempt she shows you is no different than what she shows everyone else.

But with time, maybe she'll finally learn what it is like to feel human…and what a smile is.

"If it isn't the star of tonight's show. Welcome to Diyu."

| The Arbiter of Fate (m/f)

Theyre a stranger, or so you say. But this deity knows everyone...especially you.

[1karuga]

Just wanted to draw Macaque. I feel like there is so much potential for some psychological horror with this guy being able to trap people within the shadows.

But seriously, imagine his lantern being similar to the Calabash or Li Jing's Pagoda, or perhaps a mix of both, and tormenting those trapped within with illusions of not their greatest fears but of how they fear dying.

It's like the Hundred-Eyed Demon's ability but far more painful in a sense. I think that'd be neat :D

Plus it might be cool to possibly be able to incorporate the eighteen levels of Hell into this as well since Macaque would have quite the connection to Diyu (through him probably being in there for a long time and I bet he had quite a bit of torture inflicted on him in the various hells as well, so that would have a huge impact on him).

[phoenixeclipse-lmkau]

Hello

OH MY GOD YOU JUST ANSWER ME jgjhgkk *convulses*

Well, back to the topic, how would our favorite monkeys react to the death of the reader? I admit that I like drama hahaha

Oh yes this is something that you will witness in the fic. When the duo truly thinks their loving, sweet, darling wife is dead.

As its going to be in the fic I will give BREIF descriptions on their reactions.

Wukong will get mad, he’ll lash out and try to find a way to bring you back. There is no way for him to bring you back but that doesn’t stop him from trying at all. He raises hell in the Diyu for several days before Macaque has to drag him out kicking and screaming.

All through this Macaque is trying to hold himself together, he’s heartbroken and doesn’t want to let Reader go. At the same time there isn’t much he can do, in fact there’s nothing that he can do. Reader’s soul isn’t in the Diyu so he can’t get her back no matter what he does, no matter what he tries.

After roughly a month they will force themselves to build an alter, a gravestone dedicated to their lost mate. It will be made as the finest grave on the island. Surrounded by beautiful red roses and each detail would be carves by the kings. No one else can make the grave and they barely let anyone near the site either.

[quitealotofsodapop]

Alsowe beentalkingin the notes, but this deserves its own ask. Imagine, just a moment, Xiwangmu and Jade Emperor's reaction to Wukong's miscarriage. Both when the event happens... and later on, when a very pregnant Sun Wukong stands before them pleading for sanctuary when the Lady Bone Demon threatens him and his second unborn cub, and during the proceeds, they discover who Wukong's mother was.

On one hand, the Jade Emperor's actions had directly led to Wukong being on that Journey, had he and the Buddha not sealed him under the mountain or had he been more patient or merciful towards Wukong, more understanding, the monkey might never have lost his first born. The sheer guilt he must have felt when he learned of the miscarriage.

On the other, Wukong is now standing before him, humble in a way he had never seen the monkey in his entire life, pregnant with a rainbow baby, and pleading for help to keep them safe. And then, shortly after pledging his assistance, he discovers that Wukong had, in fact, been his spirit grandchild this entire time! This means that child he still felt guilty and remorse for all these years later... enough to promise one of his greatest enemies of all time his protection... had been his firstborn great-grandson.

And that's just the emperor. That's nothing on how Xiwangmu feels. She'd already inadvertently cursed her female heirs to have difficult pregnancies, and now she discovers that false to the sole male heir that are capable of procreation without a partner amd he had already lost a cub once.

Prev. Lots of talking in the Notes.

Recap: Once Macaque realises that LBD will stop at nothing to be free and enact her plans for world destruction, he decides that he must find a way to prove that he's sorry to the person he's hurt the most. So he asks Guanyin to give him the Circlet to ensure that he can never hurt Wukong, his child, or his friends, ever again.

This act convinces Wukong (and somewhat the others) that Macaque is being honest in his remorsefulness. But he isn't quite back to speaking terms just yet.

Of course LBD still gets loose, manipulating a fiery little bull calf who just wanted his family to be happy and whole again in to using her Skeleton Key.

And with Bull still imprisoned and Wukong too weakened in his condition to free him, there's no chance of reforging the Samadhi Fire.

So Sun Wukong, along with his reincarnated Pilgrim brothers and his new allies (and his former-mate, arrested by Nezha), comes before Heaven and Hell seeking help in saving the world.

The courts ask him for why he cannot defeat the White Bone Spirit as he'd done before, only for the Great Sage to reluctantly explain that he is with child and cannot fight her in his condition.

The silence inside the courtroom is deafening.

For you see, Xiwangmu was privy to the loss of Wukong's First Egg the moment he cried out to the Heavens at also losing his mate. She had not known he was able to carry young, but was heartbroken on his behalf nonetheless. The Jade Emperor too felt remorseful, the monkey he had punished so severely sobbing into his wife and daughters' arms at the loss of both his child and mate. The Jade Emperor find himself crying too, him and his wife know the pain of a parent losing their child all too well.

So now there's Sun Wukong the once self-declared Great Sage Equal to Heaven, before them once more after nearly five centuries of hiding. His belly round (a "Rainbow Baby" the Ao-Long family calls it) and his eyes watery as he pleads for their help.

Macaque still receives a gruelling Trial. Xiwangmu in particular is not forgiving of the actions that lead to the loss of Wukong's first child. Luckily the Ten Kings and Kṣitigarbha are there to explain the shadow monkey's sheer guilt and grief at learning of the First Egg's existence, and how his despair was so great that something older than Diyu itself had consumed him. And how his soul soared to revive after it was announced that the child was soon to be reborn. The actions of a remorseful mate and future father (both eggs still containing his dao) wishing for penance from his immortal mate in order to reunite with them in the world of the living.

The fact that Macaque was willing to bargain his soul to a primordial Bone Demon is forgiven given his reasoning to return.

The world below continues to freeze and crumble as Sun Wukong and his allies plea for Heaven's assistance.

The Jade Emperor gives the command for the armies of Heaven to begin chipping away at the Bone Demon's corruption. Xiwangmu barely has time to come forward and bless Wukong's child when the heroes leave to join the fight.

A lot of chaos happens on the ground. The Bone Demon becomes frustrated that her threats of death and attempts of control do not work on Macaque, the Circlet on his head incapacitating him with a single syllable from Nezha, Tieshan, or Tang's lips. He smiles at the demon through clenched teeth as she tries to drag his limbs forward, accepting the pain of the Circlet if it means he can no longer hurt his allies.

The Thrall is quickly dealt with. Sandy still has yet to take his vow of pacifism when he gets his hands on the smiling puppet that's been harassing his friends the last couple of months.

So LBD decides to do the next best thing. If she needs the Harbinger's soul to complete her weapon, what's better than possessing it's power-drained parent?

Wukong and Macaque are forced to fight once more, this time in order for Macaque to save Wukong and the Egg from LBD's possession. LBD's hold is broken when Macaque grabs Wukong's hands, interlocking them with his own, and places them against the King's round stomach. Kicks so strong and healthy that both cannot help to feel and hear it. Wukong sobs with joy, his baby and his mate are truly alive once more!

LBD screams and rushes towards Wukong - deciding that if she cannot destroy this world, she will destroy the simian or his whelp once and for all.

A sky-shattering roar erupts as a massive war-form of a Spiritual Monkey endures the demoness's strike.

But it's not Wukong.

Macaque proves in this moment that he is truly Sun Wukong's equal. In front of Heaven, Hell, Earth, their troop, and more importantly; Wukong himself.

Not much is left of LBD for the Ten Kings to collect. They grant Macaque an aquittal for neutralizing a threat to all the Realms, allowing him to remain on Earth with his mate and future child.

As the adrenalin drops, Macaque reverts to his normal form, now painted with sickly blue vines and patches of fur bleached white from the attack of death magic. Through his pain, he asks Wukong if he and the Egg are ok. Wukong wraps his arms around his mate for the first time in millennia, sobbing with thanks and relief.

The Egg continues kicking violently as it's parents reconcile, annoyed by all the disturbance. Eventually it decides that it should make it's presence known in a *louder* way.

(*Wukong still hugs Macaque tight*) Macaque, ears flickering: "What's that water balloon sound?" Wukong: "Huh? What water-" Wukong: (*look of realisation and terror as his water breaks*) Guanyin, teleporting onto the scene: "IT'S GO TIME PEOPLE."

And of course you can imagine the joy and tiredness that follows in the birth of "Little Heaven". And the uncertainty when both of their parents are put on tight medical observation, Wukong from nearly dying in childbirth, and Macaque from his injuries. All of Heaven adn Hell seems to come forward to aid the small family's survival.

Pigsy ends up being the only one able to calm and feed the crying newborn in absence of their parents. Tieshan nearly moves back into the palace as she helps tend to her brother-in-law and his family, not caring if all of the Celestial Realm sees her or her half-demon child. Guanyin sits like a vigil over the two monkeys, rarely even moving out of fear of missing their awakening.

Xiwangmu becomes suspicious of her reincarnated daughter's attitude during this time and decides to investigate some things in the Underworld. And of course you can imagine how her and the Jade Emperor feels when they discover that Wukong's own mother was the first reincarnation of the same lost eldest daughter. And that the very child Wukong had lost all those years ago was their first great-grandchild. And how much they feel guilt at the fact Xiwangmu's curse had spread to her grandson - taking his both his mother and his first child, while even nearly taking his life in the birth of his second.

Xiaotian - the "Little Heaven" - is almost literally a rainbow in the lives of everyone who encounters him from then on.

[xianqu]

✦ : PLOTTING CALL ━━━━ wishlist items.

i have trouble starting ideas on the go, or finding a launching point at times, so i decided to compile a list of wishlist relations that i'd like to have for yixuan!! this is by no means an exhaustive list, but a hopefully a place to start from and branch outward to; one of my shortcomings is unfortunately not knowing how to respond and conversations dying so i am fingers crossed that this will work.... see below the cut for a short list of potential dynamics! i'll reblog this periodically and send IMs to those interested!!

hellbound gods / ghosts / spirits ; one of the easiest, i think, in terms of launching points and an easy way into neutral-to-high regard from yixuan. he sees most as coworkers in diyu and even if he's not personally familiar, there's at least an unspoken level of respect between them. with the exception of yanwang ( a tip-top level god who yixuan has absolutely no business trying to get buddy-buddy with in an attempt to get out of this stupid job he's found himself in ) he has at least heard of others in his rank. * coworkers, friends, found family

' righteous ' gods of heaven ; the complete opposite of the above, yixuan has an automatic dislike for the deities in heaven. their relationship has crumbled hundreds of years ago and a sort of resentment between tian / heaven meddling with the affairs of diyu / hell has led to a distrust and longstanding dislike for its gods. especially given his new job searching for the deity who leaked the pill of immortality to the humans, yixuan REALLY dislikes heaven. * enemies, bridging understanding, begrudging coworkers

doctors / deities of life ; expanding on the previous dynamic, this one is a bit more specific to yixuan himself rather than the thoughts of diyu's gods. yixuan has a personal target on his back by shennong ( the god of medicine ) and his followers for SUPPOSEDLY stealing his eye. outside of shennong, yixuan has a neutral standing on those who give / extend life if only because they make his job a bit more difficult than he feels it needs to be. * enemies, antagonizing (yixuan ), new perspectives

mortals who have found immortality ; the Bane of yixuan's existence and his main purpose on earth. while yes, he's meant to cull loves for the return of souls to diyu, his target is finding who has gotten ahold of the pill of immortality and finding which god slipped it to the humans. whether they attained immortality through other means, yixuan is hellbent on reaping their lives if they aren't one of the heroes pre-ordained to be spared. that is, unless they can give him the information he's looking for: he's willing to look the other way for a price. * enemies, hot on the trail, partners in crime (?)

necromancers / jiangshi / reanimated corpses ; cult followers of yixuan's craft and the very souls he visits to bestow his grace upon in order to create these creatures. so long as they don't meddle with the pool of souls, why can't he have a bit of fun from time to time? as a creature made of gu poison, yixuan has no problem with the art, but oversees practitioners to ensure they don't step beyond their boundaries. * mentor-mentee, teaching an old dog new tricks, troublemakers

killers ; workload lifters, he considers them. though it certainly isn't his preferred method, so long as there is a steady stream of souls returned to diyu then he has no qualms against the methodology. he's befriended town serial killers, creatures of the grove, mythical beasts, all who lighten the burden of his already heavy plate. * friends, coworkers, partners in crime

followers ; he's a minor god, at least, until someone has a need to pray to him. even still, there are those who are devout to his name and he's willing to grace them a time or two, a ward of his protection. * god and devotee, trailing puppies, knight and king

friendships ; though his face is well known across his domain and among the humans who have had the misfortune of being paid a visit by him, he isn't always immersed in work. it certainly seems that way at times, but yixuan is a playful soul beneath the layers of gruff annoyance. he's a bit clingy, a bit demanding, and is never quite direct with his thoughts, but is a steadfast rock should someone need it. never one to take anything too seriously ( save for... his work ) he's a lighthearted god who doesn't exactly act his age. * friends, pesterer and pesteree, found family

family (?) ; yixuan is a solitary soul, someone who doesn't fare well with himself much less his own family ( if they even exist-- he's yet to clarify that myth about his origins ) but it gets lonely at times. not that he would ever admit such a thing... having someone to rely on, pester, come to with victories and failures would be good for him, i think. if only to keep from going insane until he's relieved of this stupid position. admittedly difficult to get to know him to reach this point, but a greatly treasured role by the god of plague if achieved. * found family, annoyances, rare soft spots

romantic partners ; admittedly yixuan has had sparse experiences here and there, with immortals and humans alike. there aren't many who capture his heart and those who do flee too soon * right person wrong time, reincarnated love, old gods learning humanity

anything else that comes to mind ; please don't let this post limit you!! if you have your own wishlist dynamics i would LOVE to see how yixuan could puzzle into that role, or if something in this list sparks an idea, that's awesome too!!