#investiture of the gods

[ryin-silverfish]

How I imagine the conversation between the Three Demonesses and Nvwa had gone at the end of FSYY:

"Save us, Lady Nvwa! We were just carrying out your orders!" "Did you...not hear the part about 'No harming of innocents'?!" "Why, excuse my language, but how the fuck am I supposed to topple a dynasty without doing some kind of harm?" "Oh, I don't know, a strategy that doesn't involve tying people to burning metal pillars and literal snake pits in the palace courtyard?"

In her very limited defense, Nvwa does tell them to not harm innocents while they are at it, and would have gone and smited King Zhou herself if she hadn't been blocked by Yin Jiao & Yin Hong's Red Beams of Plot Armor.

Still, 1) it sounds like the verbal equivalent of a fine print, and 2) she has the entirety of demonkind summoned, and she picked the three who immediately proceeded to selectively disregard part of her order.

Damn, either the rest of that crowd were even worse picks, or her HR skill left a lot to be desired.

what if you were a FOX DEMON and you were released for the express purpose of MAKING THE KING EVIL by being SEXY so that he would LOSE HEAVEN'S FAVOUR and you do this EXTREMELY WELL by inventing 6000 NEW METHODS OF TORTURE and getting several men to KILL THEMSELVES but instead of getting your JUST REWARDS nvwa says that you were A LITTLE TOO INTO IT and then she KILLS YOU

[ryin-silverfish]

Do you have any thoughts on the dynamics between the generals of the Zhou army? I know JinZha and MuZha are described together a lot. NeZha seems to spend most of his time with YangJian and TianHua (and I’m assuming Lei ZhenZi since they get captured/beaten by the same guys in a few instances). NeZha also seems to shift in personality when TianHua and TianXiang die, making a lot less snarky remarks and killing opponents much sooner in battle (at least in Gu Zhizhong’s translation). Just a few examples

Ohhh, I have a bunch of headcanons regarding their dynamics. But before that, some infodumps:

-Nezha and Yang Jian's close relationship in FSYY may be a result of the novel taking inspiration from the "Emperor Zhenwu Kicks Demon Asses and Takes Names" genre of tales.

-Basically, in those stories, Emperor Zhenwu is sent to the mortal realm during the Shang-Zhou transistion to subdue demons and assist King Wu.

-FSYY kinda makes JZY take over Zhenwu's role. And in Yuan Zaju plays, Erlang and Nezha are often said to work under the Demon-Vanquishing Mansion of the North Pole, which is led by either Zhenwu himself or Emperor Ziwei of the North Pole's Central Sky (going by the variant where Zhenwu is one of the 4 marshals of the North Pole).

-Thus when JZY gains Zhenwu's role, he also gains his two employees from Zaju plays.

-Since Jinzha and Muzha only become a thing after Nezha, likely to flesh out the "Third Prince" thing and fulfill the classic folk tradition need to put characters in groups of set numbers, on a meta level, they aren't that close to Nezha either.

As for HCs, brace yourself, because there's a lot.

Thoughts on the Chan Junior Dynamics

-The Nezha + Yang Jian + Tianhua trio is certainly the most fun dynamic wise. Sadly, Huang Tianhua always end up getting ignored in favor of the Jianzha relationship.

(btw, I really dislike the "Yang Jian is Nezha's mentor/surrogate parent figure" take. Like, Nezha's actual master, Taiyi, is right there, and though these two are senior and junior brothers, they still come off more as equals in terms of status and abilities.)

-Nezha and Tianhua always has that vitrolic best buds vibe to me. Like, it doesn't take much for Nezha to acknowledge Yang Jian as senior brother, because their first interaction is a pretty good one, and his impression of Yang Jian is this polite, but not humorless guy with some OP shapeshifting skills.

-Huang Tianhua, though? They are both hotheaded, prideful youths prone to impulsive behavior, who've butted heads in-story. You bet Tianhua has tried to pull the senior brother card before and gotten a load of snark in return.

-Yep, whether Novel! Yang Jian has a sister or not, he's gotta be pretty skilled at acting the unofficial brother and breaking up arguments before they become too mean and heated.

-Complicating the matter: both Nezha and Huang Tianhua have brothers who fight alongside them on the battlefield, yet these brothers are practically strangers to them.

-Huang Tianhua is…well, spirited away from his family garden by Daode Zhenjun at the age of three, and when he joined the war to assist his family, he learned that his mom and aunt were dead because of Daji's plotting, and he has three younger brothers he'd never met before.

-Nezha's brothers aren't complete strangers, but they are distant enough to be unrecognizable during Nezha's first encounter with Muzha (probably because they spend most of their time away from home and studying under their respective immortal masters).

-And considering how the Patricide Arc went, I'd say Nezha isn't exactly eager to know them, at least during the first few years on the battlefield.

Tianhua: "Wait, why's Tianxiang crying? I'm just trying to lighten the mood!" Nezha: "If my brothers find one more excuse to 'make up for lost time' I'm gonna brick them. Both of them."

-Strangely enough, their mutual awkwardness around their actual brothers becomes something they bonded over, and Nezha becomes quite friendly with Tianhua's younger brothers, to his mock contention.

-Which is my explanation for his angry reaction to Huang Tianxiang's headless body being desecrated by the Shang side.

-Interestingly enough, Nezha says: "He's your enemy, and if it's out of loyalty to your kingdom, decapitation is enough! What has he done to you that warrants hanging his body on the gate tower?"

-My HC is that he has more or less accepted the fact that people he knew might die on the battlefield just because Fate Says So, but isn't quite ready for the depth of personal hatred and cruelty war can inspire yet.

-Also, I feel like the Yang Jian & Tianhua brotherhood is just as strong. Like, when he heard the news that Tianhua had died to Kong Xuan's subordinate, he got pretty angry, if the poetry is any indication.

杨戬听得黄天化已死，正是：道心推在汪洋海，却把无名上脑来。

-It isn't enough to make him lose his cool in his subsequent battle with Kong Xuan, but it's probably the most explicit description of anger we've seen from this guy.

-I can see Nezha and Yang Jian becoming much closer after Tianhua's deification yet also feeling deeply guilty about it, like they are hurrying to fill in the missing space, further complicated by the "deification isn't perma-death yet the person you know is still lost" factor.

-For Nezha specifically: he is destined to be the Vanguard of the Zhou army, but for over half of the novel, he doesn't seem to have that official title, while Huang Tianhua does introduce himself as "Vanguard with the Formal Seal".

-Only after Tianhua's death does JZY give the seal to Nezha and make him the head vanguard.

-Like, imagine if these two have bickered about the vanguard thing before, and Nezha finding out that his destiny——the fated position he always viewed with a mix of pride and entitlement——only comes true at the cost of a friend's life.

-There's probably shared anger and guilt at not being able to protect Tianhua's remaining family, even though their fate is sealed long before the war itself.

-Which is how I read Yang Jian's most ruthless deed, when he tricks Zhang Kui & Gao Lanying into slaying the former's steed and elderly mother while they are attempting to execute him, for the explicit purpose of destroying their morales.

-Like, it actually gets a disapproving line out of the Ming annotator of the novel, who comments that "Those who are the nicest and most obedient are often the most cruel, too." (可见极乖巧之人，是极恶毒之人)

-It also happens right after Huang Feihu, his brother, and the other four future Five Mount Gods died at Zhang Kui's hands. Though Yang Jian rationalizes it as military tactics and psychological warfare, personally, I feel like an element of "an eye for an eye" is at play here too.

-As for Huang Tianhua himself? This piece of old rambling in JTTW Discord pretty much sums up my thoughts.

-Finally, Lei Zhenzi...kinda like Wei Hu, he doesn't get a lot of spotlight or character. But if you wanna expand on his personality, I feel like a potential point of focus will be his relationship with King Wen and King Wu and the Zhou lineage.

-Since he's born from a great thunder, adopted by King Wen (then immediately taken away by Yunzhong Zi as a student), and transformed into a fierce winged warrior via eating magical apricots in order to rescue his father.

-Not only is there awkwardness from meeting the adoptive dad and brother he's never seen before, but also the whole monstrous transformation thing——like, King Wen has 99 sons prior to adopting Lei Zhenzi, yet he'll always be the odd one out.

(His fellow Chan juniors are of no help whatsoever when it comes to learning about normal family interactions. Not that they don't want to, but theirs either have zero presence in their lives until very recently, or are exemplars of How Not To Family.)

-I'd love to read a story where Lei Zhenzi is trying his best to integrate himself into this huge family, during or after the Investiture War, and eventually finds out about Boyi Kao...

-Also, in pre-FSYY novel version of the story, Lei Zhenzi and Yin Jiao essentially serve the role of Nezha and Yang Jian in the novel: both are born to destroy the Shang.

-Novel! Yin Jiao no longer has that association, considering that his destined role and Patricide Arc get taken over by Nezha, and he is rewritten into a tragic betrayer instead.

-But I'd love to see adaptations that add in some interactions between these two sons of opposing rulers——the Thunderborn Child vs. Last Heir of the Shang.

-Both become monstrous warriors via magical consumables. Both oppose the Shang (at least initially, for Yin Jiao). Yet what Lei Zhenzi wants (a father, a brother, a family) is what Yin Jiao can never escape, and it ends up dooming him.

[monkeyzilla]

Shithead number 1 and shithead number 2

[spoilersbutinaccurate]

Master and Disciple cont.

Pt.1 | Pt.2

[lyon-77]

Uploading some GIFs from New Gods: Yang Jian

Also, I've been wanting to clarify that Erlang Shen, as a warrior god rooted in the Chinese intellectual tradition, doesn't align with modern Western notions of warrior heroes as either glory seekers or guilt-ridden pacifists.

Erlang Shen is traditionally portrayed as an unwavering and ruthless warrior, but his actions are not driven by a quest for honor or personal glory. Instead, his role in war stems from a sense of duty to protect and to restore lasting peace. There is a tragic awareness of the cost of war—not guilt for those he defeats, but sorrow for the disruption it brings to the world and the suffering it inflicts on individuals, families, and humanity as a whole.

I really appreciate it when modern animation stays true to Erlang's fierce resolve and deep compassion, depicting them with subtlety consistent with the traditional view that war, while sometimes an unfortunate necessity, is always a solemn and regrettable means to achieve harmony

[digitalagepulao]

Prodigal son terror

Li Jing in a fury grabbed his halberd, leapt on his horse and galloped out of the headquarters. He was astonished to see Nezha with his Wind-Fire Wheels and Fire-Tipped Spear. He swore loudly, "You damned beast! You caused us endless suffering before your death, and now that you've been reborn, you're troubling us again!"

"Li Jing! I've returned my flesh and bones to you, and there's no longer any relation between us. Why did you smash my golden idol with your whip and burn down my temple? Today I must take my revenge!"

since I'm on a Nezha streak, might as well do my design for him on the Expedition AU! given that i've chosen to give characters a closer likeness to their region, it's only fitting i do the same with import deities like Guanyin, Subodhi and Nezha.

he's a complicated figure to place in the timeline because he gained popularity as a deity much after, only really arriving in China by the time the Journey would have been set. FSYY was written closer to when JTTW was written down, and he was retroactively inserted on the Zhou Dynasty period.

so deciding what to even do with him is dicey. but then i said fuck it, mythological rules apply here, he was around for the events of FSYY, and it and JTTW are set in the same universe. and for the sake of having some fun, i decided to get funky with his concept.

Nezha had the likeness of his family when he was alive, as described in FSYY, but once he was reborn with a lotus body he gained Indian traits instead. this is to be a nod to his status as an import deity and his origin as Nalakubara, and as the centuries roll by he may present himself to mortals closer to the locals' appearance wise.

as for his looks, i drew inspiration from multiple sources. read more for my rambles <3

his armor is closer to reconstructions of Zhou dynasty-period armor, skipping over extra parts simply because his lotus body is so indestructible, there's no need for a full set;

there are two red Chinese knots with jade beads dangling from the armor ties. they are said to ward off evil spirits, which felt like a good fit for a guy known to banish demons. i picked a six-petal flower pattern, which represents reunion, unity and a bright future;

i included lotus petals and leaves on his outfit as they are common in Beijing Opera outfits for him, and his makeup is a call to it as well;

The pink from the cheeks and eyeshadow seeps into his ear shell, as to convey the way sometimes, you get so angry even your ears blush;

Another thing i referenced from Opera is the two red ribbons on his sidelocks, though I changed them to two bulbs of lotus roots;

Four petals drawn close to his urna as both to make it look like a lotus but also form five petals, which is an auspicious number;

His hair crown is a fancy princely [knot] with a lotus motif and a pearl in the center, as he was the Pearl Spirit before becoming Nezha;

I was going to go with elf-like ears but I thought I could do better, so I went for stretched earlobes instead. you can't see it that well but hopefully the very large golden earrings imply it well enough xvx;

His cheek dimples are common sight on religious images of him and it was a cute touch imo;

Younger Nezha wears a golden robe because of his title as General of the Central Altar in Daoist belief, and the center direction is connected to yellow or gold, and yellow robes are usually meant for emperors and their sons, which is a minor nod to his self-assureness and boldness;

The Cosmic Ring has spiralling grooves on it both to catch blades on it for defense but also as a callback to Opera props;

On his waist is the embroidered ball weapon he was attributed with in earlier myths, he was also meant to have the leopard skin bag Taiyi Zhenren gave him, bjt it was going to be obscured by the text so i omitted it;

A few depictions of him gave him a halo of fire, which was real cool so i added it as well.

[journeytothewestresearch]

How to Kill Sun Wukong

Have you ever wondered what it would take to kill Sun Wukong? My new article describes a ritual borrowed from Investiture of the Gods (Fengshen yanyi, 封神演義, c. 1620) that would certainly kill our hero. It involves a secret, spiritual assault from a distance. That way, the villain doesn't have to worry about getting smashed into hamburger or ripped to shreds by an angry monkey immortal.

The ritual steals an immortal's spirit, tethers it to a straw effigy, and then kills the target by shooting the effigy in the eyes and heart with arrows.

[quitealotofsodapop]

Celestial Water Monkeys

Was discussing in the notes of this post with @silverlycanthropelover about the possibility of Celestial/Stone Monkeys surviving the Great Flood by adapting to the sea.

One of the jokes is that "Sea Monkeys" (the frozen brine shrimp toy), are actually a misunderstanding of sea dragon records talking about the little mer-monkeys that inhabited their seas.

Basically

Ao Guang: "What are those things hiding in your mane?" Ao Shun, surrounded by tiny mermaid-like monkeys: "I dunno man, they just showed up one day, and they won't stop picking through my fur." Ao Guang: "Why haven't you scared them off?" Ao Shun: "Honestly? They are pretty adorable. They clean my body of parasites, and comfort me when I'm feeling unwell." Sea Monkeys: (*happy chirping + porpoise-like squeaks!*) Ao Guang: "They do seem very useful... How do I go about hiring them?" Ao Shun: "I believe you cannot choose them brother, they choose you." (*cut to hundreds of years later when Ao Guang is lying at the bottom of the East Sea, despaired at the loss of his youngest pup Ao Bing*) Sea Monkeys: "Chirrp?" Ao Guang: (*looks up to see a swarm of brightly-coloured mer-monkeys, all swimming around his gigantic body as they pick off the barnacles and parasites that settled in his depression.*) Leading Sea Monkey, petting the king dragon's face with sympathy in their eyes: "Chirrrrp." Ao Guang: (*smiles for the first time in weeks*) :')

Like pilot fish to a great white, the smaller creatures stick to dragons in a symbiotic relationship. The royal dragons are very protective of their monkeys. Ao Guang refuses to acknowledge the irony of a Stone Monkey being one of his greatest annoyances, whilst tending to his beloved servants.

Wukong has no idea that these little spiritual monkeys exist! To think that some Stone/Spiritual Monkeys survived the Great Flood by changing their whole biology, or existed even beforehand, is an amazing discovery!

The Water Monkeys are a lot smaller than Wukong or Macaque, being roughly the size of tamarins. They don't speak "human" languages very well, their vocal cords are more attuned to the calls of dragons and other sea life. They can still chirp and chatter as monkeys do, allowing for some delightful conversation between the Stone Monkey King (they do not recognise Sun Wukong as their king) and the school of excited fairy-like monkeys.

[mythologyfolklore]

Buddha of Sandalwood Merit: Ah, yes. Here we have a beautiful couple... Nézhā: I really care about your feelings! Áo Bĭng: I really care about YOUR feelings! Buddha of Sandalwood Merit, turning his head: ... and then there's the disaster couple... Buddha Victorious in Strife: YOU NEED TO PAY MORE ATTENTION TO ME INSTEAD OF BEING AT THE HOSPITAL! Èrláng Shén: I WOULDN'T HAVE TO SPEND SO MUCH TIME AT THE HOSPITAL, IF YOU STOPPED INSISTING ON FIGHTING EVERYONE WHO COMES WITHIN A FIVE FOOT RADIUS OF YOU!

[passions-and-pupils]

I love the idea of a Nezha retelling instead of being told like a myth it’s told like fiction, putting more focus on how it would actually feel to be in these situations.

I want to see Li Jing come to terms with the fact that his youngest son, his baby boy, ripped out the spine of a dragon prince with his bare hands. I want to see the horror on his face as he stands face to face with a dragon king and realizes that Nezha has doomed them all.

I want to see Nezha throw a tantrum (like any child his age would) screaming that it wasn’t fair, that he shouldn’t be punished for defending himself.

I want to see Lady Yin make a temple for her baby and I want to see her cry as her husband burns it to the ground

I want to see Nezha as both a hero and a monster, reconstructed as a zombie made of lotus and spite, riding on wheels of fire towards the father who now refused to call him son, who let him sacrifice himself when he was far to young to understand the weight of his actions. Who shunned him when all he needed was a father to tell him what to do and how to fix it.

I want to see Nezha’s story as not a tale of Confucianism or heroics, but as a cruel reminder of what happens when we give children the power and responsibilities of adults.

Or maybe I should write it myself

[singlebraincelledgoat]

Hi Tumbler

I’ll be so honest I have no idea how to use Tumblr but I saw there’s a lot of FSYY content here so I wish to throw my own contributions ✌️

[steamedlotusroot]

according to fsyy, li jing’s pagoda was originally given to him to use in self-defense from a patricidal nezha, and chinese netizens like to joke that he keeps it around because he knows it’ll be over for him once nezha notices it’s missing 💀

in the lady earth flow arc of jttw, when nezha uses his sword to stop li jing from attacking sun wukong, li jing PALES in fear because he thought nezha was going to betray him and he didn’t have his pagoda around to protect himself

of course nezha isn’t trying to kill him; he was stopping li jing from killing swk (because swk was gonna take him to court LMAO). and today i saw some c-netizen comments on XHS and i wanna summarize them because oh man 😭 :

nezha has moved on from their feud, but li jing will be haunted forever. the pagoda isn’t just for his protection; it’s to remind him of the consequences of his actions because he can never put it down, not unless he wants to risk getting attacked again. he’ll be forced to carry that pagoda for the rest of his life

[ryin-silverfish]

So You Want to Read More about Chinese Mythos: a rough list of primary sources

"How/Where can I learn more about Chinese mythology?" is a question I saw a lot on other sites, back when I was venturing outside of Shenmo novel booksphere and into IRL folk religions + general mythos, but had rarely found satisfying answers.

As such, this is my attempt at writing something past me will find useful.

(Built into it is the assumption that you can read Chinese, which I only realized after writing the post. I try to amend for it by adding links to existing translations, as well as links to digitalized Chinese versions when there doesn't seem to be one.)

The thing about all mythologies and legends is that they are 1) complicated, and 2) are products of their times. As such, it is very important to specify the "when" and "wheres" and "what are you looking for" when answering a question as broad as this.

-Do you want one or more "books with an overarching story"?

In that case, Journey to the West and Investiture of the Gods (Fengshen Yanyi) serve as good starting points, made more accessible for general readers by the fact that they both had English translations——Anthony C. Yu's JTTW translation is very good, Gu Zhizhong's FSYY one, not so much.

Crucially, they are both Ming vernacular novels. Though they are fictional works that are not on the same level of "seriousness" as actual religious scriptures, these books still took inspiration from the popular religion of their times, at a point where the blending of the Three Teachings (Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism) had become truly mainstream.

And for FSYY specifically, the book had a huge influence on subsequent popular worship because of its "pantheon-building" aspect, to the point of some Daoists actually putting characters from the novel into their temples.

(Vernacular novels + operas being a medium for the spread of popular worship and popular fictional characters eventually being worshipped IRL is a thing in Ming-Qing China. Meir Shahar has a paper that goes into detail about the relationship between the two.)

After that, if you want to read other Shenmo novels, works that are much less well-written but may be more reflective of Ming folk religions at the time, check out Journey to the North/South/East (named as such bc of what basically amounted to a Ming print house marketing strategy) too.

-Do you want to know about the priestly Daoist side of things, the "how the deities are organized and worshipped in a somewhat more formal setting" vs "how the stories are told"?

Though I won't recommend diving straight into the entire Daozang or Yunji Qiqian or some other books compiled in the Daoist text collections, I can think of a few "list of gods/immortals" type works, like Liexian Zhuan and Zhenling Weiye Tu.

Also, though it is much closer to the folk religion side than the organized Daoist side, the Yuan-Ming era Grand Compendium of the Three Religions' Deities, aka Sanjiao Soushen Daquan, is invaluable in understanding the origins and evolutions of certain popular deities.

(A quirk of historical Daoist scriptures is that they often come up with giant lists of gods that have never appeared in other prior texts, or enjoy any actual worship in temples.)

(The "organized/folk" divide is itself a dubious one, seeing how both state religion and "priestly" Daoism had channels to incorporate popular deities and practices into their systems. But if you are just looking at written materials, I feel like there is still a noticeable difference.)

Lastly, if you want to know more about Daoist immortal-hood and how to attain it: Ge Hong's Baopuzi (N & S. dynasty) and Zhonglv Chuandao Ji (late Tang/Five Dynasties) are both texts about external and internal alchemy with English translations.

-Do you want something older, more ancient, from Warring States and Qin-Han Era China?

Classics of Mountains and Seas, aka Shanhai Jing, is the way to go. It also reads like a bestiary-slash-fantastical cookbook, full of strange beasts, plants, kingdoms of unusual humanoids, and the occasional half-man, half-beast gods.

A later work, the Han-dynasty Huai Nan Zi, is an even denser read, being a collection of essays, but it's also where a lot of ancient legends like "Nvwa patches the sky" and "Chang'e steals the elixir of immortality" can be first found in bits and pieces.

Shenyi Jing might or might not be a Northern-Southern dynasties work masquerading as a Han one. It was written in a style that emulated the Classics of Mountains and Seas, and had some neat fantastic beasts and additional descriptions of gods/beasts mentioned in the previous 2 works.

-Do you have too much time on your hands, a willingness to get through lot of classical Chinese, and an obsession over yaoguais and ghosts?

Then it's time to flip open the encyclopedic folklore compendiums——Soushen Ji (N/S dynasty), You Yang Za Zu (Tang), Taiping Guangji (early Song), Yijian Zhi (Southern Song)...

Okay, to be honest, you probably can't read all of them from start to finish. I can't either. These aren't purely folklore compendiums, but giant encyclopedias collecting matters ranging from history and biography to medicine and geography, with specific sections on yaoguais, ghosts and "strange things that happened to someone".

As such, I recommend you only check the relevant sections and use the Full Text Search function well.

Pu Songling's Strange Tales from a Chinese Studios, aka Liaozhai Zhiyi, is in a similar vein, but a lot more entertaining and readable. Together with Yuewei Caotang Biji and Zi Buyu, they formed the "Big Three" of Qing dynasty folktale compendiums, all of which featured a lot of stories about fox spirits and ghosts.

Lastly...

The Yuan-Ming Zajus (a sort of folk opera) get an honorable mention. Apart from JTTW Zaju, an early, pre-novel version of the story that has very different characterization of SWK, there are also a few plays centered around Erlang (specifically, Zhao Erlang) and Nezha, such as "Erlang Drunkenly Shot the Demon-locking Mirror". Sadly, none of these had an English translation.

Because of the fragmented nature of Chinese mythos, you can always find some tidbits scattered inside history books like Zuo Zhuan or poetry collections like Qu Yuan's Chuci. Since they aren't really about mythology overall and are too numerous to cite, I do not include them in this post, but if you wanna go down even deeper in this already gigantic rabbit hole, it's a good thing to keep in mind.

[monkeyzilla]

I really like Ne Zha 2019

Also I wanna see this specific version of him meet monkey king reborn’s wukong ☝️they remind me of each other so much. Also it’s really silly that Nezha is technically wukong’s senior by like idk 600 years even though he’s like a skibidi toilet iPad kid

[spoilersbutinaccurate]

Master and Disciple

Pt.1 | Pt.2

[treesah]

So blessed to live in an era where a video game has globalized the thirst for Erlang Shen