“Heaven's org chart has ten thousand Tudi Gongs and not one spare.”
A Mountain immortal of The Mortal Realm
3 known connections · an open question
The Earth God: the old man of the village shrine, white-bearded, smiling, in charge of exactly one village and its ghosts — and he runs it perfectly. Every locality has one; none of them are famous; all of them are essential. Heaven's org chart has ten thousand Tudi Gongs and not one spare.
He is sweeping the shrine steps right now, white beard in the evening breeze, while the village eats dinner behind him. A ghost needs settling. He will get to it after sweeping. The sweeping is also the job.
When the last village empties and the last shrine goes quiet, the Tudi Gong will sweep the steps one final time, bow to the empty houses, and walk into the fields he guarded for so long. The fields will still be there. They are always there.
“The village Tudi Gong keeps four small shrines at the edge of the fields — dark wood tablets, no characters, swept clean, offered to. Asked whose they are, the villagers smile the particular smile of people who have agreed, without ever agreeing, not to say. The old earth god sweeps the steps. He does not ask either. He was told once. He no longer remembers being told.”
Four shrines in one village, four blank tablets, and the villagers won't say who they're for.
They started human. Mostly. The Monkey King, the sea goddess Mazu, Guan Yu and his long beard, the Kitchen God filing his annual report — and the First Emperor’s clay guardian, who has stood his two-thousand-year watch without blinking.
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