[5] Yinlü Wuqing, vol. 1, ch. 20, closing exchange. World Health Organization, ‘Emergency contraception’ (9 November 2021), ‘Mode of action,’ explains the different mechanisms of emergency contraceptive pills and the copper-bearing intrauterine device. Page checked 21 October 2026. [Source 1](https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/emergency-contraception)
[6] Rostislav Berezkin, ‘The Precious Scroll of the Blood Pond in the “Telling Scriptures” Tradition in Changshu, Jiangsu, China,’ Religions 12(10) (2021): 865, DOI 10.3390/rel12100865. Yulu Lv, ‘“Breaking the Blood Pond”: Female Body Narrative and Ritual Practice in Jiangnan Popular Religion,’ Religions 17(6) (2026): 661, DOI 10.3390/rel17060661. These studies concern women's Blood Pond traditions, distinct from the infant-spirit city described here. [Source 1](https://doi.org/10.3390/rel12100865) [Source 2](https://doi.org/10.3390/rel17060661)
The Underworld and Its Records
In Yinlü Wuqing, people are drawn into hell by their own conduct. The same account describes courts, registers and officers charged with carrying out judgments. These belong to its explanation of consequences: harmful actions give rise to the suffering, while the offices keep records of those actions and administer the resulting judgments. Knowing what each office does helps make sense of the documents and permissions that appear throughout the book.
The judge says that violations of the precepts produce dark karma, through which the hells take shape. Yet these hells are also inhabited places, with prisoners, officers and particular punishments. Calling them self-created does not reduce them to a private feeling of guilt or make their existence depend on an official's dislike of a prisoner. The book presents a realm in which the consequences of conduct are experienced.
Chenghuang, the City God, oversees the rebirth records of beings in Jambudvīpa, the southern continent of Buddhist cosmology. His files follow them through changes of name, family and identity over successive lives. The judge also describes a Hall of Hidden Virtue, Yinde Gong, devoted to recording great good deeds. The stated boundary concerns which lives the office records: the City God's knowledge can extend beyond his jurisdiction.
Tudi Gong, the Earth God, has more local duties. Appointed Earth Gods protect their districts and oversee the good fortune and safety of the people who live there. They receive notices of births and deaths, and records of people moving away. One may look after a whole village; a city may have several. The judge says these deities had been helpful, public-spirited people during human life. Their later office continues that care for others.
The title Tudi Gong can also be used for a spirit already living in a house before a family moves in. The household sets up a tablet and makes offerings; the spirit responds by protecting its members. When the house is sold, the spirit remains and the human occupants change. This resident household spirit differs from an appointed district deity. The book also describes appointed protectors for blocks of flats, shopping centres and shops, under the care of a district Earth God. [2]
A death notice has a different purpose from a continuing register. Called a mingdie, short for Mingfu lingti tongdie, it directs an officer to a particular person whose human life is ending. The notice specifies the place, the event that brings about death and the appointed date and time, down to the second. It tells the officer where and when to act.
These notices come in two colours. Pale yellow indicates that good karma predominates; officials from the offices for rewarding good and punishing evil carry it to welcome the dead into the underworld. Dark red indicates predominant evil karma and punishment in the hells. Bull-Head and Horse-Face, the messengers who collect such spirits, carry the dark red notices. A pale yellow notice describes a form of reception into the underworld; it does not itself name heaven or a Pure Land as the final destination.