Supreme Judge of Paradise Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu Species: Yama Ability: Establishing things as clear good and evil One of the gods that resides in hell and judges the deceased. She possesses ability to establish things as clear good and evil. Her real name is Eiki Shiki, and the "Yamaxanadu" is a title that she carries in her job as a Yama. Basically the title represents the place they're in charge of. Unlike humans, she has a criteria of right and wrong in her own mind. Her judgement cannot be overturned by the deceased. Her criteria is quite complicated, and the seriousness of the crimes factor in everything from why they occurred to the personal history of those involved. The minimum requirement of lying to her, in order to appear as a good person, is not letting her discover that lie. If discovered it is a huge deduction. Her usual routine is to find faults of the deceased and decide where they will be sent to: Hell, Heaven, or somewhere else. Due to her job, she tends to be somewhat moralistic. It was when Komachi did not ferry the deceased to her that she noticed something was wrong in Gensokyo. Suspicious, she looked at Gensokyo only to find out that it was blanketed by flowers. All kinds of flowers were blooming at the same time - spider lilies, sunflowers, lilies of the valley, lotus blossoms, and cherry blossoms. As she was digesting this, both living humans and youkai attacked her, seething with anger. These assaults immediately made her realize what was going on. Now it is "that year", 60 years since the previous one. All these flowers were possessed by spirits of the deceased, and the reason they weren't processed properly was because Komachi was being lazy. Komachi, being too easygoing, only thought "ah, it's beautiful" even when the flowers were filling the whole place. It's not like she can restore the flower-covered Gensokyo, but time will eventually bring it back to normal. There was little to no harm. However, a human who's been charged with a crime is before her. With her pride, she couldn't let her pass through her place. Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu (四季映姫・ヤマザナドゥ Shiki Eiki Yamazanadu, given name "Eiki", surname "Shiki") is one of the Yama who judges the dead and decides whether they go to Heaven, Hell, the Netherworld, or get reincarnated. She first appeared in Phantasmagoria of Flower View, where she served as final boss for nearly all of the Story Mode scenarios and can be unlocked as a playable character. General Information Personality Whether it's because she simply has a habit of lecturing or because she genuinely wants others to change for the better, she's become well known in Gensokyo for lecturing anyone and everyone about their faults. Since she is very preachy and is never mistaken about anything, this makes her hard to approach. Despite her stern attitude and seriousness at her job, Eiki has a teasing side, smiling even when revealing the shortcomings of the people she's lecturing. She's described as being polite and patient when lecturing. Abilities Establishing as clear good and evil (black and white) This is as literally stated. With this power, in order to hand down judgements, the charges that have been established once as clear good and evil cannot, no matter what measures the judged person takes, be overturned. The reason why Yukari Yakumo is not good at dealing with Eiki[1] is probably not just because she dislikes preaching, but also because the Yukari that loves chaos and disorder can be said to dislike things to be established as clear good and evil. Occupation Eiki illustration in The Grimoire of Marisa Eiki is a yama who belongs to the Ministry of Right and Wrong located at Hell.[2] Although there are many yamas, Eiki is the one in charge of Gensokyo. The souls of the dead are brought to her by Komachi Onozuka, who ferries them over the Sanzu River to Higan. However, not every soul makes it all the way across without being tired out from the journey or being extinguished by Komachi. She, like the other yamas, holds the Cleansed Crystal Mirror that lets them look into a person's past, learn anything they want to know about him/her, and then use that knowledge to make fair judgements. Eiki does have work breaks, but even during these she doesn't pass up chances to lecture people in the hope that they will change for the better and so she won't have to send them to Hell. For people with particularly bad karma, she will go directly to that person to warn them, sometimes by exaggerating the punishment that they would receive. It's implied that youkai tend to avoid her because of this habit. Eiki was not always the Yamaxanadu. According to Komachi in Oriental Sacred Place, she was originally a jizou statue, who received enough faith to gain divine powers, and was promoted. Possessions Rod of Remorse Always in Eiki's possession, it can be said to be a rod or a piece of wood. Upon writing the charges on this rod, the weight of the rod changes according to the weight of the sins, and the number of times to beat the sinner is also decided, after which Eiki proceeds to do the beating. This is one of the necessary items for use by Yama for punishment. As explained in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, she carries this rod with her everywhere. In the past, each rod was used for one person, and thrown away after its usage was finished. However, for the sake of the environment, it seems that they've been changed to use new material that can be erased and reused. Cleansed Crystal Mirror This is also an item meant for Yama to perform judgement. When a sinner is reflected in the mirror, it reflects all of the sinner's past deeds, though it is tiring to use. It is a dreadful tool for which privacy is even less than worthless, but perhaps because it does not show up in Eiki's sprite, it has a tendency to be forgotten. It can be said that the mirror of the Yama can change shape as they please, but Eiki's mirror takes the form of a hand mirror. It can even turn these deeds against the person in question, as shown in Shoot the Bullet when Eiki uses the spell card Judgement "Cleansed Crystal Judgement -Aya Shameimaru-" to pit Aya against herself. The "-Aya Shameimaru-" subscript in the card's name suggests that she can create other versions of this card for use against other characters. Character Design Eiki, as illustrated in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense Origin Eiki is based on the Yama Kings, a Buddhist reinterpretation of the Hindu god Yama (Enma), influenced by the concept of an "afterlife bureaucracy" present in Chinese folk religion. Japanese folklore usually mentions ten kings, but elsewhere different number of yamas is occasionally mentioned, with some Chinese legends outright presenting it as a rank any suitably virtuous entity, including humans, might acquire. Her backstory is likely a nod to king Enma, the most prominent of the kings, being associated with bodhisattva Jizou, either outright as a gongen (manifestation), as a subordinate, or simply as a related afterlife deity. Jizou is also often described as preaching to still alive sinners to save them from torment in hell. Name Her full name is Shiki Eiki (四季映姫); Eiki Shiki (using Western name order) would be her romanized name. The kanji for Eiki (映姫) literally means "reflection/projection/casting princess", while Shiki (四季) is the Japanese word for "the four seasons". Her Yamaxanadu (ヤマザナドゥ) title is considered to be a combination of Xanadu (an ancient palace of the Mongol warlord Kublai Khan, which was later used as meaning a "Pleasure Palace" in a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Xanadu can mean "an ideal place" or "idyllic magnificence and beauty") and her status as Yama, and can mean something along the lines of "Yama of Paradise". This title can be read as " 閻魔楽園ヤマザナドゥ ", which has roughly the same meaning as the above. In the data files for Hopeless Masquerade, Eiki (映姫) was misspelt with the kanji "映季"; the latter kanji means "season". This is a common mistake in the fanbase because the reading of "ki" in 姫 is rarely used, so IME commonly converts it into the former one. Design In Phantasmagoria of Flower View's official art, Eiki has blue eyes and green hair that is longer on the right side. She wears a dark blue, sleeveless apothecary robe with gold decorations on top of a black skirt and white shirt with one ribbon on both sleeves. She wears a blue and white hat with a gold emblem in front and a red and white bow on the back; the emblem and bow are balanced equally. She also wears black shoes with a red bow on them, and frilly socks. Furthermore, there seems to be a pattern on her uniform that seems balanced and she carries the Rod of Remorse, described above. Her alternative outfit in Phantasmagoria of Flower View is the same as her usual outfit, but her hat and apothecary robe are red, and her white shirt is purple. Appearances Games Spin-offs Literature Phantasmagoria of Flower View Eiki's back sprite in PoFV Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu Occasionally, in some fanworks, her name (title) is shortened and interpreted as Yamada (山田). Yamada is a very common Japanese family name, the Japanese equivalent of being called, for example, "Smith" in English or "Pérez" in Spanish. Because this name consists of simply kanji (both are the most basic kanji where the grade-schoolers start to learn) with bland meanings (literally it means "mountain rice-field"), so using it to a considerably noble character like her sounds quite phony in Japanese. Though "Yamaxanadu" is her title, it is often mistaken for her last name. This can result in jokes making fun of the excessive length of her name. Many fans call her Eiki-sama (映姫様) using the honorific title, and also Ēki-sama (えーき様) – the more casual version of it. Many Japanese Touhou fans tend to mistype her first name Eiki (映姫) as (映季, also pronounced "Eiki"). This is because the reading of "ki" in 姫 is rarely used so the IME commonly converts it into the latter one. This was also the case in Hopeless Masquerade. Eiki is the usual choice in fanworks where the plot requires a judge, for obvious reasons. In fan art she is sometimes depicted as short or even a baby compared to Komachi, but she's actually in the height range of Komachi's when seen in the ending of Phantasmagoria of Flower View. She is also very often depicted as an elementary child in many of the fanworks, which could be due to her drawings in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense and The Grimoire of Marisa. A possible reason behind "Loli Yama" is to artificially create extra contrast with Komachi and play up the breast envy angle. Or maybe it has something to do with Bleach's Rangiku Matsumoto and her short boss. As an extension of this, fan works often depict her as aggressive against other people with "larger breasts", to the point of even arbitrarily sending them to Hell out of envy. Some fan artists portray Eiki as being envious of Komachi's bust size in particular, though sending Komachi to Hell usually isn't an option. It's quite common for fan artists to draw Eiki with magnificent legs, and she is highly popular with devotees of zettai ryouiki or "absolute territory", a fashion involving short skirts and thigh-high stockings that leave only a highly specific and measurable section of a girl's bare thighs visible between the tops of the stockings and the skirt. Canonically, her fashion is to wear very short, frilly socks, leaving her legs mostly bare skin. Because of her job and Komachi's attitude, she is usually seen striking Komachi with the Rod of Remorse for being a slacker. However, amusingly enough, fans have also speculated that this could be just a tsundere attitude toward her Shinigami. A lot of fanworks portray Eiki as a bit of a short-tempered grouch who will sentence people to hell for any arbitrary reason, but this conflicts with her personality in Phantasmagoria of Flower View where she's stern, but patient and is constantly smiling even when having to reveal someone's shortcomings. In fact, she spends a lot of time lecturing people on their shortcomings and sins for the sole purpose of getting them to repent before they have to be judged. In her opinion, "Hell does not exist to punish sinners. Hell exists to ensure that no-one sins." Some of the fanworks portray Eiki with Satori Komeiji, since they are indirectly connected by their occupation; Eiki belongs to the Ministry of Right and Wrong which used to govern the Formal Hell where now Satori has taken its role. And also because they have the ability/item to read people's minds. At the conclusion of ZUN's "A Beautiful Flower Blooming Violet Every Sixty Years", Yukari Yakumo uses the phrase "cannot defy/oppose them" (あの方には逆らえない) when referring to Eiki, and her and Yuyuko leave before she arrives. While most explanations for this center around Eiki being hard to deal with and annoying along with being the judge of Gensokyo, some fans have interpreted this to mean that Eiki would not be able to be defeated by them. Some fanworks portrays Eiki's lectures as overly long from taking a few hours to a full day for her to finish speaking. Eiki's sprite in PoFV Main article: Phantasmagoria of Flower View: Eiki's Scenario Eiki's role was to judge the souls that managed to cross the Sanzu River, but unfortunately couldn't do any major work due to Komachi Onozuka slacking off in the face of the sheer mass of ghosts that were coming through to Gensokyo. Meanwhile, Eiki's interrupted by various residents because they were curious about the huge number of flowers blooming, and Eiki started lecturing them on what negative personalities they've got. She also later researches how many of those people have taken her advice on doing good deeds, in which many of them haven't. Wily Beast and Weakest Creature She instructs Kutaka Niwatari to test the protagonist for their strength before letting them into hell, she also relays to them via Kutaka that they should not trust the animal spirit possessing them, foreshadowing its betrayal. Eiki in HM Shoot the Bullet Main article: Shoot the Bullet: Level 10 Spell Cards In Shoot the Bullet, Aya Shameimaru encountered Eiki on stage 10 and took photos of her danmaku. Hopeless Masquerade Eiki made a background cameo appearance in Hopeless Masquerade on the Divine Spirit Mausoleum stage. She is seen standing still on top of the mausoleum. Violet Detector Attention: This section is a stub and it needs expanding with more information related to the section's topic. If you can add to it in any way, please do so. Perfect Memento in Strict Sense Main article: Perfect Memento in Strict Sense: Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu Hieda no Akyuu writes an in-universe encyclopedic article on Eiki as part of the Gensokyo Chronicle. Oriental Sacred Place Attention: This section is a stub and it needs expanding with more information related to the section's topic. If you can add to it in any way, please do so. The Grimoire of Marisa Main article: The Grimoire of Marisa: Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu's Spell Cards Eiki is one of the people whose spell cards Marisa Kirisame documents, adding descriptions, comments and considerations to imitate them. Visionary Fairies in Shrine Eiki Shiki appears in chapter 5 when Reimu goes to Higan to ask about Clownpiece being out of Hell and in Gensokyo and goes to meet Shiki Eiki to ask. Eiki Shiki suggests that Hecatia is letting Clownpiece escape from Hell but Eiki Shiki is confident about Reimu and tells her she only really needs to keep an eye on her. Wild and Horned Hermit Attention: This section is a stub and it needs expanding with more information related to the section's topic. If you can add to it in any way, please do so. Whispered Oracle of Hakurei Shrine Main article: Whispered Oracle of Hakurei Shrine: Eiki Shiki, Yamaxanadu Reimu Hakurei writes a fortune slip about Eiki as a way of cleaning up in the aftermath of an incident. Relationships She is known and feared among humans and youkai alike for her lectures. Komachi Onozuka She has Komachi Onozuka as her subordinate, who she regularly scolds for slacking off. Hecatia Lapislazuli She has only heard of her and her eccentricities, and has yet to meet her personally.[3][4] Yuyuko Saigyouji and Youmu Konpaku According to Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, Yuyuko was appointed her position by the yama, therefore it can be assumed that Eiki outranks her (Yuyuko also refers to Eiki as "Eiki-Sama" in Phantasmagoria of Flower View). Yuyuko knows Eiki personally, as Eiki dropped by to push her to teach Youmu more in Youmu's ending in Phantasmagoria of Flower View, which also seems to be the first time Youmu and Eiki met in person. Kutaka Niwatari Kutaka is another of Eiki's subordinates, as confirmed in one of Marisa's Wily Beast and Weakest Creature scenarios.