Chapter 3 驕傲 Arrogance

Corresponding ExR: Arrogance part 2 FW pages 62-73

Vocab first because we have a lot of it 縛仙網 bakusenmou While I don’t love “divinity binding net”, I don’t see any easy way around it either. 仙 sen/xian1 is obnoxious as previously discussed here. Have a wikipedia page for good measure. There are a couple things we can do here. Either leave them alone as Xian, or find a suitable, consistent, translation to add to the glossary. Just spitballing here: so there seem to be three ways of looking at Xian1:

The grammar of bakusenmou is “(verb+object)-overarching noun”, which we make do with in English by flipping it to “(object+verb)-overarching noun”. It seems strange to me that Daoist cultivators might hunt “xian” for sport. It’d be more likely that they’re hunting supernatural creatures, like yao1guai4 妖怪, right? “Immortal binding net”? “Xian-binding net”? hmm jury’s out for now.

仙督 sentoku I’ll leave this as “cultivation chief”. It’s nice and snappy and I don’t feel like I could come up with something better.

仙剣 senken Just mentioning this one because ExR keeps dropping adjectives. Suihua and Bichen are not just any old swords, they’re senken/xian1jian4. “Cultivation swords”? “Magic swords”? “Immortal swords”?

傲岸不遜 gouganfuson = arrogant, haughty. It’s a sign of literary refinement if you can find a situation to shoehorn a yojijukugo into, so kudos to Zheng/Chêng sensei and the translation team for this one. (Not sure if the translator is mainland Chinese or of a different corner of the Chinese diaspora, thus both Pinyin and Wade-Giles.)

乱葬崗殲滅戦 ransoukou senmetsusen = Mass graveyard [Burial Mounds] extermination campaign Adding this b/c I know long kanji chains freak people out

陰霊 inrei “yin” + “spirit” I don’t have anything concrete for this one at the moment. Sounds like a type of gui3 鬼, so some synonym for “ghost” might be apt.

剣芒 kenbo from the inline note on page 67.

仙剣が放つ光。またそれによる攻撃。 Light released by an immortal blade, or the attack by which.

Magic sword casts BEAM ATTACK :)

鎖霊嚢 sareinou = “chained spirit bag” I am surprised to see that last character since the more common version of it is 袋. IIRC the audio drama team had the exact same thought in the Loc team round table (PASH! 2023 Jan ed./2023 Illustration file. I'll link that when I finally upload it).

叔父上 ojiue This ought to have been glossed. Just in case you were wondering, there are three different kanji for “uncle”.

Japanese hierarchy is not nearly that complicated. 伯 is not commonly used. I have only seen it come up in 伯爵 hakushaku “count, earl”. 舅 shuuto is apparently father-in-law.

逢乱必出 houranhisshutsu “Meet Chaos Certain to Come out” There’s a whole paragraph explaining this one, so I’m not going to.

禁言術 kingenjutsu “forbid speaking technique” “Silence spell” works. I like it.

I should get this out of the way up front.

邪道 does not mean 魔道 or 鬼道

邪道 jadou/xie2dao4 IS NOT A SYNONYM FOR 魔道 madou/mo2dao4 OR 鬼道 kidou/gui3dao4. It is a Buddhist term and its mistranslation is a central point of contention from what I’ve read of many fan translation criticisms, including BOTH 7S and ExR. To quote the better portion of Wikipedia:

邪道（じゃどう）は、仏教用語で、仏道に外れた不正な教えのこと。転じて、一般に、本筋に沿わない不当なやり方を評していうのに用いられる。 Jadou is a Buddhist term, meaning improper teaching that strays from Buddhist Teachings. Meanwhile, it is generally used to comment on an unfair way of doing things that does not act in accordance with the main thread [i.e. “go against the grain”].

不正 fusei and 不当 futou are pretty loaded words.

仏教の語義：仏教に反する教え（六師外道など）。邪（よこしま）な意をもって他者を貶めようとするもの。 Meaning in Buddhism: Teachings that contradict Buddhist teachings (such as the Six Heretical Teachers). Something which has evil ideas and tries to denigrate others.

I cannot stress this enough: Religion is a form of politics. The supposed heretics are rivals of the Buddha in the religious sense and very likely politically as well. The Six Heretics themselves, based on only their wiki article, are a fatalist, several nihilists, an antagonistic, and an atomist. Is that really “heretical thinking”? They’re all arguably adjacent philosophies. There’s an entire tangent to be made about the intersection of Hinduism, politics and social mobility in the Maurya Empire during the rise of Buddhism. I’ll leave that essay to someone better informed.

一般的な用法：一般的に正道と認識されているものとは異なるやり方に対して、非難を込めた論評として用いられる（後述）。辞書では「本来の目的からはずれたやり方」あるいは「正当でない方法」といった解説がなされている。 General usage: used in contrast with something for which there is a generally accepted “correct” methodology with a diverging way of doing things; used as a reproachful criticism (discussed below). Explained in the dictionary as “a way of doing things which is contrary to the original purpose” or “an injust method”.

正道 seidou another loaded term. Scare quotes added by OP.

TLDR: Jadou means “unorthodox”, “not mainstream”, “against the grain” and comes with an implication of contempt for the object of the expression.

Example 1

The boy on the ground was fuming, “You damn gay! Good for you, taking this sort of wrong path because you didn’t have enough spiritual powers to do anything! Watch out for your life! Do you know who came today? Today, I…” (ExR)

Verdict: Permissible

The youth yelled on the ground angrily, “Dam,n cut-sleeve! Lookit you, going down the demonic path just because your spiritual power is too weak to cultivate into anything worthwhile. Do you know who’s here today?! I’m gonna…” (7S pg. 74)

Verdict: Disagree

ふいに地面に伏せていた少年が怒鳴った。 「断袖野郎！お前、霊力が低くて仙術の修練が上手くいかないからって、こんな邪道に走るなんて……気をつけた方がいいぞ！今日は誰が来ると思う⁉俺の……」 (FW pg. 67) The boy lying face down in the dirt suddenly yelled angrily. “Cut sleeve bastard! You said you sucked at cultivation magic practice because you had low spiritual power, and now you’re running along this unorthodox path… you better watch out! Who do you think’s coming today!? My…”

仙術 senjutsu, another slippery term. “Wizardry” doesn’t quite feel right unless you’re okay with swapping out “cultivator” with “wizard” in all instances.

Example 2

The boy presumed that, after being chased from the LanlingJin Sect, Mo XuanYu had chosen the dishonorable path, which was a reasonable conclusion to draw, saving Wei WuXian from a lot of unnecessary trouble.(ExR)

Verdict: Permissible

…so this youth also thought Mo Xuanyu had strayed from the right path after being driven out of the Jin clan of Lanling. It was a perfectly logical suspicion and it saved Wei Wuxian from further unnecessary trouble.“ (7S pg 74) Verdict: Permissible

おそらく少年は、莫玄羽も蘭陵金氏から追い出されたあと、邪道に目覚めたと思っただろう。彼はそう考えるのも無理ではなく、そのおかげで魏無羨は余計な釈明をせずに済んだ。(FW pg. 68) The boy probably thought that, after having been chased out of the Ranryou Jin clan, Mo Xuanyu also became conscious of the unorthodox path. It wasn’t an unreasonable thing for him to think, and thanks to that, Wei Wuxian didn’t have to bother with unnecessary explanation.

Example 3

Jiang Cheng spoke grimly, “Break his legs? Haven’t I told you? If you see this sort of evil and crooked practice, kill the cultivator and feed him to your dog!” (ExR)

Verdict: Disagree

Jiang Cheng said darkly, “Break his legs? Haven’t I told you that when you run into heretics, you should kill them outright and feed them to your dog?!” (7S pg 75)

Verdict: Permissible within a margin of error

「脚をへし折るだと？教えたはずだぞ。こういう邪道を使う輩に出会ったら、すぐさま殺してお前の犬の餌にでもしろ！」 (FW pg. 69) “‘Break his legs?’ I’ve told you this before. When you come across people using this sort of unorthodox path, kill them immediately and make them into dog food!

Example 4

At the present time, his hatred had grown to affect even people who cultivated like him! (ExR) And that rage was taken out on every cultivator who imitated him! (7S pg 77) まさかこんな風に、彼を真似て鬼道を修練するすべての者に当たり散らすほどまでになっていたとは！(FW pg 69) And [to think] it’d gotten to the point where he’d [JC] find fault with everyone who imitated him [WWX] by practicing kidou [the ghost path]!

I’m not even sure if 鬼道 kidou is even part of this even part of the original text or the Japanese felt the need to really hammer the point home here.

Alright, now the actual text

When Wei Wuxian describes Jin Ling as “rich” there ought to be an air of being impressed with just how wealthy this brat is both times. ExR and FW do this; 7S does not.

The motto of the Ranryou Jin clan is

“opening the doors toward wisdom and aspiration, illuminating the world with the vermilion light (ExR)” the conviction to open the doors to wisdom, allowing the vermilion light of eternity to shine upon the world. (7S pg 69)

「知恵を啓き、確かな志を胸に、朱の光で世を照らせ」 (FW pg. 63) “open up to wisdom, and with clear resolve in your breast, illuminate the world with vermilion light.”

This 啓く hiraku is for opening the mind to enlightenment specifically. I can see where ExR and 7S got their translations from. Sometimes you need to supply your own punctuation and a few prepositional phrases in order to make things make sense.

“Get out of here! It’s disgusting just looking at you, you damn gay”. (ExR)

「さっさと失せろ！お前を見るだけで吐き気がする。この断袖野郎」 (FW pg. 66) “Get lost already! Just seeing you makes me nauseous. Damn cut sleeve bastard.”

I’m not sure if “gay” was really mean enough. Either use “cut sleeve” and foot note it or find a meaner word. There are enough inflammatory words for “homosexual” out there.

“What an attitude! I suppose you didn’t have a mother to teach you?” (ExR)　 「まったく、親の顔を見てみたいよ」 (FW pg. 66) “Good grief, I wanna see my parent[’s face]”

This is a major derivation but it feels in character. (* UwU voice* ) Oh, you’re so intimidating, I want my mommy. Who of us wouldn’t try putting a sassy teenager in their place with sarcasm?

There was some stuff I had wanted to add about the introduction of Jiang Cheng, his appearance, and how he killed the paper doll, because the JP side is more verbose, but this post is already ungodly long. I will skip it.

Lan Wangji intro scene.

Mourning clothes! (ExR) （出た！万年喪主） (FW pg 70) (He’s here! The eternal chief mourner.)

One last thing about Jiang Cheng. It’s two separate sentences in the same paragraph.

He narrowed his eyes, his left hand casually stroking the ring on his right hand’s index finger… Whenever Clan Leader Jiang started touching it, it meant that he had the intent to kill. (ExR)

彼は目を細め、左手で故意にか知らずにか、右手の人差し指にはめてある指輪を軽くさすり始めた。 そして江宗主がそれを触り始めるということは、つまり殺意が芽生えたことを意味する。(FW pg 73) He narrowed his eyes and, whether he did so purposefully or unknowingly, began to lightly stroke the ring on his right pointer finger with his left hand… Thus whenever Sect Leader Jiang started to touch it, it meant that murderous impulse began to bud.

That’s all for now.