Title: Panguan (判官)
Author: Mu Su Li (木苏里)
Chapters: 117 + 6 extras
Update Schedule: Sporadic
Raws | NU | Guide to JJWXC | Audio Drama
[No retranslations allowed, thank you.]
Summary: There once existed an honorable founder of this panguan school of cultivation. His reputation was illustrious, but nowadays nobody dared to mention him. Even if they did, all they said was, “He met a miserable end.”
Only Wen Shi still abided by the rules. Every day, he would pay respects to the founder’s ferocious, colorful portrait, but because of that he ended up summoning a sickly tenant.
The tenant stood in front of the portrait and asked, “Who drew this?”
Wen Shi: “Me.”
…
Don’t ask. If you do, you’ll just end up feeling touched.
Wen Shi (shou) x Chen Budao (Xie Wen) (gong)
Translator TL;DR: I know Mu Su Li’s summary is fairly brief, so I wrote up a tl;dr for anyone who wants to know more! There are very, very minor spoilers, but they’re all things that are revealed in the first five chapters. (click on the link, it was too long to leave here lol)
In short: Modern cultivation!AU x thousand-year pining x soul-ferrying supernatural shenanigans, topped off with a dash of horror/mystery and master/disciple dynamics.
If you’re the type to be art-baited into a novel, I gotchu: one (an absolute treasure chest of compiled fanart), two, three, four, five, six beautiful fanarts~
Translation Notes
(please read!!)
- 判官: I will be leaving ‘panguan’ in pinyin, because I really can’t think of a good way to describe it. Panguan comes from Chinese mythology and refers to, for lack of a better term, “Judges of the Underworld (diyu, huangquan)”. These judges were in charge of dealing punishments or rewards concerning reincarnation, and they were known for looking fierce and treacherous but being kind and honest inside.
- Obviously, Mu Su Li has drawn inspiration from Chinese mythology, but to my knowledge panguan as a so-called form of “cultivation” is the author’s own creation? (I’ll refer to it as cultivation because the English association with cultivation is close enough to what it means to be a panguan.) Being a panguan does not literally mean being a judge of hell in this novel; instead it’s much closer to being a ferrier of souls that have trouble leaving this world due to lingering attachments.
- 尘不到: An art name (?) of sorts for Xie Wen. I’ll leave it as Chen Budao rather than translating it literally. In essence, it’s a name that fits Xie Wen very well. I believe it comes from the phrase 一尘不到, which means ‘pure and clean,’ unfettered from worldly bonds.
- 闻时: The Wen for listen/renowned, the Shi for time
- 谢问: The Xie in thank you, the Wen for ask
Table of Contents
Arc One: An Old Friend in the World of Mortals
Chapter 1: Return
Chapter 2: Generation gap
Chapter 3: Soul
Chapter 4: Xie Wen
Chapter 5: Portrait
Arc Two: Wooden Boy
Chapter 6: Doll
Chapter 7: Mirror
Chapter 8: Drawer
Chapter 9: Notebook
Chapter 10: Switching bodies
Chapter 11: Withering
Chapter 12: Undoing the cage
Chapter 13: Losing contact
Arc Three: Wangquan Road
Chapter 14: Inviting a guest to stay
Chapter 15: Eating
Chapter 16: Night road
Chapter 17: Encountering difficulties
Chapter 18: Fated
Chapter 19: Portraits of the deceased
Chapter 20: Contradiction
Chapter 21: Legend
Chapter 22
Chapter 23: Going home
Chapter 24: Zhang Lan
Chapter 25: Unexpected
Chapter 26: Moving
Chapter 27: Bygone days
Arc Four: Shop Sanmi
Chapter 28: Trail
Chapter 29: Chance encounter
Chapter 30: Escape room
Chapter 31: Nanny
Chapter 32: Doubling up
Chapter 33: Diary
Chapter 34: Causing trouble
Chapter 35: Identification
Chapter 36: True appearance
Chapter 37: Frost and snow
Chapter 38: Jumping down
Chapter 39: Old habit
Chapter 40: Missing
Chapter 41: Distributing rooms
Chapter 42: Courage
Chapter 43: Becoming a puppet
Chapter 44: Fallacy
Chapter 45: Handwriting
Chapter 46: Date
Chapter 47: Golden wing
Chapter 48: Shadow
Chapter 49: Undoing the cage
Arc Five: Grave of the Common Folk
Chapter 50: Origin
Chapter 51: Awakening of the insects
Chapter 52: Tug-of-war
Chapter 53: Thin paper
Chapter 54: Going mad
Chapter 55: Clumsy hands
Chapter 56: History
Chapter 57: Evening chat
Chapter 58: Bird
Chapter 59: True appearance
Chapter 60: Staying overnight
Chapter 61: Entering the cage
Chapter 62: Dumplings
Chapter 63: Illusion
Chapter 64: Great Cleanse
Chapter 65: Strange custom
Chapter 66: Honest discussion
Chapter 67: Lucky dumpling
Chapter 68: Missing
Chapter 69: Entrance
Chapter 70: Giant array
Chapter 71: Affinity
Chapter 72: Cage master
Chapter 73: Array spirits
Chapter 74: Three in a row
Chapter 75: Huge gamble
Chapter 76: Mountainscape
Chapter 77: Cleansing the soul
Chapter 78: Stratagem
Chapter 79: The world of mortals
Chapter 80: To wither, to thrive
Chapter 81: Awakening
Chapter 82: Connection
Chapter 83: Liu Village
Chapter 84: Xie Wen
Chapter 85: Send-off
Arc Six: Nameless Burial Mound
Tiny Salt Translations 
This sounds super interesting! Setting up camp.
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Hello! I’m a silent reader of your ICDI tl and super happy that you chose Mu Su Li’s work as your next project! Mu Su Li is indeed a wonderful writer to be able to write different kinds of danmei and you’re also a top notch translator imo. Can’t wait to see you work on this one ❤️❤️
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Looks interesting!
Beautiful fanart. They remind me of HOB. Especially the red string, and the red and white colored robes. 😊
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Wow wow wow! I’ve been completely baited by that fanart! Can’t wait to read it! 😍
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If the summary didn’t bait me then the arts surely did. Thank you for the links!! Reading novel with clear image what the characters looks like make it more fun to me! 😆💙
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does this have a happy ending? no spoilers plz heheheh…
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If you’re still looking for an English translation, I’d suggest “Psychopomp,” but I think “Panguan” is short, distinct, and has a nice ring to it, so there’s no problem leaving it as is. I’m looking forward to the story!
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super late reply haha but I enjoyed learning what psychopomp meant! greek mythology is always so interesting!
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Somehow gave xxxHolic vibes
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So excited about this novel! Mumu’s works are my favorites, wanna read all of her, thank you so much for this translation. ❤
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This looks interesting! I think the closest Western translation would probably be the word ‘Psychopomp’ but I like Panguan better.
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I never knew about the word psychopomp before this – but it is indeed very fitting!!
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This looks super interesting aaaahhhhh
I’ll read this with Lie Hou
*sniff* I wanna summon my partner too
Thanks for translating this❤️❤️❤️❤️
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Hi! Getting started with this. I just wanted to leave a note to tell you that you’re my favorite translator. ICDI is one of my favorite novels and I’m really grateful for all that you do. Thanks! 🙂
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Hai, I’m sorry.i just binge read from beginning…why chapter 31 don’t have page?
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Hello First of all thank you so much for your hard work to translate this beautiful child ‘Panguan’.I really enjoyed reading this so far.And the last, how about you open Twitter acc I wanna follow you
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hello thank you for your effort I really like this novel *^*
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Hello thank you for your effort im still following it!!!
Can i know if u accept commission work?
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waiting…
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