Demon Suppression Guard

Biodata

Background

The Demon Suppression Guards serve within the Demon Suppression Bureau, which Great Qian’s emperor established eight hundred years before the story. Its founding followed a surge in demonic activity and unrest among sects. The Bureau’s mandate was to suppress demons, intimidate sects, and restore order for ordinary people 4.

Centuries of destroying hostile sects made the Bureau a deeply resented institution among martial organizations. Its members were derided behind their backs as the imperial court’s “hawks and hounds,” although sects generally avoided open defiance 4.

Organization and Command

Yun Province Structure

Yun Province’s guards are divided into three armies that largely operate independently. A battalion is the smallest independently functioning unit, and its Hundred Household Commander is considered a middle-ranking officer with genuine authority to act independently 7 17 24.

Authority and Discipline

• Direct command takes precedence: Outside their own chain of command, guards are required to obey and salute officers only when those officers outrank them by at least three grades. This limits interference between independently operating units 17.
• Internal killing is forbidden: Nevertheless, officers can endanger subordinates through assignments and other indirect means. Such abuses against low-ranking guards are sometimes ignored by the leadership 7.
• Withdrawal is severely restricted: At the rank held by Chu He’s newly formed squad, requesting to leave the Guard is described as punishable by execution 8.
• Private techniques are tolerated: Members need not disclose every hidden ability if they follow procedure. Sinister-looking arts are permitted, but techniques requiring mass slaughter or violating the harmony of heaven are forbidden 18.

Heavenly Martial Guard

The Heavenly Martial Guard is a subordinate support organization, largely composed of candidates who failed the Bureau’s assessment 8.

• County towns maintain squads that handle unranked demons and some weaker first-rank threats 8.
• Commanderies maintain companies of roughly one hundred men, led by a commander and two deputies. These leaders are generally early-first-grade martial artists with limited combat strength 14.
• Cases beyond their ability are referred to the Demon Suppression Bureau; local officers can request assistance and arrange recognition for responding guards 8 14.

Recruitment and Advancement

Entry Requirements

The selection process is lethal. Chu He’s Trial Mountain intake produced six squad leaders and fewer than sixty other successful candidates, even after standards were lowered. The prison trial is also dangerous: the text reports that a third of graded guards die inside the prison 2 5.

Merit and Promotion

• Demon kills earn merit: Rewards reflect the demons slain, and merit can be exchanged for cultivation resources 10 24.
• Assigned missions take priority: Killing demons outside an assigned mission earns only half the usual merit or less, discouraging guards from abandoning duties to hunt independently 14.
• Achievements undergo review: Tie Jun promises to report Chu He’s killing of a White Lotus Cult protector for assessment rather than awarding the merit himself 17.
• Promotion can involve competition: Second-rank squad commanders qualify to compete for a company-command position. Chu He wins the Third Battalion’s selection by defeating the other candidates 21 22.
• Cultivation and position shape recognition: Fourth-grade guards are explicitly described as talents worthy of the upper ranks’ attention 7.

Duties and Operations

• Extermination and investigation: Assignments include patrols, village investigations, and the elimination of demonic threats 7.
• Capture and research: Some targets are imprisoned for interrogation; unusual demons are studied to develop countermeasures 4.
• Annual service quotas: Guards must participate in enough demon-extermination operations or face punishment. These quotas continue until Thousand Household Commander rank, whose responsibilities are busier still 4.
• Graded missions: Threats are assigned levels. A grade-two incident would normally warrant a Senior Banner Officer or two elite squads rather than a newly formed squad 8.
• Civilian defense: During the Nine Nether Town disaster, guards shelter residents and repeatedly reform their defensive line despite injuries and overwhelming opposition 41.

The Bureau relies on dangerous field service to develop its personnel rather than routinely assigning elders to protect promising juniors. Survivors earn merit and promotion through combat, producing officers accustomed to fighting above their cultivation rank 34.

Training, Equipment, and Facilities

Cultivation Resources

Standard Equipment and Communications

• Flying-fish robes / brocade uniforms — Recognizable service clothing that identifies guards to outsiders 2 10 17.
• Demon-Suppressing Sabers — Common service weapons; Chu He’s saber releases demon-suppressing power when killing a White Lotus Cult remnant 10 16 17.
• Rank tokens — Carried at the waist and used to establish identity and position 4 6 22.
• Spirit horses — Used for travel and mounted deployments 19 26.
• Message hawks, fast horses, and secret agents — Communication methods used by lower-ranking guards. Officers above centurion rank have access to message-transmitting treasures 27.

Major Facilities

• Trial Mountain — Demon-populated testing ground behind the Yun Province headquarters 1.
• Demon Suppression Hall — Handles formal registration, unit assignments, and certain special missions; a metal panel displays claimed and unclaimed assignments 6.
• Demon Suppression Prison — A seven-level underground prison beneath an enormous beast statue carved by Yun Province’s garrison commissioner. Its suppressive runes deter even fourth- and fifth-rank demons 4.
  • The first floor separates demon spirits, evil demons, ghosts, and strange entities 5.
  • Habitat affects danger ratings; aquatic demons are rated one level higher because humans fight poorly underwater 5.
• Heroes’ Tomb — A ten-li memorial ground containing officers’ graves and slabs naming lower-ranking fallen guards. Its inscriptions record at least one hundred thousand dead, and the Bureau holds a memorial ceremony every ten years 48.

Major Events

Moon Ancient Village

Hundred Household Commander Sun conceals the loss of a squad and leaves the Moon Ancient Village assignment listed as level one instead of level two, intending to place Chu He in mortal danger. Zhang Wei warns Chu He that the assignment may be a scheme, but Chu He accepts it 7 8.

Chu He’s squad destroys sixty-seven Undying Corpses and exposes White Lotus Cult involvement. After clearing the village, he orders it burned and sends a guard to notify the Heavenly Martial Guard 10 12.

Chu He’s Covert Recruitment Network

Chu He orders loyal orphans he previously trained to enter the Bureau in separate batches and conceal their connection to him. Di Yiqi later reports that two hundred have joined the Yunzhou Bureau; by the Nine Nether Town deployment, at least twenty squad leaders are loyal to Chu He 12 24 26.

Battle of Nine Nether Town

Six battalions, totaling six hundred guards, deploy for an operation involving the Heavenly Origin Sect and the White Lotus Cult. When demons attack the town, Chu He’s forewarned unit suffers almost no initial losses and withdraws east to the main force 25 34 38.

The fighting escalates when a late-fourth-rank tiger-headed demon attacks. Sun Shang dies saving Zhang Wei, while the remaining guards hold a defensive line around fleeing civilians. Chu He uses a forbidden art to confront the demon 40 41.

Only four hundred of the six hundred guards remain when Zhou Cang arrives. Qian Hao accepts responsibility, but Zhou acknowledges a flaw in the operation’s plan 43.

Memorial and Reorganization

Believing Chu He dead, the surviving guards prepare to bury his uniform at Heroes’ Tomb. He returns during the ceremony and reports back to Qian Hao and Zhang Wei 48.

Qian Hao subsequently appoints him Hundred Household Commander of the Sixth Battalion to fill a vacancy left by the battle. Zhou Cang announces the appointment alongside orders to kill those who provoke the Bureau, collude with demons, or abuse the people 49.

Reputation and Enemies

• Sects and great clans — Long-standing rivals of the Guard. Despite mutual hostility, both sides often observe practical restraint because of powerful individuals and intertwined connections 4 30.
• White Lotus Cult — A recurring enemy that employs demons and targets guards’ families. After Nine Nether Town, its Holy Maiden orders Chu He’s family slaughtered to intimidate the Bureau 31 45.
• Civilian reputation — Guards are feared for their violence and arrogance, but their protection is also recognized as indispensable. Merchants make way for Chu He’s mounted force, while Nine Nether Town’s residents praise the guards who remain to defend them 26 42.
• Institutional ideals — Alongside Great Qian’s soldiers, the guards are praised as one of the dynasty’s two great pillars. Their service often brings little public glory and exposes their families to retaliation 31.

Notable Quotes

“Cultivation arts were neither good nor evil; only the user's heart was!”
— The Demon Suppression Bureau’s founder, explaining its approach to unconventional techniques 18

“But when disaster strikes and everyone else flees, only they will march against the tide to protect the common people.”
— An observer describing the Demon Suppression Guards 31

“Suppress the demons!”
— Rallying cry of the guards defending Nine Nether Town 41