*This is the updated Pinterest board that includes how each character will look in the official anime: https://www.pinterest.ca/keixxxsan/fodcgdc-anime-official-art/
Protagonists
Wei Ying
(named Mo XuanYu after transmigration)
Common name: WuXian (fourth on the list of young masters)
Title: YiLing Patriarch
Name meanings: Wei—contains the character for “ghost”; Ying— “infant”; WuXian— “no envies”; YiLing—the place Yiling, where Luanzang Hill is
Height: 186 cm (180 cm after transmigration)
Sword: Suibian (the Chinese characters “Sui Bian”, meaning “whatever”, are engraved on the sword)
Tools: Stygian Tiger Seal (of which half was destroyed prior to the siege at Luanzang Hill), Compass of Evil, spirit-attraction flag
Lan Zhan
Common name: WangJi (second on the list of young masters)
Title: HanGuang-Jun (“Two Jades of Lan” with his brother Lan XiChen)
Name meanings: Lan— “blue”; Zhan—an adjective often used to describe an azure shade of blue; WangJi—a Daoist phrase, meaning “to not seek fame or wealth, forget about worldly matters, and be at peace with the world”; HanGuang— “to hold light”
Height: 188 cm
Sword: Bichen (meaning “to avoid dust/worldly matters”)
Guqin: Wangji
YunmengJiang Sect
Motto: to attempt the impossible
Residence: Lotus Pier, Yunmeng
Motif: the nine-petal lotus
Jiang Cheng
Common name: WanYin (fifth on the list of young masters)
Name meanings: Jiang— “river”; Cheng— “clear”, “transparent”; WanYin— Wan means “night”, while Yin means “to chant”
Height: 185 cm
Sword: Sandu (a Buddhist phrase that refers to the root of all turmoil—greed, anger, and ignorance)
Ring: Zidian (“purple lightning”); it can turn into a whip that emits purple lightning, able to separate the soul and body of a person who had seized someone else’s body
Jiang FengMian
(Jiang Cheng’s father and past sect leader; he was old friends with Wei WuXian’s parents)
Name meanings: FengMian—Feng means “maple”, while Mian means “to sleep”
Yu ZiYuan
(Jiang Cheng’s mother)
Name meanings: Yu—”to worry”; ZiYuan—”purple kite-bird”
Jiang YanLi
(Jiang Cheng’s older sister, Wei WuXian’s shijie)
Name meanings: YanLi—”to dislike separation”
GusuLan Sect
Motto: be righteous
Founder: Lan An (born in a temple; became a musician afterward)
Residence: The Cloud Recesses, Gusu
Motif: flowing clouds
Lan Huan
Common name: XiChen (first on the list of young masters)
Title: ZeWu-Jun
Name meanings: Huan—“to dissipate”; XiChen—”A chancellor of the morning sun”
Height: 188 cm
Sword: Shuoyue (“new moon”)
Xiao: Liebing (“fractured ice”)
Lan SiZhui
(mature disciple with polite manners)
Name meanings: SiZhui—”to recollect and long for”
Height: 172 cm
Lan JingYi
(less mature disciple with less polite manners)
Name meanings: JingYi—Jing means “scenery”, while Yi can mean either “appearance”, “etiquette”, or “gift”
Height: 168 cm
Lan QiRen
(the pedantic, stubborn, strict teacher who brings up excellent students)
Name meanings: QiRen—Qi means “to open, to start”, while Ren means “kindness”
LanlingJin Sect
Residence: Koi Tower, Lanling
Motif: the white peony Sparks Amidst Snow
(Disciples of the Jin Clan have vermilion marks on their forehead)
Jin GuangYao
(Leader of the LanlingJin Sect)
Title: LianFang-Zun
Name meanings: Jin—”golden”; GuangYao—Guang means “light”, while Yao means “a radiant piece of jade”; LianFang—”to hide fragrance”
Height: 170 cm
Jin Ling
(son of Jin ZiXuan and Jiang YanLi)
Name meanings: Ling—”to rise above”
Height: 172 cm
Jin ZiXuan
(Ranked third on the list of young masters)
Name meanings: Zi—a common character found in many names; Xuan—”a tall pavilion”
Height: 185 cm
Jin GuangShan
(past sect leader, rumored to have died “in bed”)
Name meanings: GuangShan—Guang means “light”, while Shan means “kindness”
Mo XuanYu
(illegitimate son of Jin GuangShan, sacrificed his body to Wei WuXian)
Name meanings: XuanYu—Xuan means “mysterious”, while Yu means “feathers”
Qin Su
(Wife of Jin GuangYao)
Name meanings: Su—”sincerity”
QishanWen Sect
Founder: Wen Mao (the first to focus on expanding the clan instead of the sect)
Wen Ning
Alternative name: Ghost General
Name meanings: Wen—”lukewarm”; Ning—”peace”
Height: 183 cm
Wen RuoHan
(Past leader of the Wen Sect)
Name meanings: RuoHan—Ruo means “as though”, while Han means “coldness”
QingheNie Sect
Motif: the head of a beast
Nie MingJue
Title: ChiFeng-Zun (eldest one of the sworn brothers)
Name meanings: MingJue—”a bright, penannular jade”; ChiFeng—”a crimson blade”
Saber: Baxia (“to be under forceful power”)
Height: 191 cm
Nie HuaiSang
(the cowardly second young master)
Name meanings: HuaiSang—Huai means “to hold”, while Sang refers to “mulberry leaves”
Height: 172 cm
Yicheng Arc
Xue Yang
Height: 180 cm
Sword: Jiangzai (“to bring down disasters”)
Xiao XingChen
Name meanings: Xiao—”dawn”; XingChen—”star-dust”
Height: 185 cm
Sword: Shuanghua (“floral frost” or “the brilliance of frost”)
Song Lan
Common name: ZiChen
Name meanings: Lan—”mist”; ZiChen—Zi a common character found in many names, while Chen means “a precious stone”
Sword: Fuxue (“to brush away snow”)
A-Qing
Name meanings: Qing—”bamboo”
The character guide is really helpful! just wanna point out a few mistakes:) ‘A Qing’ is actually called ‘A Jing’ and the interpretation for Shuang Hua'(Xiao Xingchen’s sword) is ‘the brilliance of frost’ instead of floral frost. Hua here means brilliance, not flower(the two characters have similar pronunciations except the tones so it might be confusing) btw XXC’s my favorite character beside MC/ML!
First of all, sorry for the delay in reply! Real life has been quite busy and I haven’t checked the comments in a long time. Here’s my response:
I went with A-Qing instead of A-Jing because, firstly, both pronunciations are correct. Second of all, an official-ish audio drama of the Yicheng Arc (before the current audio drama was produced and before MXTX stopped giving out fan-made audio drama permission) pronounced it as A-Qing. I’ve looked into all of MXTX’s interviews, and if I remember correctly she said in one of the interviews that it’s pronounced A-Qing. I’ll be going with A-Qing as of now, but I’m sure A-Jing would be a valid pronunciation too, seeing that the actual audio drama pronounced it that way.
As for Shuanghua, I originally explained it as “floral frost” because of one of hua’s secondary meaning, to “flower” (found in Baidu Hanyu and Baidu Baike). I used this meaning because I thought that it corresponded with the frost patterns on XXC’s sword. When I searched up the term 霜华 on Baidu Hanyu, it told me to “refer to 霜花”, so I decided to go with the “floral” meaning. With some more research, however, I did seem to have found a possible origin of the word shuanghua—冷寄霜华. Here, it would indeed mean “the brilliance of frost”. I’ll be putting both interpretations up, since I think both could work well.
Thank you so much for the suggestions and I hope you find my explanations acceptable ^^
hhh it’s totally fine to put up the two versions, indeed, beside the author herself, many Chinese sometimes pronounce Jing as Qing as well. I really appreciate the research you’ve done! thank you again for the guide, I had always hoped that someone can take on the role of explaining the beautiful meanings behind all the names until I saw this and I was amazed!
The character guide is very good, but I just think maybe we can add Wen Qing. I didn’t see her in the guide.
Thank you for the translation!
exactly!!
[…] reading the character guide will also be very helpful for newbie https://exiledrebelsscanlations.com/gdc-character-and-sect-guide/ […]
This is very very helpful, but I think I need a timeline guide too…
I’m trying to catch up and I can’t find where I left off. I know where I left off in the timeline, but I can’t find the right chapter at all….
hey, i was just wondering what the chinese for the Jiang sect motto is??? I’ve seen on tumblr that it’s “明知不可，为而为之”，but i was just wondering if this is accurate or not???
I think the translation’s correct here. a longer sentence would be sth like ‘I know it’s impossible but I will still do it’ lol. ‘attempt the impossible’ is both precise and accurate in my opinion.
yes.“明知不可为而为之”.its meaning is doing everything seems impossible or tough.the motto is from kongzi.
My friend at work recommend this novel. She said this is the best novel She ever read, so far. And She read lots of books, BL or not. Chinese, Japanese and English. So, I decided to jump into my very first novel in BL world…. Best decision I’ve ever made.
Thank You for translating this epic novel, will be a legend in my heart forever.
Your guide make it easier for me to integrated into Chinese culture, since this is also my very first reading Chinese novel.
This novel also has the TV show named “The untamed”
Thank you very much for your hardwork in translating this novel. I really love the story and how you translate it.
What is the name and meaning of name for wei yings flute
Chenqing – to explain a situation or opinion in full detail
Thanks noangel
Thank you so much
It’s great to have a character and sect guide because sometime I am confused with the character, they have to many name. So I can come here to verify. Thanks for your hard work ^^
You should list given name – courtesy name (not common name) – horrific titles.
Btw, your work is so great, you must have put a lot of effort. Thanks for translate this novel, it makes more people know about it.
Love it
I just finished watching the first season of the anime adaptation. So glad I found this site to read the novel. Thank you so much for all the hard work.
Thanks for the “name meaning” part! Although my mother language is Chinese but I still can’t interpret some of the meaning of those names… Chinese is hard… 🙁
ps. ILY SONG LAN !!! those who confess later are smurf accounts!!!
This may be off topic, but i really like the font you use this time. Mind if i ask what’s the name of the font?
and btw, THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart for translating GDC. I very much appreciated all your hard-work in creating this project for us fans who can only read in English lol
Thank you! Super useful… Although the sheer number of characters, Sects and etc did make my head spin at first XD
I got confused which one is the real name and which one is the courtesy name.. Thank you for making this list.
Hello. I recently saved your GDC translation for offline read. May I know the chapters division for each book? I remember book 1 ended on chapter 45 in your offline version. I want to separate them into ‘books’, as the entire 126 chapters are too big for one file only.. (-_-;) Thank you. 🙂
I did the same exercise and I sorted this way: Book 2: chapter 46 to 78, Book 3 chapters 79-113 and finally BOOk 4 Extra chapters 114 to 126,
I hope this will help you
Regards
Manon
hi! first of all thank u for translating this amazing novel! i’m barely halfway through and only got to it because i watched the tv show.
i do have a question though. why are the names written like this: Css CssCss. I’ve never seen this way before and my parents (both chinese) taught me to write my name as Hanzhi and not HanZhi.
according to Wikipedia it’s also supposed to be written like Wuxian/Wangji etc
Is anyone else Chinese but can’t read, write, or speak it well so they have to use the English translation?
Fun Fact?: Jiang Cheng kinda sounds like sausage in Chinese so I just call him that XD
Thank you for all of your hard work in bringing you both the novel and the manhua, I am very grateful to you and it was one of the best things i have ever read in my life. thanks to you.
I am really sad that because of a mere joke, your hard work got to many hate, and I seriously do not understand it.
Is there anyway that I can get my hands on a copy of your translation just to keep it safe in case you ever decide to put this down? I really love the story and the whole world related to Mo Dao Zu Shi.
Kisses from a portuguese fan of your hard work in translating so well
I just realized the name of Lan SiZhui, didn’t LZ give that name to him? So does he really mean that he thankfully got SiZhui but he was still longing for WY!!!
thanks for the guide. it is really helpful because they have several titles and names and sometimes I can’t tell who is who and what’s their relationship to each other. so may I suggest you divide it into sects and a list of the people of each sect alone and if you can clarify the relationship with each other would be helpful. it might become a spoiler but I can’t follow up clearly.
thank you