Suzhen (full name: Bai Suzhen, Chinese: 白素贞 “Clean and True”) was a spirit snake (python) living in the Southern Song Dynasty. Her human identity on the surface was a traveling doctor, but she was actually a righteous thief, targeting corrupt officials, heartless merchants, and even evil spirit animals (CE 977).
During her travels across China, Suzhen learned numerous spells and gathered stories about spirit animals. She obtained fragments of the lost “Essential Spells for Spirit Animals Expanded,” which she compiled with her annotations into “The Fragments of Essential Spells for Spirit Animals Expanded with Annotations,” known as the “Bai Edition.” This work served as the foundation for the “Modern Chinese Essential Spells for Spirit Animals Explained.”
Suzhen also contributed significantly to the Southern Song Dynasty version of the Spirit Animal Chronicles.
She had a brief marriage with a human named Xu Xuan but accidentally scared him to death by revealing her true form while drunk. This incident became a cautionary tale among later generations of spirit animals about the dangers of engaging in a relationship with humans.
While living with Xu Xuan, Suzhen kept a carp fish as a pet. One day during water changes, the fish slipped off her hands and managed to slide all the way to the river and escaped. This inspired her to create the “Carp Slide” in Acrobatic Spells.
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