Can also be called goeng-si or kyonshii (僵尸). "Kyon" means "hardened" and "Shii" means "corpse".
In short, a jiangshi is a monster that originally was a corpse that had undergone rigor mortis.
In ancient China, the dead were buried in the ground, and it was believed that if a corpse remained buried for a thousand years without decomposing, it would absorb the earth's energy and eventually come to life and harm people. It is said that the jiangshi sleeps in the coffin during the day and only moves at night.
At first glance, they appear to be similar to Dracula, but while Dracula is a being that retains the thoughts of a living creature, a jiangshi has lost all memories of its life and its thoughts as a human being, and naturally, it cannot speak, only harm people.
Also, it is said that when it attacks, its arms and legs are outstretched due to rigor mortis, so it moves by hopping and attempts to bite people.
One story tells that those bitten by a jiangshi are turned into jiangshi as well.
In addition, "kyon" can also mean "collapsed", so "kyonshii" also means "fallen corpse".
In ancient Chinese Taoism, there existed a technique called "choushijutsu" (lit. "hopping corpse technique").
It is believed that choushijutsu was the art of creating jiangshi, but it was originally used to transport the bodies of people who had died far from their home back to their hometown, and as the name implies, it was the technique of moving a stiff corpse as if the corpse itself were hopping.
Therefore, it is said that jiangshi is what a corpse that has fallen on the road becomes.
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