A Guide to Suicide, wuxia-style

[Siven]

Suicide seems to be a rather common occurrence in wuxia novels. It is popular with the doomed warrior who struggled against impossible odds and failed, or the villain at the undoing of his insidious plans, or the heroine unwilling to submit to lecherous advances. As a result a variety of methods have evolved over the years that differ in style, effectiveness, and difficulty of execution. This guide aims to analyze and compare the most commonly encountered ones with the hope of finding what is most suitable for the reader with that urgent, terminal need.

• Biting the tongue
  Popularity: extremely high, especially among female characters. However it should be noted that although a lot of characters have threatened to do this, usually when faced with a compromising situation, few actually ever carry through.
  Difficulty: low, all you need is teeth!
  Cause of Death: asphyxiation, before loss of blood.
  Effectiveness: low. Indeed, it is not uncommon in wuxia to encounter someone whose tongue has been intentionally severed but is otherwise alive and well. It is also questionable how much of the tongue you must bite off and swallow in order to constrict the air way, and whether your jaws are strong enough to generate the force required to sever a piece cleanly. You may well pass out from the pain before you succeed, in which case you might have a chance to die from bleeding.
  
  
• Smashing head against wall
  Popularity: moderate, best suited for dignified person with a sense of honor.
  Difficulty: low, just need hard surface and a running start.
  Cause of Death: trauma and brain damage.
  Effectiveness: high, as long as your skull isn't too thick (someone like Guo Jing). Can be a bit messy though.
  
  
• Diving off a cliff
  Popularity: high, especially if you're the protagonist.
  Difficulty: low, just needs sufficient height.
  Cause of Death: hopefully through extensive internal/external trauma, but...
  Effectiveness: next to nil. Almost no one in the history of wuxia has managed to be even critically injured by jumping off a cliff. On the contrary, it drives home the wisdom of that saying, "what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger." Note that jumping off tall buildings can in no way be equated with cliff diving.
  
  
• Ingesting poison
  Popularity: moderate. Recommended for failed assassins and evil-doers.
  Difficulty: moderate, need quality poison that's fast-acting.
  Cause of Death: depends on poison, most work through paralysis of nervous system.
  Effectiveness: again, depends on poison.
  
  
• Cutting the throat
  Popularity: high, well-liked by heroic and gutsy characters.
  Difficulty: moderate, needs sharp instrument.
  Cause of Death: loss of blood AND asphyxiation.
  Effectiveness: high. Most that have done this succeeded.
  
  
• Hanging
  Popularity: moderate, more popular with women than men.
  Difficulty: moderate, needs rope, strong branch, a stool to stand on, etc.
  Cause of Death: asphyxiation.
  Effectiveness: moderate. Someone that attempts to hang but ends up breaking the rope is often played for comedic value.
  
  
• Drowning
  Popularity: moderate. Jumping into wells is popular with women, while men prefer larger bodies of water.
  Difficulty: moderate, needs sufficiently deep water.
  Cause of Death: asphyxiation.
  Effectiveness: high, especially if you can't swim.
  
  
• Shutting down internal pathways
  Popularity: moderate, especially with accomplished fighters.
  Difficulty: high, as you usually need years of practice to achieve that kind of internal control.
  Cause of Death: unknown...stoppage of the heart?
  Effectiveness: high, and fast too, as those who attempt this are rarely interrupted.

[Ken Cheng]

The difficulty of suicide using the Cliff-Diving Method applies only to characters with Character Shield (i.e. main characters). For everyone else, however, it usually works.

[Da Bao]

I'd always wondered why there would be blood coming out of the mouth when the women died. Then my cousin told me they bite off their tongue. I tried and couldn't bite my tongue. It's interesting... I think there are more ways to die though...

[Suet Seung]

Can someone explain to me why people who are hit with a powerful palm or is poisoned they must vomit blood?

Does impact of the injury some how bring blood up and out the mouth? Does poison do the same too? Or this is just bad modern day tv series' creation?

[Siven]

Can someone explain to me why people who are hit with a powerful palm or is poisoned they must vomit blood?

Does impact of the injury some how bring blood up and out the mouth? Does poison do the same too? Or this is just bad modern day tv series' creation?

When they get hit physically that may cause internal bleeding. Apparently it's no good to have pools of blood gathering inside you, so usually they try to cough it up. As for poison...not sure, though it kinda makes sense to vomit blood, hoping that the poison would come out with it...

[kidd]

How could I have missed this thread? Interesting info.

[sandy32]

Can someone explain to me why people who are hit with a powerful palm or is poisoned they must vomit blood?

Does impact of the injury some how bring blood up and out the mouth? Does poison do the same too? Or this is just bad modern day tv series' creation?

According to chinese medicine, it makes sense. Not only mouth, but also eyes, ears, nose may bleed when someone is poisoned.

[batmankiller]

Not even chinese medicine, according to modern medicine, if someone is bleeding internally due to a strong hit and their organs "bleed" or something is disrupted for blood to burst out of the blood stream, then it usually comes out of the eyes, nose, mouth and ears. So I think that the "coughing up blood" is more forced that voluntarily done to keep blood from stacking in your body.

[Sugar]

Don't forget, once u jump off a cliff, u NEVER DIE. You come back with some kick A$$ kung fu and seek vengence.

[MysteriouX]

Coughing up blood can also an automatic body reaction, doesnt always have to be forced.

One way it can happen without a person knowing is if blood got into the lungs. Poisons are usually enzymes that either prevent certain biochemical reactions needed for living from happening, or they can induce other biochemical reactions which should not occur.

And even if someone has internal bleeding, that doesnt necessarrily mean the person will cough up blood. Many times the blood will gather inside and start to reveal itself as a mark similar to bruises or just bloat up the skin.

In fact, coughing up blood only occurs if the blood gets into your lungs or windpipe/pathway to the stomach. Eyes nose ears and other parts occur if you have a hemorrhage.

[flyingfox2002]

There's some funny article in Chinese about how you can never kill a main hero. XF is the exception...

The effectiveness of a method of suicide is inversely correlated to the amount of weight the character carries in the novel.

[Single Whip]

There are two common suicide methods that were missing:
Sword in the tummy method. Quite effective, but gives you a loooong time still to say goodbye, say other meaningful stuff and even walking around a bit

and palm strike to the skull. Quite effective and instantenous if executed, but are often blocked by someone before it happened.

[MysteriouX]

well that makes it a total of 10 styles so far. Can anyone name any other style?

Is there any Formless Style for suicide?

[MysteriouX]

Oh wait here is another one,

Forcing qi to some point in either the head or body and making yourself explode or something of the sort.

[Felix]

How about walking into the middle of two palm clashes, two swords slashing. Little Dragon Girl attempted this method. (In the ROCH83 version at least).

Yip Gu Sing no-restraint-execution from SMCS.

[Ken Cheng]

My favorite: challenging Lee Chum Foon to throw his dagger at you while you stand there without even *trying* to defend yourself.

Anyone who does that *has* to be suicidal, right, Mr. Seung Gwoon? Uh, Mr. Seung Gwoon?

[resident:alien]

"How about pouring oil on yourself and setting yourself on fire?" - Burning Monk

[Ken Cheng]

"How about pouring oil on yourself and setting yourself on fire?" - Burning Monk

Let's not go there. It's no longer funny when it's about real people and real events.

[resident:alien]

Let's not go there. It's no longer funny when it's about real people and real events.

dude, i was not even trying to be funny and if this offends anyone...then i apologize.

seriously, no one in the wuxia world ever thought of such a thing? well, i guess i'll leave that suggestion alone.

[Ken Cheng]

dude, i was not even trying to be funny and if this offends anyone...then i apologize.

seriously, no one in the wuxia world ever thought of such a thing? well, i guess i'll leave that suggestion alone.

The problem is it actually happened some years ago in the real world. A Buddhist monk in South Vietnam (as it was known then) burned himself to death in public view in 1963 to protest what he believed to be the repressive policies of the South Vietnamese government.

Here's some further info on that incident. Be warned: it contains a graphic and disturbing photo of the monk's demise.