Azyyy

translations: wuxia 武俠, xianxia 仙俠, and cultivation 修真/修仙 (xīuzhēn/xīuxiān)

think i've seen posts on this eons ago, and i'm pretty sure there are tons of these online, but since this has been written up already let's just have another one.

wuxia 武俠

wuxia and xianxia sound similar, but basically for wuxia it is about the pugilistic world (江湖 jiānghú). It is relatively more down-to-earth, and people practice martial arts ("kungfu") in their current life -- they do not do it to become xians (仙) and gods (神) however.

Like Thousand Autumns and Faraway Wanderers/Word of Honor, it has more historical background and ties to the current court and kingdoms, because people are living in the moment and concern themselves with worldly issues.

Martial arts may seem unrealistic, but in view of chinese fantasy it would be considered "real". It consists of fighting moves and internal energy, which they call qi or nèigōng (內功), and at times you see people flying around, climbing hills and jumping across rooftops which is qīnggōng (輕功).

xianxia 仙俠

A level up would be xianxia, where characters in the story cultivate to become xians (and gods, like in the heaven official's blessing). They don't really care about earthly issues here now, because their ambitions lie beyond the current world, and cultivation, getting stronger, and an immortal life are majorly all their goals.

You may not always see them working towards that purpose, such as in mdzs they are considered a lower-xianxia society (低魔), meaning people don't go through all the steps of cultivation and only stay at the stage before the "golden core" stage.

In xianxia, characters still learn basic fighting moves aka. martial arts, but to direct the internal energy they use línglì (灵力), zhēnqì (真气), and fǎlì (法力), all xianxia terms you commonly see. "neigong" is practically nonexistent in this genre. That's why people building up their "neigong" instead of "lingli" are likely never going to be able to cultivate.

cultivation 修真/修仙

A subgenre in the xianxia category would be cultivation. Characters actively go through the stages of cultivation, and likely for the MC, because they are the main character, they successfully become a xian and exit the world at the end of the novel.

There are many stages of cultivation, usually defined at the beginning of the novel in the synopsis, and a typical example of the different levels would be this:

练气，筑基，金丹，元婴，化神，炼虚，合体，大乘，渡劫

And with a cursory search, an English translation would be something like this, albeit not with all the cultivation ranks identified.

Qi condensation (练气), Foundation establishment (筑基), Core Formation (金丹), Nascent Soul (元婴), and the names after that vary too greatly with translation and fandom so I'll jump straight to Immortal Ascension

extra info: getting into the philosophy of it all

It'd be interesting to note that the word "xiá" (俠) permeates all these genres. This is something akin to the concept of "hero", but not at all also, and I'd love to speak more on this but this post has already gone way longer than I hoped it would be, so perhaps another day.

Regardless, it is interesting to note that wuxia has a greater emphasis on "xia" than xianxia. (some joke that cultivation doesn't have the word "xia" in it, and much of that is because characters have foregone heroism and focused on gaining powers and working towards ascension instead). As a result, wuxia is more confucianism-oriented, though not without its taoism and buddhism influences.

xianxia, on the other hand, is mainly derived from "dào" (道), from taoism, which is another lengthy concept if I ever get to it.

And some may have heard of the "farming" genre, 种田 (zhòngtián). This has to do with golden fingers (mary sues) in imperialistic china, earning a wealth of money, and all that. It has nothing to do with cultivation, alike they sound in english.

that's it for now, hmu if you wish to ask/discuss!

Hey. Thought I'd answer the wuxia-confucian question very briefly. I did suggest wuxia being closely knitted to confucianism, but I do understand the other perspective of wuxia being anti-confucian. Quick answer only because I've got little time right now -- might consider doing a longer post later!

confucianism

First the central themes of confucianism:

常 (cháng): Virtues of compassion and courtesy. 仁 (rén)、义 (yì)、礼 (lǐ)、智 (zhì)、信 (xìn)、忠 (zhōng)、孝 (xiào)、悌 (tì) (there are more). These in order in crude translation mean compassion, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom, integrity, loyalty, filial piety, and respect to one's older siblings. These are the main ideas Confucius, the founder of Confucianism, wished to spread through his philosophy.

纲 (gāng): Order. This is about the relationships between people, the filial piety of child to their parents, the relationship between significant others, between friends and teachers, and expanding outwards in the sphere of influence in our circle of life, the patriotism and loyalty of a liege to his lord.

Understand that Confucius came up with these ideas in a time of war. He lived his life traversing different kingdoms and establishing his prominence by getting emperors to trust him as a consultant and employ his school of ideas. As such, these beliefs are very much centred around creating harmony and order in society, and of course entails the respect of commoners and lieges to their lords (because why else would kings employ his beliefs over other schools of philosophy if not so?).

wuxia

Moving on to the wuxia genre, the 侠 (xiá) in wuxia emphasises righteousness. xia, as people, are itinerants and rebels in the fictitious pugilistic society who tire of the power of the aristocracy and seek to use their own, often unlawful ways, to help others through 锄强扶弱 (chú qiáng fú ruò) -- helping the needy and going against the strong (the morals are debatable but that's me trying to sum up wuxia in 5 minutes off the top of my head rip).

conclusions

So I guess that's enough information for you to form your own conclusions, and here's what I think, at the very least.

Against Confucianism -- Subverting the power pyramid. Many of the heroes/xia's in wuxia are lawless rebels. They aren't good, upstanding citizens of the society. Hell, xia was first popularised from 游侠列传 (yóu xiá liè zhuàn) in the Han dynasty records, talking about how a "xia" went against the officials and helped the commoners in the name of righteousness. This goes against the confucian beliefs of respecting your lord and serving the kingdom.* That's why I can understand why some would consider wuxia going against confucianism.

Align with Confucianism -- Righteousness. Ultimately, however, wuxia is about righteousness and nobility and honour, defined by society and commoners and not by royal blood. These values of etiquette, decorum, and nobility were long ingrained in the hearts of all these chinese characters, from when the courtesy and etiquette rules were defined in the Zhou dynasty, and afterwards, from the Han dynasty on, when emperors heavily employed Confucian beliefs in education and throughout society because it helps in rebuilding a harmonious society.

Confucianism is about compassion and righteousness, the staples permeating and defining chinese culture in the last two thousand years, and it is these values that serve as the central impetus of the xia and wuxia genres. People are born into these values; as such they fight against the injustice they see, and thus engenders the lost xia's of every dynasty.

*And well, even Confucius wasn't that dead set on fealty to lords. Confucian highly venerated loyalty, but when the court is corrupt, they acknowledge insurgence over the mindless following of an emperor. This is a story for another day, one I would have to back up with more quotes and citations, but I hope this answered your questions, or even better, let you form some conclusions of your own :)

Thank you for all the interest, I'm sorry I've been so inactive recently -- life's been hectic, and I've been in and out of fandoms. I'll get to the other questions eventually, but it may take time which I don't have right now. (Kudos to my friend who's cooking right now when I should be helping with it so I managed to type this.)

I always love the different ideas, keep them coming. And a final note, please do not WTF my posts however controversial they are because OP sees them and OP is a person who could get wrong, has opinions, and does not appreciate seeing them.