108 Heroes

The 108 Heroes are the main characters of the Ming dynasty classic Chinese novel the Water Margin, which was written in the 14th century and usually attributed to Shi Nai'an. The heroes are divided into the 36 Heavenly Spirits and 72 Earthly Fiends, groups that are based on a belief in Daoism that Ursa Major has 36 Heavenly stars and 72 Earthly stars. The 108 Heroes represent 108 demonic generals who were banished by Shangdi, a supreme god in Chinese folk religion. Having repented since their banishment, the stars are released from imprisonment by accident, and are reborn in the world as 108 heroes who band together for the cause of justice. The bulk of the novel describes the lives of these men and women and how they came to come together in Mount Liang to rebel against the evil forces controlling the court of the Song dynasty.

Appearances and mentions in other stories

The motif of pairings between 36 and 72 stars, possibly inspired from Dipper, were common among Chinese mythologies and folk tales, including Water Margin, which represented by the number of its protagonists. The religious theme of these 108 demons that incarnated into the 108 Liangshan bandits apparently drew inspiration from the 36 heavenly spirits and 72 earth fiends that also appeared in a later Chinese vernacular novel titled Fengshen Yanyi. In that novel, the 108 demons were gathered by Jiang Taigong to fight against King Zhou of Shang. Liu Ts'un-yan added that the motif of 108 stars constellation which appeared in both works were influenced by Buddhism and Taoism.
One Heavenly Spirit, Lu Zhishen, is represented in a folktale as a sworn brother of Zhou Tong.
According to The Oral Traditions of Yangzhou Storytelling, several popular folktales about Wu Song, a Heavenly Spirit, from the "Wang School" of Yangzhou storytelling, state that he killed the tiger "in the middle of the tenth month" of the "Xuanhe year ".
In Iron Arm, Golden Sabre, Sun Li, an Earthly Fiend, is portrayed as a fellow student of Zhou Tong and Luan Tingyu.
In Louis Cha's wuxia novel The Legend of the Condor Heroes, Guo Sheng, an Earthly Fiend, is said to be the ancestor of the protagonist, Guo Jing.