邪修

From the world of fantasy novels, 邪修 has hopped into everyday Chinese internet talk. It once described a cultivation-path villain who cheats the system. Now it means something friendlier and funnier: getting the result you want through a method that technically should not work — and delighting in the absurdity.

From fantasy fiction to a life philosophy

In Chinese web novels, 邪修 ("heretical cultivators") are practitioners who skip the orthodox path and use shortcuts, tricks, and questionable methods to gain power faster. The term is usually pejorative. Around 2025, Chinese netizens flipped it into a badge of honor: when a hack is weird but genuinely effective, it gets called 邪修.

万物皆可邪修 — "everything can be 邪修"

The running joke is that any domain can be "cultivated the heretic way":

• 邪修做饭 (heretic cooking) — making char siu in a rice cooker, "cooking" steak in a thermos. Weird, but it works.
• 邪修减肥 (heretic weight loss) — eating off a smaller plate, brushing teeth before meals, "imagining you're a dog" so you won't overeat.
• 邪修健身 (heretic fitness) — coaches ditching "engage your core" for vivid metaphors: pretend you're coughing, imagine squeezing a paper between your glutes.

The uniting spirit: if the problem gets solved, the process can be as ridiculous as it wants. In a culture that constantly debates 内卷 versus 躺平, 邪修 is the playful third path — walking sideways.

How to use it

Use 邪修 as a noun or a modifier to describe a hack, a habit, or a whole lifestyle that's unorthodox but functional:

• "这也太邪修了" — "that's too heretical" (playfully: that's absurd but I respect it)
• "邪修一下" — "let's go heretical for a moment" (let's try the weird shortcut)
• "万物皆可邪修" — "everything can be done the heretic way"

Related: 内卷, 摆烂.