Tear Jerker / Hoshin Engi

• Hakuyuko's death and him being turned into hamburger meat and fed to his father, after "assaulting" Dakki (in the anime) or after Dakki made a national treasure monkey attack her (in the manga). Made worse in the anime, in which he was playing a lute while his father soon joins, followed by a flashback in which he was taught to play the instrument. His father then recites a proverb while teary eyed.
• Taikobou's past, being The Last of His Kind of the Qiang clan not an alien in the manga, and having to live with the guilt for 60 years is pretty sad.
• Bunchu deciding to kill himself, then seeing King Zhou once last time before being sealed.
• In the manga, King Chu's final days. After becoming a Body Horror abomination, he is abandoned by Dakki and left in a confused, pitiful and nearly catatonic state. He is saved before Ko Tenka manages to deal the final blow, only to be taken to his decaying capital where he finally sees the terrible suffering that his rule has brought onto the people. The body alterations Dakki has given him are starting to take its toll, and he begins looking more and more haggard and old. When a desperate mother tries to kill him, he accepts his fate with quiet resignation, but soon realizes that Dakki has made his body very difficult to kill. He returns to his palace only to be humiliated by his own guards who failed to recognize him and orders them to open the gates and divide the food found in the palace among the people. Then he returns, exhausted and saddened, to his dark and solitary throne room. By the time he is executed, he realizes that he has nobody to protect or to fight for anymore because everybody he loved is dead: his wife Kyohi, his children, and his vassals Bunchu and Ko Hiko.
  • The real heartbreaking part is that after years and years of alternating between a clown and a meat puppet, toward the end he begins acting less and less like Dakki's pawn and more and more like his former self. He regains a part of his spirit, shows genuine remorse and pain for the suffering he has caused and dies with dignity. His final hours really emphasize just how much he lost and how much he has been victimized by Dakki.
• The real So Dakki's fate. She was a sweet, gentle girl willing to sacrifice her personal happiness for the sake of her country and she was essentially killed by the fox sennyo and had her body stolen. The sennyo proceeded to use her identity to commit horrible acts and to torture the people, causing great anguish to everybody, making Dakki go down in history as a monster. Even worse, her own father and brother have no idea what truly happened to her and think that the fox sennyo really is their daughter and sister. Her own family believes that she committed those terrible acts, and are glad to get rid of her...
• The entire battle between Taikobou and prince Incho is heart-wrenching. Made worse through prince Inchon's death and the fact that it doesn't sway his older brother.
• Bagen's story and his fate.
• Kashi choosing to die rather than betray her beloved husband.
• Koshi's breakdown after Kashi's death shows just how terrible things have been for her: her marriage, originally intended to strengthen the ties between the Ko clan and the Yin Dynasty, has now turned her into a hostage to be used against her own family, and she is constantly worried about the emperor's abuses and excesses.
  • While on the topic of Kashi and Koshi, Ko Hiko's reaction upon seeing their faces again after so many years (despite being an illusion created by a magical sword) really drives home how much he loves them.
• The Heroic Sacrifice and death of Gyokutei Shinjin. He carried an exhausted and injured Yozen through an acid rain, in spite of his apprentice's screams that he should leave him there and save himself.
  Gyokutei: It reminds me... when you were a baby, we walked through the rain like this... so you wouldn't get wet... so you wouldn't catch a cold... you've grown, Yozen...
• When his body stops responding to him and he realizes he cannot stand to leave Dakki's side anymore, King Chu finds the strength to leave the palace alone and makes it to Bunchu's estate, where he crumbles down and begs him not to leave him alone. Bunchu is shocked by the state the Emperor is in and comforts him. When Dakki appears ominously on the balcony across theirs, one can almost feel King Chu's fear. Bunchu shouts at her and she deigns to leave, amused at having caused so much pain. The scene is a sharp reminder that King Chu is a victim who did nothing to deserve the horrible things Dakki subjected him to.