Is "He is the weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings" true? - A thorough investigation using DeepResearch with Generative AI

When you hear the term "Four Heavenly Kings," who comes to mind? Lorelei, Bruno, Agatha, and Lance from the Pokémon League? The beautiful, villainous executives of the Dark Kingdom who tormented Sailor Moon? Or perhaps Scarmiglione, Cagnazzo, Barbariccia, and Rubicante—yes, the Four Fiends of Golbez. If you are a gamer in your early forties, just hearing the names of these last four might instantly bring back the damp air of Mt. Ordeals, Baron Castle, or the Tower of Babil.

There is a strange sense of amusement in the term "Four Heavenly Kings." After all, the moment you hear the name, you already know the structure. There are four of them. They will probably appear one by one. They probably have different attributes. The last one is probably overly arrogant, and if the first one is defeated, one of the remaining three will probably laugh in a dark room.

"Heh, he was the weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings..."

It is an all-too-famous line. But the problem starts here. Is this line really said that often? Do we actually remember the original works? Or are we just believing in a phantom created by internet memes, like a form in classical performing arts?

So, I extracted about forty groups of Four Heavenly Kings or Four Heavenly King-like executive quartets from anime, manga, games, light novels, and tokusatsu, and checked them against the stereotype. The results are quite amusing and a little bit cruel. To conclude, "the weakest" is almost never said. At least, not as much as we think. The theory of the "weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings" is less of a staple within the works themselves and more of a posthumous posthumous name given to the loser, created arbitrarily by the memories of readers and players.

Some cold numbers revealed by the survey

In this survey, I treated groups officially called "Four Heavenly Kings," groups that go by other names in the work but are effectively in the Four Heavenly King position, and groups that parody the Four Heavenly King meme separately. This is not a complete census. It is a sampling that emphasizes representativeness. Nevertheless, even within this scope, the outline of the common belief becomes quite visible.

"The weakest" is in our memories rather than in the works

The most surprising thing is, after all, the "weakest" issue. Because of that famous line, we assume that "the Four Heavenly King who was defeated first is mocked by the remaining three." However, when I actually looked into it, this composition is not that common. Examples that are clearly treated as the weakest include Jirobo from the Sound Four in "NARUTO," Santana from "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 2," or light novel-style meta-works that push "weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings" into the title. But this is a minority when viewed as a whole.

Why is it remembered as such a strong staple despite being a minority? The answer is simple. Humans tidy up stories after the fact. If you understand the one defeated first as "defeated because they were the weakest," the world becomes very easy to see through. In reality, the first enemy is often a wall that the protagonists finally managed to defeat with all their might. But later, stronger enemies appear. Then, the first wall looks relatively low. Memory is heartless. A mountain you once climbed while crying becomes a hill when the next mountain range appears.

Just think of Scarmiglione from "FFIV." He didn't appear to be mocked as the "weakest." He is a tenacious enemy who leads the undead on Mt. Ordeals and attacks from behind after being defeated. Because he is the first one, the player does not yet know the terror of the Four Heavenly Kings. That is precisely why he has the role of carving into the player's body from the start what the Four Heavenly Kings are like. He is not the weakest. He is the introductory course. Just because it is an introductory course does not mean it is easy. It is like being suddenly hit with a stick in front of a Zen temple gate.

Mudo from "Dragon Quest VI" is even more interesting. If you look only at the level in the system, he is an opponent you fight earlier than the subsequent Jamirus, Gracos, and Duran. But in terms of the sense of despair that remains in the player's memory, Mudo is the strongest. He disturbs dreams and reality, steals the memories of the protagonists, and makes the world itself unstable from the beginning to the middle. Even if the first wall is low in terms of numbers, that wall is the darkest in terms of the story. Here, it becomes clear that "the weakest" is not a matter of ability values, but merely a technique for organizing memory.

The all-too-beautiful textbook that is the Four Fiends of Golbez

If I were to name one standard form of the Four Heavenly Kings, I think the Four Fiends of Golbez from "Final Fantasy IV" would be it. That is too well-made as an arrangement of enemy executives. It is somewhat infuriating how well-made it is. Earth, Water, Wind, Fire. There are attributes, an order of appearance, tactics, personalities, and finally, an aesthetic.

Scarmiglione is earth, undead, and the tenacity of the dead. Cagnazzo is water, disguise, conspiracy, and the persistence of leaving traps even after death. Barbariccia is wind, the only woman, and an opponent of high speed, brainwashing, and technical battles. And Rubicante is fire, a proud warrior. He fully heals the party before the battle. Why would a villain heal the enemy? But that is what is good about him. For him, battle is not a process. It is a ritual, etiquette, and his own strength includes respecting the enemy as an enemy.

These four are not just mid-bosses. They are teachers who teach the game system, bells that mark the milestones of the story, and organs that give personality to the enemy organization. If there is a villain like Cagnazzo, Rubicante's warrior nature shines. If there is the stench of death from Scarmiglione, Barbariccia's wind becomes strangely glamorous. The four are strong individually, but when lined up, the dominion of the higher existence called Golbez becomes visible.

What is important here is that they are not "four strong enemies," but "a world cut into four." Earth, water, wind, fire. The player proceeds while responding to the laws of each. In other words, defeating the Four Heavenly Kings is not about reducing the enemy's HP, but about lifting the rules that governed the world one by one.

The Pokémon League is not an evil organization, but an examination hall.

The Four Heavenly Kings do not necessarily have to be evil. The best example of this is the Elite Four of the Pokémon League in the "Pokémon" series. They are not a Demon King's army. They do not conquer the world. Rather, they are an institution. They are a certification body. To put it simply, they are a national examination.

In the first generation, there were Lorelei, Bruno, Agatha, and Lance. Ice, Fighting, Ghost, and Dragon. They force the player to submit everything they have learned so far: type effectiveness, training, move sets, item management, and PP management. Moreover, it is a series of consecutive battles. You are not allowed the luxury of defeating one, returning to town, sleeping at an inn, and then coming back. The Champion awaits after you clear the four. Here, the Elite Four function less like evil executives and more like a graduation exam imposed on the player by the game.

In this respect, the game's Four Heavenly Kings are extremely mechanical and, at the same time, extremely kind. The fact that their attributes are divided is not just for characterization. It is to say to the player, "Now, try using everything you have learned up to this point." Teachers are usually disliked. But when you look back after graduating, you realize that person was necessary. The Pokémon League Elite Four have that kind of strict kindness.

The Four Heavenly Kings of shojo manga are not beautiful just to be defeated

On the other hand, the Dark Kingdom's Four Heavenly Kings in "Sailor Moon" extend in a completely different direction from game-like attribute tests. Jadeite, Nephrite, Zoisite, and Kunzite. While they are enemies, they are not monsters. They are beautiful. Moreover, they are not just beautiful, but beautiful in a way that allows them to shoulder tragedy.

Jadeite is punished for his failures. Nephrite, through his relationship with Naru Osaka, is loved despite being an enemy executive, and then he dies. Zoisite and Kunzite are given a strong love-hate drama in the anime version. Here, the Four Heavenly Kings are not just steps to raise the status of the final boss. They become a device that teaches the viewer emotions that go beyond just hating the enemy.

If the Four Heavenly Kings of shonen manga and RPGs are "gates to be conquered," the shojo manga/anime-style Four Heavenly Kings are "shadows to be mourned." They die. But by dying, they leave behind the fact that there was love, loyalty, jealousy, and loneliness in the enemy's world as well. It is not over just because you defeated them. After you defeat them, they remain in your heart a little bit. That lingering scent turns the enemy executive from a mere obstacle into a character.

The muscle-head, the schemer, the warrior, and the "anomaly slot"

What I was able to confirm most strongly in my research was not "weakest," but the division of roles. In thirty out of forty groups, or 75 percent, there was a division of mental and combat roles among the four. This is quite high.

For example, there is someone who pushes with brute force. There is someone who uses traps or mental attacks. There is a warrior who prefers a fair and square fight. And then there is one more person who is hard to classify. Traditionally, this position has been called the "token female." Of course, female characters like Barbariccia or Nonon Jakuzure are often placed in this position. But if you simply call this slot the female slot, you miss the most important point.

Correctly, it is the "anomaly slot." Poison, illusion, speed, brainwashing, disguise, sniping, madness, unknown gender, monstrosity, childishness, or strangely funny eccentricity. The anomaly slot shifts the rules of the battle. It is not a head-on collision of strength against strength or spirit against spirit, but starting a different game. They are the kind of people who, if you were playing a proper game of shogi, would suddenly place an Othello piece on the board. They are annoying, but without them, the story would be boring.

The fourth seat in the Four Heavenly Kings is often left open for this "rule-breaking." With only strength, strategy, and pride, the world closes in a triangle. By adding poison, wind, illusion, or allure to that, it becomes a quadrilateral. The story becomes slightly distorted, and then richer.

The Four Heavenly Kings of shonen manga give breath to the serialization

The Four Heavenly Kings in manga are often the breath of the serialization. The Four Saint Beasts of "YuYu Hakusho" are typical of this. Genbu, Byakko, Seiryu, and Suzaku. In the setting of the Maze Castle, the four protagonists each break through the barriers. Here, the Four Heavenly Kings stratify the space of the story and prepare a showcase for each character. The reader understands how dangerous and how reliable Kurama and Hiei are within this structure.

Also, the flow where after Byakko is defeated, Seiryu executes his colleague, and then Hiei kills Seiryu instantly, teaches us how efficiently the Four Heavenly Kings structure shows both the "cruelty of the enemy" and the "strength of the allies" at the same time. The Four Heavenly Kings even explain the corporate culture on the enemy side. The benefits are bad. For those with poor performance, a cold personnel transfer awaits.

When it comes to the Sound Four in "NARUTO," it gets quite close to the "weakest" meme. Jirobo is clearly treated lightly by Sakon. Moreover, in the Sasuke Retrieval Arc, they function as opponents against whom the protagonists' genin each show their limits being broken. Here, the Four Heavenly Kings-like group becomes a stage to visualize the growth of allies one-on-one. Because there are four enemies, four growth stories can be written. This is very convenient for serialized manga. Things that are convenient are often beautiful.

And the Pillar Men in "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 2" are brilliant in another sense. Santana is regarded by Kars and the others as a "watchdog" or a "greenhorn." In other words, he alone is clearly of a lower rank, and in reality, it is a fairly high-purity example of the "weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings" structure. However, JoJo does not make even that weakest slot a mere opening act. Santana is a test subject that shows the scale difference between humanity and the Pillar Men, and is the entrance to fear. The Four Heavenly Kings-like structure works here too as a device to peel back the skin little by little, rather than showing the entire picture of the enemy at once.

Why four? Three is not enough, and five is too many

Here, I will talk a little about the logic. The reason the Four Heavenly Kings are convenient is that the number four is just right for grasping characters. In cognitive psychology, there is a concept called subitizing. It is the ability to grasp a very small number of objects at a glance without counting them, and it is said that adults can process a range of about one to four quickly and accurately. Of course, it is reckless to explain the popularity of the Four Heavenly Kings solely by subitizing. But the fact that the unit of four is a number that is "visible" to the receiver is significant.

A trio is easy to understand. But it is too easy. Leader, strength, wisdom. It ends there. A group of five is flashy like a sentai team, but the time given to each person becomes thin. If you have the Ten Swords, the Gotei 13, or the Twelve Heavenly Generals, just remembering their names becomes a training exercise in itself. Compared to that, four is on the boundary between order and individuality. Not too many, not too few, it is just the right number of people to make an evil organization look impressive.

In terms of narratology, just as Vladimir Propp read folktales as a chain of 'functions' rather than the psychology of the characters, the Four Heavenly Kings are functions before they are characters. They are the ones who test, the ones who hinder, and the ones who push the protagonist to the next stage. If we relate them to Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey, the Four Heavenly Kings are the 'Guardians of the Threshold.' To the hero moving from a safe daily life into unknown territory, they ask if the hero is qualified to go any further.

Therefore, the Four Heavenly Kings are both enemies and teachers. Scarmiglione teaches the surprise attack. Cagnazzo teaches the strategy. Barbariccia teaches the ingenuity of tactics. Rubicante teaches that even enemies have pride. The tuition is high. It is usually paid with one's life. But the protagonist cannot stand before the final boss without taking that class.

The Four Heavenly Kings of Buddhism are effective in the end

Having come this far, it is finally time to talk about the original source. The Four Heavenly Kings are originally beings in Buddhism who guard the four directions of Mount Sumeru. Dhrtarastra in the East, Virudhaka in the South, Virupaksa in the West, and Vaisravana in the North. They are the ones who protect the sacred order of the center from the four directions.

This structure is surprisingly compatible with the Four Heavenly Kings of the Demon King's army in modern fiction. There is a Demon King in the center. There are executives in the four directions. Each has their own territory, leads subordinates, and blocks the protagonist's progress. The Buddhist four-directional protection can be repurposed as a map of the Demon King's castle without any sense of incongruity. No, rather, it feels too natural. A pattern of spatial perception that has been imprinted on human imagination over a long period of time has secretly taken up residence in game dungeon design and the design of enemy organizations in manga.

In Japan, the term 'four elites supporting one great person' became secularized, as seen in the Four Heavenly Kings of Yorimitsu and the Four Heavenly Kings of Tokugawa. Here, the Four Heavenly Kings transform from religious guardian deities into a warlord's aides, masters of entertainment or sports, and finally executives of a Demon King's army. Even grateful Buddhas become evil executives after a long journey. Culture is generally made of such brazen transfers.

As an aside, the one among the original Four Heavenly Kings who would likely say 'He is the weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings' is probably Virupaksa. When Dhrtarastra is defeated at the East Gate, Virudhaka stands up in anger. Vaisravana listens in silence. Only Virupaksa, who sees and records everything, seems likely to calmly say something unpleasant. However, there is no hierarchy in the Buddha's law. So he would say, 'Hmph, he is the one located furthest to the East among the Four Heavenly Kings.' Terrible. But, barely, he won't be punished. (*)

The Four Heavenly Kings order evil

In the end, what are the Four Heavenly Kings? The answer is not the number of strong enemies. The Four Heavenly Kings are a device that orders evil.

Small-fry enemies are chaos. The final boss is transcendence. The Four Heavenly Kings are in between. They divide the world of evil into four gates, four attributes, four personalities, and four trials. By doing so, readers and players can receive fear in an understandable form. When there are Four Heavenly Kings in an evil organization, that evil is not just violence, but has administrative districts. It is a disgusting story, but there is nothing more formidable than orderly evil.

And the Four Heavenly Kings show the strength of the final boss without showing it directly. Even if the final boss himself has not moved yet, if there are such strong people around him, you know that there must be something even more terrifying in the back. The Four Heavenly Kings are the shadow of the final boss. The darker the shadow, the larger the main body appears.

Therefore, the line 'He is the weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings' is half a lie and half a truth. It is a lie because it is not said that often in actual works. It is the truth because the moment we see the form of the Four Heavenly Kings, we already know that there is a stronger enemy beyond that. The one who was defeated first was not really weak. Due to the structure of the story, he was placed in a position that would look weak later.

They are pitiful. But because they are pitiful, they are beautiful. The Four Heavenly Kings are strong people born to be defeated. Every time they are defeated one by one, the world opens up little by little. The protagonist becomes stronger. The shadow of the final boss becomes darker. And the reader waits for someone beyond the next door.

The Four Heavenly Kings are four promises that the story offers to the reader. It is not over yet. It will get stronger. The world still has depth. And in the end, you must face someone in the center.

That is why we are weak to the Four Heavenly Kings again and again. Whether they are the weakest or the strongest, that doesn't really matter. The problem is that there are four of them. Just by having four, the story suddenly has a castle, has directions, has stairs, and has a face waiting for us.

Therein lies a pleasure that is truly trivial, yet irresistible. (End)

Appendix: Main referenced works and theoretical auxiliary lines

In this paper, I dealt mainly with representative Four Heavenly Kings/Four Heavenly King-like groups such as the Golbez Four Heavenly Kings from 'Final Fantasy IV', the Pokémon League Elite Four from the 'Pokémon' series, the Dark Kingdom Four Heavenly Kings from 'Sailor Moon', the Four Holy Beasts from 'YuYu Hakusho', the Four Archdemons from 'Romancing SaGa 3', the Four Archdemons of Deathmore from 'Dragon Quest VI', the Sound Four from 'NARUTO', the Pillar Men from 'JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 2', and the play-within-a-play 'Sword Master Yamato' from 'Gag Manga Biyori'.

As theoretical auxiliary lines, I referred to the 'function' analysis of characters in Vladimir Propp's 'Morphology of the Folktale', the Hero's Journey in Joseph Campbell's 'The Hero with a Thousand Faces', level design/boss battles/resource management in game design, the discussion of subitizing in cognitive psychology, the Four Heavenly Kings belief in Buddhism, and the secularization of the title '○○ Four Heavenly Kings' in Japanese culture.

Note that the scope of this investigation is not a complete census, but rather a typological sampling that prioritizes representativeness and analytical utility. Therefore, the statistical values should be read not as strict occurrence rates for all anime, manga, and games, but as comparative benchmarks for considering the "Four Heavenly Kings stereotype."