Stars to Avoid as the Lucks Pass the Twelve Palaces

This mnemonic judges what is to be feared by pairing the branch of the birth year with the branch of the year or luck period, ignoring the stars altogether, a different system from the star-by-star judgments earlier in the volume. A person born in a Zi year fears Yin and Shen and also the Zi–Wu clash. Zi against Wu is easy to see. Yin and Shen are where Tian Ma, the travelling horse, sits for the Shen–Zi–Chen trine (its horse is in Yin) and where that trine is born, and the ancients saw them as places of upheaval. In the note, 「歲限」 means Tai Sui and the Minor Luck. On a Xingge chart, the birth-year branch is the branch of the year pillar in the birth data; the Annual Luck is the palace of the current year's branch, and the Minor Luck is found from the ages listed in each palace.

People born in Chou and Wu years both fear Chou and Wu. Among the branch relations, Chou and Wu are a 'harm' pair (the six harms are Zi–Wei, Chou–Wu, Yin–Si, Mao–Chen, Shen–Hai, You–Xu), which is why each side fears the other. A further item, fear of Qi Sha, is added. The line is a reminder that many of the Quan Shu's taboos for the luck periods are borrowed straight from the punishments, clashes and harms of the branches, ideas Dou Shu absorbed from Ba Zi and date selection, not something derived from the star chart.

People born in Yin or Mao years guard against Si and Hai, and fear the Mao–You and Yin–Shen clashes. Yin and Si are both a harm pair and a punishment pair, while Yin and Hai are one of the six combinations, a friendly pair; the original still lists Hai as feared, which does not match the usual good and bad of the branches, and perhaps takes Si and Hai together as a clashing pair. There is no need to find a theoretical ground for every line of such mnemonics: the Quan Shu was assembled from the verses of many schools.

「龍蛇切忌本身臨」: for people born in Chen or Si years, the worst year or luck period is the one with the same branch as their birth year, which is what 'coming to one's own branch' means. The note adds the Sky Net and Earth Net, here Chen as the Sky Net and Xu as the Earth Net. Ba Zi books commonly assign them differently, with Xu and Hai as the Sky Net and Chen and Si as the Earth Net; within the Quan Shu, though, the usage is consistently Chen for the Sky Net and Xu for the Earth Net, and the Gu Sui Fu line 「限至天羅地網屈原溺水而身亡」 (segment 43) refers to these two palaces. On a Xingge chart, find the Chen and Xu palaces directly and see when the Decade Luck, Annual Luck or Minor Luck passes through them.

People born in a Shen year fear Huo Xing and Ling Xing, and the clash of a Yin year. Huo Xing and Ling Xing are fire, Shen is metal, and fire overcomes metal: a five-element explanation. To use it on a chart, find the palaces holding Huo Xing and Ling Xing; when a year or luck period reaches them, that is the case this line describes. The Yin–Shen clash is the Yin year that comes round every twelve years.

People born in a Wei year fear Hai and You (the verse) or You and Xu (the note); the two disagree, as the textual note explains. The second half says to fear Qing Yang in the four tomb palaces (Chen, Xu, Chou, Wei). Qing Yang in a tomb palace is in Miao, the position where by brightness it is strongest, yet here the Quan Shu counts it as a disaster for those born in a Wei year. The reasoning seems to come from the image of the tomb: the tomb stores and buries, and Wei is itself one of the tomb-storehouses. On a Xingge chart Qing Yang in Chen, Xu, Chou or Wei is always marked Miao, which should not be taken to mean it is harmless.

People born in Xu or Hai years fear Qing Yang and Tuo Luo; for someone born in a Xu year, reaching the Xu palace is the Earth Net, reaching the Chen palace the Sky Net, and Chen and Xu clash. Note that when a Xu-born person's Annual Luck reaches Xu, it is his own branch's year, the same logic as 'dragon and snake coming to their own branch' above. Where Qing Yang and Tuo Luo fall depends on the birth-year stem (Qing Yang one palace after Lu Cun, Tuo Luo one before), so on a Xingge chart the two palaces either side of Lu Cun hold them, and a year or luck period entering either of them is the case described here.

People born in a You year fear Qing Yang and Tuo Luo year-and-luck periods, reaching a Mao-palace luck period, and the clash of Tai Sui in a Mao year; Mao and You are one of the six branch clashes. Taken together, these lines share a pattern: the palace clashing with the birth-year branch, the palace of that branch itself, the palaces in punishment or harm with it, and wherever Qing Yang, Tuo Luo, Huo Xing and Ling Xing sit, are the places to watch as the years and lucks pass. It is the same line of thought as The Two Lucks and Tai Sui, which says to check whether Tai Sui clashes with the luck.

The last verse sums up: people born in Hai or Xu years fear meeting Si (Si and Hai clash), and the Chen and Xu palaces are the Sky and Earth Nets. 「預先整頓衣冠木」 (with 冠 read as the character for coffin) means, taken as written, to get ready for one's own funeral, as heavy as words get. Two points are worth keeping in mind. First, the condition is only a birth-year branch plus the branch of a year or luck period, which comes round every twelve years; it cannot come true as death every time. Second, this same volume says the Decade Luck, Minor Luck, Tai Sui, month, day and hour must be weighed together, and a single taboo cannot settle good or bad. Today it is enough to treat it as a pointer to the years that deserve more care.