Guandi.
A third-century general, executed after a failed campaign, promoted by imperial decree over centuries until he outranked most of the pantheon. He is on the altar in shops, restaurants, police stations and triad lodges — in Hong Kong both the police and the people they arrest have kept him, which everyone finds funny and nobody finds strange.
Guan Yu was a general serving Liu Bei in the wars at the end of the Han, captured and executed in 220. The historical man matters less than the process: he was made a god by popular devotion and then progressively promoted by imperial decree over more than a millennium, reaching the rank of Di, emperor, under the Ming, and being claimed simultaneously by Taoists as a marshal, by Buddhists as a protector, and by Confucians as the exemplar of loyalty. The novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms cemented the image — red face, long beard, green robe, guandao halberd — for everyone. His altars are in shops and restaurants across the Chinese world because loyalty and sworn brotherhood translate into commercial trust, and the well-known fact that both the Hong Kong police and the triads venerate him is a standing joke that also illustrates the point: he presides over oaths, and both organisations run on them.
The same ground, other faiths
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