Mictlan
Aztec
The underworld and land of the dead. Mictlan, like Hades, is not synonymous with Hell: it is simply where souls go when they die. The journey from the grave to Mictlan takes four years through hazardous terrain. Souls face seismic zones where mountains move on their own to crush them. Icy winds chill them for part of the way. Arrows shot by unseen arches pierce them. The soul must then pass through eight deserts with all their heat and other dangers before coming, at last, to a great river where friendly yellow or black dogs wait to help them cross it.
MIctlan itself is not a place of woe, but one very much like the surface world where souls live and work as they did before.
The Aztecs buried their dead with things they would need for the journey and life in the underworld. FOr four years, following a death, they observed special rites that marked the passage of the soul.
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