The cracked pot on Ting-Lu's head is a testament to its immense antiquity, an ordinary piece of Paldean Imperial Ware, and a testament to the civilization it destroyed. And yet, to the wild pokemon of the forest where it is enshrined, it is a seat to take rides in, and occasionally a birdbath, with nary a trace of its ancient hostility; it must be hard for anyone in the area to imagine that it destroyed the very civilization which produced its famous head ornament.

The earthquakes which shattered Paldea's empire were too strong for even Ting-Lu's liking, strong enough to topple palaces and bury armies in their barracks – and so strong that they backfired on the user. The ferocious shaking, or perhaps the falling debris from collapsing buildings, cracked Ting-Lu's own pot, and through its cracks, this pokemon saw the very wrath it had inflicted upon the world – and felt it all too strongly. The sheer fear and horror it felt from its actions led Ting-Lu to stop stomping the ground and run away into the forest, but it broke too late to prevent the Fall of Paldea; many a historian has speculated about what would have happened if the pot had cracked just a little earlier.

Frightened humans would later build a shrine around Ting-Lu's territory, fearing that whatever succeeded the Paldean Empire would meet the same fate, but this was wholly unnecessary; either Ting-Lu is terrified by the prospect of human revenge, or it hides its face out of shame.