Shen is the ninth of the twelve Earthly Branches (dizhi). Its zodiac animal is the Monkey, its element is Metal, its direction is west-southwest, and its double-hour runs from 3 to 5 pm, the mid-afternoon. As one of the twelve branches it combines with the ten Heavenly Stems to form the sexagenary cycle of sixty that numbers years, months, days, and double-hours. The branch names the ninth animal of the twelve-year cycle and the corresponding month and double-hour, carrying the Monkey's quick and clever associations in the almanac. These are the conventions of the Chinese calendrical and cosmological tradition, in which the twelve branches order the animal years, the twelve months, and the twelve two-hour periods into which the day is divided from midnight to midnight.
Shen is the ninth Earthly Branch, corresponding to the Monkey, and to the double hour from 3 pm to 5 pm. Its dominant hidden stem is Geng, giving it the Metal phase, with Ren and Wu present as secondary hidden stems. Shen is a Yang-polarity branch, pairing only with Jia, Bing, Wu, Geng or Ren within the sexagenary cycle, and it governs the seventh lunar month, the start of autumn, and the direction southwest within the compound directional scheme that combines pairs of branches for the eight intermediate points. In BaZi astrology a chart with Shen prominent is read through the Monkey's traditional associations of cleverness, versatility and wit, combined with the Metal phase's own associations of sharpness and decisiveness, together read as an inventive, quick-adapting temperament that the tradition also cautions can tip into restlessness or trickery if the chart lacks a stabilising Earth influence.