Hel is half dead and half alive due to complications of her father and her mother. Half of her face is beautiful, like that of her father, while the other half is ugly and difficult to look at like her mother. From the waist up the skin is pink, alive and healthy. Below the waist is dead and rotting. This is the personification of the belief that death can be a good thing or a tragedy. Hel's underworld is not the Christian hell of eternal punishment for all, but a world of rewards or punishment for each as earned in life.