Tly yz, 'Master of the Sky' (also called Tly nivkh, 'sky person'), is the celestial counterpart of the Nivkh masters of the mountain (Pal yz) and the sea (Tol yz). In the Nivkh three-tiered cosmos he presides over the Upper World, Tly vo, the sky village above the Middle World of humans and above the Lower World of the dead. The sky is populated by his people, the tly nivgun, and shamans' helper spirits could be sent from his realm as readily as from the sea or the mountain. He received respect rather than an organized cult, as befits the diffuse, master-based theism that Shternberg, Kreinovich, and Taksami all described among the Nivkh.