In Aztec religion, most dead people traditionally entered the underworld called Mictlan.
Mictlan was the destination for people whose deaths did not qualify them for one of the special afterlife realms. Aztec beliefs distinguished destinations according to the manner of death: for example, people who died by drowning or lightning were associated with Tlalocan, the realm of the rain god Tlaloc. Mictlan was therefore the ordinary destination for many others, rather than a simple moral equivalent of a Christian hell.
The dead were believed to face a difficult journey through a series of challenges before reaching Mictlan. The underworld was ruled by Mictlantecuhtli and Mictecacihuatl, a divine lord and lady of the dead.
Mictlan is sometimes translated as the “place of the dead.” The famous modern Mexican holiday Día de los Muertos draws on Indigenous traditions but is not identical to the original Aztec doctrine about Mictlan.