Panguan: The Twelfth Gate
From Seven Seas: Under the blue glow of dawn, Xue Xian—former dragon and current paper doll—is mere moments away from being kidnapped and exorcized. Except, Xue Xian has no idea! Instead, he’s cursed to be trapped in the form of a hideous paper doll alongside the bickering Jiang Shining, a former ghost indebted to assist Xue Xian in reclaiming his lost glory and, ultimately, avenging the wrongs inflicted upon him. So when a monk with amnesia named Xuanmin—hot on the trail of an unknown curse—arrives at the burnt ruins of Jiang Manor, he quickly finds the source. Putting off the exorcism for his return, Xuanmin unceremoniously stuffs two crude paper dolls inside his pouch and heads back, none the wiser. Furious, Xue Xian grumpily stews in captivity and declares a new vow: To turn this high-minded monk’s life into a living hell! Trapped as a traveling trio, they must suffer one another’s company while seeking answers to their growing list of questions: Will Jiang Shining be able to fulfill the unfinished business that tethers him to this mortal coil? Will Xue Xian be able to crack Xuanmin’s icy demeanor, and will he like what he finds if he does? More importantly still, who even is Xuanmin?
The Banquet of the Winding Wine ends with one nobleman falling asleep warm in his bed. When he wakes, he’s shackled as a prisoner in the Northern Domain of Tealspire, feared by all as an archfiend! However, he’s not the only one who’s just woken up. Floating above the Boundless Sea is Tealspire—a towering, thirty-three-story prison built to contain fiends, where the damned are forgotten and demons waste away. At its summit, Wu Xingxue awakens with blood on his hands, chains at his feet, and no memory of how he arrived. The life he once led as a nobleman of Magpie Haven is gone, replaced by confinement and confusion. Disoriented and stripped of everything, Wu Xingxue is no longer a pampered aristocrat—he’s an archfiend. But fate has other plans. His awakening stirs the legendary Tianxiu Immortal, Xiao Fuxuan: a cold, enigmatic figure with the word mian etched into his neck, wielding a power steeped in divine judgment. As Tealspire begins to collapse around them, the two must forge a reluctant alliance to survive its fall—and face whatever awaits below. Yet the mysteries only deepen. Why did Tealspire fall? What became of Wu Xingxue’s former life? And who, truly, is the Tianxiu Immortal?