Once, ancient China was brimming with magic…but three hundred years ago, the Spiritual Qi of the Heavens and Earth dried up in the Silence of All Magic. Hundreds of years with no spiritual qi have allowed resentment to build unchecked, and it’s only a matter of time before calamity descends and the world is plunged into chaos and destruction. Once-powerful exorcists have done their best to preserve their legacy in the centuries since, but now only one remains: Chen Xing, now tasked with venturing out into the war-torn world to prevent the impending apocalypse. Chen Xing’s sole magical ability is a heart lamp, a supernatural light source that’s supposed to guide him to the destined Protector who will fight at his side. The heart lamp picks Xiang Shu, a mysterious stranger with no interest in being a hero—but fate has other plans for them both. A terrifying conspiracy looms over the Divine Land, and whether Xiang Shu likes it or not, Chen Xing may be his only hope of thwarting the impending darkness.
Once, ancient China was brimming with magic…but three hundred years ago, the Spiritual Qi of the Heavens and Earth dried up in the Silence of All Magic. Hundreds of years with no spiritual qi have allowed resentment to build unchecked, and it’s only a matter of time before calamity descends and the world is plunged into chaos and destruction. Once-powerful exorcists have done their best to preserve their legacy in the centuries since, but now only one remains: Chen Xing, now tasked with venturing out into the war-torn world to prevent the impending apocalypse. Chen Xing’s sole magical ability is a heart lamp, a supernatural light source that’s supposed to guide him to the destined Protector who will fight at his side. The heart lamp picks Xiang Shu, a mysterious stranger with no interest in being a hero—but fate has other plans for them both. A terrifying conspiracy looms over the Divine Land, and whether Xiang Shu likes it or not, Chen Xing may be his only hope of thwarting the impending darkness.
As winter descends, Chen Xing and Xiang Shu journey north beyond the Great Wall in search of the elusive Dinghai Pearl—only to find that the politics among the tribes of the Chi Le Covenant are just as treacherous as those of the Imperial Capital.But political strife is not the only danger that awaits them. Restless spirits stir awake, turning their journey into a battle for survival on the icy plains. As Chen Xing refuses to turn back and Xiang Shu struggles to balance duty and destiny, the path ahead grows ever more perilous—one that may force them to fight not just for their mission, but for each other.▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ERRATANote: Any typos or basic errors (such as grammar or formatting) are corrected during reprints, but are not listed here unless significant. Glossaries will also receive minor edits to reflect changes to later volumes.Chapter 36Xiang Shu let the horses loose and began to walk through the snow.Chen Xing followed behind him. He shot an apprehensive glance above them, but there was no sign of the child who had been leading the wolves. Then, to Chen Xing’s confusion, Xiang Shu took off his gloves and came to stand behind him, pressing his fingers into Chen Xing’s ears.Xiang Shu took a deep breath. Then he let out a sonorous wolf howl.The howl built up, burst after burst, into a prolonged roar. At first its resonance was intense but bearable, but as he howled on the sound brimmed with more and more strength and vigor, until it actually seemed to rend the heavens and earth themselves—with nothing more than the vibrations of his thunderous roars, Xiang Shu was shaking the mountains. The vibrations were more than Chen Xing could stand; they were making him horribly dizzy. The wolf pack, on the other hand, was growing restless, and they began to retreat.“You’ll cause an avalanche!” shouted Chen Xing.That very moment, the snow on top of the mountains began to fall, tumbling into the canyon between the peaks and sending the wolf pack scurrying away in all directions. Xiang Shu, meanwhile, fell silent. The snow thundered downward, piling up to fill in the gap between the mountains . So much snow was dislodged that a new path came into view halfway up the mountainside.The wolves had all fled by then. Xiang Shu unsheathed the huge sword he had strapped to his back, as if nothing had happened.“Let’s go,” he said quietly.The vibrations had shaken off fully half of the snow that had accumulated on the slopes of Carosha, revealing a stone path that wound through the mountains. Chen Xing was stunned. “With an ability like that, who needs to go into battle? You could just start an avalanche and everything would be over.”“Most mountains don’t have enough snow on them,” Xiang Shu replied casually as he pulled on his gloves. “For example, I can’t do it with the Yin Mountains.”You actually gave that a serious answer? Aren’t you a bit too arrogant?!The two of them circled around the huge lake, arriving at the foot of the mountain. There were no steps they could use to climb up the mountainside, only the bare rocks that the wild wolves had jumped between and some ancient wooden posts nailed into the cliff that long-ago Xiongnu had once used to climb the mountain.Xiang Shu gestured to Chen Xing, as if to say, after you.Chen Xing stared. If he tried to climb up this sheer mountainside, he was going to die. “I’ll have to trouble you,” he said obediently.Xiang Shu shot him a mocking glance. Of course, Chen Xing could hardly forget the argument they’d had on the way here—now he had no choice but to swallow his pride and ask for help, which was humiliating in the extreme. But just as he was about to say something, Xiang Shu casually wrapped one arm around him and picked him up in a bridal carry. With a single leap, he landed lightly on the nearest rock before kicking off again.Chen Xing felt like he was treading on clouds as he and Xiang Shu flew through the air.“Han people,” Xiang Shu scoffed.“Aren’t you half Han yourself?!” Chen Xing shot back angrily. He thought for a moment, then added, “Why do you resent the Han so much? Your mother was Han too!”“If you Han hadn’t driven her into a corner by ruthlessly bullying a lone woman, why would she have had to escape to Chi Le Chuan?”“If that hadn’t happened, would you have existed at all?” Chen Xing protested. “Don’t deny the benefits you gained…”Xiang Shu didn’t reply. In just a few moments, the two of them had already made it almost halfway up the mountain. Then, quite suddenly, Xiang Shu set Chen Xing down on an outcropping of rock.“Don’t joke around!” Chen Xing squawked. “Hey!” The outcropping was bare, and it jutted from the mountainside halfway between the sky and the ground, close to neither. Chen Xing could tell that Xiang Shu was trying to mess with him. “I was wrong!” he said, hugging onto the rock face tightly. “Take me up the rest of the way!”Yet Xiang Shu had disappeared in the blink of an eye. He whistled and said, “I’ll go check on the situation up there first.”“Get me up there first!” said Chen Xing. He didn’t dare move on his own, though. He had no choice; all he could do was to stand there on that little three-inch-square patch of rock. When he looked down, there was a valley almost a hundred feet below, and when he looked up, all he saw was a bare precipice.“Bastard!” Chen Xing clung to the rock with both arms as he cursed Xiang Shu out. “You bastard!”Xiang Shu climbed up over the precipice, then took a sudden half step back. His heel scraped up a bit of snow, which fell and landed on Chen Xing’s head. Chen Xing looked up and opened his mouth to shout something up to Xiang Shu, but then he saw Xiang Shu stick his hand out from the edge of the cliff and wag his index finger. He was telling Chen Xing not to speak.
As the northern emperor Fu Jian prepares to march on the south with an army of the undead, Chen Xing and his ragtag team of exorcists make one final, desperate attempt to convince him to reconsider. But even if Fu Jian abandons his unwitting alliance with the forces of darkness, that will only delay the plans of the Demon God Chiyou, not bring them to an end—and Chen Xing is no closer to solving the mystery of the Dinghai Pearl and releasing the Spiritual Qi of the Heavens and Earth, without which he knows they have no chance of defeating their ultimate foe. Xiang Shu, meanwhile, makes a drastic decision to solve what to him is the more pressing problem: Chen Xing’s imminent, fated death. Other forces are at work here, though, than the exorcists and their enemies, and when the pivotal moment arrives, nothing goes as either Xiang Shu or Chen Xing could possibly have planned…
Sent back in time three years to the day he met Xiang Shu, Chen Xing and his fellow exorcists have been given a fresh chance to thwart the Demon God. As Chen Xing journeys north to Chi Le Chuan for the second time, he hopes his experiences in the previous timeline will allow him to avert disaster for the Akele people and the Deer God Lu Ying. However, while Chen Xing and the others have retained their memories from before the reset, however, Xiang Shu seems to be none the wiser…leaving Chen Xing the only one who remembers their feelings for one another. Will Xiang Shu’s memories return? And if they don’t, can Chen Xing count on him falling in love again?