Xiao Lang of the Southern Dynasties: The Masked Knight and the Buddha Statue

At the instant an electric current pierces a gilded bronze Buddha statue, Lin Yan, a modern archaeologist, becomes the most awkward kind of "young nobleman" in the Southern Liang dynasty.

Wearing the false identity of a distant branch of the Lanling Xiao clan, he feigns civility at gatherings of the aristocracy. Every flake of gilding that comes off the Buddha statue in his arms brings him one step closer to having his cover blown. When he dazzles Xie Lin with his assembly-line gilding technique and intimidates the rebels with repeating crossbows, his modern knowledge beneath that false identity becomes his trump card for surviving the chaotic age.

But the owner of another, intact Buddha statue is closing in with Northern Qi's hidden guards. Li Yue wants to activate a rift through time and space to return home, even if the price is the collapse of her memories of Jiangzuo.

Amid the flames of the Hou Jing Rebellion, Lin Yan runs his fingers over the fragments of the broken Buddha statue. Should he abandon Su Ning, who is trying to complete the historical record, and escape to the modern world, or use blueprints recording Southern Liang's technology to kindle the spark of civilization in this chaotic age?

This mask of the Southern Dynasties has been worn so long that the responsibility beneath it has become impossible to set aside.

This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.