“Once upon a time, there was a man who wrote about the nations with a shabby brush. He burned the Qianli Pagoda to ashes, then stood alone in a lofty tower, ha ha.”
He downed a cup of rough wine and laughed aloud. “Old man, does this fellow come from some ancient tale?”
“Not at all, not at all.”
“Then surely he comes from mythology.”
“Not at all.”
Three thousand sword graves.
With nothing but a man and a broken sword, he lopped the crown from a dynasty that had flourished for a hundred years.
He composed poems and made merry among mountains and rivers, carefree as an immortal banished from heaven.
He scooped up a handful of moonlight and casually flung it away, leaving scholars across the land too afraid to write another word.
He pissed on the old emperor’s throne. Then, gripping a tuft of gray-white beard, he deposed the emperor before the assembled officials.
A child deep in the palace gazed at the man in the tower, entranced.
Want to know what happened next? Then hear this: “Born human, dare to love and hate. Raise a blade to set the rules, put brush to paper and shatter the history books. I carved my way into this world!”
Heroes rise in troubled times, and sages emerge in prosperous ages. Digging through the seas of history, later generations can only study the history on the surface as if listening to stories. Who could know how deeply the world’s horrors have sunk into people’s hearts?
