In the strictly hierarchical Great Yu dynasty, merchants rank at the bottom of the four classes. Liu Chenfeng, born with the “lowly” status of a merchant's son from Jianghuai, overcomes obstacle after obstacle to claim the title of Martial Zhuangyuan, shocking the court and the country. But this draws the scathing rebuke of Ye Zhaoyu, daughter of a renowned general from Yanbei: “The stench of money hides the bones!” Two souls worlds apart collide for the first time amid a firearms plot by the Rakshasa delegation.
War erupts on the northern frontier, as four ambitious nations look on hungrily. Rakshasa cavalry wielding “Thunderclap Guns” seek to tear the borders apart; Southern Frog poison and gu poison creep through the streets; Eastern Japanese ninja plot in the shadows; and Western Rong cavalry wait for a chance to raid the frontier. With the nation in peril, courtly prejudice, rivalries in the martial world, and feuds between nations and families all become calamities sweeping in like smoke and fire.
Relying on a merchant's resourcefulness, extraordinary martial prowess, and keen understanding of firearms and mechanisms, Liu Chenfeng repeatedly performs heroic deeds. He uses the cleverness of the streets to defeat his enemies, corroding an ice fortress like salt and burning iron ships with fire. Amid the flash of blades and rivers of blood, he proves that the merchant's way can bring prosperity to all and become a blade that protects the land. Ye Zhaoyu bears the honor of a general's family and the anguish of a bitter family feud. She is peerless in battle, yet beneath Yanbei's iron-blooded spirit lie an impulsiveness and a fiery kindness. When a scheme drives a wedge between them, she shoots an arrow at Liu Chenfeng in suspicion. The man she once called “the copper-smelling fellow” becomes an indescribable ache in her heart. Amid one misunderstanding after another and the threat of death, from cutting her wrist to use her hot blood to temporarily suppress the Frostblade gu poison, to breaking off her hair and tying it to an arrow as they defend a lonely city atop an ice fortress, two proud hearts are tested, collide, and draw closer in the crucible of blood and fire.
The Salt Gang's waterways, the Tang Sect's Thunderclap Fire, the iron-spear anti-cavalry formation... The forces of the martial world are swept into the war between the four nations,
