He is Xiao Jin, the seventh prince of Great Xia, yet also the emperor’s despised “veinless waste,” condemned to the bitter cold of the northern frontier and forced to live among dust and degradation. A Dragon-Locking Ring suppresses the terrifying power he was born with. Beneath Beiyuan City, the barbarian cavalry surges like a tide, and the walls are on the verge of collapse. To save the lives of the comrades behind him, Xiao Jin stakes everything in his desperate hour and violently assails the shackles within his body. In an instant, the dormant power of his dragon veins erupts as the Reverse-Scale Flame Dragon Qi, blazing forth to burn the eight directions. His powerful enemies are reduced to ashes, and the isolated city survives!
Yet the awakening of his power also marks the beginning of disaster. The Dragon-Locking Ring shatters, and dragon qi soars into the sky. That brief flash of brilliance illuminates a chasm of covetous eyes. The barbarian army returns, vowing to devour this strange flame; powerful figures from the martial world are drawn by its scent, eager to seize the dragon qi and pursue supremacy; suspicion from the imperial throne becomes a volley of icy hidden arrows, and the bloodline he once shared with his kin is now a death warrant. And in the shadows, peerless warlords bearing other forms of dragon qi turn their deadly gazes upon him... Nine strands of dragon qi are scattered across the world. Whoever claims them can shake heaven and earth; whoever reunites the dragon veins will become ruler of all under heaven!
Xiao Jin, the despised prince and frontier soldier tempered by fire, sets out over the rubble and ashes of Beiyuan City. With an iron will, he must tame the raging Flame Dragon within him, which can incinerate all things but also turns on its master. Surrounded by relentless hunts by barbarians, the imperial court, the martial world, and ambitious warlords, he must fight his way out of desperate straits. He must seek the dragon qi scattered in every direction, choosing whether to unite or protect it. In this age of blood and fire, he will take the name of the Reverse Scale, burn away his shackles, and rebuild the land!
