The Secret Records of Qingwu: Notes of a Northern-School Tomb Raider

My name is Chen Yu. I’m an ordinary antique dealer who’s made a living by the skin of my teeth in Panjiayuan, until half of a black-bird jade pendant left behind by my father, along with a yellowed copy of The Green Crow Classic, dragged me into the whirlpool of tomb raiding.

This book, which holds secrets thousands of years old, contains not only lost tomb feng shui diagrams but also a truth powerful enough to upend everything I know. The secret imperial mausoleum of Emperor Taizong of Tang, the longevity sorcery sought by the Xuan Sect, and the mystery of my father’s disappearance ten years ago are all bound up with the book.

To uncover the truth, I follow the descendants of tomb guardians deep into the ancient paths of the Qinling Mountains, brave a maze of black-bird totems, and face off against blood apes and ghost soldiers controlled by dark sorcery. In the underground palace of Lock-Dragon Valley on Mount Zhongnan, I witness the Xuan Sect’s “Immortality Formation,” which sacrifices the living. Only after watching my companions fall beneath the claws of yin spirits do I understand how heavy the words “life and death” are in this line of work.

The Xuan Sect’s pursuit never lets up. They raise corpse parasites and control ferocious beasts, stopping at nothing to get what they want. From the ghost market in Panjiayuan to the Dead Men’s Ravine of Changbai Mountain, from the bone-corroding formation in an underground river to the yin marrow seal in a blood corpse tomb, I carry the Green Crow Classic and my father’s final charge, navigating feng shui arts and mechanical traps while struggling against human nature and greed.

This is no simple treasure hunt. Every step falls on the bones of those who came before, and every page of the book is soaked in blood. When the black-bird jade pendant is made whole and the ultimate secret of the Green Crow Classic is revealed, I discover that immortality is nothing but a deception passed down for a thousand years. What my father protected was never the treasure in the imperial mausoleum, but the hope that could spare the world from catastrophe.

The Northern School’s tomb-raiding rules