Awakening of Intangible Cultural Heritage: I Am the Last Keeper of the Lantern

When the mint candy wrapper my deskmate handed me folded itself into a thousand-year-old bridal sedan chair in my palm, and the secrets of Yang Guifei from my history textbook spilled uncontrollably from my lips, I realized that the intangible cultural heritage genes sleeping inside me had awakened.

My name is Jiu'er. Overnight, I became a walking "vessel of intangible cultural heritage." Peking opera melodies poured from my throat for no reason, my fingers moved of their own accord to form long-lost hand gestures, and my pupils could see the memories sealed inside cultural relics. But this gift wasn't a blessing. It was a curse. A mysterious organization calling itself the "Nine Tripods Project" followed me like a shadow. Their target was the nearly extinct code of civilization inside me.

It was only after meeting Professor Zheng from the Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center that I learned I was the only "Lantern Keeper" to awaken in two thousand years. But the professor's sudden "sacrifice" taught me that no one could be trusted. The only people I could rely on were the faint Tang dynasty Daoist priest's mark on my childhood friend A Liang, and the bottle my mother left behind... of chili sauce engraved with a star chart.

Now, the Moonlight Bodhisattva on Mount Zhongnan is showing me the way, and beneath the setting sun, my shadow has split into countless ancestral spirits balancing bowls, cutting paper, and swirling their long water sleeves. This time, I will keep the flame of civilization burning.