Literature Subdues the Abyss

In this world, reading books can really kill ghosts.

A young scholar can injure disembodied spirits; a licentiate can grasp the heart and compose battle poetry; a provincial graduate can establish doctrines and make words come true; a presented scholar can walk the Way and shape literary energy... At the Sage’s height, a single stroke can determine the fate of the world, and a single essay can suppress the Heavenly Abyss.

Fourteen-year-old Lin Yan is a poor boy from a remote village.

Faced with the annual tide of Yin energy, the ancestral fire in the shrine about to go out, and his mother on the verge of death from a soul curse...

He grips the broken Seal of Literary Heart in his hand and opens The Essentials of the Imperial Examinations.

County, prefectural, and academy examinations, followed by the provincial, metropolitan, and palace examinations: scholarly honors strengthen the nation’s destiny, and official rank brings responsibility.

From a lowly young scholar to the top of the Nine Provinces’ prodigy rankings, from a remote village to the heart of the imperial court.

When he takes up his brush, he writes essays on the classics; when he puts it to paper, he suppresses demons and evil spirits.

And when he finally stands at the edge of the Heavenly Abyss, facing the harvest of gods and demons that comes once every five hundred years...

The court officials, academies across the land, sects of the Nine Provinces, incense offerings of millions, and the river of civilization will all lie within a single stroke of his brush.

“Today, I take up the brush for civilization.”

“Heavens and Earth, hear my words.”