[Eastern Fantasy / High Martial Arts / Farming / Clan Saga / Political Intrigue]
The jianghu is a beaded curtain, the imperial court a game of chess, and I, Chen Fubai, am just an unambitious farmer from Listening Rain Alley.
That year, the rain fell hard over the Great Yong Dynasty. Chen Fubai kept watch over his leaky ancestral home, with a one-armed old servant who did nothing but sharpen knives standing behind him, and a blind girl in his arms who could pinpoint directions by listening to the wind. Everyone mocked him as a discarded good-for-nothing from the Northern Liang Prince’s estate, a wastrel too far gone to be salvaged. Then came the day of Awakening of Insects, when spring thunder stirred. Chen Fubai planted a charred piece of wood in the backyard, and it grew into a Thunderclap Swordwood, a blade capable of severing the head of a seventh-rank martial artist.
From then on, the rules of the world changed. I study books, and I farm. The book I read is The Scripture of Killing, and the seeds I sow are the “Twenty-Four Solar Terms.” During “Grain Rain,” I plant a bean and scatter beans that transform into soldiers, as three thousand golden-armored warriors devour the rebel prince’s cavalry. During “Grain in Ear,” I bury a Grandmaster’s corpse; it flowers and bears fruit, yielding a “Blood Lotus” that makes everyone as strong as dragons. On that night of “Major Cold,” I turn the entire jianghu into a nursery and use the fortunes of all martial artists under heaven as fertilizer, all so that when the Heavenly Gate opens, I can ask the exalted immortal above:
“If all mortals are merely medicinal dregs you raise for harvest, then today, would you care to become a handful of spring soil in my Chen family’s fields?”
