The Way Begins at Hangu Pass: From Herding Cattle to Seeking the Dao

Li Geng, a modern physics graduate student, transmigrated to the Spring and Autumn period and landed in a muddy street outside Hangu Pass. With the biting wind and an empty stomach, he thought he was destined to drift through this chaotic age like a fallen leaf. Then he witnessed an omen straight out of the history books: purple clouds swept thirty thousand li across the eastern sky, cascading like a river of stars, unmistakably heralding the arrival of a sage. When an old man in a faded hemp robe, riding a green ox, slowly approached, Li Geng knew this was his chance to witness the source of the Dao. Dragging his injured leg, he stumbled toward the ox and cried out what he had long yearned for as the whole city knelt: “Sage, please take me as your disciple!”

With the purple clouds as witness, Laozi looked up. “An anomaly. Will you follow me beyond the pass and see the true colors of Heaven and Earth?” From then on, Li Geng was no longer a bystander, but a disciple who witnessed the birth of the Dao. From the muddy roads of Hangu Pass to the deserts of the Western Regions, from Laozi’s brief words to enlightenment in the ultimate truths of Heaven and Earth, Li Geng’s transmigration began with stopping an ox and begging to become a disciple. It would ultimately reveal the ultimate answer to the Dao and humanity hidden behind the myths.