In this world, the lines on a craftsman's palm are closer to the "Way of Heaven" than any cultivation scripture.
Fang Yan, an apprentice from Anvil City, takes hold of a ruler with no markings. His master says, "Measure yourself first, then others, and at last, measure the world's partiality."
At that very moment, the defenders of the old order sit enthroned in Rule City, casting the ways of life of billions of beings into rigid molds. The elders of the Heavenly Evolution Palace coldly declare, "Inferior tools must be discarded. This is the law of heaven."
A war over "what it means to be human, what it means to be a tool, and what it means to be fair" was already fated when the furnace first began to glow.
