In 875 AD, during the late Tang dynasty.
Three thousand soldiers of the Wuning Army in Xuzhou were slaughtered by Wang Xianzhi's rebel forces on the banks of the Sishui River.
Xu Feng lay dying amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood, his guts spilling out.
Just before his consciousness faded away
He saw a ghostly blue flame drift from the forehead of a fallen comrade.
[Chinese heroic spirit's lingering will detected... Soldier Soul System bound!]
A cold voice rang out in his mind.
Seven fragments of "Infantry Soul" hovered silently.
Gravely wounded and on the verge of death, with rebels searching the area and bandits running rampant.
There was no way back.
Grinding his teeth, Xu Feng used his first fusion on the six corpses beside him.
In the wind and snow, six dead comrades stiffly staggered to their feet.
Their wounds had sealed over. Their eyes were blank, yet they slowly dropped to one knee before him.
From then on, he commanded an army that could not be killed by ordinary means.
Fallen in battle? Their soldier souls simply returned to the forge to be fused again!
He began with seven "walking corpses" on the banks of the Sishui River.
When he took a county town, he fused "Craftsman Souls," turning crude iron into fine steel and making crossbow bolts fly like locusts.
When he took in refugees, he fused "Farmer Souls," turning wasteland into fertile fields and filling granaries to the brim.
When he fought the regional warlords, he fused "Veterans of a Hundred Battles," turning fleeing soldiers into an iron wall and driving the jiedushi back!
When Huang Chao swept across the land, Zhu Wen murdered the emperor and proclaimed himself emperor, and Li Keyong's Shatuo iron cavalry seemed invincible...
They were horrified to discover that a monster had appeared in the Central Plains, one that could not be defeated or killed, and only grew stronger the more it fought.
Xu Feng stood at the front of the formation. Behind him, his army stood silent as a forest, their eyes burning with a faint blue light.
He gazed toward Chang'an and murmured to himself:
"The debt owed to the heroic spirits of this realm..."
