During the Tianshuo era of the Great Xia dynasty, the two sages ruled together. Ye Nuan, the Left Commissioner of the Three Provinces Bureau, the highest intelligence agency under Emperor Tianshuo's direct control, was ordered to travel south to Jiangnan and assist Yuan Mi, the special envoy overseeing construction of the canal.
To ensure the canal was completed on schedule, she had to coordinate the government offices across Jiangnan, keep the deeply entrenched local powers in check, and root out bandits who had been entrenched for years across multiple prefectures. As she traveled south, a string of strange cases unfolded, while rumors of a secret treasure from the previous dynasty stirred undercurrents throughout the martial world.
Ye Nuan and the people of Haoyue Tower journeyed together, unraveling one mystery after another and tracking down the previous dynasty's secret treasure that had thrown the entire martial world into turmoil. In the end, they exposed a conspiracy that had been in the making for years.
[Reading guide: No romance, a strong female lead, martial-world intrigue, subverted tropes, and a jaw-dropping twist ending.]
[The heroine: Ye Nuan is unmatched in combat, a grandmaster-level swordswoman who wields the sword Chunhui and is heir to the Killing Sword. She has multiple roles and layers of secret identities. She is neither saintly nor melodramatic, and has her own way of handling people and situations.]
