The Spine of Mountains and Seas

There is a mountain in the heavens.

Nine layers of mountain shadows weigh upon the sky. In three thousand years, the shadows that fell have crushed nine dynasties.

There is only one path of cultivation in this world: Bearing the Peak. The more weight you can shoulder, the stronger you become. Great clans pile on the weight with pills, while the privileged use secret arts to lighten the load. But Shi Dai, a young porter from Qingya Town, has only the shoulders that have carried cargo for ten years.

At the annual test on the Ascension Stele, he measured three hundred shi, and the entire hall burst into laughter: "A porter thinks he can ascend the stele?"

No one knew that just a month earlier, this same "three-hundred-shi" porter had held up half a cliff with a single carrying pole. And no one knew what else he could bear.

"Once the load is on your shoulders, even if the sky falls, it won't hit the ground."

From Qingya Town to the Gate of Bearing Heaven, he will shoulder the fallen sky back into place, inch by inch.