Cen Heng saved three hundred people.
A year later, the first dead man came looking for him.
The corpse rolled down a hillside and stopped in front of his wheelchair. Six sects' merit seals had been branded onto his body, but the palm of his hand bore a backflow sigil drawn by Cen Heng himself.
A year ago, three hundred unregistered disciples were ordered to be thrown into a miasma pit. Cen Heng defied his master's orders, altered the formation, and freed them. His meridians were destroyed, and he was expelled from Sword Abyss.
He thought all three hundred were free.
But the dead man before him told him that someone was following the old register and capturing them one by one.
Huo Zhihuan came calling at just that moment.
The young lord of Lingjue Peak respected no authority and showed no mercy. He made a living collecting debts on behalf of those dead people whose names had been erased.
"What if the thing devouring people isn't a villain, but the rules themselves?"
One man who followed the rules to the letter, and another who investigated how many lives those rules had cost, set out together.
Their investigation led from a corpse bearing six seals to the register of three hundred people, from a nonexistent conscription depot to the Mountain and River Merit Ledger, the record that kept the world at peace.
The ledger recorded merit on one side and lives on the other.
And on the torn-off first page of the regulations, half of the sect leader's seal, the one Cen Heng knew best, was slowly coming into view.
"Young Master Cen, the trail leads back to your sect."
"Then... we'll keep investigating."
The Merit Ledger recorded heroes, but concealed a second account on its reverse: whose names had been erased, who had been sold to fill formations, and whose achievements were still being claimed in their name after death.
At the end of the investigation, an order to use ten thousand people to fill a formation was placed before Cen Heng.
If sacrificing ten thousand people could save twelve cities, would he save them or not?
Cen Heng had once chosen a path to survival for three hundred people.
This time, he decided to ask the people who would die first.
Reading note: No CP. The two male leads are ideological rivals and allies in their work. This is not a series of standalone cases, but a story of ensemble growth.
Theme: A truly lasting order begins by seeing every person and giving the choice back to those who will bear the consequences.
