The Southern Mountain Way

[Note: This novel contains childbirth.]

(My new novel has started serializing. If you're interested, click on my author page~ ⌯˃ ᵕ ˂⌯ಣ)

As a boy, Zhao Wulan saw mountains as mountains and water as water.

He saw his junior fellow disciple, Chang Nian, with one nose and two eyes.

"You little brat Chang Nian, come help your senior brother get dressed and feed him!"

In his early youth, Zhao Wulan saw mountains as not mountains and water as not water.

He saw his long-absent junior fellow disciple, Qi Changnian, and his tears soaked his blue robe (though he was faking it).

"Junior brother... I've missed you all these years!"

In later youth, Zhao Wulan saw mountains as mountains and water as water once again.

He looked at that coldhearted, ruthless, lunatic of a sickly junior brother and felt concern, pity, and love, one after another.

Zhao Wulan said calmly, "Qi Changnian, did you know I have another name, Zhao Cangsheng?"

Qi Changnian replied indifferently, "Never heard of it."

Zhao Wulan smiled. "I'll tell you about it."

Zhao Cangsheng once repeatedly challenged the person he looked down on, the number one under heaven.

Afterward, he willingly remained number two under heaven for many years. He said:

"I'll be number two. Apart from him, no one else gets to be number one under heaven!"

Zhao Cangsheng was also once called the Bloodthirsty Demon Star, a man who slaughtered countless people without a second thought.

Yet he became a divine physician, healing countless people with miraculous skill, all because one person had suffered from a chronic illness and frail health since childhood.

Zhao Cangsheng was also once dismissed by a fortune-teller as a cold, lonely star, a caged beast trapped by his own arrogance.

Then he met one person who brought rippling life to his dull years, and from then on, he loved that person faithfully and without end.

This is a story about the second and first strongest people under heaven, a story about a senior and junior fellow disciple, and also...

The dominant one: a passionate, murderous demon star, an icy, lonely star, who courts death, loves with unwavering devotion, holds a high position, and is a devil who stirs up trouble wherever he goes

versus

The receptive one: a cold, sickly, utterly mad man, who goes from fending for himself to letting himself perish, with maxed-out martial prowess

A chaotic hotpot of the five elements, yin and yang, strange people of the martial world, childbirth, and coercive love.

[The blurb adapts ideas from the Zen philosophy of the three realms.]

: The romance mostly appears in Volume Seven.

[Some loosely connected character arcs]

Feng Chenmu Xiu & Xiao Yanzi: Chapters 11, 56, 59, 63, 64, and 66.

Li Gaoren & Feng Chenxi: Chapters 43, 45, 94, and 100.

[An abbreviated guide to relevant worldbuilding, which you can skip]

The cycle of the five elements generating one another goes: wood generates fire, fire generates earth, earth generates metal, metal generates water, and water generates wood. The cycle of the five elements overcoming one another goes: wood overcomes earth, earth overcomes water, water overcomes fire, fire overcomes metal, and metal overcomes wood.

An introduction to the six continents in this setting:

1. Central Continent: A place of harmonious coexistence, founded by Li Gaoren, the first leader of the Martial World Order. Kunyang City later became a tool of the rulers.

2. Metal One Continent: A certain Li family claimed to be descended from the Golden Dragon Clan and was the first to seize land here, carving out territory for itself. This marked the beginning of the Southern Mountain court era. The land is rich in gold, and home to alchemy, bone people, and a place where gods and Buddhas are sealed away.

3. Wood Two Continent: A vast northern land with low productivity, where the people are humble and backward. Men give birth, people transform into trees, and they live long lives. It is a Peach Blossom Spring, its people innocent and unworldly.

4. Water Three Continent: Maxed-out martial prowess, advanced and powerful, open and free, ruled by the Zhao clan.

5. Fire Four Continent: Hot and arid, with water and land consorts, decent martial prowess, powerful phoenixes and ancient Western Sea clans, as well as families who traffic in corpses and people.

6. Fifth Continent: The Earth Continent, humble and backward, with complicated terrain. It is the home of ancient clans on the verge of extinction. Along with the Wood Continent, it is at the bottom of the food chain and is also the birthplace of ancient forbidden arts.

The continents above are arranged in the order of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth.

Theme: Study philosophy and open the door to a new world