Yu Shangjiu first met Mu Weichen when he was twelve. The old city lord brought the man home and took him on as a disciple, then pointed to him and told Yu to call him "Senior Brother."
The young master Yu was arrogant and headstrong. He refused to accept this cheap senior brother of uncertain origins, and it took three years before he finally called him "Brother" of his own free will.
Then upheaval struck. The old city lord disappeared, and Mu Weichen wielded his Frostflow Sword to face enemies on every side, protecting Yu as they fought through one encirclement after another. Beneath the flashing blades, the man's bloodstained eyes were so striking they burned themselves deep into Yu Shangjiu's heart.
Years later, Yu saw that same expression on his senior brother's face again. Flames split the sky, and Mu Weichen stood against the light amid the devastation before Cangyuan. The people around them roared with accusations of "treason" and "patricide," yet none dared approach him.
In his life, Yu Shangjiu had regarded only two people as family: the old city lord, his father, and Mu Weichen, the senior brother he had called "Brother" for years.
His senior brother killed his father, and years later, Yu himself forced Mu Weichen to his death atop the Lingtai.
With the city lord dead, the once-great Chaoye City fell into decline. There was no longer a young master of Chaoye City, only Yu, an unpredictable hall master of the Fusheng Sect, whose power rivaled the sect leader's.
Everyone in the Nine Provinces knew that Mu Weichen, city lord of Chaoye City, had committed patricide and betrayed his ancestors. His reputation was in tatters. After monopolizing power through iron-fisted methods for years, he had finally died at the Fuguang Terrace in the hands of his junior brother, Yu Shangjiu, once the young city lord.
No one could have predicted that a century later, the man whose name had become taboo would awaken inside a puppet body of unknown origin. It was said that Yu Shangjiu, the man who had killed him, had spent the past hundred years searching for any trace of him.
More rumors followed. One day, the mercurial Hall Master Yu broke with his usual habits and brought an ordinary person back to the Fusheng Sect. According to those in the know, that person bore a slight resemblance to the late city lord of Chaoye City.
People began to say that Hall Master Yu had brought back a "substitute" for his former enemy. Only Mu Weichen knew that Yu Shangjiu wanted to kill him all over again.
His schemes and disguise were soon exposed. Facing the blade pressed to his throat, Mu Weichen remained composed, his teasing tone impossible to read. "Shangjiu, you've changed quite a bit."
Yu Shangjiu laughed, but his eyes were icy.
"I learned it all from you, Brother."
(Mu Weichen is the main viewpoint character. Mu is the gong, Yu is the shou.)
(The blurb leaves out some crucial details. There is no melodramatic "revenge for my father's murder" plot.)
Theme: Live life with optimism
