Hunting Life by Heaven’s Decree

The imperial court stands far above, with princes and ministers at its summit. Everyone is born with a fate, and each fate takes the form of a beast. Those with the fate of a rat are greedy and sly, suited to business. Those with the fate of an ox are diligent and simple, suited to honest labor. Those with the fate of a tiger are fierce and brutal, fit to become great generals. Each fate opens a path. Chen Sheng, transmigrated into a hound of the court and an official of the Poison Bureau, had no beastly fate. All he had was a bloodthirsty totem on his chest. It allowed him to kill and seize the fates of others. Slay one tiger-fated foe, and a tiger appears on the totem. Slay a hundred, and it becomes the Mountain Lord. Hunt a hundred Mountain Lords, and they become Qiongqi. Slay a hundred snakes, and they become a python; slaughter a hundred pythons, and they become divine dragons. If a golden rooster crows beneath his blade ten thousand times, a phoenix will appear upon the totem. A tiger's roar can seize the soul and shatter evil. A snake can live on without its head. Dragons and pythons swallow mountains and rivers. The Mountain Lord commands ghostly minions... That year, the Daoist who had spent sixty years exorcising demons descended from True Martial Mountain once more. The ancestors of the Dragon-Tiger sect fled to the barbarian stockades. The “standing emperor” of the Directorate of Ceremonial had power over the entire court, while the emperor in the Golden Throne Hall had not held court for twenty years, spending day and night striking a bronze chime. That year, after hunting down every kind of fate, Chen Sheng removed the crimson robe of a Grand Secretary of the Inner Cabinet. Ancient totems roamed his body, and tens of thousands of divine abilities became innate to him. “Only a dragon remains.” Dragons were hard to find in this world. He looked toward the capital, carved a sword from wood, changed into plain clothes, and set off for the Heavenly Palace.