Chronicles of Changing Fate: Avoiding My Final Trial at the Taoist Temple

In the winter of 2002, Master Liu cast the first divination of my life.

The six lines fell into place, revealing “Water over Mountain: Obstruction,” changing into “Earth over Fire: Brilliance Injured,” an omen of great misfortune. Master Liu worked through the details on his fingers, his expression grave. “Your chart is parched and fierce with Fire and Earth. This year, Guiwei, clashes with your chart in a Zi-Wu clash and a Chou-Wei-Xu triple punishment. You face a calamity that could cost you your life. If you want to live, you must come into the mountains with me...”

My name is Deng Xiaobao. I'm from Ankang, Shaanxi, and my birth element is Gold of the Sword's Edge. I ran with the underworld crowd in Dongguan, drinking in bars, selling things on the street, and taking secret routes. I committed more than my share of sins... Burdened by guilt and fear, I followed Master Liu into seclusion at Chongxu Temple on Mount Luofu, beginning my life of cultivation in the mountains.

This is a true account of changing my fate, told down to the pores of my skin.

It begins with sweeping floors and kneeling before incense, then moves on to learning scriptures, talismans, and ritual rites; from standing meditation and training to regulate my destiny, to facing the “Peach Blossom Calamity” over seven days and seven nights, confronting every sin I had committed. My destiny had been judged to be “nearing its end,” yet step by step, I transformed a chart parched and fierce with Fire and Earth into one where Water and Fire were in balance. There is no fantasy here, only the very real daily practice of cultivation.

Written entirely in the first person, the book also recounts the teachings and guidance of three masters: Master Liu, Daoist Qingxu, and Daoist Yunhe. It includes dozens of vivid stories about Daoism and methods of cultivation, from Four Pillars destiny analysis and the Orthodox Rhyme of Quanzhen, to the principles of talismanic arts, secret ritual practices, and the protective arts of the Longmen School...

This is not a novel about supernatural powers. It is the true story of how an ordinary person, facing life and death, changed the course of his fate through retreating from the world and transforming his character.

The mountain is still the same mountain, and the moon is still the same moon. But when I walked out through the mountain gate two years later, I was no longer the man who had fled in panic.