Keeper of Silence

The City of Silence is not a medieval castle, nor is it a planet in the distant future. It is the city we live in - there are morning markets, factories, hospitals, old streets and alleys, clock repair shops, and old men playing chess under a locust tree. There are no fancy spell duels in this book. The ability of the four villains is spiritual erosion - they cannot directly kill people, but they can make a person's life emptyer than death. The protagonist Lin Xu's ability is not to "get stronger", but to "see" - he can see things that others cannot. But seeing itself is not power. Seeing is sometimes a curse. Because when you see the truth, you can no longer pretend you didn't see it. You become the only sober person on the street, and sobriety itself is a kind of loneliness.