Manifesting as a Saint in the Mortal World, Starting with Records of Demons and Strange Tales

The immortals and Buddhas no longer descend into the world, and the righteous path of humanity has crumbled. Mountain spirits and wild monsters, demons and specters, river-dwelling fiends, and Lu Ban’s curse-casting arts run rampant. This human world! To the living, it seems more like the Eighteen Levels of Hell, where life and death depend on the whim of demons. Zhang Tian chances upon a divine book called Records of Demon-Hunting and Strange Tales. It reveals the past and present of evil spirits, lets him enlist monsters as servants, and grants him all manner of secret arts. Lu Ban’s curse-casting arts, the spirit-walkers of western Hunan, borrowing luck with ghost skins, summoning souls from the netherworld, water sprites and drought demons, the River God’s Palace, the Nine Gates’ Secret Manual for Dispelling Evil, the Dragon-Seeking Art of the Earth’s Veins... All kinds of folk secrets are recorded within. Carrying a book as he walks the mortal world, he seeks neither immortality nor the Buddha. He uses only the hatchet in his hand to rid the world of every evil spirit. He hides among the common folk, watching the mortal world with a smile. He observes the rise and fall of dynasties, witnesses the partings and reunions of ordinary people, and gathers the strange spirits of mountains and rivers, cultivating immortality amid the mundane world. Folk customs and ghostly arts reveal themselves in the human world. Sages leave their names behind, and in the end, a sage appears among mortals to discuss the Dao and bring peace! [Folk customs and strange tales, lighthearted, spirit-walking and water-haunting, mortals attaining sainthood, business-building, decisive and ruthless.]