Buried alive in a blood coffin by his fellow disciple, he was drained of blood to feed the monster beneath the earth.
Zhang Danzi climbed out of the blood coffin and snapped his senior brother's neck in return.
At death's door, he used his blood as ink to awaken the Ten Thousand Forms Ancient Scroll in his sea of consciousness. From then on, he could recreate the gods and demons depicted in paintings, borrowing the chains of the Underworld and the iron halberd of an ancient general.
But the art of painting had one ironclad rule: each time he borrowed power, one of his fingers would be permanently crippled and turn to withered wood. The greater the power, the faster his fingers withered.
The Ink Sect hunted him, and the Painting Ridge surrounded him. Everyone thought a blood-drained cripple could never stir up trouble. Until, dragging four withered finger bones behind him, he shattered the great formation protecting the ridge with a single swing of his halberd and stood before the age-old dead end of the painting path.
Zhang Danzi bit through the blood in his mouth and said just one thing:
"I only recreate paintings. I won't be a prisoner in one. Whoever stands in my way dies."
