Rising to Immortality

Rising to Immortality is a long classical xianxia novel by the web author Douzi Rede Huo. It was serialized on Qidian Chinese Network from January 11, 2013, to April 14, 2015, totaling about 4.91 million characters in 1,484 chapters. The opening premise is an omen: before the ninth day the sun set and never rose again; by the tenth day, a youth named Su Jing had made his name known far and wide. Su Jing was originally a petty constable at the county office in Baima Town in the Central Plains, whose family ran Su's Cooked Food Shop, and his days were full of trivial, earthy town life. By chance he meets a dying master, Lu Ya Jiu. Lu Ya Jiu is one of the Nine Ancestors of Lishan and is paired with his twin brother Lu Jiao Ba; for reasons of fate he takes a disciple on his brother's behalf, passing on to Su Jing a cultivation method outsiders regard as "heretical," and entrusting him with the hope of reincarnation as well. Su Jing thus steps onto the path of cultivation and, because of his generational rank, becomes the young junior uncle of the Lishan sect. The so-called "heretical" method does not bind people; it cultivates the method and follows the heart. Su Jing believes in immediate retribution, is good at scheming against others and equally good at keeping his word, and breaks through obstacles with streetwise cleverness and an unyielding shred of goodness. He practices the "Three This and Three That Formula" and obtains three corpse avatars—the Red-Eyed Perfected One, the Flower-Plucking Divine Lord, and the Thunder-Moving Heavenly Worthy—presiding respectively over lust, food, and desire. He takes the sly, clever squirrel spirit Liu Liang as his demon servant and travels with companions such as the Black Wind Wraith, the Paired-Wing Twin Crows, and his disciple Shen Lianzi. The book builds its cultivation world on self-created realm systems such as the "Three Stages and Twelve Scenes" and the "Four Grades and Twelve Spirit Ranks." Its style is humorous, yet it often writes true feeling and responsibility amid the laughter, creating a vivid ensemble portrait of the Lishan sect. The story begins with a day in Baima Town and gradually unfolds into a vast scroll of humans, demons, immortals, and the Heavenly Dao.