The Devil's Rules

The Devil's Rules is a long Western-fantasy novel by the web novelist Tiaowu. It began serialization on Qidian in December 2007, and in 2009 Taibai Literature and Art Publishing House released a print edition in twelve volumes. The story takes place in the Roland Empire, a world where magic and battle aura coexist: Count Raymond, commander of the imperial navy, returns in triumph, while his eldest son, Duwei Rowling, is mocked throughout the capital as "the idiot of the Rowling family"—silent until age three, refusing to study at six, regarded as a good-for-nothing with no magical talent. In truth, Duwei carries the memories of two lifetimes and coolly examines this world—where divine authority and imperial power wrestle and the gulf between nobles and commoners runs deep—through the knowledge of another world. He trades his soul to a demon for power and opportunity, then awakens the ancient female astrologer Semel in a secret chamber and sets out on a magical path unlike anyone else's. He believes he is the only transmigrator on the continent, until in a message left by the founding emperor a thousand years earlier he sees, written in Chinese characters, "How are you? Surprised?" As the adventure unfolds, the Medusa Queen, a wanted traitor, a genius mage, exiled northern orcs and elves, the snow-mountain tribes, the South Seas islands, and even the faith system of the Goddess of Light gradually gather around this "good-for-nothing." Duwei moves from the Rowling Plains to the imperial capital, the northwest, and the snow mountains, growing through coups, wars, and intrigue into a figure who shapes the continent's balance of power, and ultimately must confront the being called the world's sole sovereign. Told in a blend of absurd humor and political maneuvering, mixing Eastern and Western fantasy elements, the book is one of the early representative long works of Chinese web fantasy.