The Verdant Gate

The Verdant Gate is a long classical xianxia novel by the web author White Wind, first serialized on Zongheng Chinese and completed in 2012. Taking as its epigraph "The mystery of mysteries, the gate of all wonders; the Great Dao is ruthless, transforming the self into the Dao," it tells of a gifted young cultivator noticed by the Verdant Gate and drawn onto the path of immortality, passing through aquatic clan conflicts, apprenticeship, sect upheaval, secret-realm trials, and wars across worlds, his cultivation rising level by level until he confronts the struggle between the "ruthless Heavenly Dao" and "joining the Dao through feeling." The work is structured in six volumes: Volume One, "The Carp Transforms into a Human Body," begins with an opportunity by the shores of Dongting Lake and lays the foundations of cultivation such as the Nine Transformations Dragon Art; Volume Two, "Sword-Flight Winds and Clouds," uses the Sword-Flight Sect, the Sword Tomb, and the Autumn Water Sword to unfold open and hidden strife within and beyond the sect; Volume Three, "Myriad Worlds of the Heavens," expands the stage to the Langya Wonderland, the Eastern Emperor Bell, and vaster heavens and earth, as the protagonist begins cultivation across realms; Volume Four, "The Decayed Immortal World," turns to an examination of the order of the immortal world itself, involving core elements such as the Map of Mountains and Rivers; Volume Five, "Reincarnation," treats the true meaning of reincarnation and the road to sagehood; and Volume Six, "Pangu," raises the perspective to the ultimate questions of the opening of heaven and earth. With an elaborate system of worldbuilding and a great many chapters, it is a typical traditional classical xianxia epic, its main thread always the cultivator's choices among affection, karma, and the Great Dao, and its ending resting on the idea of "transforming the self into the Dao."