Dao Yin

Dao Yin is an Eastern fantasy epic by the web novelist Sleepy Dragon, following his earlier Xian Shen Jie. Serialization began on December 31, 2012, on Zongheng Chinese Network and is now complete. The story opens with Jiang Xiaofan, an orphan from Earth, swept through a space-time rift to the planet Ziwei, where he lands at the foot of a cliff and, in a daze, encounters Dipankara Buddha sitting in meditation in the mountains. The old monk sees through his origins at a glance and sets this otherwise stranded mortal on the path of cultivation. He subsequently stumbles into the Imperial Gate Sect, is assigned to the desolate and neglected Wuwei Peak, and befriends its master Liu Cheng'an, a man who has lost all his cultivation yet remains unfathomably deep. Aided by a fragment of the Dao Seal obtained by chance, he cultivates the supreme ancient scriptures of both Buddhism and Daoism at once, advancing far faster than his peers. The world centers on the planet Ziwei, unfurling the open and covert struggles among four great powers—the Imperial Gate Sect, the Ziyang Sect, and others—and six ancient clans, with a cultivation hierarchy ascending from Ruwei, Juechen, Huanshen, and Renhuang, and with treasure, pills, and rare materials each graded. Around Jiang Xiaofan gather Ye Yuanxue, Bingxin, Ye Qingrou, and others; under the nickname "Jiang the Ruthless," he beats down every challenger and climbs from an unknown disciple of Wuwei Peak to a position that draws all eyes, later roaming Ziwei in spirit, ranging across the galaxy, and even founding the Heavenly Court against the Nine Heavens, until at last he himself verifies the supreme Dao. The prose is brisk and playful, alternating face-slapping set pieces with hot-blooded leveling—a quintessential high-density power-fantasy.