Rebirth of the Hundred Generals

Rebirth of the Hundred Generals is a fantasy web novel by Yue Shu, serialized on Qidian from August 1, 2011 to November 21, 2012, totaling roughly 3.5 million characters. The protagonist, Leng Zhuo, is a graduate of a third-rate architecture university who makes a living washing high-rise windows; while working at height he peeks into a resident's home, is struck by lightning, and his soul is dragged into the otherworld continent of Tianfeng, where he possesses the body of a "loser" youth at Holy Heaven Academy—one with a feeble spirit root who cannot even complete the basic spirit-summoning rite. Traveling with him is a register of Chinese generals through the ages, which transforms during the crossing into the spirit-summoning tome known as the Hundred Generals. Tianfeng cultivates by summoning spirit beasts through spirit arrays, yet what Leng Zhuo summons are living historical figures: Zhao Yun the Qingluan Spear God, Li Yuanba the Thunder Hammer Little Tyrant, Bai Qi the Human-Butcher God of Slaughter, Tan Daoji the God of Tactics, Zhou Yu, Qin Liangyu, Yue Fei, Qin Qiong, Yuchi Gong, Gao Shun, Li Guang, and others, each appearing as a "tome card" with a spirit beast of their own—Qingluan, the Thunder Gold Roaring Beast, Kuiba—and a signature divine weapon. The story opens with academy life, then shifts to warlord contention and wars against other races, unfolding around a weapon system of two halberds, twenty-four legendary blades, and thirty-two invincible spears, until Leng Zhuo finally forges an empire through the power of the hundred generals and is hailed as the Han Emperor who holds the Hundred Generals in his hand. The book is one of the earlier representatives of the "summon historical generals" web-novel genre, dense with satisfying beats and inventive in its premise, though it also bears clear marks of early web fiction.