Mirror (6-Volume Set)

Mirror is a long fantasy series written by Cang Yue around 2005 and a core work in the Yunhuang world setting. The set comprises six volumes: Mirror: The Two Cities, Mirror: The Fallen Army, Mirror: The Dragon War, Mirror: The Shattered Sky, Mirror: The Silent Gods, and the side story Mirror: The Dreamweaver. The story takes place on an ancient continent called Yunhuang: legend holds that within the four seas lies the immortal realm of Yunhuang, watched by sun and moon and recorded by the stars, regarded by countless people as a paradise. As war spreads across the Central Plains, the Miao girl Nasheng makes a long journey to escape the chaos, only to find that war clouds hang heavy here too and lives are as cheap as grass. In Yunhuang she meets, one after another, the blind merfolk puppeteer Soma, the one-handed Zhenlan who claims descent from the royal house of Kongsang, the sword saint Xijing, and the restoration soldier Yanxi, and is drawn into the thousand-year hatred and warfare among Kongsang, Cangliu, and the Sea Kingdom of the merfolk. As the power of the Sea Emperor returns and the Sea-Air Alliance is forged, the old order of Yunhuang begins to collapse, and the conflicts unfold layer by layer around the White Tower of Jialan, the Colorless City, the Abyss of Cangwu, and the Guixu. The series advances through multi-threaded ensemble narration, writing of the survival of nations and also of the passionate or restrained loves between Soma and Baiying, Zhenlan and Baiying, and Yunhuan and Muyan; the tone is desolate, and the ending carries a heavy sense of fate. This edition is a commemorative collector's edition for the fifteenth anniversary of Cang Yue's debut, with all six volumes in one set, suited to readers who wish to read the entire series through in one go.