Snow Dance, Drifting

Snow Dance, Drifting is a long fantasy novel by the web author Xuewu Yun, serialized for free and completed on platforms such as Jinjiang Literature City. It runs over 1.8 million characters in fifteen volumes, plus an afterword and three side stories: Chronicles of the Snow Dance Era, Records of Snow Dance Characters, and The Winged Angel. The work's central question is posed in a self-query at the opening: "How much power must a person have to possess happiness?" The story is set on a fictional continent called Snow Dance and revolves around the youth Xuewu Yun, who bears a dual personality: the protagonist personality has silvery-white hair and pale purple eyes, while the "Snow Dance Crown Prince" personality, with black hair and black eyes, awakens within him; the two share one soul yet are hostile to each other, repeatedly pushing him toward self-fracture. Around him are the dark goddess Nelisis, pushed by fate to the opposite side; the loyal and stubborn holy sword wielder Lan; and the princess Piaoling, who shares his name and is bound to him, among many others, as personal feeling becomes entangled with the struggles among empires, temples, and demon clans. The narrative begins with the youth's journey in the first volume, Crimson Moon Dancing Feathers, passes through the upheavals and transformations of volumes such as Dim Moon over a Broken Sky and Heavenly Dream Leaf Lan, and closes with Snow Dance Calamity, presenting an ensemble-cast fantasy style heavy with tragedy. It should be noted that this is a web serial with no formal publication record; most circulated copies are fan-edited electronic texts.