Master of Talismans

拂衣Qidian2024

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Word count: 1.3M words

Summary

A Xuanmen cultivator is surrounded and killed by witchcraft in the northern wilderness; her soul returns through the body of He Lingjiang, seventh daughter of the He family of Linchuan, only to find the body's throat cut and unable to bear sunlight, so she must stitch and mend new skin with needle and thread. Using talisman arts, she navigates among a kind mother, sick father, uncles, aunts, and siblings, exposing the inner-household plot in which the second son schemes against the legitimate eldest son; she then travels far to Nanzhao to break a ghost king's seal, enters the capital Yingdu to head the Buyuan Bureau, and is sent by imperial order to marry into the Western Tibetan tribes—supporting family and country through her mystic arts.

Editor's review

Suited to readers who favor ancient settings, Xuanmen arts, and clan intrigue. The opening body-possession setup is eerie and gripping; the heroine is calm and decisive, breaking situations with talismans and thread, and household scheming intertwines with the supernatural as the scope widens from the inner household to the nation. The weakness is a dense cast and slow start, plus many mystic-art terms; plot sometimes advances through laid-out schemes, so readers wanting fast power fantasy may find the early stretch heavy.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who like ancient supernatural and Xuanmen art settings
Readers who prefer strong, calm, strategically-minded heroines
Classical alternate-history fans who accept slow burn and political scheming

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking light romance or mindless wish-fulfillment
Readers intolerant of eerie descriptions and dense character relationships

Reading tips

Read the prologue and Volume One, Linchuan Moon, first to sort out the He household relationships before continuing
Jot down mystic-art terms as you go to follow later talisman and formation setups
After the household arc, watch for foreshadowing around the bronze talisman and Chikuo, which threads through the whole book

About the publisher

Qidian

Qidian is a platform whose catalogue brings together online literature, with about 45,000 titles in the library spanning categories such as male-oriented fiction, Eastern fantasy, xianxia and wuxia, science fiction, selected fiction and quality web novels. Representative titles include Reincarnation Paradise, War Soldier Leon, The Fairy Is Fierce (also known as Tai Mang), The Expert Is Right Beside Me, Dragon Herder, You Should Cross the Mountains Like a Hero, The Adventures of a Clever Girl and Summoning Heroes of All Ages in Another World, with themes extending from fantasy and xianxia to science fiction and adventure. Representative authors available in the library include Na Yi Zhi Wen Zi, Chi Gua Zi Qun Zhong, Guan Guan Gong Zi, Chenxing LL, Luan, Chen Mo De Ai, Piao Yi Dao Zhang and Dong Tian Bu Leng. Their works mostly appear as serialized web fiction aimed at readers who prefer long genre fiction. Public information on its founding background and scale is limited, so no inferences are made here; the description is based solely on the library's titles and categories.

FAQ

Is this a sweet romance?

No; it is a serious story with a strong heroine, focused on mystic arts, intrigue, and the nation, with romance not the focus.

Should it be read volume by volume?

Yes, characters and foreshadowing build layer by layer; skipping volumes makes clues hard to follow.

What is the heroine's identity?

A Xuanmen cultivator who returns through He Qiniang's body; she knows the five arts, especially fate calculation and talismans.

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About the author

拂衣 Author

Publicly available information about Fuyi is currently limited. It is known that Fuyi writes in the field of science fiction, with one work included in the library, titled Offering Flowers to the God of Dawn. Judging from the title and its science fiction classification, the work carries a strong sense of imagery: the pairing of "dawn" with "offering flowers" suggests that the writing may lean toward a symbolic and lyrical approach to futuristic themes, blending poetic and emotional coloring into speculative settings. Because basic details such as the author's nationality, dates of birth and death, English name, and writing career are not found in the available materials, it is difficult to assess the overall trajectory and full range of Fuyi's style, or to determine where this work stands in the author's career. On the present evidence, Fuyi is a science fiction writer with a small body of work whose profile remains to be further revealed, and Offering Flowers to the God of Dawn may serve as a starting point for understanding the author's thematic interests and literary sensibility; more works and materials will be needed for confirmation.