Chapter One: The Battlefield of Asura

Shattered snow mingled with a hellscape of chaos and war.

From a pile of corpses, a hand emerged. Du Huaishan summoned all his strength to shove aside the body weighing down his head. Snowflakes, like grains of sand, landed on his face smeared with pus and brain matter, then melted into bloody water that trickled down his cheek, dripped from his chin, and stained a corpse’s yellowed incisor.

Suppressing his ragged breaths, he resembled a wounded lone wolf, his gaze awash with a blur of crimson.

Corpses.

Everywhere, corpses.

Flags lay toppled. Arrows and blades were shattered. Severed limbs and broken arms littered the field. Horses collapsed in pools of blood. Black smoke rose from the hills. The overturned wheels of troop transports still spun. Gray, oppressive clouds hung overhead—a true field of carnage.

A chill crept down Du Huaishan’s spine; his muddy pupils contracted to sharp points.

He had once been a senior majoring in martial arts at Jiangcheng Sports University, competing in a professional fighting club. The match was intense when suddenly, his mind reeled, a flash of red light appeared, and in the next instant, he found himself here.

A hallucination? A prank? Kidnapping? Or transmigration?

He swiftly flipped his palm, touched his face—astonished to find it much smaller, like a youth of fifteen or sixteen. This was not his body. He pinched himself hard—pain! It was real.

He had truly crossed into another world?!

He could hardly believe it.

The usual flood of memories from novels and anime did not follow; he didn’t even know his new host’s name.

Fortunately, Du Huaishan had loved martial arts since childhood; he was courageous and now, his mind quickly steadied. Whatever had happened, survival came first!

After confirming there was no immediate danger, he gritted his teeth and pushed away several corpses lying atop him.

Though he’d prepared himself, the shock of a real battlefield was beyond imagination. Severed heads tumbled in the corners, mangled limbs and viscera tangled together—a hand plunged down would make a sickening squelch, strings of viscous fluid stretching between fingers, the stench so vile his stomach heaved.

After vomiting several times, Du Huaishan began searching for intact weapons for self-defense and kept alert for any useful clues.

The bodies fell into two main groups.

One kind, like him, wore short civilian tunics. The others were soldiers in khaki uniforms. Some wore cloth armor studded with metal rivets, bright military sabers thrust into the ground, blades swaying in the bitter wind. Old Mauser rifles, reminiscent of Han Yang types, were clutched tightly in dead hands.

The era these details evoked:

The Republic of China.

But the tattered red flags bore no familiar insignia—rather, a dragon and a tiger encircled a golden, sculpted shield.

In the Republic era, firearms were highly developed, yet here, cold weapons outnumbered guns. Cloth armor, too. Rifled barrels and Minie balls had long since rendered armor obsolete, phased out in the late Qing; why did it appear here?

Stranger still, every corpse had died from slashing or tearing wounds. Bullets and explosives could never make such clean cuts. Cavalry could hack off limbs, but to slice through horses as well? Absurd.

Comparatively, the armored dead were the most intact.

In an age supposedly dominated by firearms, cold weapons prevailed…

A sense of foreboding gnawed at Du Huaishan.

The same laws of physics, the same environment, the same people did not necessarily mean this was Earth as he knew it.

Therefore—

Besides the Mauser rifle, he scavenged a decent set of armor, enduring the stench to strip it off, grabbed a military saber, and quickly hid behind a tree to inspect his finds.

The cloth armor was lined with iron plates at vital points, fixed with brass studs. Though it looked fragile, it was surprisingly heavy; just the breastplate and helmet weighed seventeen or eighteen pounds.

Luckily, the body’s original owner was not weak. After donning the armor, Du Huaishan did not feel overly burdened. The thick cotton padding distributed the weight so evenly, it felt lighter than the school backpack he used to carry.

The saber resembled the Type 65 cavalry sword—almost a meter long, three pounds, gently curved, with a single edge, reinforced blood grooves, a steel guard, the handle wrapped in coarse cloth for grip, and a black wooden scabbard.

Never underestimate a three-pound weapon.

Swinging one-handed, all that weight pressed upon the wrist and forearm; ordinary people, untrained in proper technique, would feel burning fatigue after a dozen swings.

Ancient weapons said to weigh dozens of pounds were either measured differently or used from horseback, not meant for constant slashing.

Du Huaishan had majored in Sanda and Chinese wrestling, but his curriculum required traditional martial arts and weapon routines, so he was well-versed in cold arms.

He spun the saber a few times.

The balance was forward-heavy—good for chopping, harder to control, and his wrist immediately felt the strain.

He remembered countless routines for swords, sabers, spears, and staves, but having transmigrated, his new body was unfamiliar; his strength, speed, reaction—none matched his memory, and there was no muscle memory. Every move felt a beat too slow.

Still, a beat too slow was better than knowing nothing.

The Mauser rifle had four rounds left in the magazine and a sound barrel. After fiddling for a moment, he figured out the bolt action.

Boys are born with a knack for such things, and he had even fired a QBZ-95 during freshman military training.

Preparations complete.

Du Huaishan took a deep breath, scanned his surroundings, and finally chose to follow the direction of the wagon tracks.

He had no memories of this world, but as a modern youth, raised in the May Fourth spirit, with sixteen years of education and countless books and films under his belt, he could still analyze the situation.

Just like the line from the movie “Sheep Without a Shepherd”: “If you’ve watched over a thousand movies, there’s nothing in this world that can truly surprise you.”

Frequent viewings of “Detective Conan” sharpened his logic.

A love for wilderness survival novels honed his crisis awareness and survival skills.

Du Huaishan may not have been an expert in everything, but he knew a little about many things.

From the pattern of scattered body parts and overturned vehicles, it was clear the group had been ambushed from behind while fleeing. The direction the convoy had originally been headed likely led toward people or a town—greater safety.

He left the mountain of corpses behind.

The air grew less rank, his nausea eased slightly, but he remained vigilant, gripping his loaded Mauser, back hunched, senses tuned like radar for any movement.

The snow still fell. The forest thickened.

Yellow-green weeds and shrubs were dusted with a thin layer of frost.

A bitter wind cut through, making Du Huaishan’s ears twitch. He heard the sounds of fighting!

Up ahead to the right!

He hesitated, but moved toward the noise. If luck favored him, he might find rescue—or at least gain some valuable intelligence.

He trod as lightly as possible.

This was not his old world—death could come at any moment; he had to be careful, especially since he was approaching the heart of danger.

Dozens of steps later, before he spotted the source, the smell of blood returned.

The fighting had stopped.

A sense of dread overtook him. He crouched low, using thick undergrowth for cover, crept toward a clearing, and found a tree trunk for concealment. Peeking out, he saw:

The wild grass was a chaotic mess—shattered shrubs, blood and flesh splattered everywhere. A soldier in a khaki uniform hung from a tree, a branch piercing his chest, his lower body severed, white intestines dangling and draping the ground.

But in the next instant, what he saw nearly stopped his heart.

A beast, black and rotten, loomed over another fallen soldier, gnawing at him. It was larger than a heavy Shire horse. The corpse beneath it was as helpless as a chick in a raptor’s claws, bones crunching beneath its jaws.

Suddenly, the monster halted its meal, jerked up its head. Four scythe-like horns twisted from an infernal face. A gleaming military saber pierced its skull through the left eye socket. Most of its face had been flayed, bare white bone exposed. Ragged flesh still hung from its fangs.

As though it possessed x-ray vision, in a single instant, it fixed on Du Huaishan behind the tree, then stood, swaying. It had cloven hooves and limbs, a human torso, the four-horned head of a goat.

Its brutal musculature was crisscrossed with wounds. Its belly was ripped open; its left foreleg and arm were severed; only three clawed fingers remained on its right hand, nails sharp as scalpels, glinting coldly.

Du Huaishan felt as if plunged into an ice cellar, a violent shudder running through him.

It was the blood—he’d forgotten he’d just crawled out of a heap of corpses, reeking of blood.

He twisted his thigh hard. For all his courage, he’d never seen anything like this.

Was this a centaur? A satyr? Or some sort of hellish hybrid?

Terror peaked, and the pain from his pinch merged into a frenzy of desperate rage—he wanted to live!

Three years of training and a year of real combat experience kicked in. Du Huaishan seized the moment, leveled the Mauser, and fired without hesitation!

Bang!

The powder exploded in his ears. Even through his heavy armor, the recoil slammed his shoulder, but the monster was so large, and the distance so short, the first shot struck home.

The bullet bored into its rotting black belly, a spray of flesh and blood—but the creature merely staggered two steps, grinned grotesquely, and, as muscle knit, spat the deformed bullet out onto the corpse at its feet.

What—?

No time to think. With a metallic ring, the saber left its scabbard.

Du Huaishan switched from hot to cold weapons in a heartbeat. The beast lunged, three hooves pounding the earth with shocking speed.

The gap between them vanished.

He planted his feet, gripped the saber in both hands, raised his arms, blade tip lowered, the back of the blade skimming down his left shoulder and back.

The basic saber technique:

Head-wrapping cut!

The monster’s claw slashed down—clang!—sparks flying as it hammered the blade, the force crashing through armor into Du Huaishan’s shoulder and throwing him off balance, his follow-up cut turning into a wild, useless swing.

Damn!

He cursed. The monster’s strength was monstrous, and his new body was weaker than his own!

Was he really going to die here?

If he hit the ground, the beast’s speed and power meant a single swipe would maim or kill him.

Above him, the half-corpse’s intestines swayed from the branches, as if mocking his fate.

But before he hit the ground, there was a commotion behind him. He glanced back—the creature, unable to halt, crashed clumsily and wedged itself into the branches.

Missing a limb and a leg, its agility was greatly reduced!

A surge of survival instinct overwhelmed him. Like a mad dog, Du Huaishan rolled to his feet, pivoted, dropped into a low left bow stance, both hands gripping the saber. He swung from his right hip, eyes fixed on the blade’s tip, and drove it into the monster’s rising back with all his might: “Ahhh!”

Bow-step thrust!

With a near-hysterical roar, all his fear, desperation, and fury poured into that attack. Like a tiger pouncing, his blade pierced straight to the monster’s heart.

It felt as if he’d stabbed a toothpick through a radish, the blade driving deep into the heart.

Boom!

A torrent of searing red light burst from the monster’s heart, flooding over Du Huaishan’s wild eyes. Like maggots, the black blood surged into his body through every crevice.

Clang.

The saber dropped into the grass.

Agony blazed in his skull. A thousand wailing voices roared in his ears, stabbing his eardrums. Veins bulged on his forehead. With a sickening crack, two horns—wreathed in black mist and red light—burst through his brow.

His skin darkened, bones and muscles swelled like a tiger’s, strength exploded within him, nails sprouted like surgical blades, splitting flesh as they hardened and lengthened!

The noise in his ears grew to a crescendo, torturing his soul. The agony of tearing muscles gnawed at him like a thousand ants. Brutality, bloodlust, savagery—every negative impulse threatened to engulf him.

“Ah… urgh…”

He collapsed to his knees, clutching his ears and screaming, clinging to the last threads of willpower honed through years of combat training.

I cannot die. I have to live!

Suddenly, the dizziness he’d felt when transmigrating returned.

The world shattered like glass before his eyes, awash in crimson light. A golden sun hung high, the north wind howled, black mountain ranges loomed like ancient dragons.

Atop the peaks, skulls piled like ridges, bones like forests, hair matted into felt, flesh rotted to dust. A towering giant sat upon a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood—dozens of yards tall, with a bear’s waist and a tiger’s back, nine misty tails drifting eastward!