The Dark River, capable of assassinating royalty and nobility in the court and wiping out powerful sects in the wild, is the most feared organization of assassins in the martial world. However, the Patriarch, the leader of the Dark River, is aging and gradually losing control over the organization. During a mission to kill the Second Master of the Tang Clan, the Patriarch is severely injured. Several faction leaders within the Dark River send out assassins, attempting to kill the Patriarch, while the Patriarch seeks out physicians to prolong his life. This race against time, concerning life and death and the future of the assassin organization, begins. Fate brings two young men, who crawled out... more>> of the piles of corpses and share a deep bond, to stand on opposite sides...

This is also a prequel novel but is set after Shao Nian Bai Ma, approximately 8 years before the start of Shao Nian Ge Xing. <<less

In the Shili Langdang Mountains, there was an academy governed by the Confucian Sage, under whom were nine gentlemen and three hundred scholars. It was a place that epitomized literary aura. All disciples of the academy, once appointed a gentleman, will cry out “one sentence” to become their life’s maxim and will forever strive towards this maxim. This maxim became known as “Jun You Yun” (A Gentleman Says). Su Baiyi, Feng Zuojun, and Xie Yuling were disciples of the Academy, all working hard to one day become a gentleman…... more>>

(Note: the story in this novel is not connected to the Shao Nian series but is set in the same universe a few hundred years before Shao Nian.) <<less