Ding Songyan

Biodata

Power Progression

Ding’s temporarily bestowed strength and his independently reconstructed cultivation develop separately. His public realm is also deliberately understated 62 165 180.

Background / History

Transmigration and the storyteller’s identity

In his previous life, Ding Songyan was stabbed while trying to break up an argument at a street-food stall. He awakens unharmed in a ruined temple, wearing unfamiliar traditional clothing and retaining memories of his former world, but none of the life belonging to his new body. The girl calling herself Ding Qingyan identifies him as her brother—and gives him the same name he had before 1.

The apparent Ding household supplies his missing history: the family supposedly moved to Dingjiang Prefecture six months earlier, and he worked as a storyteller outside Dangkang Temple. His unexplained disappearance, missing money, and discovery near Potter’s Field make him suspect that someone tried to kill the body’s previous owner 3.

He adapts The Legend of the White Snake from his old world into an improvised serial performance. Cliffhangers, songs, and rewritten episodes win a growing audience and introduce him to Xiaoqing, who offers help with his predicament. He also studies local history, discovering familiar myths and dynasties whose details differ substantially from his memories 8 13 14 25.

The Zhen Estate conspiracy

His storytelling brings him into the Zhen Estate’s secret dungeon, where the imprisoned Yan Changqing exposes his connection to the Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas. Yan forces qi into his consciousness and attempts to recruit him for an escape, offering protection and cultivation knowledge. Ding suspects manipulation but cooperates cautiously while approaching the authorities and other potential allies 21 26 28 32.

Supernatural sight gradually reveals that his household is not what it appears to be. He sees his supposed father’s moth-like form, questions Ding Daniu’s allegedly innate strength, and realizes that hidden influences have suppressed his discoveries. Zheng Zhuxi notices restrictions on his speech and lends him sword intent to resist coercion 42 44 45.

At the estate, “Ding Qingyan” is revealed as Ji Hanyi, Yan’s former disciple and the Nine-Evil Witch. She has used a heavenly heart imprint to influence Ding’s thoughts and obscure his memories. Yan temporarily suppresses it and directs Ding to attack her, triggering a clash that tears apart the dungeon building 51.

Ding survives the crisis and kills Yan. He openly questions Yan’s ghost with Tao Wenshu and Su Qingli present rather than carrying the danger of the secret alone. The exposure of his staged family leaves him returning to an empty courtyard, where visits from Xu Chang’an and Zheng help ease his sense of abandonment 57 59.

Joining the Xiaoming Sect

Ding obtains a small fragment of the Hundun Remains, hides it in the Netherworld to keep it from Ji, and consumes it to gain temporary Law Realm perfection. He becomes Tao Wenshu’s personal disciple and later discloses the transformation to her 62 65 66.

Tao explains the Xiaoming Sect’s damaged inheritance and entrusts him with helping restore its scriptures. His ability to accommodate different arts allows him to cultivate both core scriptures, while the sect keeps his actual strength secret. He begins developing his own foundational methods and improving inherited sword techniques 67 68.

Martial research and travel

Ding’s work expands from personal experimentation into practical instruction for Xu Chang’an, Yang Shiduo, and Zheng Zhuxi. He develops aperture-creation methods, shares martial principles, and contributes to a more diligent training atmosphere among the sect’s disciples 80 87 91.

He joins Zheng, Xie Fengchao, Xing Chang, and Pan Yunzhou in recovering Dangkang Temple’s stolen treasure. During the confrontation with the Three Fiends of Xiao City, he discreetly creates openings, treats Zheng’s plague poisoning, and carries her through the mountains while directing her sword strikes with star-name signals 107 108 110.

His later investigations into the original storyteller’s fate uncover another threat to the body’s identity. A remnant soul associated with Ge Qi and the Martial Grandmaster Jiang admits attempting to possess the storyteller, then contradicts itself about whether the attempt succeeded. Ding suspects his transmigration disrupted the possession, but the soul dissolves before he can verify the explanation 149 152.

Stabilization and the loss of his master

Ding tests inherited cultivation methods on himself, corrects the Xiaoming scriptures, and develops safer branch arts for others. His revisions also help restore missing Organ Dressing methods in Pan Yunzhou’s Great Canon of the Stars 136 145 156.

After completing his personal Dayan foundation, he formally stabilizes his Law Realm cultivation. The Hundun Scripture, however, requires 128,304 void apertures—making the completion of his own path an unusually demanding project even with his bestowed perception 165.

Following Tao Wenshu’s death, Ding investigates Bai Zhaolin and the Accumulated Evil Path, coordinates a cover account with Wang Zhou, and becomes more determined to obtain foresight and stronger healing arts. His scriptural revisions begin loosening the stagnant cultivation of the sect’s remaining Martial Grandmasters 171 172 173.

Flame Capital

Ding travels to Flame Capital with Wang Zhou to help monitor the Jade Orchid Grace Examination and the forthcoming Consort Selection for demon-seed infiltration. At Prince Kang’s Residence, he serves publicly as a gifted young disciple at perfected Dayan while concealing his real strength 179 180.

Using his Golden Boy disguise, he breaks Ou Luwen’s illusory challenge realm and negotiates relief for Lay Buddhist Little Zhang. Alongside his guard duties, he investigates yin-evil disturbances, burial artifacts, and the Silver Hook Gambling House 192 193 199 206.

His pursuit of Sun Feiyang requires a new stealth art, disguises, intelligence from Twelfth Madam Luo and Shi Wuyan, and a temporary reduction of his apparent cultivation. During the confrontation, he releases that disguise and combines dream manipulation, sword intents, Hundun traits, and Heavenly Mind deception against the Accumulated Evil Path expert 211 212 214.

Appearance

His original appearance is that of a fair-faced young scholar with regular features and an open, pleasant bearing, rather than exceptional handsomeness 3.

• Early clothing: Moon-white scholar’s robe, with his hair tied using blue cloth and no cap or headwrap 3.
• Martial clothing: Black attire made from thick cotton cloth during patrol duty 94.
• Hundun transformation: Extra legs, gorgeous wings, yellowish skin, and altered facial features. He can hide the additional limbs and wings in the void and restore his familiar appearance through concealment and transformation 62.
• Double pupils: Conceals their unusual appearance when protecting his identity 147.
• Golden Boy disguise: Uses a purchased mask for activities he does not want linked to his public identity 192 193 212.

Personality

Ding is cautious, analytical, and resistant to easy promises. He recognizes the pattern of frightening someone before offering a reward as a familiar scam, tests supernatural explanations rather than accepting them, and distinguishes evidence from theories he cannot yet verify 26 28 34.

His business experience has made him skilled at cultivating relationships and managing impressions. He uses storytelling, compliments, selective disclosure, and carefully chosen public appearances to obtain protection, but increasingly prefers transparent arrangements when interests can genuinely align 8 25 45 160.

He is generous without being indifferent to money. He gives Xu an immensely valuable manual before learning its price, funds hot soup for relay-station staff, and offers Yang an interest-free loan. His private reactions to unexpected costs and missing villainous fortunes remain conspicuously comic 66 147 149 176.

His attachment to others outlasts his suspicion of them. The revelation about Ji leaves him uncertain whether their sibling affection was genuine; meanwhile, his care for Zheng drives him to spend lifespan testing cultivation methods before she uses them. He also sets limits on using dream-entry to acquire knowledge, reserving it for sparring except against evil practitioners 57 136 206.

Abilities & Skills

Hundun Traits and Martial Derivation

Hundun’s transformation lets Ding accommodate different cultivation systems and investigate them through his own body 62 67.

• Deriving Dao and De: Reproduces other arts’ qi, apertures, organs, and abilities, allowing direct comparison and experimentation 62 69 136 156.
• Return All Things to One: Supports dismantling and recombining martial systems; also dissolves illusory evil deeds in combat 148 214.
• Establishing the Six Harmonies: Becomes the basis for spatially deceptive sword techniques and briefly restrains Sun Feiyang’s invisible wings 147 214.
• Dividing the Four Seasons: Underlies his Winter–Summer Sword Intent and fast-and-slow sword techniques 74 145 214.
• Demon-Subduing and Evil-Repelling: Suppresses evil spiritual influences, but can destroy remnant souls before questioning is complete 148 212.
• Mental protection: Chaos in his Sea of Consciousness conceals his thoughts from mind-reading and soul-searching, except against sufficiently powerful opponents 62.

Heavenly Heart and Heavenly Mind

Ding deliberately retains Yan’s heavenly heart imprint after Tao removes Ji’s, finding it too useful to discard 83.

• Channels his own true qi through the remnant to reproduce perception, protection, movement, transformation, and Yin Eye functions without consuming it 62.
• Uses the Heavenly Mind Formula to make reproduced cultivation states bodily instincts; the process consumes vital essence and lifespan 69 72.
• Perceives the qi structure beneath Ou Luwen’s illusion without relying on Candle Eyes and Star Pupils 192.
• Uses a heavenly mind state to impersonate a Great Grandmaster and provoke Sun Feiyang’s fear 214.

Yin Eye and Netherworld Interaction

His initially intermittent spirit sight becomes a means of seeing, touching, and investigating the Netherworld 21 35.

• Sees ghosts, Obsidian Pillars, and the Netherworld landscape 35 116.
• Can touch Netherworld objects and ghosts when his Yin Eye is open and the seed is directed into his palm 35.
• Transfers physical objects across the boundary; an experimental copper coin returns corroded, green, and unnaturally cold 35.
• Hides the Hundun fragment in the Netherworld to keep Ji from taking it 66.
• Questions lingering souls for information, including those of Yan Changqing, Tang Du, and the imprisoned Two-Faced youth 57 148 171.
• Early experiments are exhausting, and some traces disappear before he can investigate them 35 87.

Candle Eyes and Star Pupils

This Xiaoming perception technique exposes concealed supernatural traits and becomes an important countermeasure against the Two-Faced Clan 111 179.

• Examines people for hidden faces and abnormalities 163 180.
• Confirms that Yi Qincang is not a member of the Two-Faced Clan 120.
• Assists searches for supernatural clues, though examining Wangtianmen Island yields no answer by itself 116.
• Reaches perfection before his departure for Flame Capital 179.

Swordsmanship

Ding combines Xiaoming sword arts with observation, illusion, and original martial theory 68 87 179.

• Dawnbreak: Improves introductory forms through precise coordination of the eyes, shoulder, arm, and wrist, turning prescribed feints into real attacks without advanced cultivation 68.
• Seven Night-Illuminating Swords: Reaches minor completion; associated techniques include Candlelight Like a Star and Passing the Torch 72 93 148.
• Candlelight Sword Intent: Affects intent and spirit rather than killing directly; counters evil thoughts and the eight winds 93 214.
• Cosmic Star-Dipper Swordsmanship: Reaches minor completion and remains a major focus of his training 142 176.
• Dream Sword: Plants mental weaknesses and prepared deceptions; Great Dream Sword Intent can be placed inside a decoy treasure 147 214.
• Six Harmonies as One: Traps an escaping opponent in sword-light illusions, though it is still imperfect when used against Tang Du 147.
• Dao One Sword: An initial single-thrust technique intended to distill and counter many martial arts 179.
• Tactical observation: Defeats Xie Fengchao in a restricted spar by reading shoulder movements and gaze, without relying on his hidden Hundun realm 96.

Healing and Compatible True Qi

His being-and-nonbeing myriad forms qi can harmonize with another cultivator’s qi 107.

• Absorbs disease and plague toxins from Zheng Zhuxi after her fight with Lu Guangqing 107.
• Preserves her ability to fight during their escape, although she remains feverish and weakened 108.
• Does not satisfy his later desire for an art capable of saving someone on the brink of death 171.

Dream Manipulation and Thought-Reading

Ding learns separate arts for entering dreams and hearing nearby thoughts 113 164.

• Three Thousand Years of Great Dreaming: Reproduces its pre–Law Realm sections and uses dream scenarios to awaken memories or obtain information 113 152 211.
• Mirror Lake Divine Mirror: Forms a frozen lake in his Sea of Consciousness that reflects nearby thoughts within ten feet and five inches 164.
• Stops using the mirror after realizing he has heard Zheng’s private thoughts, then explains the ability to her 164.
• Treats dream-entry as an ethical problem as well as a useful investigative tool 206.

Concealment and Movement

Ding layers bodily transformation, conventional disguises, movement arts, and specialized stealth to protect his true identity 62 149 211.

• Bi Moon Illusory Form: Emphasizes speed, illusions, and long-distance travel 96 149.
• Southern Dipper Calamity-Transcending Steps: Suited to close-range dodging and maneuvering alongside the sect’s swordsmanship 87 96.
• Sharing a Shadow Beyond the World: Merges him with plants and wooden structures; exceptional perception or specialized techniques can still detect him 211.
• Uses other concealment methods where no suitable plant-based objects are available 211.
• Requires Twelfth Madam Luo’s assistance to alter his “name and reality” and temporarily reduce the reach of his anti-evil trait during infiltration 199 211.

Storytelling and Other Arts

His storytelling draws on previous-life memories, improvisation, and deliberate audience management 8 13 25.

• Adapts The Legend of the White Snake with new adventures, songs, and cliffhangers 8 14 25.
• Uses transformed incidents from his own youth to give Xu Shilin greater depth 25.
• Refines his calligraphy enough to copy five versions of the story in one night 65.
• Practices sword movements inspired by cursive calligraphy and plays the bamboo flute 193.

Created Cultivation Methods

Equipment / Weapons / Items

• Cold Shadow Sword — Tao’s reward, forged from Kunwu Copper, Dragonhead Iron, northern dark ice essence, and Dingjiang Forged Steel. Cuts through iron and chills its target, complementing his Winter attribute 74.
• Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas — Uses its descriptions to identify mythical-beast traits and interpret cultivation systems. Yan’s handwritten copy connects the book to Kunlun and the Celestial Emperor’s Palace 42 51 65.
• Golden Boy and Jade Maiden Masks — Keeps both masks; uses Golden Boy to separate covert activities from his public identity 192 193.
• Dream-Waking Block decoy — Embeds Great Dream Sword Intent in the plain-looking block to lure and disrupt would-be thieves 147.
• Three-courtyard residence — Receives its deed through Tao and asks Xu Chang’an to manage it during his absence 66.
• Mystic Art of Ten Bodies and Hundred Hands — Receives the manual formerly belonging to Xu’s late master, then gives it to Xu; Zheng values it at at least 10,000 taels 66.
• Longevity medicines — Chooses an Herbal Longevity Pill after the Three Fiends affair and later receives a Life-Prolonging Pill for exposing the Silver Hook Gambling House 111 206.

Relationships

• Tao Wenshu — Master and mentor. Supports his reconstruction, entrusts him with restoring the Xiaoming Sect’s inheritance, and resists the temptation posed by his Hundun secret. Her death strengthens his resolve to seek better protective arts 67 171 172.
• Zheng Zhuxi — Senior sister, training partner, research collaborator, and close companion. Their bond develops through mutual care, teasing, travel, and shared danger; fellow disciples view them romantically, and Zheng later begins questioning whether she is in love with him 108 136 159 164 206.
• Su Qingli / Xiaoqing — Friend and affectionate correspondent, initially won over by his storytelling. Shares martial-world intelligence and hopes for future travel and reunion; Ding buys poetry books to improve his replies 8 59 115 138.
• Ji Hanyi / Ding Qingyan — False younger sister and powerful manipulator. Their domestic affection coexists with her control over his thoughts and memories, leaving Ding unsure how much of the relationship was genuine 51 57 65.
• Ding Shengyi, Liu Yuzao, and Ding Daniu — Members of the staged household. Ding accepts their apparent familial care before discovering concealed cultivated forms and their participation in the conspiracy 3 39 42 46.
• Yan Changqing / Yan Yong — Coercive instructor and adversary. Gives Ding Heavenly Heart qi and cultivation knowledge, but manipulates him as an escape tool. Ding kills him yet retains his useful imprint 26 51 57 83.
• Xu Chang’an — Loyal local friend and cultivation student. Receives his late master’s manual from Ding and manages Ding’s residence and storytelling affairs 66 80.
• Yang Shiduo — Martial student and friend. Ding corrects his Iron Injury Fist and helps restore his confidence; Yang later leaves for Flame Capital seeking wider opportunities 84 87 91 176.
• Pan Yunzhou — Senior sect brother and traveling companion. Provides cover for Ding’s killing of Tang Du and benefits from Ding’s restoration of his family’s cultivation canon 148 149 156.
• Xie Fengchao — Friend first met through a courteous spar. Shares dangerous expeditions, rewards, and relaxed banter with Ding; his later charitable work earns Ding’s respect 96 108 115 138.
• Xing Chang — Headless People commander and martial collaborator. Appreciates Ding’s transparent proposal for officially sanctioned improvements to military arts and formations 108 160.
• Ren Youyang — True Spirit Sect friend who offers protection despite the possible cost to sect relations. Ding admires his chivalry 25 46 57.
• Wang Zhou — Senior sect mentor. Witnesses Ding’s extraordinary aperture refinement, supports his research, and later works with him on investigations and the capital mission 69 171 179.
• Hu Chengzong — Cultivation specialist who performs Ding’s aperture implantations and Organ Dressings. Helps assess his revisions while insisting that unproven methods require testing 120 136 159.
• Wan Guhong — Senior brother and sword instructor. Their lessons become reciprocal when Ding proposes improvements to introductory techniques 68 73.
• Twelfth Madam Luo — Flame Capital ally. Helps conceal his cultivation, provides intelligence, and supports his infiltration despite exasperation at his repeated requests 199 211.
• Ou Luwen — Illusion cultivator defeated by Ding’s masked challenge. Accepts his negotiated settlement for Little Zhang and discusses cultivation ideas with him 192.

Notable Quotes

“Brother Youyang, you truly have the spirit of the chivalrous heroes of old!” 25

“Getting used to it ahead of time.”
— After Xu Chang’an compares his instruction to that of a Martial Grandmaster 80.

“Wherever you intend to attack, a glance is enough. Don’t keep watching it, or your opponent will notice. If I were you, I’d deliberately look elsewhere to mislead them.” 96

“We meet and part, then part and meet. That’s life.” 165