★ The author, Lai Ji, is a postdoctoral law scholar trained at a criminal investigation academy and also a screenwriter — he wrote the feature film Money Bastion and served as script planner on the hit series Candle in the Tomb: Kunlun Shrine.
★ The novel is recommended by Lai Shuiqing, the celebrated wuxia TV director behind The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber and Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils.
★ It is rated 9.2 on Qimao, with 800,000 reader recommendations on Jiuyu Literature and over 60 million reads.
★ A coming-of-age revenge fantasy set in the jianghu. Young Nan Fusheng carries the hatred of a fallen kingdom; his master gives him nine demon blades, each engraved with a name he must strike down, and he must gather six sacred relics before the Ten Slayers do.
★ The title comes from Qu Yuan's Nine Songs — the story of a wandering youth who, in the end, refuses to let hatred defeat love.

Beidu's Emperor Wen sweeps across the land. The strategist Yang Juxu and his brothers of the Nine Heavens Sect fight the Grand Priest of Nanling for two days and two nights, and at last cut him down, ending the kingdom of Nanling. Sixteen years later, Yang Juxu, now an ennobled lord, is killed by a mysterious young man with a flying blade.

That young man is Nan Fusheng, the last heir of Nanling and an initiate of the Soul-Breaking Tower. His master Yun Xueji leaves him a set of nine demon blades, each one named for a spirit of ancient song, and each engraved with a name. He must hunt down and kill all nine, wipe out the Ten Slayers of the imperial Secret Policy Bureau, and gather the six sacred relics before his enemies do — all to summon the Grand Master's Secret Record and help the exiled loyalists of Nanling rise again.

Along the way he is drawn into the Changge Sect's three lifetimes of doomed love, the murder of the Odd Sword Way's master, a duel between the world's greatest physician and its greatest poisoner, the court's plot to ban martial arts, and the endless swallowing of sect by sect. One by one the relics surface, and the hunt for the Ten Slayers grows hotter. Love, duty, and friendship shake the young man's fate — yet the boy adrift in a lawless world keeps his kindness and his passion, chasing truth and justice until he learns what all his blood has been for: that love can overcome hatred.

【Character Profiles】
Nan Fusheng (male lead): The orphaned heir of the fallen kingdom of Nanling, carrying the hatred of a lost nation. He survives the war with a kind heart and dreams of a life of poetry and wine, yet he is trained into a cold-blooded killer, bearing the duty of revenge from the very start. Trained in the arts of Yun Xueji of the Soul-Breaking Tower, he ventures into the jianghu: his mission is to wipe out the Ten Slayers of the imperial Secret Policy Bureau, to pave the way for Nanling's loyalists to rise again, and to gather the six sacred relics so as to summon the Grand Master's Secret Record. Through shifting fortunes, changing powers, and tangled loves, he returns to the good heart he was born with and finds release for his soul.

Changge (female lead): The new leader of the Changge Sect, a grandmaster of the second rank; after mastering the "Cloud Snow Jade Song" technique, she becomes the third master of the immortal level, after Elder Fandao and Elder Daojian. She embodies the "mission of the world" — outwardly strong, inwardly kind and tender. Having inherited the sect leader's seat, she bears the duty of sealing the demon blades and will sacrifice anything to fulfill it. She and Nan Fusheng are destined lovers across three lifetimes, yet Nan Fusheng wields the demon blades, placing him at odds with the kindness she guards. As she hunts him down, she keeps fleeing her own feelings, and even marries Yin Yangsheng, lord of Vermilion Valley, to "forget love and end all ties," so as to master the emotionless supreme art. In the end she and Nan Fusheng battle to the death between good and evil — and the outcome stuns the whole jianghu.

Leling: The second disciple of the Changge Sect, a third-rank master. While investigating the murder of his old friend Elder Fandao, he discovers that Nan Fusheng uses the Changge Sect's techniques, and so he approaches him. Like water and fire, like a reflection in a mirror, the two become friends. He loves Yin Qing, the daughter of the Vermilion Valley lord; after Nan Fusheng kills her brother Yin Lie by mistake, Leling takes the blame for him and is cast into the "Mirror of All Beings." In the next cycle he becomes Nan Fusheng, to endure the trial of seeing through love and hate — and at last he understands that to dissolve obsession is to dissolve oneself.

Lü Chongyang: A man of few words, a disciple of Elder Fandao, master of the Odd Sword Way. Investigating Elder Fandao's strange death, he meets Nan Fusheng, and the two become friends after a fight. He is caught up in the debate between the "odd sword" and the "true sword," and after weathering storms with Nan Fusheng he at last grasps the way of "neither odd nor true," becoming a strong ally when Nan Fusheng faces his greatest crisis.

Yin Qing: The eldest daughter of the Vermilion Valley lord, the one Leling loves. Gentle in appearance yet strong within, she is a master of maneuver, and she believes that only one power above all others can calm the jianghu. She and her father Yin Yangsheng reach out to the princes who oppose Emperor Wen, and at last unify the jianghu, helping her father take the seat of the martial arts leader.

Lai Ji (b. 1986) is a novelist and screenwriter from Sichuan, China. A postdoctoral law scholar and graduate supervisor, he graduated from the School of Criminal Investigation at Southwest University of Political Science and Law, where he now serves as a practice supervisor. He is a member of the Sichuan Writers Association and a contracted author of the Ba Jin College of Literature.
His near-twenty novels span espionage, mystery, legal drama, science fiction, and fantasy. Several have been adapted for the screen: Su Di: The Nameless Mountains and Rivers became a same-titled TV series (starring Liao Fan and Zhu Zhu, aired in 2024), and Secret Files of the National Security Bureau became Secret Files of XSA (2025).
As a screenwriter, he wrote the feature film Money Bastion and served as script planner on Candle in the Tomb: Kunlun Shrine and script consultant on Fearless Blood. His work has won the Dianchi Literature Award and the Baihua Literature Award.
Nine Songs: Who Will Keep Me Fair is his rare foray into wuxia fantasy; according to public sources, it was first serialized online under the pen name Ai Jiangli.

1) Night of the Full Moon
2) Duanhun Yunxue
3) King of Ten Thousand Formations
4) The Heavenly Master's Secret Record
5) Mystery of the Master's Legacy
6) The Nine-Word True Mantra
7) First Meeting in Life
8) Qijian Chongyang
9) Young Master of the Vermilion Bird
10) An Instant, Falling to Darkness
11) No Mountain Can Obstruct
12) Sound of the Lotus
13) Why Grieve for Life
14) Breaking Formation, Breaking the Stalemate
15) Tribulation of Three Lifetimes
16) Sword Fight in the Void
17) The Martial Patrol Commissioner
18) The Green Jade Poison Gang
19) The Benevolent Healer of the Medicine Hut
20) Realm of the Flying Sword
21) A Hundred Sorrows, Hard to Resolve
22) Chixiao Slays the Serpent
23) Joy and Sorrow, Parting and Reunion
24) The Martial Alliance Conference
25) The Immortal Master Returns
26) Battle of Fated Rivals
27) My Name is Yan Ji
28) Meeting for the Rest of Our Lives
29) The White Jade Pearl
30) The Pure Yang Inner Elixir
31) A Sword Like the Abyss
32) Sweet Dreams of the Southern Kingdom
33) Illusory Swords Crisscrossing
34) The Zen Dharma of the Mortal World
35) My Name is Le Ling
36) The Flowing Spring Jade Hairpin.