''The world is like a vast furnace, with yin and yang as its charcoal, humanity as the bronze, and the Dao as the flames.

Some preach the Dao like carrying firewood to extinguish a blaze, only to end up consumed by the flames—wrong, wrong, wrong.

It wasn’t until Gu Fangchen opened his eyes and transmigrated into the world of the game Mirror in the Dust that he finally understood the secret hidden within these words.

...

That year, the Northern King’s consort was still gentle as water, doting on her son to the point of folly.

The eldest princess was cold as frost, her gaze aloof—her smile worth more than gold.

The youngest princess was charmingly naive, obsessed with heroic knights and despising vile scoundrels.

The grand princess commanded armies like a god of war, while the female state preceptor overturned clouds and rain with a flick of her hand.

And the Northern King’s infamous, utterly worthless, and rotten-to-the-core only son had just been exposed as the lowly offspring of a horse groom, swapped at birth by the Demon Sect.

The true heir was the newly crowned top scholar, a direct disciple of the Sage, who had mastered a breath of noble righteousness.

Player Gu Fangchen didn’t care—and decided to start speedrunning.'''