Secrets of the Paper-Crafting Sect: The Paper Coffin-Bearers

In 1987, the Yellow River changed course, exposing an ancient tomb that had been sealed for six hundred years. A twelve-member archaeological team entered—and none returned. A month later, a notebook surfaced along the riverbank. On its final page, scrawled in haste, was a chilling message: "There are no coffins in the tomb. Only paper figures—thousands of them, standing in the great hall, waiting..." Twenty-seven years later, manuscript restorer Zhang Nian discovers this notebook among his late grandfather's belongings. His grandfather, Zhang Deshun—an illiterate old farmer—was apparently the one who wrote it. As Zhang Nian digs deeper, he uncovers a staggering truth: he is the tenth-generation heir of the "Paper-Crafting Sect." The sect's paper artisans were never originally meant to escort the dead, but to seal away "things that should not exist." Beneath the Yellow River lies the "Paper Emperor"—a living paper figure who has survived for six hundred years. Twelve successors of the sect once joined forces to destroy him; all were wiped out. Now, three of the remaining successors are already dead. Zhang Nian, the tenth, must complete the "final escort"—using his inherited paper-crafting skills to ensure that this six-hundred-year-old paper man finally dies—before the Paper Emperor awakens. On his investigation, Zhang Nian encounters Zhou Dazui, a funeral broker with a vast intelligence network and a background in paper-crafting; Lin Xiaochuan, a grey-eyed girl who is herself a living paper figure and can perceive lingering obsessions; and Old Zhong, a resident of a psychiatric hospital, one of the original twelve successors, who holds a crucial photograph. Piece by piece, Zhang Nian unravels a six-hundred-year-old destiny inscribed in the sect's darkest creed: "paper figures bear the coffin, and bloodline is the key."