Danmei can sometimes feel overwhelming if you've never read it before. Mostly that comes down to the fact that the novels tend to be at least one hundred pages longer than your typical light novel, if not more, and the novels have been the greater part of what's been officially released in English, both digitally and physically. That makes Dinghai Fusheng Records a good break-in point for the danmei-curious. Whether you call it manhua or a webtoon (and both appellations fit it), the comic format makes the book feel like less of a time commitment.

It's also a decent example of the genre, albeit one that's at this point lighter on the romance front than some other series. (They can't all be You've Got Mail: The Perils of the Pigeon Post, which, incidentally, is a good choice if you want a book with a lot of sex.) Set in the Jin Dynasty (266-420 C.E., directly after the more [anime-]famous Three Kingdoms era), the story follows Chen Xing, a sixteen-year-old exorcist. In fact, he's the last exorcist, and his powers are far weaker than those of his predecessors due to a sharp decrease in the available mana in China. The cause is the Heavenly Demon Mara, and Chen Xing is looking to defeat the demon but to do that, he needs to find his Protector Martial God. Rather than being an actual god, this is the name for a martial artist who protects an exorcist as he goes about his business, and when the book opens, Chen Xing has just arrived at a northern city seeking his. Chen Xing is guided by his “heart lamp,” an exorcist power that both illuminates his path and grows more intense when the Protector Martial God is near. Luckily for Chen Xing, his guardian is, in fact, present. Less good? The man is on death row and has zero interest in helping the exorcist.

He's also Hú, a group viewed as distinct from the Han people. A mildly vague term, it's thought today that it specifically referred to people from the Steppes, and during the Jin Dynasty, it had the connotation of being a barbarian. This sets Xiang Shu apart from the rest of the characters and also makes him out to be at least somewhat suspicious – something borne out by the fact that after Chen Xing saves him, Xiang Shu promptly abandons him. Naturally, this is not the end of the two young men's encounters, nor is it a full picture of who Xiang Shu is…in fact, he may have refused to protect Chen Xing because of his own mission and quasi-Robin Hood status.

Most of this volume is spent learning the background of Chen Xing and leading up to the idea that Xiang Shu is much more than anyone assumes. Along the way, Chen Xing is joined by a man named Feng Qianjun, a self-proclaimed assassin who is almost certainly something (and maybe someone) else, as well as a dog he rescues from an abandoned villa and immediately names Xiang Shu in a fit of pique. (He also buys the dog a little furry vest, thus winning me over entirely.) Chen Xing, we learn, believes that he will die at age twenty, when his guardian stars, the Suixing (zodiac) lose their power. He's therefore operating under duress, and while he's absolutely positive he won't die before then, he's also aware that he needs to make good use of what time he has. That's why it's so imperative to him that he convinces Xiang Shu to become his Protector Martial God: not because he'll die without him, but because his presence will make it that much easier to fulfill his mission.

The fact that there are both Hú and Han characters allows the story to explore some of the cultural differences between them, and that largely comes across in the folklore. For example, in an abandoned (or seemingly abandoned) mountain village, the characters are attacked by what they call “drought fiends,” a type of zombie created by the rage of those killed as collateral damage during a war. The monsters are called both “drought fiends” and “drought demons,” making it clear that they're the same creature, just known by two different names. This seems like a theme that may be explored further as the story goes on, because the cultural distinctions between Hú and Han appear to be important to understanding Xiang Shu as a character.

Unlike the danmei novels Seven Seas has released, this book doesn't have pronunciation guides or glossaries of potentially unfamiliar terms, so readers will need to look up what a “courtesy name” is or how to pronounce the letter “x” in Chinese on their own. Possibly this assumes a readership already familiar with Seven Seas' danmei line, but it still seems like an unfortunate omission. Despite that, the story is deeply interesting and the art is beautiful, making a good transition from vertical scroll to the traditional page while still allowing us to see how it worked in its original format.

The source novels for this series have been licensed (also by Seven Seas) and will start releasing in the spring of 2025, so there will be options for how you choose to read this story. But the manhua/webtoon is a good way to dip your toe in the danmei waters. It's an interesting story with beautiful art, and if it could stand up to the romance factor a bit, I think patience on that front will eventually be rewarded.