Hi everyone! As part of a sitewide event, I'm happy to announce that WhySee (Immortality Simulator) and I are partnering up to cross-promote each other's novels. 

Immortality Simulator is a classic xianxia cultivation novel with an intriguing premise: the protagonist, Li Fan, can rewind time to certain checkpoints along his timeline. The simulations that he thus generates afford him the uncanny intuition and knowledge by which he manipulates the world in search for his ultimate goal: eternal life. No amount of wealth, power, or prestige could possibly compare to the golden gleam of cultivation, of knowledge beyond mortal ken, of immortality.

A little ironic, then, that our lich Ambrose has trivially resolved this problem in the Western tradition and seeks nothing more than Li Fan's worthless gold. But would the two protagonists necessarily be satisfied in each other's world? Perhaps, perhaps not; we are naturally drawn to that which we do not possess. Both protagonists share the ability to manipulate: Li Fan from intimate knowledge across past simulations, Ambrose from long experience. Both protagonists share foreknowledge: Li Fan from temporal manipulation, Ambrose from divination. But what most strongly connects the two protagonists is their ruthless drive in pursuit of their objectives. Genre, setting, era, culture, context—despite the manifold differences of the novels from which they originate, Ambrose and Li Fan might well be cut from the same cloth.

I won't, and can't, guarantee that you'll like Immortality Simulator, but if any of this intrigues you, then I urge you to give it a try. While reading, I was particularly impressed by WhySee's attention to detail and historical context, as demonstrated by the ample footnotes and translator's thoughts, and the overall flow and smoothness of the translation, which I shall endeavor to match in Lich for Hire. Immortality Simulator is no easy novel to translate, and WhySee has done a sterling job.