Following the ongoing success of their Heaven Official’s Blessing hardcovers, Seven Seas Entertainment has announced a re-release of Mo Xiang Tong Xiu’s Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi.
The original English paperback edition was released in five volumes from December 2021 to May 2023, which are still widely available to purchase in both print and digital forms.
The five volume re-release matches the original English paperback count and chapter split, and promises foil-lettered dust jackets with exclusive art, linen-texture graining covers with foil imprints, illustrated edges, and a ribbon bookmark. These features are similar to those included in Seven Seas’ Heaven Official’s Blessing hardcovers, and will likely include the same interior treatment where the content and artwork remains largely a clone of the paperbacks with some additional text editing.
The artists providing the new dust jacket art for the hardcovers have not yet been revealed. For Seven Seas’ English edition of Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, the interior artwork is by artist Marina Privalova, whose black & white illustrations were previously published in the Russian edition of the series. Notably, Amazon only lists Marina Privalova as the artist for the hardcover, and does not include artists Jin Fang and Moo; who both contributed to the original volume one. It is not clear at this time if Seven Seas will be including all the artwork from the original release.
Though the response was generally very positive, a fair share of fans felt upset by the perceived pressure to re-buy the series after having already gotten the paperbacks, and others expressed their hope that Seven Seas will be giving their original translations an overhaul to address the editorial errors present in the series’ first run. Although most of the corrections were made available on the Seven Seas Danmei website as errata and subsequently included in the various reprints of the volumes, not all fixes could be accounted for in the paperbacks despite this.
Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation was picked up for English release in 2021 by Seven Seas Entertainment, and saw staggering success on sales charts; netting multiple New York Times Best Seller placements across its run. Fans have clamored for a hardcover treatment of Grandmaster ever since Heaven Official’s Blessing‘s re-release was announced in May 2024, with this announcement now leaving The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System as the only member of the MXTX trio of series without the hardcover treatment in English. Although Scum Villain fans have grown accustomed to getting the short end of the media stick, it is likely only a matter of time until Seven Seas announces hardcovers for the eldest sibling as well, as it joined its fellow MXTX series on bestseller lists with every paperback release.
Seven Seas has provided the following series summary for Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation:
Wei Wuxian was once one of the most outstanding men of his generation, a talented and clever young cultivator who harnessed martial arts, knowledge, and spirituality into powerful abilities. But when the horrors of war led him to seek a new power through demonic cultivation, the world’s respect for his skills turned to fear, and his eventual death was celebrated throughout the land.
Years later, he awakens in the body of an aggrieved young man who sacrifices his soul so that Wei Wuxian can exact revenge on his behalf. Though granted a second life, Wei Wuxian is not free from his first, nor the mysteries that appear before him now. Yet this time, he’ll face it all with the righteous and esteemed Lan Wangji at his side, another powerful cultivator whose unwavering dedication and shared memories of their past will help shine a light on the dark truths that surround them.
Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi (Hardcover) Vol. 1‘s release is slated for October 2025; just in time for the series’ tenth anniversary. Preorders are now live with select retailers:
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Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi (魔道祖师) is a danmei novel series written by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu (also known as MXTX). It began serialization on jjwxc in 2015 and ran for 113 chapters (plus 13 extra chapters). It has inspired numerous adaptations, including a donghua, a completed Chinese manhua, an ongoing Japanese manga, an audio drama (dubbed in Chinese and Japanese), a Japanese stage play, and a live-action (known as The Untamed).
DanmeiNews provides the below summary from its catalogue:
The powerful necromancer Wei Wuxian, despised across the land, awakens in a stranger’s body thirteen years after his death. He is drawn into a supernatural murder-mystery and must investigate alongside the straitlaced Lan Wangji, with whom he shares a very tangled past.
Seven Seas announced in 2021 that they had acquired the license to publish the work’s manhua adaptation, and have been steadily releasing volumes since.
Mo Xiang Tong Xiu has also written two other hit danmei series that are available in English: The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System (人渣反派自救系统) and Heaven Official’s Blessing (天官赐福).
Source: Seven Seas Bluesky
