Seven Seas revealed the cover for Vol. 1 of the highly anticipated danmei series Silent Reading: Mo Du, written by author priest. The cover art and interior B&W illustrations will be provided by artist Rylee.
Seven Seas provides the following volume summary:
The hit danmei thriller from the author behind Guardian: Zhen Hun and Stars of Chaos: Sha Po Lang–both available from Seven Seas!
A young man’s body is found outside a glitzy high-rise on the West Side of Yancheng—dressed for celebration, strangled, and left with a sheet of paper covering his face. One word is scrawled across it: money.
To Sergeant Luo Wenzhou, head of the Criminal Investigation Team at the Yancheng Municipal Public Safety Bureau, it’s just another case in a city rife with power plays and buried secrets. But as he digs deeper with his team, what begins as a straightforward homicide unravels into something far murkier—reaching into the city’s darkest corners of wealth, privilege, and police corruption.
And then there’s Fei Du: the aloof, razor-sharp CEO of the Fei Corporation, who seems to know far too much about the murder—and about Luo Wenzhou himself. Once a troubled youth with ties to Luo’s past, Fei Du now walks a fine line between brilliant ally and inscrutable suspect. His insights are disturbingly precise. His motives? Frustratingly opaque.
As the investigation twists through layers of trauma and moral ambiguity, Luo Wenzhou finds himself reluctantly drawn toward the very man who unsettles him most. But in a city where justice is easily bought and truth wears many masks, can either man afford to trust the other?
A special edition version of the volume will also be available for purchase. The Silent Reading Vol. 1 Special Edition comes with a notebook, police ID badges, a bookmark, and a sticker sheet; all with art unique to the release. The associated artists will be revealed on the volume’s release date (Dec. 9, 2025). As with all of Seven Seas’ danmei special editions, they are limited to a single print run and will not be available for purchase again after stock is sold out.
Seven Seas releases Special Editions for the first volumes of select danmei series only—previously, they would release them with every danmei series’ final volume. Seven Seas has not publicly disclosed how they determine which series receive this treatment, but it may be decided in part by projected sales numbers and fan reaction.
Silent Reading: Mo Du Vol. 1 is scheduled for release on December 9, 2025. Preorders are available from several major retailers:
Silent Reading: Mo Du Vol. 1 (Standard Edition) – $19.99 USD
U.S.:
Canada:
International:
Silent Reading: Mo Du Vol. 1 (Special Edition) – $29.99 USD
U.S.:
Canada:
International:
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Silent Reading (默讀) is a danmei series written by the prolific author priest. It was originally serialized on jjwxc starting in 2016, and finished with 180 chapters (and 5 Extras).
The series inspired an audio drama adaptation. A donghua and manhua adaptation were announced in 2020, but their current production status is unknown. A character trailer for the donghua can be viewed here, and the production’s official Weibo can be found here.
Silent Reading also inspired a live-action adaptation known as Justice in the Dark (2023). Only eight of a planned thirty episodes made it to air in February 2023 before further updates went silent, and it was eventually completely delisted from all official channels in July of the same year. In March 2025, the Japanese streaming service WOWOW began streaming the drama under the name 光・淵.
Seven Seas provides the following series summary:
Something lurks beneath the city of Yancheng, and as international spotlight falls upon it, the darkness begins to stir.
As one of the police force’s best investigators, the task of unraveling the city’s morbid mysteries falls to Luo Wenzhou. But as the case develops, a common thread seems to emerge: the infamous playboy and wealthy CEO, Fei Du.
With a harrowing past of his own, Fei Du is no stranger to the ins and outs of the crime investigation unit, and his suspiciously shrewd insights into the workings of the criminal mind are a great help to Luo Wenzhou’s team. As they work together to pursue justice, Luo Wenzhou must reconcile this new version of Fei Du—sharp, astute, with impeccable skills of deduction—with the troubled child he once helped…
priest is a prolific author, and many of her danmei works have been picked up for western release. Seven Seas previously released Guardian: Zhen Hun and Stars of Chaos: Sha Po Lang, and Rosmei is releasing Coins of Destiny (also known as Liu Yao), The Defectives, and Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire.
Source: Seven Seas Bluesky
