Xiangshu & What You're Actually Fighting

The hereditary enemy: who Xiangshu is

The whole premise of Scroll of Taiwu is a generational feud, and the entity on the other end of it has a name: Xiangshu. English-language coverage of the 1.0 launch describes Xiangshu as "an ancient evil threatening to unleash thousands of years of chaos and tragedy," and the game's Chinese-language wiki describes it in more mythic terms — something closer to a core or hub-point that every monstrous form ultimately connects back to. It isn't a single boss fight so much as a standing, generational threat that your clan's whole existence is organized around opposing.

Xiangshu doesn't fight you directly — its incarnations do

Rather than one final boss, Xiangshu manifests through a set of incarnations tied to hidden "Sword Tomb" locations, one of which is seeded somewhere near your home village each new playthrough. Sources disagree on the exact number and names of these incarnations, and we'd rather say that plainly than repeat a specific headcount we can't confirm across two independent sources. What is consistently documented is the structure: find a Sword Tomb, and you're fighting a real, distinct incarnation of the game's central antagonist, not a reskinned regular enemy.

Everyday threats between Sword Tombs

Most of what you'll actually fight day to day isn't Xiangshu directly. Expect deviant-path practitioners ("heretics" in most English coverage), wandering knights-errant who can be neutral or hostile depending on your standing with them, direct agents serving Xiangshu, and ordinary wild beasts out in the world. Some encounters come from choices you've made rather than the world itself — cross the wrong NPC and you can create a personal grudge-enemy who comes looking for you specifically, and the game also tracks NPCs who've lost their minds or become obsessively fixated on rare manuals, some of whom turn hostile as a direct result of poison or parasite effects picked up in the world.

Come prepared — encounters are reportedly build-gated

This is the most actionable, well-sourced piece of advice for anyone heading into a tougher fight: English-language Steam reviews written after the global launch specifically flag boss-style encounters as build-gated, meaning raw stats without the right training-theory and sect choices behind them can leave you stuck. If a fight feels unfair, the fix real players report is revisiting your training (see our Training & Sect build guide) rather than grinding the same approach harder.

What we're not claiming

You'll see specific incarnation names and a "twelve followers" figure attached to Xiangshu in some English coverage, but that number doesn't match the structure described in more detailed Chinese-language sources, so we're not repeating it here as fact. We also haven't found a credible, documented "rival heir" combat system distinct from the Xiangshu feud and the personal grudge-enemies described above — if you see a guide claiming otherwise, treat it with the same skepticism we're applying here.