Mu Qin

Mu Qin, also known by names such as Qin Fengqing and Mu Tianzun, is one of the defining figures of Tales of Herding Gods.

He begins life as an apparently ordinary boy, is mistakenly raised as a “Tyrant Body,” and ultimately grows into a universe-spanning cultivator and epoch-making revolutionary.

He is famed not only for overwhelming combat power, but also for changing the logic of cultivation itself.

From political reform to cosmic salvation, his story moves from dusty villages and imperial courts to ancestral lands, chaotic seas, and the end of universal time.

In the animated adaptation, young Mu Qin is voiced by Zhang Ruoyu.

Basic Information

Name: Mu Qin

Gender: Male

Aliases: Qin Fengqing, Heavenly Saint Cult Leader, Son of Youdu, Mu Tianzun, Seventh Young Master of Miluo Palace, the Cowherd, Young Master Mu, Foolish Roe Deer, Immortal Archmage Through Myriad Kalpas, Chaos

Work: Tales of Herding Gods

Creator: Zhu Zhai

Voice Actor: Zhang Ruoyu

Personal Data

Birthday: July 27

Age: Over 2 trillion years old

Height: 187 cm

Appearance

Mu Qin is described as handsome and striking, with a dignified bearing and bright, spirited eyes.

Even when he appears simple and harmless, he naturally gives off unusual presence and pressure.

Personality

On the surface, Mu Qin seems honest, rustic, and even a little naive.

In reality, he is sharp-minded, calculating, deeply confident, and famously good at hiding cunning behind an innocent face.

He can be ruthless toward enemies, yet remains gentle toward his own people and deeply protective of humanity.

He values the survival of his race above himself and, as cult leader and reformer, pursues moral legacy, practical achievement, and enduring thought.

He often claims to be “second under heaven,” pretending modesty while actually being very proud.

He is also notably vain about his looks, which gives his grand seriousness a funny edge.

Mu Qin is the 37th Human Emperor and the 107th-generation descendant of the Founding Emperor.

He was raised in childhood by nine disabled but terrifyingly powerful elders in Canlao Village.

He was originally a sacred and demonic being born in Youdu, with the divine son Qin Fengqing sealed within him at the beginning of his life.

Later, during major events tied to protection and destiny, this sealed existence separated into an independent individual.

Because of the seal, Mu Qin became a true mortal body and could not naturally break through his divine treasures on his own.

Even so, through willpower, genius, repeated reinvention, and extraordinary encounters, he transcended the limits of an ordinary physique.

At first he was falsely told that he possessed the legendary “Tyrant Body.”

In a wonderfully ironic twist, he later spread that reputation across multiple eras so successfully that many people briefly believed it.

Mu Qin has an unusually large number of names, reflecting every phase of his life.

These include Qin Family Child, the Cowherd, the 107th-generation Descendant of the Founding Emperor, Qin Chai Chai, Mu’er, Heavenly Saint Cult Leader, Human Emperor, Qin Tyrant Body, Grand Academy Doctor, Court Gentleman, Divine Physician Qin, one of the Three Heroes of the Yankang Reform, Mu Tianzun, Bad Little Brother, King of Junk, Saint Infant, Seventh Young Master of Miluo Palace, and Chaos.

Some names are formal political identities, while others are personal nicknames used by family, friends, or fans.

Together they show how many worlds he has crossed and how many roles he has carried.

Mu Qin starts as a child hunted by dark gods and devils.

He is rescued in infancy and eventually taken in by Granny Si, after which he grows up in the harsh but strangely loving environment of Canlao Village.

After leaving the Great Ruins, he becomes the leader of the Heavenly Saint Cult.

He enters the Golden Palace with Wu Kehan and defeats all opponents there by himself.

He later helps suppress rebellion in Yankang, kills the crown prince in the capital, and rises to become the new Human Emperor.

A chance encounter with his biological father reveals that he is one of the surviving heirs of the Founding Emperor’s bloodline.

This revelation opens the way for him to reshape divine arts and cultivation systems.

From there, his path becomes bigger and wilder: imperial politics, Buddhist turmoil, ancient wars, time travel, ancestral lands, heavenly courts, and battles involving gods, devils, and primordial beings.

He survives the destruction of worlds, helps revive major ancient figures, clashes with multiple Heavenly Venerables, and becomes the Saint Infant of the Creator race in Taixu.

At one stage he even becomes a soulless being after sacrificing his third eye, only to later open heaven and earth within himself and gain rebirth.

In later ages, he seals the ancestral court and guards it for 3.5 billion years.

After journeying through the destruction and rebirth of sixteen cosmic epochs, he attains the Dao through chaos and finally resolves the ultimate threat of terminal cosmic cold silence in the seventeenth epoch.

Mu Qin is a ruler, reformer, teacher, schemer, physician, and destroyer of old systems all at once.

He is one of the rare figures whose political choices matter as much as his swordsmanship.

He drives the Yankang reforms, challenges inherited worship of gods with his “theory of breaking the divine,” and creates entirely new routes for cultivation.

Instead of simply becoming strong inside the existing order, he repeatedly rewrites the order itself.

His life also carries a paradox: he is deeply tied to ancient divine and demonic origins, yet his greatest symbolic power comes from proving what a “mere mortal body” can do.

That contradiction is one of the character’s biggest charms.

Constitution

Mu Qin was originally a sacred and demonic being born in Youdu, later sealed by Tubo and reduced into a completely mortal body.

Although this prevented ordinary self-breakthrough in the divine treasure system, he still possessed both divine and demonic treasure structures.

As the ancestral court system evolved, the distinction between god and devil became less absolute.

Later, in Chapter 1643, his physical body transforms into a Hongmeng Body.

Cultivation Realms

Mu Qin’s advancement is one of the most detailed and important progression lines in the story.

He repeatedly breaks, remakes, and upgrades the accepted structure of cultivation.

He reaches the following major stages across the narrative: Spirit Embryo Divine Treasure, Five Luminaries Divine Treasure, Six Directions Divine Treasure, Seven Stars Divine Treasure, Heavenly Being Divine Treasure, Life and Death Divine Treasure, Heavenly River Divine Treasure, Venerable God, True God, Jade Terrace, Heavenly Sea, God-Slaying Platform, Nine Prisons Platform, Jade Capital, Chaos, and a state likened to Primordial Beginning.

At the Chaos level, he steps into the Chaos Hall and ascends the nine hundred ninety-nine steps through the combined wisdom of Yankang’s people.

After surviving fifteen creation tribulations and sixteen destruction tribulations, he completes his attainment.

Combat Power

Mu Qin eventually surpasses the conventional forty-heaven Dao realm system.

His vital energy becomes Hongmeng qi, his body becomes a Hongmeng Body, and his structure includes thirty-six heavenly palaces and seventy-two treasure halls.

His techniques reach a level where they are effectively miraculous.

After refining the chaos rune “Yuan”, he becomes the strongest being across seventeen cosmic epochs.

During his wanderings in the Sea of Chaos, he comprehends a complete chaos path broad enough to encompass the entire Sea of Chaos.

After meeting the Primordial Great Heavenly Venerable Jiang Nanchuan in endless void, he finally grasps the key to ending the ultimate cold silence.

Martial Entry into the Dao

First Heaven: A Thousand Palms Return from Peaks Beyond Heaven

Blade Dao Entry, up to Twenty-Six Heavens

Known stages include:

First Heaven: Knocking at the Southern Heavenly Gate

Second Heaven: Blade of Law

Third Heaven: Blade of Protection

Sword and Divine Power Entry, up to Thirty-Six Heavens

Mu Qin’s sword-divine path includes an immense sequence of named heavens.

Important forms include Opening the Kalpa, Lifting the Kalpa (Sword Nineteen), Answering the Kalpa, Breaking the Kalpa, and many later cosmic-scale forms.

These stages also include names such as Heaven and Earth Four Sovereign Seals, Mysterious Gate of Heaven and Earth, Ferry Boat to the Other Shore, Ninefold Dreamscape, One Qi Gives Birth in Guixu, Great Dao Rises in the Ancestral Court, Five Tais Become One, Six Paths Heavenly Wheel, and Hongmeng Begins, the Dao Opens Heaven and Earth.

The Thirty-Sixth Heaven is an unnamed chaos divine power completed only after he journeys back through sixteen cosmic epochs.

Main Cultivation Art

Mu Qin’s foundational method is Tyrant Body Three Elixir Technique.

It began as a basic Guiding Technique, but after receiving the complete version from Qin Hanzhen, he constantly revised and rebuilt it into something uniquely his own.

As his internal universe experienced repeated cycles of creation and destruction, he eventually comprehended his own Chaos Hall.

This reflects his whole character: he never leaves a system untouched if it can be improved.

Signature Techniques

His major sword set is Kalpa Sword, including:

Opening the Kalpa, Lifting the Kalpa, Answering the Kalpa, and Breaking the Kalpa.

General Talents

Mu Qin is almost absurdly versatile.

He excels in medicine, poison arts, alchemy, blade and sword combat, painting and calligraphy, divine eye techniques, leg techniques, fist techniques, thievery, craftsmanship, spiritual consciousness, and acting.

His transformation and creation divine arts are especially renowned.

He also possesses the chaos rune “Yuan.”

Mu Qin wields a number of famous divine weapons.

His best-known equipment includes the Broken Sword, Kalpa Sword, Killing Cauldron, Tai Emperor Seal, Ancestral Court Primordial Unity Cauldron, Six Paths Heavenly Wheel, and Chaos Bell.

These artifacts reflect the changing scale of his journey.

He starts with weapons fit for a talented young cultivator and ends with instruments suited to cosmic war and epochal reconstruction.

Mu Qin’s accomplishments are staggering even by the standards of epic fantasy.

They span politics, cultivation theory, war, invention, and cosmic salvation.

His major achievements include becoming Heavenly Saint Cult Leader, the first Grand Academy Doctor of Yankang, assisting the national preceptor in suppressing rebellion, killing the crown prince, building the Sun-Shooting Divine Cannon, becoming the 37th Human Emperor, and creating the Primordial Spirit Guide, Three Primordial Spirits Assembly Art, and Spirit Energy Transfer Bridge.

He is also recognized as the Immortal Archmage Through Myriad Kalpas, creator of Sword Eighteen and Sword Nineteen, author of the Taiwei Mathematical Canon, and the pioneer of twenty-six forms of the Seventh Divine Treasure.

He is the first person to possess both divine and demonic divine treasures at once, and he opens an entirely new road of cultivation.

He enters the Dao through technique, martial arts, sword, blade, and divine power at extraordinary heights.

He defeats the Third Young Master and Fourth Young Master, returns to the time before the First Epoch, travels the Sea of Chaos, and ultimately saves the Seventeenth Epoch from terminal cold silence.

Mu Qin is not just a strong fighter in a strong world.

He is one of the rare protagonists whose ideas are as dangerous as his weapons.

His “theory of breaking the divine” attacks blind worship of gods and dismantles inherited authority structures.

He pushes people to examine whether divine status deserves obedience at all.

He also revolutionizes the divine treasure system and creates twenty-six varieties of the Seventh Divine Treasure, opening brand-new routes for later cultivators.

In many ways, he is a civilizational inventor disguised as a troublemaker.

Early Rise

He leaves the Great Ruins and quickly shakes the world.

As cult leader, warrior, and political actor, he becomes impossible for any kingdom to ignore.

Identity Revelation

Meeting his biological father reveals his imperial bloodline.

That moment shifts him from gifted outsider to central heir of buried history.

Buddhist and Underworld Turmoil

After Qin Fengqing’s release, chaos spreads through the Buddhist realms and Xuankong.

Mu Qin later reunites with his mother in Youdu and, by joining with Qin Fengqing at Yusuo Pass, defeats the gods of Youdu.

Time Travel and Ancient Eras

He travels back a million years, causes havoc in the heavenly court, and later rides a ghost ship through history.

He enters the Dragon Han era, finds the ancestral land of the Creator race, leaves three prophecies, steals treasures from Zhaoyang Hall, and protects dynastic transitions from disaster.

Taixu and the Creator Race

In Taixu, Mu Qin unexpectedly becomes the Saint Infant of the Creator race.

This allows him to reconcile the Creator race with Wuyou Village and further destabilize the plans of the Ten Heavenly Venerables.

System Reinvention

Using the ancestral court as a model, he rebuilds his own cultivation system from the ground up.

This is one of the most important turning points in his entire journey.

War Against Heaven

He takes part in the great conflicts of the heavenly court, helps revive Heaven Duke after Xuandu’s war, and later joins in killing the Great Emperor.

Yet every victory only opens the door to an even larger enemy.

Final Epoch Struggle

After sealing the ancestral court and waiting across billions of years, Mu Qin witnesses the death of ages and walks through sixteen cosmic cycles.

He returns with the power and understanding needed to finally resolve the ultimate cold silence in the seventeenth epoch.

In the Taixu incident, Mu Qin uses matter-energy conversion techniques to reconstruct Yulin Army soldiers.

He also integrates the runes of the Path of Taishi and the great Dao of the Taichu eggshell into his own Spirit Embryo Divine Treasure.

For revenge, he once disguises himself as Ban Gongcuo and wipes out Nantuo Sect through careful planning.

That episode marks one of the clearest transitions from reckless youth to fully mature cult leader.

In the animated version of Tales of Herding Gods, the young Mu Qin is voiced by Zhang Ruoyu.

His adaptation emphasizes both his bright youthful energy and the unusual depth hidden under his seemingly straightforward personality.