Phantom Blade Zero · Character
Gu Lingran
Gu Lingran, Master Gu to his men, is the Mandate officer the squads in Weeping Creek Valley served under, a disciple of the Qingfeng Sect. You never meet him: by the time Soul reaches the Outpost in Chapter 1 he is gone, and his name lives on in the papers of two valley quests.
- FactionThe Mandate
- Where you meetWeeping Creek Valley
- Quests2 in the quest log
Who is Gu Lingran?
Gu Lingran signs himself Lingran, Disciple of the Qingfeng Sect, and his men call him Master Gu. He commanded the Mandate fighters in Weeping Creek Valley: Zheng Rong, the captain holding the Outpost, served under him, and the captain’s lieutenant was in his personal guard.
He was ambitious. A strategist, Xu Feng, wrote urging him to take the captured Four Axes to Sect Leader Ming at once, for credit no rival could match. When Sect Leader Bi of the Baishan Sect wrote begging for help, he sent back a courteous refusal: his own men were locked in bitter fighting and would only make more trouble.
When Soul arrives in Chapter 1 he is not at the Outpost, and his men speak of him with little respect. One of them, impressed that Soul brought the Axemaster down without foul tricks, sneers: “So Master Gu was nothing special after all.” What he did in the valley comes out in Four Fierce Axes and Festering Secret.
How Gu Lingran looks in the game
Pictures from later in the story (1)
© PARAWULIN PRODUCTION LIMITED / S-GAME
Who Gu Lingran is to the others
His captain
Zheng Rong’s squad at the Outpost served under him. In Festering Secret the captain finally has to face what his superior did.
“And once the Axemaster escaped, he pretended to go scouting and fled.”
In-game dialogueTurned her away
Sect Leader Bi of the Baishan Sect wrote asking him for help. His reply is all courtesy and no men: he is locked in bitter fighting and would only make more trouble.
3 more ties the story reveals later
His patron
Sect Leader Ming calls him “Nephew Gu” and trusts him to handle the matter of the Four Axes, burn after reading. The proof you gather in Four Fierce Axes shows the two of them conspired to slander the brothers and have them killed.
The man he betrayed
Gu Lingran befriended the Four Axes, drank with them, then seized them and had them tortured. The trap was his own idea: a letter saying he was to be executed in three days, so they would ride all night to save him and arrive too tired to fight.
His killer
The body dressed like Gu Lingran carries two curved wounds through the back between the shoulder blades, the mark of The Hunt’s weapon.
“Two curved wounds pierce the back between the shoulder blades, unmistakably the work of The Hunt.”
In-game dialogue
Every quest with Gu Lingran in it
Tales
Four Fierce Axes
Peng Meng’s last letter names Gu Lingran as the man who called the Four Axes brothers and then slaughtered three of them. The quest has you gather the proof, and Gu’s own letter to Sect Leader Ming is among the papers.
How this quest turns out
The proof is damning. His letter proposes the trap that caught the Four Axes, Ming’s reply tells him to deal with them and burn it, and one of the Four Axes Rebellion notes records how the brothers had found out what Ming once did, and how Master Gu seized them while they were drinking together.
Tales
Festering Secret
Three of the squad’s own men have been locked in the chained yard at the Outpost after Transcension. The captain sends Soul with a written order to his lieutenant at the old camp outside the Sha-Chi Tower, a man who served in Master Gu’s personal guard, and the lieutenant digs out Gu Lingran’s secret letter.
How this quest turns out
Shown the letter, the captain sees it at last: Gu wanted the Four Axes dead to keep his secret, and when the Axemaster escaped, he pretended to go scouting and fled. Someone has since seen a body dressed like him on the cliff across the ravine.
What happens to Gu Lingran
The end of the story for this character
When the Axemaster broke free, Gu Lingran said he was going ahead to scout, and ran. A body dressed like him lies face down in the wild grass at the edge of a cliff across the ravine, in a faded white robe torn nearly to shreds by the mountain wind, with two curved wounds through the back between the shoulder blades: The Hunt’s work. The captain says you would need grappling hooks to get across, and the game never says outright that the body is his.
The jade Lingran’s Pendant carries his name. Its description sneers at the hero of Qingfeng praised everywhere for righteousness and honour: whether those tales were true, ask the pile of bones beneath the cliff.
“Someone found a body on the cliff across the ravine... dressed like Gu Lingran...”
In-game dialogue
Keep reading
Frequently asked questions
Who did Gu Lingran command?
The Mandate squads in Weeping Creek Valley, among them Zheng Rong’s men at the Outpost and Lieutenant Fu, who had served in his personal guard.
Who is Xu Feng?
A strategist who wrote to Gu Lingran urging him to take the Four Axes to Sect Leader Ming for the credit. He appears only in that letter, one of the papers of Four Fierce Axes.
What is Lingran’s Pendant?
A jade accessory that cuts the Sha-Chi cost of Sha-Chi Combos. It carries his name; what its description says about him is in the fold above.
Sources for this page 1
- Phantom Blade Zero Official Phantom Blade Zero launch build: the game’s own dialogue, documents, bestiary, quest log and loading screens, read 3 November 2026. Quotes are the game’s English text, unchanged.