Chapter Summaries

Tantai Jing explained to the Cui Clan how Chu Xinghe had repeatedly outmaneuvered him, then secretly partnered with the clan to attack the Demonic Sect’s business network. The Cui Clan publicly appeared to fight Qiu Tian while helping Tantai Jing seize thirteen factions, and Qiu Tian realized he had lost the round.

• Clan Head Cui hosted Tantai Jing at a banquet, where Tantai Jing praised Cui Wuming and described how Chu Xinghe had always beaten him.
• Tantai Jing warned the Cui Clan that Chu Xinghe’s open schemes made him nearly impossible to surpass, leaving Cui Wuming and the clan members stunned.
• After Tantai Jing departed, the Cui Clan publicly accused Qiu Tian of abducting Liu Xing and declared that it would fight the Demonic Sect.
• Clan Head Cui led Cui Clan experts to surround Demonic Mountain and hold Qiu Tian in place while Tantai Jing attacked thirteen Demonic Sect factions and seized their businesses.
• The three great clans discovered that Tantai Jing and the Cui Clan had secretly cooperated, while Qiu Tian recognized that the Cui Clan had taken over the seized businesses and that his side had lost.

Tantai Jing ended the conflict between the Demonic Sect factions by using the Cui Clan to take control of the businesses belonging to twenty-two rival factions, while warning others not to attack his couriers. He explained that the alliance protected his forces and advanced his long-term plan to expand across the Spirit Beast Continent, as Chu Xinghe remained baffled by Tantai Jing’s reputation and their past encounters.

• Tantai Jing wiped out Soulless Valley and defeated the forces opposing him, then used rumors about the Cui Clan to draw them into taking over the businesses of twenty-two Demonic Sect factions.
• Tantai Jing declared that he had avenged his disciples and warned the Spirit Beast Continent’s Demonic Sect not to attack Demon Demon Express couriers; the factions stopped attacking as the businesses spread.
• Wu Xingyun asked why they had surrendered the businesses, and Tantai Jing explained that taking no resources secured the Cui Clan’s favor and helped deter Qiu Tian.
• Tantai Jing told Wu Xingyun that he hoped to ally with the other three great clans, expand Demon Demon businesses until the Spirit Beast Continent depended on them, and eventually contend with Chu Xinghe.
• Tantai Jing became known across the three continents as Tantai Jing of the Unfailing Plans, while people from the Blazing Sun Continent reminded others that Chu Xinghe had repeatedly outmaneuvered him.
• Chu Xinghe privately admitted that he feared interfering in the conflict and could not understand why Tantai Jing had once acted so helplessly around him.

The Ning Clan lost its hidden bet on Tantai Jing when the betting operation vanished, then suffered a string of business failures and a collapsed ceremony for the Xuanwu Spirit Beast Talisman. Convinced the Vast Heaven Sect was secretly targeting them, Clan Head Ning and the clan’s elders resolved to strike back.

• The Ning Clan discovered that the betting operation had vanished after Tantai Jing captured Shen Yue, wiping out the fortune Grand Elder Ning Buqu had expected to win.
• As the Ning Clan’s businesses suffered unexplained losses, Clan Head Ning blamed their bad luck and ordered a sacrificial ceremony for the Xuanwu Spirit Beast Talisman.
• The altar collapsed during the ceremony, burying the clan’s bigwigs, who climbed out dusty but unharmed.
• Grand Elder Ning Buqu reported rumors that the Cloud Firmament Sect had given them Xuanwu’s bad luck because Chu Xinghe had won all of Xuanwu’s luck, but Clan Head Ning dismissed the story as unbelievable.
• Clan Head Ning suggested the Vast Heaven Sect was secretly causing the Ning Clan’s troubles, and the clan’s bigwigs agreed and called for retaliation.

Clan Head Ning planned to use the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring to take the Vast Heaven Sect’s spirit medicine market, but the clan hall collapsed before the discussion was finished. At the Vast Heaven Sect, Empress Ji Ya visited and discovered that the smoke over the legendary Haotian Palace came from Gu Mingchao’s porcelain kilns, which had repeatedly set the mountain on fire.

• Clan Head Ning convinced the Ning Clan to sell Earth Spirit Gushing Spring water cheaply and seize the Vast Heaven Sect’s spirit medicine business, but their main hall collapsed during the planning discussion.
• Chu Xinghe emerged from seclusion, reflected on the sect’s unexpected victory in the Demonic Sect dispute, and decided not to prepare for the upcoming Beast God Spirit Temple opening.
• Senior Brother Shen Chun told Chu Xinghe that Empress Ji Ya had arrived, and Chu Xinghe joined the Grand Elder in welcoming her at the mountain gate.
• Empress Ji Ya visited the Vast Heaven Sect to meet Gu Mingchao and investigate his reputation as the number one under heaven, then toured the sect with the Grand Elder and Chu Xinghe.
• At Haotian Palace, Ji Ya and the Grand Elder saw disciples extinguishing a fire and learned that Gu Mingchao’s porcelain kilns had repeatedly burned the front and back mountains.

Empress Ji Ya visited Haotian Palace and interpreted Gu Mingchao’s chaotic surroundings and unconventional arts as profound expressions of his Dao. Gu Mingchao agreed to show her his Dao Porcelain, leaving Chu Xinghe to confront the fact that it looked like a pile of roof tiles.

• Ji Ya observed Haotian Palace’s dilapidated grounds and the smoke from its porcelain kiln, then concluded that Gu Mingchao’s paintings, stone carvings, and surroundings embodied a hidden Dao.
• Ji Ya explained her interpretation to the great elder and Chu Xinghe, who were stunned by how convincing her wild claims sounded.
• Gu Mingchao appeared, and Ji Ya praised his supposed fusion of painting, stone carving, and porcelain-making into a single Dao.
• Ji Ya asked to see Gu Mingchao’s Dao Porcelain, and Gu Mingchao ordered the guard disciples to bring it.
• The disciples carried over Gu Mingchao’s recent firing, and Chu Xinghe realized the supposed Dao Porcelain looked like dull gray roof tiles.

Empress Ji Ya praised Gu Mingchao’s crude Dao porcelain as a profound path that valued meaning over form, and her interpretation inspired potters and martial artists across the world. As Dao porcelain became prized and triggered breakthroughs, a beggar named Zhao Liu found his broken bowl sold for a fortune and was forced to abandon his idle life.

• Ji Ya told Gu Mingchao that his Dao porcelain fused painting and stone carving, and that its plainness revealed the essence of the Dao.
• Gu Mingchao hosted Ji Ya at the Vast Heaven Sect and escorted her out, while news of her praise spread across the world.
• Master potters endorsed Ji Ya’s explanation, and potters and sects began pursuing Gu Mingchao’s plain Dao porcelain as its value soared.
• Cheng Xiaotian fired porcelain at a kiln beside Martial Emperor City and broke through to Half-Step Mystic God, prompting other sects and Lineages to build kilns.
• A wealthy merchant recognized the broken bowl held by beggar Zhao Liu as Half-Step Dao porcelain, and it sold for a fortune that forced Zhao Liu to start a business instead of living idly.

Dao Porcelain spread across the three continents, but every potter who tried to copy Gu Mingchao could make only Half-Step Dao Porcelain, convincing Chu Xinghe that Gu’s unique achievement came from being exceptionally untalented. As the year’s festival approached, the Vast Heaven Sect’s managers returned, and Qin Xiangqian came back as the celebrated but uneasy manager of the Vast Heaven Chamber of Commerce.

• Potters held a Dao Porcelain Assembly and spent half a month trying various methods, but they produced only Half-Step Dao Porcelain and failed to match Gu Mingchao’s work.
• Chu Xinghe concluded that Gu Mingchao succeeded because his porcelain-making talent was exceptionally poor, and he noted that the grand elder could not expand production because Gu could not reproduce Dao Porcelain consistently.
• Heavy snow covered the Haotian Mountain Range as the Vast Heaven Sect’s managers returned for the approaching festival, and Tieniu greeted Chu Xinghe with a bear hug while preparing to draw his blade.
• Qin Xiangqian had risen from western-branch president to the Vast Heaven Chamber of Commerce’s sole vice president and de facto manager, gaining enough influence to affect the fortunes of kingdoms.
• People in Haotian City praised Qin Xiangqian and sought business with him, but he grew alarmed and insisted that his status came from being Chu Xinghe’s trusted aide.

Qin Xiangqian and Lu Chengqing came to report to Chu Xinghe, but Sima Bian and Shi Biao revealed that the Ning Clan’s Earth Spirit Gushing Spring water was undercutting the Vast Heaven Sect’s spirit medicine business. The elders gathered at Haotian Palace and agreed that the sect had to face the Ning Clan’s price war openly, leaving Chu Xinghe secretly delighted by the threat of losses.

• Qin Xiangqian and Lu Chengqing visited Chu Xinghe, who waved away their business reports because he already knew how the chamber was doing.
• Sima Bian and Shi Biao told Chu Xinghe that spirit medicines were failing to sell on the Spirit Beast Continent because the Ning Clan’s spring water was cheaper and just as effective.
• Chu Xinghe happily brought Sima Bian and Shi Biao to the Great Elder, who summoned the sect elders and Mu Bai to discuss the crisis.
• Ma Liang suggested that the Demonic Sect destroy the Ning Clan’s Earth Spirit Gushing Spring, but the Great Elder rejected the plan as dishonorable.
• The elders agreed that the Vast Heaven Sect had to meet the Ning Clan’s price war openly, while Chu Xinghe privately celebrated the prospect of losses.

Chu Xinghe persuaded the Vast Heaven Sect to answer the Ning Clan’s spirit medicine challenge with a price war, ordering the sect to undercut the Ning Clan despite the losses. As the war began, Hua Xichen’s Great Prophecy Art predicted that both sides would lose while Chu Xinghe would win, leaving him baffled.

• Ma Liang accepted the First Elder’s argument that the Vast Heaven Sect had to answer the Ning Clan openly rather than use force.
• Chu Xinghe proposed pricing the sect’s goods below the Ning Clan’s, hoping to outlast it in a contest of losses.
• Shi Biao said the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring was inexhaustible, delighting Chu Xinghe and confirming his plan to keep the price war going.
• After the meeting, Chu Xinghe told Shi Biao and Sima Bian to have the Northern Branch and Vast Heaven Trading Company undercut the Ning Clan by ten percent.
• Zheng Yu and Hua Xichen struggled to understand why the Vast Heaven Sect had started a price war against the Ning Clan.
• Hua Xichen’s Great Prophecy Art declared that the Ning Clan and Vast Heaven Sect would both lose, but Chu Xinghe would win.

Chu Xinghe drove the Vast Heaven Sect into a ruinous price war with the Ning Clan, thrilled when the Misfortune Compass finally moved and expanded the discounts to deepen the losses. As the New Year festival arrived, Chu Cheng voted for himself to foil the setup he expected from Chu Xinghe, who independently chose to vote for himself instead.

• Hua Xichen was baffled when the Great Prophecy Art predicted defeats for both the Vast Heaven Sect and Ning Clan, but a victory for Chu Xinghe.
• Clan Head Ning cut the price of the Ning Clan's holy water, and Chu Xinghe ordered Shi Biao and Sima Bian to lower the Vast Heaven Sect's prices until its medicines sold at a loss.
• When Sima Bian suggested limiting purchases, Chu Xinghe rejected the idea and ordered increased production and an extra discount for major customers.
• The Vast Heaven Sect's medicines sold in huge quantities, including a major order from Martial Emperor City, while Chu Xinghe celebrated the losses.
• The Vast Heaven Sect celebrated the New Year with lanterns and ballots for its annual awards, and Chu Cheng wrote his own name to prevent Chu Xinghe from making him the sole recipient of a vote again.
• Chu Xinghe decided not to vote for Chu Cheng and wrote his own name on the ballot, unaware that Chu Cheng had also voted for himself.

The Vast Heaven Sect held its annual gathering, where disciples celebrated the sect’s growth and honored their achievements. Chu Xinghe won the sect’s most outstanding disciple award, but Chu Cheng’s single vote once again prevented a unanimous result and left the gathering stunned.

• The grand elder and business stewards praised the sect’s progress as disciples celebrated, while Feng Fei and the civil engineering disciples lamented their exhausting work and hoped for annual leave.
• Mu Bai represented the Spirit Crane Palace and claimed he had wasted the year, while the civil engineering representative wished to take leave or see other palaces surpass them in cultivation.
• Shu Da won the current class’s most outstanding disciple award, and Bai Jingyan unanimously received its most popular disciple award.
• The grand elder announced Chu Xinghe had received 298,658 votes for the sect’s most outstanding disciple, then revealed Chu Cheng had received one vote.
• The gathering found Chu Cheng’s ballot, written in blood, and White Tiger and the others fell silent at his brazen show of defiance.

Chu Xinghe celebrated the New Year before escalating the Vast Heaven Sect’s spirit medicine price war with the Ning Clan, causing the sect’s losses to grow and the Misfortune Compass to move again. As the Ning Clan hired Tantai Jing’s demon-demon troll army to spread criticism of him, Chu Xinghe welcomed the damage to his reputation as another sign that his plan was working.

• Chu Xinghe won the title of the Vast Heaven Sect’s most hated person for a second consecutive year and promised to win in the coming year, including securing a holiday or female construction disciples for the construction division.
• The sect held its New Year’s feast, where the Ouyang Lineage’s Nebula Spirit Cats prepared food and the Artifact Refining Palace looked forward to the Beast God Spirit Temple for cooking techniques.
• The White Tiger Holy Venerable, She Meng, She Kui, Ma Liang, Liu Bo, and others left the feast to visit Chu Cheng at the outer sect and offer New Year’s greetings.
• As the Vast Heaven Sect and the Ning Clan cut spirit medicine prices, Chu Xinghe’s losses increased and the Misfortune Compass began moving; he sent Mu Bai and others to reclaim spirit fields while leaving Mu Xiaoqi to grow medicines.
• Clan Head Ning hired Tantai Jing to unleash the demon-demon troll army against Chu Xinghe, and Tantai Jing’s campaign spread doubts about the Vast Heaven Sect’s price war.
• Chu Xinghe saw the public criticism and privately welcomed the loss of reputation alongside his growing resource losses.

As criticism mounted over Chu Xinghe’s costly spirit-herb price war, the Vast Heaven Sect defended him and Clan Head Ning learned that the losses were negligible compared with the sect’s wealth. At a Ning Clan meeting, Ning Hang proposed targeting Chu Xinghe’s reputation through his Voodoo Arts.

• Demonic Sect rumors accused Chu Xinghe of recklessly wasting the Vast Heaven Sect’s resources, while he welcomed the resulting damage to his reputation.
• The Vast Heaven Sect said Chu Xinghe had earned the right to spend its resources, and Clan Head Ning was shocked by its support.
• Tantai Jing told Clan Head Ning that calculating how long the Vast Heaven Sect would take to run out of resources would cost eight hundred thousand spirit stones, so Clan Head Ning declined.
• Clan Head Ning convened a meeting to find a way to use the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring against Chu Xinghe, as the price war was draining both sides without giving the Ning Clan an advantage.
• Ning Hang argued that the Ning Clan should attack the Vast Heaven Sect’s reputation by targeting Chu Xinghe, then proposed approaching the problem through Chu Xinghe’s Voodoo Arts.

Elder Ning Hang proposed that the Ning Clan challenge Chu Xinghe in poison arts, relying on the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring to neutralize poisons. Chu Xinghe refused the challenge to avoid the Misfortune Compass turning the tables, and the grand elder sent Ji Changfeng to meet the Ning Clan with Ouyang Ling.

• Elder Ning Hang persuaded the Ning Clan to challenge Chu Xinghe in poison arts, using the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring as their advantage.
• Clan Head Ning spread the challenge across the three continents, and the Vast Heaven Sect and outsiders condemned the Ning Clan for using such an obvious advantage.
• Chu Xinghe welcomed the chance to lose at first, but feared the Misfortune Compass might make him win, so he tore up the challenge.
• The Ning Clan sent three challenges a day and taunted the Vast Heaven Sect for refusing to accept.
• The grand elder considered sending Jiuli, but Feng Fei revealed that Jiuli was pregnant, so the grand elder sent Ji Changfeng and Ouyang Ling instead.

The Vast Heaven Sect accepted the Ning Clan’s challenge, and the grand elder named Ji Changfeng, Ouyang Ling, and Chu Xinghe to represent the sect. Chu Xinghe volunteered to keep Ouyang Ling from fighting unless necessary, while the Ning Clan remained confident that its Earth Spirit Gushing Spring would ensure victory.

• Ji Changfeng volunteered to challenge the Ning Clan, and the grand elder ordered Ouyang Ling to accompany him despite the elders’ warnings.
• Ouyang Ling eagerly promised to poison the whole Ning Clan, so Chu Xinghe volunteered to go and try to prevent her from killing anyone.
• The Vast Heaven Sect accepted the challenge, and news that Ouyang Ling would attend frightened factions across both continents.
• Clan Head Ning celebrated the sect’s acceptance and trusted the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring to defeat Ji Changfeng and Chu Xinghe.
• Clan Head Ning contacted Tantai Jing to buy information about Ouyang Ling, but Tantai Jing pretended the communication signal was failing and hung up.

Chu Xinghe brought Ouyang Ling to the Ning Clan for the poison arts showdown and learned that her fearsome reputation had grown from a survival tactic after she and her brother were left vulnerable. She reassured him that the Vast Heaven Sect was her true bottom line, then proved she still had her own definition of acceptable retaliation by poisoning the Ning Clan's three eldest daughters into growing beards.

• Clan Head Ning dismissed the alarming stories about Ouyang Ling after learning she was only a seventh-rank support cultivator, then welcomed Chu Xinghe, Ji Changfeng, and Ouyang Ling to the Ning Clan estate.
• Chu Xinghe stayed close to Ouyang Ling and warned her not to cause trouble as Clan Head Ning introduced his daughters and hosted a banquet.
• Ouyang Ling told Chu Xinghe that her ruthless reputation had helped protect her when people targeted her during the Ouyang Lineage's decline, and said the Vast Heaven Sect and Chu Xinghe were now her bottom line.
• Chu Xinghe comforted Ouyang Ling and recognized that her past had shaped her behavior, believing she no longer needed her protective coloring within the sect.
• Chu Xinghe heard that Clan Head Ning's three eldest daughters had suddenly grown beards, and Ouyang Ling admitted she had poisoned them because they had been making eyes at her bottom line.

Chu Xinghe brought Ouyang Ling to apologize to Clan Head Ning, who accepted three rings of resources as sincere compensation for her prank. At the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring, Ji Changfeng and Ouyang Ling failed to poison the water, leaving Chu Xinghe convinced the Ning Clan would win their contest and ruin his undefeated reputation.

• Clan Head Ning cured his three daughters’ beards with holy water from the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring and blamed Ouyang Ling for the prank.
• Chu Xinghe gave Clan Head Ning three Qiankun rings of resources as compensation, and Ning happily accepted them as proof of Xinghe’s sincerity.
• Chu Xinghe and Clan Head Ning spent the night hoping Ouyang Ling would—or would not—prank the Ning Clan’s other daughters, but she did nothing.
• Clan Head Ning took Chu Xinghe and Ji Changfeng to Earth Spirit Valley, where Ji tested the spring with many poisons and found that it neutralized every one.
• Ouyang Ling also tried her unusual poisons on the spring, but they failed, and Chu Xinghe concluded the Ning Clan would defeat him in the coming contest.

Chu Xinghe eagerly anticipated losing the poison arts contest against the Ning Clan, but the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring had already defeated Ji Changfeng and Ouyang Ling. With the match drawing a huge crowd, Ouyang Ling stepped forward to try her poisons while Chu Xinghe waited for his turn.

• Chu Xinghe celebrated Ouyang Ling’s earlier defeat and believed the spring would help him lose the contest and secure his Ninth Rank.
• Poison masters across the three continents argued over whether the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring or Chu Xinghe would prevail.
• The Ning Clan opened Earth Spirit Valley to the public, and a vast crowd gathered for the contest.
• Ji Changfeng used a series of powerful exotic poisons, but the spring purified them all, so he conceded.
• Ouyang Ling apologized to Chu Xinghe and stepped forward, while he secretly looked forward to losing when his turn came.

Ouyang Ling failed to affect the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring with her strange poisons, then realized its lawlike ability purified poison. She discovered that ordinary seasonings were not purified and began fusing a new medicine from potent divine-grade pills, ending with a bottle of divine-grade Evil Repeller Pills.

• Ouyang Ling used all her strange poisons on the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring, but it purified every one of them.
• Ouyang Ling recalled Chu Xinghe's explanation that the spring purified all poisons and realized she could not overcome its law with poison arts alone.
• Ouyang Ling poured soy sauce, vinegar, and other seasonings into the spring, which remained unpurified and colored the water.
• Ouyang Ling ignored Elder Ning Hang's demand that she stop and brought out a fusion sphere and various pills.
• Ouyang Ling fused several potent divine-grade medicines, then revealed a bottle of divine-grade Evil Repeller Pills.

Ouyang Ling fused a bottle of divine-grade Evil Repeller Pills with other potent drugs, causing the Fusion Ball to explode and its contents to turn the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring pink. The spring’s medicinal effects remained, but its pink water left Chu Xinghe convinced that Ouyang Ling had made it too dangerous to drink, and he resolved to keep her from leaving the Vast Heaven Sect.

• Ouyang Ling added divine-grade Evil Repeller Pills to the Fusion Ball, which exploded and sent a multicolored substance into the Earth Spirit Gushing Spring.
• The spring turned pink and surged over a hundred meters high, raining droplets that left people across Earth Spirit Valley dazed and acting strangely.
• Chu Xinghe used Evil Repeller to clear people’s minds and Azure Shadow Flame to burn the pink droplets away.
• Ouyang Ling celebrated her success after the spring stabilized, believing she had proved that potent drugs could bypass its poison-purifying laws.
• Chu Xinghe realized the pink spring was now too dangerous to drink and decided Ouyang Ling should never leave the Vast Heaven Sect.