Chapter Summaries

Ren Yi realized that completing three days’ worth of servant work could fulfill the Instance’s hidden survival condition and earn a reward. Lu Zihan led him upstairs to meet Lu Qing, where Ren Yi recognized the strange animal in her arms.

• Ren Yi reexamined the participant panel and inferred that the Instance’s rules concealed a clearance condition tied to identity and work.
• Ren Yi concluded that servants could escape their role by completing all their contracted work, and that he had already accumulated three days’ worth by working multiple jobs.
• Ren Yi followed Lu Zihan upstairs after realizing Lu Qing had to present his contract-completion reward.
• Ren Yi met Lu Qing, Master Fu, and A-Mu beside a dining table on the second floor.
• Ren Yi recognized the striped, partly bald-tailed animal in Lu Qing’s arms and felt guilty.

Ren Yi cleared the Lu Family Courtyard Instance and stayed behind to watch what happened to the participants who failed. Lu Qing explained that they had been summoned to pay the Instance’s rent, leaving Ren Yi curious about how the eerie world operated.

• Lu Qing recognized Ren Yi’s performance, made him Lu Zihan’s study attendant, and invited him to dine with them.
• Ren Yi spent the remaining days relaxing with Lu Zihan and collecting emotional gains from the participants.
• When the countdown ended, Ren Yi cleared the Instance and chose to remain for the extra exploration period.
• The failed participants dissolved into floating characters that flew toward the night sky.
• Lu Qing congratulated Ren Yi and explained that the remaining participants had gone toward paying the Instance’s rent.

Lu Qing explained that the [Lu Family Courtyard] was one of many Instances nested within a high-level ghost’s vast Instance world, and that the space belonged to Lu Zihan’s father. After Ren Yi reached full E-Rank progress, Lu Qing offered to teach him how to make Energy Crystals so he could continue managing his energy.

• Lu Qing told Ren Yi and Lu Zihan that the Instances in the space formed a vast interconnected world and paid rent to its owner.
• Lu Zihan learned that his father owned the space, and Lu Qing scolded him for misunderstanding the rent arrangement.
• Ren Yi told Lu Qing his experiment had filled his E-Rank progress bar, then worried that his ticket to the Three-City World would be useless before he could level up.
• Lu Qing said Ren Yi could only level up after returning to the Alliance and offered to teach him to make Energy Crystals.
• Lu Qing explained that Energy Crystallizations were special currency among Instance bosses and gave Ren Yi two crystals.
• When Ren Yi expected an explanation of how to make the crystals, Lu Qing told him to eat them first.

Lu Qing gave Ren Yi an Energy Crystal containing knowledge, then brought him and Lu Zihan to a feast with the weird beings of the Lu Family Courtyard. Ren Yi apologized to Chaye, who revealed that the Instance had been made easier and warned him not to get cocky.

• Lu Qing explained that the Energy Crystal made by Lu Zihan's father could transfer knowledge directly into Ren Yi's mind, and Ren Yi swallowed it.
• Lu Qing led Ren Yi and Lu Zihan downstairs, where Master Fu and the courtyard's weird beings had gathered for a meal.
• Lu Qing thanked the weird beings for looking after the youths and told everyone to eat, and they eagerly devoured the strange dishes.
• Ren Yi sampled the food and approached the Shadow Ghost to apologize for his actions during the Instance.
• The Shadow Ghost introduced himself as Chaye, said the Instance's difficulty had been lowered and its rules had restricted everyone, then promised to show Ren Yi his true abilities next time.
• Ren Yi praised Chaye for pulling down a flying opponent and asked whether his ability was related to shadows.

Ren Yi asked Chaye about shadow abilities and his brother Ren Man’s strange power, but he could not describe Ren Man’s true form. Ren Yi and Chaye became friends, and after a night at the Lu family home, Ren Yi prepared to leave for the Three-City World.

• Chaye explained that his moonlit shadow ability let him travel through shadows and disrupt others’ coordination, but he struggled to kill participants and level up.
• Ren Yi told Chaye that Ren Man had stored a chair in a shadow and admitted he did not understand his brother’s ability or his own awakening.
• Ren Yi tried to describe Ren Man’s true form but found he could not put the vivid image into words.
• Chaye eagerly exchanged Ghost Net contacts with Ren Yi, hoping to meet Ren Man and learn from him, while Ren Yi agreed to treat Chaye to a meal.
• Ren Yi and Chaye chatted as Lu Zihan talked with the Parasol Tree and Lu Qing watched; after the banquet and a night’s rest, Ren Yi’s departure for the Three-City World arrived.

Ren Yi descended into the Three-City World wearing Mo Ming’s skin and set out across the wasteland toward Holy City. A grotesque Mutant Beast burst from a sand dune and confronted him.

• Ren Yi told Lu Qing he planned to keep using Mo Ming’s skin to gather energy, and Lu Qing warned him to keep the amulet on and remember that he might be separated from Lu Zihan.
• Ren Yi and Lu Zihan descended into the Three-City World, where the Ghost Net announced a seven-day calamity countdown and the rule, “Do not feel the same pain together.”
• Ren Yi checked Mo Ming’s equipment and used the worn map to determine his location near Holy City.
• Ren Yi headed toward Holy City, but his senses alerted him to something approaching from behind a sand dune.
• A huge, humanlike centipede Mutant Beast burst from the dune, and Ren Yi stared at the revolting creature.

Ren Yi killed a mutant centipede and discovered that its death had produced Positive Emotions, an energy source he stored for later use. He reached the outskirts of the Holy City and found it bustling with unusual activity.

• Ren Yi revealed part of his true form to freeze the mutant centipede, then killed it with his machete.
• Ren Yi traced a new burst of Positive Emotions to the centipede and stored the energy as a point of light.
• Ren Yi set out toward the Holy City, then used illusory tentacles to cross the wasteland quickly.
• Ren Yi spotted the Holy City and its enormous deity statue, which resembled the sword pendant he carried.
• Ren Yi approached the main gate and noticed that the city was unusually busy with mobilization.

Ren Yi was discovered outside the Holy City and mistaken for a divinely chosen savior after surviving an eerie trial. He entered the city under the title of Divine Son, secretly gathering positive emotions and planting Seeds of Illusion as he was taken to meet its religious leaders.

• A search party recognized Ren Yi from a portrait and hailed him as the Divine Son proclaimed by the Pope.
• Ren Yi learned that the Holy City believed he had received a divine revelation and knew how to save the world, so he claimed he would explain the method to the Pope.
• The search party brought Ren Yi back to the Holy City, where believers welcomed him and the convoy grew as it passed other search parties.
• Ren Yi absorbed positive emotions and secretly planted Seeds of Illusion in people along the route as a precaution.
• Ren Yi learned that the Pope ruled the Holy City, that its people worshiped Azure, and that they regarded eerie Instances as divine trials; he reached a chamber beneath the sacred statue to meet the leaders.

Ren Yi attended a meeting between the Holy City, King City, and Ember City, where the leaders discussed survivors of the Divine Selection Trial. As the prime minister challenged Ren Yi’s legitimacy, the pope questioned King City’s claims, leaving Ren Yi suspecting that no one had actually returned to King City.

• The pope welcomed Ren Yi before a video communication console and introduced him as the Holy City’s divine son, returned from the Divine Selection Trial.
• The pope asked King City to present its participants who had cleared the trial, and Ren Yi learned that King City claimed to have surviving heroes.
• King City’s prime minister refused to bring them to the meeting and challenged Ren Yi to explain the revelation he had received.
• The Ember King accused the prime minister of trying to obtain the method of saving the world from Ren Yi, while the prime minister questioned Ren Yi’s survival.
• The pope said the Holy City’s livestream showed no King City participants discovering the trial’s core conditions, and Ren Yi realized the cities could not see the final settlement.
• Ren Yi suspected that no one had truly returned to King City and that the prime minister was concealing the truth.

The Ember King explained to Ren Yi and the city leaders that the coming apocalypse would erase the entire world and that Instance participants could earn clues to a Method of Salvation. He asked Ren Yi what information he had received, while Ren Yi privately believed Ember City had only seven days left.

• King City's prime minister worried that none of its participants had returned and resented the Ember King for preventing him from questioning Holy City’s participants.
• The Ember King told Ren Yi that the coming apocalypse would destroy humanity, Mutant Beasts, the cities, and the entire world.
• Ren Yi questioned the Ember King’s warning, while the pope allowed him to handle the discussion.
• The Ember King and Ren Yi explained the Instance rule against sharing the same pain, which caused anyone who broke it to become Blank.
• The Ember King revealed that he had cleared an Instance and received a piece of information called the Method of Salvation.
• Ren Yi concluded that Ember City had only seven days left, and the Ember King asked what Method of Salvation Ren Yi had received.