Chapter Summaries

Jingxing tested the Cloud-Washing Ink-Tracer while Fu Xuan cared for him aboard the Starskiff as the Jidu Mirage descended toward Fanghu. A report said the Cloud-Gazing Mirror and a Divination Commission escort would arrive in ten days, and Fu Xuan quietly wrote about what might happen if the mirror was activated.

• Jingxing woke to find Fu Xuan had left him the Cloud-Washing Ink-Tracer, which let him condense more ink blocks while using less energy.
• Fu Xuan brought Jingxing porridge and rice cakes, and they saw the Vidyadhara moving eggs from the Molting Rebirth Hall by boat.
• Fu Xuan received Yaoguang's report that the Cloud-Gazing Mirror and a seventeen-person Divination Commission escort would arrive at Fanghu in ten days.
• Jingxing noticed Fu Xuan's booklet contained the unfinished line, "If the mirror is activated, I," but she covered it and told him they would divide their work.
• Fu Xuan rested her hand over Jingxing's as he made more ink blocks, then carried him back to bed when he was exhausted.
• Fu Xuan fed Jingxing that night, joked that she might keep him as a cat on the Luofu, and wrote in her booklet as rain thickened outside.

As the Cloud-Gazing Mirror arrived at Fanghu, Jingxing visited the Zhenhai Platform and discovered that Jingtian had been appointed its mirror guide. He returned to Fu Xuan without telling her about the appointment, leaving her unaware that guiding the mirror herself might be difficult.

• Over ten days, Fanghu's fog thickened and its mirage grew clearer while Jingxing steadily converted Path Energy and Fu Xuan delivered the pieces to Yaoguang.
• Fu Xuan told Jingxing that the Cloud-Gazing Mirror had arrived and would remain sealed on the Zhenhai Platform until the war ended.
• Jingxing went alone to the Zhenhai Platform, where he found the Cloud-Gazing Mirror covered beneath a cloth and saw that it looked like an ordinary old mirror.
• Jingtian inspected the mirror, completed its acceptance paperwork, and wrote his name in the register's mirror guide box.
• Jingxing returned to the Tidewatch Pavilion and told Fu Xuan that the mirror had looked shabby, but he did not mention Jingtian's appointment.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan reviewed a successful test of his creations against the Borisin and discussed the coming battle against the Jidu Mirage. After Fu Xuan left, Jingxing asked Yaoguang about the Cloud-Gazing Mirror, and Polka Kakamond warned him that a mirror could observe whoever saw their reflection in it.

• Fu Xuan received Yaoguang’s messages saying the allied forces had shifted their attack and the Jidu Mirage might descend within two days.
• Fu Xuan showed Jingxing a recording in which a Cloud Knight used one of his ink blocks to make Borisin vanish and suppress the Cloud Knights’ healing.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan discussed using their remaining creations against the Jidu Mirage and spoke about what would happen when Jingxing returned to the present.
• After Fu Xuan left to deliver boxes, Jingxing messaged Yaoguang to ask whether the Jingtian Diviner would be affected by the Aeon of the Hunt if she used the Cloud-Gazing Mirror.
• Yaoguang explained that Fu Xuan had been affected by the Hunt because she was bound to Jingxing, and Polka Kakamond appeared to warn Jingxing that a mirror could observe him.

Jingxing learned that using the Cloud-Gazing Mirror could cost Fu Xuan her life, and the two discussed her resolve to challenge her divination. As the Jidu Mirage prepared to descend, Jingxing left to confront it, while Fu Xuan’s choice remained unresolved.

• Jingxing confronted Fu Xuan about the cost of using the Cloud-Gazing Mirror, and she admitted it was a last resort to save her master.
• Yaoguang reported that the Jidu Mirage would fully descend the next day, while General Moon-Chaser wanted to unseal the Cloud-Gazing Mirror and Huyuan-Jun opposed it.
• Fu Xuan confessed that she wanted to take part in changing the divined outcome, and Jingxing vowed to stand beside her if she used the mirror.
• Jingxing promised Fu Xuan that, if they both survived, they would paint a landscape of Fanghu and a portrait of her.
• After breakfast, as the Jidu Mirage hung motionless over the city, Jingxing prepared to go deal with it.

As the Jidu Mirage descended on Fanghu, Jingxing used the energy from Yaoguang’s ink blocks and Fu Xuan’s restraints to paint against the living planet with the Cloud-Washing Ink-Tracer. He slowed its descent and began breaking apart its protrusions while Cloud Knights fought the Denizens of Abundance Allied Forces.

• Jingxing arrived at Fanghu’s outer harbor as the Jidu Mirage descended and the city prepared for disaster.
• More than a hundred ink blocks on the Jidu Mirage released energy connected to Jingxing and bound by Fu Xuan’s restraints.
• Jingxing used the Cloud-Washing Ink-Tracer to gather the energy into a net around the Jidu Mirage and began painting on its surface.
• Jingxing’s strokes broke apart the Jidu Mirage’s outward-growing ridges and visibly slowed its descent.
• Cloud Knights charged from the city and clashed with the Denizens of Abundance Allied Forces while Jingxing continued painting.

Jingxing destroyed the Jidu Mirage despite Polka Kakamond tempting him to ascend, choosing instead to keep his freedom and honor his promise to Fu Xuan and Yaoguang. With the Abundance forces fleeing and Fanghu’s defenders rallying, Fu Xuan reunited with Jingxing and thanked him.

• Jingxing sensed his Path Energy growing stronger as he painted away the Jidu Mirage, while the Denizens of Abundance failed to perceive him.
• Polka Kakamond urged Jingxing to take the final step toward becoming an Aeon, but he refused because he wanted to remain free and keep his promise.
• Jingxing poured his remaining Path Energy into his final stroke, causing the Jidu Mirage to vanish above Fanghu Xianzhou.
• Daylight returned, the Abundance forces scattered, and General Rongtao ordered Fanghu’s troops to pursue them.
• Jingxing rested on the pier, and Fu Xuan ran to him, embraced him, and called him her hero.

After the Denizens of Abundance Allied Forces fled Fanghu, Jingxing and Fu Xuan watched the city recover and waited for Senior Sister. Elsewhere, the Interastral Peace Corporation questioned the Xianzhou Alliance about Idrila, while Jingtian discovered that a divination predicting his death had changed.

• The Cloud Knights and Pearl-Bearers pursued the fleeing Denizens of Abundance Allied Forces across the tidal flats after Yaoguang's announcement.
• After nightfall, the Cloud Knights and Pearl-Bearers returned to Fanghu and counted their numbers as the city mourned its losses.
• Jingxing held Fu Xuan's hand and said that peace had returned, while Fu Xuan said they only had to wait for Senior Sister.
• Moon-Chaser ordered the Yaoqing to tell the Interastral Peace Corporation that its Cloud Knights were pursuing the remnants of Abundance and knew nothing else, and she worried that Feixiao had not returned.
• Jingtian found that the divination predicting Fu Xuan would cause his death had changed when the Jidu Mirage was destroyed, and suspected an Aeon had intervened beyond his calculations.

Jingtian learned that Yaoguang’s junior sister had changed the outcome of his divination, though he could not determine the price. Aboard the Starskiff, Fu Xuan confessed her feelings to Jingxing and invited him to return to the Luofu with her, before Polka Kakamond offered them an invitation to the Ninth Mechanism.

• Yaoguang told Jingtian that her junior sister had changed the outcome of his divination, so the Cloud-Gazing Mirror would not need to be opened and the Reignbow would not appear on the Fanghu.
• Jingtian questioned who had paid the price for changing the outcome, but his divination showed no apparent cost in either disciple’s destiny.
• Fu Xuan offered to pay Jingxing’s thirty-billion-Credit debt, and Jingxing explained that he had accepted it because the Light-Severing Sea had helped his eyes recover.
• Fu Xuan asked Jingxing to return to the Luofu with her as her beloved, and he promised to make her a fancy replacement hairpin.
• Polka Kakamond delivered an invitation for Fu Xuan and Jingxing to visit the Ninth Mechanism, then disappeared.
• Jingxing asked Fu Xuan to divine whether they should accept the invitation, saying he trusted her judgment.

Fu Xuan and Jingxing followed Polka Kakamond through a memory of Fanghu to the hidden Ninth Mechanism, where she explained that changing the timeline had marked them as anomalies. Polka Kakamond proposed anchoring their existence in the universe by returning to an earlier time.

• Fu Xuan's divination yielded no result, and she and Jingxing decided to set out the next morning.
• Polka Kakamond used the invitation to lead Jingxing and Fu Xuan through a colorless space, where Jingxing saw visions of Fanghu's destruction in its original history.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan reached the hidden Ninth Mechanism, a strange house containing Polka Kakamond's work.
• Polka Kakamond explained that their changes to the timeline left traces that could cause the timeline to reject them as anomalies.
• Polka Kakamond said they could anchor their existence in the universe by returning to an earlier time.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan chose to travel back to the era of the Swarm Disaster, hoping to find clues about the Vidyadhara’s ability to reproduce. After Yaoguang gave them her divinations and they packed, Polka Kakamond began sending them into the past.

• Polka Kakamond explained that Jingxing and Fu Xuan could travel to either the Twilight War or the Swarm Disaster, but could take only their bodies and would face mortal danger.
• Fu Xuan chose the Swarm Disaster because the Xianzhou had more records of that era, and Jingxing hoped to find traces of Permanence that could help the Vidyadhara reproduce.
• Yaoguang gave Fu Xuan two divinations and said she would remain anchored in the present once she recovered the Heavenly Wisdom Jade Knot.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan packed small bundles, leaving most of their belongings behind and carrying the invitation, the brocade pouch, and Fu Xuan’s intelligence booklet.
• Polka Kakamond appeared at the Starskiff, and gray spread around Jingxing and Fu Xuan as the pavilion, Yaoguang, and the present faded from view.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan arrived on a barren planet during the Swarm Disaster and helped a settlement defend itself from an approaching Swarm. They easily stopped the insects, and Jingxing wondered whether the Swarm's strength depended on the planet.

• Jingxing and Fu Xuan found themselves on what Jingxing recognized as Priva II, unable to contact anyone else.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan spotted a vast Swarm approaching a fenced settlement and decided to help its inhabitants.
• Fu Xuan identified a weak point in the settlement's defenses and moved to seal it while Jingxing confronted the Swarm.
• Jingxing trapped the insects with Path Energy as Fu Xuan repaired the gap, and the settlement's inhabitants watched the Swarm fall back.
• Fu Xuan joined Jingxing in defeating the insects, and Jingxing remarked that the fight felt easy.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan met Jenny and the Amber Lord Support Team after helping Priva II survive a Swarm attack, then agreed to travel with them and aid their work. As the convoy prepared to head west, Jingxing asked Fu Xuan whether she wanted to see the Amber Lord.

• After Jingxing helped drive the Swarm away from the town, Jenny arrived with the Amber Lord Support Team and thanked him and Fu Xuan for their aid.
• Jenny explained that her team had come from the Xideli System to transport supplies and help build the Amber Lord’s wall against the Swarm.
• Fu Xuan said she wanted to help the team and see the wall for the Xianzhou’s historical records, and Jingxing agreed.
• Jenny recorded Jingxing and Fu Xuan’s names and told them the convoy would head west at daybreak.
• That night, Fu Xuan began a diary entry about witnessing the Swarm Disaster on Priva II, while Jenny invited them to travel with the convoy to its base camp.
• Jingxing told Jenny they wanted to gather material from the Swarm, then asked Fu Xuan if she wanted to see the Amber Lord.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan traveled with Jenny’s convoy, helping settlements survive Swarm attacks while Fu Xuan recorded how people lived and where the Swarm struck. At the Amber Lord Support Team’s headquarters, Jenny announced they would leave in two days by spaceship to continue toward the Amber Lord.

• Jingxing and Fu Xuan joined Jenny’s convoy as it traveled west, using a blessed lantern to ward off the Swarm at night.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan defended a salt-producing settlement from the Swarm, while Jenny’s team brought its people essential supplies.
• Jingxing blocked Swarm-filled mine tunnels at a canyon settlement, then worked with Fu Xuan to turn the attacking bugs into amber.
• Jenny’s team delivered grain to a guarded settlement, while Fu Xuan recorded population, daily life, and the direction of past Swarm attacks.
• The convoy reached the Amber Lord Support Team’s headquarters, where Jenny said they would leave in two days by spaceship and continue toward the Amber Lord.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan helped Jenny’s team settle the debate over whether to aid the Amber Lord or protect the settlements on Priva II, and the group split its forces. The main force set course for Pier Point, where Jingxing reflected on the Swarm Disaster and the powers shaping the universe.

• Jingxing argued that defeating the Swarm required helping the Amber Lord, while Old Zhou was right that someone needed to defend the settlements on Priva II.
• Fu Xuan proposed splitting the team, and the next morning the main force departed while Old Zhou stayed behind with a smaller group.
• Jenny broke an amber piece in two and gave one half to Old Zhou so they could trust the Amber Lord to guide them back together.
• Jenny told Jingxing and Fu Xuan that their ship would reach Pier Point in twelve days, where the Amber Lord was building his wall.
• Jingxing reflected on the Interastral Peace Corporation’s connection to the Amber Lord and later examined Polka Kakamond’s motionless invitation before going to sleep.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan arrived at Pier Point with the Amber Lord Support Team and saw the Amber Lord’s immense protective body and the settlement beneath it. After parting from Jenny, they explored the city and Fu Xuan judged its society loosely organized despite its apparent abundance of resources.

• Jingxing and Fu Xuan watched the Amber Lord’s glowing ribbon from the spaceship as the passengers praised the Amber Lord and Fu Xuan recognized it as part of the Aeon’s divine body.
• The spaceship landed at Pier Point, where workers registered and inspected the Support Team’s standardized stone blocks.
• Jenny gave Fu Xuan information about Pier Point and parted from Jingxing and Fu Xuan to continue the team’s work.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan explored the city, where people left weapons outside restaurants and discussed stone deliveries to the Amber Lord.
• Fu Xuan observed the city’s notices and supplies and concluded that Pier Point had resources but lacked effective organization.

Fu Xuan and Jingxing explored the city and grew closer, but she reminded him that Xianzhou law and their different lifespans made a future together impossible. Jingxing said he would seek a way to change his lifespan for her, and Fu Xuan ended the day asking the Heaven-Mending Lord to bless her happiness.

• Fu Xuan explained how the Xianzhou studied history and discussed its faith in The Hunt with Jingxing.
• Fu Xuan and Jingxing ate together, then visited the factory district and its memorial stones.
• Fu Xuan bargained at stalls, and Jingxing bought her a hairpin after the elderly vendor called him her man.
• At the inn, Fu Xuan told Jingxing that Xianzhou law and her long lifespan made marriage and children with him impossible.
• Jingxing said laws could not govern their feelings and promised to seek a way to change his lifespan for Fu Xuan.
• Fu Xuan put on the hairpin and wrote in her diary, asking the Heaven-Mending Lord to bless her happiness.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan traveled through Pier Point just as the Amber Lord Support Team became the Interastral Peace Corporation. After reaching the Stone Gathering Field, they were summoned by the new corporation’s board of directors and met two powerful men.

• Jingxing woke before Fu Xuan, and the two prepared to continue their journey with the amber fragments they had.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan left the factory district for Pier Point’s largest settlement, the Stone Gathering Field.
• They found a crowd gathered around a stele announcing that the Amber Lord Support Team had been reorganized as the Interastral Peace Corporation.
• Two messengers invited Jingxing and Fu Xuan to speak with the board of directors, and they agreed to go.
• At a makeshift tent, Jingxing met two middle-aged men and felt the same sharp eye pain he had experienced when facing Xuzhao, only stronger.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan met IPC directors Louis Fleming and Dongfang Qixing, who recruited them to help fight the Swarm Disaster through a new department. After signing the contract, Jingxing planned to get a ship and begin making their mark on the era.

• Dongfang Qixing asked Jingxing and Fu Xuan about their origins and the future of the IPC, while Fu Xuan described how the Swarm Disaster would end.
• Jingxing asked who the directors were, and Louis Fleming proposed that they join the IPC’s planned Market Development Department to fight the Swarm and rescue people.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan agreed to lend their names to the department in exchange for logistical support and freedom to act, then signed the register at P47 compensation.
• After leaving the tent, Jingxing told Fu Xuan that Louis Fleming and Dongfang Qixing seemed to represent an Aeon or be closely connected to one.
• Jingxing said they should have a ship prepared so they could act on their new commitment and establish their existence in that era.

Jingxing received P47 benefits alongside Fu Xuan, then questioned Fleming about why the company was helping them. Fleming revealed that Jingxing was Idrila’s child and said Qlipoth’s help was preparation for the threat of Beauty’s “Temperance”; he also arranged a spaceship for Jingxing’s mission.

• Jingxing and Fu Xuan received amber P47 badges and learned about their new pay, accommodation, provisions, and other benefits.
• Fu Xuan recorded their benefits while Jingxing wondered whether their P47 rank meant they would manage a department.
• Jingxing visited Fleming and asked why they received high-level treatment despite not following Qlipoth.
• Fleming revealed that Jingxing was Idrila’s child and said Qlipoth would help him because he had acted during the Swarm Disaster.
• Fleming said the company was preparing for Beauty’s “Temperance,” confirmed Qixing was arranging a spaceship, and warned Jingxing not to treat his suspicions about others as facts.

Jingxing and Fu Xuan accepted Dongfang Qixing’s help and set out to aid a planet threatened by the Swarm. They arrived at Zeus Tehetra just in time to find its survivors facing imminent defeat.

• Jingxing told Fu Xuan about his conversation with Louis Fleming and his suspicion that their earlier encounter had been an aspect of the Aeon of Preservation, while Fu Xuan said her divination suggested they would achieve only half their purpose.
• Fu Xuan explained why she wanted to help Dongfang Qixing and said their efforts could also strengthen their standing in the era.
• Dongfang Qixing gave Jingxing and Fu Xuan a modified spaceship, a map of places under Swarm attack, and a registration slip with its department field blank.
• Fu Xuan divined that Zeus Tehetra was the best place for them to go, and Jingxing chose the planet after learning it was close to being overrun.
• Jingxing and Fu Xuan traveled for half a month and arrived at Zeus Tehetra, where the Swarm was advancing on the planet’s remaining illuminated region.
• Jingxing prepared to fight as Fu Xuan warned that, without their timely arrival, they might have reached the planet only to avenge its people.