Chapter Summaries

Chen Shi fought off a group of men who had sold him, killed the innkeeper, and escaped the restaurant's destructive golden-core blast with Hu Feifei. They headed to see Gongzhou Province's Provincial Education Commissioner, where Hu Feifei continued to warn him about the province's corruption.

• Chen Shi wounded the six strongmen who attacked him and severed the tendons in one man's hand.
• The innkeeper unleashed his black golden core, but Chen Shi cut his neck with his sword qi and escaped the restaurant.
• The innkeeper's golden core erupted, destroying the restaurant and killing the innkeeper, his wife, the servants, and the strongmen.
• Hu Feifei found Chen Shi outside and led him away with the black pot and wooden cart following behind.
• Hu Feifei explained that she had sold human traffickers into hard labor and told Chen Shi to visit the Provincial Education Commissioner with her.
• Hu Feifei and Chen Shi reached the Governor-General's Academy as she cautioned him against trying to change the world.

Chen Shi and Hu Feifei reached Gongzhou for the Autumn Provincial Examination and learned that powerful local associations worshiped evil sui as protective godmothers. After settling into the crowded Official Posthouse, Chen Shi awoke at night to find a shadow gnawing on a sleeping scholar’s leg.

• Chen Shi and Hu Feifei registered at the Governor-General's Academy and headed to the Official Posthouse, where they met Zhao Kaiyun and heard about Gongzhou’s major associations.
• Chen Shi and Hu Feifei saw Granny Minjiang enter the Cao Lao Association’s estate, and Zhao Kaiyun explained that incense had turned her into a protective godmother.
• Chen Shi recognized the father and daughter from Xinxiang County on the Minjiang and learned they had fought off the Cao Lao Association’s members, Altar Master Cao Yunshen, and Granny Minjiang.
• Chen Shi saw the monstrous Red Mountain Empress and worried that Gongzhou’s many powerful evil sui godmothers could cause a disaster despite the city’s officials.
• Chen Shi moved into the Official Posthouse with Zhao Kaiyun, went to sleep, and awoke to find a shadow gnawing a sleeping scholar’s leg down to the bone.

Chen Shi killed a Tianmu Association disciple who had transformed into a black bear and sought Red Mountain Hall’s protection. As Tianmu arrived to demand Chen Shi, the Red Mountain Empress intervened.

• Chen Shi killed the black bear demon and used a Soul Summoning Talisman to awaken the injured scholar it had attacked.
• Chen Shi and Zhao Kaiyun discovered the demon was a Tianmu Association disciple and brought her token to Red Mountain Hall for protection.
• The Crane Boy accepted Chen Shi’s incense and relayed that the Empress would shelter him overnight, while warning that Tianmu’s people were coming to kill him.
• Director Lu offered Chen Shi a martial instructor position, and Chen Shi agreed to join Red Mountain Hall for its stipend and opportunities to earn more.
• Chen Shi used a Wind Settling Talisman to stop a gale that injured Director Xiao’s Nascent Soul, then an old woman identifying herself as Tianmu demanded that Red Mountain hand him over.
• The Red Mountain Empress answered Tianmu as the old woman’s enormous face filled the courtyard.

Chen Shi was captured by the Tianmu Association’s old woman, but the Red Mountain Empress healed him by refining the malevolent Qi in his body. After discovering that the Empress recognized his small temple, Chen Shi agreed to take her out for a stroll and secretly carried her away inside it.

• The old woman of the Tianmu Association wrapped Chen Shi in her tongues and fled, but the Crane Boy destroyed the tongues and caught Chen Shi before he hit the ground.
• Director Lu and Director Xiao brought the paralyzed Chen Shi before the Red Mountain Empress, who refined the malevolent Qi in his body with purified moonlight.
• The Red Mountain Empress recognized Chen Shi’s small temple and told him how Yutian City had helped her control her power and established the Red Mountain Society.
• Chen Shi promised to take the Red Mountain Empress out for a stroll, and she emerged from the Blood Taisui as a little girl in red.
• After the Empress fully healed Chen Shi, he hid her inside his small temple and left, worrying that he was stealing the Red Mountain Empress after only just agreeing to join Red Mountain Hall.

Chen Shi joined Red Mountain Hall as an instructor and spent the morning accompanying Red Mountain Empress around Gongzhou City. After learning that she had been born at Yanxia Ridge, he traveled there with her and discovered a suspended temple named Mazu Temple in the rift valley.

• Red Mountain Empress helped Chen Shi regulate his qi, and Director Lu registered him as a Red Mountain Hall instructor and gave him a token.
• Chen Shi took Red Mountain Empress, Black Pot, and the wooden cart through the city, where the empress ate food and bought toys while Black Pot concealed their strange behavior from onlookers.
• Chen Shi spent his money on the empress and learned that Tianmu Association was expanding and used begging, transforming living creatures into beasts, and abducting and dismembering people to sustain itself.
• Chen Shi asked Red Mountain Empress where she had been born, and she led him to Yanxia Ridge south of the city.
• Chen Shi found a split mountain ridge, a sea beyond it, and a suspended temple in the rift valley, where he identified the name Mazu Temple.

Chen Shi explored Mazu’s ruined temple, where his offering of incense stirred divine power and Red Mountain Empress sensed movement within. After his cultivation advanced through meditation, Han Mingyu confronted him over the death of his disciple and attacked with the Tianmu Association’s Life Harvesting Dolls, prompting Chen Shi to prepare to fight back.

• Chen Shi deduced that Mazu’s temple had once faced the sea, offered incense at its empty shrine, and left as divine power began gathering there.
• Red Mountain Empress’s meditation drew Chen Shi into a profound state that advanced his Golden Core cultivation and produced strange radiant effects.
• Chen Shi left the posthouse for Red Mountain Hall and encountered Han Mingyu, who accused him of killing his disciple Qiu Yingying.
• Han Mingyu sent a dozen Life Harvesting Dolls to attack Chen Shi, and Red Mountain Empress warned him that they were children cruelly transformed into weapons.
• After learning how the Tianmu Association made the dolls, Chen Shi asked Red Mountain Empress to help him fight the association, promised to take her out to play, and declared that he would kill someone.

Chen Shi destroyed Han Mingyu’s life-harvesting dolls, sent their tormented spirits toward reincarnation, and pursued Han Mingyu to the Tianmu Association’s Life Harvesting Hall. After killing Han Mingyu, Chen Shi entered the incense hall and considered wiping it out, while the Red Mountain Empress demanded three days out in return.

• Chen Shi shattered one life-harvesting doll’s jar, used a Rebirth Talisman to guide the dead child within it toward the underworld, and destroyed the jars of Han Mingyu’s other eleven dolls with sword qi.
• Chen Shi sent the remaining dolls’ spirits toward reincarnation, and Han Mingyu fled after losing all twelve of his life-harvesting dolls.
• Han Mingyu ran through his disciples and ordered them to block Chen Shi, but Chen Shi’s Zi Wu Zhan Xie Sword killed the eleven Tianmu Association cultivators as he pursued him.
• Han Mingyu reached the Life Harvesting Hall, where disciples were tending dolls and discussing his lost disciple, before Chen Shi’s sword qi killed him at the entrance.
• Chen Shi entered the Life Harvesting Hall and asked whether they should uproot the entire incense hall, and the Red Mountain Empress agreed on condition that he take her out to play for three days.

Chen Shi stormed Life Harvesting Hall and slaughtered Instructor Hu and the ambush in its front courtyard, but stopped before confronting the hall director, whose Nascent Soul aura was beyond his certainty. After seeing the children’s souls and finding the mutilated Zhao Kaiyun begging for death, Chen Shi began summoning the Nine Heavens Wind and Thunder Talisman to avenge him.

• Red Mountain Empress agreed that three days could not be reduced, while Chen Shi sensed Instructor Hu and the disciples waiting in ambush inside Life Harvesting Hall.
• Chen Shi entered the front courtyard and killed the ambushers with swift punches, kicks, and sword qi as Instructor Hu’s Life Harvesting Dolls attacked.
• Instructor Hu unleashed his seven-revolutions golden core, but Chen Shi killed him with the Stabbing Sword Style; the dolls then tore apart the corpses and wrecked the courtyard.
• Chen Shi sensed the Life Harvesting Hall director’s Nascent Soul aura and began retreating, while the director and the disciples in the back courtyard held their positions.
• Chen Shi saw the dead children’s souls and found the mutilated Zhao Kaiyun, who begged Chen Shi to kill him.
• Chen Shi refused to abandon Zhao Kaiyun and summoned the Nine Heavens Wind and Thunder Talisman, vowing to avenge him.

Chen Shi attacked Life Harvesting Hall and fought its incense master, Yu Daozhi, while heavenly thunder struck the compound. After killing Yu Daozhi and the hall’s disciples, Chen Shi found Zhao Kaiyun dead among the ruins and carried him away.

• Yu Daozhi sensed Chen Shi approaching and hoped he would retreat, but Chen Shi broke his spiritual fixation and summoned wind and thunder with a Qi-and-blood talisman.
• Chen Shi smashed through the courtyard wall in his three-headed, six-armed Templo Body and battled Yu Daozhi, whose soul-demons tore at Chen Shi while his weapons shattered against Yu Daozhi’s defenses.
• Chen Shi’s small temple captured Granny’s divine statue avatar, and heavenly lightning struck Yu Daozhi’s Nascent Soul as it attacked, killing him.
• Chen Shi rampaged through the back courtyard and killed the remaining Life Harvesting Hall disciples before dismissing his Templo Body.
• Chen Shi found Zhao Kaiyun dead beside the collapsed gateway, picked him up, and walked away as the incense hall collapsed behind them.

After Chen Shi slaughtered the Tianmu Association’s Life Harvesting Hall to avenge Zhao Kaiyun, Gongzhou’s officials issued a warrant for his execution while the rival associations watched the fallout. Chen Shi woke from his injuries at Red Mountain Hall and was greeted by Hall Master Yu Tiancheng.

• Chen Shi returned to Red Mountain Hall carrying Zhao Kaiyun’s corpse, reported that he had destroyed the Life Harvesting Hall, and collapsed from his injuries.
• Red Mountain Hall’s directors learned that Chen Shi had killed all seventy-four people in the Life Harvesting Hall, including Yu Daozhi, Han Mingyu, and Hu Yiqi, and destroyed Tianmu’s divine statues.
• Cao Yunshen and Altar Master Feng learned that the lone attacker was Chen Shi, a newly appointed Red Mountain Hall instructor who had come to Gongzhou for the imperial examinations.
• Provincial Governor Fei Tianzheng and the gathered officials agreed to strip Chen Shi of his scholarly status, issue a warrant and execution bounty, and demand compensation from Red Mountain Hall.
• Granny Sha, Hu Xiaoliang, and Green Goat learned that Chen Shi had been targeted by the officials, while Li Tianqing wrote to him about the coming examinations and a strange corpse cloud near Xijing.
• Chen Shi woke at Red Mountain Hall, made his way to the door, and met Hall Master Yu Tiancheng.

Chen Shi met Red Mountain Hall Master Yu Tiancheng, who praised his actions against the Tianmu Association and refined the Tianmu avatar’s power into a blood bead for him. When Wu Daozheng and Tianmu’s forces attacked, Red Mountain Hall rallied to fight, and Chen Shi followed as Yu Tiancheng and Red Mountain Empress battled them.

• Yu Tiancheng praised Chen Shi for avenging Zhao Kaiyun and promised to take responsibility for any trouble caused by destroying the Tianmu Association’s incense hall.
• Chen Shi summoned the captured Tianmu avatar, and Yu Tiancheng refined its extraordinary power into a blood bead that he gave to Chen Shi.
• Wu Daozheng arrived with Tianmu Association experts, clashed with Yu Tiancheng, and fled as Red Mountain Hall prepared for battle.
• Chen Shi followed the Red Mountain Hall fighters in a magically animated wooden cart while Black Pot chased after it.
• Tianmu attacked the talisman masters with her tongues, but Red Mountain Empress struck her and joined Yu Tiancheng in fighting Tianmu and Wu Daozheng.
• Chen Shi urged Yu Tiancheng to strike with all his strength, and Yu Tiancheng praised Chen Shi’s learning as Red Mountain Empress lunged back at Tianmu.

Red Mountain Hall and the Tianmu Association fought across the Min River until Xia Luoying and General Xia intervened, but Chen Shi’s presence and Black Pot’s strange power disrupted their attempts to identify him. The Tianmu Association and officials fled in fear, Black Pot fainted, and Chen Shi was left wondering about the dog’s origins.

• Red Mountain Empress and Tianmu fought in the Min River while Yutian City battered Wu Daozheng, and Cao Yunshen’s skippers stabilized the water to protect the riverbanks.
• Red Mountain Hall slaughtered Tianmu Association members along the banks until Xia Luoying ordered both sides to stop and demanded an accounting.
• Cen Xuefu and Xia Chuwen tried to settle the dispute by making Yutian City surrender Chen Shi, but Yutian City denied that Red Mountain Hall had an instructor by that name.
• General Xia, Xia Luoying, Cen Xuefu, Wu Daozheng, and the Tianmu Association all found themselves unable to remember Chen Shi’s name after looking toward Black Pot.
• Tianmu and Wu Daozheng fled in terror, Cen Xuefu and the others withdrew, and Black Pot fainted beside Chen Shi’s cart.
• Chen Shi carried Black Pot into the cart, then wondered where Grandpa had found the dog and imagined making money by breeding it.

Chen Shi taught Yutian City that the Red Mountain Hall’s methods for opening the Heavenly Gate were dangerously mistaken, then guided Gu Yunshu through the process and revived him. He revealed that Chen Yindu had taught him the correct method, including the need to lock the Heavenly Gate, leaving Yutian City stunned by how many cultivators had died from their errors.

• Red Mountain Hall’s members and the authorities repeatedly forgot Chen Shi’s name, so they could not pursue the arrest warrants against him.
• Chen Shi received a letter from Li Tianqing in Quanzhou and sent back news of his recovery, cultivation, and warning about people being sold in Gongzhou.
• Yutian City offered Chen Shi Red Mountain Hall’s Great Method of Crimson Blood Incarnation, but Chen Shi rejected using a second golden core and nascent soul as an external body.
• Yutian City showed Chen Shi the paralyzed Gu Yunshu and the spirit tablets of cultivators who had died attempting to open the Heavenly Gate.
• Chen Shi guided Gu Yunshu through opening the Heavenly Gate and emerging from the aperture in half an hour, restoring his ability to speak and move.
• Chen Shi explained that cultivators had to lock the Heavenly Gate to preserve their primordial yang, and Yutian City realized Red Mountain Hall had followed false methods.

Chen Shi taught Red Mountain Hall’s rune masters the correct cultivation methods, helping many advance, then opened his own Heavenly Gate. While exploring as a Golden Core, he discovered Black Pot entering another world through the kitchen stove and reading a ghost book.

• Chen Shi calmed Yutian City’s evil transformation, then taught Red Mountain Hall’s instructors how to lock the Heavenly Gate and cultivate the Golden Core.
• Chen Shi discovered that Black Pot’s new ability had affected memories, leaving him unable to recognize his own name.
• Chen Shi guided Red Mountain Hall’s rune masters, and several opened their Heavenly Gates while two reached the Nascent Soul Realm.
• Chen Shi healed, opened his Heavenly Gate in half an hour, and sent his black Golden Core out to explore.
• Chen Shi watched Black Pot enter green flames beneath the kitchen stove, fight monsters in another world, and return carrying a ghost book.
• Chen Shi wondered whether Black Pot’s mysterious past connected it to the palace in that other world.

Li Tianqing traveled to Gongzhou, where he encountered the mysterious ferrymen from the Underworld and the aged monk Kuzhu before discovering that Chen Shi was wanted for killing seventy-four people. He reunited with Chen Shi at the posthouse, where the chapter ended with news that Kuzhu had died.

• Chen Shi learned from Crane Boy that Hall Master Yu was struggling to suppress demonic corruption and had suffered several relapses.
• Li Tianqing reached Gongzhou by boat with Kuzhu and his young disciple; the boat was dragged into the Underworld, but Kuzhu’s Golden Body Buddha returned it to the Yang World.
• The boat girl warned Li Tianqing that Kuzhu’s death would be dangerous because he had lived beyond his appointed time, then vanished with the boat after they reached Gongzhou.
• Li Tianqing entered Gongzhou, saw Chen Shi’s wanted notice for killing seventy-four people, and realized people were forgetting Chen Shi’s name.
• Li Tianqing reunited with Chen Shi at the posthouse, where he also saw Kuzhu and his disciple arrive.
• During the night, someone announced that Kuzhu had died.

Chen Shi and Li Tianqing discovered that Chan Master Kuzhu’s golden body had begun leaking dust that transformed people into giant mushrooms, so they rushed to evacuate Gongzhou. Chen Shi ordered Red Mountain Hall to clear the city, and Yu Tiancheng took responsibility for the potentially fatal charge.

• Chen Shi and Li Tianqing discussed Black Pot’s origins and wondered whether the boat girl and her daughter had been watching them before they learned Chan Master Kuzhu had died.
• Chen Shi identified two apertures that Chan Master Kuzhu needed to seal, and Monk Wuchen confirmed that his master’s Heavenly Gate and navel were sealed.
• Monk Wuchen transported Chan Master Kuzhu’s golden body to Daxing Zen Temple, where a monk’s eyes popped out and mushrooms grew as dust sprayed from a pinhole in the body.
• Chen Shi learned that Chan Master Kuzhu’s golden body might have absorbed moonlight and ordered the Xiucai to leave Gongzhou, while Hu Feifei charmed them into following her.
• Chen Shi and Li Tianqing hurried to Red Mountain Hall and warned its members to evacuate the city, but Director Lu cautioned that the order could bring a death sentence.
• Yu Tiancheng ordered Red Mountain Hall to carry out Chen Shi’s evacuation order and said he would bear all the charges.

Chen Shi and Li Tianqing witnessed Chan Master Kuzhu’s demonic mutation spreading from Daxing Zen Temple, while Gongzhou’s officials abandoned the city and its people. As the city faced imminent disaster, Chen Shi proposed using Empress Shi Ji’s head to create a Ghost and God Domain before Kuzhu’s demonic domain consumed them.

• Director Lu persuaded Red Mountain Hall to warn the people of the coming demonic mutation, while Fei Tianzheng and other officials dismissed the warning and planned to punish Yutian City.
• A report confirmed Chan Master Kuzhu had entered nirvana, and Bailiff Tang arrived transformed by mushroom growth before erupting into a spreading infestation in Fei Tianzheng’s hall.
• The high officials fled or ordered their households to evacuate after colorful dust rose from Daxing Zen Temple, while Fei Tianzheng refused to warn the city’s residents.
• Chen Shi and Li Tianqing saw that Kuzhu’s golden body had broken and his mutated primordial spirit had formed a giant mushroom above the temple.
• Realizing the citizens could not escape Gongzhou, Chen Shi proposed activating Empress Shi Ji’s head to create her Ghost and God Domain before Kuzhu’s demonic domain spread.

Chen Shi borrowed Red Mountain Empress’s divine power to unleash Empress Shi Ji’s Ghost and God Domain across Gongzhou City, petrifying its inhabitants while Chan Master Kuzhu’s Demonic Domain took hold. As Red Mountain Empress’s power ran out, Chen Shi went to search for the rampaging Yutian City and encountered a mushroom-headed creature studying heavenly human transformation.

• Chen Shi used the Crane Boy’s divine power and Red Mountain Empress’s assistance to summon the Head of Shi Ji and spread its Ghost and God Domain.
• Yutian City, corrupted into a giant rabbit, fled the back courtyard as the Crane Boy pursued him.
• The Ghost and God Domain petrified people and things throughout Gongzhou City and beyond, while Fei Tianzheng and other powerful figures set out for Daxing Zen Temple to confront Kuzhu’s demonic primordial spirit.
• General Xia, Inspecting Official Zhang, Xu Ming, Gao Canghai, Yang Gui, Jiang Shouqing, and other officials also headed for Daxing Zen Temple.
• After Red Mountain Empress’s divine power was exhausted, Chen Shi left Li Tianqing and the Black Pot to guard her and went looking for Yutian City.
• Chen Shi found a mushroom-headed being beneath a giant mushroom, proclaiming that it had discovered the mystery of heavenly human transformation and eternal life.

Chen Shi fought mushroom demons in Yutian City, taught Red Mountain Hall talisman masters how to ward off the deadly dust, and worried that starvation would put the weakened Red Mountain Empress in danger. The chapter ended with three Golden Core mushroom demons charging him as he used the Haunted House Suppression Talisman to animate a house and ensnare them.

• Chen Shi and Instructor Wan’s talisman masters burned and chopped apart a mushroom creature that had once been Chan Master Kuzhu, then Chen Shi taught them the Dust Purification Talisman.
• Red Mountain Hall’s talisman masters told Chen Shi that a huge, muscular rabbit had repeatedly rescued cultivators from danger, and Chen Shi suspected it was Hall Master Yu.
• Chen Shi sent the talisman masters back to Red Mountain Hall to learn the protective talisman and guard the weakened Red Mountain Empress.
• Chen Shi searched Yutian City and realized that petrified food and growing mushroom infestations could drive the Tianmu Association and other factions to target the Empress.
• Three Golden Core cultivators appeared as giant mushroom creatures and charged Chen Shi, who used the Haunted House Suppression Talisman to turn a nearby house into a monster that trapped them.

Chen Shi defeated the mushroom cultivators and learned that Master Kuzhu was searching for a new spirit child, while Fei Tianzheng and the others failed to overcome the demon domain with the Gongzhou Earthly Record. Kuzhu then attacked Chen Shi, but an unknown force inside Chen Shi’s sea of consciousness repelled him, leaving Kuzhu fleeing in fear.

• Chen Shi used talismans and brain worms to make the three giant human-shaped mushrooms lose control, then killed the brain worms after the mushrooms collapsed.
• Chen Shi tested how a golden core could strengthen his attacks and wondered whether Master Kuzhu had become a demon seed.
• Fei Tianzheng, General Xia, and the others attacked Daxing Zen Temple with the Gongzhou Earthly Record, but Kuzhu’s mushroom-headed Buddha overpowered it and drove them away.
• Kuzhu told Monk Wuchen that he had found a more promising spirit child, then left to seek another candidate.
• Chen Shi found Yutian City transformed into a giant rabbit and watched him return to normal as Kuzhu’s spirit entered Chen Shi’s glabella.
• An unknown force inside Chen Shi’s sea of consciousness struck Kuzhu back out, badly injuring him and forcing him to flee.