Chapter Summaries

Zhou Qing and his companions explored Sky City, where Dugu Bo discovered that a silver cube could absorb and convert his Soul Power. They met Regu, the Sixth Layer’s Guardian and a Recorder, who accepted his missing mechanical arm and agreed to guide them.

• Dugu Bo struck the silver cube and found it could disperse his Soul Power and absorb his Time Solidification skill.
• Zhou Qing had Romantina record the golden patterns that appeared on the cube.
• A fast-moving figure emerged from a fortress, and Zhou Qing’s group learned he was Regu, a Guardian who offered to guide them.
• Zhou Qing returned Regu’s mechanical arm, which Regu attached and quickly healed around.
• Riko and the others introduced themselves to Regu, and Dugu Bo reflected on how easily Soul Masters took offense.

Zhou Qing and the others met Losi, Regu’s fellow Guardian, and learned that the bridge to Sky City’s castle was also a musical instrument. As they crossed, Zhou Qing sensed its notes vibrating through his body and stirring his Qi and Blood.

• Regu explained that his name combined with Losi’s to form Regulus, and said knowing what it meant could let the group bypass the Guardians’ tests.
• Regu corrected Zhou Qing’s guess about Losi’s name, insisting that its “si” meant longing.
• The group met Losi at Sky City’s gate, where she called them children for being unable to explore the Starry Sky.
• Regu and Losi led everyone across a floating bridge whose black-and-white slabs played musical notes.
• Zhou Qing stepped onto the bridge and sensed its notes vibrate through his cells, stirring his Qi and Blood.

Zhou Qing and the others reached the castle, where Regu and Luo Si explained the dangers of returning to the Sixth Layer and revealed their extraordinary bodies. The group learned that the two were Recorders, though their lifelike emotions left Zhou Qing unconvinced that they were mere machines.

• Luo Si invited the challengers to stay in the castle, and Rabbit Girl asked how ordinary people would manage the journey between layers.
• Luo Si and Regu explained that the White Sphere Device would return after an hour and that crossing the Energy Sea required flight and an exceptionally strong body.
• Regu bit and swallowed a chunk of silvery metal, and Zhou Qing found the metal too hard to dent but Regu's skin soft and poreless.
• Luo Si identified herself and Regu as Recorders, while Romantina examined Regu and confirmed that he was male.
• Riko stroked Luo Si's cheek and praised how soft and smooth it felt, making Luo Si blush and boast that she was slightly more exceptional than Regu.

Regu and Luo Si explained that Lyra had passed their test and gone to another planet, then revealed the history of Earth’s journey to its current star system and the origins of Martial Souls. They left Zhou Qing and the others with the revelation that the Abyss Ruins was a remnant of a Planetary Engine repurposed to nurture the Planet’s Will, whom they called Mother.

• Regu explained that the Swarm had severed his arm after he lost consciousness and attacked it while escorting an Explorer through the Energy Sea.
• Regu recognized Riko as Lyra’s daughter and said he had placed her in a device that shielded her from the rising Aura Field.
• Luo Si told Riko that Lyra had passed the Guardians’ test, and Regu revealed that the Eighth through Twelfth Layers had never been opened.
• Regu and Luo Si explained that Earth had been moved from its original Star System to a new one, where a new energy led humans to awaken Martial Souls.
• Luo Si recounted how humanity’s civil war and the rise of powerful beasts left the scientists to build the Abyss Ruins as a surviving Planetary Engine foundation.
• Regu revealed that the scientists had contacted the Planet’s Will and used the planet’s magnetic field to turn the ruins into a cradle for Mother’s body.

Regu and Luo Si explained how the Cradle’s seven layers embodied humanity’s growth and protected Earth’s Planet’s Will, while also preparing humans to explore other worlds and resist the God Realm. Zhou Qing realized that Earth’s culture had spread across the Douluo Universe and that Earth had hidden the wounded Silver Dragon King from pursuit.

• Regu described the first three layers as stages of childhood and human exploration, while Zhou Qing reflected on how ordinary people could still have their own strengths.
• Luo Si and Regu explained that the Fourth Layer’s Steel Base preserved knowledge and curiosity, and that the Fifth and Sixth Layers stored resources and housed the intelligent swarm.
• Regu and Luo Si said the Seventh Layer was the center of Mother’s incubation, where humanity would choose to defeat them and seek new homes beyond Earth.
• Regu and Luo Si revealed that humans used spacetime passages to travel to other worlds and treated the God Realm as a hypothetical enemy that might oppress humanity.
• Regu explained that scientists concealed Mother from Fourth-Dimensional lifeforms by activating Sky City and manipulating Earth’s magnetic field and energy.
• Zhou Qing, Romantina, and the others realized that Douluo Continent had originally been Earth and that its humans were the planet’s original inhabitants.

Regu and Luo Si explained the origins and purpose of Sky City, the experiments that changed Douluo Star’s rules, and the First Generation Angel God’s failed attempt to create a new God Realm. They left Zhou Qing and the others with Sky City’s distant mission: nurture Mother, explore the stars, and build an interstellar environment together.

• Ice Empress grew angry about humans hunting the ice silkworm clan, while Sky Dream Ice Silkworm urged her to keep listening.
• Luo Si and Regu revealed that the Swarm Kingdom experiment disrupted a passage to another space containing intelligent life and seventy-two pillars.
• Regu explained that creatures from the Fourth-Dimensional Space added rules to Douluo Star, restricting human growth and hindering technological progress.
• Regu and Luo Si described Sky City as humanity’s legacy and revealed that the First Generation Angel God had tried and failed to turn Earth into a new God Realm.
• Luo Si explained that the Ascension Curse was meant to fuse humans with their martial souls, but altered rules made perfect fusion rare.
• Regu and Luo Si stated Sky City’s mission to nurture Mother, explore space, and unite against the God Realm, leaving Riko embarrassed by their comment about people seeking self-satisfaction.

Regu and Luo Si explained why Lyra had helped protect future generations and described Sky City’s music-centered design and the science of vibration. They welcomed Zhou Qing’s group to stay, then offered to show them more of the Seventh Layer and Mother’s material body.

• Regu and Luo Si told Riko that Lyra had acted to protect her descendants from real dangers, and Riko vowed to follow her mother’s example as an Explorer.
• Zhou Qing and his companions entered the castle, where Regu and Luo Si demonstrated the tubular bells built into the stairway and explained the castle’s musical theme.
• Regu explained that vibration produced waves, frequencies, and energy that could influence the world, while Luo Si described music as a blessing from humanity’s Cradle to future generations.
• Luo Si told the group that reaching the Seventh Layer meant they had to rely on themselves to progress, though they could persuade Regu and Luo Si to send them upward.
• Regu and Luo Si gave the group rooms and offered to show them other places; Zhou Qing agreed and asked to learn about Mother, whose material body lay beneath Sky City.

Zhou Qing and the others descended to the laboratory and encountered Mother, a body connected to the Planet’s Will. Regu explained Mother’s power and the relationship between Divine Thrones, faith, and the Divine Realm, leaving Zhou Qing eager to study the Fourth-Dimensional Space.

• Regu and Luo Si activated the Elevator with their Spiritual Power, bringing the group to a vast underground laboratory.
• Zhou Qing and the others saw Mother, a towering woman seated inside a cultivation device, and sensed the life embodied in her crown.
• Zhou Qing recognized Mother as part of the Planet’s Will and asked whether she had awakened before.
• Regu said Mother had awakened when angels descended twenty thousand years ago, defeated them, and transformed him and Luo Si.
• Regu explained that Mother could command the planet’s energy, while gods relied on the authority granted through Divine Thrones and the Divine Realm.
• Zhou Qing considered the Fourth-Dimensional Space a subject he wanted to study.

Zhou Qing and the others explored Sky City and learned why its founders had destroyed advanced knowledge, then watched Milotic leap through the rice paddies and heard how their growth represented the choice between remaining carefree and accepting responsibility. Zhou Qing resolved to create an ideal world where future generations could retain the sweetness of childhood.

• Regu and Luo Si showed Zhou Qing and the others the rooms beneath Sky City and explained that the founders had erased advanced knowledge so later generations could develop along their own path.
• Zhou Qing considered why humanity had planned to spread beyond Earth and concluded that the original goal might have been to escape the God Realm's control.
• Regu and Luo Si led the group to the city wall, where they saw Milotic leaping from the rice paddies.
• Dugu Bo admired the Milotic as beautiful water snakes, while Romantina and Rabbit Girl focused on Regu's revelation that the adults tasted bitter.
• Regu explained that Milotic had been genetically designed as an educational metaphor for the responsibilities and effort involved in growing up.
• Zhou Qing reflected that childhood's pure sweetness could sustain people as adults and resolved to create an ideal world that preserved it for future generations.

Zhou Qing learned that the Cradle’s trial offered passage to another world and used his Soul Guidance Core Crystal to activate a one-person round-trip teleportation. He departed alone, promising Dugu Bo he would return within twenty-four hours.

• Regu and Lus explained that challengers could earn one-way or round-trip passage by defeating them, while another way to pass was to state the true meaning of Regulus.
• Romantina asked whether Lyra had defeated both guardians, and Lus revealed that she had defeated Regu when he had lost an arm.
• Zhou Qing showed the guardians his Soul Guidance Core Crystal, and they confirmed it could be used as a round-trip ticket without a challenge.
• Regu explained that the crystal could teleport only one person to a randomly selected world suitable for human life, and that using it would establish coordinates for future passageways.
• Zhou Qing placed the crystal in the teleportation platform, which split it in two and began the countdown as he prepared to leave.
• Dugu Bo asked how long Zhou Qing would be gone, and Zhou Qing promised to return within twenty-four hours.

Zhou Qing arrived in a lava cavern and protected Ji Dong, a fellow Earth transmigrator, from the heat. They watched a mysterious woman emerge from the magma, and she confronted them after they spoke in a language she could not understand.

• Zhou Qing appeared in the lava cavern and used the energies of spring, summer, autumn, and winter to shield Ji Dong from the heat.
• Ji Dong and Zhou Qing realized they were both from Earth, and Ji Dong introduced himself as a former God of Wine.
• Zhou Qing told Ji Dong that copper poisoning, not the wine’s quality, had caused his death in his previous life.
• A woman rose from the magma after drinking the wine drifting toward her, and Zhou Qing called her an exhibitionist and possibly an ancient Monster.
• The woman approached the boys and demanded to know what they had been muttering about.

Ji Dong spoke with the naked woman, Blazing Flame, and explained how he had made his cocktail, Midnight Sun. While he tried to resist her allure, Zhou Qing studied the magma lake and learned enough of the local language to follow their conversation.

• Zhou Qing told Ji Dong to test Blazing Flame while he observed, promising to intervene if Ji Dong was overwhelmed.
• Ji Dong greeted Blazing Flame and identified the drink she had tasted as alcohol, though she doubted it because it differed from human alcohol she knew.
• Blazing Flame stretched openly as Ji Dong stared at her, leaving him with a nosebleed and convinced she might be a Succubus.
• Ji Dong described the ingredients and meaning of Midnight Sun, explaining that a true cocktail conveyed the mixer's emotions.
• Zhou Qing studied the Earth Core Magma Lake to help refine his Inner Scenery and learned the basics of the Five Elements Continent's language.

Zhou Qing explained to Lie Yan that the God Realm was a system for extending planetary authority and that nonhuman gods were barred because of the Dragon God’s oath. He left Lie Yan and Ji Dong with a startling account of the God Realm’s history and a shared insult for the Dragon God.

• Zhou Qing questioned Ji Dong about Earth and recognized that the Five Elements Continent shared Earth’s liquor brands.
• Ji Dong introduced himself and Zhou Qing explained that he had arrived from another world during a cross-dimensional experiment.
• Lie Yan bristled at Zhou Qing’s comparison of her home to hell, but Zhou Qing’s Martial Soul Possession and Qi Field Power matched her pressure.
• Zhou Qing warned Lie Yan that god-level nonhuman beings were hunted by the Sentient Creatures of the Fourth-Dimensional Space.
• Zhou Qing explained that the God Realm amplified the authority of gods and described the Dragon God’s oath barring members of the Beast Race from godhood.
• Lie Yan agreed with Zhou Qing’s insult of the Dragon God.

Zhou Qing proposed cooperating with Lie Yan to resist the God Realm, offering a way for her to use god-level power without attracting its notice. Lie Yan tentatively accepted and learned that Zhou Qing and Ji Dong were reincarnated adults, while Zhou Qing explained that the struggle would require humans and intelligent nonhuman races.

• Ji Dong cursed the Dragon God at Lie Yan's demand, and Zhou Qing and Lie Yan discussed how the Dragon God's actions and later Deities' rules restricted nonhuman races.
• Zhou Qing proposed that he and Lie Yan cooperate against the God Realm, and Lie Yan asked him to swear that he could conceal her use of god-level power.
• Zhou Qing swore an oath to the God Realm, then admitted that not everything he had said was true; Lie Yan decided to provisionally trust his unusual cultivation method.
• Zhou Qing showed Lie Yan half of a Soul Guidance Core Crystal and explained that it could enable travel between two planets, arguing that humans and intelligent nonhuman races would be needed in their resistance.
• Zhou Qing revealed that Ji Dong was a reincarnated adult, then admitted that he too had been reborn and claimed his strength made him a suitable partner for Lie Yan.

Zhou Qing urged Lie Yan to become a qualified empress by letting the Underground World's civilization develop instead of suppressing it. He argued that its intelligent races might one day coexist with humans, leaving Lie Yan surprised and Ji Dong wary of the sacrifices that would entail.

• Zhou Qing told Lie Yan to take charge of the Eighteen Layers of the Underground World and govern it properly.
• Zhou Qing explained that Lie Yan's strict limits on city-state populations had pushed the intelligent races back to a primitive way of life.
• Zhou Qing criticized Lie Yan for destroying the races' chance to build a unified civilization that could negotiate with humanity.
• Lie Yan asked whether coexistence with humans was truly possible, and Ji Dong pointed out that it would require many sacrifices.

Zhou Qing chastised Lie Yan for failing to use her power responsibly, then explained that he needed to inspect her true body to investigate the Earth Core Magma Lake. As Lie Yan revealed her Earth Fire Red Lotus, Zhou Qing told Ji Dong that Earth had become Douluo Continent after the Wandering Earth Project encountered a space-time wormhole.

• Zhou Qing told Lie Yan that her power and long lifespan made her responsibility to the planet greater, and compared her unfavorably with Ji Dong's determination to pursue winemaking.
• Lie Yan and Zhou Qing traded teasing remarks at Ji Dong's expense before Lie Yan asked what Zhou Qing needed her to do.
• Zhou Qing asked to inspect Lie Yan's true body, and Lie Yan summoned her enormous Earth Fire Red Lotus from the Earth Core Magma Lake.
• Lie Yan explained that her humanlike appearance was an energy form, and Zhou Qing described how Soul Beasts could transform into humans after reaching Hundred-Thousand-Year cultivation.
• Zhou Qing explained to Ji Dong that Earth had become Douluo Continent after the Wandering Earth Project carried it through a space-time wormhole into a domain with extraordinary energy.

Zhou Qing revealed his past life and challenged Ji Dong to consider whether he was merely an orphan from the Five Elements Continent or the God of Wine Li Jiedong from Earth. Ji Dong resisted Zhou Qing’s ideals but was captivated when Zhou Qing argued that recreating Jade Liquid Nectar required understanding civilization, not just personal memories.

• Zhou Qing described his humble origins, powerful Martial Soul, and choice to retain his past-life identity while pursuing ideals from his former world.
• Zhou Qing’s Mind-Sense Qi Field stirred Lie Yan’s true bodies and let her sense the planet’s will, while Ji Dong recalled his past life and resisted the field without being knocked unconscious.
• Zhou Qing reassured Ji Dong that he did not have to choose a grand ideal and asked about his dream of recreating the Jade Liquid Nectar that had killed him in his previous life.
• Zhou Qing argued that the wine’s essence came from his homeland’s history and civilization rather than personal emotion, leaving Ji Dong unable to dismiss the idea.
• Zhou Qing hinted that even greater wines existed, tempting Ji Dong to pursue more than recreating Jade Liquid Nectar.

Zhou Qing transformed into Lie Yan and used his connection to her true body to awaken the planet’s circulation, revealing Lie Yan’s role in regulating magma throughout the Underground World. Lie Yan recognized the responsibility as her own and resolved to shoulder it.

• Zhou Qing told Ji Dong that surpassing Jade Liquid Nectar required creating something new, leaving Ji Dong to reflect alone.
• Zhou Qing sensed Lie Yan’s aura and transformed into her likeness, then stepped onto the Earth Fire Red Lotus without being harmed by the magma.
• Zhou Qing discovered that Lie Yan’s true body was a stone at the junction of the Earth Core Magma Lake and the Earth Fire Red Lotus.
• Zhou Qing circulated the Innate Internal Scripture Chart, causing magma to flow through the Eighteen Layers of the Underground World and awakening a planetary rhythm that Lie Yan sensed.
• Lie Yan understood that her mission was to regulate the planet’s magma, heard underground creatures praise her, and felt ashamed that Zhou Qing was carrying out her responsibility for her.

Zhou Qing taught Lie Yan how to blend her aura with the planet and urged her to rule the Underground World responsibly. Before leaving, he challenged Ji Dong to decide whether he would live as Li Jiedong or Ji Dong, and left him questioning whether he would commit himself to serving the masses.

• Zhou Qing used the Earth Fire Red Lotus to understand the planet’s energy circulation and strengthen his Inner Scenery World, astonishing Lie Yan with how completely he blended into his surroundings.
• Zhou Qing told Lie Yan to study the planet’s rhythms, guide the intelligent races of the Underground World, and choose a human spokesperson; Lie Yan looked to Ji Dong.
• Zhou Qing left a Soul Guidance Core Crystal with Lie Yan as an anchor for travel between the two worlds, then asked Ji Dong whether he was Li Jiedong or Ji Dong.
• Zhou Qing told Ji Dong that choosing Li Jiedong would make them comrades, while choosing Ji Dong would mean returning to a new life and acting justly with his power.
• Zhou Qing challenged Ji Dong to mix the passion of serving the masses into his drinks, then asked whether emotion was merely flowery embellishment as he brought out wine ingredients and blood from the Abyss Ruins.

Ji Dong challenged Zhou Qing to a mixing contest and created Golden Crow's Demise, a cocktail that used the heat of the Underground World and his Magic Power to express the persistence and sorrow of his previous life. Lie Yan tasted it and confirmed that Ji Dong had infused his emotions into the drink.

• Zhou Qing proposed a mixing contest, and Ji Dong accepted after tasting Zhou Qing's low-alcohol Fruit Wine.
• Lie Yan supplied Ji Dong with bottles of liquor from the human world and agreed to judge the contest.
• Ji Dong mixed vodka, gin, tequila, liqueurs, fruit, sugar, and Fruit Wine, using the Underground World's heat and his Magic Power.
• Ji Dong performed his Hou Yi Shooting Down the Nine Suns technique, burning his palm as he tossed and caught the shaker nine times.
• Ji Dong served Lie Yan Golden Crow's Demise, and she drank it and sensed his persistence and sorrow.
• Ji Dong explained the cocktail's recipe and said the emotion he infused came from his past life as a God of Wine.