Chapter Summaries

Lou Gao and Tang San presented their armors at a public contest in Gengxin City, with Zhou Qing establishing rules that included judging and mutual inspection. Lou Gao unveiled the powerful Thunder Dragon Armor, while Tang San’s Crimson Armor had yet to be revealed.

• Lou Gao praised Tang San’s craftsmanship but believed his own Thunder Dragon Armor would win, and Zhou Qing proposed judging both appearance and function before the smiths inspected each other’s work.
• Lou Gao invited Tang San to join the Blacksmith Association as Vice President, while Tang San said he would take the role if Lou Gao cooperated with the Red Assembly.
• The contest opened in Gengxin City’s auction hall, where Lou Gao said his armor would be auctioned but Zhou Qing announced that Tang San’s armor was not for sale.
• Lou Gao unveiled the Thunder Dragon Armor and explained that it used rare metals, the hide of an eighty-thousand-year Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, and his Qi and Blood to enhance its power.

Tang San and Zhou Qing revealed the Crimson Armor, a spirit-bearing armor that chose its own wearer and could grow with them. After it rejected Miles and Lou Gao, Lou Gao conceded defeat and pledged the Blacksmith Association to cooperate with the Red Assembly.

• Tang San unveiled the Crimson Armor and explained that it could protect its wearer, aid Soul Power recovery, and grow alongside a master it recognized.
• Miles tried to seize the armor, but it blasted him into a wall and rejected him.
• Zhou Qing announced that the Crimson Armor was not for sale and could be given to someone it accepted.
• Lou Gao tried to touch the armor and was thrown back, then demanded that Tang San explain his forging technique.
• Lou Gao admitted defeat and announced that he and the Blacksmith Association would cooperate with the Red Assembly.
• Miles objected to Lou Gao's announcement.

Lou Gao resisted Miles’s interference and auctioned the Thunder Dragon Armor, which Yu Tianheng bought for one billion Gold Soul Coins. After the crowd failed to approach the Crimson Armor, Zhou Qing showed that it could fit him.

• Lou Gao rebuffed Miles, who left the auction with his people, and Silong announced the Thunder Dragon Armor auction with a starting bid of five million Gold Soul Coins.
• Zhou Qing recognized the masked Yu Tianheng and told Tang San about his cultivation, injuries, and the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan’s weak foundations.
• Yu Tianheng won the Thunder Dragon Armor for one billion Gold Soul Coins and promised that the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan would pay within half a year.
• The guests who tried to approach the Crimson Armor were forced back, including Yu Tianheng, who asked whether anyone could wear it.
• Zhou Qing snapped his fingers, causing the Crimson Armor to split apart and fit itself around his body.

Zhou Qing revealed that Tang San’s Crimson Armor merged with its wearer and could be worn by people whose beliefs aligned with Zhou Qing’s. Lou Gao agreed to relocate the Blacksmith Association to the Red Assembly’s headquarters, while Miles left furious and determined to obstruct the move.

• Zhou Qing made the Crimson Armor disappear into his body, then showed that it could reappear and be removed like a Soul Bone.
• Tang San explained that the armor evolved while bonded to its wearer, cost one hundred billion Gold Soul Coins to forge, and rejected people whose beliefs opposed Zhou Qing’s.
• Yu Tianheng abandoned the idea of challenging Zhou Qing and Tang San after learning about the armor and the Red Assembly’s techniques.
• After the visitors left, Lou Gao asked Tang San to teach him how to forge the Crimson Armor, and Zhou Qing said the Blacksmith Association must relocate to the Red Assembly’s headquarters.
• Lou Gao agreed to move the association within the year and demanded that Miles repay his debt, enraging Miles and prompting him to leave while planning to stop the relocation.

Zhou Qing offered to move Lou Gao and the master blacksmiths who wished to leave Gengxin City to Holy Soul Village, despite the threat Miles and the city lord posed. He revealed that he had created Cloud Riding and Mist Traveling, a flight technique for carrying people, but had not yet explained its speed.

• Tang San considered Spirit Hall’s internal problems and questioned how it had once resolved a continent-wide currency inflation crisis.
• Lou Gao worried that Miles and Gengxin City’s lord would prevent the Blacksmith Association’s skilled craftsmen from leaving, and Zhou Qing proposed keeping the local association as a branch.
• Zhou Qing asked Lou Gao to gather the departing master blacksmiths and their families at the association, promising to take them to Holy Soul Village that day.
• After Lou Gao left to notify the craftsmen, Zhou Qing explained to Tang San how he had created Cloud Riding and Mist Traveling by studying seasonal air currents and linking the Twenty-Four Solar Terms to the human spine.
• Tang San marveled at Zhou Qing’s cultivation achievements and asked how fast Cloud Riding and Mist Traveling was, but the chapter ended before Zhou Qing answered.

Zhou Qing demonstrated his Cloud Riding and Mist Traveling by flying more than six hundred people from Gengxin City to the north, leaving the city’s leaders and observers astonished. Yu Tianheng reflected on how far Zhou Qing and Tang San had surpassed him and told the Imperial Fighting Team what he had witnessed.

• Zhou Qing explained to Tang San that his current limit was flying 24,000 li in an instant, while his theoretical maximum was 240,000 li.
• Lou Gao gathered more than six hundred people, including their families, outside the Blacksmith Association to leave for the Red Assembly headquarters in Holy Soul Village.
• Zhou Qing used Cloud Riding and Mist Traveling to lift the group into the sky and carry them north, astonishing the city lord, the Spirit Hall Hall Master, and the other onlookers.
• Yu Tianheng watched Zhou Qing and Tang San depart and realized that the ordinary Soul Master classifications could not measure their strength.
• Yu Tianheng returned to Storm Grand Canyon, told Dugu Yan and the Imperial Fighting Team what he had seen, and admitted he could not gauge the gap between himself and Zhou Qing and Tang San.

Yu Tianheng resolved to make his own way rather than rely on his clan, while Zhou Qing brought Lou Gao and the other smiths to Holy Soul Village to join the Red Assembly. Lou Gao began learning about the Assembly’s growing network and its plans for the blacksmiths.

• Yu Tianheng admitted that the Red Assembly had built its success through its own efforts, then vowed to make something of himself without relying on his elders.
• Zhou Qing transported Lou Gao, the forging masters, and their families from Gengxin City to the vicinity of Holy Soul Village.
• Aitaljia dragged Da Ming and Er Ming back to school after Zhou Qing caught them skipping class.
• Zhou Qing told Lou Gao about Aitaljia’s origins, the Abyss Ruins, and the Red Assembly’s trade with Tianming City and Abyss Town.
• Lou Gao and the newcomers registered for temporary Identity Cards, and Zhou Qing explained where the Red Assembly’s identity system was accepted.
• Lou Gao questioned whether the Red Assembly would eventually attack Heaven Dou, and Zhou Qing denied that it intended to do so.

Lou Gao joined the Worker-Peasant Council and agreed to teach at Hope Primary School after Tang San challenged him to try. In Nuoding City, Li Daniu led a protest that won tax cuts for city residents, then Zhou Qing guided him and Wang Sheng toward further work in the Council.

• Old Jack welcomed Zhou Qing and more than six hundred craftsmen, including Lou Gao, to Holy Soul Village, where Lou Gao joined the Worker-Peasant Council and studied Soul Tool techniques under Tang San.
• Tang San urged Lou Gao to teach at Hope Primary School, and Lou Gao agreed after Tang San challenged his spirit and experience.
• Li Daniu led nearly a thousand people through Nuoding City in a protest that surrounded Li Ai's residence and forced him to restore the city's former tax conditions.
• Li Daniu returned to Holy Soul Village and reported that he had secured tax cuts for city residents but not rural farmers; Zhou Qing explained why the protesters had dispersed and urged him to unite workers and farmers.
• Li Daniu devoted himself to the Worker-Peasant Council, while Zhou Qing encouraged Wang Sheng to guide its members and develop his own Cultivation System.

Zhou Qing developed External Bodies to ease the Red Assembly’s workload and used them to help Nuoding Academy recruit students under academic and character-based standards. The chapter left spies reconsidering their loyalties as the Red Assembly’s fair treatment and growing influence impressed them.

• Wang Sheng accepted Zhou Qing’s arrangement and temporarily went to work for the Worker-Peasant Council.
• Zhou Qing and Romantina developed External Body, allowing people to control Mental Child Spheres shaped like them through a connection between their Martial Souls.
• Zhou Qing, Tang San, Xiao Wu, Romantina, Wang Sheng, and others used their External Bodies to help assess applicants at Nuoding Academy.
• The academy required applicants to be official Soul Masters, literate and numerate, and of acceptable character, which Romantina assessed with Virtual Illusion.
• Spies at the recruitment tried to hide their identities, but some began considering defecting because the Red Assembly treated its workers better than their own forces did.

Zhou Qing and the other examiners eliminated visiting students who had ignored people in need, then revealed the power of their assessment to the remaining candidates. Qingzhu Zhu and Ning Rongrong met at Nuoding Academy and clashed over their histories, personalities, and Soul Power.

• Zhou Qing, Tang San, and Xiao Wu explained why selfish visiting students failed the assessment, and Zhou Qing transported them and their elders outside Nuoding Academy with a snap.
• Ning Rongrong and Qingzhu Zhu recognized that they both knew Zhou Qing and the others, and Qingzhu Zhu explained that they had formed the original Nuoding Team as children.
• Ning Rongrong mocked Qingzhu Zhu's chest, so Qingzhu Zhu grabbed her ear and warned that her spoiled temperament could get her expelled.
• Qingzhu Zhu said she had worked hard since her Martial Soul awakened and had reached level thirty-one, and Ning Rongrong revealed that she had reached the same level.

After Nuoding Academy's new students registered, Ning Rongrong and Qingzhu Zhu tried to reconnect with Zhou Qing, only to discover that he and the others had been using his Clones while handling Red Assembly business. The girls learned that Zhou Qing and Romantina had once merged, and joined forces in jealousy.

• Ning Rongrong and Qingzhu Zhu registered for the same dorm room and tried to get Zhou Qing to remember them, but his Clone brushed them off.
• The two girls found that Xiao Wu, Tang San, Romantina, and Wang Sheng were similarly unresponsive while their true bodies attended to other work.
• After registration, the Clones revealed their appearances were borrowed from Zhou Qing, who explained his ability to the Nuoding Academy Dean.
• Zhou Qing teased Ning Rongrong and Qingzhu Zhu about barely remembering them before departing as a crimson bead.
• The Nuoding Academy Dean told the girls that Zhou Qing and Romantina had once merged, prompting Ning Rongrong and Qingzhu Zhu to resolve to eliminate Romantina.

Zhou Qing and Tang San traveled through the Abyss Ruins to inspect its newly opened Eighth Layer and learn about the Five Elements Continent's cultivation system. They arrived at a prepared settlement but had not yet found a route to the continent.

• Zhou Qing learned that Riko and Abel had repaired the Abyss Ruins' gateway pillars and opened the Eighth Layer, then brought Tang San to inspect the site.
• At Abyss Town, Zhou Qing and Tang San used the repaired Black Pillar gate to reach the Sixth Layer and then traveled by sphere to the Seventh Layer.
• Tang San recognized the Mother as a planetary consciousness and felt that her Aura Field resembled the origin of all things.
• Zhou Qing asked Regu and Luo Si how to build Teleportation Arrays, and they explained that their essential Sand Gold came from the moon and substitutes were dangerous.
• Regu and Luo Si guided Zhou Qing and Tang San through a Teleportation Array to the Eighth Layer, where Zhou Qing asked how they could reach the Five Elements Continent.

Zhou Qing brought Tang San to the Five Elements Continent, where Lie Yan described her progress toward integrating the Planet's Mantle and gaining the power to challenge a God King. He summoned Ji Dong, who had spent two years mastering the Yin and Yang Five Elements and was eager to begin cultivating in earnest.

• Zhou Qing and Tang San used the Array Platform to travel from the Eighth Layer to the Five Elements Continent.
• Lie Yan greeted Zhou Qing, teased him about bringing Tang San as a gift, and discussed how organizing the Underground World had awakened her sense of purpose.
• Lie Yan said her stubborn-stone true body would be complete in about ten years and that joining the Planet's Mantle could let her wield the Planet's power against a God King.
• Lie Yan declared that she would defy the God Realm and the Dragon God if they continued to bar non-human races from becoming gods.
• Zhou Qing asked Lie Yan to summon Ji Dong, who said he had mastered the Yin and Yang Five Elements during his two years of slow cultivation and begged Zhou Qing to teach him.

Tang San and Ji Dong met in the Underground World, where Zhou Qing arranged for Tang San to cultivate on Lie Yan’s Blazing Red Lotus and warned Ji Dong about Tang San’s complicated feelings toward his parents. Zhou Qing then questioned Ji Dong about Yin Yang Magic Masters’ cultivation and concluded that their methods were primitive compared with cultivation on Douluo Star.

• Tang San recognized Ji Dong’s northern Mandarin, and the two introduced themselves in Soul Land Common Language.
• Zhou Qing had Lie Yan summon the Blazing Red Lotus for Tang San to cultivate on, while joking that studying it might require marrying Lie Yan.
• Zhou Qing told Ji Dong to be careful about discussing Tang San’s parents and explained that Tang San’s relationship with them was complicated.
• Zhou Qing asked Ji Dong how the Five Elements Continent’s Yin Yang Magic Masters cultivated, and Ji Dong described awakening an attribute and sensing its elements in the air.
• Zhou Qing compared their basic method to common meditation and said Soul Masters on Douluo Star cultivated faster by circulating Soul Power through the body in a set sequence.

Zhou Qing explained how Martial Souls guide Soul Power through the body and taught Ji Dong that Internal Energy methods could also cultivate Magic Power. Lie Yan gave Ji Dong subsidiary flames and accepted him as her godson, while Tang San continued cultivating with two opposing kinds of Soul Power and a neutral force that reconciled them.

• Zhou Qing explained to Ji Dong that awakened Martial Souls guided Soul Power through meridians, making cultivation easier than it was for Yin Yang Magic Masters.
• Zhou Qing compared Lie Yan's work guiding the lava beneath the Eighteen Layers to circulating Internal Energy through a body, prompting Lie Yan to protest that she knew Magic Techniques too.
• Ji Dong asked whether Internal Energy methods could cultivate Magic Power, and Zhou Qing confirmed that they could.
• Zhou Qing asked Lie Yan for subsidiary flames of the Bingwu Yuan Yang Sacred Fire and Dingsi Ming Yin Spirit Fire, then teased that Ji Dong was like a child of hers.
• Lie Yan gave Ji Dong the flames and took him as her godson, calling him Little Ji Ji or Little Dong Dong.
• Lie Yan examined Tang San's cultivation and noticed two opposing kinds of Soul Power being reconciled by a neutral force carrying life and Zhen.

Zhou Qing taught Ji Dong a more advanced cultivation method using the subsidiary flames of the Bingwu Yuan Yang Sacred Fire and the Dingsi Ming Yin Spirit Fire. Ji Dong reached Level Ten and formed his Yin Yang Crown, which Zhou Qing joked resembled a birthday cake.

• Zhou Qing guided Ji Dong into cultivation and observed that Ji Dong's Magic Power resided in his Middle Dantian.
• Zhou Qing led Ji Dong's Magic Power through his Ren and Du Meridians and taught him to complete a Lesser Zhou Circulation.
• Zhou Qing placed the two subsidiary flames in Ji Dong's Lower Dantian, and Ji Dong endured their alternating heat and cold while circulating his Magic Power.
• Ji Dong completed nine circulations, reached Level Ten, and gathered Bing Fire and Ding Fire elements that tempered his body.
• Ji Dong's crown stars transformed into a red-and-blue Crown Ring, and Zhou Qing joked that his Yin Yang Crown looked like a birthday cake.

Zhou Qing explained to Ji Dong that supernatural skills depended on resonance with energy outside the body, then demonstrated how isolating that energy could disable Ji Dong’s Magic Power. He revealed that his Inner Scenery let him remain unaffected and said Lie Yan would teach Ji Dong the meridian knowledge needed to build one.

• Zhou Qing joked that Ji Dong’s Yin Yang Crown looked like a birthday crown and told him to study the origins of the Five Elements Continent’s Cultivation System.
• Zhou Qing isolated Ji Dong from supernatural energy, leaving Ji Dong unable to mobilize his Magic Power.
• Zhou Qing explained that skills needed to resonate with external energy through a medium, so isolation could leave even a powerful cultivator unable to use Magic Techniques.
• Zhou Qing showed Ji Dong his Inner Scenery and explained that it let him use supernatural power even when cut off from natural energy.
• Ji Dong asked to build an Inner Scenery, and Zhou Qing said Lie Yan would teach him after he opened the remaining meridian pathways.

Zhou Qing asked Lie Yan to teach Ji Dong, and Lie Yan agreed after Zhou Qing called her Ji Dong’s godmother. After learning Zhou Qing’s meridian and acupoint diagrams, Lie Yan gained greater control over fire and a deeper connection to the planet, while Zhou Qing asked her to gather records that might reveal how the Yin Yang Crown was created by the God Realm’s rules.

• Lie Yan said she was too busy regulating the planet’s magma flows to teach Ji Dong, but agreed after Zhou Qing called her Ji Dong’s godmother.
• Zhou Qing gave Lie Yan diagrams of human meridians and acupoints, and she memorized them and simulated them in her energy body, strengthening her fire control and connection to the underground world.
• Lie Yan teased Zhou Qing about becoming Ji Dong’s godfather, and Zhou Qing explained that building a hopeful future and a warm family mattered more to him than romantic love.
• Zhou Qing told Lie Yan and Ji Dong that the Dragon God’s rules had harmed non-human beings across the God Realm’s worlds, leaving god-level beings like Lie Yan in hiding.
• Zhou Qing asked Lie Yan to teach Ji Dong and collect ancient records from the Five Elements Continent so he could investigate whether the God Realm’s rules created the Yin Yang Crown.

After Ji Dong became a Yin Yang Magic Master, Zhou Qing taught him how to refine his cultivation by adapting it to the Planet’s rhythms and warned him not to rely on the Yin Yang Crown. Ji Dong embraced Zhou Qing’s revolutionary ideals, and the chapter ended with someone knocking at the dormitory door.

• Ji Dong returned to Li Huo Academy and excitedly announced that he had become a Yin Yang Magic Master, where he found Zhou Qing waiting in his dormitory.
• Zhou Qing explained that he had left Tang San to experience the Planet’s rhythms and clarified that he had not forced Ji Dong to give up on Lie Yan.
• Zhou Qing taught Ji Dong to adjust Circulating the Heavenly Cycle to changes in Bing Fire and Ding Fire activity, and urged him to study the world’s rhythms rather than depend on the Yin Yang Crown.
• Zhou Qing criticized the Five Elements Continent’s shallow understanding of Yin and Yang, the Five Elements, and the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches.
• Ji Dong agreed that the imperfect world was worth changing, clasped Zhou Qing’s hand, and vowed to become his comrade.
• Someone knocked on the dormitory door and called for Ji Dong to get up.

Zhou Qing advised Ji Dong to reform Li Huo Academy by example and force, then decided to register as a professor so Ji Dong could explain his sudden advancement. At the Auditorium, Teacher Liu Jun challenged Ji Dong and Zhou Qing, but Teacher Xia Tian intervened before the dispute was settled.

• Carl and Bi Su arrived to tell Ji Dong that the end-of-term assessment was underway, and Zhou Qing introduced himself as Ji Dong's friend who had snuck into the academy.
• Zhou Qing urged Ji Dong to improve the academy's atmosphere, stand up to bullies, and avoid squabbling with children; he then offered to register as a professor.
• Zhou Qing, Ji Dong, Bi Su, and Carl went to the Auditorium, where Liu Jun questioned Zhou Qing's presence and accused Ji Dong of bringing an outsider into the academy.
• After Zhou Qing reminded Ji Dong not to lose his temper, Ji Dong calmed himself and offered to prove Zhou Qing was his relative by speaking with the principal.
• Liu Jun threatened to expel Ji Dong for violating academy rules, but Teacher Xia Tian arrived and challenged Liu Jun's interference.