Chapter Summaries

Zhang Heng and Sherlock Holmes searched Sacred Heart Church for the hidden entrance while Father Jacob held Irene Adler captive underground and explained how his past with Emma led to the pale man beside her. The pale man, whom Father Jacob revealed to be his son, prepared to begin while the searchers remained above.

• Zhang Heng and Sherlock Holmes forced their way into the church and split up to search for an entrance.
• Father Jacob told Irene that the secret chamber would keep the searchers out for a while, while the pale man urged him to begin.
• Father Jacob recounted how he had met Emma, a young prostitute, and slept with her after she came to him injured.
• Father Jacob said Emma later left their baby at the church, and he revealed that the pale man was their son.
• Father Jacob gave the pale man permission to call him Father as the man pressed to begin.

Zhang Heng and Sherlock Holmes rescued Irene Adler from Father Jacob and found that Jacob had killed Jack the Ripper. Holmes then explained how Jacob had concealed his son’s crimes, used Mark Cohen to mislead the police, and ultimately killed him when he realized the murders would continue.

• Zhang Heng and Sherlock Holmes entered the secret room and found Father Jacob standing over the dead Jack the Ripper, with Irene Adler bound nearby.
• Zhang Heng freed Irene Adler, and he and Holmes restrained Father Jacob before notifying the police.
• Zhang Heng escorted Irene Adler home, while Holmes stayed behind to wait for the police and later returned to 221B Baker Street.
• Holmes explained that Jack the Ripper had sought a sense of belonging through murders that symbolically connected him to his birth mother.
• Holmes explained that Father Jacob had protected Jack the Ripper, used Mark Cohen to divert the investigation, and kidnapped Irene Adler to test whether his son would kill again.
• Holmes concluded that Father Jacob had killed Jack the Ripper after realizing he could not stop him from taking more lives.

After solving the Whitechapel murders and spending 270 days investigating cases with Sherlock Holmes, Zhang Heng met Arthur Conan Doyle on his last day in the instance. Conan Doyle revealed himself as the God of Fiction, hinted at Zhang Heng’s origins and future choices, and left behind a fountain pen as Zhang Heng’s instance neared its end.

• Sherlock Holmes conceded that Zhang Heng had won their bet by finding Father Jacob before him, and Zhang Heng chose the evening’s opera.
• Over the next 270 days, Zhang Heng solved more than a dozen cases with Sherlock Holmes and developed his investigative skills, but found no trace of an item in the instance.
• On the final day, Zhang Heng and Sherlock Holmes met Arthur Conan Doyle in a tavern after Conan Doyle suggested a case involving stolen earrings.
• Conan Doyle told Zhang Heng that he was the God of Fiction and explained that deities observed players through instances while seeking compatible agents.
• Conan Doyle hinted that he knew about Zhang Heng’s origins and that Zhang Heng would eventually face a final choice, then left him unable to move.
• Zhang Heng found Conan Doyle’s fountain pen beneath the newspaper he had left behind.

Two weeks after the Deduction Method dungeon, Zhang Heng browsed the player forum and found a post from Scarlet Sword, the woman in red he had fought in The Leaker dungeon. She was asking to negotiate for the broken Katana, and Zhang Heng replied to her post.

• Zhang Heng returned to the specialty cafeteria while rumors spread that he was involved with Han Lu.
• Shen Xixi's player cooperative organization grew, and she spent most of her time coordinating its complicated affairs.
• Zhang Heng used the USB drive from The Leaker dungeon to browse the player forum and found Scarlet Sword's post seeking someone.
• Zhang Heng realized Scarlet Sword wanted to discuss the Katana, whose two broken pieces were split between them.
• Zhang Heng apologized for the parking garage incident and asked Scarlet Sword how she wanted to negotiate.

Zhang Heng and Scarlet Sword negotiated over the broken Mikazuki Munechika, which they each held a half of. Zhang Heng refused to sell his half and instead offered to buy Scarlet Sword’s, leaving their trade unresolved.

• Zhang Heng’s comment revived a forum post, and newcomers filled the replies with jokes before Scarlet Sword invited him to a private chatroom.
• Scarlet Sword confirmed that Zhang Heng’s half was Mikazuki Munechika and said the museum’s copy was fake; she offered 1,000 Game Points or items for his half.
• Scarlet Sword explained that the C-rank blade grew stronger the longer she wielded it and that she specialized in Blade Mastery.
• Zhang Heng refused to sell, explaining that he used blades too, then counteroffered 1,000 Game Points for Scarlet Sword’s half.
• Zhang Heng considered the blade’s scarcity, its potential repair and upgrade costs, and the coming Proxy War as reasons the purchase could be worthwhile.

Scarlet Sword hesitated to sell her half of Mikazuki Munechika to Zhang Heng, while Zhang Heng learned from Bartender Lady that the Proxy War would soon move the game into its next stage. After Fan Mei Nan replied that she was busy, Zhang Heng checked the player forum and found explosive news.

• Scarlet Sword considered Zhang Heng’s offer of 1,000 Game Points but asked about his Blade Technique before their chat ended.
• Zhang Heng attended a Western cultural history elective and took the unappraised fountain pen back after Bartender Lady’s appraisal failed.
• Bartender Lady told Zhang Heng that the Proxy War’s final list would arrive in about a month and that ordinary players could join factions as apostles.
• Zhang Heng messaged Fan Mei Nan about the Proxy War, but she replied only that she was busy.
• Zhang Heng logged into the player forum after a week away and saw explosive news.

Guanghu issued an ultimatum demanding that Shen Xixi hand over the players involved in a clash or face war, and Zhang Heng recognized it as a threat to The Consortium. Shen Xixi’s leadership overwhelmingly favored surrendering the players, while she believed Guanghu was lying and was left facing the cost of standing by her principles.

• Guanghu accused The Consortium’s players of ambushing its squad in Tongzhou and demanded an apology, the four culprits, and compensation.
• Forum users mocked Guanghu’s account of events, while a super moderator muted one critic who quickly returned with an alternate account.
• Zhang Heng saw the ultimatum as a pretext for The Three Great Guilds to undermine The Consortium and recognized that either choice could destroy it.
• Shen Xixi convened The Consortium’s leaders, and nearly ninety percent supported handing the accused players over without seeking the truth.
• Shen Xixi recalled meeting the players and felt eighty percent certain Guanghu was lying, leaving her weary as the leaders dismissed the individuals’ likely fate.

With Guanghu’s midnight ultimatum looming, Shen Xixi refused to hand over the people it demanded, even as Consortium members pushed for surrender. Boundary Line and other groups then began withdrawing from the Consortium, leaving the emerging force on the brink of collapse.

• Shen Xixi rejected her colleagues’ arguments that the Consortium had to surrender the people Guanghu demanded to avoid war.
• Li Bai and Rabbit brought in three Boundary Line members caught trying to seize the people, and Boundary Line’s president defended the attempt.
• Shen Xixi asked the meeting whether surrendering the people was justice, and Xifeng answered that politics had nothing to do with justice.
• As Guanghu’s deadline approached, forum users speculated that Shen Xixi would give in, while most considered surrender the rational choice.
• At 11:12 p.m., Boundary Line announced it was leaving the Consortium, and other guilds and independent groups quickly posted similar announcements.

As The Consortium collapsed after Shen Xixi refused to hand over innocent players, Zhang Heng prepared to help her and repay his debt. He collected equipment, assembled a suppressed CS5 Sniper Rifle, and was ready to act as Starfish completed its circuit.

• Zhang Heng read The Consortium's account of the clash with Guanghu, which contradicted Guanghu's version and said the squad had killed five attackers while losing two people.
• Shen Xixi refused Guanghu's demand, prompting players to abandon The Consortium in growing numbers, while Guanghu said it would focus on punishing the four killers.
• After receiving Bartender Lady's message, Zhang Heng packed his gear and left the dorm before midnight.
• Zhang Heng tracked down Bartender Lady's hidden case, confirmed it held what he needed, and continued through his planned errands.
• Zhang Heng rested at a hotel, then assembled the CS5 Sniper Rifle from the case as Starfish neared the end of its circuit.

Guanghu launched an operation to capture Shen Xixi’s people and force her to reveal the four targets’ whereabouts, but Shen Xixi had secretly moved the targets and prepared an offensive trap. Guanghu’s vanguard pursued Li Bai as bait, unaware that Shen Xixi intended to seize its upper management as bargaining chips.

• Guanghu learned through an informant that Shen Xixi had moved the targets, and its management considered capturing her people to make her talk.
• February Siege left Guanghu’s operation to his deputies and focused on his daughter’s birthday party.
• Guanghu’s vanguard surrounded Li Bai’s rental building, but he disappeared before they could catch him.
• A subordinate used strange tobacco to summon owls that searched for Li Bai, while the big-bearded commander decided to use him as leverage against Shen Xixi.
• Shen Xixi chose to attack Guanghu and planned to capture its upper management, using Li Bai to lure the guild into a trap.

Li Bai and his allies trapped four Guanghu squads with the Tricolor Spiral Cylinder Lamp, but Xiao Bing revealed that Guanghu had anticipated their capture plan and used it to locate more of Shen Xixi’s people. Xiao Bing’s next move remained unclear as she confronted Shen Xixi beside the frozen captives.

• Li Bai fled from Guanghu’s pursuers until an ambusher struck his calf with a golf club and fractured it.
• Li Bai drew the pursuers toward the barbershop, where the Tricolor Spiral Cylinder Lamp froze all four squads and their twenty-four members.
• Rabbit and Shen Xixi emerged from the barbershop, and Li Bai urged Shen Xixi to negotiate with Guanghu while he delayed treatment for his leg.
• Xiao Bing introduced herself as a member of Guanghu’s Strategic Analysis Department and said she had studied Shen Xixi for a month.
• Xiao Bing revealed that she had expected Shen Xixi’s team to capture Guanghu’s people and had used the capture to find Shen Xixi’s teammates.

Shen Xixi and Rabbit escaped Xiao Bing’s ambush as Guanghu and The Consortium began fighting in the urban village. Zhang Heng used Guanghu’s operation plan to ambush an elite long-range squad and continued his attack as the survivors sought cover.

• Shen Xixi and Rabbit disappeared after a flare blinded Xiao Bing and the surrounding squads.
• Guanghu and The Consortium’s battle began, and Guanghu was surprised by how many people still supported Shen Xixi.
• Xiao Bing learned that Shen Xixi’s group had been rescued and that Guanghu’s task force targeting Old K and Faceless Man had been wiped out.
• Zhang Heng obtained Guanghu’s operation plan and used a CS5 to attack two vans carrying an elite squad toward the urban village.
• Zhang Heng killed several members of the squads, then released tear gas as the survivors took cover behind the vehicles.

Zhang Heng continued dismantling Guanghu’s forces with precise sniper attacks, but Guanghu used a decoy to lure him into a rooftop ambush. Surrounded by three powerful opponents, he was offered a place in Guanghu and questioned whether they had underestimated him.

• Xiao Bing learned that several Guanghu teams had been ambushed, leaving many dead, injured, or missing.
• Forum users uncovered details about Zhang Heng’s attacks and marveled at how he repeatedly escaped Guanghu’s encirclements.
• Zhang Heng prepared to shoot his fifth target, but a newcomer appeared and heated CS5 until Zhang Heng dropped it.
• A winged man and a chainsaw-wielding man joined the newcomer, surrounding Zhang Heng on the rooftop.
• The newcomer offered Zhang Heng a chance to join Guanghu, and Zhang Heng asked if sending only three people to stop him was careless.

Zhang Heng used a rooftop trap to separate Guanghu's three fighters and leave him alone with Chainsaw Man. As Chainsaw Man prepared to attack again, Zhang Heng drew two Nepalese kukris.

• Chainsaw Man charged Zhang Heng with his running chainsaw, forcing him back to the rooftop's narrow edge.
• Zhang Heng slipped over the edge, caught the ledge, swung back onto the rooftop, and appeared behind Chainsaw Man.
• The winged man and the man who could heat gun barrels prepared to attack together, but Zhang Heng used Wall of Malice to turn the rooftop floor liquid and separate them.
• The winged man crashed into the restored concrete floor, while Chainsaw Man and Zhang Heng fell into an office and the man who could heat gun barrels landed in a restroom.
• Zhang Heng explained that he had used the fall to separate the opponents and moved to defeat Chainsaw Man before the others returned.
• Chainsaw Man picked up his chainsaw and taunted Zhang Heng, who silently drew two Nepalese kukris.

Zhang Heng killed Chainsaw Man and the man who could heat up gun barrels, then used a bow to bring down their fleeing companion with shadow wings. The three attackers were dead, leaving Zhang Heng alone after the fight.

• The man who could heat up gun barrels escaped the restroom and found Zhang Heng fighting Chainsaw Man in the office.
• Zhang Heng killed Chainsaw Man, then used a desk as a shield while fighting off the man’s sharpened, forceful playing cards.
• The man with shadow wings arrived and saw Zhang Heng kill the man who could heat up gun barrels with a thrown kukri.
• The man with shadow wings fled through the window, but Zhang Heng’s arrow curved through the air and struck him in the heart.
• The man with shadow wings crashed onto an SUV below, and Zhang Heng watched from the window.

At his daughter’s birthday party, February Siege learned that Zhang Heng had overwhelmed Guanghu’s specially assigned Seven Warlords and asked for the woman responsible to handle the situation. Zhang Heng reached the urban village, where Xiao Bing hid as her lookout teams went silent.

• February Siege called Swordfish after the birthday ball and heard that Zhang Heng had defeated five teams and taken two C-rank items.
• Swordfish told February Siege that Guanghu’s three Seven Warlords-level operatives had also been killed while trying to stop Zhang Heng.
• February Siege asked for the woman responsible for the incident to be sent to deal with it.
• Zhang Heng entered the urban village after losing access to the OA’s information about Guanghu’s deployments.
• Xiao Bing retreated to an inn, turned off the lights, and hid in the bathroom with a pistol as her lookout teams stopped responding.

Zhang Heng used a newly assembled CS5 to eliminate Guanghu’s sentries and reach the inn where he suspected its leader was hiding. There, he encountered a bulletproof woman in white who proposed ending their fight for tonight, but offered no truce between Guanghu and The Consortium.

• Zhang Heng replaced his damaged CS5, spotted Guanghu’s retreat and suspected a major target was concealed at a nearby inn.
• Zhang Heng shot Guanghu’s lookouts and cleared the surrounding sentries before entering the inn through a second-floor window.
• Zhang Heng fired at a woman in white who appeared in the stairwell, but the bullets passed through her without harming her.
• The woman in white asked whether Zhang Heng was Shen Xixi’s friend, and Zhang Heng offered to stop fighting if Guanghu left The Consortium alone.
• The woman in white refused to accept his terms and proposed that they stop fighting tonight, promising not to attack him if they met again.

Zhang Heng confronted Justitia, who revealed that she had encouraged the war between Guanghu and The Consortium to test Shen Xixi as a potential agent. Zhang Heng rejected Justitia’s claim that Shen Xixi’s struggle was hers to arrange and prepared to fight her.

• The woman in white urged Zhang Heng to withdraw from the war, claiming Shen Xixi had to face her own battle.
• Zhang Heng recognized the woman as Justitia, a goddess of justice seeking to make Shen Xixi her agent.
• Justitia admitted she had persuaded Guanghu’s president to start the war so Shen Xixi could prove her convictions, though she said the conflict between the factions was inevitable.
• Justitia said she wanted Shen Xixi to keep resisting, regardless of whether she won.
• Zhang Heng lowered his CS5, took out two Nepalese kukris, and told Justitia that Shen Xixi did not need her to decide her path.

Zhang Heng fought Justitia to protect Shen Xixi and her team, but the old man in Tang suit stopped time and brought him to Bashang before the battle could finish. Zhang Heng was left stranded on the grassland while the old man waited for help.

• Zhang Heng attacked Justitia, who dodged his strikes before drawing her sword and invoking Judgment.
• Justitia's golden sword transported Zhang Heng from the hotel corridor to a grassland, where he found the old man in Tang suit.
• The old man explained that he had stopped time and brought Zhang Heng away to prevent Justitia from killing him.
• Zhang Heng said he had fought Justitia because he owed Shen Xixi and her team a favor.
• Zhang Heng discovered that the Volvo had no gasoline, and the old man said help would arrive in two hours.

Zhang Heng escaped the grasslands with the old man in Tang suit, who explained the coming Proxy War and warned him about rival agents. The old man offered his support, then tried to lighten the long drive with music and chatter.

• Zhang Heng drove the old man in Tang suit away from the grasslands and stopped to refuel, where the old man bought snacks.
• The old man in Tang suit discussed Justitia and asked Zhang Heng about his recent games and the gift he had received.
• The old man in Tang suit told Zhang Heng that the Proxy War was approaching and described its dangers, including threats from competing agents and the value of apostles.
• The old man in Tang suit warned Zhang Heng to watch out for agents who might target him outside the games and offered to help him.
• The old man in Tang suit turned on the stereo and began talking about popular songs and a female streamer.