Chapter Summaries

Jiang Zhen explained to Ma Xiaoling why famine and disaster still plagued a world with abundant Spiritual Qi, and argued that powerful clans—not merely Yang Guang—were chiefly responsible for the Sui Dynasty’s suffering and collapse. He told Ma Xiaoling to focus on gaining experience as they continued down the road toward something waiting ahead.

• Ma Xiaoling questioned why famine persisted in a world with immortals, strong people, and abundant farmland.
• Jiang Zhen explained that greater strength and agricultural output were matched by a much larger population, while ordinary people remained weak by their world’s standards and also faced Demons and Monsters.
• Ma Xiaoling blamed Yang Guang for the people’s plight, but Jiang Zhen argued that he had been more capable and less brutal than popular accounts claimed.
• Jiang Zhen said Yang Guang’s Grand Canal and campaigns against Goryeo were aimed partly at weakening powerful clans that controlled vast land and populations.
• Jiang Zhen blamed the great clans for most of the Sui Dynasty’s collapse and concluded that Ma Xiaoling should gain proper experience because something awaited them ahead.

Ma Xiaoling and Jiang Zhen uncovered villagers transformed into Cannibal Ghosts and destroyed them, then sent the evil spirit behind them to Avici Hell. A young Taoist named Yuan Tiangang emerged after watching the encounter.

• Ma Xiaoling sensed something unclean near a shrine, but the villagers defended the spirit they worshipped and attacked her.
• Jiang Zhen revealed that the villagers were Cannibal Ghosts who had eaten human flesh, and he told Ma Xiaoling to kill them.
• Ma Xiaoling used the Dragon Scale Rod to strike the villagers with lightning and destroy the Cannibal Ghost that emerged from the shrine.
• Jiang Zhen seized the Cannibal Ghost's True Spirit and sent it to Avici Hell, where the Underworld authorities arranged its punishment.
• Jiang Zhen explained his influence over the Underworld to Ma Xiaoling, then called out a young Taoist who introduced himself as Yuan Tiangang.

Ma Xiaoling and Jiang Zhen met Yuan Tiangang, who told them about an ancient Secret Realm emerging in the eastern Central Plains. Ma Xiaoling chose to go there for training, and Yuan Tiangang revealed that he hoped to find something inside to help him overcome a bottleneck.

• Ma Xiaoling recognized Yuan Tiangang, and he explained that he had come after sensing baleful energy and ghostly qi nearby.
• Yuan Tiangang told Jiang Zhen and Ma Xiaoling that an ancient Secret Realm was about to appear and had attracted experts, demons, monsters, and foreigners.
• Yuan Tiangang said he wanted partners because the Secret Realm was dangerous and he sought something inside it.
• Jiang Zhen confirmed the Secret Realm was real, and Ma Xiaoling decided to go there for training.
• As they set out, Yuan Tiangang said his divination had revealed something in the Secret Realm that could help him break through his cultivation bottleneck.

Yuan Tiangang explained that the Secret Realm was a projection of the Yellow Emperor and Chi You’s war, where entrants had to choose a side and survive a deadly battle. Jiang Zhen questioned the history of Bai Qi’s legacy and the First Emperor’s mysterious acquisition, then suspected the Secret Realm might be connected to the destruction of the Zhou Tian Xing Dou Great Array.

• Yuan Tiangang told Ma Xiaoling that the Secret Realm was likely the ancient battlefield where the Yellow Emperor fought Chi You and hoped to learn Feng Hou’s techniques there.
• Jiang Zhen explained that entrants would relive the battle as participants and could die, while Yuan Tiangang warned that War-Type Secret Realms were exceptionally dangerous.
• Yuan Tiangang recounted how Bai Qi gained Witch Clan bloodline and legacy in a Secret Realm, fought the Heavenly Court, and was suppressed by Empress Nuwa.
• Jiang Zhen questioned why Bai Qi had provoked the Heavenly Court and wondered what the Qin State’s mysterious item was, considering several possible Witch and Demon treasures.
• Jiang Zhen speculated that the First Emperor’s Twelve Golden Men and the Zhou Tian Xing Dou Great Array might be connected to the Secret Realm, and Yuan Tiangang inferred that Jiang Zhen had been a powerful figure from that era.

Jiang Zhen, Ma Xiaoling, and Yuan Tiangang discovered that a mysterious youth who had ascended from the Lower Realm was being hunted. When the pursuers threatened the trio, the youth returned to protect them, and the conflict was about to begin.

• Jiang Zhen sensed a fleeing person with unstable Fortune, and Yuan Tiangang deduced that the person had unusually ascended from the Lower Realm.
• Yuan Tiangang explained to Ma Xiaoling how ascended cultivators were usually recruited by sects, while this youth had joined none and was being hunted.
• The youth burst from the woods, used Dragon's Regret to break through the trees, and fled as pursuers cut off his path.
• More than a dozen uniformed swordsmen appeared, sent three men to attack Jiang Zhen, Ma Xiaoling, and Yuan Tiangang, and continued chasing the youth.
• The youth returned to strike at the pursuers after realizing they intended to kill the trio, explaining that he had come back to protect them.

Ma Xiaoling defeated the sword-wielding attackers with the staff technique Sun Wukong had adapted for her, while Jiang Zhen questioned the young man. The youth introduced himself as Xiao Feng, prompting Jiang Zhen to ask if he had been the former Beggar's Sect leader.

• Jiang Zhen told Ma Xiaoling to use the attackers to practice, and she stepped forward to protect the youth.
• Ma Xiaoling shattered the attackers' sword qi and killed them with the Dragon Scale Rod and its transformed staff form.
• Yuan Tiangang recognized Ma Xiaoling's technique as resembling Sun Wukong's staff technique, and Ma Xiaoling explained that Sun Wukong had modified it for her.
• Jiang Zhen noticed the youth's old soul and young body, recognized his use of the Twenty-eight Dragon Subduing Palms, and asked about his background.
• The youth introduced himself as Xiao Feng, and Jiang Zhen asked if he was the former Beggar's Sect leader.

Jiang Zhen asked Xiao Feng about his past, and Xiao Feng recounted his life after falling from the cliff with A'zi and surviving in a river valley for nearly thirty years. After returning to a changed world, he revisited Shaolin, the Beggar's Sect, and Jiangnan before secretly saving members of the Xiao Family in a declining Great Liao.

• Jiang Zhen asked Xiao Feng to explain his Lower Realm history, and Xiao Feng told him how he became Qiao Feng, leader of the Beggar's Sect, before learning he was Liao and killing himself with A'zi at his side.
• Xiao Feng survived the fall and river, but A'zi died protecting him; he buried her, remained in the valley, and spent nearly thirty years refining his cultivation and Dragon Subduing Palm.
• Xiao Feng returned to find the people he knew gone, learned that his father and Murong Bo had died, paid his respects, and completed the Beggar's Sect's Dog Beating Staff Technique.
• Xiao Feng traveled to Jiangnan, saw Murong Fu living in madness and learned that Miss Wang had separated from his Third Brother, then left without revealing himself to her.
• Xiao Feng reached Great Liao, found it declining under Great Jin's pressure, secretly saved several members of the Xiao Family, and departed.

The narrator recounted his later journeys, the deaths and decline of people and sects from his era, and his reunion with Dugu to break through the limits of their world. Their battle shattered space, but a strange wind separated them, leaving the narrator gravely wounded in this world until a Golden Fruit restored him.

• The narrator visited the Kingdom of Dali and Lingjiu Palace, found his Third Brother devoted to Buddhism and his Second Brother living happily with his wife, and left without revealing himself.
• The narrator met a gifted young swordsman, later known as the Sword Demon, guided his swordsmanship, and agreed to join forces with him to break their limits.
• The narrator found that Jianghu had changed: Murong Fu and Wang Yuyan were dead, Great Liao had fallen, and the Xiaoyao Sect and Lingjiu Palace had vanished from public view.
• The narrator visited Dali, guided his Third Brother's martial-arts-loving son in One Yang Finger, and learned that Lingjiu Palace had been cut off from the outside world after his Second Brother's child inherited it.
• The narrator reunited with Dugu, traveled with him to the Kunlun Mountains, and fought a battle that shattered space and sent them away from their world.
• A strange wind separated the narrator and Dugu, and the narrator landed grievously wounded in this world before recovering after eating a Golden Fruit.

Jiang Zhen explained how Xiao Feng had arrived in a world far beyond the one he should have reached and identified the blood pool as a site of demonic cultivation. The group headed to investigate while members of the Qingmu Sect discussed their Sect Master's attempt to master the Blood Shadow Divine Skill.

• Jiang Zhen told Xiao Feng that he had skipped several stages of ascension by arriving directly in this powerful world, and that a Spirit Fruit had greatly increased his strength.
• Xiao Feng explained that people had attacked him after he discovered them gathered around someone meditating in a pool.
• Jiang Zhen inspected the site and recognized a Blood Pool filled with corpses and bones, where someone was practicing a Demonic Art.
• Jiang Zhen opened a Space Rift and led Ma Xiaoling, Yuan Tiangang, and Xiao Feng toward the pool to investigate.
• A Qingmu Sect member described the Sect Master's horrific cultivation of the Blood Shadow Divine Skill, while a Young Man explained its legendary power and the sect's hopes of mastering it.

Jiang Zhen and his companions discovered a skinless cultivator practicing the Blood Shadow Divine Skill in a Blood Pool, and Yuan Tiangang explained the art’s bloody history. Jiang Zhen absorbed the pool’s essence and recognized its inscriptions as originating from the Sea of Blood, leaving Yuan Tiangang shocked by his mention of Old Ancestor Minghe.

• Jiang Zhen tore open space and arrived with Ma Xiaoling and the others, who saw a skinless man in a Blood Pool.
• Yuan Tiangang identified the Blood Shadow Divine Skill and recounted how its legendary founder became the Blood God before the Blood Shadow Sect was destroyed.
• Jiang Zhen killed the Qingmu Sect disciples with a glance, then absorbed the Blood Pool’s essence and burned away its waste.
• Jiang Zhen examined the inscriptions and concluded that the art came from the Sea of Blood and could give Old Ancestor Minghe another avatar.
• Yuan Tiangang asked whether Jiang Zhen meant the legendary Ancestor Minghe, and Jiang Zhen confirmed it.

Jiang Zhen explained that Sun Wei’s Blood Shadow Divine Skill could turn its cultivator into a puppet of Old Ancestor Minghe, then offered Xiao Feng the chance to cultivate in a safer Lower Realm. Xiao Feng agreed, and Jiang Zhen revealed that the chosen world was a powerful composite Wuxia world where another Xiao Feng already existed.

• Jiang Zhen explained that Sun Wei’s Blood Shadow Divine Skill ultimately transformed its cultivator into one of Old Ancestor Minghe’s Blood God Sons, while Yuan Tiangang showed that he knew much about Minghe.
• Yuan Tiangang described Styx, the Blood God Sons, and their ability to serve as Minghe’s clones, alarming Ma Xiaoling and Qiao Feng.
• Jiang Zhen warned Xiao Feng that the world was perilous and offered to send him to a Minor Thousand World to cultivate more safely.
• Xiao Feng trusted Jiang Zhen and agreed to go to the Lower Realm.
• Jiang Zhen described the composite Wuxia World’s cultivation levels and revealed that another Xiao Feng lived there.

Jiang Zhen sent Xiao Feng into a parallel world as a child, fusing him with his counterpart and giving him the War God's Catalog so he could change past tragedies. Afterward, Jiang Zhen and Yuan Tiangang arrived outside a Secret Realm, where Jiang Zhen asked Yuan Tiangang to identify the assembled experts for Xiaoling.

• Jiang Zhen explained that Xiao Feng would merge with his child counterpart and have a chance to change the deaths of Qiao Sankui, his wife, and A Zhu, as well as learn about his biological father.
• Jiang Zhen taught Xiao Feng the War God's Catalog and sent him through a rift into a parallel Martial Arts World.
• The five-year-old Xiao Feng awoke with his older self's memories and the forty-nine diagrams, then considered seeking his biological father while postponing any attempt to approach Shaolin Temple.
• Yuan Tiangang explained that he had not destroyed the Blood Shadow Divine Skill because he feared incurring karma with the powerful figure behind it, and Jiang Zhen warned that the Art could drive cultivators toward the Sea of Blood.
• Jiang Zhen took Yuan Tiangang and Xiaoling to a mountain near the forming Secret Realm entrance, then asked Yuan Tiangang to identify the people gathered there.

Jiang Zhen and Yuan Tiangang explained the Secret Realm’s factions and cultivation suppression to Ma Xiaoling, who prepared to enter with the Dragon Scale Rod. When Li Shimin arrived, Yuan Tiangang sensed his fortune surging and wondered if the Li Family’s second son would become the land’s future ruler.

• Yuan Tiangang described the four factions in the Secret Realm, while Jiang Zhen explained that entrants’ cultivation would be suppressed.
• Jiang Zhen told Ma Xiaoling that the Dragon Scale Rod could help her handle danger and promised to deal with troublemakers who pursued her afterward.
• Yuan Tiangang spotted Li Shimin among the newcomers, and Jiang Zhen reflected that the Secret Realm’s battle between the Yellow Emperor and Chi You might benefit him in his bid for the throne.
• Yuan Tiangang secretly calculated Li Shimin’s fortune and was shocked to find it surging, possibly surpassing Li Yuan’s.

Jiang Zhen sent Ma Xiaoling into the Secret Realm before confronting the factions who objected. After Laojun and Tathagata appeased him and punished their followers, Jiang Zhen let the remaining people proceed into the Secret Realm.

• Jiang Zhen sent Ma Xiaoling and himself flying into the Secret Realm as soon as it opened.
• Jiang Zhen turned a Golden Immortal great demon into a meal and forced the Demons and Monsters to kneel.
• Jiang Zhen summoned Laojun, who gave him Eight-Revolutions Golden Pills and crippled the offending Taoist's cultivation.
• Jiang Zhen negotiated with Tathagata, who erased the old monk's Buddhist arts and transformed him into a Sarira, in exchange for sparing his life and delaying his return to cultivation by a few hundred years.
• Jiang Zhen allowed everyone else to continue into the Secret Realm and assured the Human Race that he would not attack them.

Ma Xiaoling and Yuan Tiangang entered the Secret Realm and were chased by a Sky-Swallowing Toad, escaping by staying still. After learning about the ancient Fierce Beasts, they set off for the Battlefield of Yellow Emperor and Chi You.

• Ma Xiaoling and Yuan Tiangang arrived in the Secret Realm, and Yuan Tiangang used a tortoiseshell and copper coins to find their direction.
• They encountered a giant toad, which Yuan Tiangang identified as the Fierce Beast Sky-Swallowing Toad, and fled from it.
• The Sky-Swallowing Toad fired red lightning that erased a boulder, but Yuan Tiangang dodged and Ma Xiaoling told him to lie still.
• They hid motionless until the toad left, and Yuan Tiangang explained its terrifying strength and the story of the Three Heavens.
• Ma Xiaoling explained that she had guessed the toad would ignore them if they stayed still, and Yuan Tiangang led them toward the Battlefield of Yellow Emperor and Chi You.

Yuan Tiangang and Ma Xiaoling found a thousand-mile fog that disoriented anyone trapped inside, and they questioned a soldier who emerged from it. He told them that the Yanhuang Tribe’s army had been scattered by Chi You and the Wind and Rain Masters’ formation, leaving the Yellow Emperor and his allies’ fate unknown.

• Yuan Tiangang confirmed that the strange fog stretched for a thousand miles and Ma Xiaoling realized the soldier had emerged far from his camp.
• Yuan Tiangang stopped the soldier from rushing back into the fog and asked him to explain who he was and what had happened.
• The soldier identified himself as a warrior under Chief Li Mu and described the Yanhuang Tribe’s war against Chi You and the Nine Li Tribe.
• The soldier explained that Chi You had summoned the Wind and Rain Masters, whose formation scattered the Yanhuang army.
• Ma Xiaoling asked whether the Flame Emperor was Shennong, and Yuan Tiangang explained that Shennong was the first Flame Emperor while the current one was the last chief of that tribe.
• The soldier learned that Yuan Tiangang and Ma Xiaoling were Qi Practitioners close to Immortality and respectfully recognized them as Immortals.

Yuan Tiangang explained Chi You’s origins and the Profound Yin Great Array to Ma Xiaoling, revealing the history behind the battle that forced Haotian Shangdi to reincarnate. When Ma Xiaoling questioned Yuan Tiangang’s own unusual knowledge, he admitted he was the reincarnation of an original Star God.

• A Yanhuang Tribe soldier asked Ma Xiaoling and Yuan Tiangang to help rescue their leader, Xuan Yuan, from the Formation, and Yuan Tiangang agreed to take him back to the tribe.
• On the road, Yuan Tiangang told Ma Xiaoling that Chi You had been a Half-Step Ancestral Witch who reincarnated into the Nine Li Tribe and later fought for the Human Emperor Throne.
• Yuan Tiangang explained that Chi You created the Profound Yin Great Array from the Twelve Heavenly Fiend Array and that many powerful forces had needed Mysterious Lady of the Nine Heavens’ Qimen Dunjia to break it.
• Yuan Tiangang recounted how Xing Tian attacked Haotian Shangdi after Chi You’s defeat, eventually forcing Haotian Shangdi to reincarnate and cultivate anew.
• Ma Xiaoling challenged Yuan Tiangang about his knowledge, and he revealed that he was the reincarnation of an original Star God, though no longer truly a Star God.

Yuan Tiangang explained to Ma Xiaoling that Star Gods were born from stars and differed from Star Lords, who received their titles from others. He revealed that the Demon Court had slaughtered his generation of Star Gods to build the Zhou Tian Xing Dou Great Array, and the chapter ended with Ma Xiaoling suggesting they ask Jiang Zhen about the earlier generations of Star Gods.

• Yuan Tiangang distinguished Star Gods, who were nurtured by stars, from Star Lords, who held bestowed titles, and described Grand White Venus as an ancient and powerful Star God.
• Yuan Tiangang told Ma Xiaoling that the Demon Court had killed Star Gods to secure stars for the Zhou Tian Xing Dou Great Array.
• Yuan Tiangang explained that Boyi Kao became the Great Emperor Ziwei because he was a reincarnated Star God, and said he had awakened his own memories after reincarnating.
• Yuan Tiangang warned Ma Xiaoling to keep their discussion secret and said Doumu Yuanjun had already disappeared when his generation was destroyed.
• Yuan Tiangang suspected earlier generations of Star Gods had existed before his own, and Ma Xiaoling suggested asking Jiang Zhen what he knew.

Yuan Tiangang and Ma Xiaoling reached Xuan Yuan's tribe, where Xuan Yuan declined their offer to help with Chi You's Profound Yin Great Array. Yuan Tiangang believed he had found a way to break the Formation, while Xuan Yuan and Feng Hou remained focused on the threat it posed.

• Ma Xiaoling used her Heavenly Eye to see the golden dragon of fortune above Xuan Yuan's tribe, and Yuan Tiangang explained the Human Emperor's extraordinary fortune.
• Xuan Yuan welcomed Yuan Tiangang and Ma Xiaoling, but declined their offer to help break Chi You's Profound Yin Great Array and invited them to stay in the tribe.
• Yuan Tiangang told Ma Xiaoling that Xuan Yuan did not trust them because they had not revealed their identities and that the Formation could draw on the Secret Realm's power.
• Yuan Tiangang said he had encountered something that would make breaking the Formation easy.
• Xuan Yuan asked Feng Hou about the two visitors, and Feng Hou advised that they focus on Chi You and the Formation.

Feng Hou and the Yellow Emperor found no way to break Chi You’s formidable formation, and the army waited for outside help. Three days later, Ma Xiaoling and Yuan Tiangang watched the Twelve Golden Immortals and many other forces gather for the coming battle, while Yuan explained why different factions had joined each side.

• Feng Hou told the Yellow Emperor that the formation had no known way to break it, and Li Mu said the beasts he sent into it went mad and threatened their own troops.
• Xuan Yuan wondered whether they could only ask his Master to descend.
• Three days later, Ma Xiaoling saw Daoist figures, dragons, and colored clouds arrive, then urged Yuan Tiangang to watch the formation-breaking attempt.
• Ma Xiaoling and Yuan Tiangang joined the army as the Yellow Emperor’s forces confronted Chi You and the Nine Li Tribe, and Ma noticed that most outside cultivators had sided with the Yellow Emperor.
• Yuan Tiangang explained why the Daoist disciples, Demon Race, demonic cultivators, and others had chosen their sides, and said they sought treasures, martial arts, and rewards through the war.