Chapter Summaries

On the flight to Tianfu City, Sun Hang learned that Wang Xiyi’s meme backlash left her chances of survival slim, but he persuaded Pei Zongjun to let him try extracting her unstable memes. The conversation also raised questions about Pei Zongjun’s knowledge of the Nameless Island research institute, which Yang Qi was not cleared to investigate.

• Candle Dragon said Chimera Seventeen’s scorpion-tail trait might connect it to known Chimeras, and explained that Zhong Ling had been sent to prepare a consciousness link with Wang Xiyi if she became an anomalous corpse.
• Yang Qi and Candle Dragon warned Sun Hang that absorbing Wang Xiyi’s mutating memes could trigger his own memes to go out of control, but Sun Hang insisted on trying.
• Sun Hang called Pei Zongjun, who approved the attempt and discussed studying whether Taotie could remove memes from infected people; Sun Hang negotiated payment for his help.
• Yang Qi explained that Pei Zongjun had led the Nameless Island research institute, prompting Sun Hang to wonder whether Pei’s memories of the island had been erased.
• Yang Qi kept quiet about her questions because she lacked clearance to know what had happened on Nameless Island.

After Sun Hang and his companions returned to Shu Province, a huge fireball devastated Panlong Airport in Lizhou City. With the area too hot for rescuers to enter and no local Hunters available, Sun Hang prepared to investigate alongside Candle Dragon and Zhong Ling’s Anomaly corpses.

• Sun Hang asked Candle Dragon about the Eight-Headed Serpent and learned of its ties to ancient Fusang mythology and Anomaly infection.
• After their aircraft entered Shu Province, an explosion severed contact with Lizhou 051 Observation Post, and the group saw a fireball consuming Panlong Airport.
• Yang Qi directed the pilot to land at Lizhou City Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, while Sun Hang suspected the fire might have been meant to draw him in.
• Officials reported that the fireball’s heat had made the area within ten kilometers impassable and that attempts to monitor it with drones had failed.
• Sun Hang asked Zhong Ling whether her Anomaly corpses could enter the heat, then asked Candle Dragon to take him toward the fireball’s core.

Sun Hang and Candle Dragon entered Lizhou City’s expanding high-temperature zone to confront the enormous fireball, but it vanished before they could reach it. At Panlong Airport, they found no trace of it and concluded it was likely an Ephemeral Anomaly that had burned itself out after releasing immense heat.

• Zhong Ling offered to join the fight, but Sun Hang and Candle Dragon told her to stay back while Yang Qi watched over her.
• Sun Hang and Candle Dragon reached the edge of the burning zone, where Sun Hang dismissed liquid nitrogen as a solution and led Candle Dragon toward the fireball.
• The fireball swelled and collapsed until it disappeared, and the surrounding temperature rapidly fell.
• Sun Hang borrowed a car and drove Candle Dragon through the burning streets to Panlong Airport, where the fireball had appeared.
• Sun Hang and Candle Dragon found only melted asphalt and cracked concrete, with no remaining Anomaly aura or signs of a blast.
• Candle Dragon identified the fireball as a likely Ephemeral Anomaly, and Sun Hang observed that it had released heat without causing blast-wave damage.

After the fireball vanished, Sun Hang and Candle Dragon discussed whether to claim credit for its destruction, and Sun Hang chose to report the incident truthfully. Sun Hang reached a hotel arranged for the hunters and collapsed into bed, but the image of the white-haired girl came back to him as he tried to sleep.

• Officials praised Sun Hang and Candle Dragon for eliminating the fireball, while Sun Hang asked about the casualties and then left the command tent.
• Candle Dragon offered to claim that Sun Hang had destroyed the aberration, but Sun Hang insisted that he wanted to report what had happened truthfully.
• Candle Dragon said he respected Sun Hang's choice and explained that the officials wanted credit to report, then left to help Zhong Ling and Yang Qi at the fires.
• Sun Hang saw that local media had already cast him and Candle Dragon as heroes and realized the Federation might assign them credit regardless of their reports.
• Sun Hang went to the hotel arranged for the group, learned its remaining staff were stranded nonlocals, and received a keycard and supplies.
• Sun Hang collapsed onto his bed after nearly forty-eight hours without proper sleep, but the white-haired girl came to mind as he closed his eyes.

Sun Hang confronted Anna Demoshina in a dream about the people she had consumed, but Three Monkeys erased the part of her answer that might have revealed his past. After waking, Sun Hang questioned whether he was human, then learned from Yang Qi that the fireball was a known anomalous entity called Helios.

• Sun Hang accused Anna of killing the people consumed by her fireball, and Anna claimed their emotions, memories, and souls had joined her.
• Sun Hang named the white-haired girl Anna Demoshina and asked what he had taught her, but Three Monkeys tore her apart and erased the crucial part of her reply.
• Sun Hang woke after nearly three hours, questioned whether he was human, and realized Three Monkeys had removed part of his memory.
• Yang Qi arrived with footage and reported that Tianshu Tower identified the fireball as the rare Phenomenon-type entity B-92, called Helios by the United States.
• Yang Qi explained Helios’s connection to ancient Greek records, and Sun Hang wondered whether it was among the suns in the Xiazhou myth of Hou Yi.

Sun Hang learned that the mysterious sun could return unpredictably and stayed in Lizhou City while Wang Xiyi remained frozen and critically ill. Zhong Ling apologized for spying on him, then revealed that Sun Hang had appeared in an intimate dream of hers, leaving him to face her mother’s hostile Anomaly Corpse and the possibility that his power had affected her dreams.

• Yang Qi told Sun Hang that the mysterious sun had no predictable pattern and that the team would remain in Lizhou City as its available emergency force.
• Sun Hang told Yang Qi he intended to save Wang Xiyi by absorbing her meme and insisted he would not be infected.
• Sun Hang discovered Zhong Ling’s concealed Anomaly Corpse had been eavesdropping outside his room.
• Zhong Ling apologized to Sun Hang and explained that she had sent the Anomaly Corpse because she thought he and Yang Qi were romantically involved.
• Zhong Ling told Sun Hang that he had appeared in an intimate dream she treasured because dreams sometimes let her see her deceased mother.
• Zhong Ling’s mother’s Anomaly Corpse confronted Sun Hang for supposedly bullying her, while Zhong Ling admitted she had spent the day thinking about the dream.

Sun Hang tried to keep Yang Qi from investigating the fireball’s impact site, warning that he had detected no anomalous residue. After learning that one victim had secretly worked as an intelligence liaison, he suspected the attack was connected to hidden information and began tracing a thread between Anna, Chimera Seventeen, and the victims.

• Sun Hang sent Zhong Ling back to her room and went to sleep, then Yang Qi woke him the next morning to survey the impact site.
• Yang Qi explained that she planned to test the wreckage and soil for Anomaly Meme residue, but Sun Hang said he and Candle Dragon had detected none.
• Sun Hang urged the group to help resettle disaster victims instead of searching the site, fearing that further investigation could draw Three Monkeys’ attention.
• After asking about the death toll, Sun Hang questioned why Anna had attacked Panlong Airport and considered whether the victims’ identities mattered.
• Yang Qi checked the confirmed victims and revealed that one apparent Disaster Response Committee clerk had secretly been a liaison officer for the intelligence department of the Chunming City Investigation Bureau.

Sun Hang connected the Panlong Airport fireball to the disappearance of Liangshui Gully and its missing investigation team, then decided to investigate the village. He headed into the mountains with Yang Qi and the others, worried that Anna might use them against him.

• Yang Qi showed Sun Hang a report describing how Liangshui Gully's residents and a dispatched investigation team had vanished without a trace.
• Sun Hang concluded that Liangshui Gully was their best lead and used his authority to order the group to drive there immediately.
• Sun Hang explained that his sense for Memes had linked the airport liaison officer's death to the village disappearances.
• The old Peacekeeper, afraid of the danger, left the vehicle after Sun Hang offered to drive and handed him an electric baton and tear gas spray.
• Sun Hang tried to send Yang Qi and the others away, but Yang Qi refused, and Candle Dragon guessed he was worried about putting them in danger.

Sun Hang and his team drove toward Liangshui Gully to investigate the missing team, using a military drone to monitor their route. After discovering an anomaly hidden among Zhong Ling’s controlled corpses, they traced it to a nearby Qiang village and found a strange organism embedded in its brain.

• Sun Hang had Yang Qi connect a military drone to their trip and send its footage to Tianfu City while the group discussed the risks and the missing investigation team.
• Zhong Ling noticed that twelve anomaly corpses were following them although she had deployed only eleven, and her corpses captured the intruder.
• Sun Hang’s team restrained the newly transformed anomaly corpse and detected a second, incompatible meme inside its brain.
• Sun Hang identified the corpse as a Qiang man and ordered the drone to investigate nearby Qiujiawan, where he suspected more anomalies had appeared.
• Sun Hang opened the corpse’s skull and found a translucent, spider-like organism with eight tentacles wrapped around its brain.

Sun Hang and Yang Qi investigated Qiujiawan after finding a parasite resembling Chimera Seventeen’s offspring in an anomalous corpse. The village appeared deserted, and Sun Hang discovered that its Nuoxi opera masks were visible in person but absent from photographs.

• Sun Hang ordered Yang Qi to compare the parasite’s meme with Chimera Seventeen’s recorded meme fragments while he dissected the anomalous corpse and found its memories had already been absorbed.
• Sun Hang contained the eight-tentacled parasite in a metal-coated bottle and paralyzed it with a drop of his blood.
• After Yang Qi reported no signs of villagers in Qiujiawan, Sun Hang redirected the group there instead of continuing to Liangshui Gully.
• Sun Hang entered Qiujiawan alone and found an apparently empty farmstay with no heat sources inside.
• Sun Hang saw grotesque Nuoxi opera masks through a window, but the photographs he sent Yang Qi showed only empty display racks.

Sun Hang uncovered a newborn Geng-type Anomaly formed from blood flowing out of camera-invisible Nuoxi opera masks and found a masked villager corpse at its core. The corpse spoke with Anna Dimoshina’s lingering consciousness, which said she had been tracking a notorious thief and denied causing the villagers’ condition.

• Sun Hang saw Nuoxi opera masks that his phone camera could not capture, then chopped them apart with hyphae and metal blades, releasing a flood of blood plasma.
• The blood’s memetic fragments merged into the courtyard, creating a Geng-type Anomaly, while Yang Qi and the others tried to reach Sun Hang from outside.
• Sun Hang sensed the Anomaly’s core and found a Qiang villager’s corpse whose mask had grown into her face and whose altered blood vessels connected her to the blood pool.
• Sun Hang confirmed that his phone could not photograph the corpse, and Yang Qi linked the events to Chimera Seventeen.
• The corpse moved and spoke to Sun Hang as Anna Dimoshina’s lingering consciousness; Anna denied causing the villagers’ condition and said she had come to track a notorious thief.

Sun Hang fought a malformed aberration born from a Qiang mother and learned that Three Monkeys had erased part of his memory, reinforcing his effort to approach the truth without directly knowing it. He left Qiujiawan for Tianfu City, reasoning that Chimera Seventeen would recover by feeding and then seek revenge.

• Anna described a pregnant Qiang woman whose malformed older twin survived on her blood after the younger twin was stolen, and Sun Hang’s speculation about the twins was erased by Three Monkeys.
• Anna urged Sun Hang to survive the older sister’s revenge, and a malformed aberrant fetus rose from the blood pool and trapped his legs.
• Sun Hang crushed the fetus with a mycelium hand, after which the aberration and the mother’s corpse withered away.
• Sun Hang told Yang Qi to alert the Lizhou City Management Committee and send the City Defense Guard to search the Qiang villages, then decided to return to Tianfu City.
• Sun Hang concluded that Chimera Seventeen was feeding to recover and would come for revenge, and he connected the idea of revenge to the memory Three Monkeys had erased.

Sun Hang returned to Tianfu City after warning Lizhou’s City Defense Guard against entering the mountains before hunter reinforcements arrived. At the institute, he learned that Wang Xiyi had only about two months left before her anomalization progressed too far, and the researcher refused to open her coffin until adequate safety preparations were made.

• Sun Hang argued with Yang Qi and Candle Dragon that Chimera Seventeen would likely choose Tianfu City as the final battlefield, despite the danger to civilians elsewhere.
• A Lizhou City Defense Guard officer told Sun Hang that two companies and three Investigation Bureau field teams were heading into the Qiang settlement area to rescue civilians, and Sun Hang warned them not to enter the mountains without hunters.
• Sun Hang left Lizhou City and returned to the Tianfu City Anomaly Research Institute, where Yin Xiang greeted him and told him the city had suffered several major incidents.
• Sun Hang asked Yin Xiang to take him to see Wang Xiyi, and Yang Qi joined him after completing her handover.
• At the Class A Containment Zone, a researcher told Sun Hang and Yang Qi that Wang Xiyi had about two months left and refused to open the Everfrost Coffin before safety preparations were complete.

Sun Hang returned home after learning that Wang Xiyi’s dangerous absorption experiment would take place outside Tianfu City within a day or two. He drank in her absence and later let Zhong Ling stay at his villa, where she cooked him jjajangmyeon.

• Yang Qi told Sun Hang the Institute would prepare Wang Xiyi’s absorption experiment and emergency rescue plan within two days, and that it would take place 160 kilometers west of Tianfu City.
• Sun Hang went home, remembered Wang Xiyi while drinking from her preferred canned liquor, and recalled her acceptance of her eventual death.
• Sun Hang repaired Wang Xiyi’s scratched Ultraman disc with his wish-fulfillment ability and worried that she might become a monster the way one did in an episode.
• Zhong Ling arrived with a suitcase and coffins of anomaly remains after Yin Xiang arranged for her to stay at Sun Hang’s villa.
• Zhong Ling cooked jjajangmyeon from the villa’s sparse supplies, and Sun Hang praised the meal.

Sun Hang and Zhong Ling shared meals at home before Yang Qi summoned them to Test Site Zero for an attempt to save Wang Xiyi. Sun Hang began devouring Wang Xiyi’s infection as she transformed into a dragonlike creature, and the outcome remained uncertain.

• Zhong Ling cooked for Sun Hang, tried alcohol, and passed out after gulping a strong drink; Sun Hang carried her to the guest room and covered her with a blanket.
• The next morning, Zhong Ling made breakfast despite her hangover, and Yang Qi called to say the institute had prepared the procedure for two that afternoon.
• Yang Qi told Sun Hang to bring Zhong Ling and warned him not to act recklessly, while explaining that the institute had contingency plans if the attempt failed.
• At Test Site Zero, staff removed the transport container around the Everfrost Coffin as Sun Hang waited inside a glass dome.
• Sun Hang used his devouring ability on Wang Xiyi as her infection accelerated, and she rapidly developed horns, a tail, and black scales.

As Wang Xiyi’s transformation spiraled out of control, Sun Hang ignored the order to escape and drank her Dragon Blood to absorb the mutation meme. The flames began to weaken, and Candle Dragon concluded that Sun Hang had brought the crisis under control.

• Yang Qi ordered Sun Hang to escape as Wang Xiyi’s infection passed the Third-Rank threshold and the researchers prepared to evacuate.
• Wang Xiyi’s body transformed amid spreading Dragon Flame, while Sun Hang remained inside the enclosure and heard the team discussing Plan C.
• Sun Hang remembered his promise to free Wang Xiyi, decided that day was not today, and bit into her neck.
• Sun Hang drank Wang Xiyi’s Dragon Blood as it burned through and repeatedly regenerated his body.
• Candle Dragon noticed the flames weakening and told Yang Qi to hold off on Plan C because Sun Hang seemed to have controlled the situation.

Yang Qi and Candle Dragon halted the evacuation as Sun Hang appeared to be containing Wang Xiyi’s transformation, while the researchers prepared to launch a nuclear missile under Plan C. Pei Zongjun canceled the launch, and Yang Qi’s monitoring showed the Black Dragon Meme fading as Sun Hang’s Meme changed in a way that suggested he had devoured the mutating Black Dragon.

• Candle Dragon said Sun Hang had the situation under control, and Yang Qi refused to evacuate because she believed in him.
• A researcher warned that Plan C would launch a nuclear missile if the evacuation deadline passed, but Yang Qi ordered the plan suspended and said she would take responsibility.
• Pei Zongjun revoked authorization for the nuclear launch, and the missile platform lowered as he confirmed he would bear responsibility for ending Plan C.
• Yang Qi ordered the remaining staff to resume Plan A and use spare remote monitoring equipment after the Dragon Flame destroyed the enclosure’s instruments.
• Yang Qi detected the Black Dragon Meme weakening and Sun Hang’s Meme changing, leading her to conclude that he had devoured the Black Dragon during its mutation.

Sun Hang stabilized Wang Xiyi’s Black Dragon Meme by consuming her blood, leaving her alive but permanently transformed with horns, a tail, and a dragon’s heart. As the researchers examined the result, the Old Director explained that Sun Hang had corrected the fatal flaws from the old Black Dragon Meme fusion experiments.

• Sun Hang stopped drinking Wang Xiyi’s blood, checked that she had survived, and woke her from the melted Everfrost Coffin.
• Wang Xiyi discovered that her meme had stabilized but that her horns and tail remained, and she worried that she had become less human.
• Sun Hang fashioned Wang Xiyi a living dress from Tai Sui Hyphae before the enclosure’s flames went out and exposed them to the gathered researchers.
• Yang Qi ordered the researchers back to work, and they reported that Wang Xiyi’s meme intensity had risen nearly sixteenfold while its stability had improved dramatically.
• The Old Director told Yang Qi that Sun Hang had repaired Wang Xiyi’s flawed meme fragments and explained that the nineteen survivors of the old fusion experiments had all been imperfect.

Yang Qi found that Sun Hang’s meme-frequency data showed no changes after he absorbed the Black Dragon Meme, and the strange readings she had observed had vanished from the records. As Sun Hang left the test area, he learned that Chimera Seventeen had devastated the Qiang villages near Lizhou City, and he agreed with Yang Qi that it would come for revenge.

• Yang Qi compared Sun Hang’s before-and-after meme reports and found their frequency curves identical, with no trace of the abnormal readings she had witnessed.
• Yang Qi gathered the researchers’ recordings, but they all matched the unchanged data; Old Director told her that at least twenty thousand people were missing from the Qiang villages near Lizhou City.
• Song Yarong told Sun Hang that Wang Xiyi had to remain in observation for seven days, while Sun Hang was allowed to leave the test area.
• Sun Hang drank several bottles of water after escaping the Dragon Flame’s dehydration, then invited Yang Qi to eat ramen and later asked her to dinner with Zhong Ling.
• Yang Qi asked Sun Hang what he had felt while absorbing Wang Xiyi’s mutated meme, and he described swallowing her blood as like burning petroleum.
• Yang Qi told Sun Hang that none of the Qiang villages in the mountains had been spared; Sun Hang said Chimera Seventeen would come for revenge.

Sun Hang and Yang Qi discussed humanity, Sun Hang’s priorities, and his curiosity about his forgotten past. Yang Qi worried that he was growing distant, while Old Director pointed out that Sun Hang had invited her to dinner.

• Sun Hang sensed a resentful gaze from another time, then told Yang Qi he did not think of humanity as a unified camp.
• Sun Hang said he cared most about food and sleep, and Yang Qi explained how his curiosity about his past fit the higher levels of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
• Yang Qi realized Sun Hang was steering their conversation away from her point and told him to stop interrupting her work.
• Sun Hang invited Yang Qi to dinner at his home, but she refused, so he vanished and left her to her work.
• Old Director asked Yang Qi why she had refused Sun Hang’s invitation.