Chapter Summaries

Sun Hang tested whether his ability could connect him to active communication channels, but the attempt destroyed his headphones and ruined his dumplings. He went outside under the citywide travel restrictions and encountered a Temporary Peacekeeper who insisted he obey the rules.

• Sun Hang found Wang Xiyi's note telling him to report to the institute before noon and tried to cook frozen dumplings in a rice cooker.
• Sun Hang attempted to use his ability to connect his headphones to current communication channels, briefly heard voices, and then burned out the headphones.
• Sun Hang's rice cooker boiled over and left him with a pot of minced meat and dough paste, which he ate before going for a walk.
• Sun Hang walked through the dark, freezing neighborhood and reflected on the risks of staying in Tianfu City and his goals of survival, strength, and recovering his memories.
• A Temporary Peacekeeper stopped Sun Hang and told him that travel across the city was restricted, even for important people.

Sun Hang encountered frightened Peacekeepers and visited a temporary supply station during the Eternal Night, where a young cadre’s old burn scar triggered a vision of a past battle. The chapter left Sun Hang wondering whether he had seen the cadre’s memories.

• Captain Gong recognized Sun Hang as a resident of the villa district, apologized for the young Temporary Peacekeeper’s behavior, and drove away with him.
• Sun Hang walked to a supermarket converted into a supply transfer station and showed his Hunter License to the wary staff and soldier.
• The cadre explained that Sun Hang could requisition goods, then paid for his Fanta when Sun Hang could not use his phone or cash.
• Sun Hang saw a vision of a winged, scaled figure tearing apart a flaming anomaly mask as the young cadre staggered.
• Sun Hang noticed a burn scar on the cadre’s neck and wondered whether the vision had come from his memories.

Sun Hang and a young official were caught off guard when armed rioters attacked a supermarket, killing a City Defense Guard soldier and a woman. Sun Hang recognized one attacker as infected but did not know what abilities he had, and stayed behind as the official led his colleagues toward the warehouse exit.

• Sun Hang realized he could read the young official's memories without devouring him, but an approaching engine interrupted his attempt to test the ability.
• Sun Hang warned the young official that the approaching vehicle was a sedan rather than a supply truck, and a City Defense Guard soldier went outside to inspect it.
• A masked rioter shot and killed the soldier, then killed a young woman at the supermarket entrance.
• The young official ordered his colleagues to retreat to the warehouse and contact the authorities as more rioters emerged from the sedan.
• Sun Hang sensed that the last rioter was infected and told the young official to escape through the warehouse's back door while he stayed behind.

Sun Hang used Object Control to ambush a dangerous infected who had killed an Anomaly Hunter, but the attack nearly exhausted him. He realized his ability could keep drawing on his life after his mental energy ran out, leaving him at risk of killing himself through uncontrolled imagination.

• Sun Hang trapped the young official in the warehouse, while Monkey shot the girl outside and the gang prepared to loot and burn the supermarket.
• Sun Hang learned that the infected leader had strangled an Anomaly Hunter, making him hesitate before attacking the gang.
• Sun Hang sent mycelial filaments toward the infected as the ground opened beneath him, then wrapped and tore him apart in a cocoon.
• The infected's corrosive blood killed the rifleman after it splashed onto his arm.
• Sun Hang recovered from nearly passing out and recalled that controlling concrete had consumed far more mental energy than he expected.
• Sun Hang recognized that Object Control could overdraw his mental energy and keep consuming his health until his imagined action was complete.

Sun Hang killed the infected thug and his accomplices, then discovered that consuming the infected person had strengthened his mycelium with corrosion resistance. The realization that his power might be the ability to make wishes come true left him questioning what Anomaly had infected him, before the City Defense Guard arrived to secure the scene.

• Sun Hang absorbed warmth and strength as the infected person's aura faded, and likened consuming Anomalies to gaining experience points and rare skills.
• Sun Hang shot the two remaining thugs, then examined the infected person's mutated skeleton and found that his mycelium could simulate corrosion resistance by forming a keratin layer.
• Sun Hang wondered whether his true ability was to make whatever he wished come true and questioned the identity of the Anomaly that had infected him.
• The City Defense Guard arrived, and Sun Hang reported the deaths and warned the officer that the infected person's blood was extremely corrosive.

Sun Hang learned that the infected Song Yarong had survived and heard how a Blood-Eroding Slime Mold experiment had produced the fugitive he killed. Yang Qi and Wang Xiyi then told him that the Disaster Response Committee had called hunters and Qualified Users to a vital mission in Baqu City, where they would receive their briefing.

• Yang Qi told Sun Hang that Song Yarong had survived as an infected, with recovery abilities and a primary strain that gave him control over her life.
• Yang Lian identified the anomaly behind the attack as E-328, Blood-Eroding Slime Mold, and Yang Qi explained that a researcher’s illegal experiments had caused four test subjects to escape years earlier.
• Yang Qi revealed that Sun Hang had killed the last fugitive test subject, while Wang Xiyi questioned how he had detected the man despite a drug that concealed anomalous presence.
• Yang Qi and Wang Xiyi announced that the Disaster Response Committee had ordered hunters, Anomaly Equipment, and Qualified Users to join a vital mission.
• Sun Hang asked where the mission would take them, and Yang Qi said they were heading to Baqu City for the operational briefing.

Sun Hang and the others arrived at a temporary camp near Jin Ya Airport for a combat meeting about the Eternal Night anomaly. Inside the tent, they saw Tianshu Tower’s experts and powerful Anomaly Hunters gathered around a terrain projection, and Sun Hang likened the assembled group to a Manchu Han Imperial Feast.

• After circling Jin Ya Airport nine times in heavy rain, the plane carrying Sun Hang and the others landed safely.
• Sun Hang, Yang Qi, and the others passed several checkpoints and entered the temporary camp’s meeting tent.
• Yang Qi identified the white-coated Tianshu Tower researcher and the enormous eleventh-ranked hunter Iron Wall.
• Yang Qi warned Sun Hang not to look directly at Bao Si, whose ability enchanted people and could control some anomalies.
• Yang Qi noted that many of the hunters gathered there ranked among the Federation’s top three hundred, and Sun Hang called the group a Manchu Han Imperial Feast.

Sun Hang and the others attended an overdue operational meeting where Professor Li revealed their mission was to find and destroy the Breeding Ground, a nursery producing anomalies. Historical records suggested it had once been located at Yadan Devil City, and the meeting left the group with that lead as Shu Province faced the threat of the Eternal Night.

• Yang Qi warned Sun Hang to avoid provoking the hunters, and Ye Xuan and Ye Jiu joined them in the meeting tent.
• When the reinforcements from the Emei region failed to arrive, an elderly general began the operational meeting without them.
• Professor Li explained that the mission was to find and destroy the Breeding Ground to prevent newborn anomalies from flooding into human territory.
• Professor Li said Tianshu Tower's analysis found that a Breeding Ground appeared within every area affected by the Eternal Night.
• Professor Li showed historical anomaly movements converging on Yadan Devil City, where a Breeding Ground had been located during the Eternal Night of 4533.

Professor Li explained the history of the Eternal Night and the danger posed by its Breeding Grounds, which could produce even Primal Anomalies. He revealed that an Eternal Night in the Amazon had formed within the domain of Ding Zero - Decaying Mother Tree.

• Yang Qi explained to Sun Hang that records of Anomalies dated back to ancient times, though their large-scale invasions began only about three hundred years ago.
• Professor Li showed historical accounts of a nine-year Eternal Night during the Zhu Ming period that devastated the region from Siming Prefecture to Zhaoqing Prefecture.
• Yang Lian asked what happened to a Breeding Ground and its Anomalies after an Eternal Night ended, and Professor Li said they disappeared for unknown reasons.
• Professor Li warned that Breeding Grounds could produce low-serial-number Anomalies, including Primal Anomalies, which Hunters referred to as “Her.”
• Professor Li revealed that an Amazon Eternal Night’s Breeding Ground lay within the domain of the Primal Anomaly Ding Zero - Decaying Mother Tree.

The hunters debated whether a possible Primal Anomaly made the operation in Shu Province hopeless, and the elderly general suspended the meeting so they could review past Eternal Night intelligence. Professor Li summoned Sun Hang and Yang Qi for a private conversation, and they arrived at his cluttered tent as he brought them tea.

• Yang Qi explained to Sun Hang that Primal Anomalies were inferred from memetic evidence and had never been directly observed by humans.
• An elderly general suspended the operational meeting for thirty minutes and made previous Eternal Night intelligence available to the hunters.
• Yang Qi and Yang Lian explained that stronger hunters remained loyal to the Federation because they depended on it for suppressants.
• A Tianshu Tower soldier invited Sun Hang and Yang Qi to speak privately with Professor Li, while Yang Lian and Wang Xiyi stayed behind.
• Professor Li welcomed Sun Hang and Yang Qi into his tent and brought them tea.

Sun Hang met Professor Li, who discussed theories about why anomalous objects began attacking humanity three hundred years ago. Professor Li said he had no conclusive explanation, leaving Sun Hang without the answer he sought.

• Iron Wall asked Sun Hang whether he was infected by the Gluttonous Meme, and Sun Hang confirmed it.
• Professor Li said Sun Hang's infection challenged his theory that Gluttonous Memes could not infect humans, and he welcomed the correction.
• Sun Hang asked why anomalous objects had attacked humanity en masse only three hundred years ago, despite existing since the Pre-Qin Period.
• Professor Li described the Self-Purification Theory, which proposed that anomalous objects were nature's response to human industrial pollution, and Yang Qi compared them to an immune system.
• Yang Qi outlined the Territory Theory, and Professor Li said he knew a student seeking evidence for it.
• Sun Hang asked for Professor Li's own explanation, and Professor Li said he did not know.

Professor Li proposed founding an anomaly research academy beneath the Eternal Night and appointed Sun Hang as its first principal. As Sun Hang questioned the choice, he realized he had been unable to feel fear since waking from his coma.

• Professor Li said the Eternal Night offered a rare chance to establish an academy for anomaly research and training in Shu Province.
• Professor Li told Sun Hang he would be the academy’s first principal, arguing that graduates could gain guaranteed admission to Tianshu Tower and that Sun Hang had the courage for the role.
• Professor Li cited Sun Hang’s actions at Longquanyi Air Force Base and against the anomalous shadow as evidence of his courage.
• Sun Hang recalled that he had not felt fear since waking from his coma, even when imagining powerful anomalies.

Sun Hang accepted the position of academy principal and met Ye Qi, his prospective dean of discipline, whose research interests prompted a warning from Professor Li. The strategy meeting then shifted toward tracking Anomalies across Shu Province to locate the “Breeding Ground.”

• Sun Hang agreed to become principal after learning the position carried authority and benefits equivalent to a Tianshu Tower Special Class Researcher.
• Professor Li introduced Ye Qi as Sun Hang’s prospective right-hand man, and Ye Qi explained his family background and offered to introduce Sun Hang to Huntresses.
• Yang Qi revealed that Ye Qi wanted to study the offspring of infected people, and Professor Li rebuked him for treating children as experimental subjects.
• Professor Li told Sun Hang to keep an eye on Ye Qi, and Sun Hang noticed how little Ye Qi’s expression changed.
• The strategy meeting changed the Hunters’ assignment to tracking Anomalies in Shu Province during the Eternal Night and reporting their routes so Tianshu Tower could calculate the Breeding Ground’s location.

Sun Hang celebrated Yin Xiang’s freedom with him on the institute rooftop, where Yin Xiang insisted on staying in Shu Province and asked to become an Anomaly Hunter. After Sun Hang stopped him from jumping off the roof, a military call reported that a mountain was moving sixteen kilometers west of Tianfu City.

• Yin Xiang brought food and beer to celebrate his release and thanked Sun Hang for helping save the investigation team.
• Yin Xiang said he planned to stay in Shu Province, take the investigator exam, and fight the anomalies instead of fleeing.
• Yin Xiang asked Sun Hang to infect him so he could become an Anomaly Hunter, but Sun Hang refused.
• Yin Xiang jumped over the rooftop railing, and Sun Hang pulled him back with fungal threads before he hit the ground.
• A military communications call informed Sun Hang that a mountain was moving west of Tianfu City.

Sun Hang and the response team learned that Longyanlei was moving toward Tianfu City, causing widespread destruction, and debated how to stop it. With evacuation and a nuclear strike both deemed inadequate, Sun Hang suggested using Bao Si’s Charm anomaly, leaving the team to consider whether it could affect the moving mountain.

• A monitoring post reported that Longyanlei was moving toward Tianfu City at about sixty kilometers per hour, and footage showed it crushing the ground in its path.
• Sun Hang and the others reviewed the rising damage and casualty reports, while researchers identified the moving mountain as Longyanlei.
• The military representative urged an immediate interception, but researchers warned that the mountain’s immense momentum made it impossible to stop with their current means.
• The military representative proposed a nuclear strike, and Song Yarong objected that it could devastate the city.
• Sun Hang suggested contacting Bao Si at the Qingcheng Mountain camp to try charming Longyanlei, and Yang Qi revealed that Bao Si was infected by the Type A rule-based Anomaly called Charm.

The Disaster Response Committee approved a plan to lure Longyanlei into a safe area and destroy it with a nuclear weapon, assigning Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi to clear Anomalies along its route. As the teams set out, the Hunters discussed Bao Si’s dangerous Allure ability and prepared for the operation.

• Yang Qi explained that Bao Si carried the Type A-59 Allure meme, which made her a low-ranked Hunter despite its ability to affect people who saw her.
• The Disaster Response Committee approved the Longyanlei Induction Operation, dividing the Hunters into Guard, Sweep, and Infiltration Groups.
• Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi joined the Sweep Group, while Ye Jiu was assigned to guard Bao Si and worried about being affected by Allure.
• Ye Jiu repaid Sun Hang the two million he owed using a card from Ye Xuan, then put on his Ogre Mask.
• Ye Xuan briefed the Hunters aboard the helicopter, and Sun Hang warned Wang Xiyi that the operation already involved a formidable threat.

Sun Hang and the others approached Tianfu City as Longyanlei threatened to destroy it, while Bao Si prepared to use her charm ability from the Garuda aerial platform to divert the moving mountain. The induction operation was about to begin, with civilians still largely unable to evacuate.

• Ye Jiu left the helicopter after Sun Hang kicked him out, and Ye Xuan said Ye Jiu would survive the fall.
• Ye Xuan explained that the Garuda Type I platform had arrived at Qingcheng Mountain Base and that Bao Si would try to charm Longyanlei into changing direction.
• Ye Xuan reported that only two percent of the threatened western districts had been evacuated, and Sun Hang wrestled with his doubts about whether he cared about the people at risk.
• Sun Hang saw Longyanlei bearing down on Tianfu City as the command team prepared to start the induction operation.
• The on-site commander ordered monitoring equipment shut down and personnel to keep their eyes on their assigned directions; Ye Xuan confirmed Bao Si's charm could work through a screen.

Bao Si’s charm ability successfully diverted Longyanlei away from Tianfu City, though its turn caused severe ground damage. Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi landed to clear their assigned defensive area, then received orders to hurry to Zone D16.

• Bao Si was released from her protective suit, and her charm ability induced Longyanlei to turn away from Tianfu City.
• Longyanlei’s turn caused fissures to swallow buildings, but the city was declared safe as the mountain moved onto the induced route.
• Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi jumped from a helicopter and landed on the mountain’s route, with Wang Xiyi using an explosion and Sun Hang weaving a mycelium parachute.
• Ye Xuan deployed J2796, which transformed into Bright Light Armor around Sun Hang.
• Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi advanced through their assigned defensive area as Longyanlei approached and the ground fractured.
• Yang Qi assigned Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi a new mission in Zone D16, more than two hundred kilometers away.

Hunters clearing the area encountered a mass emergence of ghouls from underground, including ancient soldiers revived at a Three Kingdoms-era battlefield. As Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi fought the horde, a five-meter-tall Giant Ghoul burst from the ground and sent Wang Xiyi flying, leaving the two to face a much stronger enemy.

• Yang Qi reported that Anomalies had emerged across multiple areas and that support drones detected many more beneath Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi.
• Wang Xiyi and Sun Hang fought off faceless ghouls that crawled from cracks in the ground, while Wang Xiyi explained how ghouls were created and described their usual threat level.
• The ghouls began appearing in ruined ancient armor and carrying weapons, and Yang Qi identified the location as a Three Kingdoms-era battlefield where ancient soldiers had been revived by the Anomalization Virus.
• Ye Xuan ordered Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi to clear their area and support the other hunters, whose enemies were more dangerous, as drones and the two hunters cut down the ghouls.
• A five-meter-tall Giant Ghoul burst from the ground, struck Wang Xiyi aside, and tore through Sun Hang's filament net; Wang Xiyi recovered and began full beastification.

Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi struggled against a regenerating Giant Ghoul while the wider battle worsened, and Sun Hang chose to investigate Longyanlei. He left Ye Jiu to take over the fight and departed by helicopter, with Wang Xiyi wondering whether he could break the deadlock.

• Wang Xiyi attacked the Giant Ghoul, but it slammed her into the ground before Sun Hang's imagined injury caused it to stagger and allowed her to escape.
• Sun Hang and Wang Xiyi found that the Giant Ghoul healed rapidly, while Yang Qi reported that other sectors were under heavier attack and hunters sent to Longyanlei had gone missing.
• Sun Hang decided to go to Longyanlei, and Ye Xuan said the Command Center had approved sending him to investigate the source of the crisis.
• Yang Qi objected to Sun Hang's dangerous mission, but he insisted on going and joked with her before a helicopter arrived.
• Ye Jiu leaped from the helicopter to take over the Giant Ghoul fight, and Sun Hang used J2796 to attach himself to the aircraft as it prepared to depart.
• Ye Jiu urged Sun Hang to retreat if necessary, while Wang Xiyi said she believed he might be able to break the deadlock.