Chapter Summaries

Gecko spoke with Master Snake about Qinggang and Blackwater Town while Lu Xin interrogated the red-suited Puppet-type ability user inside the warehouse. Lu Xin left the prisoner in Master Snake’s custody, assuring her that he was perfectly normal now.

• Master Snake questioned Gecko about Qinggang, and he described the city’s ordinary comforts and criticized Blackwater Town as too wild.
• Master Snake learned that Gecko’s loudspeaker claim about High Wall City was a bluff, then heard the red-suited man scream from inside the warehouse.
• Lu Xin finished questioning the prisoner and asked Master Snake to keep him until someone from Qinggang could retrieve him.
• The prisoner trembled and called everyone monsters, but Lu Xin calmly told Master Snake that he was perfectly normal now.

Lu Xin and Gecko left Blackwater Town with Master Snake’s generous gifts, and Lu Xin eased Gecko’s troubled mood by telling him he considered him a friend. As they headed onto the main road, Lu Xin began recounting what he had learned from interrogating Chen Zhong.

• Lu Xin praised Master Snake for giving them valuable goods, supplies, and help arranging delivery to Qinggang City.
• Gecko admitted he had been unsettled since Blackwater Town, and Lu Xin reassured him that he cared about him as a friend and teammate.
• Lu Xin revealed that his ability was strange and that his family members were not quite normal, while Gecko accepted the explanation without pressing further.
• Gecko asked Lu Xin what he had learned from interrogating the Puppet-type ability user, and Lu Xin consulted his notes.
• Lu Xin explained that Chen Zhong had joined Qin Ran’s Knights’ Order three years earlier and described their commissioned missions, including assassinations, escorts, and searches.

Lu Xin learned from Chen Zhong that Qin Ran was likely hiding in Happy Town at the end of Highway 85, but Gecko recognized the place as an exceptionally dangerous region. The chapter ended with Lu Xin studying a map marked with five skulls and a warning that nobody who went there returned.

• Lu Xin told Gecko that Chen Zhong’s team had stolen the painting, carried out a failed mental pollution bomb mission, and included the ability user Big Head Ghost, who caused the Rose Flower incident.
• Lu Xin said Chen Zhong had described Qin Ran’s ability with the word “Unkillable” and had been defeated before Qin Ran fully revealed his power.
• Lu Xin revealed that Qin Ran might be hiding at Happy Town, where the team planned to meet again after three months.
• Gecko abruptly stopped the vehicle, checked the map, and recognized Happy Town as a region marked with five skulls and a question mark.
• Gecko warned Lu Xin that nobody who went near the place came back.

Gecko explained that Happy Town was an S-rank mysterious forbidden zone where past expeditions had vanished, but Lu Xin insisted on going there to bring Qin Ran back. As they headed toward it, Lu Xin read the sparse records about the town and its deadly mental force field.

• Gecko told Lu Xin that Happy Town was a forbidden zone that had swallowed an entire Pioneer Team and left no useful exploration records.
• Lu Xin decided to enter Happy Town to retrieve Qin Ran, while Mom and Sister eagerly welcomed the trip.
• Gecko contacted headquarters, which approved the exploration and sent information about the forbidden zone.
• Lu Xin read that Happy Town's mental force field caused severe symptoms, disrupted electronics, and made anyone who crossed its boundary disappear.
• Lu Xin learned that Happy Town's residents wore constant smiles and that a detained resident, the interrogators, and their research report had vanished without a trace.

On the way to Happy Town, Gecko explained ability-user classifications and asked Lu Xin how powerful he was. Lu Xin judged himself at most A-class and admitted he was afraid of the Mysterious Forbidden Zone, but remained determined to go because rescuing the people inside was their job.

• Lu Xin finished reading the ability-user materials and told Gecko they would need to inspect the situation themselves.
• Gecko explained that ability-users were classified from C-class to S-class, with S-class abilities considered unsolvable.
• Lu Xin said he was not unsolvable and was at most A-class, while Mom listened from the back seat and smiled.
• Gecko asked why Lu Xin would enter the Mysterious Forbidden Zone if he was afraid, and Lu Xin said fear did not change their duty to bring the people back.

Lu Xin and Gecko reached the outskirts of Happy Town, where Lu Xin warned Gecko that he might be the real danger and decided to enter alone. After resting and preparing, Lu Xin followed a path into the mist, while Gecko stayed behind and noticed two shadows accompanying him.

• Lu Xin told Gecko to wait outside Happy Town because Lu Xin himself might be dangerous.
• Gecko insisted he would enter with Lu Xin, but agreed to stay outside after Lu Xin explained that he did not want to put him at risk.
• Gecko advised Lu Xin to eat, rest, and avoid consuming anything inside the town to guard against Mental Pollution.
• After resting and eating, Lu Xin set off down a winding path toward Happy Town while Gecko remained by the vehicle.
• Gecko saw one tall and one short shadow following Lu Xin, then asked whether Uncle was going after them.

Lu Xin entered Happy Town and encountered its silent, smiling residents while searching for Qin Ran and the other ability users. After the residents refused to answer his questions, a young woman accepted his money without speaking.

• Lu Xin walked toward Happy Town with Sister, while Mom disappeared and Sister admitted she feared someone other than Father.
• Lu Xin reached vast, orderly farmland under the Crimson Moon and recorded his observations in his notebook.
• Lu Xin encountered a man working among pink medicinal flowers, but the man only smiled instead of answering whether this was Happy Town.
• Lu Xin reached the town and saw silent residents in the fields watching him with identical smiles.
• Lu Xin showed a young woman Qin Ran's photograph and offered her fifty yuan, which she accepted without answering.

Lu Xin entered the silent town to search for Qin Ran, but the residents turned hostile after Mom cut away something that had nearly contaminated him. Mom pointed him toward a house that might have been lit, and he headed there while the armed townspeople followed in the shadows.

• A girl took Lu Xin's fifty Alliance currency but refused to answer his question, so Lu Xin and Sister pried the bill from her hand and he entered the town alone.
• Lu Xin surveyed the town's densely packed houses and sensed danger as he considered opening one to search for Qin Ran.
• Mom appeared and said she had cut away something dirty that had nearly touched Lu Xin.
• Lu Xin noticed armed residents hiding beneath the houses and following him, while Mom denied responsibility for their hostility.
• Mom recalled seeing a room with its lights on and pointed toward the southeastern corner of town, so Lu Xin went to investigate.
• Sister said the hostile residents were already toys and that she did not want things someone else had played with.

Lu Xin followed Mom and Sister through the watched town to find Qin Ran, whom he suspected was hiding in a row of rooms. After he threatened to smoke out anyone inside, Qin Ran emerged, and Lu Xin finally confronted the man he had searched for over several days.

• Lu Xin, Mom, and Sister reached the town’s back row of rooms while residents watched them from the shadows.
• Lu Xin smelled meat near the rooms and reasoned that opening the doors could let the people hiding inside escape amid the confusion.
• A little boy offered Lu Xin sour dates, and Lu Xin accepted them after correcting the boy for calling him Uncle.
• Lu Xin proposed burning pine and cypress branches beside the rooms to force anyone inside to come out.
• Qin Ran stepped out of a room holding roasted corn, and Lu Xin recognized him as the man who had ambushed him and Chen Jing and stolen the painting.
• Lu Xin relaxed when Mom and Sister joined him, then told Qin Ran that he had been looking for him for several days.

Lu Xin confronted Qin Ran over the massacre in Qinggang City, but Qin Ran dismissed ordinary lives and attacked him with help from armed mercenaries. Lu Xin tore out Qin Ran’s still-beating heart, then hurriedly put it back after Mom’s reaction suggested something was wrong.

• Lu Xin told Qin Ran he had come to answer for the deaths of more than two thousand people and to recover the painting if it remained.
• Qin Ran mocked Lu Xin for caring about ordinary people, and Lu Xin called him a madman before advancing.
• Mercenaries hiding in the rooms opened fire, while Mom shielded Lu Xin from the bullets.
• Lu Xin charged through the gunfire as Qin Ran fled inside, dodged Qin Ran’s shots, and tore out his heart.
• Qin Ran smiled and laughed after Lu Xin removed his heart, and Lu Xin put it back when Mom sighed.

Lu Xin killed Qin Ran, triggering the No. 041-style revenge pollution, which rapidly spread through Happy Town’s residents. As the Flesh Monster Tree grew and Lu Xin struggled to stop it without accelerating its spread, Qin Ran’s companions fled and Lu Xin fired a flare for Gecko to intercept them.

• Lu Xin realized Qin Ran’s death could trigger the No. 041 pollution incident, but the wound was already fatal.
• A tree grew from Qin Ran’s corpse, and its vine seized a resident who mistook Lu Xin for Zhang Si huo and attacked him before killing himself.
• More vines polluted residents, causing them to turn on one another as Lu Xin recognized the pattern of the Avengers and tried to stop the spread.
• Qin Ran’s companions escaped on motorcycles, so Lu Xin threw residents into nearby rooms and fired a flare to alert Gecko.
• Mom warned Lu Xin that tearing apart the growing corpse could split the Pollution Source and accelerate its spread, while the monster and number of Avengers continued to grow.

Lu Xin realized Qin Ran had transferred his victims’ hatred onto him by growing a face beneath his skin, and Mom cut the face away. With the townspeople no longer attacking him, Lu Xin turned to confront Qin Ran.

• Lu Xin pieced together that Qin Ran’s contamination devoured people’s spirits but carried the price of their hatred, which Qin Ran redirected onto targets like Cui Wang and Lu Xin.
• Lu Xin concluded that the face growing beneath his skin had made the townspeople mistake him for Qin Ran and attack him.
• Mom found Qin Ran’s forming face beneath Lu Xin’s skin and cut it away, while Sister cooled his wound.
• The townspeople collapsed and fought over the severed flesh, leaving Lu Xin free to face Qin Ran.

Lu Xin interrupted Qin Ran’s rapid pollution and learned that Qin Ran had escaped from a laboratory mission. After a strange man’s plea briefly distracted him, Lu Xin seized Qin Ran before he could merge completely with the flesh tree, while revealing that Sister had gone after the rose seller.

• Lu Xin realized that Qin Ran’s pollution could be stopped by completing revenge, and the townspeople who ate Lu Xin’s flesh became motionless.
• Qin Ran’s face emerged from the flesh tree and explained that Lu Xin’s mental level had accelerated the pollution of the fifth group.
• Qin Ran said that Lu Xin’s special nature had accidentally completed the laboratory mission he had escaped from.
• Lu Xin attacked Qin Ran as his face began merging into the tree, suspecting Qin Ran was about to use a third ability.
• A strange man called from a house and demanded that Lu Xin not hurt Qin Ran, briefly making Lu Xin reluctant to attack.
• Lu Xin overcame the distraction, seized Qin Ran by the neck, and told him that Sister had gone to find the rose seller.

Lu Xin’s attempt to pull Qin Ran from the Flesh Monster Tree killed one version of him and awakened sixteen others, whose attacks spread a forest of monsters through the town. As Lu Xin became overwhelmed, Mom decided it was time to let Father out, and the chapter ended with Qin Ran startled as Lu Xin suddenly stood up.

• Lu Xin tried to drag Qin Ran out of the tree, but Qin Ran turned into dead wood and died.
• Sixteen humanoid fruits awakened as Qin Ran, attacked Lu Xin, and grew faces wherever they touched him.
• Thirty-six contaminated residents burst into smaller Human-shaped Fruit Trees, spreading chaos through the town.
• Mom reminded Lu Xin that the family had agreed to let Father out, and Lu Xin looked toward Qinggang City as Room 401’s door flew open.
• Qin Ran worried about his companion, then watched Lu Xin stand up as every Qin Ran on the tree turned toward him in surprise.

Big Head Ghost discovered that his ability had failed to influence Lu Xin, then was attacked and killed by a strange little girl inside the house. Outside, Lu Xin stood surrounded by monsters as his shadow grew, rose, and opened blood-red eyes.

• Big Head Ghost realized Lu Xin had ignored his influence and charged out to grab the boss by the throat.
• A strange voice and a blaring mental detector alerted Big Head Ghost to something unseen in the room.
• The little girl appeared and twisted Big Head Ghost’s senses and limbs until he could barely move.
• The little girl hugged Big Head Ghost’s head and killed him, saying she would protect the little doll until Daddy came out.
• As monsters surrounded Lu Xin, his shadow expanded, stood upright, and opened a pair of blood-red eyes.

Lu Xin’s black shadow drove Qin Ran’s will out of him and unleashed devastating power against the Human-shaped Fruit Trees in Happy Town. He destroyed the trees surrounding him and charged toward those still standing.

• Lu Xin’s black shadow appeared, and its heartbeat drowned out the noise as the faces carrying Qin Ran’s will burst from Lu Xin’s body.
• The Qin Rans on the main Human-shaped Fruit Tree reacted in terror, while Lu Xin accused them of invading his home and began moving forward.
• More than thirty small Human-shaped Fruit Trees swarmed Lu Xin and engulfed him.
• Lu Xin’s shadow spread through the attacking trees, making them scream, and he smashed two of them into the road.
• Lu Xin’s strike and its shock wave destroyed the affected trees, and he pounced toward the remaining Human-shaped Fruit Trees.

Lu Xin fought the Human-shaped Fruit Tree in Happy Town, growing more monstrous as he tortured and destroyed it. One Qin Ran escaped toward the town’s edge, where Mom and Sister were waiting for him.

• Mom called Lu Xin a true monster as he destroyed the small Human-shaped Fruit Trees, then led Sister away from him.
• The Qin Rans combined their voices into a curse that pushed against Lu Xin, but he walked through it and confronted the main Human-shaped Fruit Tree.
• Lu Xin caught a Qin Ran, turned him and his vine into a whip, and repeatedly lashed the tree as its many selves screamed.
• One Qin Ran secretly broke away from the tree and fled town carrying a silver briefcase.
• At the edge of town, the fleeing Qin Ran encountered Mom and Sister standing among the flowers.

Lu Xin tore through Happy Town to reach Qin Ran, who was cornered by the refined woman and her strange daughter. Qin Ran revealed that Lu Xin had awakened the sleeping Queen, the town’s ruler, just as Lu Xin struggled to restrain the shadow trying to seize him.

• Qin Ran tried to flee the town, but the refined woman stopped him and deflected his special bullet before asking why he would not die painlessly.
• Lu Xin noticed the shot, destroyed the Human-shaped Fruit Tree, and charged through Happy Town, demolishing houses and the monsters inside them.
• Qin Ran realized the woman and girl were connected to Lu Xin and asked who had given him the code name One-Man Army.
• Lu Xin reached the flower field as his shadow tried to grab Qin Ran, but Lu Xin held it back.
• Qin Ran said he had hidden in Happy Town because the Queen was sleeping there and everyone in town was her subject, then declared that Lu Xin had awakened her.

Lu Xin faced the Queen of Happy Town after Qin Ran awakened her, while his family prepared to confront the town’s ruler. The Queen halted when Lu Xin joined his family and stared back at her.

• Qin Ran revealed that the creature emerging from the mountain villa was the Queen and that his body belonged to her subjects.
• The Queen appeared above the villa as dead residents and decayed troops emerged throughout Happy Town and gathered against Lu Xin.
• The black shadow behind Lu Xin roared, provoking the Queen and triggering the town’s residents and troops to charge.
• Lu Xin regained consciousness, recognized how the Queen had turned the town’s residents into her subjects, and looked to his family for guidance.
• Mom reached into her bag, Sister bared her teeth at the Queen, and Lu Xin chose to stand with his family.
• The Queen stopped advancing and showed surprise when Lu Xin stared directly at her.

Lu Xin and his family confronted the Queen of Happy Town, but Mom defused the danger by calmly chatting with her. After the Queen withdrew, Dad tried to kill Qin Ran, and Lu Xin resisted until Mom ordered Dad to go back.

• Lu Xin endured the Queen’s mental pressure and stood beside his family, shielding Sister.
• Mom greeted the Queen and suggested ways to make the town’s flower fields more varied, easing the Queen’s hostility.
• The Queen accepted Mom’s apology and retreated into the villa as the armed residents lowered their guns and withdrew.
• Lu Xin and his family turned their attention to Qin Ran, whom Lu Xin wanted to question.
• Dad seized control of Lu Xin’s arm and tried to grab Qin Ran, but Lu Xin resisted and Mom told Dad to go back.