Chapter Summaries

Chu Mu advanced his Devouring Divine Ability by studying the Heavenly Evolution Divine Soul, but found that even a version perfected beyond its limit could not safely consume Chaotic Void energy without a suitable vessel. He began testing spatial storage artifacts as vessels, and one collapsed after taking in ten threads of the energy.

• Chu Mu studied a Top-Grade Spirit Stone and the Heavenly Evolution Divine Soul, raising his simulated Devouring Divine Ability from sixty percent to over eighty percent.
• After years of experiments in the Outer Realm, Chu Mu formed a devouring black hole that absorbed Chaotic Void energy, but the power threatened to kill him, so he dispersed it at ten-tenths plus ten percent.
• Chu Mu returned to the realm and tested the ability on spiritual qi, which it absorbed safely as it evolved to ten-tenths plus fifty percent.
• Chu Mu concluded he needed a vessel to contain Chaotic Void energy and selected spatial storage artifacts taken from Nascent Soul Demons for testing.
• Chu Mu fed Chaotic Void energy into a Storage Space, which endured nine threads but collapsed when he added the tenth.

After more than ten years of experiments, Chu Mu confirmed that Spirit Rhythm could contain energy absorbed by his perfected Devouring Divine Ability, but he remained unsure how to embed the resulting cultivation cycle within himself. Rested from his work, he met the Longevity Sect Master and openly called for Lie Yan to be captured after forming a Nascent Soul because of suspected demonic ties.

• Chu Mu tested the Devouring Divine Ability and confirmed that Spirit Rhythm could contain the Chaotic Void energy it absorbed.
• Chu Mu outlined a cultivation cycle using space, the Devouring Divine Ability, Blade Intent, and true fire, but struggled with how to house it within his body.
• Chu Mu returned to the Cultivation World, rested for nearly a month, and then answered the Longevity Sect Master's summons.
• The Longevity Sect Master told Chu Mu that Lie Yan had reached Golden Core Completion and was preparing to form a Nascent Soul, and Chu Mu said Lie Yan should be captured because he might be connected to the demons.
• Chu Mu and the Longevity Sect Master discussed the demons' fifth-rank blessing, the cultivators' limits, and the Immortal Spirit Abode as a possible refuge.

After a year of contemplation, Chu Mu devised a secret art to cultivate Lie Yan as a human-body Great Medicine and used the moment Lie Yan formed his Nascent Soul to suppress him. Lie Yan ended the chapter imprisoned in the True Inheritance Palace, while Chu Mu’s purpose for the scheme remained unrevealed.

• Chu Mu realized he could nurture a World Seed from his remaining Essence, Qi, and Spirit, and spent a year developing a secret art.
• During Lie Yan’s Nascent Soul tribulation, the Longevity Sect Master and Xu Changqing recognized that Lie Yan shared Chu Mu’s root and source and suspected Chu Mu had cultivated him as a Great Medicine.
• Lie Yan endured the tribulation and formed his Nascent Soul, drawing the attention of cultivators throughout the Longevity Mountain Gate.
• Chu Mu accused Lie Yan of colluding with demons and pressed down with Heaven and Earth Power, causing the other cultivators to withdraw.
• Chu Mu suppressed Lie Yan’s Nascent Soul and transformed the True Inheritance Palace into a prison capable of holding a Nascent Soul.

After suppressing Lie Yan for colluding with demons, Chu Mu completed the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method and sought permission to destroy a Secret Realm Small World as part of his cultivation plan. He prepared to use Lie Yan’s Spirit Root and Dao Fruit to improve his cultivation, while the Longevity Sect Master revealed that heaven and earth’s shackles blocked any path to a higher realm.

• Chu Mu finished forming the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method, which would refine all things and help him advance to Fifth Order.
• Chu Mu entered the Sect Main Hall and asked the Longevity Sect Master for permission to destroy a Secret Realm Small World.
• Chu Mu gave the Longevity Sect Master the Nirvana Rebirth Method and explained that it could improve Spirit Roots and serve as Human Body Great Medicine.
• The Longevity Sect Master recognized the method’s potential and said Chu Mu could reach Nascent Soul Perfection by using Lie Yan’s Dao Fruit Spirit Root.
• The Longevity Sect Master told Chu Mu that invisible heavenly shackles had prevented him from finding a path beyond Nascent Soul Perfection.

Chu Mu destroyed the Suppressing Prison Secret Realm to study the workings of a world's collapse and creation for his Heaven and Earth Furnace Method. After gaining profound insights and collecting treasures left by the destruction, he turned his attention toward the vast cultivation world.

• Chu Mu entered the evacuated Suppressing Prison Secret Realm, whose resources had been stripped and whose spiritual energy had dwindled.
• Chu Mu used his command over the world and its World Veins to trigger the spread of Space Cracks throughout the Secret Realm.
• Chu Mu watched the Secret Realm collapse into the Chaotic Void, using Spirit Radiance Blessing to comprehend the destruction of Heaven and Earth.
• Chu Mu endured the collapsing world's forces with his black membrane and gained insights into the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method.
• Chu Mu collected World Origin and Void Crystal Stones from the ruins, then looked toward the vast cultivation world.

Chu Mu learned how the sect had framed Lie Yan as a demon collaborator and confined Chu Yan, then went to the True Inheritance Palace and erased Lie Yan’s consciousness. He took Lie Yan to Tianshu City and brought him to the True Understanding Courtyard.

• Xu Changqing showed Chu Yan the sect’s evidence against Lie Yan and told her she would be confined in Purple Cloud Courtyard for ten years.
• Chu Mu admitted to Xu Changqing that he was responsible for the outcome and left to visit Lie Yan.
• Lie Yan asked Chu Mu why he had done this, but Chu Mu gave no explanation and erased Lie Yan’s consciousness.
• Chu Mu removed the palace’s restrictions, subdued Lie Yan’s Essence, Qi, and Spirit, and carried him away from Longevity Immortal Mountain.
• Chu Mu brought Lie Yan to the True Understanding Courtyard in Tianshu City, where he had prepared a fourth-tier grand formation.

Chu Mu began forging the Nirvana Rebirth Pill through the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method, using Lie Yan, spiritual qi, and world-born treasures to form its core. As the pill was tempered over the years, an ominous oppression gradually spread across the land.

• Chu Mu secured the True Understanding Courtyard with layered formations and prepared Lie Yan and several spiritual treasures for the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method.
• After nearly ten days of meditation, Chu Mu created a devouring rune and drained the True Understanding Courtyard of its spiritual qi.
• Chu Mu fed the rune spiritual treasures and Lie Yan’s Nascent Soul Dao Fruit, struggling to control the immense energy and his craving for Lie Yan.
• Chu Mu used Nascent Soul Realm Heaven and Earth Power to forge the Nirvana Rebirth Pill as the seed of his Heaven and Earth Furnace.
• The True Understanding Courtyard remained spiritually depleted for years while the demon body slept outside, and an oppressive gloom spread across the land.

Chu Mu completed the formation of a strange Nirvana Rebirth Pill after it devoured the energy in the True Understanding Courtyard, then absorbed it into his dantian. He began tempering it toward perfect compatibility, which he estimated would take at most nine years, before he could open the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

• The pill’s devouring left the True Understanding Courtyard utterly drained, while signs of Heaven and Earth’s mutation appeared in the Northern Border.
• Chu Mu absorbed the pill into his dantian, where it devoured his Great Sun True Fire, Divine Soul Blade, and immortal cultivation before releasing pure magical power that restored his body.
• Chu Mu realized the pill still needed up to nine years of tempering before he could achieve nirvana rebirth and open the Heaven and Earth Furnace.
• Chu Mu focused on nourishing the pill and set aside concerns about the world beyond the courtyard.

Chu Mu rescued Yan Yun Shuang from a Fourth Order demon, devoured the demon, and demonstrated how his Heaven and Earth Furnace refined its energy to strengthen his cultivation. He then swallowed the fog across thousands of li and gathered it into a bead, forcing the terror hidden within to reveal itself.

• Yan Yun Shuang and her senior brother fled through the fog until a nearly Fourth Order demon killed him and cornered her.
• Chu Mu appeared, sent Yan Yun Shuang back to the sect with a jade talisman, and devoured the demon until it crumbled to ash.
• Chu Mu explained that his Great Sun True Fire and Blade Intent had fused into the Heaven and Earth Furnace, which refined the demon's blood qi and fed pure energy into his Furnace True Essence.
• Chu Mu spread his Divine Sense over the fog-shrouded land, swallowed the fog without refining it, and compressed it into a growing bead.
• After Chu Mu consumed the final wisp of fog, the terror hidden within it was forced to reveal itself.

Chu Mu considered how Heaven's Evolution was transforming demon bloodlines and whether the Demon Clan's rapid rise would exhaust the cultivation world's spiritual qi. He dismissed the mystery as beyond the world's ability to resist, devoured the Fourth Order mist demon, and continued deeper into the Demon World.

• Chu Mu studied the Fourth Order mist demon and reasoned that Heaven's Evolution fused and transformed demon bloodlines at an accelerated pace.
• Chu Mu recognized that the demon's mist could spread across ten thousand miles and inflict poison, concealment, perception, and other effects while enabling it to raise inferior demons.
• Chu Mu questioned whether every demon might gain peak-tier potential and overwhelm the world's spiritual qi, causing the cultivation world to decay.
• Chu Mu concluded that the present cultivation world could neither resist nor undo the world's assimilation, and reflected that his own devouring also destroyed what he consumed.
• Chu Mu devoured the mist demon completely, leaving only ashes, then headed deeper into the Demon World.

Chu Mu destroyed a demon city, seized its Sacred Soul, and reflected on how years of devouring demons had transformed his body and how deeply the Demon World had become alienated. When powerful demons pursued him despite his attempt to mislead them with a puppet bearing his former disguise, he realized they were tracking him by some other means.

• Chu Mu slaughtered the demons in a city, destroyed its altar and statue, and captured the blood light containing a Third Order Sacred Soul.
• Chu Mu considered how the Heaven and Earth Furnace had made his body increasingly inhuman and powerful, though he believed his mind and soul remained unaffected.
• Chu Mu sealed the Sacred Soul among the more than a hundred he had collected and left the city before powerful demons arrived and pursued him.
• Chu Mu changed his disguise to a Serpent Clan demon and sent a puppet carrying his old Demon Aura in another direction.
• Chu Mu discovered that the pursuing demons ignored the puppet and continued toward him.

Chu Mu realized that a fifth-order presence had secretly tracked him and fled through the demon-ruled southwest, where countless demons were closing in. He unleashed his full, monstrous form and discovered the Demon World’s suppression of him had vanished, then struck at the approaching figures with a massive blade-light.

• Chu Mu concluded that a fifth-order Divine Sense had locked onto him and fled while desperately searching for a mark on his body.
• Chu Mu reasoned that the pursuer’s fifth-order power must have a weakness because it depended on a Sacred Soul, heaven-and-earth blessing, and a spiritual vein.
• A voice ordered Chu Mu to surrender as several Demon Auras approached, and he drew on the energy stored in his Heaven and Earth Furnace.
• Chu Mu transformed into a towering, spiked, horned form with crescent-shaped blades for hands.
• Chu Mu sensed that the Demon World’s suppression of him had disappeared and attacked the approaching figures with a jet-black blade-light.

Chu Mu unleashed the Heaven and Earth Furnace Method and defeated a Pseudo Fifth-Order Demon, forcing it to flee while two Nascent Soul Great Demons escaped. Badly injured but exhilarated by his growing strength, he realized his physique could support the Furnace’s continued growth.

• Chu Mu struck the Pseudo Fifth-Order Demon with a series of fiery attacks, revealing that its Fifth-Order power was incomplete.
• The Pseudo Fifth-Order Demon summoned an ancient long sword, but Chu Mu’s next strike severely wounded it and drove it fleeing across the sky.
• The two Nascent Soul Great Demons fled in opposite directions when Chu Mu turned toward them.
• Chu Mu’s suppressed injuries surfaced, leaving him badly wounded as he admitted he had been overconfident.
• Chu Mu sensed that the Heaven and Earth Furnace was still expanding and that his physique could support its continued growth.

Chu Mu captured a young cultivator who claimed to belong to Great Heng’s Demon Suppression Division and learned that Great Heng had sent a massive army into the Southwest. Her account suggested that Great Heng had contained the Demon Calamity at home and was now focused on the deathly silent Desert Sea, leaving Chu Mu to wonder what it sought there.

• Chu Mu seized a Golden Core Early Stage woman in a nearby valley and suspected she was a human traitor until she said she had been transported there through a spatial gate.
• The woman identified herself as a member of Great Heng’s Demon Suppression Division, investigating changes in Cloud Sea City before demons separated her from her companions.
• She explained that Great Heng had established a Southern Sky Main Division seven years earlier and, five years later, sent the Crimson Flame Army Department and Four Great Legions to the Southwest.
• The woman said nearly two million cultivators had crossed through a spatial gate in less than half a month, and that the expedition was connected to the deathly silent Desert Sea.
• Chu Mu questioned how Great Heng had handled the Demon Calamity, and the woman said the Nation Guarding Three Divisions had purged hidden demons before the outbreak and regional garrisons quickly suppressed later unrest.

Chu Mu learned how Great Heng’s Inspiration Seal and Celestial Domain helped it contain the Demon Calamity, then headed toward the Desert Sea. Near Great Heng’s fortified cities, demons tracked him down and clashed with the city’s Nascent Soul cultivators while he concealed himself to observe.

• Chu Mu questioned a Great Heng woman about the Inspiration Seal and learned it connected cultivators to the Celestial Domain, allowing Great Heng to monitor them and detect demonic corruption.
• Chu Mu warned the woman to keep their meeting secret, sent her out of the valley, and healed his wounds with energy from the Heaven and Earth Furnace.
• Chu Mu suspected the sacred souls in the furnace had revealed his trail to demons, but he continued toward the Desert Sea without refining them.
• Chu Mu reached the Great Heng cities on the Desert Sea’s edge and sensed three Nascent Soul Great Demons approaching him.
• Chu Mu concealed himself by burning a sacred soul, while Great Heng’s Nascent Soul cultivators immediately attacked the demons and began a fierce battle.

Chu Mu watched a battle formation legion emerge from the Giant City and turn the tide against three powerful demons. The legion’s commander crushed the demons’ assault, leaving one dead and two fleeing.

• Chu Mu realized the three demons’ ancient treasures had let them suppress the Great Heng Nascent Soul cultivators, and he prepared to fight rather than flee.
• War drums sounded from the Giant City as hundreds of warships and ten Scaled Armor Legions assembled into a vast battle formation.
• The legion’s commander drew the soldiers’ combined power into himself and escaped the demons’ encirclement.
• The commander and the legion formed a great shield that blocked the demons’ attacks without harming their soldiers.
• The commander’s blade struck down the three demons, and a follow-up assault killed one while the other two fled.

After judging that Great Heng’s battle formations could not reliably counter true fifth-order foes, Chu Mu left the army and was pursued in suspicion by its commander and the Demon Suppression Division. He then ambushed and killed a gravely wounded pseudo fifth-order demon, leaving the story with him standing over its corpse.

• Chu Mu concluded that battle formations were poorly suited to pursuit and would require enormous numbers to challenge a true fifth-order being.
• The general and a Demon Suppression Division subordinate investigated the mysterious watcher, suspected a devouring ability, and considered a connection to the Longevity Sect.
• Chu Mu followed the defeated pseudo fifth-order demon into the Demon World while his concealed form was fading.
• Chu Mu revealed his giant body and attacked the demon, driving the Three Foot Blade through its chest and crushing it with repeated blows.
• The wounded pseudo fifth-order demon died after Chu Mu destroyed its chest and organs.

After defeating the Pseudo Fifth-Order demon, Chu Mu absorbed its energy and examined the demon’s treasures, learning how its borrowed Fifth-Order power had been sustained. He suspected that an unknown being had also been responsible for aberrating Demon Xuan Cheng’s intact Ancient Treasure, leaving that mystery unresolved.

• Chu Mu assessed his strength after the battle and concluded that his Heaven and Earth Furnace still had room to grow before he reached the limit of the Fourth Order.
• Chu Mu drained the Pseudo Fifth-Order demon’s corpse, greatly expanding the Heaven and Earth Furnace and strengthening his body and magical power.
• Chu Mu inspected the demon’s storage bracelet and dissolved a sealed sculpture, revealing a Fourth-Order Sacred Soul and six aberrated Top-Grade Spirit Stones.
• Chu Mu realized the Sacred Soul and Spirit Stones had fueled the demon’s incomplete Pseudo Fifth-Order power and concluded that a genuine Fifth-Order demon was unlikely to emerge soon.
• Chu Mu sensed that the Ancient Treasure cauldron had been aberrated and its Artifact Spirit destroyed, then considered how Demon Xuan Cheng had obtained an intact Ancient Treasure long spear.
• Chu Mu suspected that an unknown being, rather than a Fifth-Order demon, had aberrated Demon Xuan Cheng’s Ancient Treasure.

Chu Mu met Hong Shan, a marshal leading Great Heng’s expedition into the Desert Sea to locate and repair the Sky Palace Relic before the sealed being escaped. Hong Shan asked Chu Mu to join the effort, which depended on the Nine Great Military Departments summoning the Sky Palace Domain to suppress demons while they purified the region.

• Hong Shan introduced himself as marshal of Great Heng’s Crimson Flame Army Department and explained that the expedition sought the Sky Palace Relic’s true location in the Desert Sea.
• Chu Mu recalled how earlier explorations of the relic had been linked to demonization and questioned whether Great Heng could repair it and withstand the demons’ response.
• Hong Shan described the expedition’s Nascent Soul forces, then revealed that all Nine Great Military Departments would use the Imperial Court’s Heavenly Heart to summon the Sky Palace Domain and suppress nonhumans.
• Hong Shan explained that the relic’s captive had once reached the limit of the Fifth Order and that Great Heng needed to purify the Desert Sea before repairing the relic.
• Hong Shan asked Chu Mu to aid the expedition and offered to answer his questions openly.

Chu Mu studied Great Heng’s military and political structure and the forces mobilized to cleanse the Silent Death Desert Sea. He concluded that Great Heng faced severe pressures at home and that the expedition’s success depended on his ability to absorb the Silent Death Power.

• Chu Mu reviewed the information available to him through the Crimson Flame Army Department after six months in the city.
• He learned that Great Heng’s power rested on its Nine Great Military Departments, Nation Guarding Three Divisions, civil officials, sects and families, and Imperial Court.
• He assessed that the Demon Calamity had strained Great Heng and that its southwest expedition had limited forces despite further reinforcements being planned.
• Chu Mu considered how purifying the Silent Death Desert Sea would require vast resources, formations, and ways to draw out the Silent Death Power quickly.
• He realized that Hong Shan had revealed the plan because Chu Mu might be uniquely able to devour and absorb the Silent Death Power.