Chapter Summaries

Little Grape led an expanding army of eyeballs to the Sunshine Hotel to rescue William, only to discover that the silver-haired fighter battling the Dead was William himself. Little Grape joined the fight by lending William his eyes, allowing him to track the Dead’s movements and threads.

• Little Grape used an evil formation to gather eyeballs from corpses across the city and lead an army toward the Sunshine Hotel.
• The eye tide overwhelmed Dead and frightened nearby gentlemen, growing enormously as it approached the hotel.
• A Surgical Line cut through the army, and Little Grape saw two figures fighting inside the hotel.
• Little Grape mistook the silver-haired William for someone else until William called for his help, and Little Grape blocked a Surgical Line with a stone coffin.
• Little Grape’s eyeballs flowed into William, sharpening his vision so he could track the Dead and its threads.

Yi Chen and Little Grape joined forces against Vice Dean Ayvat, but Ayvat evaded their attacks as Yi Chen’s death form began to fail. Little Grape sealed them both inside a stone coffin, leaving an eyeless corpse in their place and Yi Chen’s whereabouts unknown.

• Little Grape explained how he had gained power from Stone Statue Graveyard, while Yi Chen described his death form and the danger Vice Dean Ayvat posed.
• Yi Chen and Little Grape linked themselves with chains and attacked Ayvat together, using stone coffins, an axe, and gunfire, but Ayvat dodged every attack.
• As Yi Chen’s body began to break down and his remaining time dwindled, Ayvat waited for his death form to end and planned to turn him into a dead person.
• Little Grape raised a stone coffin around Yi Chen and himself, then Ayvat cut it open and found only an eyeless corpse inside.

Yi Chen used a graveyard illusion and a carefully staged search to kill Vice Dean Aivart and absorb his concentrated Breath of Death Plague. As Yi Chen collapsed and tried to leave with Little Grape, Lotsen and Old Mr. Hervoye arrived and called him the best vessel.

• Aivart searched the stone coffins one by one and mistook Yi Chen’s Mirror Flower Water Moon illusion for Yi Chen’s corpse.
• Yi Chen cut off Aivart’s head, sealed his body in a stone coffin, and used Barry Besarius’s corpse and an iron chain to kill him.
• Yi Chen absorbed Aivart’s Breath of Death Plague, increasing his Sensation to 5+ and strengthening his Dead Person Makeup.
• Little Grape carried the badly injured Yi Chen toward the hotel exit as they discussed how the illusion had exploited Aivart’s obsession with capturing him.
• Lotsen and Old Mr. Hervoye arrived at the entrance, praised Yi Chen, and called him their best vessel.

Yi Chen was captured by Lotsen and the Blood Baron, who planned to take over his body, but the Yellow Robe began repairing him and claimed him as its chosen skin slave. Just as Lotsen tried to force the possession, a masked rescuer carried Yi Chen away.

• Little Grape attacked Lotsen and Hervoye, but the Blood Baron stopped it with a giant blood hand and crushed most of its eyes.
• Yi Chen deduced that Lotsen and the Blood Baron shared Hervoye's body and intended to invade his body and take his memories and Diseased Traits.
• Lotsen hesitated to possess Yi Chen after the Blood Baron warned that his confidence suggested an unknown danger, so they used the Yellow Robe to test him.
• The Yellow Robe offered to help Yi Chen escape in exchange for his taking control of the Abyssal Skin Field, and its threads began repairing his body.
• Lotsen realized the Yellow Robe had chosen Yi Chen and tried to force the invasion, but a masked figure in a floral suit severed his arm and carried Yi Chen away.

Jin fought Lotsen after he attacked Yi Chen, but Lotsen escaped her first assault and was repeatedly crushed by a newly arrived young man. As Lotsen tried to fight back, a cable-armed figure appeared behind him and crushed his head.

• Jin set Yi Chen by the hotel entrance and confronted Lotsen, who decided to seize Yi Chen despite Baron urging him to retreat.
• Lotsen unleashed a blood tide and tried to spirit Yi Chen away, but Jin identified his attack and cut through him and the hotel floors with a single slash.
• Lotsen split into clones and fled through the hotel, while Jin pursued and cleansed the sepsis infecting her.
• Lotsen escaped to the rooftop, but a brown-haired young man used Mental Power to slam him back into the lobby and repeatedly flatten his regenerating body.
• Lotsen attacked the young man, but a cable-armed figure appeared behind him and crushed his head.

After Regan and Miss Fei defeated Lotsen, Yi Chen escaped Lewenholm with Regan and Jin as Reaper Rotvis unleashed a deadly Black Fog across the city. The carriage broke through the fog, but Lewenholm was left transformed into a City of the Dead, with Yi Chen having inhaled the Black Fog to help the others survive.

• Miss Fei killed Lotsen, ending the hotel incident, and Regan urged Yi Chen to leave Lewenholm with him.
• Yi Chen asked Jin to retrieve a headless corpse, and the group boarded a Power Station carriage with Barry Besarius's corpse hidden inside.
• Rotvis killed Dean Diss Campbell, took his head, and opened a black circle that released the Black Fog known as Final Harvest.
• The Black Fog engulfed the carriage and threatened to kill Regan and Jin, so Yi Chen switched to Dead Person Makeup and inhaled the fog while they reinforced the carriage's defenses.
• The carriage escaped through the city boundary, while the Black Fog turned Lewenholm into a City of the Dead.

Yi Chen, Jin, and Regan recovered from the battle outside Lewenholm and shared what each had encountered in the Old World. As they returned to Zion, Disease Control Center personnel intercepted them for quarantine.

• Jin brought river water to Yi Chen, who recovered after drinking it and eating the flesh-made bucket.
• Yi Chen told Regan that he had killed Vice Dean Aivart and reflected that his victory depended on luck and his Death Trait.
• Jin described completing Limit Break in Cancer Palace and receiving the Swollen Lotus Heart relic from her master.
• Regan said he had gained a relic from a group of lunatics but could not reveal their identities because of a sealing disease in his consciousness.
• Yi Chen told Jin and Regan about his journey through the Old World with Lorien, whom he described as a powerful Patient Zero.
• Disease Control Center personnel stopped Yi Chen, Jin, and Regan at Zion's mountain and escorted them into a hidden passage for quarantine.

Yi Chen and his teammates were brought to the Epidemic Control Center for examination after escaping Lewenholm, but Doctor Visari intervened and cleared them of the Death Epidemic. Yi Chen concealed key details of his experience and learned that his breakthrough was near, leaving the group poised to return to Zion.

• Jin threatened the Epidemic Control Center personnel, while Yi Chen sensed the dead’s resentment throughout the facility.
• Doctor Visari recognized William Berens and took Yi Chen, Jin, and Regan to his private office, overruling a director’s objections.
• Yi Chen described the Death Epidemic investigation and asked Visari not to report that he had killed Aivart or that Lotsen had taken Hervoye’s body.
• Visari examined the three and found no Death Epidemic factors, though he sensed unusual strength in Jin and Regan and Yi Chen’s awakened death attribute.
• Yi Chen told Visari he expected to break through within two months, and Visari invited him to Major Hospital of Hippocrates with Twilight Silver Liquid; the group could return to Zion after an hour.

After returning to Zion, Yi Chen reported on the Death Plague mission, delivered Barry’s body to his family, and used the discontinued Sun Secret Medicine to restore his balance. His Gentleman's Attire then approached him with a message asking to talk.

• Supervisor Aige questioned Yi Chen about the mission, promised rewards and compensation, and warned that time and resources were running short.
• Yi Chen brought Barry’s body and head to the Bessarius Family and assured them that Barry had fought beyond death.
• At his dormitory, Yi Chen found that the Death Aura had left his body dangerously imbalanced and his Black Umbilical Cord nearly inactive.
• Yi Chen injected Dean Diss’s Sun Secret Medicine, which suppressed the death in his body and restored his balance.
• Yi Chen’s Gentleman's Attire attached itself to him and displayed a message asking whether they could talk.

Yi Chen learned Yellow Skin’s history and signed a soul-binding contract with it, agreeing to help it rule the Skin Field within five hundred years. The next day, Yi Chen went with Professor Chamberson to Divine Skin Manor, where the First Gentleman demanded to meet him alone.

• Yellow Skin told Yi Chen it had escaped the Skin Field after a near-erasure by the Primal Affliction and wanted Yi Chen’s help to rule the Skin Field.
• Yellow Skin offered Yi Chen enhanced support in exchange for a five-hundred-year agreement, and Yi Chen signed its contract in blood.
• Yellow Skin withdrew into Yi Chen’s body after the contract bound them at the soul level.
• Professor Chamberson escorted Yi Chen to Divine Skin Manor to receive the reward for Lewenholm’s death and accept skin from the First Gentleman.
• Clerics barred Chamberson from accompanying Yi Chen, so he secretly gave Yi Chen a feather to crush if his life was threatened.
• Chamberson hurried back to the academy to find Hogney and Zede and prepare for the worst.

Yi Chen received a large piece of Skin from the First Gentleman and accepted a place among the candidates to succeed him, despite the dangers of the coming selection. After reaffirming his choice to Professor Chamberson, Yi Chen learned that Principal Deslin wanted to meet him that night, and planned to ask her for guidance on reaching his perception limit.

• Principal Deslin reassured Chamberson that William would be fine and asked him to send William to her office that night.
• Yi Chen visited the dying First Gentleman alone, received an oversized piece of Gentleman's Skin, and was invited to become one of the candidates for the First Gentleman.
• A voice in Yi Chen's consciousness told him to accept, and he agreed to compete for the position.
• Yi Chen told Chamberson he had accepted the offer, while keeping the yellow skin secret and explaining that Duke Garryson could help him escape if necessary.
• Chamberson told Yi Chen that Principal Deslin had summoned him to Fetal Heart Chapel that night, and Yi Chen hoped to ask her how to improve his perception.

Yi Chen visited Principal Deslin in the academy’s isolated Astrology Room, where she viewed his hidden memories of the battle with Vice Dean Ayvat and questioned his understanding of the Skin Field. The Principal then brought Yi Chen’s consciousness onto a Fantasy Celestial Body to teach him perception, leaving him to begin the journey toward its highest peak.

• Yi Chen entered the Principal’s Office at midnight and found Principal Deslin without her Weeping Mask, holding a strange celestial body.
• Principal Deslin asked Yi Chen about the details he had concealed in his report, then used his memory to watch his battle with Vice Dean Ayvat.
• Principal Deslin praised Yi Chen for defeating Ayvat and said hiding the feat had prevented the First Gentleman from making him the sole candidate.
• Yi Chen discussed the Skin Field’s surveillance and said he hoped to gain the organization more initiative by negotiating with the Primal Affliction.
• Principal Deslin led Yi Chen to the Fantasy Celestial Body and brought their consciousnesses onto its surface to begin teaching him perception.

After spending more than seventy days gazing at the stars, Yi Chen reached the sensing limit and unlocked Star Magic. Principal Deslin sent him to prepare for his Limit Break, then let him stay in her office to solve the sensing riddle of his Triple-Attribute Relic.

• Principal Deslin worried that Yi Chen had remained on the Fantasy Celestial Body for two months, but his consciousness transformed into a shooting star and returned to his body.
• Yi Chen gained five points of sensing, reached the sensing limit, and unlocked the Star Magic system.
• After Yi Chen woke, Principal Deslin confirmed he had grasped Star Magic and advised him to take his time with his coming Limit Break.
• Yi Chen revealed that he had concealed a Triple-Attribute Relic, the Box of the Mad, whose intelligence and physique riddles he had solved but whose sensing riddle remained.
• Principal Deslin let Yi Chen stay in her office to solve the relic's riddle while she went out to clear her head.

Yi Chen used his heightened Sensitivity and Star Magic to decipher the Box of the Mad, transforming it into a brain-shaped relic. Deslin rushed back to the Astrology Room when Cerebral Fluid began leaking through the chapel, and Yi Chen contained the transformed relic and fluid in the Golden Box.

• After Principal Deslin left, Yi Chen inspected the Box of the Mad and used his Sensitivity to perceive its interior.
• Yi Chen recognized the sphere’s mismatched metal plates and brain-like patterns as a puzzle, then began rearranging them.
• Deslin left the school in disguise to enjoy forbidden food before deciding to return and check on Yi Chen.
• Deslin found the chapel staff gathered outside because brain-like fluid was leaking from the Astrology Room, and she ordered them to stay back.
• Deslin entered the Astrology Room and saw Yi Chen hovering with the Box transformed into a brain-shaped relic.
• Yi Chen stored the Mad Brain and compressed the Cerebral Fluid inside the Golden Box.

After completing the cube’s decryption, Yi Chen discovered he could manipulate space and quickly learned to pull objects toward him. After a week of rest, he set out to meet Doctor Vesali and discuss his breakthrough, feeling pressure from the achievements of Jin Almeida and Regan Ludwig.

• Yi Chen saw that the cube had evolved into a brainlike structure, and Principal Deslin advised him to wait before attempting a breakthrough.
• Deslin made Yi Chen clean the Astrology Room, where he unconsciously used Star Magic to pull a bucket through space.
• Yi Chen practiced manipulating Spatial Fluid, pulled the bucket from a distance, and recalled his ax after throwing it, though his attempt to retrieve it from farther away failed.
• Deslin was astonished by Yi Chen’s rapid progress, abandoned meditation, and went out to the Street District.
• After resting at Teacher Zed’s paradise for a week, Yi Chen learned Jin Almeida and Regan Ludwig had risen to prominent positions, retrieved his Twilight Silver Liquid, and headed to Major-Hospital-of-Hippocrates to meet Doctor Vesali.

Yi Chen visited Vice Principal Visari at the Major Hospital of Hippocrates and entered a Death Pool in Visari’s workshop to begin a breakthrough using the Biomass Brain. After the brain fused with his own, Yi Chen found himself transported into a vision of the Old World as the Mad Shell.

• A guard escorted Yi Chen into the Pathogen Center after his special Business Card granted him clearance.
• Visari asked whether Yi Chen wanted to become a Doctor, and Yi Chen said he had chosen to become the First Gentleman’s candidate for his own reasons.
• Visari led Yi Chen to a pool containing ten years’ worth of accumulated death essence and told him he could use it for his breakthrough.
• Yi Chen drank from the pool, entered it, and placed the Biomass Brain against his forehead.
• The Biomass Brain pierced Yi Chen’s skull and fused with his brain, transporting his awareness to a diseased world where he discovered he had become the Mad Shell.

Yi Chen inspected his unusual Mad Shell Virus body and began infecting a young man to experience how a Mad One formed. After taking control of the young man’s brain, he began absorbing knowledge while keeping the host alive and teaching him and the other Pathogens.

• Yi Chen examined his capsid, Absorb-Brain, iron chains, and Death Aura, then inferred that his viral evolution could help his physical body break through its limits.
• Yi Chen descended among the Old World’s Sick Ones and chose a young man with few visible abnormalities as his host.
• Yi Chen used refraction and environmental imitation to evade the Herpes Viruses in the young man’s nasal cavity and brain.
• Yi Chen attacked the Herpes Viruses in the brain’s core, established a neural connection, and threatened to use the host’s immune system against them if they approached.
• Yi Chen began absorbing the host’s memories and drove him to seek knowledge while maintaining his health and educating him and the other Pathogens.

Yi Chen formed the Hospital among the Sick Ones of the Old World and used their combined Mental Power to connect with the root of the disease source, beginning a transformation beyond ordinary Sick Ones. At the Major-Hospital-of-Hippocrates, Doctor Andre Vesali witnessed Yi Chen's Limit Break and recognized that his connection to the Old World was still deepening.

• Yi Chen learned from his hosts' memories about the Old World's layers, Source Plague Zones, and the catastrophe that had sealed the world.
• Yi Chen infected more than five thousand Sick Ones, indoctrinated most of them, and organized them into the Hospital, a group active in the Surface Layer.
• Yi Chen gathered the indoctrinated Sick Ones, who linked their Mental Power to amplify his connection to the disease source as he began his final Mad Evolution.
• At the Major-Hospital-of-Hippocrates, patients and staff suffered head symptoms as strange clouds gathered above the sealed white building and Death Aura spread.
• Doctor Andre Vesali observed Yi Chen suspended in the Death Studio, undergoing a transformation that he judged to surpass that of a Sick One.

Yi Chen drilled through the mental membrane in the relic’s imagined Old World and accepted the Diseased Origin, breaking the Human Limit. His breakthrough transformed his brain and body, caused a citywide disturbance in Zion, and left him with a new profession: Lecturer.

• Yi Chen used the linked minds of thousands of indoctrinated patients to drill toward the Focus of Infection Center, while many patients died from the strain.
• Yi Chen reached the radiant center of the relic’s world, broke through the Human Limit, and accepted the Diseased Origin.
• A brain-shaped black cloud formed over Zion and caused discomfort throughout the city as Jin, Instructor Baili, Regan, and the Power Station director witnessed the disturbance.
• Yi Chen’s brain tissue spread through his body and fused with his muscles, then the cloud-brain and Death Aura flowed into him.
• Yi Chen awakened with a stabilized Biomass Brain, a bond to the disease source, and a new profession of Lecturer.

After his breakthrough, Yi Chen recovered in the hospital and demonstrated his new Death Barrier to Principal Deslin. He left through a secret passage as a new frame of metallic Black Liquid appeared above his head.

• Duke Garryson sensed Yi Chen’s breakthrough and gave a customer a twenty-percent discount, while a horned girl in the Old World celebrated the signal from her Big Brother.
• Principal Deslin infiltrated the hospital and joined Vice Principal Visari as Yi Chen slowly relearned how to control his body.
• Yi Chen explained that his connection to the Disease Source had strengthened, then blocked Deslin’s arrow with a Death Barrier that destroyed it.
• Deslin invited Yi Chen to study Star Magic, and Visari offered him a secret exit to avoid the crowd gathered outside the hospital.
• Yi Chen told Visari that he had truly died once, promised to help with future death experiments, and left the hospital through the secret passage.
• As Yi Chen fully regained his human stride, a brass Long Frame filled with metallic Black Liquid condensed above his head.