Chapter Summaries

Jiang Qiao faced a pack of supernatural wild dogs controlled by the elders outside the town, but his defenses destroyed every attacker that came near. As the elders escalated their attack with larger, more grotesque dogs, Jiang Qiao watched to learn how ancient Evolvers controlled evil spirits.

• Jiang Qiao recognized the wild dogs as Painted Skin monsters and realized someone was using them as a medium for a technique.
• Zhao Qian identified the creatures as Corpse-Guarding Dogs that preyed on consciousness, while his son privately resolved to gradually change the current path of cultivation.
• The dogs attacked Jiang Qiao, but each one exploded into malignant qi upon reaching three feet from him.
• Jiang Qiao observed the elders controlling the dogs and compared their method with the indirect ghost-guiding abilities of later Evolvers.
• The pack stopped attacking as several larger, skinned dogs emerged, and lumps resembling human faces began growing across the ordinary dogs.

Jiang Qiao recognized the vicious dogs as Corpse-Guarding Dogs and realized their graves had drawn him into a hidden supernatural space designed to teleport its victims elsewhere. Outside the town, the old man controlling the dogs discovered he could not close the spatial gate because Jiang Qiao was somehow forcing it open.

• Jiang Qiao identified the dogs as Corpse-Guarding Dogs, evil entities that guarded their discarded bodies and attacked anyone who threatened them.
• The dogs vanished, and Jiang Qiao sensed that the surrounding graves had enclosed the street within a covert supernatural space that would transport him to another dangerous place.
• Jiang Qiao analyzed the graves’ connected defenses and concluded that the trap was meant to delay him while the spatial gate prepared to send him away.
• The old man controlling the vicious dogs told the Bearded Old Man that the spatial gate would not close, despite his having completed the trap.
• The old man realized Jiang Qiao was not an ordinary target and called on everyone to help.

Jiang Qiao faced the Bearded Old Man and several allies, who tried to trap him in a supernatural space. The Bearded Old Man instead used a straw effigy to drain the town’s vitality and transform it into a supernatural place, then kowtowed to it as the town began to twist.

• The Bearded Old Man called on nearby old men to help after Jiang Qiao found and pressed the weakest point in their space.
• The Bearded Old Man used a straw effigy representing the town, with needles marking its ley-line nodes, and pulled out the needles to release the town’s vitality.
• Jiang Qiao explained that the leaking vitality would create death qi, turn the town into a supernatural place, and expose its inhabitants to danger.
• Green smoke rose as the town’s vitality escaped, and the Bearded Old Man placed the effigy on the ground, put mud in his mouth, and kowtowed to it.
• An evil wind swept through the town and made it twist, prompting Jiang Qiao to wonder whether the old man was celebrating a birthday.

Jiang Qiao endured the Bearded Old Man’s birthday-congratulation technique, which tried to drain his life and vitality, and forced the unseen gaze to retreat. The old men realized the attack had failed and joined forces to launch new assaults against him.

• The Bearded Old Man’s kowtows caused the town’s deathly aura to drain Jiang Qiao’s vitality, blood, and lifespan.
• Jiang Qiao unleashed lightning from within his body, making the town’s gaze retreat and the Longevity Ghost avoid him.
• The Bearded Old Man discovered that Jiang Qiao was unharmed, and the others struggled to believe his technique had failed.
• The fat old man cut flesh from his limbs and turned it into four flag-bearing Little People marked illness, weakness, injury, and death, then sent them into the town.
• The old man who had summoned the graves released Corpse-Guarding Dogs, while the Bearded Old Man bowed fiercely to the town, and all three launched their killing moves.

Jiang Qiao watched three Evolvers unleash sophisticated supernatural techniques, but their curses and attacks had no effect on him. The Old Man in Red Brocade realized the danger and ordered the others to flee.

• The Bearded Old Man cursed Jiang Qiao with a straw man, and the town darkened as spectral dogs and a flesh-made Little Person appeared.
• The four Little Persons inflicted supernatural illness, bad luck, injury, and death on Jiang Qiao, who remained unaffected.
• Jiang Qiao reflected on how the Nether Era’s supernatural arts had refined powers that later Evolvers used more crudely.
• The Bearded Old Man and the other Evolvers wondered why their combined curses could not harm Jiang Qiao, while the Old Man in Red Brocade recognized that something was wrong.
• The Old Man in Red Brocade ordered the three Evolvers to leave immediately.

Jiang Qiao stayed behind as the old men fled, while the deathly aura around the town began to fade and their supernatural protections failed. The Old Man in Red Brocade reassured his companions and waited for Fengyin Mountain to send help, though he privately feared Jiang Qiao might still attack.

• Jiang Qiao watched the old men escape without pursuing them as the town's deathly aura began to recede.
• The Bearded Old Man saw the straw man decay and realized someone had blocked the deathly aura flowing from the town's earth veins.
• The fat old man reported that all four Grass Head Little Ghosts had died, while the scarred old man said his dogs and tomb curses had also failed against Jiang Qiao.
• The Old Man in Red Brocade said he had sent a Paper Crane to Fengyin Mountain and argued that Jiang Qiao might be too injured or limited to pursue them.
• The Old Man in Red Brocade promised to protect the others until help arrived, while privately admitting he was trying to keep them calm.

Jiang Qiao explained how the broken coffin nails caused the town’s life energy to leak away, then suppressed the earth-vein nodes to stop the death energy from spreading. Curious about Fengyin Mountain and its rumored powerful Evolvers, he waited for the Paper Crane’s message to bring someone back and summoned Zhao Qian.

• Jiang Qiao explained that the coffin nails had damaged the town’s earth veins while preventing their energy from leaking, and their destruction had made the town’s life energy drain away.
• Jiang Qiao considered whether Fengyin Mountain held powerful Evolvers who could retain their humanity, and decided to investigate.
• Jiang Qiao revealed that he had secretly covered the fleeing old men with his Ghost Domain and let the Old Man in Red Brocade’s Paper Crane escape so he could follow its message.
• Jiang Qiao pulled out the coffin nails and used his Ghost Domain to suppress the earth-vein nodes, stopping the death energy from leaking further.
• Jiang Qiao summoned Zhao Qian from the house where he had been watching through a Puppet Person and remarked that her home had indeed been robbed.

After Jiang Qiao cleared the deathly veil from the town, he learned that the trapped Painted Skin had called for help from Fengyin Mountain, a place feared for its self-aware Mountain Ghosts. Zhao Qian warned him to flee, while Jiang Qiao wondered whether the Mountain Ghosts had been transformed from Evolvers.

• Jiang Qiao removed the town’s black veil and summoned Zhao Qian, who thanked him for saving his family.
• Zhao Qian revealed that the town’s former Clan Elders had been replaced by Painted Skin, and Jiang Qiao said he had trapped them outside town.
• Jiang Qiao told Zhao Qian that someone from Fengyin Mountain might arrive within twenty minutes to rescue the Painted Skin.
• Zhao Qian described Fengyin Mountain as a haunted range inhabited by self-aware Mountain Ghosts and urged Jiang Qiao to flee.
• Jiang Qiao compared the Mountain Ghosts to one he had encountered at Golden Rooster Mountain and wondered if they had once been Evolvers.

Jiang Qiao learned how mountain ghosts and spirit sacrifice shaped the world, then faced a Soul Summoning Technique at the town entrance. After protecting Zhao Qian and the captured clan elders, he asked about the strength of the City Gods and Prefectural Lords.

• Jiang Qiao learned that the mountain ghosts of Fengyin Mountain had joined forces with outer-realm demons and could sever ghost-carriers’ ties to their spirits.
• Zhao Qian urged Jiang Qiao to retreat with the captured clan elders and report their capture to the Lord Prefect.
• A Soul Summoning Technique lured Zhao Qian toward the town entrance, but Jiang Qiao’s shout jolted him back before he left the town.
• Jiang Qiao identified the attack as a Ninth Tier expert’s technique and asked Zhao Qian about powerful beings in the world.
• Zhao Qian said every county City God could Break the Void but was bound to their territory, while Prefectural Lords might be stronger.
• Jiang Qiao realized the world had sixteen Prefectural Lords and wondered whether each was a ninth-tier spirit sustained by sacrifices.

Jiang Qiao kept the townspeople trapped in the Ghostly Deception safe behind his Ghost Domain as a Vicious Ghost from Fengyin Mountain approached. The enemy recognized Jiang Qiao as a possible Awakened and prepared to break through the barrier to capture him.

• Zhao Qian urged Jiang Qiao to leave town before the evil beings from Fengyin Mountain could arrive, but Jiang Qiao realized the approaching enemy was likely a conscious Vicious Ghost rather than a Mountain Ghost.
• A Soul Call spread through the leaves outside town, but Jiang Qiao's Ghost Domain blocked it and left the townspeople trapped in their circular walk.
• Thirty li from town, a thin man and a broad-shouldered woman discussed Jiang Qiao, suspected he was an Awakened, and decided to capture him for Yang San Taiye.
• The thin man planted a black cloth banner, lit incense, and cut his palm so his blood could make crimson smoke rise as he prepared to break the Ghost Domain.

Jiang Qiao studied the Soul Collecting Technique as its blood-red smoke suppressed the Thunder Spirit's Ghost Domain, then used the enemy's supernatural gaze to make the rescuers kill the four Evolvers themselves. The furious pale man summoned bizarre paper-like figures that began floating toward the town.

• Crimson smoke engulfed the town, and Zhao Qian identified it as the Soul Collecting Technique.
• Jiang Qiao sensed the smoke seeping through the Ghost Domain and admired the technique while choosing to observe rather than counterattack.
• The pale man strengthened the incense with his blood as the vicious woman warned him not to underestimate Jiang Qiao.
• Jiang Qiao used the supernatural gaze transmitted through the smoke to make the four Evolvers bear its Mental Shock, leaving three corpses and revealing that the Old Man in Red Brocade had been an incarnation.
• The pale man realized his group had killed the people they came to save, grew furious, and threatened to collect Jiang Qiao and his allies into the banner.
• The pale man transformed the blood-red smoke into bizarre paper-like figures that laughed as they floated toward the town.

Jiang Qiao learned that the Blood Mist’s lost souls and the little ghosts made from Fierce Sha Energy could distort and unravel their surroundings. As the chaos spread into his Ghost Domain and threatened to corrupt his perception and abilities, he prepared to act.

• Jiang Qiao pulled Zhao Qian out of the Blood Mist after Zhao Qian lost his sense of direction, and learned that the fog absorbed the lost and grew stronger with each victim.
• Zhao Qian explained that ancient Evolvers combined Fierce Sha Energy with extracted living consciousness and refined supernatural chaos to create the little ghosts.
• Jiang Qiao reasoned that the method concentrated extreme emotions and separated chaos and distortion from the supernatural.
• Mad, laughing figures approached, causing buildings, roads, fire, and other things around the town to behave unpredictably and destructively.
• Jiang Qiao sensed that the figures’ influence was spreading through his Ghost Domain and could soon distort his perception and supernatural ability, so he decided to act.

The Bamboo Pole Man and a robust woman discussed his cruel methods and his teacher’s technique for refining supernatural phenomena into chaos as the town collapsed. Jiang Qiao revealed his Thunder Spirit True Form and fought the twisted chaos with thunder and life-giving power, drawing the flying figures toward him.

• The Bamboo Pole Man described how he tortured Awakened and their loved ones, while the robust woman discussed the technique he had inherited from his dead teacher.
• The town collapsed into chaos as its houses, roads, and stone dissolved, while Zhao Qian and the other survivors became delighted.
• Jiang Qiao unleashed thunder that shattered the blood-colored fog, but the twisted chaos corroded his lightning and advanced on him.
• Jiang Qiao transformed into his ten-meter Thunder Spirit True Form and sent a storm of thunder and vitality against the chaos, reviving plants across the dying land.
• A strange aura appeared and vanished during the clash, and the flying figures surged toward Jiang Qiao.

Jiang Qiao pushed through the Bamboo Pole Man’s distortions and entered the Nirvana Void, where he expanded his body and unleashed a flood of thunder. Thirty li away, the Bamboo Pole Man’s confidence faltered when he sensed Jiang Qiao’s power breaking through the void.

• Jiang Qiao shattered a distorted figure carrying an extracted consciousness and fought his way toward the Bamboo Pole Man and the sturdy woman.
• The sturdy woman mocked the Bamboo Pole Man as Jiang Qiao overcame the figures blocking his advance.
• The Bamboo Pole Man scattered Paper Money to create a twisting path marked by banners reading “Life” and “Death,” but Jiang Qiao bypassed it with thunderwater and swept it away.
• Jiang Qiao charged into a Black Hole formed by the pursuing figures and found himself in the empty Nirvana Void.
• Jiang Qiao enlarged his body and released immense lightning and thunder, cracking the void around him.
• The Bamboo Pole Man explained that the Nirvana Void was his dead teacher’s ultimate technique, then reacted in disbelief as Jiang Qiao’s power surged.

Jiang Qiao broke free of the Bamboo Pole Man’s Nirvana Void by unleashing his full Thunder Spirit True Form and shattering the prison. After the man’s crystal skull swallowed the collapsing space, Jiang Qiao emerged and destroyed the skull from within.

• The Bamboo Pole Man watched cracks spread across Nirvana Void as Jiang Qiao’s immense form strained the space apart.
• The brawny woman mocked the Bamboo Pole Man, who summoned a crystal skull to swallow the black curtain and stop Jiang Qiao from escaping.
• Jiang Qiao fully unleashed his Thunder Spirit True Form and used a gigantic axe strike to shatter Nirvana Void.
• The crystal skull swallowed the collapsing black curtain, but Jiang Qiao leaped out and smashed the skull from within.

Jiang Qiao defeated the Bamboo Pole Man’s attempt to summon the Yin Soldiers and confronted him and the robust woman. He revealed that their Ninth Rank power came from an evil spirit’s blessing and concluded that the Evolver path was a dead end.

• The Bamboo Pole Man wrote strange symbols in blood on a skull, but the skull shattered before it could summon the Yin Soldiers.
• Jiang Qiao emerged in his Thunder Spirit form and attacked; the robust woman blocked his strike but was driven back three steps.
• Jiang Qiao mocked the two Evolvers and said he had come to kill them, while the Bamboo Pole Man and the woman faced him.
• Jiang Qiao recognized that both opponents had borrowed an evil spirit’s power to reach false Ninth Rank, leaving their consciousness at Eighth Tier.
• Jiang Qiao reflected that borrowed power could be withdrawn and that rare treasures used to advance could bring disaster, concluding the Evolver path was a dead end.

Jiang Qiao attacked Bamboo Pole Man and the woman, revealing overwhelming thunder power as he battled the woman. After she disrupted his lightning, he slipped past her and reached Bamboo Pole Man, leaving her alarmed.

• Jiang Qiao seized Bamboo Pole Man’s long flute and blasted his arm apart with thunder.
• The woman stepped in to protect Bamboo Pole Man and told him to support her from behind with a Soul-Calling Banner.
• Jiang Qiao fought the woman, countering her wooden club and its poisonous effect with black lightning.
• Jiang Qiao’s thunder tiger struck the woman, but she pierced it with her club and dispelled the lightning on her body.
• Jiang Qiao bypassed the woman and reached Bamboo Pole Man, who roared in fear and anger.

Jiang Qiao defeated the skinny man with lightning despite his shadow curse and killed him after the woman warned that he was Fengyin Mountain’s Incense Bearer. Jiang Qiao then turned his attention to the woman and declared that he had come to kill.

• Jiang Qiao broke away from the muscular woman and attacked the skinny man, judging him the weaker target.
• The skinny man used the Soul-Calling Banner and a shadow curse that conjured the Judgment of Ten Thousand Ghosts, but Jiang Qiao shattered the curse with lightning.
• Jiang Qiao trapped the skinny man in Five Thunders Strike the Crown, overwhelming his body, Vicious Ghost, and consciousness.
• The woman rushed to save the skinny man and threatened Jiang Qiao with the ancestor of Fengyin Mountain, but Jiang Qiao crushed the man’s neck and reduced his corpse to dust.
• The woman revealed that the dead man was Fengyin Mountain’s Incense Bearer, and Jiang Qiao said he would kill her next.

Jiang Qiao fought the burly woman of Fengyin Mountain after learning that its Mountain Ghost ancestor had reached the Divinity Ninth Tier. He drove her back, but her power surged as she burned through her body and unleashed an overwhelming pressure.

• The woman warned Jiang Qiao that the Mountain Ghost ancestor had marked him for killing its Incense Bearer, but Jiang Qiao dismissed the threat and suspected the ancestor could not leave the mountains.
• Jiang Qiao recognized that the woman was stalling for reinforcements and charged at her before she could delay further.
• The woman attacked with a wooden staff and an old ghost, but Jiang Qiao used lightning to block its breath and burn its hands.
• Jiang Qiao fought the woman barehanded as she broke down her flesh for strength and grew powerful enough to match him.
• The woman declared that six hundred years of suffering and killing had made her impossible to defeat, while her rising momentum pressed down on Jiang Qiao like a mountain.

Jiang Qiao fought the woman, who used a flesh-and-blood sacrifice to boost her strength, while concealing his own power and quietly planting lightning in her body. The woman mistook their apparent stalemate for her advantage, but she suddenly realized something was wrong.

• Jiang Qiao marveled at the woman's ability to match him in close combat as her sacrifice made her emaciated and strengthened her aura.
• The woman attacked with her cursed wooden club, and Jiang Qiao swept away the spreading mold before striking her back with a punch amplified by his Dharma Body.
• The woman guessed Jiang Qiao had been depleted or injured after killing the Bamboo Pole Man and grew confident that she could hold out for Fengyin Mountain's reinforcements.
• Jiang Qiao revealed in his thoughts that he had been holding back to lure out any hidden enemies and that his attacks had been slipping electric arcs into the woman's body.
• The woman grew more aggressive, convinced she could defeat Jiang Qiao and earn a reward, but her smile froze as she suddenly cried out in shock.