Recaps

Yu Sheng and his companions defeated the Hermetic Society cultists, and Yu Sheng died after making his final requests before his expected revival. The Great Sage Golendel was reborn at the Hermetic Society’s capital, but his new body suffered the same catastrophic leg injuries as before.

• The Great Sage destroyed himself and collapsed the spatial rift, leaving Yu Sheng’s group with no captives or spoils.
• Huli, Eileen, and Luna gathered around Yu Sheng as he lay dying, and Eileen closed his eyes after he gave his final instructions.
• Luna carried the Artificial Saintess, and Huli opened a portal so the group could return home through the Teleportation Hub.
• Golendel was reborn in the Hermetic Society’s Holy Realm and prepared to report to the Holy Seat.
• Golendel fell on the stairs when both his legs suddenly shattered, and he realized the injuries had returned.

Golendel’s attempts to escape the curse failed, while Yu Sheng reflected on the Hermetic Society’s rift and Eileen’s blood sacrifice after returning to the Soul Wilderness. There, he found Luna waiting for visitors who had not arrived and suggested creating a cemetery for weary souls.

• Golendel destroyed his cursed legs and ordered mechanical prosthetics, but an invisible force crushed them and filled his mind with a warning that he was guilty.
• Yu Sheng reviewed the battle, wondering how the Hermetic Society had opened a passage outside a Dark Alley and why the High-ranking Priest had sacrificed himself to close the rift.
• Yu Sheng recalled Eileen’s omen form and the blood sacrifice that had summoned the Spider Goddess’s projection.
• Yu Sheng returned to the Soul Wilderness and found Luna waiting outside the cathedral for visitors who had not appeared.
• Yu Sheng gave Luna game coins and candies and suggested making a cemetery behind the cathedral for weary souls.

Yu Sheng returned home and took Eileen to the Nexus Pyramid to examine her fatigue and possible shrinking. Eileen revealed her enormous spider form, then struggled to figure out how to walk on eight legs.

• Eileen waited for Yu Sheng at home, while Huli slept on the sofa and the smaller Eileens gathered around her.
• Yu Sheng suddenly appeared and startled Huli, whose flailing tail knocked Eileen around.
• Yu Sheng asked whether Eileen's blonde body showed signs of shrinking, and she described growing increasingly tired.
• Eileen produced one translucent spider leg, and Yu Sheng brought her and Huli to a spacious hall in the Nexus Pyramid to investigate her other form.
• Eileen transformed into a gigantic black spider with a woman's upper body, boasted about her long legs, and attempted to work out how to walk.

Eileen tested the abilities of her new Spider Goddess battle form, which proved powerful but temporary. After she shrank back, Yu Sheng tried using his blood to reactivate the form, but the brief transformation ended almost immediately, leaving them to consider repeating the original sacrifice procedure.

• Eileen practiced moving in her eight-legged form and discovered that it could summon black Threads of Omen, while her golden threads belonged to her other form and could not be used at the same time.
• Eileen's battle form weakened after several hours and shrank back into her 66.6-centimeter doll body.
• Eileen asked Yu Sheng to help recharge her so they could test whether the battle form could be reproduced.
• Luna emerged from hiding and stabbed Yu Sheng's arm so Eileen could absorb his blood.
• Eileen's aura surged and her body briefly grew, but she quickly shrank back, prompting Yu Sheng to suggest repeating the full sacrifice procedure.

After Eileen’s growth test showed little effect, Yu Sheng suspected her ability had a cooldown, and the group returned home to rest. Eileen then drifted through an unusual dream that revealed fragmented memories of her early training and her first meeting with Shirley.

• Eileen absorbed Yu Sheng’s blood after popping off her head, but she barely grew and quickly shrank back.
• Yu Sheng suggested Eileen’s ability had a cooldown, and Eileen accepted the idea before joking about using a straw next time.
• The group returned to No. 66 Wutong Road, where Huli fell asleep in a ball of fur and Luna prepared to take the nameless Saintess’s remains to The Lost Ship.
• Eileen arranged for four of her bodies to sleep in a chest and curled up beside Yu Sheng with her blond-haired shell.
• Eileen dreamed of voices discussing her setup and compatibility, then remembered a tall woman teaching her to run and fight.
• Eileen heard Shirley introduce herself and offer to have Ah Gou teach Eileen general knowledge.

Eileen drifted through memories of her battle with the Spider Goddess, then followed the Boundary Bridge through a vision of the ancient Crossroads and fell through its layers. She landed beside the tower in a wasteland and recognized the hill as strangely familiar.

• Eileen recalled fighting the Spider Goddess and sealing the disaster in a forgotten Different Dimension.
• Eileen followed the Boundary Bridge through a foggy space and saw the ancient Crossroads, with its city-states, Obsidian Pillars, giants, and dragons.
• Eileen lost her grip on the tower, and the Crossroads collapsed as a voice ordered the simulation stopped and the Council activated.
• Eileen fell through the Small Island and deeper layers of light and shadow before landing in tall Nameless Wild Grass.
• Eileen struggled upright, surveyed the Boundary Bridge embedded in a wasteland hill, and thought the place looked familiar.

Eileen dreamed that she had been created by the Ancient Holy Spirits as an experimental model and that the Boundary Bridge had pierced the Crossroads into the Soul Wilderness, then recounted the fragments to Yu Sheng. After Baili Qing called Yu Sheng to discuss the Hermetic Society’s infiltration of Boundary City, Eileen suggested that the events in her dream had all occurred on the same day and asked whether Yu Sheng had been there too.

• Eileen explored a ruined hill in her dream and saw the Boundary Bridge and a tower vanish as she reached the Soul Wilderness.
• Eileen met Yu Sheng in the Soul Wilderness and rapidly told him she had dreamed of being an Ancient Holy Spirits experimental model and of the Boundary Bridge crashing through the Crossroads into another dimension.
• Yu Sheng questioned what Eileen remembered about her creation, and she summarized herself as a special Alice doll before they argued over her failed first mission.
• Yu Sheng and Eileen woke to Baili Qing’s call, and she asked Yu Sheng to come discuss the Hermetic Society members who had infiltrated Boundary City.
• Eileen connected the Omen Goddess’s arrival, her first mission, the Boundary Bridge’s passage through the Crossroads, and the tower’s fall into the Soul Wilderness as events from one day, then asked Yu Sheng whether he had been there.

Yu Sheng wondered whether he had been connected to the Othergod’s arrival three thousand years earlier, but Eileen’s questions yielded no answers. At the Special Operations Bureau, Baili Qing examined traces left by the Hermetic Society’s invasion and found evidence that its members had used a powerful controlled energy source to open rifts.

• Eileen asked Yu Sheng whether he had been present when the Othergod descended, and he struggled with memories of his former home and the Soul Wilderness.
• After Eileen fell into the sink, Yu Sheng dried her, then Huli crashed into him when she rushed from her room.
• Yu Sheng, Eileen, and Huli went to the Special Operations Bureau, where Baili Qing invited them to eat while discussing the Hermetic Society’s invasion.
• Yu Sheng told Baili Qing that the Hermetic Society could open rifts inside the Crossroads and create artificial Otherworlds around them.
• Baili Qing showed Yu Sheng an illusion of the underground parking lot and identified hidden lines in the wall as traces of irradiation from a controllable, ultra-powerful energy source.

Yu Sheng and Baili Qing connected the Hermetic Society’s rift technology to the dormant Dark Angel Shadowless Bones and planned to lure the cultists with false intelligence about Angel Catalyst remains. Yu Sheng then asked Baili Qing about Eileen’s dream, and her revelations showed that several Ancient Holy Spirits had personally shaped Eileen.

• Baili Qing told Yu Sheng that the Hermetic Society’s rifts used technology stolen from Luo and an energy source that might be the dormant Dark Angel Shadowless Bones.
• Yu Sheng recalled the cultists’ need for a stronger catalyst to stabilize a door, and Baili Qing explained that the bureau had planted rumors about escaped remains to bait them.
• Yu Sheng suggested that Luo spread matching intelligence through her contacts on Grey Dwarf Star, and he and Baili Qing refined the operation’s details.
• Yu Sheng described Eileen’s dream and asked Baili Qing what its references to the Lost Ship, the captain, and the Crossroads meant.
• Baili Qing identified Falling Star Lady and Star Thrower as titles of Ancient Holy Spirits and learned from Eileen that the Ancestor of Dolls, the captain, Falling Star Lady, and Star Thrower had each helped create or teach her.

Yu Sheng and Baili Qing discussed Eileen’s memories of the Classical Era and the mysteries surrounding the Boundary Bridge and The Crossroads. At the Special Operations Bureau, Yu Sheng began planting an unstable door into counterfeit Angel Catalysts to prepare bait for the Hermetic Society.

• Eileen recalled that the Ancient Holy Spirits had blessed her, and Yu Sheng teased her about failing her first mission.
• Yu Sheng pointed out how Eileen’s account of the Classical Era suggested The Crossroads had been radically reshaped, and Baili Qing said her eyewitness testimony greatly advanced the Council’s research.
• Yu Sheng, Eileen, and Huli went with Baili Qing to a secure laboratory to inspect counterfeit Angel Catalysts made by the Bureau.
• Baili Qing explained that the Bureau had given the fakes mental-pollution properties and would stage recovery operations and crackdowns to make the bait convincing.
• After the laboratory was cleared, Yu Sheng entered with Eileen and began implanting an unstable door into one of the crystals using the Boundary Bridge’s blueprint.

Luo received data from the Special Operations Bureau and discovered that the psionic research matched her own work, then decided to confront the compromised Grey Iron Junkyard and draw out Old Qiao’s allies. She arrived at the junkyard expecting trouble, while Old Qiao remained hidden.

• Luo woke from a terrifying nightmare and used a hidden system to send the Bureau’s psionic data to Black Stone Space Station.
• Luo recognized much of the data as her own research and questioned Ryan about Old Qiao’s whereabouts and their local contacts.
• After learning that the Grey Iron Junkyard administrator might be working with Old Qiao, Luo ordered Ryan to prepare a visit there.
• Luo and Ryan traveled through the polluted lower levels of Steel Node City toward Grey Iron Junkyard.
• Luo spotted a modified Fairy-6Z shuttle near the junkyard and said she would welcome an attack from Old Qiao’s people.

Luo confronted Iron Hand at Grey Iron Junkyard after learning he had sold one of her trade routes. Iron Hand admitted he had altered a shipment’s jump route under pressure, and Luo left him facing the consequences of a betrayal he claimed he had not intended.

• Luo arrived by shuttle at Grey Iron Junkyard and met Iron Hand, the former junk kid whose mechanical arm she had given him.
• Luo and Iron Hand withdrew to his two-story building, where he explained that the middle-level recycling business was declining and he needed to plan for the future.
• Iron Hand told Luo that Old Qiao had approached him but insisted he had not shared information about her or her contacts.
• Luo showed Iron Hand a cargo manifest and jump codes proving he had redirected equipment and data meant for Node Planet YN-135 to a Black Domain Galaxy.
• Iron Hand said he had only added a delivery location and cargo, not expecting the ship to vanish after leaving Grey Dwarf Star.
• Luo reminded Iron Hand that he used to be honest and told him he had neither been honest when needed nor clever when it mattered.

Luo confronted Iron Hand over his ties to Old Qiao and left him to die after discovering that living metal had invaded his body. She then used a planned escape attempt as a trap to force Old Qiao to reveal himself, but her shuttle was intercepted by the missing Fairy shuttle as she descended into the Giant Wall’s lower levels.

• Luo learned that Iron Hand had worked with Old Qiao for four years and leaked Zolda Black Stone test data and Rift Generator blueprints.
• Luo discovered that Iron Hand had injected two of Old Qiao’s Gene Potions, shook his hand, and left him to die in a psychic fireball.
• Luo gave her badge to a young foreman to make him the new boss, then found a charred body sent by Old Qiao beside her shuttle.
• Luo revealed that the smuggling ship and high-wall passage were decoys meant to make Old Qiao believe she was trapped, and she flew toward the lawless lower levels.
• Old Qiao’s forces locked onto Luo’s shuttle, and the missing Fairy shuttle burst from an abandoned building to attack.

Luo and the guard captain survived an ambush by hijacking enemy systems during a desperate shuttle escape, then fled into the ruins beneath the Iron Nest. As Black Dot soldiers closed in, a sleepy girl appeared and put the squad to sleep, transforming them and their walker into a rose garden.

• Luo linked her mechanical limbs to the shuttle controls, evaded missiles, and turned a heavy drone against the attacking Fairy shuttle.
• Luo’s damaged shuttle crashed into the lower ruins, where she and the guard soldiers escaped before tactical walkers attacked them.
• Luo and the guard captain led the soldiers deeper into the ruins as Black Dot forces sealed the exits and pursued them.
• A Black Dot squad encountered a sleepy girl in a white nightdress carrying a rabbit plushie.
• The girl’s power overwhelmed the soldiers with drowsiness, and thorns and flowers grew over them and their walker.

Luo confronted Old Qiao in the lower levels of Grey Dwarf Star, where he demanded the Rift Laboratory’s Zolda Black Stone test data. As Old Qiao’s forces attacked, unexpected allies arrived and turned the fight against them.

• Luo led her guards through the abandoned lower district and used a rune card to begin forming a living doorway.
• Old Qiao arrived in a tactical walker and offered to spare Luo’s holdings if she handed over the Rift Laboratory’s original data.
• Luo accused Old Qiao of seeking the Zolda Black Stone data for Hermetic Society believers and warned that their faulty rift device could open a Great Void in the Dark Current Starfield.
• Old Qiao ordered his forces to destroy Luo and her guards, but incendiary bombs suddenly engulfed the district.
• A long-haired woman appeared in the flames and attacked the Black Dot soldiers, while Snake Princess charged Old Qiao’s walker and slammed it into the ground.

Old Qiao’s tactical walker escaped the battle in the dark district, where Luo’s allies unleashed bizarre monsters and fire, but his retreat ended when a Shadow Wolf lured him into a trap. A gigantic armored man disabled the walker and opened it, leaving Old Qiao helpless inside.

• Old Qiao watched card-like soldiers, Snake Princess, and Matchstick attack Black Dot’s forces as eerie singing rose through the battlefield.
• Old Qiao concluded that Luo had died in the bombardment, ordered reserve squads to contain the enemies, and decided the surviving soldiers who had heard sensitive information could not be left alive.
• Old Qiao fled in his damaged walker, but stopped at an abandoned building when its power core overheated and the singing continued to follow him.
• A Shadow Wolf appeared with a blood grenade, dropped it, and vanished; the crimson mist reminded Old Qiao of the incense on Luo’s desk.
• A giant in thunder-forged adamantine armor lifted Old Qiao’s walker, knocked off its legs, and produced a can opener as Old Qiao roared from inside.

Snow White and the giants defeated Old Qiao’s walker, but reinforcements let him escape the abandoned district. Back at a concealed hideout, Old Qiao prepared to flee, then questioned whether Luo was really dead.

• Thunder Titans tore open Old Qiao’s damaged walker and dumped out his metallic body, which Snow White recognized as an avatar.
• Snow White relayed Sister Luo’s instructions while Thunder Titans battered Old Qiao and prepared to finish him.
• Black Dot Group drones attacked Thunder Titans, allowing Old Qiao to grab a mounting rack and escape with two escort drones.
• Snow White comforted the wounded Thunder Titans as Mermaid’s song continued through the district.
• Old Qiao returned to a concealed hideout and prepared to flee aboard a shuttle, then wondered whether Luo was truly dead.

Old Qiao escaped Grey Dwarf Star and returned to his hidden base, where he agreed to continue his deal with the Path of Holy Asceticism after learning their plans involved a Great Void. His strange itching and unexplained sensations worsened as he went to admire his collection of human body parts.

• Old Qiao fled Grey Dwarf Star, doubting whether Luo had survived the ambush but deciding he could not risk returning to search for her.
• Old Qiao brought his frigate through hidden routes to a concealed base and verified that the ship and its crew were secure.
• Old Qiao confronted the Path of Holy Asceticism about withholding information on the Great Void and agreed to continue the transaction after preparing a new way to deal with Luo.
• Old Qiao felt a mysterious sticky sensation and spreading itch, while the base's equipment behaved strangely around him.
• Old Qiao went to his private gallery and relaxed as he admired his preserved collection of human body parts.

Old Qiao was overcome by a psychic contamination that made his body and laboratory seem to transform into a nightmare. A strange card opened a door for Yu Sheng and his companions, who subdued Old Qiao and entered the disturbing laboratory.

• Old Qiao saw Lo appear in his laboratory and experienced visions of his dead specimens as his body began changing.
• Old Qiao realized he had been contaminated, but his call for help went unanswered as his communications cables turned into flesh and nerves.
• A strange card fell from Old Qiao, and when he picked it up, it outlined a door that opened in the air.
• Eileen kicked Old Qiao in the face, and Huli and Eileen restrained him while Luna guarded the doorway.
• Yu Sheng surveyed the laboratory's specimens and exclaimed at the terrifying sight.

Yu Sheng and his allies infiltrated Old Qiao’s base, bound his damaged avatar, and began spreading bloody mist to gain control of the facility. Old Qiao awoke and led cloned soldiers toward the Core Area, where a filthy doll appeared in their path.

• Yu Sheng, Luo, and Eileen discovered Old Qiao’s hall of grotesque collections and bound his steel-shell avatar, while Luo explained that his main body would wake once the trapped mind died.
• Yu Sheng brought out the Demon Suppressing Tower Trio’s diffusion device and spread bloody mist through the base as Luo began describing its layout.
• Luna detected approaching units, and Luo warned that Old Qiao had awakened and would likely attack through Passage Two.
• Eileen teleported an army of dolls into the hall, and Luo suggested sending them through a ventilation duct while Yu Sheng urged Eileen to follow the movie-style tactic.
• Old Qiao assembled cloned soldiers and activated the base’s defenses, then found a filthy doll lying in the corridor near the Core Area.

Old Qiao’s forces were overwhelmed by living puppets and an Artificial Saintess as the base’s security systems failed. Just as he sensed a threat emerging from the Core Area, a furry tail appeared and an explosion interrupted him.

• Old Qiao opened fire on a motionless puppet, triggering an ambush by a swarm of identical puppets that poured from the ventilation ducts and killed many clone soldiers.
• Old Qiao learned that several of his units were under attack while the base’s alarms, sensors, and monitoring systems failed outward from the Core Area.
• An unseen attacker cut down clone soldiers in a connecting passage, and Old Qiao recognized his opponent as an Artificial Saintess before losing that body.
• Old Qiao realized the situation had slipped beyond his control and began to reconsider his orders as his remaining soldiers awaited instructions.
• A large furry tail floated out from a side door, and an explosion interrupted Old Qiao.

The fortress transformed into a hostile living structure as Luo broadcast a surrender offer to the clone soldiers, while Yu Sheng and the others prepared to secure the Core Area. Two clone units surrendered, and Old Qiao’s attempted escape failed when the shuttle’s stationary field and airlock refused his commands.

• The fortress’s defenses and changing corridors attacked Old Qiao’s clone soldiers, trapping and killing units as the transformed area spread.
• Luo used the facility’s communications to strip Old Qiao of authority and urge surviving soldiers to surrender.
• Yu Sheng reported that two Black Dot units had surrendered, then detected a shuttle attempting to escape.
• Old Qiao launched the shuttle and ordered the stationary field disabled, but the facility rejected his command and pulled the craft back onto its platform.
• The launch-channel airlock closed, and the console told Old Qiao, “It is.”

Yu Sheng and his companions captured Old Qiao after Huli wrecked his escaping shuttle. Luo removed Old Qiao’s living brain from its mechanical shell and took him away for questioning.

• Old Qiao tried to escape the fortress in his shuttle, but Huli smashed through the passage wall and rammed the craft.
• Huli tore open the shuttle, pulled Old Qiao from the cockpit, and pinned him to the floor with foxfire.
• Yu Sheng, Eileen, Luna, and Luo arrived, and Old Qiao recognized Luo as the former experimental animal who had escaped his laboratory.
• Old Qiao tried to stab Luo with a hidden plasma blade, but Luo’s mechanical limb intercepted it and Luna cut off both his arms.
• Luo dismantled Old Qiao’s shell and removed the container holding his brain, then told him Yu Sheng had taken control of the fortress.
• Yu Sheng said they would question Old Qiao somewhere quiet, while Luo warned him not to provoke her.

After taking Deep Rock Fortress, Yu Sheng and Luo interrogated Old Qiao and learned that the Hermetic Society was building a passage to a world called Eden. Old Qiao revealed that the Zolda Black Stone had been planted in Luo’s path from the beginning, leaving her to confront the possibility that the Society had been manipulating her all along.

• Yu Sheng took control of Deep Rock Fortress, while Luo isolated its network and imprisoned Old Qiao’s consciousness in a tank.
• Luo questioned Old Qiao, who said the Hermetic Society contacted him through intermediaries and promised him a place in Eden, an unclaimed world they hoped to reach through an Eden Gate.
• Old Qiao explained that the Society’s prototype gate had charging and stabilization problems, and that they had sought his Zolda Black Stone data to help solve them.
• Yu Sheng, Luo, Eileen, Huli, and Luna discussed whether Eden would tempt them, and Yu Sheng said he would want to visit it without necessarily acting like the Society’s fanatics.
• Luo asked when Old Qiao and the Society had targeted her, and Old Qiao revealed that the Zolda Black Stone had been a deliberate gift from the start.

Yu Sheng and Luo interrogated Old Qiao’s brain about the Hermetic Society and Luo’s stolen body parts, then Luo destroyed his remaining consciousness. Afterward, she composed herself and prepared to return with Yu Sheng and the others.

• Luo learned that the Hermetic Society had used Old Qiao to connect her to the Zolda Black Stone, which had responded strongly to her.
• Yu Sheng searched Deep Rock Fortress and found it was mostly Old Qiao’s hidden residence and collection of cruel amusements.
• Luo interrogated Old Qiao until he revealed that he had displayed her spinal cord, discarded her skin, and fed her organs to Su, who later died in a reactor accident.
• Luo used electricity to destroy Old Qiao’s consciousness, then burned what remained of him after Yu Sheng and the others left the room.
• Yu Sheng reminded Luo that Long Hair was waiting to roast mushrooms, and he reassured her that they were friends as her mechanical limbs settled back into her body.