Chapter Summaries

At Three Incense Sticks’ Central Region headquarters, assassins learned of a Muster Order summoning them to the Eastern Region after a major Holy Spirit Hall figure died. A lucrative gold bounty for Xu Xiaoshou appeared alongside it, and Double Fool considered joining the other gold-token assassins in pursuing him.

• Corpse told Sky Hound that a Muster Order called red-token and higher assassins to Eastern Domain Sword God Heaven, and Double Fool revealed that a Holy Spirit Hall big shot had died amid the events surrounding Sky City.
• Golden Foot suggested the Holy Spirit Hall had issued the order and learned that Double Fool had unsuccessfully tried to assassinate a Half-Saint.
• Golden Foot’s allies Evil Elder, Ghost Granny, and Little Ren arrived, bringing the gold bounty notice for Xu Xiaoshou.
• The assassins reacted to Xu Xiaoshou’s age, combat strength, Saint Slave affiliation, and reward of fifty billion Spirit Crystals, five Void Tokens, and a Saint-Sealing Essence Source.
• Double Fool, tempted by the bounty, asked the group if they could talk.

Xu Xiaoshou used Ancestor Wuji’s time-altering Heavenly Secrets Formation to hide his and Liu Changqing’s movements, then impersonated Mu Zixi back at the Xu Gang camp. When a trial officer mentally interrogated him, Xu Xiaoshou feigned unconsciousness and gave evasive, childlike answers, leaving the officer struggling to learn what happened on the mountain.

• Ancestor Wuji used a time-element Heavenly Secrets Formation disk to blend Xu Xiaoshou and Liu Changqing’s return into a scene from a quarter-hour earlier.
• Xu Xiaoshou brought Liu Changqing back to the Xu Gang camp, avoided speaking with Xu Xiaoji, and slept in Mu Zixi’s wooden house.
• Lei Xier told Xu Xiaoshou to water and weed the flowers, then ordered him to curse a bug as though it were Xu Xiaoshou.
• A black-clad trial officer arrived and used mental power to interrogate Xu Xiaoshou, who stayed conscious through Mental Awakening and pretended to be controlled.
• Xu Xiaoshou answered the officer’s questions with confused remarks about spirit beasts, the Xu Gang leadership, and taking a walk, frustrating the officer.
• The trial officer asked what the person Xu Xiaoshou met on the mountain had done to him.

Xu Xiaoshou impersonated Mu Xiaogong to mislead the trial officer, who found no abnormalities in her or Xiao Qing and concluded that a hidden faction had trapped Aberrant. Just as he considered investigating Young Master Xu, Rao Yaoyao recalled him and revealed that Wang Big Hammer had found traces of the Saint Slave Storyteller’s Yin-Yang Life and Death power at the scene of Aberrant’s death.

• Xu Xiaoshou pretended to be a dazed Mu Xiaogong and gave the trial officer only vague details about Aberrant’s interrogation.
• The trial officer used mental guidance to test Mu Xiaogong’s memories, then concluded that she was genuine and had no role in Aberrant’s death.
• The trial officer questioned Xiao Qing and found no abnormalities, strengthening his suspicion that a traitor inside the Holy Spirit Hall had leaked Aberrant’s movements.
• The trial officer considered using mental guidance on Young Master Xu, despite the danger, to pursue the possibility that he knew the truth.
• Rao Yaoyao ordered the trial officer to return and told him that Wang Big Hammer had found residual Yin-Yang Life and Death power belonging to the Saint Slave Storyteller at Aberrant’s death scene.

At the Void Island Rift, intelligence chief Huan Yi led an argument about who had killed Aberrant, concluding that a third party had been present but could not have been Void-level. He left Rao Yaoyao with a pointed puzzle: if the division heads could escape or defeat the suspected attackers, why had Aberrant died?

• Wang Big Hammer announced that the Storyteller had killed Aberrant, and the black-clad intelligence personnel debated whether a third party had been involved.
• Rao Yaoyao ordered the intelligence personnel to continue arguing, and Teng Shanhai realized they were using the dispute to assemble clues and help her reason through Aberrant's death.
• Huan Yi concluded that the Heavenly Secrets practitioner had been restrained and the Storyteller could not deliver the finishing blow, so a third party had been present but was not Void-level.
• Huan Yi asked Teng Shanhai and Wang Big Hammer how they would fare against the Storyteller, a Heavenly Secrets practitioner, and the Eighth Sword Immortal; both said they would flee.
• Huan Yi pointed out that Aberrant had died despite the division heads' confidence that they could escape or fight, then admitted he had reached the limit of what he could infer.

Rao Yaoyao and the intelligence officers pieced together how Aberrant might have been killed and concluded that Xu Xiaoshou was the likely third person at the scene. Rao Yaoyao ordered Wang Big Hammer and Huan Yi to locate the Saint Slave group, especially Xu Xiaoshou.

• Rao Yaoyao argued that Aberrant had likely been lured into a trap by a seemingly weak but important opponent who could counter him.
• The officers debated whether the Storyteller’s Yin-Yang Life and Death traces had been left deliberately, brought to the scene, or appeared after the battle.
• Huan Yi concluded that three people were likely present: a Heavenly Secrets Art practitioner, the Storyteller, and a high-status person with Saint Blood and methods that countered Aberrant.
• Wang Big Hammer and Teng Shanhai identified Xu Xiaoshou as the likely third person and proposed that his Yousi Sword had killed Aberrant.
• Rao Yaoyao assigned Wang Big Hammer and Huan Yi to find the Saint Slave group, especially Xu Xiaoshou, and Wang Big Hammer offered to help kill him if Huan Yi called him by that name.

Xu Xiaoshou released a painted-avatar Storyteller to muddy Rao Yaoyao’s investigation into Aberrant’s death, while Xu Xiaoji took command of the Xu Gang at dawn. The chapter ended with Xu Xiaoji announcing that the gang would march forth to contest the Nine Dragon Veins.

• Xu Xiaoshou used a hidden array token to release a painted-avatar Storyteller into the Yunlun Mountain Range, planning to draw the enforcers into a fruitless search.
• Storyteller tested his ancient book’s powers, while Xu Xiaoshou anticipated sending out more painted avatars, including Cen Qiaofu and Ba Zunan, to deepen the confusion.
• The Royal City Trial’s battle for the Nine Dragon Veins began, offering far greater points than hunting Cloud Beasts or collecting Cloud Orbs.
• Xu Xiaoji stepped before the assembled Xu Gang and discovered that his gesture could silence the crowd and that he relished being their leader.
• Xu Xiaoji declared that the Xu Gang would march forth.

Luo Yin and the rival factions fought over the Fourth Dragon Vein until an enormous force arrived and revealed itself as the Xu Gang. The Xu Gang demanded the mountain’s surrender and began its assault, leaving Luo Yin and the others facing a vastly outnumbered battle.

• Luo Yin defended the Fourth Dragon Vein with a few dozen allies and pulled out six Dragon Guard Flags while hundreds of attackers tried to stop him.
• The mountain shook as scouts reported that hundreds of real trial participants were marching toward the Fourth Dragon Vein.
• Luo Yin and the attackers suspended their battle to learn who was approaching and estimated that the newcomers might be a coalition of smaller groups.
• A woman speaking for the Xu Gang demanded that everyone on the mountain surrender and surrender their Trial Jade Pendants for scanning.
• The Xu Gang counted down rapidly and shouted its battle slogans as it prepared to attack the Fourth Dragon Vein.

Xu Xiaoshou, disguised as Mu Xiaogong, led Xu Gang in a swift assault on the Fourth Dragon Vein while Luo Yin tried to rally the defenders and seize its flags. After learning the summit contest was close to unlocking the Dragon Vein Formation, Xu Xiaoshou ordered his fighters to plant poison seeds there, leaving his own troops uncertain about the plan.

• Luo Yin learned that Xu Gang had broken through the mountain's defenses under a little girl's command and urged the attacking leader to help pull out the Dragon Guard Flags and claim the Dragon Lord Banner.
• Xu Xiaoshou, disguised as Mu Xiaogong, used wood-element powers to lead seven hundred Xu Gang members in overwhelming the exhausted defenders.
• Xu Xiaoshou realized Mimicry let him experience and imitate other attributes, and considered using a clash between Ba Zunan and Huangquan to study their abilities.
• A Xu Gang member gave Xu Xiaoshou a jade slip showing that six of the eight Dragon Guard Flags had been pulled out and explaining how to claim the Dragon Vein.
• Xu Xiaoshou gathered Xu Gang, handed out poison seeds and antidote pills, and ordered the fighters to plant the seeds at the summit before fleeing.

Luo Yin and the mountain defenders tried to protect the Dragon Guard Flags from Xu Gang, whose members scattered medicinal seeds across the mountain before Mu Xiaogong made them sprout. The herbs poisoned everyone, leaving the defenders vomiting as the flag pullers suffered sudden diarrhea.

• Luo Yin rallied the weakened mountain defenders to hold off Xu Gang for the three minutes needed to raise the Dragon Guard Flags.
• Xu Gang’s members broke through the defenses but dodged attacks and accidentally revealed the flags’ location, then scattered handfuls of dirt containing spiritual medicine seeds around the mountain.
• Mu Xiaogong appeared, causing Xu Gang’s members to flee; she summoned the seeds, which sprouted into spiritual herbs across the mountain, and then left.
• Luo Yin and the defenders sampled the herbs and began vomiting as the supposedly nourishing plants revealed their poisonous effects.
• The two flag-pulling contestants clutched their stomachs and suffered uncontrollable diarrhea.

Xu Xiaoshou’s poisonous herbs incapacitated Luo Yin and the cultivators on the Fourth Dragon Vein, letting him dictate terms for their release. Luo Yin accepted Xu Xiaoshou’s demand that his group withdraw and surrender their points, while Xu Xiaoshou added that Luo Yin must serve as his vanguard for twenty days.

• Xu Xiaoshou’s poisonous herbs caused widespread, escalating symptoms among the cultivators atop the mountain, and Qian Lei was eliminated after Luo Yin’s punch exposed how weakened the poison had made him.
• Luo Yin took an Ash-Severing Golden Pill, then shouted for Mu Xiaogong to fight him one-on-one; below the mountain, Xu Xiaoji learned that Gang Leader Mu had used poison and told the Xu Gang to wait.
• Xu Xiaoshou approached the summit protected by spiritual essence, resisted the poison through his abilities, and challenged Luo Yin’s complaint about Young Master Xu.
• Luo Yin proposed that Mu Xiaogong detoxify his companions in exchange for a fight, but Xu Xiaoshou took control of the negotiation and demanded that Luo Yin’s group withdraw from the fight for the Fourth Dragon Vein.
• Xu Xiaoshou demanded that Luo Yin’s group hand over their points and that Luo Yin serve as his vanguard for the next twenty days; Luo Yin reluctantly accepted the earlier terms and listened to the last demand.

Xu Xiaoshou, disguised as Mu Xiaogong, persuaded Luo Yin to join the Xu Gang and helped secure the Fourth Dragon Vein. At the first Dragon Lord Conference, the Xu Gang members backed Mu Xiaogong to take the Dragon Lord Banner, while Xu Xiaoshou concealed his plans behind their act.

• Xu Xiaoshou threatened to expose Luo Yin for soiling his trousers unless he joined the Xu Gang, and Luo Yin agreed.
• Xu Xiaoshou transformed into an ancient tree and absorbed the poison from the mountain’s survivors, draining much of their spiritual essence and life force as well.
• Luo Yin handed Xu Xiaoshou the Dragon Guard Flags, and Xu Gang members took control of the Fourth Dragon Vein and placed the recovered survivors under Luo Yin’s command.
• At the Dragon Lord Conference, Xu Xiaoji asked Mu Xiaogong who should bear the risks of becoming the Lord of Nine Dragons, and Xu Xiaoshou steered the group into endorsing her.
• Xu Xiaoji declared that Mu Xiaogong should pull out the Dragon Lord Banner of the Fourth Dragon Vein.

Xu Xiaoshou secured the Fourth Dragon Vein and sent the Xu Gang out to capture the remaining Dragon Veins, while Su Qianqian offered to take the Eighth Dragon Vein. After the group departed, Xu Xiaoshou turned his attention to arranging for Storyteller to be discovered by the enforcers.

• Xu Xiaoshou pulled out the Dragon Lord Banner, became the Dragon Lord of the Fourth Dragon Vein, and received its formation token.
• Xu Xiaoji proposed sending two teams at a time to capture Dragon Veins, and Xiao Wanfeng warned that the Xu Gang lacked enough peak combat power to defeat every Dragon Lord.
• Su Qianqian volunteered to take the Eighth Dragon Vein, and Xu Xiaoshou thanked her on Young Master Xu's behalf.
• The Xu Gang split into units and departed, with Su Qianqian heading alone toward the Eighth Dragon Vein while the others targeted unclaimed Dragon Veins.
• Xu Xiaoshou remained at the Fourth Dragon Vein with a portrait avatar ready to guard the mountain, then considered how Storyteller could be discovered by the enforcers without raising suspicion.

Xu Xiaoshou used a portrait clone disguised as Storyteller to draw the trial officials' attention, and Shouye identified the figure as a likely Saint Slave stowaway. As Yu Zhiwen investigated and reported the discovery to Rao Yaoyao, the Void Island Rift suddenly opened.

• Xu Xiaoshou made his portrait clone appear in the wilderness, then vanish through a painted spatial rift before anyone could reach it.
• Shouye spotted the clone after capturing another stowaway and reported the suspicious figure to Yu Zhiwen.
• Yu Zhiwen found no Spirit Mirror footage or Trial Jade Pendant record for the black-and-white-dressed man and traced him back to his emergence from the ground.
• Yu Zhiwen and Shouye recognized the clone's original red dress and suspected it was Saint Slave's Storyteller, then sent the footage and their findings to Rao Yaoyao.
• Yu Zhiwen noticed the figure had behaved like an uncontrolled puppet and wondered whether it was Storyteller's external incarnation.
• The Void Island Rift opened above Yu Zhiwen with a strange shriek.

Sky City began tearing free from the Void Island Rift, terrifying East Heavenly King City as Lan Ling and the Holy Spirit Hall tried to reassure its people. Rao Yaoyao returned injured after failing to enter Void Island’s inner island and told Teng Shanhai that Demon Emperor Black Dragon had defended it, confirming Ba Zunan’s control over the Black-and-White Branches and leaving them shaken by his genius and long-running scheme.

• The Void Island Rift wailed and Sky City struggled against the Chains of the Heavenly Dao, exposing a third of its mass and raining rubble toward East Heavenly King City.
• Lan Ling reassured the city that Sky City would not fall on it, while she waited for orders from Sword Immortal Rao.
• Teng Shanhai failed to reach Rao Yaoyao through the Void Stage World until she emerged injured from the Void Island Rift.
• Rao Yaoyao told Teng Shanhai she had found the source of the rift but had been driven back by Demon Emperor Black Dragon while trying to enter the inner island.
• Rao Yaoyao and Teng Shanhai concluded that Ba Zunan had taken command of the Black-and-White Branches, and Teng Shanhai struggled to comprehend how he had achieved it.
• Rao Yaoyao looked toward Sky City and said that perhaps this was what a genius was.

Rao Yaoyao and Teng Shanhai investigated Storyteller’s suspicious movements as the Void Island Rift erupted with holy power, drawing the Holy Spirit Hall’s forces and terrifying the trial participants. The supposed Ghost Beast flood turned out to be a torrent of treasures, beginning with a First-Grade spirit sword.

• Rao Yaoyao and Teng Shanhai considered whether Storyteller’s portrait-avatar was trying to contact his true body in Void Island’s Inner Island and whether that was connected to Sky City’s emergence.
• The Void Island Rift cried out again and shattered the surrounding space, so Rao Yaoyao summoned the Trial Officers to guard it against a possible Ghost Beast outbreak.
• Trial participants feared the Saintly Dao disturbance while smugglers hoped the anomaly would reveal an opportunity tied to Sky City’s Saint-Sealing Dao Foundation.
• Xu Xiaoshou realized that Lei Shuangxing had likely triggered the disturbance according to their plan, and he worried Ba Zunan might be preparing a far larger move.
• Rao Yaoyao ordered the Red Robes and White Robes to form a defensive formation, but the first object it stopped proved to be a First-Grade spirit sword rather than a Ghost Beast.

Rao Yaoyao kept the Enforcers disciplined as treasures poured from the Void Island Rift, ordering them to collect and inspect everything for Ghost Beast traces. When more than a hundred experts from East Heavenly King City arrived, she accused them of coming for the holy-powered treasures.

• Treasures burst from the Void Island Rift, and Rao Yaoyao ordered the Enforcers to collect them while maintaining the Seventy-Two Section Dragon Essence Formation.
• The Enforcers grew distracted by rare treasures, including the final volume of the Broken Wall Flame Canon and Saint Blood, so Rao Yaoyao punished Zhao Nuo for disrupting discipline.
• After the torrent stopped, Rao Yaoyao ordered the Red Robes to check every treasure for Ghost Beast traces and assigned Shouye to organize the inspection.
• More than a hundred experts from East Heavenly King City approached, greeting Rao Yaoyao while eyeing the collected treasures.
• Rao Yaoyao rejected their offer of assistance and accused them of seeking the treasures infused with holy power.

Rao Yaoyao turned the greedy experts gathered at the Void Island Rift into conscripts for the Ghost Beast purge and put Teng Shanhai in command. Meanwhile, Xu Xiaoshou watched the scene from Yunlun Mountain Range and remained baffled by Ba Zunan’s reasons for sending out treasures and attracting more people.

• Rao Yaoyao warned the thirteen Sovereigns that the rift led to an alternate-dimensional space and that Red Robes were purging Ghost Beasts, but Huang Yang True Person and the others chose to stay for a chance at treasures and sainthood.
• Rao Yaoyao conscripted the willing Sovereigns and twenty-seven Cutting Path cultivators, while the rest withdrew rather than risk their lives.
• Rao Yaoyao placed the conscripts under Teng Shanhai, who demanded they call him Chief and threatened death for disobeying wartime orders.
• The conscripts accepted Teng Shanhai’s authority, and Rao Yaoyao continued to wonder what the figures inside Void Island’s Inner Island intended.
• Xu Xiaoshou used Perception to observe the rift and puzzle over why Ba Zunan had sent treasures that armed Red Robes and drew a crowd that became Rao Yaoyao’s assistance.

Yu Zhiwen tracked suspicious trial participants and continued trying to uncover evidence against Young Master Xu, while Xu Xiaoshou hid as Mu Xiaogong and directed the Xu Gang’s campaign across the Dragon Veins. After the Xu Gang claimed several Dragon Veins, the Void Island Rift stirred again, leaving the trial-takers wondering whether its treasures would reach them.

• Yu Zhiwen identified seventy-six suspicious trial participants and sent their Spirit Mirror feeds to Rao Yaoyao, then watched Young Master Xu and struggled to prove he was Xu Xiaoshou.
• Xu Xiaoshou, disguised as Mu Xiaogong, had his followers plant flowers on the Fourth Dragon Vein while he avoided drawing suspicion.
• Tai Xing claimed the Third Dragon Vein, and the Trial Jade Pendant identified him as Mu Xiaogong’s First Dragon Guard from the Fourth Dragon Vein.
• Su Qianqian claimed the Eighth Dragon Vein, followed by Mo Beibei claiming the Second Dragon Vein, prompting trial participants to fear the Xu Gang’s rapid expansion.
• Some trial participants abandoned their assaults and watched the Void Island Rift, which suddenly let out an eerie cry as they hoped its treasures would fall into the Yunlun Mountain Range.

Rao Yaoyao and the Red Robes survived a second, stronger torrent of treasures from the Void Island Rift, but found no Ghost Beasts. The rift then sent out a black scale that pierced Teng Shanhai’s Azure God Armor, and Rao Yaoyao identified it as a scale from the Demon Emperor Black Dragon.

• Rao Yaoyao redeployed the Seventy-Two Section Dragon Essence Formation, and Teng Shanhai kept the Void Clan members and other outsiders from joining the defense.
• A stronger second torrent of Holy Power-laced treasures battered the Enforcers for a quarter of an hour, but they intercepted the treasures and found no Ghost Beast aura.
• Rao Yaoyao dismissed most of the Enforcers, and she and Teng Shanhai wondered what the inner island was trying to accomplish with the treasure eruptions.
• A streak of light shot from the rift, and Teng Shanhai caught it but was blasted back as the object pierced his Azure God Armor.
• Rao Yaoyao examined the black scale and declared that it came from the Demon Emperor Black Dragon.

A Saint Emperor Dragon Scale released Demon Emperor Black Dragon’s black holy power in the Yunlun Mountain Range, killing twenty-seven Path-Cutters and threatening the remaining experts. As Ai Cangsheng’s Evil Sin Bow arrow arrived to strike the scale, a black broadsword emerged from it and drew swords from across the region; Rao Yaoyao recognized it as Myriad Weapons Devil Lord.

• Rao Yaoyao and Teng Shanhai tried to contain the Saint Emperor Dragon Scale, but it shook free and unleashed a dragon roar that spread across the Yunlun Mountain Range and East Heavenly King City.
• Demon Emperor Black Dragon’s holy power stirred greed and inner demons, driving the twenty-seven Path-Cutters to charge the scale and be devoured; Rao Yaoyao’s sword helped the Supreme Voids resist its influence.
• As the scale’s heartbeat quickened, Rao Yaoyao stopped Teng Shanhai from using saint blood and waited for help from the Central Region.
• Ai Cangsheng fired an arrow from his Evil Sin Bow at the scale, sending immense saintly might across the regions.
• The scale produced a black broadsword that drew spirit swords into a vast array, and Rao Yaoyao recognized it as the famous demonic sword Myriad Weapons Devil Lord.