Chapter Summaries

Speaker Xiao Zhengyan announced the evacuation of Shelter No. 9, leaving one hundred thousand people to remain underground while the rest relocated to the surface. He praised Lu Bai for his accomplishments and assigned the attendees relocation duties, but a message from his chief secretary made him visibly uneasy.

• Xiao Zhengyan told the gathering that the city council had decided to abandon Shelter No. 9 and relocate most of its population to the surface.
• Pu Xueli asked how many people would stay, and Xiao Zhengyan said one hundred thousand had already been assigned places.
• Xiao Zhengyan praised Lu Bai for keeping the Underground City illuminated, capturing the Can Society leader, and destroying the society's hideout.
• Xiao Zhengyan assigned the attendees tasks to support the relocation, then prepared to leave.
• A secretary announced that Xiao Zhengyan had received a new message from his chief secretary, and Xiao Zhengyan showed signs of panic.

Lu Bai agreed to join Captain Jiang in suppressing unrest in Seventh Livability City, where Team Ten had been deployed. Their routine assignment turned urgent when Sun Wei reported that Director Shen had run into trouble and a team member sent to investigate a deathmatch fighter at the E3 intersection disappeared.

• Xiao Zhengyan left the lounge, and the assembled teams chose assignments to quell unrest across the livability cities.
• Team Six's captain took responsibility for Fourth Livability City, while representatives from Yuji and Chuzhong argued over First Livability City.
• Captain Jiang asked Lu Bai to accompany Team Ten to Seventh Livability City, and Lu Bai agreed.
• Jiang drove Lu Bai out of the City Council building, which hundreds of armed soldiers now surrounded.
• Sun Wei stopped Jiang's car and reported trouble involving Director Shen.
• Sun Wei explained that a Team Ten member had vanished after being sent to deal with a deathmatch fighter at the E3 intersection.

Baldy and Lu Bai investigated the disappearance of City Direct Military members at the E3 intersection, where Baldy was shot by a distant attacker hiding behind a trap. Meanwhile, Li Shan and Feng Yixuan encountered a bloodthirsty young man in Fourth Livability City, and the sniper identified himself over a phone as the Vice President.

• Baldy drove to the E3 intersection after learning that Xiao You, the Fifteenth Seat, and Director Shen had gone missing.
• Lu Bai and Sun Wei followed Baldy past the cordon and found three bodies stacked in the middle of the intersection.
• Li Shan realized the killer was still nearby, and a young man emerged from behind a fallen sign to face her and Feng Yixuan.
• Baldy approached the bodies and was struck through the chest by a distant attack.
• Baldy found an active phone in Director Shen's corpse, identified the caller as Black Sniper, and heard him demand to be called Vice President.

Lu Bai tracked Black Sniper to a room in a Livability Building, leaving Baldy and the others behind as he confronted the Can Society Vice President. Black Sniper revealed his motives and prepared to attack, but Lu Bai took control of his tripwire.

• Black Sniper repeatedly shot Baldy from hiding, and Baldy tried to provoke him into revealing his location.
• Black Sniper mentioned he was wary of Lu Bai, but Lu Bai had already vanished from Sun Wei's side.
• Lu Bai found Black Sniper in a room on the twenty-eighth floor and asked why he was only the Vice President.
• Black Sniper said he had joined the Can Society because he opposed the social order and wanted to do what the organization did.
• Black Sniper prepared to attack, but Lu Bai grabbed his tripwire and declared it his own.
• Black Sniper recovered his composure and asked Lu Bai what he planned to do about the social order.

Lu Bai bound Black Sniper and left after calling Baldy, while a young man unleashed a devastating Blood Pool that Feng Yixuan and Li Shan struggled to escape. Lu Bai headed to Fourth Livability City to repay a favor, where Team Six's captain confronted the young man over the blood he had gathered.

• Lu Bai used his tripwire to bind Black Sniper, called Baldy with the room number, and left.
• The young man sent a flood of blood through the streets, and Feng Yixuan used Lion's Roar to scatter the oncoming torrent.
• Feng Yixuan grabbed Li Shan and fled as the young man blocked her sound waves with a blood barrier.
• The man in the white trench coat healed Baldy and told him Lu Bai had gone to Fourth Livability City to repay a favor.
• Feng Yixuan and Li Shan joined Team Six's captain as he confronted the young man in the Blood Pool, who asked whether the City Council had killed more than he had.

Lu Bai confronted a young man who controlled blood after the man attacked Captain of Team Six, Feng Yixuan, and Li Shan. The young man panicked at the sight of Lu Bai, then regained his confidence after Lu Bai scattered his blood and declared that Lu Bai was only a deathmatcher, not a Heavenly Venerate.

• Feng Yixuan used Lion's Roar to scatter the young man's blood, but he sent the suspended droplets back at her and her companions.
• Captain of Team Six shielded himself from the blood with his glowing ability, then told Feng Yixuan to escape with Li Shan.
• The young man blocked Feng Yixuan's escape and struck her legs with blood droplets as he raged against crooked cultivators.
• Lu Bai appeared behind the young man, startling him into scattering and reforming his body in fear.
• Lu Bai walked through the blood and blew away the young man's massive attack with [Wind Riding].
• The young man laughed wildly and said Lu Bai was only a deathmatcher, not a Heavenly Venerate.

Lu Bai restrained the young man who threatened him and had him arrested, while the Deathmatch System’s self-check remained unexplained. At the City Council building, Pu Xueli learned that officials had set an urgent schedule to relocate more than a hundred million people to the surface within a week.

• Lu Bai suspected the young man was tied to the Deathmatch System’s self-check after recognizing him from an earlier murder case.
• The young man attacked Lu Bai with a torrent of blood, but Lu Bai blew it aside and immobilized him with a golden haze and a “Freeze” character.
• Lu Bai ordered the Team Six captain to arrest the young man, and reinforcements arrived before Lu Bai returned to the City Council building with the prisoner.
• Pu Xueli challenged a councilor over the plan to begin mass relocation the next day and move more than a hundred million people to the surface within a week.
• The councilor told Pu Xueli that the City Councilors had approved the deadline together, though he had voted against it.

As Livability City prepared to relocate its residents to the surface, Lu Bai and his companions returned to the City Council building after escorting a young man to the holding cells. The first groups had already begun traveling through the Evacuation Elevator, and Lu Bai questioned whether it could carry more than a hundred million people.

• Pu Xueli criticized the bespectacled councilor’s defense of majority rule, and the councilor suggested Pu Xueli apply to the Coordination Committee.
• Armored vehicles announced the relocation across Livability City as residents crowded shops to stock up on supplies.
• Li Shan drove Lu Bai, Feng Yixuan, and the young man to the City Council building, where Li Shan and Feng Yixuan took the young man to the holding cells.
• Lu Bai and Feng Yixuan watched workers prepare the Evacuation Elevator, while the group discussed the coming relocation and the young man’s unexplained escape.
• Lu Bai, Li Shan, and Feng Yixuan went to the cafeteria, where Lu Bai asked whether the Evacuation Elevator could transport more than a hundred million people.

Lu Bai and the others learned that a thousand elevators hidden inside the military exclusion zone’s towering building could evacuate the Underground City’s population in seven days. While they rested after their mission, a secretary summoned Lu Bai over Speaker Xiao Zhengyan’s son, Xiao Xueyin, and drove him away from the Council building.

• Li Shan and Feng Yixuan wondered how the Underground City’s population could reach the surface, and Pu Xueli explained that the enormous building contained 4,404 floors and a thousand elevators.
• Pu Xueli said the elevators could transport more than a hundred million people in at least seven days, and he criticized the City Council for treating citizens as numbers.
• Feng Yixuan and Li Shan relaxed with wine while Lu Bai rested, and they noted that the evacuation had been moved up.
• A secretary asked Lu Bai to meet Speaker Xiao Zhengyan, then persuaded him by revealing that the matter concerned Xiao Zhengyan’s son, Xiao Xueyin.
• The secretary drove Lu Bai to find Xiao Zhengyan, who had left the Council building and had not returned.

Lu Bai learned that Mona Warriors had taken Xiao Xueyin and asked Speaker Xiao Zhengyan to investigate how they entered the shelter. Meanwhile, residents of Shelter No. 9 returned to the surface and saw the real night sky for the first time.

• Xiao Zhengyan told Lu Bai that three Mona Warriors had taken Xiao Xueyin and showed him security footage of them carrying a model of Lu Bai.
• Lu Bai identified the captors as human Mona Warriors, said Xiao Xueyin did not appear to be in immediate danger, and asked Xiao Zhengyan to investigate their entry into the shelter.
• Zheng Yongliang emerged from the shelter and was moved to tears by the full moon and stars.
• Other residents gathered outside to look at the night sky until staff directed them away from the shelter exit.

Zheng Yongliang left Forward Base with a group heading for a nearby settlement, but the short man leading them lured them into a robbery. As Big Tattoo Arm and his gang seized their food, a mysterious man in white appeared and spoke of a great Lord.

• Zheng Yongliang followed the short man’s advice and joined a group traveling to an abandoned sports center settlement.
• The short man became hostile when Zheng Yongliang tried to turn back, and Big Cat and three other burly men emerged from the darkness.
• Big Tattoo Arm stabbed the bespectacled salesman and demanded that everyone surrender their food.
• The group handed over their supplies, and a man in white appeared, lamenting humanity’s depravity and the need for a great Lord.

A White Robe Mona Warrior captured Big Tattoo Arm, Zheng Yongliang, and the other residents, then recruited them to help the Mona people oppose the city council. The residents agreed to return to Forward Base and turn against the council.

• The White Robe Mona Warrior revealed himself as a Mona Warrior and ensnared everyone with plant tendrils.
• Big Tattoo Arm recognized the warrior’s power, offered his cooperation, and agreed to follow his orders.
• The White Robe Mona Warrior asked the residents to side with the Mona people and recruit others at Forward Base.
• He told the residents the council had sent them away because the Heavy Element Reactor was destroyed and resources were scarce.
• The residents agreed to obey, and the White Robe Mona Warrior ordered them to return to Forward Base and make the council bigwigs feel their wrath.

As the Forward Base tightened its brutal control over the returning population, White Robe Mona Warrior ordered Big Tattoo Arm to lead ten thousand people in an assault on the base. Big Tattoo Arm suspected he was being sent to die, while Zheng Yongliang remained reluctant to serve the Mona people.

• The Forward Base used lethal force to suppress disturbances, and more than a thousand people were shot as many residents chose to leave rather than live under armed surveillance.
• Big Tattoo Arm confronted Zheng Yongliang for failing to recruit anyone and threatened to report him to White Robe Mona Warrior.
• White Robe Mona Warrior mocked Big Tattoo Arm as someone who was never meant to be human, then ordered him to capture the Forward Base.
• White Robe Mona Warrior gave Big Tattoo Arm leaflets to distribute and promised that the Lord would provide help, but Big Tattoo Arm doubted the promise and feared the mission was a suicide operation.

Big Tattoo Arm covertly led Mona Warrior recruits into the Forward Base to stir up unrest, but their first attempt faltered when soldiers killed the initial protestors. As the White Robe Mona Warrior urged the recruits onward, Big Tattoo Arm suddenly lost control of his body and climbed onto a cargo container.

• The White Robe Mona Warrior promised Big Tattoo Arm a place at his side if he survived the mission, then ordered him to declare their existence.
• Lu Bai, Li Shan, and Feng Yixuan waited at the Forward Base and discussed exploring nearby after finding the surface dull.
• Big Tattoo Arm split the recruits into small groups so they could enter the Forward Base without drawing attention, then coordinated a simultaneous disturbance.
• Soldiers shot and killed the first recruits who handed out leaflets and shouted against the city council, causing the scattered civilians to lose their nerve.
• The White Robe Mona Warrior argued that the recruits only needed a push, while Big Tattoo Arm suddenly lost control of his body and climbed onto a cargo container.

Big Tattoo Arm turned a speech against the White Robe Mona Warriors into a mass uprising, naming the protesters the Rebel Army. The riot spread into the residential area, where Lu Bai, Li Shan, and Feng Yixuan watched as swarms of drones began attacking the crowd.

• Big Tattoo Arm blocked a soldier’s bullet with a wooden shield and urged the crowd to fight back against the authorities.
• People joined the chant, with returning Forward Base residents helping organize their calls into a unified demand to fight back.
• Big Tattoo Arm called the uprising the Rebel Army, prompting a surge of violence that overwhelmed soldiers and spread across the base.
• Lu Bai, Li Shan, and Feng Yixuan emerged from a prefab house as the riot reached the residential area, and Feng Yixuan climbed onto the roof to survey the chaos.
• Drones converged on the riot and fired into the densely packed crowd, filling the air with blood mist.

Lu Bai investigated the mastermind behind the uprising and found Mona Warriors outside the Forward Base, where one planned to challenge Mephisto despite the Lord’s orders and the risk of losing his abilities. As the White Robe Mona Warrior warned him about Mephisto, Lu Bai listened in and reacted with amazement at his comrade’s loyalty.

• Drones attacked the uprising, killing and wounding people and driving the crowd to flee.
• Lu Bai concluded that the revolt had been orchestrated and suspected the Mona Warriors, then vanished to search outside the Forward Base.
• The White Robe Mona Warrior explained that the massacre would deepen class divisions and eventually lead humanity to destroy itself.
• A Mona Warrior said he wanted to fight Mephisto, and the White Robe Mona Warrior reminded him that the Lord had forbidden them to act alone.
• The Mona Warrior declared he would gladly give everything to the Lord, and Lu Bai overheard and marveled at his loyalty.

Lu Bai defeated two Mona Warriors and used mind control to learn that the Mona people had ordered a wider attack on Shelter No. 9. He returned to find the Forward Base rebellion quelled, though the conflict had left widespread casualties and unrest that could flare up again.

• The two Mona Warriors attacked Lu Bai with vines and a metallic transformation, but he nullified their abilities with a snap.
• After the warriors killed themselves to protect their Lord's secrets, Lu Bai revived and restrained them, then used mind control to question them.
• Lu Bai learned that the Mona people had mobilized warriors worldwide to damage Shelter No. 9, with at least a dozen targeting the Forward Base.
• Lu Bai searched for more Mona Warriors but found none and returned to the Forward Base.
• Lu Bai found that the rebellion had been quelled, but tens of thousands may have died and the seeds of another uprising remained.

As unrest spread at Forward Base on the first night of the Ground Return Plan, the Coordination Committee tightened security while more residents camped outside or traveled onward. Feng Yixuan went to find food with Lu Bai, while Li Shan was asked to scout an area using his Wind Riding ability.

• Public clashes repeatedly broke out at Forward Base, and armed forces soldiers began shooting protesters, worsening hostility between residents and authorities.
• The Coordination Committee increased patrols, drones, and troops near the shelter entrance as tensions continued to rise.
• Forward Base imposed movement restrictions overnight, prompting more residents to camp outside; nearly twenty million people had already returned to the surface.
• Feng Yixuan visited Lu Bai and invited him to eat while they waited for Li Shan to finish his assignment.
• A Security Department director told Li Shan he had been chosen to scout an area because his Wind Riding ability was suited to staying concealed.

Li Shan confirmed that the Forward Base wanted him to secretly investigate the north slope. There, the settlers founded the Rebel Army in Big Tattoo Arm’s name, but their celebration quickly turned into a struggle over power before a young leader called them to focus on rescuing people still under the City Council’s control.

• Li Shan confirmed that he would investigate the north slope without alerting its inhabitants.
• The settlers gathered around bonfires and raised a crude flag bearing the words “Rebel Army.”
• Zheng Yongliang watched the flag being raised and then withdrew from the crowd.
• A bright-eyed young man invoked Mr. Mu, the name the rebels had given Big Tattoo Arm, and called on the crowd to carry on his legacy.
• The rebels argued over their aims and who should lead, until the young man fired his gun into the air to quiet them.
• The young man urged the Rebel Army to unite and prioritize rescuing citizens still under the City Council’s control.

Zheng Yongliang watched the Rebel Army rally while Li Shan tried to observe the settlement and return to the Forward Base. After his cover was exposed, the rebels surrounded him.

• A clear-eyed young man calmed the Rebel Army and urged its members to infiltrate the Forward Base and spread resistance.
• Zheng Yongliang suspected a hidden mastermind was manipulating the rebels but stayed silent to protect himself.
• Li Shan watched the Rebel Army and worried that its revolt against the City Council would cause many deaths.
• A young couple heard Li Shan hiding on the slope, and his ghillie suit drew the man's suspicion.
• Li Shan discovered his motorcycle was missing and was surrounded by torch-bearing rebels.
• The man who had confronted Li Shan emerged from the crowd and said he had known something was fishy about him.