Chapter Summaries

Jiang Mian and Ye Chenyang boarded a train to Base City Number One, where Jiang Mian unexpectedly reunited with Shen Qiuyu. After noticing that the people around her seemed to have fallen asleep, Jiang Mian sensed that something was wrong.

• Jiang Mian stored her suitcase in her necklace and left the hotel with Ye Chenyang for the station.
• Jiang Mian and Ye Chenyang boarded the train and settled into a private compartment.
• Jiang Mian went to the dining car and ran into Shen Qiuyu, who asked how she had been.
• Jiang Mian stumbled while trying to explain her relationship with Ye Chenyang, and Shen Qiuyu guessed they were together.
• Jiang Mian noticed the train had grown strangely quiet and used her perception to find that most passengers appeared to be asleep.

Jiang Mian and Shen Qiuyu moved through a train overtaken by a sleep-inducing mental attack and spreading darkness, which Jiang Mian suspected came from [Oblivion River] and a powerful [Chaos] Calamity. They found their route blocked by an Awakened apparently possessed by another entity, just as a giant black hand attacked from behind them.

• Jiang Mian used her bracelet’s [Radiance] to keep Shen Qiuyu from collapsing under the mental attack.
• Jiang Mian sensed that a living Fifth-tier-or-higher [Chaos] Calamity was isolating the train cars in darkness while the attack left many passengers dead.
• Jiang Mian brought Shen Qiuyu toward Ye Chenyang, believing his [Radiance] Path would protect her.
• Jiang Mian and Shen Qiuyu passed through three cars filled with unconscious passengers and Awakened.
• A possessed Awakened blocked their way as shadows sealed both ends of the passage, and a gigantic black hand lunged at them from behind.

A Soul Eater ambushed Jiang Mian and Shen Qiuyu aboard the train, but Jiang Mian’s bracelet broke while protecting them and she suddenly turned on the attacker. She blasted the Soul Eater out of its host with a sniper rifle and prepared to face it and the other Calamity waiting nearby.

• The Soul Eater revealed that it had joined a group of Calamities planning to kill the human pinnacles aboard the train and had possessed a passenger to ambush Jiang Mian and Shen Qiuyu.
• Jiang Mian pulled Shen Qiuyu away from the Soul Eater’s condensed mental attack, while Shen Qiuyu hurled fireballs that passed through its shadowy hand.
• Jiang Mian’s bracelet activated on its own, dispelled the attack, then shattered; Shen Qiuyu sensed a terrifying aura from Jiang Mian as she walked toward the enemy.
• The Soul Eater rushed at Jiang Mian, and Shen Qiuyu tried to intercept it, but Jiang Mian drew her sniper rifle and shot the possessed passenger in the head.
• Jiang Mian recognized the expelled spirit as a Soul Eater and declared that it and the Chaos Calamity waiting outside would both die.

Jiang Mian used the [Abyssal Sea Eye] and [Eternal Day]-imbued weapons to wound the Soul Eater, forcing it to flee into the Other Shore. She followed it there in her Calamity Transformation state and confronted the terrified calamity.

• The Soul Eater spread its domain through the carriage, but Jiang Mian froze it with the [Abyssal Sea Eye].
• Jiang Mian used a crystal sword imbued with [Eternal Day] to pierce the Soul Eater and fend off its pale hands.
• The Soul Eater fled into the Other Shore to escape the spreading [Eternal Day] power.
• Jiang Mian appeared in the Other Shore in her Calamity Transformation state and slapped the Soul Eater.
• The Soul Eater recognized Jiang Mian's superior power and knelt, and Jiang Mian grabbed its head and challenged it.

Jiang Mian destroyed the Soul Eater and led Shen Qiuyu through the train’s shifting carriages while searching the Other Shore for the Calamities’ stronghold. After an Impersonator disguised as a woman was killed, Jiang Mian recognized the person emerging from the shadows as Ye Chenyang.

• Jiang Mian burned the Soul Eater’s shattered spirit and realized the attacker had destroyed the bracelet Ye Chenyang gave her.
• Jiang Mian sensed the Oblivion River’s domain in the Other Shore and decided to catch the outside culprit off guard.
• Jiang Mian took Shen Qiuyu through the Chaos Calamity’s assault, crystallizing the carriage and its tentacles before they entered a shadowy passage.
• Jiang Mian and Shen Qiuyu emerged in Carriage Ten, discovering that the shadows scrambled the train’s carriage order.
• An Impersonator disguised as a frightened young woman approached them and was sliced in half by a ring of light.
• Jiang Mian saw Ye Chenyang emerge from the passage and rushed toward him.

Ye Chenyang reunited with Jiang Mian after she survived a fifth-tier Soul Eater, and he gave her cores from the Calamities he had killed. Realizing the train had been dragged into the Void Realm, Ye Chenyang decided to find a familiar person in one of the cars near the front.

• Jiang Mian told Ye Chenyang that a fifth-tier Soul Eater had broken the bracelet he gave her, and he reassured her before promising to make her a new one.
• Ye Chenyang gave Jiang Mian several fifth- and sixth-tier cores, explaining that he had killed a sixth-tier Nightmare responsible for the passengers dying in their sleep.
• Jiang Mian collected the Mimic's core and introduced Ye Chenyang to Shen Qiuyu as her boyfriend.
• Ye Chenyang concluded that the train had been dragged into the Void Realm and suspected Formless had survived and joined forces with Oblivion River.
• Ye Chenyang enveloped the group in a golden glow and said they were going to find a familiar figure near the front of the train.

Yin Mengyao defeated the Fifth-tier Nightmares in Car Two, but a hidden Sixth-tier Nightmare revealed an abnormal power that fused its domain with Decaying Shadow’s. As its darkness engulfed the carriage, golden light identified as Eternal Daylight began consuming the domain.

• Yin Mengyao overwhelmed the Fifth-tier Nightmares and cornered their wounded leader in the passageway.
• The leader seized a sleeping human girl as a hostage, but Yin Mengyao used invisible mental threads to disarm it and rescue the girl.
• Yin Mengyao sensed a lurking presence and struck at the window, where a hidden Sixth-tier Nightmare blocked her Blade Aura.
• The Sixth-tier Nightmare transformed its hand into black tentacles and spread a darkness that corroded Yin Mengyao’s consciousness and blocked her mental power.
• A brilliant golden light appeared in the darkness and began devouring the fused domain, prompting Yin Mengyao to recognize it as Eternal Daylight.

Ye Chenyang joined Yin Mengyao to confront a Sixth-tier Nightmare, and his golden slash tore open the Nightmare’s domain. After they discussed tactics, Ye Chenyang entered the shadows and began unfolding his domain.

• Yin Mengyao used her split Tang sword to hold off the Nightmare while waiting for reinforcements.
• Ye Chenyang’s golden slash struck the Nightmare, which melted into the shadows, and the attack tore a widening breach in its domain.
• Ye Chenyang reached Yin Mengyao with Jiang Mian, Shen Qiuyu, and Xu Xiaoan, and he and Yin Mengyao introduced themselves and discussed tactics through a mental network.
• Jiang Mian learned that Xu Xiaoan was a Second-tier Awakened with Sequence 47, [Phantom Performer], then stepped aside with her and Shen Qiuyu.
• Ye Chenyang entered the shadows and began unfolding his domain, [Eternal Everlasting Light].

Ye Chenyang defeated Nightmare’s Chaos Behemoth with Yin Mengyao’s weapon, but a spatial slash carried their chamber away before he could lead the others to safety. Outside the train, Xiang Long discovered that a former comrade had betrayed them and faced two Nightmare Calamities, including an Eighth-tier Fierce God.

• Nightmare gathered its strength for a decisive attack as Ye Chenyang prepared to strike with Yin Mengyao’s Extreme Blade.
• Ye Chenyang fired the transformed Tang sword from a conjured bow, and its golden power overwhelmed the Chaos Behemoth, which exploded into black smoke.
• Yin Mengyao shielded the group from the mental shockwave, then supported Ye Chenyang as he pretended to be weakened.
• A golden spatial slash separated their chamber from the other carriages and carried it away.
• Xiang Long confronted two Nightmare Calamities in the Void Realm after a former comrade’s betrayal left a teammate lost in the Other Shore.
• Xiang Long unleashed his Wind Element and summoned a hurricane in the Void Realm.

Jiang Mian emerged alone from the Void Realm on a snowy mountain, then followed a direction-finding arrow toward a village in the Mist. She suspected she had landed far from the old Xia Kingdom and followed three strange men into the settlement to learn more.

• Jiang Mian found herself separated from Ye Chenyang on a mist-covered mountainside and discovered that the local elements carried a nauseating mental power.
• Jiang Mian burned a mass of black flesh that contained hidden spatial [Radiance] power, then headed toward the mountain’s foot.
• Jiang Mian found a black river and a village surrounded by bizarre Mist Plants, including human-faced mushrooms and vegetables that struggled to flee when harvested.
• Jiang Mian watched three dark-skinned men harvest the plants and realized their auras resembled Calamities rather than ordinary people or Awakened.
• Jiang Mian concealed her aura and followed the three men into the village.

Jiang Mian encountered a bizarre village under a crippled [Chaos] domain and discovered that its grotesque Aberrant could control polluted elements and carried a power resembling a [Formless] derivative. She escaped the village and followed her glasses toward Ye Chenyang, while suspecting the Mist hid a far more dangerous settlement.

• Jiang Mian sensed that the villagers were mostly men and found a dense shadow inside the village’s largest house, which triggered a psychic shriek when she probed it.
• A shadow domain covered the village, and a dark-red giant emerged from the central house as the villagers calmly hid indoors.
• The giant charged Jiang Mian and drew polluted Wind Elements to resist her, but she pinned it down and cut it apart with wind blades.
• Jiang Mian recognized the giant’s [Dissolution] ability and detected a strange power resembling the Mutual Aid Society’s red Suppressor, prompting her to suspect a [Formless] derivative.
• Jiang Mian cut a gap through the shadow curtain with her crystal sword, followed her glasses’ new direction, and vanished into the Mist along the black river’s flow.

Jiang Mian followed the directional arrow through a strange land where locals farmed Mist Plants and docile Void Realm Walkers, while Ye Chenyang discovered he was trapped in the Northern Brahma Realm. As the city's monks surrounded Ye Chenyang, a violent golden storm descended from the mist.

• Jiang Mian observed the barren wilderness and found locals raising Third-tier Void Realm Walkers in river pens.
• Jiang Mian suspected the realm's strange conditions were connected to the first-generation Formless and redirected her glasses toward a nearby city.
• Ye Chenyang fought a Sixth-tier Decaying Shadow in the city and realized he had entered the Northern Brahma Realm, a little realm shaped by the first-generation Formless's abandoned nodes.
• The Sixth-tier monk summoned the city's Fifth-tier fighters to kill Ye Chenyang as an outsider.
• Golden lightning and a powerful Gale surged from the mist above the city and swept down toward Ye Chenyang.

Jiang Mian used elemental Fusion to destroy the monks attacking Ye Chenyang, while he helped kill their leader. After the battle, she reunited with Ye Chenyang and embraced him.

• Ye Chenyang secretly bound several monks as Jiang Mian gathered golden lightning in the sky.
• Jiang Mian's lightning killed one monk and ignited the [Chaos] energy of others, while the leading old monk spread his [Decaying Shadow] domain.
• Jiang Mian fused the Wind and Fire elements into golden lightning, shattered the shadow domain, and sent a massive thunder sword at the old monk.
• Ye Chenyang pierced the old monk from behind with a golden flying sword as Jiang Mian's thunder sword struck, destroying him and collapsing nearby buildings.
• Jiang Mian ran to Ye Chenyang, and they embraced.

After reuniting in the ruined city, Jiang Mian and Ye Chenyang agreed to head south toward a volcanic archipelago and later find a way back to the main world. Meanwhile, Yin Mengyao and Shen Qiuyu hid from searching monks until a golden streak approached them.

• Jiang Mian asked Ye Chenyang about the sealed domain, and he explained that it lay outside the main world and was tainted by the first Formless.
• Ye Chenyang proposed finding their companions before traveling south to the volcanic archipelago, and Jiang Mian agreed to live with him in a house at Base City Number One.
• Ye Chenyang swept Jiang Mian into his arms and sped away as a streak of golden light.
• Yin Mengyao hid with Shen Qiuyu while monks searched nearby, and she assessed the danger as they remained undetected.
• Yin Mengyao considered the missing Jiang Mian and Xu Xiaoan, then heard a whistle and saw a golden meteor streak toward them.

Formless, disguised as Xu Xiaoan, infiltrated the Central District temple to recover power and pursue a legacy left by the first-generation Formless. She found a hidden lump of flesh beneath the Buddha statue, awakening three shadowy beings as the monks discovered her.

• Xu Xiaoan revealed that she was the incomplete Formless, who had infiltrated the train and planned to reclaim her transformed followers and find her original body.
• Xu Xiaoan drained the young monk’s Chaos Core and discarded his shriveled corpse before entering the temple courtyard unnoticed.
• Xu Xiaoan climbed the Three-faced Thousand-armed Buddha statue and smashed open its head, revealing a black-and-red lump of flesh.
• Xu Xiaoan picked up the lump of flesh as the monks noticed her, and three pairs of red eyes opened in the shadows behind the Buddha statue.

Ye Chenyang and the others faced a Seventh-tier ghost Buddha after he rescued Yin Mengyao and Shen Qiuyu. As the Buddha overwhelmed their defenses, Jiang Mian prepared to reveal a dangerous power, leaving the group’s next move uncertain.

• Ye Chenyang defeated the pursuers and reunited with Yin Mengyao, Shen Qiuyu, and Jiang Mian, but Xu Xiaoan was still missing.
• A Seventh-tier figure appeared above the city, and Ye Chenyang identified it as likely being Wuming’s clone or puppet.
• The three-faced ghost Buddha appeared beside the group and attacked with Nether flames and giant hands emerging from the Mist.
• Yin Mengyao and Ye Chenyang combined their powers to raise a barrier, but the ghost Buddha broke through and began healing from Ye Chenyang’s slash.
• Jiang Mian took Ye Chenyang’s hand as he considered burning his life and mental energy, then looked toward the ghost Buddha with golden light in her eyes.

Jiang Mian revealed her overwhelming power and summoned World-Overturning Torrent to defeat the Three-faced Ghost Buddha. After the group left to talk, Xu Xiaoan watched from the temple and guessed that Shen Qiuyu was [Doom].

• Jiang Mian protected Ye Chenyang and the others with a powerful Wind Field, then ordered the group to kill the crippled Seventh-tier monster.
• World-Overturning Torrent emerged from the Mist, destroyed the grotesque hands, and shielded the group from the Three-faced Ghost Buddha's attack.
• World-Overturning Torrent overwhelmed and killed the Three-faced Ghost Buddha while Jiang Mian's companions watched in shock.
• Jiang Mian told Ye Chenyang that the fight was over and suggested they move somewhere else to talk.
• Xu Xiaoan watched from the temple and guessed that Shen Qiuyu was [Doom].

Xu Xiaoan absorbed a Chaos Core and discovered the location of something in the distant southern outskirts. At the boundary between regions, Jiang Mian secured Yin Mengyao and Shen Qiuyu’s silence with a Soul Contract, which strengthened both women and brought Jiang Mian close to the Fifth tier.

• Xu Xiaoan condensed the black-and-red flesh into a Chaos Core, swallowed it, and used its memories to locate something south of her.
• Jiang Mian and Ye Chenyang confronted Yin Mengyao and Shen Qiuyu at the boundary between two regions.
• Yin Mengyao and Shen Qiuyu agreed not to reveal Jiang Mian’s secret, and Ye Chenyang proposed that Yin Mengyao seal her promise with a Soul Contract.
• Yin Mengyao and Jiang Mian signed the contract, boosting Jiang Mian’s mental strength toward the Fifth tier.
• Yin Mengyao discovered that the contract had given her the ability to kindle silvery-white flames.

Yin Mengyao accepted a silver mental-power flame from Jiang Mian, while Ye Chenyang and Jiang Mian reconciled. The group traveled into the Mist toward a volcanic Calamity, where Jiang Mian discovered that the area had been contaminated.

• Yin Mengyao examined the silver flame and concluded its mental-power properties made it useful against Mental System Awakened and Calamities.
• Jiang Mian softened after receiving the flame, and Ye Chenyang apologized for taking risks without asking her for help.
• Jiang Mian led Ye Chenyang and the others toward a powerful Calamity, hoping to recruit it as an extra helper.
• Jiang Mian used Gale to carry the group across the black rocks and ocean toward a volcano, while Ye Chenyang cleared the Mist with his light.
• Jiang Mian sensed a Calamity inside the volcano, and a huge crow wreathed in blood-red flames burst out, covered in strange black-and-red matter.

Jiang Mian tried to purge the [Formless] corruption from a dying [Purgatory], but it burned itself away and left behind an altered core. She Dominated the core, causing [Scorched Embers] to upgrade into [Myriad Forms Scorched Embers] with the new trait Formless.

• Jiang Mian learned that the sixth-rank [Purgatory] was terminally ill because [Formless] power had fused with its soul and abilities.
• Jiang Mian ordered Torrent to restrain the corrupted Purgatory and used her orange-golden flames to burn away the black corruption.
• The Purgatory briefly recovered its blood-red flames, then poured them into Jiang Mian's fire and burned its body and soul away, leaving a scarred core.
• Jiang Mian found the core had become a blank slate, chose to Dominate it, and triggered the upgrade to [Myriad Forms Scorched Embers] with the trait Formless.