Chapter Summaries

Zhang Chu killed Shen Yangui and the guard, took the Sickness Stele from beneath Pei Yuanfeng, and killed Pei Yuanfeng as the stele’s power consumed him. Steward Gu arrived and overwhelmed Zhang Chu, who then forcibly merged with the Sickness Stele and used the system to begin refining it.

• Zhang Chu killed Shen Yangui and the guard, then learned that Pei Yuanfeng was imprisoned in a chamber below the Great Hall.
• Zhang Chu found Pei Yuanfeng being eroded by the Sickness Stele, pulled the stele from beneath the chamber floor, and killed Pei Yuanfeng as his body failed.
• Zhang Chu returned to the Great Hall and encountered Steward Gu, who revealed the Prince had ordered him to stop Zhang Chu from leaving.
• Steward Gu used his power to pin Zhang Chu and injure him, declaring that Zhang Chu was not yet strong enough to escape.
• Zhang Chu forcibly drew on the Sickness Stele, and the system spent ten million Merit Points to remove its hidden danger and begin changing its power.
• Zhang Chu called on Shenlan to add points as the four Stone Steles resonated within him and the Sickness Stele’s erosion began to recede.

Zhang Chu reinforced the Sickness Stele, broke through to a strength beyond the third Breaking the Limit, and fought Steward Gu in the Song Prince's Mansion. His power shook Zhongzhou City, and a messenger reported the upheaval to the Imperial Advisor Hall.

• Zhang Chu spent ten million Merit Points to reinforce the Sickness Stele, comprehended its power of dissolving, and fused it with the other three Seven Limits Stele.
• Zhang Chu's breakthroughs pushed him beyond the third Breaking the Limit, while Steward Gu recognized that he had reached the fourth Breaking the Limit.
• Zhang Chu blocked Steward Gu's palm force with the Sickness Stele's dissolving power and struck him with the Godslayer Palm Technique, forcing Steward Gu back.
• Steward Gu revealed his true strength and tried to crush Zhang Chu with his accumulated power, but Zhang Chu unleashed his vast spiritual power and appeared above the Prince's Mansion as the dark-golden beam dissipated.
• The disturbance spread across Zhongzhou City; Gu Changfeng ordered the Sky Patrol Guards to go on alert and barred unauthorized entry and exit.
• A messenger knelt outside the Imperial Advisor Hall and reported that the Capital City had undergone a change.

Zhang Chu defeated Gu Cangming in a battle above the ruined Song Prince’s Mansion, overcoming his seventeen hundred years of accumulated strength with the powers of the Four Symbols and the Bitter Stele. King Song then emerged from the ruins, setting the stage for a new confrontation.

• The Imperial Advisor learned that Zhang Chu had attacked the Song Prince’s Mansion and noted that events were unfolding three years earlier than expected.
• Prince Qin read a report about the attack and summoned Gu Changfeng to the palace while wondering what King Song was doing.
• Zhang Chu waited above the mansion as experts across Zhongzhou City gathered to witness his fight with Gu Cangming.
• Gu Cangming unleashed his Blood Prison Mountain Suppression manifestation, but Zhang Chu countered with his Four Symbols Manifestation and damaged Gu Cangming by absorbing his spiritual attack.
• Zhang Chu struck Gu Cangming with the Godslayer Third Form and drove him into the earth, defeating him despite sustaining injuries.
• King Song emerged from the ruins and praised Zhang Chu, drawing every watcher’s attention to the coming confrontation.

King Song offered Zhang Chu the Seven Limits Steles and information about the Fate Character Stele if he joined him, but Zhang Chu refused and revealed that he had been waiting for King Song as well. As King Song advanced toward the Yin-Sealing Realm and threatened him, Zhang Chu fused his Five Manifestations to challenge that boundary, before King Zhao arrived in Zhongzhou with a powerful guard unit and a woman at his side.

• King Song told Zhang Chu he needed him and offered two Seven Limits Steles and clues to the Fate Character Stele in exchange for his allegiance.
• Zhang Chu rejected King Song's offer, declaring that he would obtain what he wanted himself and that he had been waiting for King Song.
• King Song revealed that he had touched the Yin-Sealing Realm and warned Zhang Chu that an entire heaven separated it from the Extreme of Strength.
• Zhang Chu activated the four Stone Steles and fused his Five Manifestations, reaching toward the Yin-Sealing Realm and shocking King Song and the watching experts.
• As King Song demanded that Zhang Chu join him or die, King Zhao arrived from the east with about a hundred Daoist Scripture Realm guards and a woman beside him.

King Zhao intervened in King Song’s confrontation with Zhang Chu, using the threat from Great Yin in the Northern Frontier to make King Song retreat. After the Imperial Advisor Hall summoned Zhang Chu to the palace, King Zhao warned him that he had entered the Empress’s sight.

• King Zhao arrived at the ruined Song Prince’s Mansion with a hundred Daoist Scripture Realm guards and challenged King Song’s account of Zhang Chu’s actions.
• King Zhao declared that he had come to take Zhang Chu away and defended him by recounting his service to Great Ling.
• King Zhao revealed that Great Yin had gathered near the Ghost Realm and was being secretly encouraged to invade, prompting King Song to leave for the Northern Frontier and order the army and Secret Guards to mobilize.
• A bell rang from the Imperial Advisor Hall, and a eunuch delivered an imperial decree summoning Zhang Chu to the palace.
• King Zhao warned Zhang Chu that the summons meant he had entered her sight, while Yang Yichen cautioned him that she stood only with herself.
• Zhang Chu accepted the decree, which bore the words “Imperial Advisor.”

Zhang Chu met the Imperial Advisor, who revealed that his master Huang Xugu had taken the Underworld Heaven Ferry to the Other Shore of the Netherriver. Zhang Chu agreed to fulfill a future condition in exchange for the information and decided to use the Old Celestial Master's map to make the journey himself.

• A eunuch escorted Zhang Chu through the Imperial City to the Imperial Advisor Hall.
• The Imperial Advisor said she could not divine Zhang Chu's fate and explained that his master, Huang Xugu, had once asked about the Other Shore of the Netherriver.
• The Imperial Advisor told Zhang Chu that Huang Xugu had taken the Underworld Heaven Ferry and that she could tell him where his master was in exchange for a future favor.
• Zhang Chu agreed to the condition, and the Imperial Advisor revealed that Huang Xugu was on the Other Shore of the Netherriver.
• After leaving the hall, Zhang Chu decided he would use the Old Celestial Master's map to travel there.

After learning that his master was on the Other Shore of the Netherriver, Zhang Chu set out with Song Li to return to Yeyu Village and walk the road to the Underworld Heaven Ferry again. On the way, he found an ancient array hidden in a rock face and realized the path had been deliberately altered, warning that strange things might lie ahead.

• Zhang Chu left the Imperial Advisor Hall, reflected on the clues about his master and the Other Shore of the Netherriver, and met Song Li at an inn.
• Song Li told Zhang Chu that the Pei Family had withdrawn from Zhongzhou and King Song had gone to the Northern Frontier; Zhang Chu decided to travel to Yeyu Village.
• Zhang Chu examined the four steles and Dao Embryo in his Sea of Consciousness, then noticed that a sugar dragon resembled one of the dragons on the Imperial City's Nine-Dragon Wall.
• Zhang Chu and Song Li left Zhongzhou by a side path, passed King Zhao's covert carriages without intervening, and continued toward the Hengduan Mountains.
• Zhang Chu detected a thousand-year-old Array Pattern sealed inside a rock face and concluded that someone had deliberately altered an old road leading toward Yeyu Village.

Zhang Chu and Song Li discovered an ancient array in the valley, where a shattered disc released the lingering emotions of people who had died there. The valley’s hidden crevice opened, revealing evidence of a ritual and a dead Extreme of Strength, as ghostly figures gathered around them.

• Zhang Chu recognized the stone stele and array marks as the work of the same group that had left traces at Yeyu Village and the stone bridge.
• Zhang Chu and Song Li found a disc set into a stone platform and discovered that the valley’s ground formed a vast array recently disturbed by someone.
• Zhang Chu activated the array, breaking the disc and absorbing the released emotions of the dead with the Bitter Character Stele.
• A crevice opened in the northern rock wall, revealing a mural of a person extracting emotions from kneeling people and using them as fuel for an array.
• A dead figure bearing the faint power of the Extreme of Strength emerged, and more ghostly figures gathered around Zhang Chu and Song Li.

Zhang Chu and Song Li found that the shattered array in the valley had released hundreds of emotional remnants, which Zhang Chu dissolved. A vision revealed Huang Xugu at Underworld Heaven Ferry warning Zhang Chu not to come, but Zhang Chu continued toward Yeyu Village, where an unknown presence watched him.

• Hundreds of translucent figures gathered around the stone platform, knelt, and silently repeated the word "Return."
• Zhang Chu probed a membrane beneath the platform and saw Huang Xugu standing on a stone bridge at Underworld Heaven Ferry, warning him, "Do not come."
• The figures rose and approached Zhang Chu, so he used the Sickness Stele's Dissolving Power to erase them and close the fissure's disturbance.
• Zhang Chu told Song Li that the valley's array-makers were the same people who had set up Underworld Heaven Ferry, then continued toward Yeyu Village.
• As Zhang Chu and Song Li neared the village, Zhang Chu sensed a distant presence watching him and resolved to find out what lay beyond the stone bridge.

Zhang Chu and Song Li returned to Yeyu Village, where Zhang Chu destroyed waves of ghosts and glimpsed a disturbing presence in his ancient mirror. As they continued along the Yellow Springs Road, the Underworld Heaven’s Fourth General, Shi, confronted them and forbade living mortals from entering the Life and Death Realm.

• Zhang Chu noticed the village stele’s inscription had vanished and entered Yeyu Village with Song Li, where the fading Road Keeper warned them not to go outside.
• Zhang Chu went out to confront the approaching ghosts, destroying dozens with his Return to Ruins Power and Heaven Covering palm.
• The remaining ghost claimed it was walking the road to the Other Shore of the Netherriver, then vanished when Zhang Chu seized it.
• Zhang Chu told Song Li that stronger ghosts would return and chose to remain in the village, where he saw a mysterious outline within his ancient mirror.
• Stronger Bone Law Realm ghosts appeared as Zhang Chu and Song Li continued along the Yellow Springs Road toward the stone bridge.
• Shi, the Underworld Heaven’s Fourth General, appeared on the bridge and declared that living mortals could not enter the Life and Death Realm.

Zhang Chu confronted Shi, the Fourth General of Underworld Heaven, on Naihe Bridge and learned that crossing the Fourth Bridge required someone to remain behind. He fought Shi rather than accept the bridge’s terms, defeated him with Godslayer, and was left facing the awakening of Naihe Bridge.

• Zhang Chu met Shi on the stone bridge and learned that the Fourth Bridge demanded someone stay behind or be chosen by the bridge.
• Zhang Chu declared that he and Song Li would cross together, then challenged Shi when Shi tried to enforce the bridge’s demand.
• Zhang Chu fought Shi with power from his four stone steles and argued that Naihe Bridge had no will of its own and could be killed.
• Zhang Chu struck Shi with Godslayer, shattered his barrier, and sent him crashing into the darkness at the far end of the bridge.
• Shi admitted defeat but warned that when Naihe Bridge awakened, the living would die, and Zhang Chu sensed a terrifying aura rising.

Zhang Chu was drawn from Naihe Bridge into a vast forest of steles honoring martial legends from across the ages, where he discovered the Warrior Tomb and encountered a mysterious phantom marked like himself. The phantom challenged him to fight, leaving Zhang Chu facing the revelation as his Heavenly Palace, Dao Embryo, and Ancient Mirror reacted violently.

• Zhang Chu used Return to Ruins Power against Naihe Bridge, which began collapsing inward and transported him to a strange gray world.
• Zhang Chu found endless rows of steles bearing the names of legendary martial artists, including Zhao Wujiu, Celestial Maiden Si, Ancient Demon Chi, and Feng, Xi.
• Zhang Chu recognized the place as the Warrior Tomb, a resting place for martial artists who had reached the pinnacle across more than ten thousand years.
• Zhang Chu encountered a stele marked Great Annihilation and discovered a colossal, unnamed Heroic Tomb at the center of the forest.
• A phantom emerged from the Heroic Tomb, bearing a silver forehead mark like Zhang Chu's, while Zhang Chu's Ancient Mirror, Dao Embryo, and lotus buds reacted.
• The phantom spoke of defeating Heaven, then challenged Zhang Chu: "Dare you fight me?!"

Zhang Chu met the Formless Emperor, whose ten-thousand-year-old will explained the Eye of Strength and how the ancient Extreme of Strength differed from the modern path. The Emperor challenged Zhang Chu to a same-realm fight, and both unleashed their strength as the Heroic Tomb’s sealed Martial Dao Intents awakened.

• Zhang Chu recognized the phantom as the Formless Emperor, who revealed that he had left a thought in the Heroic Tomb to find someone able to withstand his punch.
• The Formless Emperor explained that he had sealed the wills of past opponents beneath the Stone Steles and described his Eye of Strength, which was beginning to merge with Zhang Chu’s unusual mark.
• The Formless Emperor challenged Zhang Chu to fight at the Extreme of Strength, with victory granting Zhang Chu permission to leave the Warrior Tomb.
• The Formless Emperor explained that ancient strength was refined by repeatedly Breaking the Limit, while the modern Extreme of Strength focused on opening the Nine Apertures.
• Zhang Chu accepted the fight and released the power of his four Stone Steles and Five-Manifestation Fusion, awakening the Martial Dao Intents throughout the forest as the Formless Emperor’s aura surged.

Zhang Chu fought Formless Emperor in the Stele Forest to understand his pure strength and awaken the Eye of Strength. After Zhang Chu grasped the line behind Formless Emperor’s punches, Formless Emperor prepared to strike the never-before-used punch called “Existence,” and Zhang Chu chose to face it as his eye began to open.

• Zhang Chu revealed his Five-Manifestation Fusion, and Formless Emperor tested his body with a punch before explaining that his many powers created friction and that he needed to awaken the Eye of Strength through battle.
• Zhang Chu attacked with Return to Ruins Power and the Sickness Stele’s Dissolving Power, but Formless Emperor blocked him and struck his shoulder with a fast slash of pure strength.
• Zhang Chu used the Mirror Manifestation to move with Shadow in the Mirror, while Formless Emperor tracked his landings through the strength covering the Stele Forest.
• Zhang Chu spread Return to Ruins Power and Dissolving Power across the ground, then endured twelve punches while his Eye of Strength recorded their trajectories.
• Zhang Chu realized Formless Emperor’s punches followed a pure line and that they were only half-complete; Formless Emperor revealed that the final punch was called “Existence.”
• Zhang Chu accepted the risk of facing the punch, and the Dao Embryo runes, lotus buds, and cracks in the silver mark on his forehead began to flare and widen.

Zhang Chu defeated the Formless Emperor with a palm that embodied nothingness, and the Emperor’s will dissipated after awakening Zhang Chu’s Eye of Strength. Zhang Chu absorbed insights from the Warrior Tomb’s steles, found an empty tomb chamber bearing an inscription, and left with Song Li to confront the Underworld Heaven General.

• Zhang Chu’s mirror-based palm strike countered the Formless Emperor’s world-bearing punch, and the Emperor admitted defeat.
• As the Formless Emperor dissolved into the stele forest, he awakened Zhang Chu’s Eye of Strength and told him to look at himself.
• Zhang Chu touched the steles and absorbed visions of the martial arts and powers of the legendary figures recorded there.
• Zhang Chu discovered an empty tomb chamber inside the Heroic Tomb, where an inscription read, “The ultimate limit of purposeful action is the beginning of effortless non-action.”
• Zhang Chu met Song Li at the edge of the stele forest and found a crack in the barrier leading back to the Hengduan Mountains.
• Zhang Chu and Song Li headed out to meet the Underworld Heaven General.

Zhang Chu defeated Mo and the six remaining battle generals of the Underworld Heaven on Naihe Bridge. As the darkness beyond the bridge stirred, a distant voice warned that none who entered the Underworld Realm survived and asked whether Zhang Chu would still go in.

• Zhang Chu emerged from the Return to Ruins Minor Realm with Song Li and confronted Mo, the second battle general of the Underworld Heaven.
• Zhang Chu used the power of Kong and the Dissolving Power to destroy Mo, then declared that he would cross Naihe Bridge and attack the Underworld Heaven.
• Ming led six battle generals against Zhang Chu, but Zhang Chu used Kong to draw them in and killed them with the third form of the Godslaying Palm Technique.
• A voice from the darkness beyond the bridge warned that none who entered the Underworld Realm survived and asked Zhang Chu whether he would proceed.

Zhang Chu and Song Li entered the Underworld Heaven and discovered a horrifying prison where the condemned were kept alive through endless torture. After Song Li mentioned Yama and Black and White Wuchang—figures absent from this world’s legends—Zhang Chu suspected she had been replaced and demanded to know when the real Song Li was taken.

• Zhang Chu ignored the warning at the Gate of the Underworld and entered the darkness, with Song Li following him.
• Zhang Chu and Song Li emerged onto a road lined with chained prisoners whose mutilated bodies were kept alive by dark red light.
• Zhang Chu reasoned that the prison’s punishments were designed around human fears, and he and Song Li approached the gate guarded by immense jailer-like silhouettes.
• Zhang Chu entered the space beyond the gate and found a stele marked “Purgatory Heaven!”
• Song Li recalled stories about the King Yama Hall and Black and White Wuchang, prompting Zhang Chu to confront her about who had told her those stories.
• Zhang Chu pressed a finger to Song Li’s forehead and demanded to know when she had been swapped and where the real Song Li was.

Zhang Chu discovered that Song Li’s body housed Lan, a banished Gatekeeper who had waited for someone capable of reaching the gate. Lan showed him memories of a fellow Gatekeeper resisting the urge to open it, then a vision of the Underworld Heaven’s forces opening it and something emerging; she ended by claiming Zhang Chu had already seen what lay behind the gate.

• Zhang Chu exposed the voice in Song Li as Lan, who revealed she had lived inside Song Li since she was fifteen and identified herself as a banished part of a Gatekeeper.
• Lan explained that the Underworld Heaven’s seal was weakening and asked Zhang Chu to make a choice about the gate.
• Lan showed Zhang Chu a memory of Chao nearly opening the gate before he relented and resumed his duty after Lan warned that opening it would destroy everything.
• Lan showed Zhang Chu a future vision of the Underworld Heaven’s forces opening the gate as something emerged from behind it.
• Lan told Zhang Chu that the thing behind the gate was something he had already seen.

Lan revealed that the Eight Profound of Heaven and Earth were the scattered organs of a colossal corpse sealed behind the Gate, and that their returning powers were awakening it. As the Gate began to light up, Lan said only the heir of the Emotion Clan could prevent it from opening.

• Lan told Zhang Chu that the Eight Profound of Heaven and Earth had been deliberately scattered and asked whether he understood their connection.
• Lan touched Zhang Chu’s forehead and showed him the corpse behind the Gate, whose eight cracks contained distinct powers that Zhang Chu recognized from wondrous places he had visited.
• Lan explained that the corpse had split its own power into eight portions to evade its seal, and that the Eight Profound were its organs returning to their source.
• Zhang Chu sensed the eight powers converging as the corpse awakened and the Gate’s runes began to light up.
• Lan warned Zhang Chu that the Gate must not open, then revealed that the heir of the Emotion Clan could stop it.

Lan revealed that Jing Zhongyue was the Emotion Clan heir whose power could seal the Three Worlds Well and prevent the awakened corpse from reclaiming its strength. Zhang Chu rejected the idea that Jing Zhongyue must obey an ancient mission and declared that he would face the gate himself.

• Lan explained that the Emotion Clan had guarded the Three Worlds Well and that seven Gatekeepers protected seven of the corpse’s eight fissures, while the eighth was the Origin.
• Lan said the corpse’s Origin was awakening behind the rising gate and that sealing any fissure would prevent the corpse from fully returning.
• Lan revealed that Jing Zhongyue inherited the Emotion Clan’s Carefree Heart and could use the Three Worlds Well to reseal its fissure.
• Zhang Chu questioned forcing Jing Zhongyue, still a young new Gu God, to undertake the sealing, and Lan insisted she would fulfill her inherited mission.
• Zhang Chu argued that Jing Zhongyue might refuse an ancient obligation and that descendants could surpass their predecessors, then stepped toward the gate and declared he needed no Gatekeeper.