Chapter Summaries

Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu reached the Ancient Nether Abyss, where Bai Feiyu realized the silent, poisonous wasteland was likely a trap. A mysterious black-robed man appeared and revealed that Lord Shen had lured Zhang Chu there, but Zhang Chu said he had come to discover Lord Shen’s strength.

• Zhang Chu carried Bai Feiyu to the Ancient Nether Abyss at terrifying speed, and they advanced through its poisonous miasma.
• Bai Feiyu examined the silent, lifeless terrain and warned Zhang Chu that the supposed Heavenly Evil Cult headquarters was likely a trap.
• Zhang Chu said their enemies had already arrived, though Bai Feiyu could sense no one nearby.
• A black-robed man emerged from the fog, and Bai Feiyu could detect no sign of life or energy from him.
• The black-robed man mocked Zhang Chu for walking into the trap, and Zhang Chu replied that he had come to learn Lord Shen’s strength.

Zhang Chu confronted Shen Zonglin at the Ancient Nether Abyss and revealed that he had knowingly entered the trap to learn what the marshal was plotting. Shen Zonglin admitted he had used the Heavenly Evil Cult to conceal his search for the medicine Dao Master Legacy, which he intended to obtain through mass human sacrifice.

• Shen Zonglin revealed himself to Bai Feiyu and Zhang Chu as the Western Regions Sky Patrol Guard Marshal who had lured Zhang Chu to the Ancient Nether Abyss.
• Zhang Chu explained how Shen Zonglin had guided him there and deduced that the Heavenly Evil Cult was a pawn concealing a larger scheme.
• Shen Zonglin admitted the Heavenly Evil Cult served him and that its kidnappings, Medicine Slaves, and poisons were meant to draw attention away from his real plan.
• Shen Zonglin revealed that he sought the medicine Dao Master Legacy and its Reverse Chaos Yin Yang Undying Ascend to Immortality technique.
• Shen Zonglin declared that he would sacrifice tens of thousands of people to obtain the legacy and pursue immortality.

Zhang Chu confronted Shen Zonglin and two powerful allies at the abyss, where the abducted victims had been used to fuel a grand formation. He identified one ally as Western Regions Grand Governor Zhao Chongshan, who revealed the scheme involved the Source Cult and that the abyss was actually called the God Burial Abyss.

• Shen Zonglin explained that the canyon’s formation had absorbed the blood essence and Spiritual Power of people abducted by the Heavenly Evil Cult, and proposed making Zhang Chu the sacrifice’s core.
• A Gray-eyed Man and a burly black-robed man appeared beside Shen Zonglin, and Zhang Chu calmly confronted them.
• Zhang Chu identified the burly man as Zhao Chongshan, the Western Regions Grand Governor, shocking Bai Feiyu.
• Zhang Chu explained how he had suspected Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin of orchestrating the trap, and Zhao Chongshan admitted they had used real intelligence to lure him in.
• Zhao Chongshan revealed that the Cicada Slough Divine Skill came from the Source Cult and that the Medicine Dao Master had taken something from that cult sixty years earlier.
• Zhao Chongshan revealed that the abyss was truly called the God Burial Abyss.

Bai Feiyu learned that Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin were heirs of the Source Cult and had lured Zhang Chu into God Burial Abyss to trap him in its activated great array. As the fog chains drained Bai Feiyu’s spirit, Zhang Chu cut them apart with a stroke of golden light and challenged his enemies’ strength.

• Bai Feiyu recognized God Burial Abyss as a deadly place where an Ancient God was said to be buried.
• Zhao Chongshan revealed that he and Shen Zonglin were inheritors of the Source Cult, which had manipulated the Horse Gang and the Heavenly Evil Cult.
• Shen Zonglin activated the God Burial Great Array, and the fog formed chains that suppressed martial power and closed in on Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu.
• Bai Feiyu failed to cut a fog chain with his sword, and Shen Zonglin explained that the array had trapped even the Medicine Dao Master before.
• A chain coiled around Bai Feiyu’s ankle and began draining his spirit, but Zhang Chu sliced it apart with golden light and challenged Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin.

Zhang Chu fought Shen Zonglin and Zhao Chongshan, revealing the power of his Heavenly Saber and a Divine Mansion Rudiment. Its influence left the two leaders unable to remember how to fight or control their power, while the Gray-eyed Man resisted and roared at Zhang Chu.

• Shen Zonglin and Zhao Chongshan attacked Zhang Chu together, but he countered their techniques and praised their strength.
• Shen Zonglin used the Mysterious Heaven Prison-Suppressing Claw while Zhao Chongshan restrained Zhang Chu, but Zhang Chu’s Heavenly Saber severed Shen Zonglin’s lower leg.
• The Gray-eyed Man repaired Shen Zonglin’s severed leg, and Zhang Chu revealed a Divine Mansion Rudiment.
• Zhang Chu’s Spiritual Power affected Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin, making them forget how to fight and control their power.
• The Gray-eyed Man resisted the influence and roared that Zhang Chu could not affect him.

The Gray-eyed Man transformed into a Medicine Person and revealed that the Medicine Dao Master had altered him sixty years earlier to uncover the God Burial Abyss’s secrets. He lured Zhang Chu there to claim the Medicine Dao Master’s inheritance, then activated the God Burial Great Array, whose dark-red chains surged toward Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin.

• The Gray-eyed Man’s body changed into a grotesque monster, alarming Bai Feiyu while Zhang Chu watched.
• The Gray-eyed Man explained that the Medicine Dao Master had turned him into a Medicine Person and searched through his memories sixty years earlier.
• The Gray-eyed Man revealed that the Medicine Dao Master learned the great array’s secret, took something left by the Source Cult, and left behind an inheritance when trapped.
• The Gray-eyed Man admitted he had lured Zhang Chu to obtain the inheritance, undo his restrictions, become human again, and take revenge on the Demonic Cult.
• The Gray-eyed Man plunged his arms into the ground and activated the God Burial Great Array, causing dark-red chains to rise and move toward Zhao Chongshan and Shen Zonglin.

Zhang Chu killed Shen Zonglin, Zhao Chongshan, and the Gray-eyed Man, earning Merit Points as the God Burial Great Array began to fade. Before entering the abyss to seek the Medicine Dao Master's inheritance, he questioned why it required a sacrifice.

• Zhang Chu killed Shen Zonglin with a swift blade strike and received 400,000 Merit Points.
• Zhang Chu used the Reincarnation Palm to kill Zhao Chongshan and received 450,000 Merit Points.
• The Gray-eyed Man summoned enormous mist arms, but Zhang Chu cut him down with the Nine Feathers Heavenly Saber and received 510,000 Merit Points.
• The God Burial Great Array faded after the Gray-eyed Man died, and Bai Feiyu asked Zhang Chu whether they should descend into the abyss.
• Zhang Chu looked into the churning depths and asked why the Medicine Dao Master's inheritance required a sacrifice.

Zhang Chu deduced that the Medicine Dao Master had used the Gray-eyed Man as a weapon to conceal something beneath the God Burial Abyss. Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu descended into the abyss, where they encountered an unsettling presence in the darkness.

• Zhang Chu explained that the sacrifices had fed the inheritance, and Bai Feiyu realized the Medicine Dao Master had planted the Gray-eyed Man’s obsession and used him as a pawn for sixty years.
• Zhang Chu revealed that the Gray-eyed Man, not the great array, had been the true core of the abyss’s defenses and had killed everyone who entered.
• Zhang Chu leapt into the God Burial Abyss, and Bai Feiyu followed him after learning the inheritance had been bait to protect something below.
• Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu descended past crimson patterns on the abyss walls as the mist receded and the array weakened.
• After they descended about a thousand zhang, Bai Feiyu felt a bone-chilling presence despite the Gray-eyed Man’s death and the array’s decline.

Key Plot Points and Events

• Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu descend into the God Burial Abyss.
• They discover carvings on the abyss wall, some by the Source Cult and others by the Medicine Dao Master.
• They find a skeleton kneeling at the abyss's core, holding a black stone with glowing red patterns.
• Zhang Chu reveals that the God Burial Abyss is a prison created by the Source Cult to suppress something.
• He suggests that the Medicine Dao Master left behind a legacy and a contingency plan.

Character Developments

• Bai Feiyu struggles with the pressure and air quality in the abyss, highlighting the gap between him and Zhang Chu.
• Bai Feiyu is briefly bewitched by the black stone, showing his vulnerability and the stone's power.
• Zhang Chu demonstrates his knowledge and calm demeanor in the face of the stone's power.

Significant Themes

• The power of ancient artifacts and their potential danger.
• The legacy of the Medicine Dao Master and his long-term planning.
• The theme of sacrifice, both in the context of the Gray-eyed Man's existence and the lives lost to maintain his power.

Character Interactions

• Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu work together to explore the abyss, with Zhang Chu guiding and protecting Bai Feiyu.
• Bai Feiyu looks up to Zhang Chu, seeking his guidance and protection.
• The skeleton and the black stone serve as a silent, eerie presence that interacts with the characters through their awe and fear.

Zhang Chu revealed that the Gray-eyed Man was the Medicine Dao Master's living inheritance, and that sacrifices both sustained him and weakened the God Burial Abyss Great Array to expose what it suppressed. At the abyss platform, Zhang Chu identified the skeleton as the twentieth-generation Source Cult Great Array Guardian and concluded that all twenty guardians had died completing a ritual.

• Bai Feiyu realized that the Gray-eyed Man was a living Medicine Person carrying the Medicine Dao Master's inheritance and will.
• Zhang Chu explained that the sacrifices sustained the Gray-eyed Man and gradually weakened the God Burial Abyss Great Array.
• Zhang Chu deduced that the Medicine Dao Master had been weakening the array to obtain something it suppressed.
• Zhang Chu identified the skeleton beside the platform as the twentieth-generation Source Cult Great Array Guardian and said the Gray-eyed Man was the final generation.
• Bai Feiyu found roughly twenty guardians' skeletons scattered around the abyss, and Zhang Chu concluded they had sacrificed themselves to complete a ritual.

Zhang Chu and Bai Feiyu left God Burial Abyss after discovering that the Source Cult’s self-repairing formation suppressed something beneath its platform. Outside the abyss, Zhang Chu revealed that he had uncovered Bai Feiyu’s deception and confronted him about his true identity.

• Zhang Chu explained that generations of guardians had sacrificed themselves to sustain the formation, which was slowly repairing itself after the Gray-eyed Man died.
• Zhang Chu refused to open the formation and led Bai Feiyu out of God Burial Abyss.
• Bai Feiyu worried that Zhang Chu would kill him now that the crisis was over, then claimed he needed to return to the Sacred Cult and report the Heavenly Evil Cult’s actions.
• Zhang Chu said he had placed Anomaly Marks on Bai Feiyu and another man, and that the other man’s mark had been erased after he returned to the Demonic Cult.
• Zhang Chu pointed out that a man who had been tens of thousands of miles away appeared before him without an Anomaly Mark, and asked Bai Feiyu to explain.

Zhang Chu exposed Bai Feiyu as Fake Ma Wuji, the Demonic Cult member he had encountered before, and learned why she had returned to his side. He ended by demanding to know what she would offer to spare her life this time.

• Zhang Chu revealed that he had recognized Bai Feiyu because the supposed swordsman lacked the Anomaly Mark he had placed on Fake Ma Wuji.
• Fake Ma Wuji removed her disguise, and Zhang Chu laughed at her small stature and oversized robes.
• Zhang Chu deduced that a powerful Demonic Cult figure had erased her Anomaly Mark and questioned her status in the cult.
• Fake Ma Wuji explained that she had come west to seek the Medicine Dao Master's inheritance and successor, then disguised herself as Bai Feiyu after unexpectedly encountering Zhang Chu.
• Zhang Chu reminded Fake Ma Wuji that she had previously traded Cloud Dragon Nine Manifestations for her life and demanded to know what she would offer now.

Zhang Chu threatened Ma Wuji for another supreme art, then learned of ancient stone carvings in Monan that might reveal a lost divine art. Ma Wuji earned another chance to live and revealed that his real name was Jiang Yao.

• Zhang Chu confronted Ma Wuji for impersonating Bai Feiyu and demanded a cultivation art in exchange for his life.
• Zhang Chu demonstrated Cloud Dragon Nine Manifestations, shocking Ma Wuji and Bai Feiyu by mastering the Divine Ability.
• When Ma Wuji said he had no cultivation arts left, Zhang Chu threatened to leave him as a guardian at the deserted site.
• Ma Wuji told Zhang Chu that the Sacred Cult had sent him to Monan to investigate a lost supreme art linked to ancient stone carvings discovered in ruins.
• Zhang Chu spared Ma Wuji, who revealed that his real name was Jiang Yao.

Zhang Chu took Jiang Yao toward Monan, stopping first in Shalan City as he sought information about the Monan Stone Carving. In a tavern, they heard that experts had entered the Nether Sand Sea after stone carvings linked to a divine art, and that people there had encountered ghosts.

• Zhang Chu slaughtered the prefect's family and many Sky Patrol Guards in Liangzhou before setting out with Jiang Yao for Monan.
• Zhang Chu asked Jiang Yao whether her disguise technique could change his appearance, then traveled with her south toward the Nether Sand Sea.
• Jiang Yao disguised herself as an ordinary-looking youth, and she and Zhang Chu arrived in Shalan City, where Zhang Chu sensed several powerful experts.
• At Zuisha Pavilion, Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao overheard martial artists praise Zhang Chu for destroying the Horse Gang and discuss how its fall had helped merchants.
• An old saber-wielder said that experts had entered the Monan Sand Sea seeking stone carvings tied to a divine art, and that someone had seen ghosts there.

Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao left Shalan City at night and camped in the Monan Sand Sea, where they talked beside a fire. Their rest ended when the badly wounded Wu Qingfeng of White Deer Academy staggered toward them.

• Zhang Chu noticed several tavern patrons leave after hearing talk of ghosts and the stone inscription.
• Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao left Shalan City after dark, avoiding attention from people watching the gates.
• Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao made camp among the dunes, where he charged her ten thousand taels for a roast chicken and made her write an IOU.
• Jiang Yao asked Zhang Chu about his strength and why he had come to Monan, and he said perhaps Fate had pushed him there.
• A burst of footsteps woke Jiang Yao, and Zhang Chu recognized the bloodied figure approaching them as Wu Qingfeng of White Deer Academy.

Wu Qingfeng reached Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao in the desert and told them that ghostly fires had hunted him after he entered the Nether Sand Sea seeking traces of the Great Desert Dao Ancestor. A funeral procession carrying a white coffin appeared, and after it passed without leaving footprints, Zhang Chu set off to discover where it was going.

• Wu Qingfeng found Zhang Chu and explained that White Deer Academy had sent him into the Nether Sand Sea to search for traces of the Great Desert Dao Ancestor.
• Wu Qingfeng described being chased by ghost fires, then Zhang Chu heard funeral music coming from the desert.
• A procession of pale figures carrying a white coffin approached amid green ghost fire, and Jiang Yao and Wu Qingfeng hid behind Zhang Chu.
• The procession stopped and searched the area, but Zhang Chu's Spiritual Power kept its members from finding them before it moved on.
• Zhang Chu noticed that the procession had left no complete footprints, then went after it to learn where it was headed.

Zhang Chu, Jiang Yao, and Wu Qingfeng followed a funeral procession into the underground Samsara Hall, where people sought answers at a terrible price. After entering its hidden Ghost Town and witnessing masked visitors consult a mysterious figure, the three were singled out for staying silent.

• Zhang Chu led Jiang Yao and Wu Qingfeng after the funeral procession as it opened a stairway into Samsara Hall beneath the dunes.
• Jiang Yao explained that Samsara Hall could answer anything but exacted strange prices, and Zhang Chu entered despite her warnings.
• The group followed a man who had awakened in a coffin through the Great Hall and into an underground Ghost Town, wearing masks Zhang Chu had obtained for them.
• Inside a grand residence, the masked visitors took turns asking questions of a mysterious figure seated beneath a painting of the Yellow Springs.
• The figure noticed Zhang Chu, Jiang Yao, and Wu Qingfeng and demanded to know why they had come uninvited without speaking.

Zhang Chu exposed the Samsara Hall and its funeral procession as illusions reinforced by the Demonic Cult’s Thread Play, then confronted the masked figure behind them. The figure revealed that Zhang Chu stood at the center of the third ring of an illusion formation, leaving the group facing the formation’s core.

• When the misty figure invited questions, Zhang Chu removed his mask, approached it, and demanded to know what it was.
• After the figure called itself the Samsara Hall Master, Zhang Chu mocked it and traced the funeral procession’s control method to Thread Play, prompting Jiang Yao to identify the Demonic Cult technique.
• Zhang Chu demonstrated that he could alter the masked people’s perceptions by making them believe he was Qin Shi Huang and watch them offer him valuables.
• Zhang Chu explained that illusions and Thread Play had made the funeral procession, the Samsara Hall Master’s supposed answers, and the questioners’ experiences seem real.
• The masked figure applauded Zhang Chu’s insight, revealed its crying-and-smiling mask, and challenged him to identify the core of its illusion formation.
• Jiang Yao saw glowing rings on the floor and realized Zhang Chu stood at the center of the third ring.

Zhang Chu passed the Samsara Hall’s trial by exposing its masked master as a Paper Person and breaking the illusion formation. The true Samsara Hall Master granted each of the three a question, and Wu Qingfeng learned that the Great Desert Ancestor Zhu Yu had gone to the East Sea to seek a chance of survival.

• Jiang Yao watched the formation rings activate and saw the inverted world trap Zhang Chu among mirror images that attacked him.
• Zhang Chu revealed a Divine Mansion Rudiment, disrupted the illusion, and exposed the masked figure as a Paper Person with no Dharma Bone attribute.
• The Paper Person re-formed, confirmed Zhang Chu had passed the trial, and explained that the Samsara Hall inquiry had been a test.
• The true Samsara Hall Master offered Zhang Chu, Jiang Yao, and Wu Qingfeng one question each without a price, and Wu Qingfeng asked about the Great Desert Ancestor.
• The master said Zhu Yu had opened the Secret Treasury of Qi and likely gone to the East Sea to gamble for a glimmer of survival, then shifted Wu Qingfeng away after his question.

Zhang Chu questioned the Samsara Hall about his master, Huang Xugu, but learned that Huang Xugu was not recorded there; he then found the hidden Stone Carving Divine Technique inside the Yellow Springs Reversal Painting. After Samsara Hall vanished, Wu Qingfeng left for White Deer Academy, while Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao remained in the desert.

• Jiang Yao learned that the Dao Master of Emotion had exchanged her martial art to the Samsara Hall, then lost her chance to ask more questions.
• Zhang Chu asked where Huang Xugu was, but the Hall Master said the Samsara Hall held no record of him and offered Zhang Chu another question instead.
• Zhang Chu asked whether the stone inscription with the divine technique was in the hall, and the Hall Master confirmed it was there for a worthy inheritor to find.
• Zhang Chu drew the stone inscription out of the Yellow Springs Reversal Painting, impressing the Hall Master, who then vanished as the Paper Person turned to ash.
• Zhang Chu, Jiang Yao, and Wu Qingfeng escaped as Samsara Hall collapsed and sank beneath the desert; Wu Qingfeng thanked Zhang Chu and departed for White Deer Academy.
• Zhang Chu and Jiang Yao remained amid the sand, and Zhang Chu turned to look at her.