Chapter Summaries

Key plot points and events

• After the black light disappears, Honglian and Wang Baihu see that it has erased a huge section of the building, leaving a small airborne Erosion Point. With hundreds dead and the destruction impossible to hide, Honglian orders the industrial park sealed off and the logistics team notified.
• Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue are thrown through the rift and land in a ruined, deserted city. They conclude that Gustav’s death likely caused his teleportation ability to malfunction and send them elsewhere.
• Chen Xuan confirms that the Demon is dead through the Flesh Seed’s reaction. He and Liu Shuyue discuss how Gustav’s humanlike intelligence complicates existing ideas about what Demons are.
• Chen Xuan discovers that the fall has broken the Scanner Gun. Without it, they cannot return to the store on their own or change their abilities.
• A nearby woman’s scream interrupts their discussion. Liu Shuyue suggests investigating, and Chen Xuan agrees, warning that it may be a trap and telling her to use the Invisibility Talisman.

Character developments and interactions

• Honglian responds pragmatically to the disaster, prioritizing public safety despite knowing the organization can no longer conceal the incident.
• Chen Xuan is injured but recovers quickly. He stays analytical, examining the unfamiliar world and the nature of Demons, then shifts to caution when their means of returning breaks.
• Liu Shuyue shows poise by landing safely and concern by helping Chen Xuan. She is curious about Gustav’s nature and quick to propose aiding someone in danger.
• Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue work as a team: they compare what they witnessed, assess their predicament, and prepare carefully before approaching the scream.

Significant themes

• Uncertainty about Demons: Gustav’s intelligence challenges the assumption that Demons are fundamentally unlike humans, suggesting their nature is more complex than current classifications allow.
• Isolation and vulnerability: Stranded in a lifeless city with a broken return device, the pair must face an unknown environment without reliable support.
• The cost of supernatural power: Gustav’s death brings catastrophic destruction and an uncontrolled teleportation event, while the Erosion Point leaves the wider organization with an undeniable public crisis.

Key plot points and events

• Liu Shuyue and Chen Xuan locate Elorie being attacked by a person-sized centipede. Liu kills it, and Elorie clings to her in terror before explaining that she is especially afraid of bugs.
• Chen Xuan recognizes Elorie as a new member of the Dimensional Limit Organization. He reveals that he and Liu killed the demon; Elorie responds with gratitude rather than hostility and says she joined to hunt demons, not to take sides in the organization’s conflicts.
• Elorie explains that she followed the demon across worlds using her ability to track its aura. The group’s passage through the demon’s spatial rift has left them stranded in an unknown world, with no obvious route back to Jiangcheng.
• Elorie asks to travel with them, and the three head toward a nearby city. They find overgrown, ruined buildings and signs of a long-abandoned civilization, as well as enormous insects and spiders.
• Chen Xuan worries that the world may be dying and notices that there are no ordinary animals. French signs suggest they may be in Europe; Elorie recognizes the street as possibly the Champs-Élysées.

Character developments and interactions

• Liu Shuyue acts decisively to rescue Elorie, then awkwardly accepts her emotional embrace and thanks.
• Chen Xuan remains wary of the organization but chooses to be candid with Elorie. He also tries to assess their surroundings and the risks of being stranded.
• Elorie shifts from panic to gratitude and cooperation. She clarifies that she is not their enemy, shares her demon-tracking ability, and seeks the group’s protection from the giant insects.
• The trio forms a tentative alliance: Elorie trusts her rescuers, while Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue agree to let her accompany them.

Significant themes

• Survival and uncertainty: The characters are stranded without a clear way home in a decaying, unfamiliar world.
• Trust across affiliations: Elorie’s membership in the organization does not prevent her from cooperating with Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.
• Worlds and terminology: Chen Xuan realizes that concepts like “Wanderer” may be specific to the organization, while different worlds may understand interdimensional travelers differently.
• Nature reclaiming civilization: Ruined streets and buildings, overgrown with vegetation and inhabited by giant insects, suggest a world transformed by abandonment or catastrophe.

Key plot points and events

• Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and Elorie discover that they have arrived in a ruined future version of Paris. The collapsed Arc de Triomphe and overgrown Champs-Élysées confirm the city’s identity.
• Elorie recognizes familiar shops from her own world and realizes that her homeland may have been destroyed. Chen suggests they may be separated from her era by decades or centuries, and reminds her that this future does not prove the same disaster happened to her world.
• Elorie regains her composure and decides the ruins might help them uncover what caused the catastrophe—and perhaps how to prevent it when they return.
• As they head west toward a shopping district, Elorie explains how she first noticed she was in another world: disconnected phone numbers, an unfamiliar Dimensional Limit Organization advertisement, and the absence of Mind Rings.
• She describes the world’s angels and Devils, the purpose of Mind Rings, and the Flawless Crystals that power them. Chen connects her account to the Organization’s past discovery of a powerful Erosion Point and suspects this ruined world may be the place it leads to.
• Near the commercial district, Chen spots movement in a building and notices an unnatural layer of hexagonal, honeycomb-like structures on its upper floors.

Character developments

• Elorie begins devastated by the apparent destruction of her homeland, but steadies herself by treating the discovery as a chance to learn how the disaster happened. She also reveals more about her identity and powers as an “angel.”
• Chen Xuan shifts from reacting to the ruins to analyzing how the worlds and timelines may connect. His theory about the Erosion Point gives the group a possible route home.
• Liu Shuyue stays close to Chen and contributes a comparison between Elorie’s awakening as an angel and a practitioner’s awakening to Qi-Sensing.

Significant themes

• Loss and resilience: Elorie confronts the apparent ruin of everything familiar, then chooses to seek answers rather than surrender to grief.
• Worlds, time, and uncertainty: The group’s displacement may involve both a different world and a different era, complicating what they know about the future.
• Different paths to power: Angels, Devils, practitioners, and ability users suggest that supernatural abilities manifest and are understood differently across worlds.
• Hope through knowledge: The ruins and their strange technology may reveal the cause of the catastrophe and offer a way back—or a way to prevent it.

Character interactions

• Chen quietly comforts Elorie and offers a cautious explanation for the ruined city; Liu Shuyue joins him in supporting her.
• Elorie guides Chen and Liu through the Champs-Élysées, while her explanations prompt their questions about Devils, angels, and Mind Rings.
• Chen and Liu compare Elorie’s awakening with their own understanding of spiritual cultivation, recognizing similarities across different systems.
• The group’s discussion is interrupted when Chen detects possible danger in the abandoned buildings.

Key plot points and events

• Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and Elorie approach a commercial building whose upper floors are covered by a huge hive. Though wary of its unknown inhabitants, Chen decides to search the ground-floor shops before nightfall.
• In a looted jewelry store, Liu finds a Scanner Gun and spare batteries. Chen successfully powers it on and transfers his old program to it, hoping to use it to return to his own world.
• The gun fails to produce the expected selection window. Opening his damaged Scanner Gun, Chen discovers its internal technology is far more complex than he had realized. Without someone able to repair it, the group cannot return that day and must seek a safer place to spend the night.
• Chen notices that a box of moldy Euros has been left behind even though the store’s merchandise was taken. Before they can investigate, Lin Qing hides the group with an Invisibility Talisman.
• Strange figures enter the shop: they wear neat business suits and ties, but have insect-like faces, mandibles, and hooked limbs. Their sudden appearance leaves Chen shocked.

Character developments

• Chen Xuan remains determined and resourceful, but his attempt to use the Scanner Gun exposes a gap in his understanding of the store’s technology. He acknowledges his mistake and adapts to the setback.
• Liu Shuyue is observant and increasingly familiar with Chen’s plans; she finds the gun and points out that Elorie is not yet a guest of the store.
• Elorie is frightened by the hive and the prospect of being left behind if the others return, but she is included in Chen’s plan to make her a guest. The Invisibility Talisman also surprises her.
• Lin Qing acts quickly and protectively, concealing the group when danger approaches.

Significant themes

• Survival amid uncertainty: The group must balance urgency, curiosity, and caution in a devastated world.
• Limits of knowledge and technology: Familiar-looking devices may conceal advanced systems, and Chen’s assumptions prove unreliable.
• The uncanny: The contrast between the intruders’ polished clothing and monstrous insect features turns an ordinary shop into a scene of horror.
• Connection and belonging: Chen’s effort to make Elorie a guest reflects the importance of bringing others into the group rather than leaving them behind.

Character interactions

• Chen reassures Elorie when the hive worries her, then explains that he intends to include her in the store’s return system.
• Liu and Chen communicate efficiently, with Liu identifying the problem of Elorie’s guest status and Chen proposing a workaround.
• When the Scanner Gun fails, the group shares the setback; Lin’s quick gesture and talisman then shifts them from investigation to concealment as the insect-like strangers arrive.

Key plot points and events

• Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and Elorie discover that insect-faced, half-human creatures inhabit the enormous hexagonal hive above a building. The monsters’ presence is difficult to detect with the Heavenly Cloud Skill, suggesting the hive blocks Mind Method perception.
• The creatures gather around the building and appear to be preparing to attack. Realizing they may have been watching the trio all along, Chen Xuan decides to flee rather than wait.
• Liu Shuyue drops the Invisibility Spell and carries Chen Xuan into the air; Elorie flies alongside them using her Light Wings. The insect-men quickly take flight in pursuit.
• The chase reveals that the monsters dress and accessorize much like humans—and that they likely took the goods from the abandoned shop, leaving its money behind.
• When the pursuers open fire, Chen Xuan uses eight Thousand Thoughts Swords to intercept bullets and kill or wound many of them. The attackers fall back, but the trio’s escape is blocked by a camouflaged armored vehicle carrying a twin anti-aircraft cannon. As it opens fire, Chen Xuan tells the others to dive.

Character developments

• Chen Xuan acts decisively under pressure. He initially avoids killing the monsters until their hostility becomes clear, then unleashes the full power of his upgraded sword technique.
• Liu Shuyue remains alert and practical, recognizing the growing danger and quickly coordinating the escape.
• Elorie overcomes her fear enough to fly with the others. Witnessing Chen Xuan’s formidable ability deepens her awe of him and strengthens her resolve to stay away from the Dimensional Limit Organization.

Significant themes

• The unknown and misjudgment: The insect-men seem monstrous, yet their clothing and behavior suggest a society with familiar human habits.
• Escalation and survival: The trio’s cautious attempt to escape turns into a violent battle once the creatures pursue and shoot at them.
• Power and responsibility: Chen Xuan holds back until the threat is unmistakable, then uses lethal force to protect the group.

Character interactions

• Elorie reacts with relief that the creatures are only partly insect, while Chen Xuan privately finds that reasoning absurd.
• Liu Shuyue warns the others that the situation is deteriorating; Chen Xuan responds by proposing flight, and she carries him while Elorie keeps pace.
• Elorie watches Chen Xuan’s combat prowess with fear and admiration, while the trio cooperate in flight and rely on one another as the insect-men attack.

Key plot points

• Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and Elorie are caught in a barrage of anti-aircraft fire while fleeing through the air. Chen uses his energy swords and Divine Eye Method to shield the group, but the effort rapidly drains his Spiritual Energy.
• Once they reach the streets, Liu carries the exhausted Chen to safety. The trio evade their pursuers through winding side roads, but the Insect-Faced Monsters keep locating them despite Liu’s concealment formations and attempts to hide.
• With their escape routes closing, they prepare to break out again—until a stranger opens a manhole and offers them refuge. He reveals human eyes to show he is not a monster, then gives them Mind Rings that conceal them from the enemies’ apparent psychic tracking.
• The stranger leads them through underground waterways to a hidden, well-equipped transit system. A cable car carries them down into a vast underground city, where he introduces himself as Raphael.
• Raphael explains that people exposed on the surface usually mutate within two hours. The chapter ends with the group seeing the bustling, illuminated settlement he calls Second New Paris.

Character developments and interactions

• Chen Xuan pushes himself to protect the others, but accepts Liu’s help when his strength falters. He remains cautious toward the stranger, though he chooses to trust Raphael after the rescue.
• Liu Shuyue is decisive and protective: she warns Chen not to exhaust his Spiritual Energy, carries him, and repeatedly uses formations to evade pursuit.
• Elorie is frightened but unharmed, agrees to keep moving, and helps interpret Raphael’s French.
• Raphael first appears as a mysterious rescuer, then reveals himself as a representative of an organized underground community. He is friendly but makes clear that his group also wants information from the newcomers.

Significant themes

• Survival through cooperation: the trio’s escape depends on Chen’s defense, Liu’s leadership, Elorie’s help, and eventually Raphael’s intervention.
• Limits and vulnerability: Chen’s power can protect others, but using it too long risks lasting harm.
• Appearance versus trust: Raphael must prove he is human, while the group must decide whether to accept help from a stranger.
• A hidden world beneath catastrophe: the ruined, dangerous surface contrasts sharply with the advanced, thriving city below.

Chapter Summary: “Future Residence”

Key Plot Points and Events

• Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and Elorie arrive in Second New Paris City, an immense underground metropolis built beneath the ruined surface of Paris.
• The city astonishes them with its advanced infrastructure: artificial lighting, energy production, food systems, water circulation, and other features that form a semi-closed ecosystem.
• Raphael explains that the city was originally designed for five million residents and was completed in fifteen years, though it has since expanded and continues to grow.
• The surface monsters are revealed to be mutated local residents. An unknown environmental force—possibly radiation, a field, or an unexplained wave—causes mutations, and current technology cannot detect or resist it.
• Raphael reveals that he has been “inoculated,” allowing him to survive up to five minutes of unprotected surface exposure, though he refuses to explain the process.
• The group is taken to a rare detached villa and given translator earpieces. Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue are told to remain there overnight, while Elorie is taken elsewhere for separate questioning.
• Chen Xuan realizes that their residence is effectively a comfortable form of house arrest, with at least twelve visible guards and likely more hidden nearby.
• He and Liu Shuyue decide not to escape immediately. They need rest, and Chen Xuan suspects that Elorie—because of her angelic wings and connection to this world—may be the real subject of New Paris City’s interest.
• At the end of the chapter, an intelligent robot named A306, or “Amy,” arrives to serve as Chen Xuan’s personal guide to the city.

Character Developments

• Chen Xuan: Remains observant and cautious despite his exhaustion. He analyzes New Paris’s technology, the motives of its authorities, and the possible reason for their detention. He also worries about being separated from Liu Shuyue, since their proximity may prevent his forced return to Jiangcheng.
• Liu Shuyue: Demonstrates sharp awareness and vigilance by immediately detecting the guards surrounding the residence. She remains protective of the group and questions Raphael’s decision to separate Elorie.
• Elorie: Shows strong attachment to Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue, objecting when Raphael takes her away. However, Raphael’s private explanation convinces her to cooperate. Her angelic identity and wings make her potentially far more important to New Paris City than the others.
• Raphael: Acts as a helpful guide but remains secretive and authoritative. He provides information about the city, offers them shelter and translators, and controls Elorie’s separation while withholding details about the inoculation and the city’s deeper secrets.
• Amy/A306: Is introduced as an advanced intelligent guide robot assigned to Chen Xuan, signaling that the city’s technology extends beyond its infrastructure into sophisticated artificial intelligence and service systems.

Significant Themes

• Humanity’s technological future: Second New Paris City represents a level of scientific advancement far beyond 2025-era Jiangcheng, showing humanity’s ability to create an artificial environment when nature becomes hostile.
• Survival and adaptation: The underground city exists because the surface has become dangerous, while the mutated residents and Raphael’s inoculation show different responses to environmental catastrophe.
• Trust versus suspicion: Although Raphael and the city appear welcoming, Chen Xuan recognizes that the newcomers are being monitored and investigated.
• Freedom versus security: The residence provides comfort and safety but also functions as controlled confinement, raising questions about whether protection justifies restricting personal freedom.
• The unknown and limits of science: The cause of the mutations remains unexplained, emphasizing the limits of even New Paris City’s advanced technology.
• Identity and significance: Elorie’s status as an angel may give her special importance, contrasting with Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue’s uncertainty about their own roles in this world.

Character Interactions

• Raphael discusses the underground city’s history and technology with Chen Xuan, who questions him closely about its construction and the surface threat.
• Elorie expresses concern when Raphael removes his mask and later protests being separated from Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.
• Liu Shuyue challenges Raphael’s decision to take Elorie away and later informs Chen Xuan about the guards surrounding their residence.
• Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue cooperate in assessing their situation, agreeing to remain quiet and rest rather than attempt an immediate escape.
• Raphael privately persuades Elorie to accompany him, suggesting that he reveals information to her that he does not share with the others.
• Amy enters as a new intermediary, offering Chen Xuan an official introduction to Second New Paris City.

Key events

• At 9 p.m., police cordon off Wuhuan Industrial Park after the lobby attack. Jiang Siqi waits outside while the incident’s security footage spreads online, showing reception staff mutating and Dimensional Limit Organization agents rescuing civilians and fighting them.
• Jiang’s fame surges: her channel gains nearly two million followers, and Magical Girl Si Tian becomes a major topic. She privately celebrates having become a hero, though she knows the deaths behind the publicity make that success feel complicated.
• Injured agent Han Yuhao arrives instead of resting in hospital. He criticizes Jiang for seeming more interested in her newfound fame than in the victims or missing teammate Elorie.
• Wang Baihu ends their argument and praises the rookies’ performance in what may be the Organization’s largest rookie trial. Li Xing is absent, having chosen hospital leave for a serious leg wound; Captain Honglian is busy coordinating logistics.
• The team is told they will receive guidance from psychological experts and lawyers before facing the press and victims’ families.
• The immediate priority is the Erosion space above the building. Since Elorie disappeared along with the structure’s upper floors, the Organization is preparing to enter it—despite its usual prohibition on crossing into the other world.

Character developments and interactions

• Jiang Siqi enjoys her sudden recognition but is forced to confront how that enthusiasm may look beside mass death and Elorie’s disappearance. She insists that she is worried about Elorie, even if worrying cannot change the situation.
• Han Yuhao maintains his combative, boastful persona despite his injuries. His moral rebuke of Jiang reveals genuine concern for the dead and Elorie, though he expresses it harshly.
• Wang Baihu acts as the calm mediator, reassuring Jiang and Han that neither is heartless. His exhaustion and conflicted reaction to the planned entry show the strain of the crisis.
• Xiao Jiu quietly offers blankets to the others, appearing nervous around both Jiang and Han.

Significant themes

• Heroism and public image: The agents become celebrated online, but their fame is inseparable from a tragedy and the suffering of victims’ families.
• Grief and differing responses: Jiang and Han disagree over what compassion should look like—visible mourning versus continuing to act—while both are affected by the loss and uncertainty.
• A changing boundary between worlds: The Organization may abandon its longstanding rule against entering Erosion as the crisis, the missing agent, and the public’s demand for answers make isolation increasingly untenable.

Key events

• Xiao Kanong and Honglian argue over how to report the battle at Five-Ring Machinery Park. The Organization plans to credit the Operations Team with defeating Devil and rescuing survivors, while keeping the other Wanderers—White-Clad Immortal and Flesh Butcher—out of the public account.
• Xiao Kanong argues that revealing the Wanderers’ involvement would confuse and alarm the public, strain the Organization’s ties with official agencies, and weaken the team’s heroic image. Jiang Siqi, Han Yuhao, and Wang Baihu support his position; Xiao Jiu leaves the decision to the others. Honglian reluctantly accepts the majority’s choice.
• Xiao Kanong says the victims’ families will receive substantial compensation, arguing that the Organization bears some responsibility for ending the victims’ puppet-like lives and that the payment may ease their families’ hardship.
• The Jiangcheng Branch will investigate the Erosion zone on a large scale, release recorded footage, and leave the Erosion Point open—even if Elorie is recovered—because its development has already brought people benefits and its expansion can be managed.
• Gunfire interrupts the discussion. On the rooftop, the group finds a construction worker, Gong Qiang, dead after attacking coworkers. He had briefly entered the Erosion zone and emerged mutated, with enlarged eyes and abnormal strength. Xiao Kanong lists possible causes—radiation, infection, mental contamination, or an ability—and says the Organization will investigate.

Character developments and interactions

• Xiao Kanong shows himself to be pragmatic and politically calculating: he prioritizes public stability and the Organization’s standing, but also acknowledges responsibility to the victims’ families and favors pursuing the Erosion zone’s benefits.
• Honglian challenges the deliberate distortion of the truth, believing other protectors should be acknowledged. She ultimately yields, though her concern about public deception and the danger of the Erosion zone remains.
• Jiang Siqi supports the official story, reasoning that the public prefers simple heroic narratives and that disclosure would not undo the tragedy. She privately reflects on the limits of truth and the possibility that compensation may shape public expectations.
• Han Yuhao questions whether the other Wanderers are truly good and favors avoiding unnecessary complications. Wang Baihu backs Xiao Kanong to protect the Organization’s fragile relationship with officials. Xiao Jiu is unable to decide.
• The sudden mutation turns the debate over keeping the Erosion Point open into an immediate, concrete warning about its risks.

Significant themes

• Truth versus public narrative: The Organization manipulates information to preserve confidence and simplify a complicated event.
• Collective responsibility and compromise: Compensation and shared credit are presented as ways to address harm, but they do not erase moral discomfort.
• Progress versus safety: The Erosion zone offers potential benefits while exposing people to unpredictable danger.
• The cost of heroism and institutional image: The team’s earned praise becomes entangled with the Organization’s political needs.

Key events

• Worried by the news that Wuhuan Industrial Park has been sealed off, Lin Qing concludes that Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue may have been caught in an Erosion event and transported to another world. With no confirmation that Chen Xuan is dead or captured, she decides to search for him herself, despite Little Green warning that leaving the shop would put her in danger.
• Just as Lin Qing prepares to close the shop, its surroundings abruptly transform into a luxurious palace corridor: a new customer has arrived. Lin Qing abandons her plan to head to the industrial park and recognizes the customer as Elorie, a Dimensional Limit Organization recruit and Jiang Siqi’s teammate.
• Elorie discovers that the shop’s television is showing news from Jiangcheng, even though she is in Second New Paris. Lin Qing infers that an Erosion explosion may have transported Elorie there, much as it may have transported Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.
• Lin Qing closes the shutter to speak privately with Elorie, explains that she and the shop came from Jiangcheng, and claims the shop can connect worlds without an ordinary Erosion Point. She then offers Elorie coffee.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Qing struggles between protecting the shop—her only secure foothold—and keeping her promise to protect Chen Xuan. She chooses action over safety, but the shop’s arrival in another world forces her to adapt. Though she has no combat prosthetics, she takes control of the encounter and uses her knowledge and calm manner to question Elorie.
• Elorie shifts from curiosity about the “retro” shop to alarm and disbelief when she sees Jiangcheng news and learns Lin Qing came from that world. She is wary of Lin Qing but remains engaged, suggesting she wants to understand how she crossed over.
• Lin Qing treats Elorie as both a potential threat and a valuable source of information, blocking the exit at first before softening the encounter with reassurance and an offer of coffee.

Significant themes

• Loyalty and sacrifice: Lin Qing is willing to risk her safety and abandon her refuge to honor her promise to Chen Xuan.
• Uncertainty and connection across worlds: The possible Erosion event links characters separated by worlds, while the shop itself offers a mysterious route between them.
• Adaptability and role reversal: With Chen Xuan absent, Lin Qing must act as the shopkeeper and make decisions in a rapidly changing situation.

Key plot points and events

• Elorie wakes in Lin Qing’s shop, accepts coffee, and learns that the shop appeared because of the worry keeping her awake.
• Lin Qing claims the store sells abilities that can help resolve customers’ problems. Since she is not the shopkeeper and cannot use the store’s usual tools to prove it, she earns Elorie’s trust by showing her extraordinary rooms that open onto different worlds.
• Convinced by what she sees, Elorie decides she wants to buy an ability, though she is unsure what would help. Lin Qing explains that advice is free and asks her to describe her troubles.
• Elorie explains that she is an Angel—an ability user who opposes Devils—and recounts her experiences. When she describes being sent a hundred years into the future and meeting two Wanderers, Lin Qing becomes especially interested and asks about them.

Character developments

• Elorie moves from anxious and suspicious to amazed and trusting. She admits her worries, but remains cautious about whether she can afford help.
• Lin Qing improvises in Chen Xuan’s absence, using confidence and demonstrations rather than the store’s normal equipment. Her calm, welcoming approach encourages Elorie to open up.

Character interactions

• Lin Qing gently questions Elorie about why she is awake, then presents the store as a place that can help with her troubles.
• Elorie tests Lin Qing’s credibility by asking how she knows her name and whether consultation costs money. Lin Qing reassures her and makes clear that only ability transactions require payment.
• Elorie shares her history, while Lin Qing listens closely—especially when the story reaches the two Wanderers.

Significant themes

• Trust and proof: Lin Qing must convince Elorie without the shopkeeper’s usual tools; witnessing the impossible becomes persuasive evidence.
• Wonder and limited perspective: The otherworldly rooms reveal how little Elorie knows about the wider multiverse.
• Help tailored to personal needs: The store’s purpose is framed not merely as selling abilities, but as addressing the worries behind each customer’s visit.

Summary of “New City’s Past”

Key Plot Points and Events

• Lin Qing learns from Elorie that the powerful Wanderers Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue are currently somewhere in the world connected to the shop. She is thrilled by this discovery but conceals her excitement while continuing to listen.
• Elorie recounts arriving in Second New Paris and discovering that more than a century has passed since her own era. The world has changed drastically: the Devils are gone, Angels have disappeared, and Europe was destroyed by an attack from the moon involving falling rocks rather than nuclear weapons.
• Earlier, Raphael persuaded Elorie to abandon Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue temporarily by offering information about the Angel Alliance. Hoping to gain allies and possibly find a way back to the past, Elorie followed him to Second New Paris.
• Second New Paris is an underground reconstruction of Paris, complete with a palace modeled after the Louvre, preserved scenery, and genetically modified pigeons capable of living and reproducing underground.
• Raphael brings Elorie before Governor Nymph and the city’s officials. They are astonished because Elorie is an awakened Angel from the past, confirming that time-and-space travel may be possible.
• Nymph reveals that the Angel Alliance effectively ceased to exist a century earlier because no other Angels remain on the continent. However, its ordinary members founded Second New Paris and built it as humanity’s final refuge.
• The decline of the Angels began after the Devils united and attacked the Angel Alliance’s Artifact Treasury, a shocking event because Devils were traditionally selfish and uncooperative.
• The chapter ends as Nymph begins explaining the Angel Alliance’s purpose: protecting and studying ancient Artifacts, which can be activated through Soul Power or “ability.”

Character Developments

• Lin Qing becomes hopeful and energized after learning that Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue may be nearby. Her restrained outward behavior contrasts with her intense desire to find them.
• Elorie is revealed as emotionally isolated and overwhelmed by her displacement into the future. She seeks conversation and companionship because everyone around her is unfamiliar.
• Elorie also demonstrates practical judgment: despite trusting Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue, she chooses to follow Raphael because contact with the Angel Alliance could provide protection and a route home.
• Raphael appears persuasive and informed. He uses Elorie’s interest in the Angel Alliance to guide her to Second New Paris, while also acting as her escort.
• Governor Nymph is presented as kind, welcoming, and historically knowledgeable. Her warmth helps Elorie feel less threatened, though she also represents the remnants of a vanished order.

Significant Themes

• Displacement and loss: Elorie faces the emotional shock of discovering that her home, society, and era have disappeared.
• The passage of time: The chapter emphasizes how history can transform familiar places beyond recognition while preserving superficial details, such as the Louvre’s architecture.
• Humanity’s survival and adaptation: Second New Paris represents civilization rebuilding itself underground after global catastrophe. Even its pigeons had to be genetically altered to survive.
• Hope amid extinction: Although the Angels and much of the old world are gone, the Angel Alliance’s legacy survives through Second New Paris and the possibility that Elorie’s arrival signals a larger miracle.
• Secrets and hidden history: The causes of the Devils’ alliance, the attack on the Artifact Treasury, and the nature of Artifacts remain major mysteries.
• Power and responsibility: Soul Power is not merely a weapon; it is the force that enables humanity to activate and study ancient Artifacts.

Character Interactions

• Lin Qing quietly questions Elorie while concealing her excitement about Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.
• Elorie and Raphael discuss the Angel Alliance, with Raphael persuading her to accompany him.
• Raphael introduces Elorie to Second New Paris, explaining its underground environment and genetically modified wildlife.
• Governor Nymph receives Elorie compassionately, placing her at ease before questioning her origins.
• Elorie explains her time displacement to Nymph and the officials, who react with wonder and discuss the implications of time travel.
• Nymph informs Elorie about the Angel Alliance’s disappearance, the Devils’ assault on the Artifact Treasury, and the organization’s role in protecting Artifacts.

Chapter Summary: “Enemies from Beyond the Stars”

Key Plot Points and Events

• Elorie learns that demons successfully captured an Angel Alliance warehouse—an astonishing feat given its heavy military and angelic defenses.
• The Consul reveals an antique Mind Ring from Elorie’s era. When its crystal covering is removed, the ring is shown to contain a small, living mass of flesh rather than a true crystal.
• Nymph explains that “Flawless Crystal” is actually flesh originating from a gigantic mother body called Lucy, which was stored in the Himalayan Ridge Temple.
• Demons attacked and destroyed the temple’s Final Temple Vault, burying Lucy beneath rubble and snow. Afterward, demons disappeared, and no new angels awakened. As the existing angels died, the old Angel Alliance gradually collapsed.
• Nymph suggests that angels and the flesh mother body share the same source of power. She is especially intrigued that Elorie has manifested Light Wings without showing signs of mutation from the Contaminated Crystal Source.
• To explain the disaster affecting Paris, Nymph shows Elorie a holographic reconstruction of Earth from space.
• Decades after the demons vanished, Earth suffered a devastating attack originating from the Moon. A gigantic worm-like organism had fused with the lunar surface, appearing as part of the Moon’s mountain ranges.
• Dark-blue crystal formations grew along the creature’s back. One crystal launched from the Moon, crossed space, entered Earth’s atmosphere, and struck a North American city.
• The impact devastated the city, killing approximately 5.94 million people and revealing that humanity faced threats originating beyond Earth.

Character Developments

• Elorie becomes increasingly horrified and confused as her assumptions about Mind Rings, Flawless Crystal, angels, and demons collapse. She briefly considers exploiting the difference in value between antique and modern rings, but quickly realizes that changing Paris’s fate matters more than wealth.
• Her skepticism develops into alarm as she recognizes that the Angel Alliance may have concealed the true origin of the power protecting humanity.
• Elorie also questions whether being an angel truly explains her resistance to mutation, noting that Wanderer is not an angel yet has also avoided mutation.
• Nymph/the Consul is established as a knowledgeable survivor of the post-disaster world. She acts patiently and protectively toward Elorie while revealing increasingly disturbing historical truths.
• Nymph’s disbelief at seeing Elorie’s Light Wings emphasizes how extraordinary Elorie’s existence is in an era where angels have effectively vanished.

Significant Themes

• Truth versus institutional deception: The Angel Alliance concealed that Mind Rings and Flawless Crystal derive their power from living, grotesque flesh.
• The collapse of established beliefs: Elorie discovers that familiar concepts—angels, demons, protection, and sacred artifacts—may all have origins far different from official history.
• Mutation and shared origins: Angels, demons, anomalous artifacts, and Lucy may be connected through a common biological or supernatural source.
• Human vulnerability: Even advanced surveillance, military defenses, and global institutions cannot protect humanity from incomprehensible cosmic threats.
• Cosmic horror: The Moon is revealed to harbor an enormous organism fused with its surface, transforming a familiar celestial body into a living source of destruction.
• Historical catastrophe and lost civilization: The disappearance of demons and angels did not end the crisis; it marked the beginning of humanity’s gradual collapse.

Character Interactions

• Nymph physically guides and reassures Elorie while showing her the antique Mind Ring.
• Elorie reacts with disbelief and fear, repeatedly questioning Nymph about the flesh inside the ring, the origin of Flawless Crystal, and the connection between angels and mutation.
• Nymph answers patiently but controls the pace of the revelation, promising to explain the entire history.
• Their exchange shifts from a discussion of the demon attack on the warehouse to a much larger revelation: the downfall of the Angel Alliance and the existence of extraterrestrial or lunar entities threatening Earth.

Key plot points

• Elorie learns that an extraterrestrial force—the Ancient Insect—has entrenched itself on the Moon. It sends down Crystal Clusters that devastate Earth and mutate people.
• Humanity’s counterattacks have limited success. The Great Wall Project moves people underground, where earth and concrete shield them from the crystals’ radiation; this leads to the creation of Second New Paris.
• Fallen Crystal Clusters can be broken, but their fragments remain dangerous. Mutated Insect-People collect and store them, and Elorie recalls seeing their honeycomb homes and hearing them speak.
• The Governor explains that the city holds Primordial Life, a mass taken from humanity’s progenitor, Lucy. Researchers believe it created life and that beings more deeply influenced by it became angels.
• The Devil, by contrast, may have gained its power from the Ancient Insect and may itself be that creature’s slave. Elorie considers this theory plausible, seeing angels and Devils less as moral opposites than as parts of a larger struggle.

Character developments and interactions

• Elorie moves from shock at the scale of Earth’s destruction to uneasy understanding of the origins of angels, Devils, and humanity. Her experience with the Angel Alliance and the Dimensional Limit Organization makes her receptive to a view beyond simple good-versus-evil labels.
• Nymph, Raphael, and the Governor explain the history and science of the crisis. Raphael reassures Elorie that Second New Paris is technologically capable, while Nymph and the Governor connect the Moon threat to the origins of supernatural power.
• The Governor’s account makes Elorie feel like the city’s long-awaited hope—and possibly its intended solution—leaving her wary as the gathered people press for the explanation.

Significant themes

• Survival through adaptation: Humanity retreats underground and develops technology to endure an overwhelming enemy.
• Transformation and identity: Insect-People may retain humanlike bodies, speech, and habits, yet are regarded as a different species.
• The blurred line between good and evil: Angels and Devils may be opposing forces in a biological or cosmic struggle, rather than moral categories.
• Origins and exploitation: Primordial Life and the Ancient Insect may be the sources behind humanity’s powers—and the forces driving conflict between angels and Devils.

• Nymph explains Primordial Life and Fusion: Eighty years earlier, people began implanting pieces of Primordial Life—the flesh of humanity’s supposed ancestor—into themselves in hopes of gaining power to fight an immense threat surrounding the moon. Most died, but survivors became “Half-Angels,” with enhanced abilities and an affinity for anomalous objects. Their successes helped drive technological progress and the growth of underground Great Wall fortresses into self-sustaining cities. Fusion now has an 87% success rate, and Second New Paris celebrates it with a festival.
• Elorie learns the people around her have undergone Fusion: Nymph and the others have all accepted the procedure. Raphael reassures Elorie that he has been inoculated and can safely appear briefly. Nymph asks Elorie to join the Fusion Festival, hoping an angel’s supposed compatibility with Primordial Life will help restore the Angel Alliance and guide the city’s future. No angel has undergone Fusion before.
• Elorie chooses to help: Back in the shop, Lin Qing is alarmed that Elorie agreed despite the risks. Elorie explains that the city faces a looming catastrophe from growing Crystal Clusters, and she considers its residents—possibly including descendants of people she once knew—her countrymen. Since Gustav is dead and the route back to her original time is lost, she believes this world may now be her only home.
• Lin Qing identifies Elorie’s deeper worry: Elorie is not merely uncertain about her abilities; she fears that she may inspire hope in the people of Second New Paris but fail to save them. A carefully prepared conversation helps her admit this fear. Elorie feels relieved after speaking, while Lin Qing insists that the shop’s abilities can solve any problem.
  Character developments and interactions: Nymph’s calm account reveals the human cost behind the city’s progress, and her appeal to Elorie carries a note of desperation. Elorie’s sense of duty and belonging deepens as she accepts the risk of helping. Lin Qing challenges her decision, then listens closely enough to uncover the doubt beneath her resolve.
  Themes: The chapter explores sacrifice in the name of survival and progress, responsibility to one’s community across generations, the dangers of hope and failure, and the search for belonging when returning home may be impossible.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Qing persuades Elorie to make a deal: before merging with Primordial Life, Elorie must bring the two Wanderers—Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue—to the shop, and give up at least one ability in exchange for what she needs.
• Lin Qing explains how to summon the shop: Elorie must find her friends, then strongly wish to see the shop while wandering. Though suspicious, Elorie agrees and leaves.
• The next day, Elorie asks Governor Nymph to let her go out. Nymph refuses, citing the danger of making the newly returned Angel visible during political tensions.
• Nymph explains the conflict between the New Angel Alliance’s Great Wall Project and supporters of the Star-Slaying Project, who want humanity to reclaim the surface. Primordial Life can dissolve Crystal Clusters, but using it as a weapon is risky because supplies are scarce and failure could be disastrous.
• Elorie asks to invite her two friends to the Louvre Palace. After insisting they are trustworthy because they saved her life, she persuades Nymph to send them an invitation for the following day.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Qing improvises a convincing but misleading deal, making Chen Xuan’s return a condition while concealing her real motives. Her priority is rescuing him, and she is willing to risk embarrassment to do so.
• Elorie remains wary of Lin Qing’s unusual bargain but chooses to trust the shop’s demonstrated powers. She also asserts herself with Nymph, insisting that her companions be treated as friends and threatening to withdraw from the Fusion Festival otherwise.
• Nymph acts protectively and patiently explains the political and strategic stakes, but also sees Elorie as a future leader who needs preparation.
• Elorie and Nymph clash over Elorie’s freedom and relationships, then reach a compromise: Elorie stays in the palace, while her friends are invited.

Significant themes

• Trust and obligation: Elorie accepts an opaque bargain, while her loyalty to the Wanderers motivates her to defend them.
• Political division and competing hopes: The surface-reclamation plan offers hope but carries serious risks; the Great Wall Project prioritizes safety underground.
• Leadership and personal choice: Elorie is being groomed as a symbol of the Angel Alliance, yet begins asserting her own priorities and relationships.

Plot points and events

• Chen Xuan wakes to find Liu Shuyue has made fried eggs after learning from Lin Qing. He enjoys them and is pleased by her happy reaction.
• Amy informs them that their twelve-hour quarantine has ended. It recommends Chen Xuan find work, but he refuses and asks instead for directions to an electronics repair shop.
• Chen and Liu leave the compound without being stopped. Amy says they can stay there for a month, though accommodation fees are already being charged. Liu worries they have no money; Chen reveals he secretly took banknotes from a jewelry store.
• They walk through New Paris, where everyday city life is recreated underground beneath a holographic sky and artificial lighting. Outsiders receive a two-thousand-Euro credit line, so the pair sample food and shops without using Chen’s cash.
• After two hours, they reach the city’s sole electronics repair shop, Atom and Electron. When Chen asks about joining a repair queue, a staff member explains that items are evaluated and assigned to service windows by rarity—then reveals the establishment is an artifacts factory, not a repair shop.

Character developments and interactions

• Liu Shuyue shows domestic initiative by making breakfast and takes pleasure in Chen’s approval. Her concern about owing money reflects her strong sense of independence.
• Chen Xuan remains irreverent and resistant to settling into ordinary city life. He scavenges money out of habit, but is comfortable enjoying the city while planning eventually to leave.
• Amy provides practical information in a rigid, overly literal manner, prompting Chen’s jokes and irritation.
• Chen and Liu share a relaxed outing, while their exchange about money shows their contrasting attitudes: Liu is cautious; Chen is unconcerned.

Significant themes

• Comfort versus struggle: New Paris uses technology to imitate life aboveground, preserving morale but potentially encouraging people to accept their confinement rather than fight it.
• Displacement and belonging: Chen and Liu are outsiders navigating unfamiliar rules, expenses, and institutions.
• Adaptation and autonomy: Liu learns new skills, while Chen resists the city’s expectation that newcomers work and settle down.
• Technology and social order: Artificial environments, face-scanned credit, and automated guidance make daily life efficient, yet also reveal how tightly managed the city is.

Plot and events

• Chen Xuan brings his damaged antique Scanner Gun to Atom and Electron, a repair shop, hoping to have it assessed and fixed. Its technician, Kyle, discovers a mind chip inside and rates the device A+, though he cannot identify its origin.
• Kyle explains that A-Class repairs are handled in enclosed, automated rooms, and that the shop can deal with objects it does not fully understand. Artifacts—the mysterious technology credited with making underground life possible—are rated even higher, beginning at S-Class.
• In the repair room, a synthesized assistant lists strict warnings: the item may change, customers may retry after one failure, but a third attempt could make it disappear, and other risks remain their responsibility.
• Liu Shuyue places protective talismans around the room. Chen puts the Scanner Gun on the tray. It is sent into a vast, unseen industrial system, but the first repair attempt fails and the device is tossed back.
• Chen tries again. This time the Scanner Gun is ejected almost immediately amid sparks. The assistant begins speaking in an unusually agitated voice, then cuts out as the shop’s lights go dark.
• Chen and Liu leave the room amid the commotion. Kyle says staff are investigating what appears to be an isolated power failure. The pair laugh about the incident and leave without accepting blame.

Character developments and interactions

• Chen Xuan remains curious and resourceful. He conceals the Scanner Gun’s true history with a casual lie, takes a chance on the repair despite the warnings, and keeps his composure when the second attempt causes trouble. He confidently insists the failure was the shop’s fault.
• Liu Shuyue is cautious and protective, preparing an Array Formation before the repair. When the room malfunctions, she is ready to act, but follows Chen’s suggestion to wait. She shares his amusement afterward.
• Kyle is knowledgeable about the shop’s procedures but candidly admits that he cannot identify the Scanner Gun’s origins. He stays focused on managing the customers during the outage.
• Chen and Liu’s teamwork is evident: she prepares safeguards, he decides when to proceed, and they respond to the strange accident together.

Significant themes

• The limits of human knowledge: The shop handles unfamiliar devices without understanding them, while Artifacts remain even more mysterious.
• Technology as both wonder and risk: Automated repair offers access to extraordinary capabilities, but comes with unpredictable outcomes and strict disclaimers.
• Adventure and humor in the unfamiliar: Chen and Liu treat a potentially alarming malfunction as an exciting mishap, while Chen’s self-serving denial adds comedy.
• Mystery and foreshadowing: The Scanner Gun’s mind chip and the repair assistant’s seemingly personal, irritated outburst suggest that the device—or the repair system—may be more unusual than it first appears.

Chapter Summary: “Invitation from an Angel”

Key Plot Points and Events

• Chen Xuan remains unconcerned that the Scanner Gun is still broken because he believes he can return through an Erosion Point or overlapping Erosion zone connected to the Dimensional Limit Organization.
• He and Liu Shuyue reunite with Amy, the cylindrical guide robot, after accidentally leaving it behind. Chen Xuan becomes interested in possibly bringing the advanced robot back to Jiangcheng.
• While sightseeing in New Paris, they encounter a protest against the Angel Alliance. The protesters accuse the Alliance of cowardice and deception for continually expanding underground tunnels instead of leading humanity back to the surface. They demand sunlight, freedom, and the recovery of their homeland.
• Liu Shuyue questions why ordinary citizens would risk their safety by opposing the Angel Alliance, while Chen Xuan dismisses the demonstration as harmless public unrest.
• Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue continue their leisurely tour, eating at an upscale restaurant and boating along the miniature Seine River. Liu Shuyue impresses Chen Xuan by using the Spirit Sword Technique to cut her food effortlessly.
• Upon returning to their residence, they are visited by Raphael, who delivers an invitation from Elorie. She wishes to meet them the following morning at the Louvre Palace.
• Chen Xuan accepts, though he suspects Elorie’s invitation has a deeper purpose than simple friendship.
• The next day, a car takes Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue to the Louvre Palace. Amy stays behind at the residence.
• Raphael escorts them through the palace before leaving them alone with Elorie for one hour. The lavish room and formal hospitality emphasize Elorie’s elevated status within the Angel Alliance and the distance now separating her from her former companions.

Character Developments

• Chen Xuan: Remains relaxed and observant, treating the protest as an amusing local spectacle rather than a serious political threat. He grows increasingly curious about New Paris’s technology, especially Amy, and remains suspicious of Elorie’s motives for requesting the meeting.
• Liu Shuyue: Shows clear emotional growth. Unlike her formerly indifferent self, she now smiles frequently and participates comfortably in sightseeing and conversation. Her use of the Spirit Sword Technique demonstrates both her continued cultivation and her practical willingness to use simple techniques.
• Amy: Displays increasingly humanlike behavior, complaining about battery depletion and expressing displeasure when Chen Xuan makes it run. Its advanced AI strengthens Chen Xuan’s desire to take it back to Jiangcheng.
• Elorie: Though she appears only briefly, her status has changed dramatically. She is now a central public figure and the focus of New Paris’s attention because of the Fusion Festival.
• Raphael: Continues acting as a friendly intermediary between Chen Xuan, Liu Shuyue, and the Angel Alliance. His teasing manner contrasts with the formality surrounding Elorie.

Significant Themes

• Freedom versus security: The protesters reject underground safety in favor of sunlight, independence, and reclaiming the surface, while Liu Shuyue questions the wisdom of risking protected lives.
• Political control and public dissatisfaction: The Angel Alliance’s authority is challenged by citizens who believe it has deceived them and abandoned the goal of returning to the surface.
• Changing social status: Elorie’s new position creates a visible divide between her and Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue. The palace’s formal arrangements suggest that personal relationships are now being filtered through political and institutional expectations.
• Humanity in technology: Amy’s emotional reactions and near-human intelligence blur the line between machine and person.
• Emotional recovery and personal change: Liu Shuyue’s growing warmth and willingness to enjoy ordinary experiences suggest that her cultivation and the influence of Callousness have not destroyed her humanity.

Character Interactions

• Chen Xuan playfully reassures Amy after abandoning it and agrees to warn it before running in the future.
• Liu Shuyue and Chen Xuan discuss the protest, revealing their contrasting perspectives: she is analytical and concerned about the protesters’ motives, while he is more dismissive.
• During lunch, Chen Xuan teases Liu Shuyue about using Western utensils, only to find that she handles them elegantly and enhances her movements with sword energy.
• Raphael jokes about Chen Xuan enjoying the company of a beautiful woman, then formally conveys Elorie’s invitation.
• At the palace, Chen Xuan lightly teases Elorie about becoming New Paris’s celebrity, but the luxurious setting makes clear that their previous casual relationship now exists within the Angel Alliance’s political framework.

Key plot points and events

• Angel—now appearing more polished—reunites with Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue. She explains that others pushed her into becoming the public face of the Angel Alliance.
• Angel reveals that she found the Ability Store inside the palace two nights earlier. A clerk, likely Lin Qing, told her that she could obtain an ability through a transaction but would need to stay with Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.
• Chen Xuan believes her and helps her try to summon the store. He and Liu Shuyue suspect Angel may want to change history and prevent her world’s destruction, which could make her request difficult to fulfill.
• Before the store appears, a massive explosion rocks the palace. Chen Xuan investigates and sees a truck wrecked in the courtyard and armed intruders moving through the Louvre Palace.
• The intruders spot Chen Xuan and fire tracking bullets at him. He evades them using his enhanced perception and sword, realizing the attackers are exceptionally dangerous.

Character developments and interactions

• Angel is more composed in appearance but remains emotionally sincere. She is relieved that Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue believe her, and anxious when she cannot summon the store.
• Chen Xuan reassures Angel and takes her account seriously. He also recognizes the potential complications of her likely wish and quickly shifts into a protective, combative role when the palace is attacked.
• Liu Shuyue supports Angel’s explanation and shares Chen Xuan’s concern about the consequences of her possible transaction.
• Lin Qing is absent, but her clever handling of Angel is discussed: she guided the new customer toward Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue.

Significant themes

• Trust between friends: Angel fears being dismissed, but Chen Xuan and Liu Shuyue accept her story without ridicule.
• Power and difficult choices: The Ability Store may offer Angel a way to alter history, but her goal could carry serious consequences.
• Sudden danger amid the miraculous: The group’s effort to summon the store is interrupted by a violent, unexplained assault, turning a conversation about supernatural possibilities into an immediate fight for survival.