Recaps

Zhai Le sent the Minister of Agriculture to investigate Lin Feng’s improved grain seeds, but Lin Feng’s Word Spirit ripened the fields in moments and convinced him that Qu could not easily replicate Kang’s methods. The chapter ended with Shen Tang’s kitchen discovering that its supposed jellyfish had turned into a person.

• Zhai Le let Lin Feng’s escape and the deaths of the Imperial Guard soldiers go without pursuing her, then asked Yu Hai to arrange for the Crown Princess to spend time with Lin Ling De.
• Zhai Le gave the Minister of Agriculture Lin Feng’s improved seeds and explained that he wanted Qu to overcome Kang’s limits on seed reproduction.
• The Minister of Agriculture visited the Ji Tian, witnessed Lin Feng’s Word Spirit turn green rice golden, and accidentally flattened crops while wandering into the fields.
• Lin Feng told the Minister of Agriculture that only women could cultivate the Word Spirit, then ripened the fields and began harvesting the grain.
• Shen Tang and her companions found that the jellyfish in the kitchen had turned into a person, narrowly avoiding making soup from human flesh.

Shen Tang discovered that the jellyfish spirit who nearly became soup was actually a messenger serving Luo Shen Lu, carrying news of an ambush tied to Qu State’s royal court. After learning that Zhai Xiaofang’s strength and the hidden 20th Rank Che Hou could threaten Lingde’s party, Shen Tang considered how to secure reinforcements and learned Xiahou Yu had a plan connected to Shanyong Commandery.

• Shen Tang gave the naked jellyfish spirit clothes, questioned the kitchen staff, and learned he had been added to the seafood delivery by mistake.
• The jellyfish spirit invented a merchant story, and Shen Tang let him go after discussing a possible seafood trade, then ordered Xiahou Yu to have him followed.
• The jellyfish spirit accidentally returned to the Prefectural Yamen, where he revealed that he served under Luo Shen Lu and had been carrying a secret letter.
• The jellyfish spirit said he had been ambushed by attackers whose techniques suggested military training, and Shen Tang destroyed the letter after reading it.
• Shen Tang told the group that Zhai Xiaofang would not let Lingde’s party leave easily but would not harm them, while Gu De warned that a hidden 20th Rank Che Hou could endanger them.
• Xiahou Yu proposed calling in reinforcements tied to the next battle in Shanyong Commandery, identifying its Captain as a possible contact.

Shen Tang learned that the Captain of Shanyong Commandery was a fallen Che Hou whose strength could rise to match stronger opponents, then devised a plan to exploit his hidden identity and send soldiers into the city disguised among frozen fish. Gu De met the Captain with the dean’s unsent letters and claimed he had come seeking a way to live, leaving the Captain questioning his motives.

• Xiahou Yu told Shen Tang that the Captain of Shanyong Commandery was once a Che Hou whose cultivation had fallen, and explained that his strength could temporarily rise against stronger opponents.
• Shen Tang considered the Captain’s limits and rejected Xiahou Yu’s offer to approach him, deciding instead to use Gu De to sow discord while concealing her faction’s strength.
• Shen Tang planned to hide elite soldiers among frozen fish and send them into Shanyong Commandery to attack from within when the time came.
• A caravan carrying frozen fish entered the city, and Gu De identified himself to the Captain as a student of Quqing Academy and an old acquaintance through the academy.
• Gu De gave the Captain the dean’s unsent letters and said he had read them, prompting the Captain to threaten him while Gu De claimed he had come seeking a way to live.
• The Captain asked how many men Gu De had brought, and Gu De said he had just over two hundred trusted men and had brought the fish because food supplies were tightly guarded.

Gu De’s plan to sow discord between Captain and the Commandery Governor succeeded when the Governor seized the fish sent to the camp, while Captain continued to tolerate his rival. Shen Tang emerged from the frozen fish inside the enemy’s granary, putting her in position to act from within.

• Captain had his men inspect Gu De’s followers and the frozen fish, confirming the men were trained fighters and the fish were not poisoned.
• Captain’s subordinate reported that the enemy scouts were searching for someone while the troops pulled back their defensive lines.
• The Commandery Governor demanded the fish, and Captain let him take them despite his deputy’s protests about the soldiers’ shortages.
• Gu De recognized that the feud between Captain and the Commandery Governor had made the plan work better than expected and considered acting ahead of schedule.
• Shen Tang climbed out from among the fish in the enemy’s granary after hiding inside a fish’s belly.

Shen Tang and her men infiltrated Shanyong Commandery’s granary, set a fire, and flooded several storehouses through underground tunnels. As the Captain rushed toward the city gate, a huge disturbance erupted there, leaving the attack’s next stage underway.

• Shen Tang ordered her men to set fire to the granary while keeping their identities hidden.
• Shen Tang’s men killed the watchmen who discovered the water they had spread across the granary grounds.
• The governor learned that the granary was on fire and sent soldiers to extinguish it.
• The Captain used palm strikes to put out the flames, unknowingly triggering underground water that flooded several granaries.
• The Captain headed for the city gate, and the governor heard a tremendous commotion there.

Gu De escaped the enemy camp after setting fire to the granary, then devised a way to disrupt its formation while Shen Tang’s forces attacked Shanyong Commandery. Shen Tang joined the assault on the city wall, where she took over the Rope Dart Warlord’s body to fight the Captain, leaving him furious at her unorthodox tactic.

• Gu De set fire to the granary, escaped through the camp’s Eight Trigrams formation, and met his colleague after the enemy’s orders recalled his pursuers.
• Gu De explained how they could rearrange the camp’s formation to confuse the Captain’s soldiers, and his colleague agreed to the plan.
• Shen Tang’s forces blew open the city gate, raised their flag on the wall, and confronted the Captain as he arrived.
• The Captain attacked Shen Tang, but the Rope Dart Warlord intervened and fought him while Shen Tang sabotaged the wall’s defenses.
• When the Captain’s vines threatened Shen Tang, she rescued the Rope Dart Warlord and took over his body, using his senses and fighting skill to face the Captain.

Shen Tang led a raid on Shanyong Commandery, where she fought Captain and discovered that his Martial Gall Totem had gone berserk. She withdrew after the raid’s objectives were met, and the chapter ended with her rejoining Xiahou Yu’s troops and joking about Captain’s name.

• Shen Tang taunted Captain while fighting through the Rope Dart Warlord’s body, and the Rope Dart Warlord gained insight into a new way to use her weapon.
• Captain revealed his enormous plant-type Martial Gall Totem, and Shen Tang switched to defense after realizing its condition was worse than she had expected.
• Shen Tang signaled a retreat, then fired a scarlet arrow into the Totem’s maw before its mental shock wave left the Rope Dart Warlord injured and disoriented.
• Shen Tang’s troops withdrew after destroying Shanyong Commandery’s granaries, damaging its wall, and inflicting heavy losses on its garrison camp.
• Xiahou Yu received Gu De’s returning troops, and Shen Tang arrived afterward and asked about Luo San before making a joke about his name.

Shen Tang discussed preserving endangered languages with Gu De, then the Rope Dart Warlord’s jokes about being possessed by her lord led Xiahou Yu to mistake their conversation for a romantic entanglement. The chapter then shifted to Lin Feng, whose composure was unsettled when Zhai Le left his daughter in her care.

• Xiahou Yu admitted he did not know Luo Zhongshu and Luo Lin, and Shen Tang explained that she had asked because of Robert and J.K. Rowling.
• Gu De recalled an ancient language he had heard about and the dean’s lost collection of endangered languages, prompting Shen Tang to propose seeking out people who could preserve them.
• Gu De was moved by Shen Tang’s support for the dean’s legacy, while she reassured him that he and Xiahou Yu carried that legacy forward.
• The Rope Dart Warlord boasted that Shen Tang had possessed her body, and Xiahou Yu mistakenly concluded that she and her colleague had been discussing a love affair with their lord.
• Lin Feng reflected on her reputation in Qu State and recalled her reluctance when Zhai Le left his daughter in her care.

Lin Feng hosted Zhai Le’s Crown Princess at Ji Tian, where the girl questioned her about Kang’s ruler, divine statues, and Shen Youli. Lin Feng carefully deflected the Crown Princess’s probing questions and left her curiosity about Shen Youli’s past unanswered.

• The Crown Princess arrived at Ji Tian and asked Lin Feng whether Kang’s ruler had an heir, while Lin Feng avoided discussing Kang’s succession.
• The Crown Princess watched Lin Feng’s Word Spirit work and said officials, not the ruler, should handle specialized duties.
• After seeing the grain grow through its stages, the Crown Princess asked why Lin Feng had no temple or statue, and Lin Feng said anyone could earn reverence through service.
• The Crown Princess challenged Lin Feng’s claim that anyone could become a god, and Lin Feng redirected the question to a future exchange between the rulers of Qu and Kang.
• The Crown Princess asked Lin Feng to recount stories about Shen Youli and her father, but Lin Feng only said the two had gotten along well.

Lin Feng spoke with the Crown Princess of Qu Country, observed her court and tasted the rice cakes she had made. Gongxi Chou returned with news that a seal had vanished and that he had been ambushed, leaving Lin Feng to investigate alongside him when she negotiated with Zhai Le the next day.

• Lin Feng deflected the Crown Princess's pointed remarks about Zhai Le and learned that the young heir understood common people's livelihoods and had a carefully prepared group of officials around her.
• A trusted female official told Lin Feng that the Crown Princess had been dispirited but had smiled after speaking with her, then served her rice cakes the Crown Princess had made after harvesting grain.
• Lin Feng assessed the fields' declining fertility while eating the unusual rice cakes, and Gongxi Chou returned looking disheveled.
• Gongxi Chou told Lin Feng that both a sealed person and the seal suppressing them had disappeared, and that he had been ambushed while investigating.
• Lin Feng invited Gongxi Chou to join her next day when she negotiated with Zhai Le about the National Fortune's fertility, and he agreed.
• Gongxi Chou remarked that the Crown Princess was a Martial Gall Warrior and that no one could touch her, then spoke of the corruption he had witnessed beside Tang Guo.

Lin Feng learned that the red-clad Crown Princess was far more dangerous and mature than her age suggested, while a female official hinted at a secret about herself. After securing Zhai Le’s approval to use National Fortune on Ji Tian’s fields, Lin Feng and Gongxi Chou planned their withdrawal and identified the scent of Gongxi Chou’s former enemy near the palace.

• Gongxi Chou warned Lin Feng that the red-clad Crown Princess was a predator, not a helpless child, and urged her to avoid getting caught in palace intrigue.
• Luo Sha recognized that Gongxi Chou had practiced the Chastity Cultivation Technique, and the two argued over the strange scents they detected on each other.
• Lin Feng discussed the fertility of Ji Tian’s fields with the Crown Princess, then learned that the female official’s Literary Heart Sigil lacked a seal knot because she was born incomplete.
• Lin Feng met Zhai Le the next day and obtained his approval to use Qu Country’s National Fortune to improve the fields.
• Gongxi Chou detected the earthy scent of the enemy who had ambushed him near the palace, and Lin Feng said their work would take another month and ten days before they could withdraw.

Lin Feng completed her grain mission in Qu and prepared to return to Kang, while secretly setting plans in motion around the Crown Princess and Ji Tian. As her party reached Qu’s border, an attacker tried to stop them, and Lin Feng revealed that she had exposed secrets that could destabilize the capital.

• Lin Feng explained that she had planted a Gu Worm in the female official to uncover a threat near the Crown Princess and use it to pressure Qu’s court.
• Gongxi Chou and Luo Sha took turns keeping watch as Lin Feng’s mission continued, and Luo Sha suspected she had also planted Gu Worms around Ji Tian and the harvested rice.
• Lin Feng completed the grain assignment early, observed the Crown Princess’s closeness with the female official, and accepted Zhai Le’s farewell banquet before preparing to leave Qu.
• Zhai Le personally saw Lin Feng’s party off, but a hidden attacker raised a fog barrier at the border and threatened to kill them if they continued.
• Lin Feng challenged the attacker and argued that Zhai Le would have to choose between stopping them and allowing Qu’s capital to fall into turmoil.
• Lin Feng declared that the capital was changing hands and that she had sent Zhai Le secrets he had been kept from knowing.

Lin Feng and her companions escaped Qu after Wei Cheng drove off the hidden Marquis, then continued toward Shanyong Commandery. Back in Qu, Zhai Le’s purge of the court followed the discovery that the Crown Princess had been manipulated into an affair with a disguised male official seeking revenge.

• Lin Feng recognized Marquis Wei, who revealed himself as Wei Cheng and forced the hidden Marquis to retreat by threatening to fight him.
• Lin Feng explained that she had invoked the danger to Qu’s capital to give both sides an excuse to avoid battle, and Wei Cheng escorted her group out of the country.
• Lin Feng and her companions set off for Shanyong Commandery, while Wei Cheng left after ensuring they were not being followed.
• Scouts later found enemy scouts dead with their intelligence intact but their map missing.
• Zhai Le’s returning envoy learned from Yu Hai that the capital was locked down after Zhai Le executed several families, crippled Prince Xun, and purged many attendants.
• Yu Hai explained that a female official had seduced the Crown Princess as part of a revenge scheme, and that the official was actually a man whose identity and accomplices had gone undetected.

After the Crown Princess killed the female official who had betrayed her, Zhai Le let her take charge of purging the mansion, while Yu Hai investigated how she had been drugged. Meanwhile, Lin Feng agreed to Gongxi Chou’s plan to seize Shanyong Commandery and surprise Shen Tang.

• The Crown Princess questioned the female official in the dungeon, learned that the woman had never been loyal to her, and killed her before asking Zhai Le for time to clear her head.
• Yu Hai said the Crown Princess would handle the mansion’s purge herself, and the blue-robed scholar suspected Lin Ling De had arranged the drugging.
• Yu Hai ordered an exhaustive search of Ji Tian and the provisions while concluding that the Gu Worm might have left no evidence.
• Gongxi Chou proposed taking Shanyong Commandery before Shen Tang arrived, and Lin Feng reluctantly agreed to join the attack.
• Gongxi Chou planned to display Shen’s banner and open the city gates to make Shen Tang suspect an Empty City Strategy.

Gongxi Chou and his small force challenged Shanyong Commandery, where they discovered that its defender, Luo San, had concealed his true strength. As the fight escalated, Shen Tang learned that another formidable warlord force had launched a direct assault on the commandery.

• Lin Feng worried that Shen Tang's forces might have encountered trouble, but Gongxi Chou argued that Shen Tang was using Shanyong Commandery to lure enemy reinforcements into a trap.
• Gongxi Chou led forty-nine people to Shanyong Commandery and threatened its defenders, provoking Luo San into appearing on the city wall.
• Gongxi Chou charged Luo San and was blasted off the wall, so Luo Sha joined the fight while Lin Feng supported them with her Word Spirit and ordered the troops in the valley to prepare to retreat.
• Luo San revealed overwhelming strength, attacked Gongxi Chou and Luo Sha, and easily knocked the Humpback Whale phantom into the moat.
• Shen Tang received an urgent report that a powerful warlord force had bypassed her troops and attacked Shanyong Commandery directly.

Gongxi Chou and his companions escaped Luo San after Wei Cheng intervened, and Luo San learned that Gongxi Chou might be the famous Strange Hero Chou. Shen Tang reunited with the group and, furious that Gongxi Chou had helped restore Luo San to Che Hou, confronted him and learned how much trouble the encounter had caused.

• Wei Cheng persuaded Luo San to let Gongxi Chou and the others leave, and Luo San withdrew after warning them to stay out of Shanyong Commandery.
• Lin Feng questioned Luo San's motives, while Luo San asked his subordinates and the imprisoned commandery governor about Gongxi Chou's identity.
• The commandery governor suggested Gongxi Chou might be Strange Hero Chou and joked that taking his Fundoshi could attract wandering knights to help Luo San.
• Shen Tang followed the unfamiliar signals to Lin Feng's concealed base and angrily attacked Gongxi Chou when she realized what he had done.
• Shen Tang explained the trouble Gongxi Chou had caused, and he tried to shift blame to Wei Cheng, who rebuked him for acting recklessly.

Shen Tang chose to surround Luo San in Shanyong Commandery rather than risk a direct fight, then heard Lin Feng's account of her journey through Qu State. As the two groups of officials and generals met, Gongxi Chou's face revealed a past connection that he did not remember.

• Gongxi Chou apologized after Shen Tang's wig came off, and Shen Tang decided to contain Luo San by surrounding Shanyong Commandery and cutting off supplies.
• Lin Feng reported on the schemes against Qu State's Crown Princess and Zhai Xiaofang's attempt to intercept her party.
• Shen Tang recalled why she had ordered close protections for young girls, describing an attack on an academy student and the punishment of her assailant.
• Shen Tang introduced the two groups' leaders, and several men reacted shyly to meeting Lin Feng in person.
• Gongxi Chou removed his face guard, prompting several of Fundoshi's recruited generals to confront him, but he claimed he did not know them.

Shen Tang’s officials reconciled with Gongxi Chou over their old fundoshi rivalry and bonded over popular dramas and storybooks. She then led a meeting to draw Luo San out of Shanyong Commandery with a supposed supply shipment, and Lin Feng proposed exposing the location of a granary to bait his forces.

• Gongxi Chou failed to recognize the men whose fundoshi he had taken, then vaguely remembered them and taunted them about winning the garments back.
• The men bonded with Gongxi Chou and Luo Sha over storybooks and performances, and Lin Feng revealed that Five Elements Lack Virtue was one person from her teacher’s generation.
• Shen Tang proposed luring Luo San out of Shanyong Commandery with provisions because hunger might drive him to attack or break through the siege.
• Gu De suggested using provisions as bait, and Xiahou Yu proposed faking a shipment.
• Lin Feng suggested letting Luo San discover the location of a granary, reasoning that she could replace the supplies while his forces could be weakened if they tried to seize them.

Shen Tang set a trap around the enemy granary, and Luo San led his starving troops toward it after a fugitive revealed where the stolen grain was stored. As Luo San arrived, Shen Tang spotted a giant ring above the granary and anticipated an unusual opponent.

• Shen Tang arranged for a grain transport official to escape and report that the stolen grain was stored near Qiaodan County.
• Luo San questioned the fugitive, then reunited him with his nephew, the governor of Shanyong Commandery.
• The fugitive said the grain was still at the enemy granary, though an ambush might be waiting there.
• Luo San decided to lead his troops to the granary, willing to risk the trap or destroy the grain if they could not take it.
• Shen Tang saw Luo San's troops arrive and noticed an enormous ring above the granary.

Luo San attacked Shen Tang’s granary camp with troops descending from the sky, but Shen Tang and her allies fought back and revealed that the provisions there were only a decoy. The battle continued as Wei Cheng engaged Luo San, and Shen Tang ordered her forces to kill as many of Marquis Luo’s elite troops as possible.

• Luo San’s troops descended through a ring in the sky and attacked the granary camp, while Lin Feng directed the defenders and archers.
• Shen Tang fought Luo San until Luo Sha and Gongxi Chou joined her, and the three worked together to contain his attacks.
• Luo San redirected their attacks with his strange full-moon technique, prompting Shen Tang to call on Wei Cheng for help.
• Lin Feng enhanced Wei Cheng, who summoned enormous skeletal hands to trap Luo San, but Luo San broke free.
• Shen Tang revealed that the granary provisions were real but that the true granaries were elsewhere, then ordered her forces to kill as many of Luo San’s elite troops as they could.

Shen Tang and Wei Cheng fought Luo San while He Shu’s [Great Auspice Under Heaven] transformed soldiers into lightning-armored berserkers and Wei Cheng summoned the dead to overwhelm Luo San. The chapter ended with Wei Cheng breaking Luo San’s bone and demanding that he submit.

• Wei Cheng blocked Luo San and fought him, while Shen Tang realized the strange full moon redirected attacks rather than absorbing them.
• Luo San struck Wei Cheng into a pit and nearly destroyed his ghostly fire, but Shen Tang intervened and kicked Luo San away.
• He Shu arrived and used [Great Auspice Under Heaven] to transform hundreds of soldiers into powerful lightning-armored fighters, then took control of their attack.
• Wei Cheng dragged Luo San across the battlefield, but Luo San refused to surrender despite his serious injuries.
• Wei Cheng summoned the dead as Yin soldiers, who overwhelmed Luo San and exploited his weakness; Wei Cheng broke Luo San’s bone and demanded his submission again.

Wei Cheng and Lin Feng stopped Luo San’s rampaging vine tumor, and Shen Tang’s forces captured Shanyong Commandery after a costly battle that destroyed their grain warehouses. Shen Tang later questioned Luo San about his loss of control and offered him medical help and conditional freedom, leaving him wary of her treatment of Wei Cheng.

• Luo San unleashed his Martial Gall Totem, and Lin Feng’s Corpse Man Vine spores overran the tumor and exposed Luo San, whom Wei Cheng captured and restrained.
• Shen Tang ordered the prisoners guarded, while Xiahou Yu and He Shu assessed the defenders’ losses and the destruction of the grain warehouses.
• Xiahou Yu’s army entered Shanyong Commandery with little resistance, and Lin Feng ordered the captured governor kept alive for judgment.
• Luo San woke in the dungeon, learned that he had not massacred the city, and admitted that he had once lost control and massacred a city.
• Shen Tang offered Luo San a choice between cooperating with the Xinglin Physicians and remaining under house arrest if he could not prevent another loss of control.
• Luo San questioned Shen Tang’s judgment of Wei Cheng after she said she only wanted him not to cause trouble.

Shen Tang secured Luo San’s agreement to her terms and showed him Kang Country’s humane process for resettling his captured former subordinates. As Luo San began treatment and learned more about Kang Country, hearing that Chu Yao’s student was Lin Feng left him visibly troubled.

• Luo San accepted Shen Tang’s terms, then asked her to consider the fate of his captured former subordinates.
• Shen Tang explained that the prisoners could serve in the army or perform labor to ransom themselves, and gave Luo San a process for helping them become self-farming peasants.
• Luo San questioned why Shen Tang’s forces were still considered wandering troops, and Shen Tang privately reflected on Kang Country’s hidden strength.
• An Xinglin Physician began treating Luo San and eagerly offered to use him in medical testing.
• Luo San asked the Shanyong Commandery Governor about Xinglin Physicians and learned that Dong Dao served the Sovereign of Kang Country.
• The governor recited the Biographies of Famous Ministers and Scholars, and Luo San reacted sharply when he heard that Chu Yao had a student named Lin Feng.

Luo San learned that the woman commanding the force was Shen Tang of Kang Country, but his suspicions about her ambitions led him to offer help with a rebellion. Meanwhile, his former subordinates discovered that their captors treated them far better than expected.

• The commandery governor mocked Lin Feng’s appointment as Kang Country’s future Right Chancellor, and the Rope Dart Warlord hinted that she might be nearby.
• Luo San agreed to persuade his former subordinates to accept their new circumstances, and many cried as he urged them to put their families first.
• Luo San’s former soldiers found that wasteland laborers received manageable workloads, three hot meals a day, and opportunities to earn wages and regain their freedom.
• Former soldiers who joined the army received leadership roles and warm winter clothes, leaving them baffled by their treatment.
• Luo San asked Shen Tang whether Kang Country was wealthy and offered to help her establish her own household, prompting her to realize he thought she might rebel against herself.

Shen Tang organized relief and a massive reconstruction effort in Shanyong Commandery, recruiting Martial Gall Warriors to haul city stones for military merit and a share of the budget. Luo San learned that his former subordinates had refused the lucrative work because they had been mistreated, and he called them fools for enduring it.

• Shen Tang rejected Luo San’s assumption that she was secretly building an independent power base, then began relief work, rebuilding registers, clearing ruins, and repairing Shanyong Commandery’s defenses.
• Shen Tang’s forces recruited Martial Gall Warriors of Fifth-Rank Grand Master and above to haul stone, while the other soldiers repaired roads and earned military merit.
• Luo San watched Gongxi Chou, Luo Sha, and other warriors carry bricks, then learned that the hundred-million martial-fortune budget was being divided among a small group of workers.
• The Rope Dart Warlord told Luo San that Shanyong Commandery’s former warriors had declined the work, and Luo San went to question his former subordinates.
• Luo San’s former subordinates said they had been mistreated and could no longer fight back, and Luo San called them fools for tolerating it.