Chapter Summaries

Xu Huo forced government officials and other influential people to witness the consequences of the Gluttony Potion, then spent two days visiting safe houses across nine cities. He left his remaining targets scattered and harder to find, and the Magician returned while Xu Huo was dealing with more people on Nie Xuan's List.

• Xu Huo injected several men with Potions after using dice to choose who would receive them, and the Evolvers descended into a violent frenzy.
• Xu Huo told the crew cut woman and her companions to warn the government and the Special Defense Department before disappearing as government Players entered the safe house.
• Xu Huo visited seventeen safe houses in nine major cities over two days, using seventy-one Potions and killing fourteen people named on Nie Xuan's List.
• The remaining people on the List stopped trusting government safe houses, scattered, and hid after learning what had happened.
• The Magician returned while Xu Huo was confronting several professors, and Xu Huo told her he was busy and to come back in a few days.

Xu Huo and the Magician fought through the laboratory and the Magician’s Spiritual World, destroying the building as they battled. The Magician trapped Xu Huo in a spatial pyramid, and Xu Huo used Angel’s Teeth to hold a gap open before taking out City Sandbox.

• The Magician turned colored paper into blades that killed all seventy-one people remaining in the laboratory building.
• Xu Huo questioned whether the Magician was truly an A-class player and the original owner of Magician’s Gift, and the Magician attacked him with a vortex of paper blades.
• Xu Huo and the Magician chased and fought each other through the Spiritual World, using portals, Book Towers, and spatial powers until the laboratory collapsed.
• On the sports field, Xu Huo used his defensive items to withstand the Magician’s attacks and the falling rubble, while several of his newer items proved ineffective or were destroyed.
• The Magician pinned Xu Huo and attacked through portals with eighteen Long Swords, but Xu Huo escaped and marked him with Written Weakness.
• The Magician trapped Xu Huo inside a moving spatial pyramid; when Xu Huo could not break out, he wedged Angel’s Teeth into a gap and took out City Sandbox.

Xu Huo escaped the Magician’s spatial pyramid and ended their fight before resting and flying out the next morning. On the plane, the Magician argued that kindness required equal exchange and asked Xu Huo to consider what his actions meant; Xu Huo asked what the Magician wanted to trade.

• Xu Huo used City Sandbox to move himself out of the Magician’s spatial pyramid, then withdrew as the Magician ended the fight and they left in opposite directions.
• Xu Huo rested at a hotel, and Gu Yu told him the Special Defense Department had dismantled cults and criminal player gangs while government officials had also been assassinated.
• Xu Huo flew out the next morning, where the Magician sat across from him and questioned why he had gone to such trouble to kill people who had wronged Nie Xuan.
• The Magician told a story about a philanthropist who became homeless and argued that kindness required gratitude in return.
• Xu Huo said he acted only because he felt like it, then asked the Magician what he wanted to trade.

Xu Huo and the Magician reached a stalemate after debating whether to trade a playing card, and the Magician left the plane without harming its passengers. As the plane neared its destination, Xu Huo rejected Song Xiaohua’s recruitment pitch and left, while plane security detained Song Xiaohua for investigation.

• The Magician threatened to make the passengers attack Xu Huo, but Xu Huo countered that he would save anyone who tried to kill him.
• Song Xiaohua asked Xu Huo and the Magician to spare the innocent passengers, and Xu Huo proposed that the Magician make a fair trade instead of threatening him.
• Xu Huo and the Magician recognized that neither could gain a decisive advantage, so the Magician left the plane.
• Song Xiaohua introduced himself as an agent for Fat Cat Player Economy Company and tried to recruit Xu Huo as a player celebrity.
• Xu Huo warned Song Xiaohua that his job could endanger him and that the Special Defense Department would crack down on prominent players.
• As the plane neared its destination, security handcuffed Song Xiaohua for investigation after Xu Huo had already left.

After returning to the Safe Zone, Xu Huo faced the Special Defense Department’s attempts to learn more about the killings and asked Nie Xuan to investigate a suspicious passenger named Song Xiaohua. Nie Xuan then told him an island had vanished from satellite images and unstable space had appeared nearby, leaving Xu Huo with a new matter to consider.

• Xu Huo returned home, reassured Father Xu that the Special Defense Department’s questioning was not serious, and spoke with Minister Fan about the government officials who had been killed.
• Minister Fan tried to learn how Xu Huo had found the victims, but Xu Huo refused to offer information or take the blame.
• At the Special Defense Department’s request, Team Leader Wu visited Xu Huo, who treated him to lunch before sending him away.
• Nie Xuan visited Xu Huo and said the department wanted to know where he had been; Xu Huo asked him to investigate Song Xiaohua, a recently arrested passenger from Xu Huo’s flight.
• Nie Xuan told Xu Huo that an island near the coastline had disappeared from satellite images and that unstable space had appeared around it.

Xu Huo learned that a disappearing island might be forming an instance, and Nie Xuan asked him to prevent the Special Defense Department from claiming it. After investigating the island’s history, Xu Huo discovered Song Xiaohua had been waiting invisibly by his door.

• Nie Xuan asked Xu Huo to go to the disappearing island and keep any instance there out of the government’s hands, but Xu Huo made no promise.
• The surveillance post and recently arrived players left the Safe Zone, and Xu Huo searched the Vanguard Player Forum for information about the island.
• Xu Huo read an account describing how the island had shrunk behind a transparent barrier before vanishing, prompting speculation that it had been swallowed by an instance.
• Xu Huo noticed Song Xiaohua outside his door and told him to come in.
• Song Xiaohua deactivated his invisibility and complained that Xu Huo had set him up.

Xu Huo agreed to take Song Xiaohua along to the vanished island, despite learning that Song Xiaohua had died ten days earlier. On the private plane, he reunited with Wang Xiaohui and Wei Mang, while the other passengers wondered whether Xu Huo wanted fame.

• Xu Huo asked Song Xiaohua to join him on a trip to the vanished island, and Song Xiaohua agreed after proposing to film a documentary.
• Nie Xuan messaged Xu Huo that Song Xiaohua had died ten days earlier, but Xu Huo deleted the message and waited for him.
• Song Xiaohua arranged for them to fly on a private plane and brought Xu Huo to the airport.
• Xu Huo boarded with Song Xiaohua and encountered Wang Xiaohui, Wei Mang, Ban Tao, Sun Minqi, and Wang Dafa.
• Wang Xiaohui greeted Xu Huo and credited the Special Defense Department's Antidote with easing Wei Mang's suffering.
• Wang Xiaohui asked whether Xu Huo wanted to become famous, drawing the attention of Ban Tao and the other players.

Xu Huo met Wang Xiaohui and other players preparing to approach the island, but declined to join their group. Meanwhile, Minister Fan planned to restrict Xu Huo from entering and use the island operation to trap foreign infiltrators and punish unauthorized arrivals.

• Sun Minqi questioned Xu Huo's player rank, and Xu Huo explained that he had worked as an extra before becoming a player.
• Wang Xiaohui told the group that the Special Defense Department had agreed to let player organizations onto the island if they sold it one item they found there, and that department players would accompany them.
• Sun Minqi objected to adding Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua to his team, so Xu Huo said they might not go to the island.
• Minister Fan learned that Xu Huo was aboard Wang Xiaohui's plane and ordered that Xu Huo be kept off the island.
• Team Leader Chang reported that 27 of the 169 confirmed visitors were infiltrators and that eighteen unknown groups were approaching the island; Minister Fan ordered unauthorized groups to be let in and taught a lesson.

Xu Huo entered the vanished island and explored its ruined, gravity-bound city, where floating buildings, shifting paths, and sudden darkness revealed that the space was unstable and fragmented. He found a seemingly identical area beyond the first one just as the stone path and airborne ruins began collapsing.

• Xu Huo learned from Special Defense Department Players that the island had five accessible entrances and that its elite unit had found little inside.
• Xu Huo crossed the barrier and explored a ruined city where buildings and stone slabs floated above the ground, while gravity still affected anything he dropped.
• Xu Huo encountered other players after passing through a faint force, then watched a stone path form and the buildings behind them vanish into impenetrable darkness.
• Xu Huo traveled two thousand meters and found a similar version of the ruins, realizing that the island contained overlapping spaces that did not always share the same people or scenery.
• A stone path collapsed from the bottom upward, and the floating ruins began to fall apart.

Xu Huo investigated the shifting ruined spaces and discovered that the A3 exit marked on the Special Defense Department’s map was missing. Suspecting his Cube Space had affected the island’s spatial boundaries, he decided to find another player before risking further experiments.

• After a collapse sent Xu Huo back to an identical ruined space, he found that he could not switch spaces or leave through the Spiritual World.
• Xu Huo met Song Xiaohua, Wei Mang, and two Special Defense Department players, who gave him a map and a pointer to the A3 exit.
• Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua followed the pointer but crossed several spaces and found no exit at the mapped location.
• Xu Huo suspected his Cube Space had created a stable zone that disrupted the island’s shifting spaces, and he decided to find another person first.
• Song Xiaohua chose their next direction by pointing randomly at the map.

Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua emerged between two groups of players, where Xu Huo confronted a hostile team and killed its bald leader with overwhelming spatial abilities. The Special Defense Department players recognized Xu Huo’s extraordinary Super Evolution, while the other team was left unable to follow his movements.

• Xu Huo followed the route Song Xiaohua chose, while Song Xiaohua pressed him to honor an alleged promise to make him an agent.
• Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua emerged from a ruin-space between a Special Defense Department squad and another group of players.
• A bald player from the other group confronted Xu Huo, who mocked him for targeting a two-person team instead of the larger squad.
• Xu Huo used spatial barriers and an A-class item to kill the bald player before anyone could track his movements.
• The Special Defense Department squad’s leader identified Xu Huo’s ability as exceptionally powerful Super Evolution.

Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua explored the ruined space, taking photographs as they searched for anything valuable. Xu Huo’s overwhelming presence unsettled the players around him, and Wang Minqi suggested that his group follow him.

• The Special Defense Department’s C-class players judged Xu Huo capable of matching top-tier B-class players, and Xu Huo left the bald man’s companions behind.
• Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua explored the scattered ruins, discussed the dark areas, and took photographs of the strange buildings and each other.
• Xu Huo and Song Xiaohua met Wei Mang’s group, where Sun Minqi challenged their claim that they had only taken pictures.
• Xu Huo’s pressure left Sun Minqi, Guo Nan, Wei Mang, and the others unable to move, prompting them to stop questioning him.
• A player-organization team recognized Xu Huo and turned away, and Wang Minqi suggested following him to make progress.

Xu Huo realized the ruin space was a dangerous maze of nested, repeating spaces rather than a likely dungeon site. After floating ruins suddenly attacked him, he traced their controlling rays and confronted the Magician, who had been hiding nearby.

• Wei Mang chose to split up with Wang Dafa, Sun Minqi, Ban Tao, and Wei Yan to search independently.
• Xu Huo explained to Song Xiaohua why the ruin space was dangerous and why the players were unlikely to find or manage a dungeon there.
• Two players entered a black patch despite warnings, while Xu Huo studied repeating patterns in the ruins and suspected the spaces had boundaries.
• Stones around Xu Huo rose into the air and attacked him, forcing him to defend himself with Space Power and spatial barriers.
• Xu Huo traced the rays controlling the stones, crossed to their source, and revealed the Magician with an attack waiting behind him.

Xu Huo and the Magician battled through shifting spiritual spaces, and the Magician trapped Xu Huo in his “A Thousand Selves” trick. A black shadow attacked the Magician from within Xu Huo’s scattered scraps, and Xu Huo regained control just as the Magician was cornered.

• Xu Huo and the Magician clashed with Space Rays, mental Manifestations, and Artifacts as their fight swept through several ruins.
• The Magician drew Xu Huo onto a stage and used “A Thousand Selves” to scatter him into scraps of colored paper and overwhelm him with countless viewpoints.
• The Magician weakened Xu Huo’s scraps and demanded Magician’s Gift, but two scraps opened their eyes and revealed that Xu Huo remained aware.
• A black shadow formed from the dark scraps and attacked the Magician, blocking his escape through the Mental Portal and piercing his calf through the portals on his body bag.
• Xu Huo reassembled himself, seized a black spike, and commanded it to come back.

Xu Huo and the Magician fought to a draw, then discussed Magician's Gift and the A-class Magician's possible legacy. The Magician offered two A-class items for the card, but Xu Huo remained unconvinced and asked for another reason to hand it over.

• Xu Huo released his shadow personality, and the Magician ended their fight after admitting they had both held back.
• The Magician offered Xu Huo two A-class items for Magician's Gift and explained that it could open an A-class Dungeon linked to a vanished magician.
• The Magician said Magician's Gift had marked its target and that Cube Space matched an item used in the A-class Magician's battle records.
• The Magician explained that Cube Space was a technological device, possibly from an A-class Wormhole Point, rather than a spacetime item.
• Xu Huo said he could keep or sell Magician's Gift and asked the Magician to give him another reason to trade it.

Xu Huo and the Magician explored a ruined space, discovering that Time Rays held its suspended structures in place. They investigated the ruins’ writing and totems and set off toward the center to find clues about its destruction.

• The Magician agreed to trade the inheritance for Xu Huo’s help and gave him a performance ticket, using the Player nickname Moth Art; Xu Huo gave his nickname as Passerby A.
• Xu Huo invited the Magician to study the ruined space, and the Magician demonstrated how he controlled objects and perceived the space’s boundaries.
• The Magician realized that Time Rays held the floating buildings and pathways in place, and proved it by crushing a slab and making nearby structures vanish.
• Xu Huo and the Magician discussed the ruins’ writing and totems, speculating that the place had been a vast center of Alien worship and that its destruction might have begun at its center.
• The Magician and Xu Huo compared the writing with his dictionary and used its variations to determine a direction toward the center of the ruins.

Xu Huo and the Magician reached the center of the ruins and found a massive stone slab pierced by Time Rays. When the Magician moved it, the frozen spaces began collapsing, leaving Xu Huo to face the falling island and debris.

• The Magician warned Xu Huo that his shadow personality acting independently was a dangerous sign and that he had no solution for it.
• Xu Huo and the Magician found a stone slab at the apparent center of the ruins and discussed the risks of moving it.
• The Magician used a Space Ray to shift the slab, causing the Time Rays and frozen spaces throughout the ruins to break down.
• The island reappeared and began falling apart as Time Rays weathered it and debris poured down.
• The Magician fled while Xu Huo expanded Cube Space to protect himself.

As the Ruins Dungeon collapsed under the Time Rays, Xu Huo rescued Players and discovered a stone containing a suspected high-grade Time Origin. He killed the Players who tried to take it, escaped the dungeon, and asked Minister Fan for a ride back.

• Time Rays and falling islands killed or trapped Players as they searched for an exit, while Xu Huo used Cube Space to help several people.
• Wang Dafa and his group reached Xu Huo, who pulled them to safety; a rescued female Player attacked Sun Minqi, and he stabbed her.
• Xu Huo found a red stone containing a white stone that he suspected was a high-grade Time Origin, then stopped five Players from stealing it.
• Two Special Defense Department members withdrew, but Xu Huo killed Sun Minqi and the other attackers, along with nearby Player organization members.
• Xu Huo escaped as the Ruins Dungeon collapsed, boarded a Special Defense Department ship, and appeared beside Minister Fan to ask for a ride back.

Xu Huo refused to sell the rare island ore and offered the Special Defense Department two S-rating Dungeon walkthroughs in exchange for a supervised hypnosis session with Tang Guangbo. He warned Minister Fan that Tang Guangbo might be dangerous, leaving the department wary of the therapist it had trusted.

• Minister Fan offered to buy some of Xu Huo's ore, but Xu Huo refused and offered two S-rating walkthroughs instead.
• Xu Huo confirmed that the walkthroughs covered one E-class Dungeon and one D-class Dungeon, and said he had earned an SS rating to reach C-class.
• Xu Huo asked Tang Guangbo to hypnotize him while at least five top psychologists and twenty elite players witnessed the session.
• Minister Fan questioned Xu Huo's distrust of Tang Guangbo, and Xu Huo said he considered Tang Guangbo relatively controllable.
• Xu Huo advised the Special Defense Department not to provoke Tang Guangbo and warned that he had treated many of its players.

Xu Huo prepared for hypnotic treatment while investigating Song Xiaohua, who had been targeting him. He discovered Song was luring Players into a Dungeon to rob them and learned someone had paid for Xu Huo’s brain.

• The Special Defense Department arranged hypnotic treatment for Xu Huo and expanded the number of observers, including Elite Players and Nie Xuan.
• Xu Huo met Ms. Fang, then paid the Chunyu Association to monitor the Xu family and discussed Song Xiaohua’s interest in him with Gu Yu.
• Xu Huo visited Song Xiaohua’s company, but recognized the building entrance as a Dungeon entrance and pushed the boss across it, causing him to vanish.
• Xu Huo confronted Song Xiaohua, who admitted he recruited targets for a group that robbed Players after they entered the Dungeon.
• Song Xiaohua revealed someone had paid for Xu Huo’s brain, and Xu Huo asked whether they were selling Players’ organs.